[XML-SIG] Ugh! Why are DOM access methods spelled with a leading '_'?

Jim Fulton jim@digicool.com
Fri, 23 Jun 2000 14:06:15 -0400


Traditionally, Python attributes (including methods) with 
names starting with '_' were treated as private.

Why oh why then does the Python DOM implementation use 
method names beginning with '_'s in the public API (for
getting attributes), as in '_get_nodeType'? Why not 
'get_nodeType' or 'getNodeType'? Is the intent that these
functions shouldn't be called by Python code?

Is there are description somewhere of the Python DOM mapping, 
other than the DOM sources?


Jim

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