Guido van Rossum wrote:
See the thread "pre-PEP: Suite-Based Keywords" (shamless plug) (an earlier, similar proposal is here: http://groups.google.co.uk/groups?selm=mailman.403.1105274631.22381.python-l... %40python.org ).
In short, if doFoo is defined like:
def doFoo(func1, func2): pass
You would be able to call it like:
doFoo(**): def func1(a, b): return a + b def func2(c, d): return c + d
That is, a suite can be used to define keyword arguments.
I'm still not sure how this is particularly solving a pressing problem that isn't solved by putting the function definitions in front of the call. I saw the first version of the proto-PEP and didn't think that the motivating example (keeping the getx/setx methods passed to a property definition out of the class namespace) was all that valuable.
OK. I think most people (myself included) who would prefer to define properties (and event handlers, etc.) in this way are motivated by the perception that the current method is just ugly. I don't know that it solves any pressing problems.
Two more issues:
(1) It seems that *every* name introduced in the block automatically becomes a keyword argument. This looks like a problem, since you could easily need temporary variables there. (I don't see that a problem with class bodies because the typical use there is only method and property definitions and the occasional instance variable default.)
Combining the suite-based keywords proposal with the earlier, 'where' proposal (linked in my above post), you would be able to name variables individually in the case that temporary variables are needed: f(x=x): x = [i**2 for i in [1,2,3]]
(2) This seems to be attaching a block to a specific function call but there are more general cases: e.g. you might want to assign the return value of doFoo() to a variable, or you might want to pass it as an argument to another call.
The 'where' proposal also doesn't have this problem. Any expression is allowed.
*If* we're going to create syntax for anonymous blocks, I think the primary use case ought to be cleanup operations to replace try/finally blocks for locking and similar things. I'd love to have syntactical support so I can write
blahblah(myLock): code code code
instead of
myLock.acquire() try: code code code finally: myLock.release()
Well, that was my other proposal, "pre-PEP: Simple Thunks" (there is also an implementation). It didn't seem to go over all that well. I am going to try to rewrite it and give more motivation and explanation (and maybe use 'with' and 'from' instead of 'do' and 'in' as keywords). -Brian