pre-PEP for optional 'pass'

Fernando Pérez fperez528 at yahoo.com
Wed Apr 17 01:20:00 EDT 2002


phil hunt wrote:

>>I think the idea behind pass is that usually not having anything in
>>a conditional is a mistake, so we want to be informed about it. Putting
>>pass is like saying "I'm sure that's what I want."
> 
> I'm sure what I want, without needing to explicitly say it.
> 

And that would put python in the land of the dreaded C construct:
if(this) 
        do_that();
        and_that();

Was the second function meant to be in the if and the developer forgot braces? 
Or is it meant to be truly outside and it's misindented? 

You may have known what you wanted without being explicit when you wrote the 
code, but what about the poor sob who has to deal with it two years later 
when you're not around? That's why explicitness is good, particularly when 
implictness opens the way to ambiguity.

Cheers,

f.



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