call by reference howto????

[Terry Reedy]

"Antoon Pardon" <apardon at forel.vub.ac.be> wrote in message 
news:slrnfthp1s.61k.apardon at rcpc42.vub.ac.be...
| On 2008-02-28, Steven D'Aprano <steve at REMOVE-THIS-cybersource.com.au> 
wrote:
| > On Thu, 28 Feb 2008 02:02:19 +0200, Tamer Higazi wrote:
| >
| >> Hi!
| >> Can somebody of you make me a sample how to define a function based on
| >> "call by reference" ???
| >
| > Python doesn't do call by reference. Nor does it do call by value. 
Please
| > pay no attention to anyone who says it does.
|
| Whatever python has for a calling convention, it is close enough that
| naming it "call by reference" gives people a reasonable idea of what
| is going on.

But it is also different enough to mislead people.

| AFAICS people don't have a problem with understanding the calling
| convention of python. They have a problem understanding the
| assignment semantics.

The calling convention is cross-namespace assignment.  So one cannot 
understand calls without understanding assignment.

tjr