dictionary initialization

[Peter Hansen]

Caleb Hattingh wrote:
> IF this is the point you are making, and the awk functionality 
> demostrated  in this particular example is a really significant feature 
> for you in your  specific problem domain, then I must concede that awk 
> is probably right  for you, and you shouldn't waste your time with Python.

Unfortunately for the logic, if one finds something like
that to be a "really significant feature ... [in a] specific problem
domain", then with Python you can of course create your own
custom data type which behaves exactly as desired.  And in fact
it is likely that there is additional behaviour that could be
added that would make the Python approach to the problem *even
simpler than the awk approach*, but maybe that's getting too
much of a good thing...

Of course, this capability prevents one from whining about how
wonderful a specialized limited-purpose tool is compared to
that waste of space called Python, but if it weren't for people
like that Usenet would have no traffic and we'd all have lives
instead.

-Peter