Q: We have *args and **kwargs. Woud ***allargs be useful?

[Jonathan Fine]

The idioms
     def f(*args, **kwargs):
         # Do something.
and
     args = (1, 2, 3)
     kwargs = dict(a=4, b=5)
     g(*args, **kwargs)
are often useful in Python.

I'm finding myself picking up /all/ the arguments and storing them for 
later use (as part of a testing framework).  So for me it would be nice 
if I could write
     def f(***allargs):
          args, kwargs = allargs
          # Continue as before.

However, if we do this then 'args' in '*args' is misleading.  So I'll 
use 'sargs' (for sequence arguments) instead.

I can now write, for a suitable class Args
     args = Args(1, 2, 3, a=4, b=5)
     g(***args)   # Same as before.
     sargs, kwargs = args
     g(*sargs, **kwargs)  # Same as before.

Even better, now that Args is a class we can give it a method 'call' so that
     args.call(g)
is equivalent to
     g(***args)
which removes the need for the *** construct.

This reminds me of functools.partial except, of course, we've fixed all 
the arguments and left the passing of the function for later, whereas in 
partial we fix the function and some of the arguments.
     http://docs.python.org/library/functools.html#functools.partial

My view are that
1.  Conceptually ***allargs is useful, but an Args class would be more 
useful (not that it need be either-or).

2.  If Args were built in , there could be performance benefits.

3.  It's clearer to write
         def(*seqargs, **kwargs):
than
         def(*args, **kwargs):

4.  When the Args class is used a lot, one might welcome
         def(***args):
             # Do something with args.
as a shortcut (and minor speedup) for
         def(*seqargs, **kwargs):
             args = Args(*seqargs, **kwargs)
             # Do something with args.

I look forward to your comments on this.

-- 
Jonathan