Groups | Search | Server Info | Keyboard shortcuts | Login | Register [http] [https] [nntp] [nntps]
Groups > comp.lang.python > #69206
| References | <lgsi07$k1p$1@speranza.aioe.org> <mailman.8531.1395775491.18130.python-list@python.org> <5331D902.3030902@gmail.com> <53321819$0$29994$c3e8da3$5496439d@news.astraweb.com> <lh1g3h$meg$1@speranza.aioe.org> |
|---|---|
| From | Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> |
| Date | 2014-03-27 10:22 -0600 |
| Subject | Re: unicode as valid naming symbols |
| Newsgroups | comp.lang.python |
| Message-ID | <mailman.8626.1395937404.18130.python-list@python.org> (permalink) |
On Thu, Mar 27, 2014 at 9:28 AM, Mark H Harris <harrismh777@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Do you think that the ability to write this would be an improvement?
>>
>> import ⌺
>> ⌚ = ⌺.╩░
>> ⑥ = 5*⌺.⋨⋩
>> ❹ = ⑥ - 1
>> ♅⚕⚛ = [⌺.✱✳**⌺.❇*❹{⠪|⌚.∣} for ⠪ in ⌺.⣚]
>> ⌺.˘˜¨´՛՜(♅⚕⚛)
>
>
> Steven, you're killing me here; argument by analogy does not work!
That's not an analogy. That's an example of valid Python code if
arbitrary Unicode characters could be used to name identifiers.
> No, any unicode character (except numerals) should be able to begin a name
> identifier. alt-l λ and alt-v √ should be valid first character
> name identifier symbols.
What's a numeral? The circled numbers in the example above are
categorized as No ("Number, Other"). Currently Python only allows the
ASCII digits in numeric literals, but who's to say that ٤٢ --
categorized as Nd ("Number, Decimal Digit") shouldn't be a valid way
to write 42? ㊷ seems a bit excessive for a literal, though, so should
that be permitted to start an identifier?
>> There are languages that can allow arbitrary symbols as identifiers, like
>> Lisp and Forth. You will note that they have a certain reputation for
>> being, um, different, and although both went through periods of
>> considerable popularity, both have faded in popularity since.
>
>
> Actually, there is a recent resurgence of popularity in both common lisp
> and scheme these days. But, again, that has nothing to do with my argument.
> No modern language should limit the use of certain symbols to say, only math
> √ . The radical symbol is more often than not going to be useful only
> with math (which , by the way is why it should be built-in as √ =
> squre-rooot) but why limit its use elsewhere.
>
> Whether this can work in python is also beside the point, because I'm not
> demanding anything here either, at this point.
One of the things that Python is widely known for is its readability.
Allowing symbols such as √ to denote identifiers may be quite
expressive and appreciable to the person writing the code. However it
damages readability considerably, as seen in Steven's example above.
Personally I'm not interested in having to maintain another
programmer's code that arbitrarily uses ⌚ as a timer function, ╩ as
intersection or ░ as a matrix constructor.
Back to comp.lang.python | Previous | Next — Previous in thread | Next in thread | Find similar | Unroll thread
unicode as valid naming symbols Mark H Harris <harrismh777@gmail.com> - 2014-03-25 13:30 -0500
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols wxjmfauth@gmail.com - 2014-03-25 11:52 -0700
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Mark H Harris <harrismh777@gmail.com> - 2014-03-25 14:24 -0500
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Rustom Mody <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2014-03-25 19:16 -0700
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols MRAB <python@mrabarnett.plus.com> - 2014-03-25 19:24 +0000
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Mark H Harris <harrismh777@gmail.com> - 2014-03-25 14:29 -0500
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Marko Rauhamaa <marko@pacujo.net> - 2014-03-25 21:48 +0200
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Skip Montanaro <skip@pobox.com> - 2014-03-25 14:54 -0500
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Cameron Simpson <cs@zip.com.au> - 2014-03-26 09:16 +1100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2014-03-25 13:49 -0600
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Tim Chase <python.list@tim.thechases.com> - 2014-03-25 15:29 -0500
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Ethan Furman <ethan@stoneleaf.us> - 2014-03-25 15:47 -0700
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> - 2014-03-25 23:58 +0000
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Mark H Harris <harrismh777@gmail.com> - 2014-03-27 10:28 -0500
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Rustom Mody <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2014-03-27 08:51 -0700
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Mark H Harris <harrismh777@gmail.com> - 2014-03-27 11:03 -0500
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Gregory Ewing <greg.ewing@canterbury.ac.nz> - 2014-03-28 12:45 +1300
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols MRAB <python@mrabarnett.plus.com> - 2014-03-27 17:17 +0000
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Rustom Mody <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2014-03-27 10:53 -0700
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2014-03-27 10:22 -0600
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Rustom Mody <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2014-03-27 10:41 -0700
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2014-03-28 03:23 +1100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Antoon Pardon <antoon.pardon@rece.vub.ac.be> - 2014-03-31 11:55 +0200
