anything like C++ references?

[Stephen Horne]

On Thu, 17 Jul 2003 12:35:48 -0400, "Terry Reedy" <tjreedy at udel.edu>
wrote:

>
>"Stephen Horne" <intentionally at blank.co.uk> wrote in message
>news:hub7hvgjjm0prt5p3jn92npmb3gf777mr9 at 4ax.com...
>> A goal of Python is to be a 'very high level language'. Another is
>to
>> 'do the right thing'.
>
>At this point, we need to differentiate between Guido's goal for
>Python, your goal for Python, and anybody else's.  The above may by
>your goals but not necessarily others' (primary) goals.

Really - funny that these two goals didn't originate from me, then. I
just repeated two phrases that get used quite a bit around here.

For example...

http://www.python.org/doc/1.5.2/tut/node3.html

"""
Python is simple to use, but it is a real programming language,
offering much more structure and support for large programs than the
shell has. On the other hand, it also offers much more error checking
than C, and, being a very-high-level language, it has high-level data
types built in...
"""

Care to claim that the phrase "the right thing" is my invention?

What if I add "(tm)"

>> Python isn't really a member of that list. ...
>> It isn't an experimental language. It doesn't obsess on one
>particular
>> concept. It is a language for getting things done with very little
>> fuss.
>
>This is, I believe, expresses Guido's goal for Python much better than
>your two goals above.  So, by your own statement, he has met *his*
>goal pretty well.

In my view, a very high level language which does the 'right thing'
*is* a language for getting things done.

When I argue in terms of the practical issue of accidental
side-effects - one which Guido himself identified, as shown by the
link I gave earlier in the thread - then people give theory-style
reasons why I'm wrong. The fact that I hadn't really thought through
the theory at the start of the thread is proof positive that the
practical issue is where I'm coming from.

When I debate the theory arguments used against me, people suggest
that I'm just fussing too much about high-and-mighty theoretical BS.
As you just did. Funny, that.

Oh, and the other main suggestion is that I'm just from a C background
and can't get used to Python. Again that is quite simply false. I had
been programming for nearly ten years before I ever used C, I only
used it for a couple of years, and I have been programming Python
longer than C++.