Path: csiph.com!fu-berlin.de!uni-berlin.de!not-for-mail
From: Vincent Davis <vincent@vincentdavis.net>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.python
Subject: Try: rather than if :
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 2015 15:38:05 -0700
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Xref: csiph.com comp.lang.python:100433

In the code below try is used to check if handle has the attribute name. It
seems an if statement could be used. Is there reason one way would be
better than another?

def write_header(self):
    handle = self.handle
    try:
        handle.write("# Report_file: %s\n" % handle.name)
    except AttributeError:
        pass
    handle.write("########################################\n")

The specific use case I noticed this was
https://github.com/biopython/biopython/blob/master/Bio/AlignIO/EmbossIO.py#L38

Vincent Davis