slice notation as values?

[Duncan Booth]

Antoon Pardon wrote:

>> If the user can write
>>
>>    for key in tree['a':'b']:
>>
>> then he can write:
>>
>>    for key in tree['a':'b'].iteritems():
> 
> No he can't. tree['a':'b'] would provide a list
> of keys that all start with an 'a'. Such a list
> doesn't have an iteritems method. It wouldn't even
> contain the information to construct items.

Why would it produce a list?

Slicing a *list* produces a list, slicing a tuple produces a tuple, slicing 
a string produces a string. I would expect slicing any other type would 
also return you a new object of the same type. Thats what the code sample I 
posted earlier does.