New to Python: Features

[Alex Martelli]

Dan Bishop <danb_83 at yahoo.com> wrote:
   ...
> Most of your questions are answered at http://docs.python.org/

Yep, but some of the answers are debatable.  E.g.:

> > 3. Function nesting with proper lexical scope (i.e. closures)
> 
> Yes.

...but no rebinding in outer-scope, which to some people (not functional
programmers, obviously;-) means it ain't "proper".


> > 4. Operator overloading (inc. the ability to define new operators)
> 
> Yes.  This is done by defining the special methods __add__, __mul__,

...which doesn't let you define NEW operators, just the code that runs
when known operators are applied to objects of a certain user-coded
type.  To define new operators, look instead for example to Haskell.
(I've never seen "operator overloading" used to describe "define new
operators", they're really totally distinct language features).


Alex