Re: [Python-ideas] Consistency in naming [was Re: ...ALL CAPS] (off-list)

[Carl Smith]

I shouldn't let it bother me, but that "Sent from my iPhone" cruft really
gets under my skin.
-- Carl Smith
carl.in...@gmail.com


On Mon, 4 Feb 2019 at 11:17, Paul Moore  wrote:

> On Mon, 4 Feb 2019 at 05:36, Christopher Barker 
> wrote:
> >
> > This is getting pretty off toipic, but I want to point out hat as a
> rule, Python has been critisised more for having too MUCH cnage than too
> little over the last few years:
> [...]
> > Finally, what the heck is wrong with datetime.now ?
>
> Surely what's wrong is the fact that it adds another item to the list
> of changes that people will complain is "too much"? The conservatism
> in Python's development is not a result of the core devs being change
> averse, or because of a policy of blocking change. Rather it's because
> *the user community* reacts so strongly when we change things, so that
> we feel that stability is what our users want, and try to achieve that
> while still balancing the need for the language to grow and develop.
>
> In a list like this, which represents only a tiny fraction of Python's
> user community, it's easy to misjudge the appetite Python's users have
> for change, because this is a self-selecting group of people who are
> interested in change. That's why the pushback on *any* proposal made
> here is to ask what benefits it gives, and why in the absence of good
> arguments for a change, "the status quo wins".
>
> Paul
>
> PS Personally, I'd love to add a lot of the ideas discussed in this
> list (although I'm "meh" about datetime.now, it's at best a minor
> annoyance). But with my "python developer" hat on I have to look
> beyond that and try to help proposers develop a good case for their
> suggestions (if indeed they do have sufficient merit). Just saying
> "yay, that sounds cool" doesn't do that, even if it's my personal
> instinct.
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Re: [Python-ideas] Consistency in naming [was Re: ...ALL CAPS] (off-list)

[Paul Moore]

On Mon, 4 Feb 2019 at 05:36, Christopher Barker  wrote:
>
> This is getting pretty off toipic, but I want to point out hat as a rule, 
> Python has been critisised more for having too MUCH cnage than too little 
> over the last few years:
[...]
> Finally, what the heck is wrong with datetime.now ?

Surely what's wrong is the fact that it adds another item to the list
of changes that people will complain is "too much"? The conservatism
in Python's development is not a result of the core devs being change
averse, or because of a policy of blocking change. Rather it's because
*the user community* reacts so strongly when we change things, so that
we feel that stability is what our users want, and try to achieve that
while still balancing the need for the language to grow and develop.

In a list like this, which represents only a tiny fraction of Python's
user community, it's easy to misjudge the appetite Python's users have
for change, because this is a self-selecting group of people who are
interested in change. That's why the pushback on *any* proposal made
here is to ask what benefits it gives, and why in the absence of good
arguments for a change, "the status quo wins".

Paul

PS Personally, I'd love to add a lot of the ideas discussed in this
list (although I'm "meh" about datetime.now, it's at best a minor
annoyance). But with my "python developer" hat on I have to look
beyond that and try to help proposers develop a good case for their
suggestions (if indeed they do have sufficient merit). Just saying
"yay, that sounds cool" doesn't do that, even if it's my personal
instinct.
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Re: [Python-ideas] Consistency in naming [was Re: ...ALL CAPS] (off-list)

[Christopher Barker]

This is getting pretty off toipic, but I want to point out hat as a rule,
Python has been critisised more for having too MUCH cnage than too little
over the last few years:

The py2 -> 3 transition
Adding "yet another" formatting option (f-strings)
Adding :=
The async stuff

Granted, these are bigger deals than changing the spelling of stdlib class,
but the point is that people want consistency as much (or more) as new
features. And changing something like the spelling of datetime buys us
exactly nothing in terms of expressiveness, etc.

Finally, what the heck is wrong with datetime.now ? making it a classmethod
keeps everything in one namespace, so you can reasonably do:

from datetime import datetime, timedelta

and be done with it.

