Steven Elliott <selliott4@austin.rr.com> wrote:
I'm interested in how builtins could be more efficient. I've read over some of the PEPs having to do with making global variables more efficient (search for "global"): http://www.python.org/doc/essays/pepparade.html But I think the problem can be simplified by focusing strictly on builtins.
Whether or not it is a good idea, it is not wholly uncommon for users to manipulate variables in the builtin or other module namespaces. From very simple import hooks replacing __import__, to module.QUIT = 1, these things happen, and I don't think that making them produce a warning as suggested by Paul, necessarily helps us. I personally think the problem can be simplified (and solved) by applying decorators where such builtin lookups could/should be more efficient. Raymond has a recipe for doing such optimization over at the Python cookbook: http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/277940 Toss that little guy into a decorators module; if people want their runtime calling to be fast (at the expense of a slightly increased compilation time), they'll start using it. - Josiah