[Python-ideas] Repurpose `assert' into a general-purpose check
smarie
sylvain.marie at schneider-electric.com
Tue Jan 16 11:25:52 EST 2018
Thanks Paul
Le mardi 16 janvier 2018 16:56:57 UTC+1, Paul Moore a écrit :
>
> > Why does this need to be a statement at all? Unlike assert, it's
> > always executed, so it can be defined as a simple function
>
Very good point. Actually that's what I already provide in valid8 with the assert_valid
function. See all examples here
<https://smarie.github.io/python-valid8/#usage-examples-inline>.
Let's consider this example where users want to define on-the-fly one of
the validation functions, and combine it with another with a 'or':
assert_valid('surface', surf, or_(lambda x: (x >= 0) & (x < 10000), is_foo_compliant), help_msg="surface should be 0=<x<10000 or foo compliant")
How ugly for something so simple ! I tried to make it slightly more compact
by developping a mini lambda syntax but it obviously makes it slower.
Anyway it becomes
assert_valid('surface', surf, or_((x >= 0) & (x < 10000), is_foo_compliant), help_msg="surface should be between 0 and 10000 or foo compliant")
or even (if you pre-convert Is_foo_compliant to mini_lambda)
assert_valid('surface', surf, ((x >= 0) & (x < 10000)) | Is_foo_compliant), help_msg="surface should be between 0 and 10000 or foo compliant")
There are three reasons why having a 'validate' statement would improve
this:
* no more parenthesis: more elegant and readable
* inline use of python (1): no more use of lambda or mini_lambda, no
performance overhead
* inline use of python (2): composition would not require custom function
composition operators such as 'or_' (above) or mini-lambda composition
anymore, it could be built-in in any language element used after <validate>
resulting in
validate (surf >= 0) & (surf < 10000) or is_foo_compliant(surf), "surface
should be 0=<x<10000 or foo compliant"
(I removed the variable name alias 'surface' since I don't know if it
should remain or not)
Elegant, isn't it ?
> I don't see how a validate statement avoids having to deal with all of
> > the complexity you mention here.
It would obviously need to be quite smart :) but it is possible, since I
can do it with assert_valid today.
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