[Guido van Rossum]
Wouldn't this be even better? "create index ${table}_lid1_idx on $table($lid1)" % params
"Better" because it uses `$' instead of `%'? It is really a matter of taste and aesthetics, more than being "better" on technical grounds. Technically, the multiplication of aspects and paradigms goes against some unencumberance and simplicity, which made Python attractive to start with. We would loose something probably not worth the gain.
it seems that $foo is just much more common than %foo as a substitution indicator, across various languages.
Python has the right of being culturally distinct on some details. I see it as an advantage: when languages are too similar, some confusion arises between differences. The distinction actually helps.
Anyway, I think this is something that can wait until 3.0, and I'd rather not have too many discussions here at once,
OK, then. Enough said! :-) -- François Pinard http://www.iro.umontreal.ca/~pinard