[Python-Dev] Mini-Pep: Simplifying the Integral ABC

[Bill Janssen]

> I think I agree with Raymond on the basic principle that simple ABC's
> are easier to use than simple ones.

I don't think he was saying that.  He was saying that simple ABC's are
easier to implement to.

It's not at all clear to me that simple ABC's are good in and of
themselves.  I think a String ABC should probably include all the
methods that basestring provides, perhaps by reducing the methods that
basestring provides, and moving the removed methods to the String ABC,
with implementations that call the methods provided by basestring.
That way, String classes could be implemented by overriding the "base"
set of methods, but still inherit from String to get the other
methods.  But, then, isn't basestring the true simple ABC for strings?

Bill