while (thread.alive()):

[Jay O'Connor]

>The fact that it's taken about three attempts by
>experienced Python people to come up with a full
>and accurate characterisation of what constitute
>'true' and 'false' in Python suggests that things 
>could have been a lot simpler if there had been a 
>dedicated boolean type!

Believe it or not, both Ada and Smalltalk have boolean types.

Both languages were designed in the 70s, commercially implemented in the
80s; one is dynamically typed, one is statically typed.

Why are we still maintaining these leftover idioms such as using
integers as booleans.  If we are to carry the state of the art of
programming beyond it's current level, we need to be programming a t a
higher level of abstraction than is easily supported while still
dragging anachronisms such as this around.

Those who claim that 'while 1:' is obvious, it's not.

It's only obvious if you've programmed "C" and other such languages. 
It's makes no sense really, unless you've learned the 'code

My first professional language was Ada83.  From there I went to
Smalltalk.  When I finally started working with languages such as C,
C++, etc... I was at first confused ( while (1)...what does that mean)
and then revolted.

I'm continuously amused that people try to take language design forward
and still drag obsolete ideas along for the ride.

Python's got a lot of cool stuff, but the lack of a real Boolean object
is a glaring omission

-- 
Jay O'Connor
joconnor at cybermesa.com
http://www.cybermesa.com/~joconnor

"God himself plays the bass strings first when He tunes the soul"