[Python-3000] PEP 3124 - Overloading, Generic Functions, Interfaces, etc.

[Greg Ewing]

Phillip J. Eby wrote:
> For 
> example, objects to be documented with pydoc currently have to 
> reverse engineer a bunch of inspection code, while in a GF-based 
> design they'd just add methods.

There's a problem with this that I haven't seen a good
answer to yet. To add a method to a generic function,
you have to import the module that defines the base
function. So any module that wants its objects documented
in a custom way ends up depending on pydoc.

This problem doesn't arise if a protocol-based approach
is used, e.g. having pydoc look for a __document__ method
or some such.

There's also the possibility that other documentation
systems could make use of the same protocol if it's
designed appropriately, whereas extending pydoc-defined
generic functions benefits pydoc and nothing else.

--
Greg