PEP 285: Adding a bool type: yes, but not as int subtype

[Martin v. Loewis]

Paul Sidorsky <paulsid at shaw.ca> writes:

> to the new style.  If this is going to be done anyhow, why not at least
> force people it to be done right the first time?  

There are guidelines for language evolution (PEP 5). Those mandate
that incompatible changes get a warning period, before outright
breaking code.

If booleans are introduced in the way the PEP suggests, but would
*not* interact with numbers in the way proposed, PEP 5 would be
clearly violated. Also, there are strong opinions on both sides: some
people actually like booleans to interact with numbers in the way
Python does it.

So phasing out those interactions would be another PEP, one that
cannot complete before Python 2.7 or so.

Regards,
Martin