UserLinux chooses Python as "interpretive language" of choice

[John Roth]

"Skip Montanaro" <skip at pobox.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.393.1071981117.9307.python-list at python.org...
>
>
>     HV> I think no one even tries to understand the very concept of
reducing
>     HV> sequence to a single object using a rule . Sum is not a
replacement
>     HV> of this *concept*.  Just what is so wrong with having such a
general
>     HV> tool available in a programming language ? Doesn't it hurt to
>     HV> understand how to use it?
>
> It doesn't hurt to understand the concept of reduce(), but if it's never
(or
> very rarely) used, it's just extra (nearly dead) code which has to be
> maintained.  It's easy enough to write reduce() in Python, and if/when
PyPy
> is a reality shouldn't be any less efficient than the current C version.

I'd have to agree that reduce, per se, isn't the world's most
useful function, and getting rid of marginally useful C code that
has to be maintained is a worthwhile objective.

It finally dawned on me last night that I could use the visitor
pattern for all cases of reduce, in a form that's probably
more understandable for the average programmer. And
if it isn't, then he's learned something more globally useful:
the visitor pattern.

That being the case, I'm going to withdraw whatever objections
I had to removing it from the language.

John Roth
>
> Skip
>