code review

[Evan Driscoll]

On 7/1/2012 4:54, Alister wrote:
> On Sat, 30 Jun 2012 23:45:25 -0500, Evan Driscoll wrote:
>> If I had seen that in a program, I'd have assumed it was a bug.
> 
> You would?
> I have only been using python for 6 - 12 months but in my past I 
> programmed microcontrollers in assembly.
> 
> as soon as i saw it i understood it & thought great, like a light bulb 
> going on.

It's not a matter of "I wouldn't have understood what the author was
trying to do" (with a small caveat), it's a matter of "I'd have assumed
that the author didn't understand the language semantics."

I'm pretty sure it goes contrary to *every other programming language
I've ever used* (and a couple that I haven't).

I understand why Python does it, and it certainly is nice in that it
matches typical mathematical notation, but the surprise quotient is
*very* high in the PL world IMO.

Evan