On Thu, Apr 16, 2015 at 2:54 AM, Peter Otten <__pete...@web.de> wrote: > boB Stepp wrote: > >>> import Tkinter as tk >> >> Question: I have been using "from Tkinter import *" as suggested in >> "Programming Python" by Lutz. He remarks that unlike other situations, >> this is generally safe with Tkinter. Is there a benefit to doing the >> import as you have? > > It's a stylistic preference: I like to keep namespaces separate.
After reading your full post, you have convinced *me* this is more than stylistic preference. > When I make an exception, typically for generic functionality like > > contextmanager, groupby, namedtuple, defaultdict... > > I import these in a controlled way with > > from collections import defaultdict > from itertools import islice, zip_longest Making it very clear to anyone who comes later. > etc., use them as "pseudo-builtins", and avoid writing functions with the > same name myself. By contrast I have no clear idea of what's in the tkinter > package and might write my own getint() function, say, thus forcing a reader > to scan the complete module to learn which getint() is used. This in particular applies to me at my current stage of learning as I have only scattered knowledge of all that is in the tkinter package. > This is a general problem of star imports; when you overwrite an imported > name you typically don't care or even know about that name in the imported > module. When you read your module later to fix or amend something your > knowledge may have grown, and you expect the imported function where the > custom function is used. This confusion becomes even more likely when a > second developer is involved. You are so persuasive here that forthwith I will change to a substantially explicit format of importing! -- boB _______________________________________________ Tutor maillist - Tutor@python.org To unsubscribe or change subscription options: https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/tutor