-CHB



On Sun, Feb 3, 2019 at 9:34 AM James Lu  wrote:

> Python’s decline is in not growing.
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
> On Feb 3, 2019, at 11:20 AM, Ned Batchelder  wrote:
>
> James, you say below, "This kind of readability issue, datetime.now, is an
> example of what’s contributing to Python’s decline."
>
> Do you have any evidence of Python's decline?  Lots of metrics (albeit
> simplistic ones) point to Python growing in popularity:
>
>-
>
> https://www.techrepublic.com/article/fastest-growing-programming-language-pythons-popularity-is-still-climbing/
>-
>https://www.netguru.com/blog/why-python-is-growing-so-quickly-future-trends
>-
>
> https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2018/07/26/python-is-becoming-the-worlds-most-popular-coding-language
>
> Are there indicators we are missing?
>
> --Ned.
> On 2/2/19 11:56 PM, James Lu wrote:
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
>
> On Feb 2, 2019, at 3:41 AM, Steven D'Aprano  
>  wrote:
>
>
> On Sat, Feb 02, 2019 at 12:06:47AM +0100, Anders Hovmöller wrote:
>
>
> - the status quo means "no change", so there is no hassle there;
>
> Not quite true. There is a constant hassle of "do I need to write
> datetime.datetime.now() or datetime.now()?"
>
> My point was that there is no hassle from *making a change* if you don't
> actually make a change. (There may, or may not, be other, unrelated
> hassles.)
>
> Besides, I'm not seeing that this is any worse than any other import. Do
> I call spam.Eggs.make() or Eggs.make()? If you don't remember what you
> imported, the names don't make much difference.
>
> I accept that datetime.datetime reads a bit funny and is a bit annoying.
> If we had the keys to the time machine and could go back a decade to
> version 3.0, or even further back to 1.5 or whenever the datetime module
> was first created, it would be nice to change it so that the class was
> DateTime. But changing it *now* is not free, it has real, serious costs
> which are probably greater than the benefit gained.
>
> Why can’t we put “now” as a property of the module itself, reccomend that, 
> and formally deprecate but never actually remove datetime.datetime.now?
>
> I solved this at work by changing all imports to follow the "from
> datetime import datetime" pattern and hard banning the other
> statically in CI. But before that people suffered for years.
>
> Oh how they must have suffered *wink*
>
> I'm surprised that you don't do this:
>
> from datetime import datetime as DateTime
>
>
>
> I have a colleague who likes to point that the future is longer than
> the past. It's important to keep that perspective.
>
> Actually, no, on average, the projected lifespan of technologies,
> companies and cultural memes is about the same as their current age. It
> might last less, or it might last more, but the statistical expectation
> is about the same as the current age. So on average, "the future" is
> about the same as "the past".
>
> Python has been around not quite 30 years now, so we can expect that it
> will probably last another 30 years. But chances are not good that it
> will be around in 300 years.
>
> A big reason why projects last as long as you say they last is that the 
> maintainers get un-ambitious, they get used to relaxing in the language they 
> know so well, they are no longer keen on change.
>
> This kind of readability issue, datetime.now, is an example of what’s 
> contributing to Python’s decline.
>
> Bottom line: if someone submits a PR for this, will anyone merge it?
>
> --
> Steve
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>


-- 
Christopher Barker, PhD

Python Language Consulting
  - Teaching
  - 

Re: [Python-ideas] Consistency in naming [was Re: ...ALL CAPS] (off-list)

[James Lu]

I agree with everything all of you have said in reply to me.

