On Fri, Jul 21, 2017 at 10:19 AM, Brett Cannon <brett@python.org> wrote:

On Fri, 21 Jul 2017 at 10:08 Jason H <jhihn@gmx.com> wrote:
I experimented with Python in college and I've been for close to 20 years now. (Coming and going as needed) I love the language. But there is one annoyance that I continually run into.

There are basically two assignment operators, based on context, = and :
a = 1
{ a: 1 }

The `=` isn't an assignment operator, it's a *binding*. The name 'a' gets bound to the integer object "1" in your example. Don't confuse this with a language like C where it really is an assignment. If I later write:

a = 2

I haven't changed the "cell" that contains the integer object, I've rebound the NAME `a` to a different object.

But you've left out quite a few binding operations. I might forget some, but here are several:

import a # bind the name `a` to a module object

with open(fname) as a: pass # bind the name `a` to a file handle

for a in [1]: pass # bind the name `a` to each of the objects in an iterable

# ... In this case, the net result is identical to `a=1`

def a(): pass # bind the name `a` to a function object defined in the body

class a: pass # bind the name `a` to a class object defined in the body

With a bit of circuitous code, you *can* use a dictionary to bind a variable too:

>>> globals().update({'a':1})

>>> a

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