[Python-Dev] Deprecating builtin id (and moving it to sys())

[Timothy Fitz]

On 8/17/05, Christian Robottom Reis <kiko at async.com.br> wrote:
> I've done some searching through my code and id() isn't the most-used
> builtin, so from my perspective the impact would be limited, but of
> course others might think otherwise.

All of my primary uses of id would not show up in such a search. id is
handy when debugging, when using the interactive interpreter and
temporarily in scripts (print id(something), something for when
repr(something) doesn't show the id).

In my experience teaching python, id at the interactive interpreter is
invaluable, which is why any proposal to move it would get a -1. The
fundamental issue is that I want to explain  reference semantics well
before I talk about packages and the associated import call.