[Tutor] using lists as values for key in dictionary?

[Marc Tompkins]

On Wed, Oct 15, 2008 at 12:22 AM, wesley chun <wescpy at gmail.com> wrote:

> >> so if you turn your list into a tuple (I can never remember, is that a
> >> cast or a coercion?)
> >
> >> lX = tuple(lX)
> >
> > To answer my own question: neither, but it's closer (in spirit) to a
> cast.
>
> you're keeping everyone is suspense! :-)  you are creating a brand new
> tuple by copying out the references to the objects in the list. then
> you assign that tuple to the variable that previously referenced your
> original list.
>
> NOTE: the original object remained as a list with no modifications,
> but was probably marked for deallocation when you dropped your
> references to it unless there were other references to it.
>

Yes - if I had stopped and thought for just a few more seconds, I would
never have said that in the first place.  tuple() is a function like any
other; assigning its return value to an object of the same name as its input
obviously has nothing to do with either casting or coercion and it was a
dumb thing to say.  Which was why I retracted it almost immediately.
However, what I meant by "closer in spirit" - and it was still a dumb thing
to say - was that, if the whole thing happened in a black box and you had no
idea of the mechanics, it would have the "flavor" of a cast, as opposed to
the "flavor" of coercion.  Sorta.  Not really.  Unfortunately, thanks to the
magic of the Internet, I can't just ask everybody to forget I mentioned
it... can I?  Please?


-- 
www.fsrtechnologies.com
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