[SciPy-dev] scipy.optimize.nonlin rewrite

[Pauli Virtanen]

Sun, 30 Nov 2008 21:59:32 -0500, Anne Archibald wrote:

> 2008/11/30 Gideon Simpson <simpson at math.toronto.edu>:
>> Still no args input for inputting arguments to the function F?
>>
>> Sorry to complain, but the absence of this has put me off using these
>> routines as it would require a rewrite of much of my code.
> 
> Why?
> 
> Instead of
> optimize.whatever(F, args=extra)
> just use
> optimize.whatever(lambda x: F(x,extra))

Exactly; I was under the impression that this 'args' business was some 
legacy from times when Python didn't support nested scopes, cf. eg.

	http://www.python.org/doc/2.1/ref/lambda.html
	http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0227/

I don't see a need for the 'args' option except maybe for conformance 
with the other optimization functions in Scipy. But maybe there are also 
other reasons to include it?

-- 
Pauli Virtanen