Sent from my iPhone

> On Feb 3, 2019, at 7:34 PM, Ned Batchelder  wrote:
> 
>> On 2/3/19 6:01 PM, Steven D'Aprano wrote:
>> (1) Taking the group discussion off-list should be done rarely, and
>> usually only for personal messages that shouldn't be shared
>> publically, or by mutual agreement for off-topic discussions.
>> 
>> I can't see Ned's original comment in either my inbox, or at the
>> archives, so it seems that he took the discussion off-list. I don't know
>> why. It doesn't strike me as either personal or off-topic, so taking it
>> off-list seems to be both unnecessary and a little rude to the rest of
>> the group -- why were the rest of us excluded?
>> 
>> But since Ned apparently intended to take it off-list, it is only polite
>> to respect that your reply.
>> 
>> 
>> (2) The long-standing tradition is to put "OFFLIST" at the *start* of
>> the subject line, not the end where it is easy to overlook.
>> 
>> To make it even more clear, we should explicitly state that the
>> message is off-list at the top of the message.
>> 
>> (Especially if you intend the message to be confidential.)
> 
> I replied to James privately because I felt that the question of "Python's 
> decline," and James' reasons for believing it to be so, were not on-topic for 
> a list about suggestions for improving Python.  It also seemed to me that it 
> could easily devolve into an unproductive discussion for such a large group.  
> But, it was probably also of interest to the group, many of whom were 
> probably wondering the same things I was, so I can see how it could have 
> stayed in the list (where it now is.)
> 
> It also seemed to me to be a topic which could easily result in James feeling 
> at a disadvantage, being on the other side of a subjective debate from the 
> bulk of the group. I had hoped to discuss it with him in a setting that was 
> less likely to get heated.
> 
> I didn't mean to be rude to anyone.
> 
> --Ned.
> 
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Re: [Python-ideas] Consistency in naming [was Re: ...ALL CAPS] (off-list)

[Chris Angelico]

On Mon, Feb 4, 2019 at 10:02 AM Steven D'Aprano  wrote:
> (3) In the thread about improving communication, I mentioned that the
> easier it is to make comments, the more likely it is for people to make
> poor-quality comments. In my experience, posting from a phone is one of
> those tools that encourages poor-quality comments.
>
> It is each person's responsibility to either use a better communication
> tool (better does not necessarily mean more convenient) or to manage
> their own use of the tool better. I've seen too many people blame their
> tools for their own repeated mistakes: "I can't help it, it's my phone,
> it makes it too hard to do the right thing." Who is the master, them or
> their phone?

Let's see.

* You don't usually get much, if any, choice of operating system
* Even if you can get a terminal app, it doesn't get true access,
especially not root
* "Jailbreaking" your phone - that is, getting actual access to it -
generally voids your warranty

You don't own your phone. It owns you.

I don't carry a phone. Terrible UI, locked-down device, the ONLY thing
it has going for it is that it fits in your hand/pocket. I'd much
rather carry a laptop (running Debian GNU/Linux). True, my mobile
connection still comes from a device I don't have control of, but it's
JUST a network connection, using standard 802.11 to communicate with
the laptop.

ChrisA
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Re: [Python-ideas] Consistency in naming [was Re: ...ALL CAPS] (off-list)

[Steven D'Aprano]

James, Ned, and everyone else,

(I'm intentionally leaving the subject line untouched, but since James' 
message was sent to the list, I'm replying to the list.)

In another thread, you (James) asked for ways to not feel like such a 
n00b, and you attempted (with mixed success) to start a discussion about 
improving the quality of communication here.

So in the spirit of constructive criticism so that you and others can 
learn from experience and communicate better:


(1) Taking the group discussion off-list should be done rarely, and 
usually only for personal messages that shouldn't be shared 
publically, or by mutual agreement for off-topic discussions.

I can't see Ned's original comment in either my inbox, or at the 
archives, so it seems that he took the discussion off-list. I don't know 
why. It doesn't strike me as either personal or off-topic, so taking it 
off-list seems to be both unnecessary and a little rude to the rest of 
the group -- why were the rest of us excluded?

But since Ned apparently intended to take it off-list, it is only polite 
to respect that your reply.


(2) The long-standing tradition is to put "OFFLIST" at the *start* of 
the subject line, not the end where it is easy to overlook.

To make it even more clear, we should explicitly state that the 
message is off-list at the top of the message.

(Especially if you intend the message to be confidential.)


(3) In the thread about improving communication, I mentioned that the 
easier it is to make comments, the more likely it is for people to make 
poor-quality comments. In my experience, posting from a phone is one of 
those tools that encourages poor-quality comments.

