[Python-3000] PEP 3137 plan of attack

[Joel Bender]

Speaking from the protocol encoding/decoding view, and one where a 
buffer is very similar to a list of small integers...

>> Also what about .replace() and .translate()?
> 
>> If they are not done in place should they return a new buffer (PyBytes_)
>> object or a bytes (PyString_) object?  [i'd say a buffer (PyBytes_)]
> 
> They should return the same type as 'self'.

My preference would be to do the work in place and return None, just 
like sorting a list, reversing a list, appending to a list, etc.

>> Alos if not, should we add additional .ireplace() .ilower() etc.. methods to
>> the mutable buffer (PyBytes_)?  There are speed advantages to doing many of
>> those in place rather than a data copy.
> 
> I'm not sure I see the use case where this matters all that much
> though. Let's say not, if only because it's not in the PEP. ;-)

I would appreciate it if these functions were list-like and not 
tuple-like.  In extending buffers to support more structure encoding and 
decoding functions, it would be nice to carry the expectation that these 
extensions mutate the buffer and I can leverage the built-in 
functionality to do that.

I am but a small voice in the chorus.


Joel