[Python-Dev] Python 1.6 timing

[Fred L. Drake, Jr.]

Guido van Rossum writes:
 > Oops, sorry.  The first one is proposing a validate() function for
 > pathnames.  In the second one, the patch code speaks for itself -- it

  I did have a thought on this, but hadn't gotten back to it.
Essentially, I'm not sure how to implement this correctly; things like 
MAXPATHLEN aren't always easy to root out the "right" way to get the
*real* definition from C.  pathconf(_PC_PATH_MAX) could be used to get 
that, and pathconf(_PC_NAME_MAX) can get the maximum length of an
individual name within the path, but I don't know if the concepts are
even meaningful on all systems.  I wouldn't be surprised if validity
on some systems is highly specific to the actual filesystem that's
being referred to, and that requires the name be valid on the local
system.
  I've noticed that the functions in the os.path implementations fall
into two categories: "abstract" functions like join(), split(), and
the like, which are bound to the "path algebra" syntax rules, and the
"local-access" functions like isfile() and abspath(), which require
the paths relate to the local system.  This isn't a problem, but
something we should probably keep in mind.

 > makes an exception class conform to the rule that exceptions must
 > inherit from Exception.

  I don't think this is valuable for 1.6, but might be interesting for 
1.7; the documentation can include a notice that this relationship
will be required in the future.  That would allow people to define
exceptions with the required inheritance before the last minute.
  On the other hand, I'm not sure it really matters that exceptions
inherit from a specific base class.  *That* seems unnecessary.


  -Fred

--
Fred L. Drake, Jr.	  <fdrake at acm.org>
Corporation for National Research Initiatives