misleading prefix ++
Steve Holden
steve at holdenweb.com
Sat May 20 08:43:57 EDT 2006
LuciferLeo at gmail.com wrote:
> given i = 0,
> I know i = i + 1 and i += 1 are all correct
> but when I type:
>
>>>>i++
>
> the interpreter replies:
> File "<stdin>", line 1
> i++
> ^
> SyntaxError: invalid syntax
>
> so I get the idea that suffix ++ is invalid in python
> but when I input:
>
>>>>++i
>
> and the interpreter replies
> 0
>
> Don't you think it is misleading when you expect a variable to
> increment?
>
Terribly. So stop expecting it to increment :)
Seriously, --i is also valid Python. Both expressions apply two unary
operators to a name. Would you have these become illegal, or start to
mean increment/decrement? Either change would break years of backwards
compatibility.
regards
Steve
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