[Python-Dev] PEP 3103: A Switch/Case Statement

[Guido van Rossum]

On 6/28/06, Talin <talin at acm.org> wrote:
> Guido van Rossum wrote:
> > Let's just drop the switchable subroutine proposal. It's not viable.
>
> Perhaps not - but at the same time, when discussing new language
> features, let's not just limit ourselves to what other languages have
> done already.

Well, Python 3000 is explcitly not intended as a platform for
arbitrary experimentation with feature invention (read PEP 3000).

I've gotten quite a bit of mileage out of borrowing from other
languages instead of inventing my own stuff, so I don't want to go out
inventing as a replacement of researching options that have already
been tried elsewhere.

> Forget subroutines for a moment - the main point of the thread was the
> idea that the dispatch table was built explicitly rather than
> automatically - that instead of arguing over first-use vs.
> function-definition, we let the user decide. I'm sure that my specific
> proposal isn't the only way that this could be done.

But anything that makes the build explicit is going to be so much more
ugly. And I still think you're trying to solve the wrong problem.

-- 
--Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)