On 4/2/06, Alex Martelli <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I believe that such "magically appearing" does not depend on > adaptation, per se, but on the mix of "convenience" approaches to > adaptation and registration that one chooses to provide alongside it.
Apologies if I didn't explain myself well - that's what I was trying to say, that it does happen, but it's to some extent an abuse of adaptation. How much of an abuse is a style issue, but *I* don't like it. > > I don't know if that's an "unwritten rule" as such - but I can barely > > imagine what you're describing as unacceptable (adaptation to a > > mutable interface which adds or copies state). It just seems like a > > stupid thing to do (or at least, not at all what adaptation is about). > > But maybe that's what you mean by a "hidden assumption". > > Uh? Consider iteration -- that's a prime example of an adaptation > which adds "hidden state", and I don't see it as particularly > problematic to frame as an adaptation. Again, I'm not disagreeing with you - I see iteration as a perfectly acceptable use of adaptation, but I don't see it as related to Nick's "hidden assumption". That's what I was trying to say when I said I can't imagine what Nick's getting at - in the same way that Nick is failing to "get" your explanation of why adaptation is good, I (and you?) am failing to see what he's getting at with his concerns. It's a communication issue more than anything, I suspect. > Do we have a "good practice document" about what you should or > shouldn't do with metaclasses, or decorators, or, for that matter, > with inheritance, operator overloading, and other powerful constructs > and tools that have been with Python a long, long time? Again, that was my point - I don't think there's much value in such a document for adaptation, just as there isn't any for metaclasses, etc. > Isn't it just wonderful, how the foes of adaptation switch horses on > you? First they request a simple-as-dirt, bare-bones "example > system" -- then as soon as you provide one they come back at you with > all sort of "cruft" to be piled on top. Ah well, having tried to > evangelize for adaptation for years, I've grown wearily accustomed to > this kind of response; it sometimes looks more like such foes are > feeling defensive, and ready to pull any trick to stop adaptation > from getting in the language, rather than interested in the various > technica aspect of the issue. To be fair, this isn't all that > different from the average reaction one always gets from python-dev > as a whole to any proposal whatsoever. Anyway, I hope it's clearer > now why, each and every time, I end up giving up, and deciding that > beating my head against a wall is more productive and fun;-). :-) To be fair, your simple-as-dirt strawman *does* have limitations. That's fine, given what it's designed to do. But it's also so simple and self-evident that it's easy to see the holes, and start trying to fill them. Whether that's a good thing or not, I couldn't say... Anyway, I'm getting sucked into writing more and more, and i doubt I'm coherent by now. So I'll stop. Paul. _______________________________________________ Python-3000 mailing list [email protected] http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-3000 Unsubscribe: http://mail.python.org/mailman/options/python-3000/archive%40mail-archive.com
