I thought I understood how import worked...

Terry Reedy tjreedy at udel.edu
Tue Aug 7 13:15:37 EDT 2012


On 8/7/2012 11:32 AM, Roy Smith wrote:
> On Tuesday, August 7, 2012 9:55:16 AM UTC-4, Ben Finney wrote:
>
>> The tutorial is misleading on this. It it says plainly:
>>
>> A module can contain executable statements as well as function
>> definitions. […] They are executed only the *first* time the
>> module is imported somewhere.

The last sentence should be more like "They are executed only the
*first* time the module is imported anywhere with a particular name.
(One should avoid importing a module under different names.)

>> <URL:http://docs.python.org/tutorial/modules.html>

>> [1]	In fact function definitions are also ‘statements’ that are
>> ‘executed’; the execution of a module-level function enters the
>> function name in the module’s global symbol table.
>
> I think what it's supposed to say is "... the execution of a
> module-level def statement ..."

right

>> Care to file a documentation bug <URL:http://bugs.python.org/>
>> describing this?
>
> Sure, once I understand how it's really supposed to work :-)

You don't need a final solution to file. Anyway, I think the change 
above might be enough.

-- 
Terry Jan Reedy





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