Thoughts about Python

[Marco Aschwanden]

> I agree with you in all but that tuples are not
> necessary. Lists are the ones that are actually a
> hack for speed! :-)

Did you do some time profiling? I would be interested in the results.


> 3_ I prefer reading from left to right instead from right
> to left (it makes the parenthesis less confusing too).
> Compare to:
> 
> count=len(reversed(sorted(appended(lst,3)))).
> 
> Maybe I should learn Hebrew :-)
> Or we could always change it to
> 
> $ lst|append -3|sort|reverse|len
> 
> (in the end all are just filter patterns :))

This is an excellent example!
count = lst.append(3).sort().reverse().len()
is extremly readable but chaining of method calls is not supported in
Python. And I can live with it... Python has a more "expressive" path:

>>> lst = []
>>> lst.append(3)
>>> lst.sort()
>>> lst.reverse()
>>> count = len(lst)

The last line looks a bit odd after all the dot-notations to see a
function-call in the last line.


> 4_ If the python interpreter was smart enough sort()
> [...]
> Inmutable types are usually less "magical" than their
> mutable counterpart.
> 
> For instance:
> 
> >>> lst1=[1,2]
> >>> lst2=lst1
> >>> lst2.append(3)
> >>> lst1
>  [1, 2, 3]
> >>> lst2
>  [1, 2, 3]
> >>> tup1=(1,2)
> >>> tup2=tup1
> >>> tup2=tup2+(3,)
> >>> tup1
>  (1, 2)
> >>> tup2
>  (1, 2, 3)
> >>> 
>
> Do you think a newbie would expect that a modification
> on one variable would have a effect on another?

Good point.

Thanx,
Marco