Unexpected Python Behavior

[Andrea Griffini]

On Thu, 30 Sep 2004 15:22:04 +1200, Greg Ewing
<greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> wrote:

>Alex Martelli wrote:
>> I think it's in fact very nice syntax:
>> 
>> def f(x, cache=[]):
>>     if x in cache: ...
>
>No, it's not, because it suggests that cache is
>intended to be an optional parameter, whereas it
>probably isn't.
>
>This is a hack. Don't do it.

Puh-LEEEZE!!!

Who are you to question what Him, the Great Alex, says about it ?

That's is a very nice piece of code and I among the others
true Alex' believers actually moved over from C to python
basically just for the beauty of the idea of moving local
statics from the body to the interface!

It doesn't matter *what* the great Alex says, just remember
*who* said it. Does the discussion about the risk of
rebinding names a total nonsense just because the very same
applies in that very same example to math.cos and math.sin ?
So ? Still it's Alex's word... widsom from another planet
you (a no-one) surely can't question.

Watch your mouth next time, you worst of all hypocrites...
or the maledition of thousands of irrelevant co_*
implementation details magic formulas will destroy you.

And don't try to say that pychecker actually emits
warnings when that cra^H^H^Hbeatiful technique is
used. It's just because the Great still didn't wasted
time annihilating the misbelievers behind it.

Andrea