re: Types and true division (was Re: strange output
I conclude that you don't yourself understand the importance of typing, or you wouldn't wish div to remain so ambiguous.
Conclude what you like. After you understand my position. Python, I thought, was always interested in the practical outcome rather than theoretical purity. Which is why my mind does shut off I bit when you and Guido and Tim explain to me the *real* reason the div operator had to change. It's theoretical "right". I'm sure. Its symetrical, and all that. Does it help someone trying to get a handle on things? How? My position has *no* theoretical basis. Beyond the fact that - and please don't jump all over me if there is something technical amiss in this wording - it better exposes the reality of what we are dealing with (a pretty thin wrapper around standard C, no?). And that is only my attempt to say in higher falutin language, that my point is experiental - not theoretical. And not unlikely wrong. Which you are well entitled to tell me. But I will definitely take it better if I think you have first taken in the practical point I am making. Michael did. You haven't. Art
At 09:15 PM 10/11/2002 -0400, Arthur wrote:
My position has *no* theoretical basis. Beyond the fact that - and please don't jump all over me if there is something technical amiss in this wording - it better exposes the reality of what we are dealing with (a pretty thin wrapper around standard C, no?).
I'd say a pretty *thick* wrapper, if you judge in terms of the distance between the respective semantics. Python is not about trying to make you think like a C programmer.
And that is only my attempt to say in higher falutin language, that my point is experiental - not theoretical. And not unlikely wrong. Which you are well entitled to tell me. But I will definitely take it better if I think you have first taken in the practical point I am making.
Michael did.
I think you're mislabeling other peoples' experience as "theoretical" just because you don't happen to share those same experiences. Kinda like saying some people are theoretically experiencing starvation right now. It's a real experience (of frustration) trying to read complex code written by others (or by oneself years previously). The old behavior of div made this even more frustrating. This isn't just some ivory tower view in comparison to which you represent all that is practical and grounded. I simply don't buy that premise.
You haven't.
I've made my position clear: you're not irrational for insisting certain people at one time maybe had too much influence (maybe they did), but beyond this, the technical arguments for changing the behavior of div are in my view stronger than the arguments for keeping it (you being one of many who preferred the status quo). Your specific example of a "new confusion" drawn from Numeric did not seem to speak to the issue in any direct way (I shouldn't need to repeat why). Kirby
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Arthur -
Kirby Urner