Class Methods

[Rainer Deyke]

"Thomas Heller" <thomas.heller at ion-tof.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.987779255.16686.python-list at python.org...
> There are some signs :-) that Python's object
> model is going to be revised even _before_
> Python 3000.
>
> Is someone willing to join me fighting
> for class methods (I mean 'real' class-methods
> in the Smalltalk style here, _not_ static
> methods like in Java or C++).

I posted this in another thread, but I think it bears repeating here.


I consider classes/instances a special case of namespaces: one which allows
(multiple) instantiation and inheritance.  In actual pratice not all of the
classes I design are designed for multiple instantiation, or instantiation
at all for that matter.  What I would like to see is a separation of
concerns ("Does this namespace have __special__ attributes for operator
overloading?" inpdependent from "Does this namespace require
instantiation?") followed by a culling of irrelevant features ("Don't want
operator overloading?  Don't name your function '__add__' then.").  The
resulting programming language might look something like this:

namespace A: # Create a named unique object
  pass
namespace B(A): # Similar to 'from ... import', but done through linking
                # instead of copying
class C(A): # 'class' = namespace that requires/supports instantiation
            # class inherits from namespace => functions in namespace
            # are treated as "static" functions
  pass
namespace D(C()): # namespace inherits from instance of class
  pass


The module itself would be a 'namespace' object.  Overall, I think this has
the potential of creating a much simpler and more regular language.
Separate keywords for 'class' and 'namespace' might even turn out to be
unnecessary.


In this context, class methods would either be automatically included, or
turn out to be truly redundant, or both.


--
Rainer Deyke (root at rainerdeyke.com)
Shareware computer games           -           http://rainerdeyke.com
"In ihren Reihen zu stehen heisst unter Feinden zu kaempfen" - Abigor