At 14:27 09.12.2000 -0500, Jeremy Hylton wrote:
But all this is moot unless someone comes up with a way to spell this that doesn't require a new keyword or change the meaning of 'global x' even if there's an x at an intermediate scope (i.e. you can't change 'global x' to mean "search for the next outer scope that defines x").
And we still have to answer Alex's complaint that newbies misinterpret the word 'global'.
I'm not averse to introducing a new keyword, which would address both concerns. yield was introduced with apparently little problem, so it seems possible to add a keyword without causing too much disruption.
If we decide we must stick with global, then it's very hard to address Alex's concern about global being a confusing word choice <wink>.
why exactly do we want write access to outer scopes? for completeness, to avoid the overhead of introducing a class here and there, to facilitate people using Scheme textbooks with Python? so far I have not been missing it, I don't find: def accgen(n): def acc(i): global n in accgen n += i return n return acc particulary more compelling than: class accgen: def __init__(self, n): self.n = n def __call__(self, i): self.n += i return self.n I'm not asking in order to polemize, I just would like to see the rationale spelled out. regards.