[Python-Dev] Next version of PEP278 - universal newline support - available

Jon Ribbens jon+python-dev@unequivocal.co.uk
Fri, 15 Mar 2002 16:52:54 +0000


Guido van Rossum <guido@python.org> wrote:
> Me too.  But it opens up the nasty problem of the gazillions of
> Unix-only programmers who never use 'b' for binary files.  We've fixed
> that in the std library (since it's cross platform), but I'm not too
> comfortable with imposing this on everybody without a transition
> period, given that this is both common knowledge and has "just worked"
> for 12 years in Python.

Please don't change this. The reason I use Python is because it
Does What You Tell It To, unlike certain other languages with the same
initial. If you make the standard simple form of the open() call,
i.e. open(filename) start doing weird shit to files that is a big step
down the Dark Path to Perlishness. Please leave open() like it is and
make a new mode specifier for doing new things.

(And yes I know on Windows it already does stupid things, but that's
the operating system's fault not the language.)