It's still I, Miville

[Erik Max Francis]

François Miville-Dechêne wrote:

> You say in the definition of mappings that at present Python has only
> one type of it, the dictionnary.  I suggest another one, the sparse
> array, where absence of key would mean not absence of element but
> presence of a default-value element, such as zero for sparse arrays in
> the mathematical sense.  This would enable the use of mapping with the
> distributive operators as I just suggested them in a previous e-mail.

It's extremely easy to implement something like this.  Here's a start:

	class SparseList(dict):
	    def __init__(self, defaultValue=0):
	        dict.__init__(self)
	    self.defaultValue = defaultValue

	    def __getitem__(self, index):
	        return self.get(index, self.defaultValue)

> I will be pestering you with my suggestions from time to time.  You
> say
> Python is an evolving language, prove it.

"Prove it"?  To whom, you?  Why?

-- 
   Erik Max Francis && max at alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
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