mxTools (was Re: why no "do : until"?)

[Steve Holden]

Donn Cave <donn at u.washington.edu> wrote in message
news:93fobh$rqs$1 at nntp6.u.washington.edu...
> I have never used mxDateTime, so I have 0 cents on that, but I have
> used mxTextTools.  I found it to be efficient and powerful, and ought
> to be useful in a significant number of applications and modules
> that have text to parse -- if it were already available with the
> distribution.
>
> Donn Cave, donn at u.washingotn.edu
>
There is, though, the argument that each addition of such a nature
represents a smoking gun. When they are available as a standard part of the
distribution, the problem seems to be that they are smoking because every
newless clubie on the net just shot themselves in the foot!

I exaggerate for dramatic effect, of course. Just the same I would prefer a
small core, with an EASILY AVAILABLE set of extension modules WHICH INSTALL
SIMPLY.

It seems to me that Python should be as small as  practical. I can see an
argument for mxDateTime, say, because the standard 1970 - 2038 date
representation is simply a nonsense from the point of view of a naiive user,
especially one with an interest in history.

The next thing, people will be saying they want "more than one way to do
it"!

regards
 Steve