RE: [Python-Dev] peps 329, 266, 267
At 12:22 PM 4/22/04 -0400, Jewett, Jim J wrote:
At 04:39 PM 4/21/04 -0400, Jewett, Jim J wrote:
If this is really only about globals and builtins, then you can just initialize each module's dictionary with a copy of builtins.
(Note that Raymond's original proposal was much stronger; instead of just moving builtins to globals, it moved both builtins and globals into locals.)
But at least it was still backward-compatible with respect to what actually is found in the module's globals.
Phillip J. Eby:
There's only one problem with this idea, and it's a big one: 'import *' would now include all the builtins,
Why is this bad?
Because some modules are examined by software, and only the expected names belong there. For example, I believe if you run 'pydoc' on such a module, it will proceed to document all the builtins.
Fair enough. But that software could compare against builtins, and do a set-minus.
It *could*, but it's wasteful to break such programs without necessity.
But note that import * _already_ imports names which shadow builtins, so the only real change would be when the imported module does *not* shadow a builtin, but your own module does (and does so before the import, perhaps because of an earlier import *).
If you want to protect even this obscure case, import could be changed to special-case builtins.
I think you're missing the part where builtins change from one release to the next. I might have had a global named 'zip' or 'enumerate' in a Python 1.5 program, and when I upgrade to 2.4 I am now "shadowing a builtin".
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Phillip J. Eby