How about adding rational fraction to Python?

[D'Arcy J.M. Cain]

On Thu, 28 Feb 2008 10:39:51 -0000
"Steven D'Aprano" <steve at REMOVE-THIS-cybersource.com.au> wrote:
> On Thu, 28 Feb 2008 00:30:11 -0800, Dennis Lee Bieber wrote:
> > 	Automatic conversions, okay... but converting a result when all
> > inputs are of one time, NO...
> 
> What? How does that make any sense?
> 
> By that logic, we should see this:
> 
> >>> len("a string")
> '8'
> >>> len([2, 4, 6])
> [3]
> >>> len({'key': 'value'})
> {1: None}

I think that you have to show your work here.  How does the above
statement about operators imply that the len method should return the
type of its argument?

> > 	The only rule needed is very simple: promote simpler types to the
> > more complex type involved in the current expression (with expression
> > defined as "value operator value" -- so (1/2) * 3.0 is INTEGER 1/2,
> > resultant 0 then promoted to float 0.0 to be compatible with 3.0).
> > 
> > 	Very simple rule, used by very many traditional programming
> > languages.
> 
> And rightly rejected by many other programming languages, including 
> modern Python, not to mention calculators, real mathematics and common 
> sense.

Lost me again.  I was not aware that calculators, real mathematics and
common sense were programming languages.  Check out the definition in
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programming_language and others if you are
unclear.  PLs are designed to communicate with machines.  Even a
calculator is an application, not a language.  This is an important
difference.

-- 
D'Arcy J.M. Cain <darcy at druid.net>         |  Democracy is three wolves
http://www.druid.net/darcy/                |  and a sheep voting on
+1 416 425 1212     (DoD#0082)    (eNTP)   |  what's for dinner.