[New-bugs-announce] [issue9538] Replace confusing pseudoname 'object' in special methods section.

[Terry J. Reedy]

New submission from Terry J. Reedy <tjreedy at udel.edu>:

In 3.3. Special method names, 'object' is used as a pseudo class name to prefix all the special method entries. This conflicts with the usual two Python meanings.

1. 'object' is the name of a specific class. So the entry for object.__getattribute__(self, name) says to avoid circularity by calling
object.__getattribute__(self, name), which looks circular and requires a bit a mental work by the reader to properly understand. Ditto for
object.__setattr__(self, name, value) calling
object.__setattr__(self, name, value)

2. Non-specifically, 'object' is usually understood to mean any Python object, not just a class. But the signatures as written require that 'object' specifically be a class and 'object' does not convey that.

So for both reasons, I propose that the pseudoname 'object' be replaces with 'class' or 'someclass'

----------
assignee: docs at python
components: Documentation
messages: 113194
nosy: docs at python, georg.brandl, terry.reedy
priority: normal
severity: normal
stage: needs patch
status: open
title: Replace confusing pseudoname 'object' in special methods section.
versions: Python 3.2

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Python tracker <report at bugs.python.org>
<http://bugs.python.org/issue9538>
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