[Python-Dev] "and" and "or" operators in Py3.0

[Reinhold Birkenfeld]

Raymond Hettinger wrote:
> I propose that in Py3.0, the "and" and "or" operators be simplified to
> always return a Boolean value instead of returning the last evaluated
> argument.

No, please not. It's useful sometimes and doesn't hurt most times.

> 1) The construct can be error-prone.  When an error occurs it can be
> invisible to the person who wrote it.  I got bitten in published code
> that had survived testing and code review:
> 
>   def real(self):
>     'Return a vector with the real part of each input element'
>     # do not convert integer inputs to floats
>     return self.map(lambda z: type(z)==types.ComplexType and z.real or
> z)

I'm surprised you wrote that in the first place. The "and/or conditional"
is one of the few occurences where one will carefully look for false values
in the "and" part.

> The code fails silently when z is (0+4i).  It took a good while to trace
> down a user reported error (when Matlab results disagreed with my matrix
> module results) and determine that the real() method contained an error.
> Even when traced down, I found it hard to see the error in the code.
> Now that I know what to look for, it has not happened again, but I do
> always have to stare hard at any "and/or" group to mentally verify each
> case.

[...]

> P.S.  Simplifying "and" and "or" may create a need to introduce a
> conditional operator but that is a discussion for another day.

Exactly. A conditional was turned down some time ago, for good reasons.

Reinhold

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