On 4/5/07, Raymond Hettinger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Guido van Rossum wrote: > >> Isn't this violating the rule that a try/except should only enclose > >> the smallest expression where the exception is expected? > > > > Yeah, and I keep finding myself wanting to hyperlink to that "rule" in > > the official docs, but it only seems to be written down in developer's > > heads. Can we get that into the Language Ref somewhere? Maybe on the > > http://docs.python.org/ref/try.html page? > > I'll add a snippet to the tutorial with advice on try/except. > > I don't think it should go in the main documentation because it is > really more of a suggestion or technique than an actual rule. > Also, there are plenty of other situations where the "rule" doesn't apply.
I see a lot of code written by Googlers who are not (yet) experienced Python users. Overly wide try/except clauses are a common mistake, and it is nearly always easy to apply this rule. I would argue, as a style issue, for making this rule the norm, and require deviations to be thought through very carefully. This rule has no place in a pure language *reference* manual. But it certainly deserves mention in any form of more practical documentation, be it a tutorial or a more advanced programming manual. -- --Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/) _______________________________________________ Python-Dev mailing list Python-Dev@python.org http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-dev Unsubscribe: http://mail.python.org/mailman/options/python-dev/archive%40mail-archive.com
