[Python-Dev] bytes.from_hex()

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

>>>>> "Guido" == Guido van Rossum <guido at python.org> writes:

    Guido> I'd say there are two "symmetric" API flavors possible (t
    Guido> and b are text and bytes objects, respectively, where text
    Guido> is a string type, either str or unicode; enc is an encoding
    Guido> name):

    Guido> - b.decode(enc) -> t; t.encode(enc) -> b

-0  When taking a binary file and attaching it to the text of a mail
message using BASE64, the tendency to say you're "encoding the file in
BASE64" is very strong.  I just don't see how such usages can be
avoided in discussion, which makes the types of decode and encode hard
to remember, and easy to mistake in some contexts.

    Guido> - b = bytes(t, enc); t = text(b, enc)

+1  The coding conversion operation has always felt like a constructor
to me, and in this particular usage that's exactly what it is.  I
prefer the nomenclature to reflect that.


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