[Tutor] Lambda function, was: Simple counter to determine frequencies of words in adocument

[ALAN GAULD]

> > Notice that it uses key as a function inside  sorted.
> > And lambda creates a function so sorted applies
> > the  lambda to each item in turn to retrieve the sort key.
> 
> OK. I get it.  Thanks a lot. This should have been clear if I had been
> able to see the code  for the sorted() method. 

OK Good, But I stress the code I posted bears no relation to 
the actual code for sorted! It was purely illustrative.

> Can anyone point me to a URL (or some other  document) 
> where the code for the different built-in methods can be examined? 

The source code for Python, including all the standard modules 
and  the builtin stuff is available on the web site to view or download. 
(The joy of Opensource.) Much of the core code (like sorted) is 
actually written in C but many of the higher level modules are in 
Python - and you probably have it on your PC/Mac if you look 
for the Python modules folder...

The good news is that unlike some opensource projects the code 
quality is pretty good and you can usually figure out how it works 
fairly easily, even the C stuff. (Having said that I only look at the 
source about once a year on average, only if things are getting 
really hairy... :-)

HTH,

Alan G.