If we *do* want the name 'slice' as the spelling for the thing that can either be called or indexed to create a slice object, we could probably use some boilerplate like this:

In [1]: class Slice:
...: def __init__(self):
...: self.slice = slice
...: def __getitem__(self, x):
...: return x
...: def __call__(self, *args, **kws):
...: return self.slice(*args, **kws)
...:

In [2]: slice = Slice()

In [3]: slice(1,10,2)
Out[3]: slice(1, 10, 2)

In [4]: slice[1:10:2]
Out[4]: slice(1, 10, 2)

I'm sure there are some less common uses of the name 'slice' that would break here. That's why I'd want an official standard behavior.

The very common use case for creating slice objects is in Pandas and similar libraries. Xarray certainly, or Blaze, to a lesser extent NumPy.

That said, it's very easy to define a suitable __getitem__, as Guido shows. It's really a question simply of whether that object should be named 'slice' or something else.

On Nov 12, 2016 5:08 PM, "Guido van Rossum" <guido@python.org> wrote:
Honestly I think the use case of wanting to create a slice object is rare enough that we can continue to write slice(x, y, z). If you really find yourself wanting something shorter, I believe in the past it's been pointed out that you could create a helper, e.g. like this:

Keeping medicines from the bloodstreams of the sick; food
from the bellies of the hungry; books from the hands of the
uneducated; technology from the underdeveloped; and putting
advocates of freedom in prisons. Intellectual property is
to the 21st century what the slave trade was to the 16th.