Pep 238 Why new // operator (Non-integer Division)

[Courageous]

On Sun, 18 Mar 2001 03:16:03 GMT, Steve Williams <stevewilliams at wwc.com> wrote:
>Courageous wrote:
>> This isn't true; the moment you encounter code written by someone else,
>> you DO have to use them. This simple principle is the magic of Python
>> minimalism, and the primary driving reason why new Python programmers
>> can become so effective so fast (IMO).

>           For simplicity's sake I do all my computations in the base-pi number
>system. In this system pi=10.

While I perceive a shadowy point here, the fact of the matter is that the more
features you add to a language, the more a new programmer must know in
order to read code produced by more experienced programmers. I'm a big
fan of Python's minimalism for this case, and believe it's one of its strong
selling points. The relative paucity of forms in Python is a strength, not a
weakness. If Python departs from this aspect of its origin, it will no longer
really be Python.

This isn't to say that I'm against the growth of the language. I merely would
like to point out that all additions are at odds with Python's principal of
minimalism. If some addition can already be achieved through a simple
means in Python, perhaps it shouldn't be added.

Python is not Perl.

C//