> Multiple additions (with "+") mean "sum" in > arithmetic, but you can't generalize that to strings > and text processing. The "+" operator for any two > strings is not about adding--it's about > joining/concatenating. So multiple applications of > "+" on strings aren't a sum. They're just a longer > join/concatenation.
Hmmm. Your argument would be more pursuasive if you couldn't do this in Python: >>> a = "abc" + "def" + "ghi" + "jkl" >>> a 'abcdefghijkl' >>> The real problem with "sum", I think, is that the parameter list is ill-conceived (perhaps because it was added before variable length parameter lists were?). It should be sum(*operands) not sum(operands, initialvalue=?) It should amount to "map(+, operands)". Bill _______________________________________________ Python-3000 mailing list Python-3000@python.org http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-3000 Unsubscribe: http://mail.python.org/mailman/options/python-3000/archive%40mail-archive.com
