On Sat, 15 Jul 2000, Paul Prescod wrote:

Moshe Zadka wrote:

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-- have all that wonderful stuff in help.py -- have the startup code of the *interactive interpreter only* do "from help import help" at the beginning.

Sorry, that's a part I should have explanied more.

help is not a magical function/statement but an instance with a repr that does the right thing. And yes, it will probably only be loaded at the repl. Or it could be a 10-line instance that loads its content when it is actually used. That might allow

python -c "import help"

Here's a sample definition.

class helploader: def __repr__( self ): global help from helptext import help return repr( help ) def __call__( self ): global help from helptext import help return repr( help ) help=helploader()

BTW, that should probably be CCed to the doc-sig, because that information has to come from somewhere. doc-sig traffic kind of died after the initial IPC8-induced burst. Fred, any plans on seriously reviving doc-sig? -- Moshe Zadka <moshez@math.huji.ac.il> There is no GOD but Python, and HTTP is its prophet. http://advogato.org/person/moshez