Hi there, I'd like to propose that the OrderedDict get a more readable syntax, the way the syntax for set changed from set(['spam', 'ham', 'eggs']) to {'spam', 'ham', 'eggs'} when it became a built-in type in Python 2.4. The way set is unordered like the keys of a dict, similarly list is ordered like the keys of an OrderedDict. In that sense, what {'ham', 'eggs'} is to {'ham': 'spam', 'eggs': 'spam'}, so ['ham', 'eggs'] is to ... my proposal of a cleaner OrderedDict syntax ... ['ham': 'spam', 'eggs': 'spam']. So a "dict" is like a "set" (hence curly braces) of key-value pairs. And an "OrderedDict" is like a "list" (hence square braces) of key-value pairs. (Of course, I am ignoring how lists can have duplicate items. An ordered set would carry the analogy further, but it wouldn't help illustrate my syntax proposal.) I find "['ham': 'spam', 'eggs': 'spam']"" unambiguous, and more readable than "OrderedDict([('ham', 'spam'), ('eggs', 'spam')])". I work with OrderedDict a lot, because JSON represents an OrderedDict and I need to work with JSON a lot. In an attempt to make the OrderedDicts that I work with more readable, I wrote a module to parse a string representation of an OrderedDict that uses my proposed syntax. You can find it here: https://github.com/kaapstorm/listdict With the ubiquity of JSON, it may also be time to promote OrderedDict to a built-in type too. Kind regards, Norman