Cult-like behaviour [was Re: Kindness]

[Roel Schroeven]

Steven D'Aprano schreef op 16/07/2018 2:18:
> On Sun, 15 Jul 2018 16:08:15 -0700, Jim Lee wrote:
> 
>> Python3 is intrinsically tied to Unicode for string handling. Therefore,
>> the Python programmer is forced to deal with it (in all but trivial
>> cases), rather than given a choice.  So I don't understand how I can
>> illustrate my point with Python code since Python won't let me deal with
>> strings without also dealing with Unicode.
> 
> Nonsense.
> 
> b"Look ma, a Python 2 style ASCII string."

Except for one little difference, which has bitten be me a few times. 
Consider this code:

from __future__ import print_function
s = b"Look ma, a Python 2 style ASCII string."
print('First element:', s[0])

Result in Python 2: First element: L
Result in Python 3: First element: 76

Likewise this code:

from __future__ import print_function
for e in b'hello':
   print(e, end=', ')
print()

Result in Python 2: h, e, l, l, o,
Result in Python 3: 104, 101, 108, 108, 111,

There are times (encoding/decoding network protocols and other data 
formats) when I have a byte string and I want/need to process it like 
Python 2 does, and that is the one area where I feel Python 3 make 
things a bit more difficult.


-- 
"Honest criticism is hard to take, particularly from a relative, a
friend, an acquaintance, or a stranger."
         -- Franklin P. Jones

Roel Schroeven