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2014-03-31 11:40 -0600
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Tim Chase <python.list@tim.thechases.com> - 2014-03-31 13:02 -0500
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2014-03-31 12:10 -0600
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Antoon Pardon <antoon.pardon@rece.vub.ac.be> - 2014-03-31 21:31 +0200
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Terry Reedy <tjreedy@udel.edu> - 2014-03-31 16:12 -0400
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Terry Reedy <tjreedy@udel.edu> - 2014-03-31 16:15 -0400
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Marko Rauhamaa <marko@pacujo.net> - 2014-03-31 23:34 +0300
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2014-03-31 18:47 -0600
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols David Hutto <dwightdhutto@gmail.com> - 2014-03-31 23:58 -0400
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols David Hutto <dwightdhutto@gmail.com> - 2014-04-01 00:11 -0400
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Antoon Pardon <antoon.pardon@rece.vub.ac.be> - 2014-04-01 10:19 +0200
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2014-04-01 03:18 -0600
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Marko Rauhamaa <marko@pacujo.net> - 2014-04-01 12:32 +0300
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2014-04-01 03:58 -0600
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Marko Rauhamaa <marko@pacujo.net> - 2014-04-01 15:02 +0300
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2014-04-01 23:54 +1100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Marko Rauhamaa <marko@pacujo.net> - 2014-04-01 16:16 +0300
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2014-04-02 00:32 +1100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Marko Rauhamaa <marko@pacujo.net> - 2014-04-01 18:59 +0300
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Rustom Mody <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2014-04-01 19:58 -0700
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Rustom Mody <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2014-04-01 20:16 -0700
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Marko Rauhamaa <marko@pacujo.net> - 2014-04-02 08:55 +0300
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2014-04-01 21:39 +1100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Antoon Pardon <antoon.pardon@rece.vub.ac.be> - 2014-04-01 12:37 +0200
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2014-04-01 21:58 +1100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Antoon Pardon <antoon.pardon@rece.vub.ac.be> - 2014-04-01 13:59 +0200
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Roy Smith <roy@panix.com> - 2014-04-01 08:29 -0400
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2014-04-02 00:08 +1100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Rustom Mody <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2014-04-01 06:34 -0700
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2014-04-02 00:00 +1100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Ned Batchelder <ned@nedbatchelder.com> - 2014-04-01 09:33 -0400
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2014-04-02 00:44 +1100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Rustom Mody <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2014-04-01 06:58 -0700
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2014-04-01 09:53 -0600
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols MRAB <python@mrabarnett.plus.com> - 2014-03-26 02:56 +0000
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2014-03-26 14:09 +1100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Antoon Pardon <antoon.pardon@rece.vub.ac.be> - 2014-03-26 09:25 +0100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Antoon Pardon <antoon.pardon@rece.vub.ac.be> - 2014-03-26 09:52 +0100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2014-03-26 10:37 -0600
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Antoon Pardon <antoon.pardon@rece.vub.ac.be> - 2014-03-27 10:36 +0100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Rustom Mody <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2014-03-27 08:10 -0700
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Tim Chase <python.list@tim.thechases.com> - 2014-03-27 10:34 -0500
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols random832@fastmail.us - 2014-03-28 14:55 -0400
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Rustom Mody <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2014-03-28 22:00 -0700
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2014-03-29 16:12 +1100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Ben Finney <ben+python@benfinney.id.au> - 2014-03-29 16:32 +1100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Dennis Lee Bieber <wlfraed@ix.netcom.com> - 2014-03-29 14:11 -0400
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2014-03-30 09:01 +1100
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Gregory Ewing <greg.ewing@canterbury.ac.nz> - 2014-03-30 19:16 +1300
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Mark H Harris <harrismh777@gmail.com> - 2014-03-25 14:29 -0500
Re:unicode as valid naming symbols Dave Angel <davea@davea.name> - 2014-03-25 15:45 -0400
Re: unicode as valid naming symbols Terry Reedy <tjreedy@udel.edu> - 2014-03-25 22:26 -0400
csiph-web