On 7/14/2013 7:09 AM, Nick Coghlan wrote:
Slight adjustment to the proposed wording to ensure completely undocumented modules are also considered private:
================= Private interfaces
Unless explicitly documented otherwise, a leading underscore on any name indicates that it is an internal implementation detail and backwards compatibility guarantees do not apply. It is strongly encouraged that private APIs (whether modules, classes, functions, attributes or other names) be clearly marked in this way, as Python users may rely on introspection to identify available functionality and may be misled into believing an API without a leading underscore is in fact a public API with the standard backwards compatibility guarantees.
Even when their names do not start with a leading underscore, all test modules and all modules that are not covered in the documentation are also considered private interfaces.
I was going to suggest adding 'and most idlelib ' between 'test' and 'modules', but the broader addition covers idlelib, which is not mentioned yet in the docs, even in the (unindexed) Idle chapter. When it is, I will try to remember to make explicit which names and interfaces are public and that the rest are private. -- Terry Jan Reedy