[issue4796] Decimal to receive from_float method

[Steven D'Aprano]

New submission from Steven D'Aprano <steve at pearwood.info>:

In the PEP for Decimal, it was discussed that the class should have a 
from_float() method for converting from floats, but to leave it out of 
the Python 2.4 version:
http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0327/#from-float

Following discussions with Mark Dickinson, I would like to request 
that this now be implemented.

The suggested API is:
Decimal.from_float(floatNumber, [decimal_places])

At the risk of derailing the request, I wonder whether it is better to 
give a context rather than a number of decimal places?

Pro: better control over conversion, as you can specify rounding 
method as well as number of decimal places.

Con: more difficult for newbies to understand.

Semi-pro: float to decimal conversions are inherently tricky, perhaps 
we should be discouraging newbies from blindly calling from_float() 
and make the (hypothetical) context argument mandatory rather than 
optional?

----------
components: Library (Lib)
messages: 78664
nosy: stevenjd
severity: normal
status: open
title: Decimal to receive from_float method
type: feature request

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Python tracker <report at bugs.python.org>
<http://bugs.python.org/issue4796>
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