On Tue, Nov 28, 2017 at 1:12 PM, Ivan Pozdeev via Python-ideas <python-ideas@python.org> wrote:
The `assert' statment was created the same as in previous languages like C/C++: a check to only do in debug mode, when you can't yet trust your code to manage and pass around internal data correctly. Examples are array bounds and object state integrity constraints.
Unlike C, Python does the aforementioned checks all the time, i.e. it's effectively always in "debug mode". Furthermore, validation checks are an extremily common use case.
I have been using assert in my in-house code for input validation for a long time, the only thing preventing me from doing the same in public code is the fact that it only raises AssertionError's while library code is expected to raise TypeError or ValueError on invalid input.
Actually, Python does have a way of disabling assertions (the -O flag), so they should be treated the same way they are in C. Assertions should not be used as shorthands for "if cond: raise Exc" in the general case. ChrisA