Bug or feature? 'abc'.split('') rejects empty separator

[Tim Peters]

[Bengt Richter]
>  >>> 'abc'.split('')
>  Traceback (most recent call last):
>    File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
>  ValueError: empty separator
>
> Wouldn't it make sense to return list('abc') ?

[Neil Schemenauer]
> It would also make sense to return ['a', 'b', 'c'].

Well, that's what list('abc') does return, so you're in violent agreement.
However, this still stands:

> Since it's not obvious what you want Python raises an error.

Indeed, my first thought was "OK, if it has to return *something*, then
since we're asking it to split on nothing, it shouldn't split at all:

    ['abc']

is what it should return."  That's also compatible with

    ''.join[['abc']] == 'abc'

People who think '' should split "everywhere" instead of "nowhere" should
really be arguing for 'abc'.split('') to return

    ['', 'a', 'b', 'c', '']

instead, since in any sense that '' could be said to "match", it matches at
4 slice positions in 'abc', not 2.