On 14/04/16 18:23, Guido van Rossum wrote:
If the discussion ends up with rough consensus on changing this I will happily change it back (and change all other occurrences to match the new rule).
Interestingly, the sentence above specifically binds the 'and' with what follows, via parentheses. It is not part of the preceding text to indicate something follows ...
however cogent arguments for/against the status quo (or for relinquishing the rule altogether) are welcome.
What I said above pretty much sums up my argument for this (it came up in a different context a month or so ago). I think that is also Matthias's argument (though I won't speak for him). English speakers will not usually accentuate the 'and's and 'or's in a sentence before pausing. To me, I read: if foo == bar and \ baz == spam: as: "if foo equals bar AND, baz equals spam". (emphasis on the "and", a pause before 'baz'). Where I will read: if foo == bar \ and baz == spam: as: "If foo equals bar, and baz equals spam" (pause after 'bar'). Just my personal opinion. The problem with this sort of style issue is that it's a pattern-based thing. If one is used to reading code written with a particular pattern then it's hard to adjust to another. So I don't think you'll get a complete consensus one way or the other. E.