Class data being zapped by method

[Kevin M]

Good news. I've fixed it up and all seems to be well.

Thanks, all. I've learned a lot from this :)


John Machin wrote:
> Kevin M wrote:
> > Inline
> >
> > > 1.) Why are you removing the .pyc file?
> >
> > After I had run the script once and subsequently changed the class
> > file, I would run the script again, and it would use the pyc file from
> > the older revision of the script. I got frustrated with having to
> > manually delete the pyc file before rerunning the script after every
> > edit, so I built it in.
>
> Huh? Something funny is going on here. (1) You should never need to
> delete a pyc file (2) A script run from the command line doesn't create
> a pyc file, only imported modules get that. So: What platform are you
> running it on? What version of Python? Are you running the script from
> the command line, or in an IDE? Which IDE?
>
> >
> > > 2.) Reading lines from a file is better done like so:
> > >
> > > arrLines = open('datafiles/'+filename+'.tabdata').readlines()
> > >
> > > and the 'r' flag is the default, you can omit it.
> >
> > I know. In fact, this was the original code. However, I have read in
> > many places that if the file is *massive*, which is true in my case, it
> > is far more efficient to use the line-by-line implicit method I used.
> > On a decent machine it doesn't really make a noticeable difference, but
> > some of the ".tabdata" files I'm parsing are > 20MB plain text, so I
> > figured that warranted the alternative approach.
>
> Firstly, 20MB is not massive.
> Secondly, the problem with large files is keeping a list like arrLines
> hanging about when you only need one line at a time.
> If you insist on keeping the list, get it in one hit using readlines(),
> instead of assembling it yourself manually.
>
> >
> >
> > John M, I realized what you meant about splitting the code between the
> > class and the processing file. At first it seemed intuitive, but
> > stepping back, it doesn't really make sense that a test would be able
> > to analyze and take an inventory of *itself*. I think I'm going to
> > reorganize the code such that the Test class does nothing but provide a
> > barebones data structure with which to work.
> >
> > And regarding the file separation, it's totally personal preference. It
> > scales well, at least.
>
> One class per file does *not* scale well, even when you're not being
> driven silly by having to flick backwards & forwards furiously between
> files :-)
>
> >
> > Another Aside --
> >
> > Does anybody see any major bottlenecks in the code? I'd like to be able
> > to speed up the program considerably. Psyco was really no help.
> >
>
> 1. Get it refactored and working correctly first. "except IndexError:
> pass" certainly won't help you win the Grand Prix; how many of those
> were you doing per 20MB of data?
> 2. How long does it take to run ? How long would you prefer it to take?
> How many lines x how many tests == 20 MB?
> 
> Cheers,
> John