[Python-ideas] PEP 505 (None coalescing operators) thoughts

[Steven D'Aprano]

On Tue, Sep 29, 2015 at 12:07:10PM -0600, Carl Meyer wrote:
> On 09/29/2015 12:04 PM, Brian O'Neill wrote:
> > A further virtue of 
> > 
> >     self.vertices = vertices or []
> > 
> > and the like is that they coerce falsy parameters of the wrong type to the falsy object of the correct type.
> > 
> > E.g. if vertices is '' or 0, self.vertices will be set to [], whereas the ternary expression only tests 
> > 
> > for not-None so self.vertices will be set to a probably crazy value.
> 
> Doesn't seem like a virtue to me, seems like it's probably hiding a bug
> in the calling code, which may have other ramifications. Better to have
> the "crazy value" visible and fail faster, so you can go fix that bug.

Agreed.

Assuming the function is intended to, and documented as, using the 
passed in "vertices", using `or` is simply wrong, in two ways:

- if vertices is a falsey value of the wrong type, say, 0.0, it will be 
  silently replaced by [] instead of triggering an exception (usually a 
  TypeError or AttributeError);

- if vertices is a falsey value of the right type, say 
  collections.deque(), it will be silently replaced by [].

In the first case, the code is hiding a bug in the caller. In the second 
case, its a bug in the called code.

I am very sad to see how many people still use the error-prone `x or y` 
idiom inappropriately, a full decade after PEP 308 was approved. 
(Depending on where you are in the world, it was ten years ago today, or 
yesterday.) `x or y` still has its uses, but testing for None is not one 
of them.



-- 
Steve