Difference between double and single quotes

[François Pinard]

[pauljolly at my-deja.com]

> Please can someone tell me whether Python distinguishes between double
> and single quotes in any way?  This was brought to my attention by a
> friend who queried my use of double and single quotes, saying that in
> the UNIX shell a distinction is made.

The Unix shell and Perl do a distinction, indeed, but Python does not.

Being myself anal and needing a reason and motive for everything, I
gave myself an artificial rule which I try to follow, but this is only a
convention of mine, Python does not force me into anything.  If the string
is to be ultimately read by a human, I use "", when if the string is meant
for the machine or algorithm mainly, I use ''.  (This is not the same
thing as the translatability of a string, which I mark by other means).
Even if slightly fuzzy, this convention is best for me.  I do prefer ''
over "" in general as I find the former more readable, but the fact that
the apostrophe is commonly used in human texts make "" more adequate.
I usually prefer using \" within " strings and \' within ' strings, than
to break my own convention.

-- 
François Pinard   http://www.iro.umontreal.ca/~pinard