Whining about "struct"

[Ned Deily]

In article <am1db6h9dh3abep1g3s21bqf3172fa3ve8 at 4ax.com>,
 Tim Roberts <timr at probo.com> wrote:
> I have a bad memory.  I admit it.  Because of that, the Python "help"
> system is invaluable to me.  Up through Python 2.5, I could get a quick
> reference to the format specifiers for the struct module via
>   import struct; help(struct)
> 
> I used that a LOT.
> 
> But in Python 2.6, the struct module moved from Python code to C code, and
> that helpful help string was removed.
> 
> Is that still gone in Python 3.1?  What are the chances of reinstating that
> helpful chart?

Hmm, for me, help(struct) produces pretty similar results on all pythons 
from 2.5 through 3.2.  (This is on Mac OS X with the Pythons from 
various sources.)  Here's a snippet from the 3.1.2 help:

[...]
DESCRIPTION
    Functions to convert between Python values and C structs.
    Python bytes objects are used to hold the data representing the C 
struct
    and also as format strings (explained below) to describe the layout 
of data
    in the C struct.
    
    The optional first format char indicates byte order, size and 
alignment:
      @: native order, size & alignment (default)
      =: native order, std. size & alignment
      <: little-endian, std. size & alignment
      >: big-endian, std. size & alignment
      !: same as >
    
    The remaining chars indicate types of args and must match exactly;
[...]

Is that what you meant?   Ah, I see.  It looks like the doc string was 
missing-in-action in the initial 2.6 releases but subsequently fixed (as 
of 2.6.5 or so).

-- 
 Ned Deily,
 nad at acm.org