Hello Michael, I've just reported http://bugs.python.org/issue15657 to track your request. Regards, Sandro On Fri, Apr 6, 2012 at 6:31 PM, Michael Welsh Duggan <mwd@cert.org> wrote:

In the Python 3.2.2 documentation (and earlier Python 3 versions), in the Python/C API Reference Manual, chapter Object Implementation Support, the documentation for PyMethodDef says:

The ml_flags field is a bitfield which can include the following flags. The individual flags indicate either a calling convention or a binding convention. Of the calling convention flags, only METH_VARARGS and METH_KEYWORDS can be combined (but note that METH_KEYWORDS alone is equivalent to METH_VARARGS | METH_KEYWORDS).

The bit in the parenthetical is incorrect. If you take a look at PyCFunction_Call in Objects/methodobject.c, you will find a switch for METH_VARARGS | METH_KEYWORDS, but no switch for METH_KEYWORDS. Hence, using METH_KEYWORDS will land you with a SystemError that complains about METH_OLDARGS.

This is either a bug in the documentation, or a bug in Python. In this case, since the code has persisted through three major revisions of Python 3, I suggest that the bug _is_ in the documentation (whether it should be or not), since changing the code for this at this late date means a programmer has to use METH_VARARGS | METH_KEYWORDS anyway for compatibility.

It may be work pointing out specifically in the documentation that just using METH_KEYWORDS will not work.

-- Michael Welsh Duggan (mwd@cert.org) _______________________________________________ docs mailing list docs@python.org http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/docs

-- Sandro Tosi (aka morph, morpheus, matrixhasu) My website: http://matrixhasu.altervista.org/ Me at Debian: http://wiki.debian.org/SandroTosi

Hello Michael, I've just reported http://bugs.python.org/issue15657 to track your request. Regards, Sandro On Fri, Apr 6, 2012 at 6:31 PM, Michael Welsh Duggan <mwd@cert.org> wrote:

In the Python 3.2.2 documentation (and earlier Python 3 versions), in the Python/C API Reference Manual, chapter Object Implementation Support, the documentation for PyMethodDef says:

The ml_flags field is a bitfield which can include the following flags. The individual flags indicate either a calling convention or a binding convention. Of the calling convention flags, only METH_VARARGS and METH_KEYWORDS can be combined (but note that METH_KEYWORDS alone is equivalent to METH_VARARGS | METH_KEYWORDS).

The bit in the parenthetical is incorrect. If you take a look at PyCFunction_Call in Objects/methodobject.c, you will find a switch for METH_VARARGS | METH_KEYWORDS, but no switch for METH_KEYWORDS. Hence, using METH_KEYWORDS will land you with a SystemError that complains about METH_OLDARGS.

This is either a bug in the documentation, or a bug in Python. In this case, since the code has persisted through three major revisions of Python 3, I suggest that the bug _is_ in the documentation (whether it should be or not), since changing the code for this at this late date means a programmer has to use METH_VARARGS | METH_KEYWORDS anyway for compatibility.

It may be work pointing out specifically in the documentation that just using METH_KEYWORDS will not work.

-- Michael Welsh Duggan (mwd@cert.org) _______________________________________________ docs mailing list docs@python.org http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/docs

-- Sandro Tosi (aka morph, morpheus, matrixhasu) My website: http://matrixhasu.altervista.org/ Me at Debian: http://wiki.debian.org/SandroTosi