title: Are Python modules compiled?
body: <p>Trying to understand whether python libraries are compiled because I want to know if the interpreted code I write will perform the same or worse.</p>
  
  <p>e.g. I saw it mentioned somewhere that numpy and scipy are efficient because they are compiled. I don't think this means byte code compiled so how was this done? Was it compiled to c using something like cython? Or was it written using a language like c and compiled in a compatible way?</p>
  
  <p>Does this apply to all modules or is it on a case-by-case basis?</p>