It is each person's responsibility to either use a better communication 
tool (better does not necessarily mean more convenient) or to manage 
their own use of the tool better. I've seen too many people blame their 
tools for their own repeated mistakes: "I can't help it, it's my phone, 
it makes it too hard to do the right thing." Who is the master, them or 
their phone?

We're all only human and therefore make mistakes, but we ought to own 
them when we do, and learn from them, not fob responsibility off to the 
tools we choose to use.


(4) Speaking of poor-quality comments, you said "Python’s decline is in 
not growing." Do you have evidence that Python is "not growing" or did 
you just make that up?



On Sun, Feb 03, 2019 at 12:34:02PM -0500, James Lu wrote:
> Python’s decline is in not growing. 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone




-- 
Steven
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Re: [Python-ideas] Consistency in naming [was Re: ...ALL CAPS] (off-list)

[Ned Batchelder]

James, frankly, it sounds to me like you have found things you don't 
like about Python, and are frustrated that your ideas here have not been 
celebrated.  That's far from "decline."  The process for changing Python 
is fundamentally conservative, which can be frustrating.  I understand 
that.  I myself have experienced that frustration.


But claiming that Python is in decline, or that something "is the only 
real chance of having a successful Python language" is just hysteria 
that won't win over anyone.


Now you say Python isn't growing? Do you mean in features, or usage? 
Either is obviously false. Perhaps you mean that it isn't growing the 
way that you want?


There are things I would change about Python if I could, but I am not 
the BDFL, and neither are you.  Python is imperfect, because it is made 
by people, over more than 25 years, and it's got to balance competing 
demands.


It's clear that you are smart and have energy to dedicate to the future 
of Python.  I hope you find a productive way to contribute.


(Sorry for top-posting...)

--Ned.

On 2/3/19 12:34 PM, James Lu wrote:

Python’s decline is in not growing.

Sent from my iPhone

On Feb 3, 2019, at 11:20 AM, Ned Batchelder > wrote:


James, you say below, "This kind of readability issue, datetime.now, 
is an example of what’s contributing to Python’s decline."


Do you have any evidence of Python's decline?  Lots of metrics 
(albeit simplistic ones) point to Python growing in popularity:


  * 
https://www.techrepublic.com/article/fastest-growing-programming-language-pythons-popularity-is-still-climbing/
  * https://www.netguru.com/blog/why-python-is-growing-so-quickly-future-trends
  * 
https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2018/07/26/python-is-becoming-the-worlds-most-popular-coding-language

Are there indicators we are missing?

--Ned.

On 2/2/19 11:56 PM, James Lu wrote:

Sent from my iPhone


On Feb 2, 2019, at 3:41 AM, Steven D'Aprano  wrote:


On Sat, Feb 02, 2019 at 12:06:47AM +0100, Anders Hovmöller wrote:


- the status quo means "no change", so there is no hassle there;

Not quite true. There is a constant hassle of "do I need to write
datetime.datetime.now() or datetime.now()?"

My point was that there is no hassle from *making a change* if you don't
actually make a change. (There may, or may not, be other, unrelated
hassles.)

Besides, I'm not seeing that this is any worse than any other import. Do
I call spam.Eggs.make() or Eggs.make()? If you don't remember what you
imported, the names don't make much difference.

I accept that datetime.datetime reads a bit funny and is a bit annoying.
If we had the keys to the time machine and could go back a decade to
version 3.0, or even further back to 1.5 or whenever the datetime module
was first created, it would be nice to change it so that the class was
DateTime. But changing it *now* is not free, it has real, serious costs
which are probably greater than the benefit gained.

Why can’t we put “now” as a property of the module itself, reccomend that, and 
formally deprecate but never actually remove datetime.datetime.now?

I solved this at work by changing all imports to follow the "from
datetime import datetime" pattern and hard banning the other
statically in CI. But before that people suffered for years.

Oh how they must have suffered *wink*

I'm surprised that you don't do this:

from datetime import datetime as DateTime



I have a colleague who likes to point that the future is longer than
the past. It's important to keep that perspective.

Actually, no, on average, the projected lifespan of technologies,
companies and cultural memes is about the same as their current age. It
might last less, or it might last more, but the statistical expectation
is about the same as the current age. So on average, "the future" is
about the same as "the past".

