Thanks Rob, I recognize that I have so-far skirted the order-of-precedence concern. I believe I have used parens in my example everywhere there might be a question... But that's not a general description or rule. I have a bunch of issues that I know I need to flesh out, many coming as suggestions in this thread, which I appreciate. I just wanted to provide something concrete to start the conversation. FWIW, there is a bunch more at the link now than in my initial paste. But I want to clarify more before I copy a new version into the email thread. I haven't used Twisted in a while, but it is certainly an important library, and I don't want to cause confusion. Any specific recommendation on language to use? On Wed, Jun 22, 2022, 8:45 PM Rob Cliffe via Python-ideas < python-ideas@python.org> wrote:
Thank you for your proposal David. At last we have a counter-proposal to talk about. A few points:
(1) (As I pointed out in an earlier post) There is a flaw in using the syntax of an expression PRECEDED by a SOFT keyword: x = later -y With your proposal, x is assigned a deferred-evaluation-object which will be evaluated at some time later as "minus y", right? Erm, no. This is already legal syntax for x being immediately assigned a value of "later minus y". If you put the soft keyword *after* the expression: x = -y later it may or may not read as well (subjective) but AFAICS would work. Alternatively you could propose a hard keyword. Or a different syntax altogether.
(2) Delayed evaluation may be useful for many purposes. But for the specific purpose of providing late-bound function argument defaults, having to write the extra line ("n = n" in your example) removes much of the appeal. Two lines of boilerplate (using a sentinel) replaced by one obscure one plus one keyword is not much if any of a win, whereas PEP 671 would remove the boilerplate altogether apart from one sigil. Under your proposal, I for one would probably stick with the sentinel idiom which is explicit. I think "n=n" is confusing to an inexperienced Python user. You may not think this is important. My opinion is that late-bound defaults are important. (We may have to agree to differ.) Apart from anything else: Python fully supports early-bound defaults, why discriminate against late-bound ones?
(3) You talk about "deferred objects" and in one place you actually say "Evaluate the Deferred". A "deferred" is an important object but a different concept in Twisted, I think calling it something else would be better to avoid confusion.
Best wishes Rob Cliffe
On 21/06/2022 21:53, David Mertz, Ph.D. wrote:
Here is a very rough draft of an idea I've floated often, but not with much specification. Take this as "ideas" with little firm commitment to details from me. PRs, or issues, or whatever, can go to https://github.com/DavidMertz/peps/blob/master/pep-9999.rst as well as mentioning them in this thread.
PEP: 9999 Title: Generalized deferred computation Author: David Mertz <dmertz@gnosis.cx> Discussions-To: https://mail.python.org/archives/list/python-ideas@python.org/thread/ Status: Draft Type: Standards Track Content-Type: text/x-rst Created: 21-Jun-2022 Python-Version: 3.12 Post-History:
Abstract ========
This PEP proposes introducing the soft keyword ``later`` to express the concept of deferred computation. When an expression is preceded by the keyword, the expression is not evaluated but rather creates a "thunk" or "deferred object." Reference to the deferred object later in program flow causes the expression to be executed at that point, and for both the value and type of the object to become the result of the evaluated expression.
Motivation ==========
"Lazy" or "deferred" evaluation is useful paradigm for expressing relationships among potentially expensive operations prior their actual computation. Many functional programming languages, such as Haskell, build laziness into the heart of their language. Within the Python ecosystem, the popular scientific library `dask-delayed <dask-delayed>`_ provides a framework for lazy evaluation that is very similar to that proposed in this PEP.
.. _dask-delayed: https://docs.dask.org/en/stable/delayed.html
Examples of Use ===============
While the use of deferred computation is principally useful when computations are likely to be expensive, the simple examples shown do not necessarily use such expecially spendy computations. Most of these are directly inspired by examples used in the documentation of dask-delayed.
In dask-delayed, ``Delayed`` objects are create by functions, and operations create a *directed acyclic graph* rather than perform actual computations. For example::
>>> import dask >>> @dask.delayed ... def later(x): ... return x ... >>> output = [] >>> data = [23, 45, 62] >>> for x in data: ... x = later(x) ... a = x * 3 ... b = 2**x ... c = a + b ... output.append(c) ... >>> total = sum(output) >>> total Delayed('add-8f4018dbf2d3c1d8e6349c3e0509d1a0') >>> total.compute() 4611721202807865734 >>> total.visualize()
.. figure:: pep-9999-dag.png :align: center :width: 50% :class: invert-in-dark-mode
Figure 1. Dask DAG created from simple operations.
