Alf P. Steinbach /Usenet wrote:
* Stephen Hansen, on 11.07.2010 21:00:
On 7/11/10 11:45 AM, wheres pythonmonks wrote:
Follow-up:
Is there a way to define compile-time constants in python and have the
bytecode compiler optimize away expressions like:
if is_my_extra_debugging_on: print ...
when "is_my_extra_debugging" is set to false? I'd like to pay no
run-time penalty for such code when extra_debugging is disabled.
Any code wrapped in a __debug__ guard is utterly ommitted if you run
Python with the -O option. That, and asserts go away.
On #2: My point regarding the impossibility of writing the swap
function for ints is to explicitly understand that this isn't
possible, so as not to look for solutions along those lines when
trying to write python code.
Its impossible because Python's calling and namespace semantics simply
don't work like that. There's no references in the traditional sense,
because there's no variables-- boxes that you put values in. There's
just concrete objects. Objects are passed into the function and given
new names; that those objects have names in the enclosing scope is
something you don't know, can't access, and can't manipulate.. even the
objects don't know what names they happen to be called.
Check out http://effbot.org/zone/call-by-object.htm
Oh, I wouldn't give that advice. It's meaningless mumbo-jumbo. Python
works like Java in this respect, that's all; neither Java nor Python
support 'swap'.
Of course there are variables, that's why the docs call them variables.
In Java a variable is declared and exists even before the first
assignment to it. In Python a 'variable' isn't declared and won't exist
until the first 'assignment' to it.
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