On 27/06/2011 23:18, Terry Reedy wrote:
On 6/27/2011 2:33 PM, Terry Reedy wrote:
Let me repeat that that is historically wrong for Python, and illustrate
why the term 'members' should not be used. From the 1.5 Language
Reference, 3.2 Standard type hierarchy: "There are also some 'generic'
special attributes, not listed with the individual objects: __methods__
is a list of the method names of a built-in object, if it has any;
__members__ is a list of the data attribute names of a built-in object,
if it has any."
This sentence was left untouched until 2.2. What's new 2.2 has "In
previous versions of Python, there was no consistent way to discover
what attributes and methods were supported by an object. There were
some informal conventions, such as defining __members__ and
__methods__ attributes that were lists of names, but often the author
of an extension type or a class wouldn't bother to define them."
So the Python 2.2 what's new talks about attributes and methods as
different things.... Of course the context makes it clear, but this
mirrors how I use the terms in discussion and how I see others generally
using them.
Great topic for bikeshedding. :-)
Michael
This is a section on descriptors, but the real replacement is, I
believe, dir().
--
http://www.voidspace.org.uk/
May you do good and not evil
May you find forgiveness for yourself and forgive others
May you share freely, never taking more than you give.
-- the sqlite blessing http://www.sqlite.org/different.html
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