[Pythonmac-SIG] importing namespaces/modules

[David Worrall]

Hello all,
I've got a query which is probably obvious for people more  
experienced than I
but I can't find any exact reference to it elsewhere.
It's not mac specific, but hey, I already belong to too many dev  
groups...   :-)
The discussion at http://docs.python.org/tut/node11.html is OK but it  
doesn't really answer my query.

I note that increasingly programmers are deprecating

 >>> from module import *

  in favour of
 >>> import module

which is fair enough, as explicit attributes make code more readable.

Are the functions/classes/whatevers that are imported into the  
namespace with >>> import module
but not otherwise referenced, explicitly loaded into the python  
"workspace" (excuse me, I'm an unrepentant APL programmer)
including the __doc__ strings etc etc or not?
And if so, do they remain in the .pyc image?
And after py2app?

In the case where module is quite large (think wx or twisted for eg)
I'm wondering what are the relative advantages/disadvantages of, for  
example
 >>> import twisted
 >>>  class MessageHandler(twisted.internet.protocol.DatagramProtocol):

compared with
 >>> from twisted.internet.protocol import DatagramProtocol
Class MessageHandler(DatagramProtocol):

other than the obvious easy of reading  
"twisted.internet.protocol.DatagramProtocol" in a large environment  
with many imported modules, which is my situation.

Any advise gratedfully acknowledged,

David

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