Ternary operator (Re: Ternery operator)

[Michael Geary]

John Roth wrote:
> I wouldn't cast the blame on Guido. It's quite clear that he doesn't
> like the notion, but I don't get the impression that he's got the kind
> of devious mind that would think this was the way to resolve it.
> On the contrary, he seems to be a quite straightforward fellow in
> most ways.

Very true, and I certainly didn't mean to imply that Guido or anyone else
deliberately set up the voting in a devious way.

> The whole notion of "one and only chance" is astonishingly naive.
> There is no way that the vote on PEP 308 is going to keep people
> from bring up the idea, and having the opponents refer to it as the
> "community decision" when the vote was clearly in favor of having
> the feature added to the language will simply drive people away
> from the process.

Yes, that was what troubled me when I read the PEP. My first reaction on
reading this statement in the introduction was that it seemed
disingenuous--but I'm sure it was not intentionally so:

"Following the discussion, a vote was held. While there was an overall
interest in having some form of if-then-else expressions, no one format was
able to draw majority support. Accordingly, the PEP was rejected due to the
lack of an overwhelming majority for change."

OTOH, in a different context I might be all for this approach:

Sacramento, October 8, 2003: "While the recall of Gray Davis passed by a
wide margin, none of the 135 replacement candidates was able to draw a
majority of the votes. Therefore, California will have no Governor."

I can only dream... ;-)

-Mike

(Gray Davis fans: I'm just kidding around with you, OK?)