__all__

[Ethan Furman]

Greetings!

Does anyone know/recall the original purpose of __all__?

I had thought it was primarily to specify what would be imported when 
`from ... import *` was executed, such as for tk;  today, it seems it is 
also used to specify the API for the module, and so the help() subsystem 
will only provide details for those items found in __all__.

The issue I'm having with this is that there are roughly a dozen items I 
would like to make available via the `import *` mechanism in my dbf 
module, and another dozen that, while part of the public API, don't need 
to be available via an `import *`.

History lessons, as well as ideas, welcomed!

~Ethan~