[Python-Dev] Re: [Python-checkins] CVS: python/dist/src/Lib xmlrpclib.py,1.11,1.12

[Jeremy Hylton]

>>>>> "SM" == Skip Montanaro <skip@pobox.com> writes:

  SM> xmlrpclib.py Log Message: allow long ints to be marshalled as
  SM> ints - no check is made to the incoming value, so the programmer
  SM> will have to catch OverflowError.

  Jeremy> How does the other end unmarshal it?  You shouldn't get
  Jeremy> overflow errors any more.

  Jeremy> Oh, well, actually you do still get overflow and value
  Jeremy> errors from the builtin int().

  SM> The receiving end will unmarshal the object into an int.

Sorry to repeat myself but:

  "Jeremy> How does the other end unmarshal it?"

  Jeremy> I wonder if there should be a generic number-from-string
  Jeremy> conversion function that returns either a long or an int as
  Jeremy> needed.  If an integer literal in your program text can
  Jeremy> produce a long, why can't builtin int()?

  SM> Not sure what you're getting at here.

I meant to say "I wonder if Python should provide a generic
string-to-number conversion routine that returns either an int or a
long." 

  SM>                                            The XML-RPC spec also
  SM> indicates that the <int> tag is restricted to the value that can
  SM> be represented by a four-byte signed integer.

It sounds like such a function would not be particularly useful for
XML-RPC, but I can imagine it would be useful in a world where
programmers don't worry about whether they have an int or a long.

Incidentally, it looks like the XML-RPC code won't work with
subclasses of built-in types.  It's does dispatch on the type() of the
object, but a subclass of string won't have type StringType.  It seems to
me, though, that it should be marshallable using XML-RPC.

Jeremy