Guido:
Me:
If the file object were to become an object obeying the iterator protocol, its next() method should really return the next *byte* of the file.
I don't think so. We should pick the most convenient chunking for the default iterator
But we're talking here about making the file object *be* an iterator itself, not just have a "default iterator". If that's to happen, all the other ways of iterating over a file ought to be implemented on top of the basic iteration facility provided by the file object -- lest we get unfortunate interactions between the different iteration methods a la xreadlines(). To me, this implies that the file object must iterate by bytes. I'm not necessarily advocating this, just following the idea to its logical conclusion. If the conclusion is distasteful, maybe that's a sign that the idea (i.e. making file objects into iterators) isn't so good in the first place. Greg Ewing, Computer Science Dept, +--------------------------------------+ University of Canterbury, | A citizen of NewZealandCorp, a | Christchurch, New Zealand | wholly-owned subsidiary of USA Inc. | greg@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz +--------------------------------------+