Under this PEP, the soft keyword ``later`` would work in a similar manner to this dask.delayed code. But rather than requiring calling ``.compute()`` on a ``Delayed`` object to arrive at the result of a computation, every reference to a binding would perform the "compute" *unless* it was itself a deferred expression. So the equivalent code under this PEP would be::
>>> output = [] >>> data = [23, 45, 62] >>> for later x in data: ... a = later (x * 3) ... b = later (2**x) ... c = later (a + b) ... output.append(later c) ... >>> total = later sum(output) >>> type(total) # type() does not un-thunk <class 'DeferredObject'> >>> if value_needed: ... print(total) # Actual computation occurs here 4611721202807865734
In the example, we assume that the built-in function `type()` is special in not counting as a reference to the binding for purpose of realizing a computation. Alternately, some new special function like `isdeferred()` might be used to check for ``Deferred`` objects.
In general, however, every regular reference to a bound object will force a computation and re-binding on a ``Deferred``. This includes access to simple names, but also similarly to instance attributes, index positions in lists or tuples, or any other means by which an object may be referenced.
Rejected Spellings ==================
A number of alternate spellings for creating a ``Deferred`` object are possible. This PEP-author has little preference among them. The words ``defer`` or ``delay``, or their past participles ``deferred`` and ``delayed`` are commonly used in discussions of lazy evaluation. All of these would work equally well as the suggested soft keyword ``later``. The keyword ``lazy`` is not completely implausible, but does not seem to read as well.
No punctuation is immediately obvious for this purpose, although surrounding expressions with backticks is somewhat suggestive of quoting in Lisp, and perhaps slightly reminiscent of the ancient use of backtick for shell commands in Python 1.x. E.g.::
might_use = `math.gcd(a, math.factorial(b))`
Relationship to PEP-0671 ========================
The concept of "late-bound function argument defaults" is introduced in :pep:`671`. Under that proposal, a special syntactic marker would be permitted in function signatures with default arguments to allow the expressions indicated as defaults to be evaluated at call time rather than at runtime. In current Python, we might write a toy function such as::
def func(items=[], n=None): if n is None: n = len(items) items.append("Hello") print(n)
func([1, 2, 3]) # prints: 3
Using the :pep:`671` approach this could be simplified somewhat as::
def func(items=[], n=>len(items)): # late-bound defaults act as if bound here items.append("Hello") print(n)
func([1, 2, 3]) # prints: 3
Under the current PEP, evaluation of a ``Deferred`` object only occurs upon reference. That is, for the current toy function, the evaluation would not occur until the ``print(n)`` line.::
def func(items=[], n=later len(items)): items.append("Hello") print(n)
func([1, 2, 3]) # prints: 4
To completely replicate the behavior of PEP-0671, an extra line at the start of the function body would be required::
def func(items=[], n=later len(items)): n = n # Evaluate the Deferred and re-bind the name n items.append("Hello") print(n)
func([1, 2, 3]) # prints: 3
References ==========
https://github.com/DavidMertz/peps/blob/master/pep-9999.rst
Copyright =========
This document is placed in the public domain or under the CC0-1.0-Universal license, whichever is more permissive.
-- 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.
_______________________________________________ Python-ideas mailing list -- python-ideas@python.org To unsubscribe send an email to python-ideas-leave@python.orghttps://mail.python.org/mailman3/lists/python-ideas.python.org/ Message archived at https://mail.python.org/archives/list/python-ideas@python.org/message/DQTR3C... Code of Conduct: http://python.org/psf/codeofconduct/
_______________________________________________ Python-ideas mailing list -- python-ideas@python.org To unsubscribe send an email to python-ideas-leave@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman3/lists/python-ideas.python.org/ Message archived at https://mail.python.org/archives/list/python-ideas@python.org/message/STVZXL... Code of Conduct: http://python.org/psf/codeofconduct/