defining the behavior of zip(it, it) (WAS: Converting a flatlist...)

[Fredrik Lundh]

Steve Holden wrote:

> Now, see, that's the thing. The more ways there are to write the same
> program, the harder any given program will be to understand.
>
> This is indeed a fairly deliberate approach in the Python world, and
> contrasts with languages where readability is low because of the
> multiple different ways of expressing the same idea.

you can express ideas in many ways in Python (just witness all the web
frameworks and xml toolkits ;-).  the deliberate approach you're referring
to is more about using a consistent spelling.

seriously, if anyone has a job so boring that his only way to express his
creativity is to be able call a trivial library operation in many different
ways somewhere deep inside his program, his problems are a lot more
fundamental than the choice of programming language.

(in a way, this is related to what creative programmers sometimes refer
to as python's "pencil-like qualities"; the fact that once you've grokked
python's way to do things, the language pretty much disappears from
sight.  *your* ideas is what matters.  see e.g. the venners interview
with bruce eckel:

    http://www.artima.com/intv/aboutme.html
    http://www.artima.com/intv/prodperf.html
    http://www.artima.com/intv/typing.html
    http://www.artima.com/intv/tipping.html

for more on this.

here's the keynote they're referring to, btw:

    http://www.mindview.net/FAQ/FAQ-012

</F>