[Python-Dev] type categories

[Oren Tirosh]

On Sat, Aug 17, 2002 at 02:18:56PM -0400, David Abrahams wrote:
> Huh? That's certainly not what I thought I was saying. I was saying that a
> reason I thought it was important to be able to test type categories (what
> Guido calls "look before you leap") was for implementing multiple dispatch.
> In other words, an idiom which most people agree is usually a bad choice
> for user code might be a great choice for a generalized library or language
> facility.

Multiple dispatch is one possible use for testing type categories. Another
important use is early detection of errors and more informative error 
messages.  When using a library the errors resulting from a bad argument 
to one of its published entry points are often raised deep within someone 
else's code with an uninformative message, making them hard to trace. If 
an object of the incorrect category is passed to a method that just stores 
a reference to it the actual error may only be raised much later, making it
even harder to trace.  There is also the issue of trusting someone else's 
code - maybe it's a bug in the library? With explicit category checks it's 
easier to tell that the source of the problem.

The extreme form of early detection is static typing, of course. Forcing
category checks on all arguments passed is too much overhead for me.
I prefer explicit checks for protocol compliance at some well-defined
interface points between different domains of code. When an exception is
raised the region of uncertainty about its real source can sometimes be
quite large. Category checks can serve as a kind of fire door to try to
limit the spread of uncertainty. The problem with putting too many fire 
doors is that they hinder passage because they must be kept closed at all 
times.

	Oren