Python has been around not quite 30 years now, so we can expect that it
will probably last another 30 years. But chances are not good that it
will be around in 300 years.

A big reason why projects last as long as you say they last is that the 
maintainers get un-ambitious, they get used to relaxing in the language they 
know so well, they are no longer keen on change.

This kind of readability issue, datetime.now, is an example of what’s 
contributing to Python’s decline.

Bottom line: if someone submits a PR for this, will anyone merge it?

--
Steve
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Re: [Python-ideas] Consistency in naming [was Re: ...ALL CAPS] (off-list)

[James Lu]

Python’s decline is in not growing. 

Sent from my iPhone

> On Feb 3, 2019, at 11:20 AM, Ned Batchelder  wrote:
> 
> James, you say below, "This kind of readability issue, datetime.now, is an 
> example of what’s contributing to Python’s decline."
> 
> Do you have any evidence of Python's decline?  Lots of metrics (albeit 
> simplistic ones) point to Python growing in popularity:
> 
> https://www.techrepublic.com/article/fastest-growing-programming-language-pythons-popularity-is-still-climbing/
> https://www.netguru.com/blog/why-python-is-growing-so-quickly-future-trends
> https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2018/07/26/python-is-becoming-the-worlds-most-popular-coding-language
> Are there indicators we are missing?
> 
> --Ned.
> 
>> On 2/2/19 11:56 PM, James Lu wrote:
>> Sent from my iPhone
>> 
 On Feb 2, 2019, at 3:41 AM, Steven D'Aprano  wrote:
 
> On Sat, Feb 02, 2019 at 12:06:47AM +0100, Anders Hovmöller wrote:
> 
> - the status quo means "no change", so there is no hassle there;
 Not quite true. There is a constant hassle of "do I need to write 
 datetime.datetime.now() or datetime.now()?"
>>> My point was that there is no hassle from *making a change* if you don't 
>>> actually make a change. (There may, or may not, be other, unrelated 
>>> hassles.)
>>> 
>>> Besides, I'm not seeing that this is any worse than any other import. Do 
>>> I call spam.Eggs.make() or Eggs.make()? If you don't remember what you 
>>> imported, the names don't make much difference.
>>> 
>>> I accept that datetime.datetime reads a bit funny and is a bit annoying. 
>>> If we had the keys to the time machine and could go back a decade to 
>>> version 3.0, or even further back to 1.5 or whenever the datetime module 
>>> was first created, it would be nice to change it so that the class was 
>>> DateTime. But changing it *now* is not free, it has real, serious costs 
>>> which are probably greater than the benefit gained.
>> Why can’t we put “now” as a property of the module itself, reccomend that, 
>> and formally deprecate but never actually remove datetime.datetime.now?
 I solved this at work by changing all imports to follow the "from 
 datetime import datetime" pattern and hard banning the other 
 statically in CI. But before that people suffered for years.
>>> Oh how they must have suffered *wink*
>>> 
>>> I'm surprised that you don't do this:
>>> 
>>> from datetime import datetime as DateTime
>>> 
>>> 
 I have a colleague who likes to point that the future is longer than 
 the past. It's important to keep that perspective.
>>> Actually, no, on average, the projected lifespan of technologies, 
>>> companies and cultural memes is about the same as their current age. It 
>>> might last less, or it might last more, but the statistical expectation 
>>> is about the same as the current age. So on average, "the future" is 
>>> about the same as "the past".
>>> 
>>> Python has been around not quite 30 years now, so we can expect that it 
>>> will probably last another 30 years. But chances are not good that it 
>>> will be around in 300 years.
>> A big reason why projects last as long as you say they last is that the 
>> maintainers get un-ambitious, they get used to relaxing in the language they 
>> know so well, they are no longer keen on change.
>> 
>> This kind of readability issue, datetime.now, is an example of what’s 
>> contributing to Python’s decline.
>> 
>> Bottom line: if someone submits a PR for this, will anyone merge it?
>>> -- 
>>> Steve
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