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Re: Fear and suspicion of lambdas, was Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions

From Ben Finney <ben+python@benfinney.id.au>
Newsgroups comp.lang.python
Subject Re: Fear and suspicion of lambdas, was Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions
Date 2016-07-02 11:52 +1000
Message-ID <mailman.7.1467424342.2295.python-list@python.org> (permalink)
References (3 earlier) <nl2hh5$ar7$1@ger.gmane.org> <87poqx96ul.fsf@handshake.de> <mailman.153.1467356702.2358.python-list@python.org> <87bn2h85rn.fsf@bsb.me.uk> <8537nsvmbc.fsf@benfinney.id.au>

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Ben Bacarisse <ben.usenet@bsb.me.uk> writes:

> By replying I'm not accepting the premise -- I have no idea if there
> is widespread fear and suspicion of lambdas among Python users but it
> seems unlikely.

I can testify, as the person who started this thread, that there is no
fear or suspicion of lambda here. I use it quite frequently without
qualm for creating self-explanatory functions that need no name.

Rather, the motivation was that a complex thing, with many moving parts,
has an unexplained implementation: a nested set of functions without
names to explain their part in the pattern.

That these are then immediately bound to a name, to me defeats the
purpose of using lambda in the first place. If you want a named
function, lambda is not the tool to reach for; we have the ‘def’
statement for that.

But by using ‘lambda’ the author avoided one of the more important parts
of publishing the code: making it readable and self-explanatory. If
they'd chosen a name for each function, that would at least have
prompted them to explain what they're doing.

So ‘lambda’ is great, and I use it without worry for creating simple
self-explanatory nameless functions. But it's not the right tool for
this job: This is not self-explanatory, and the component functions
should not be nameless.

-- 
 \       “It is forbidden to steal hotel towels. Please if you are not |
  `\          person to do such is please not to read notice.” —hotel, |
_o__)                                               Kowloon, Hong Kong |
Ben Finney

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Thread

Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Ben Finney <ben+python@benfinney.id.au> - 2016-06-28 15:02 +1000
  Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Paul Rubin <no.email@nospam.invalid> - 2016-06-27 23:08 -0700
  Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> - 2016-06-28 18:39 +1000
  Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Lawrence D’Oliveiro <lawrencedo99@gmail.com> - 2016-06-29 19:43 -0700
    Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Steven D'Aprano <steve@pearwood.info> - 2016-06-30 13:49 +1000
    Fear and suspicion of lambdas, was Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Peter Otten <__peter__@web.de> - 2016-06-30 09:25 +0200
      Re: Fear and suspicion of lambdas, was Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Lawrence D’Oliveiro <lawrencedo99@gmail.com> - 2016-06-30 00:43 -0700
        Re: Fear and suspicion of lambdas, was Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> - 2016-06-30 18:00 +1000
        Re: Fear and suspicion of lambdas, was Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Peter Otten <__peter__@web.de> - 2016-06-30 10:41 +0200
    Re: Fear and suspicion of lambdas, was Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions dieter <dieter@handshake.de> - 2016-07-01 09:04 +0200
      Re: Fear and suspicion of lambdas, was Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Ben Bacarisse <ben.usenet@bsb.me.uk> - 2016-07-01 21:25 +0100
        Re: Fear and suspicion of lambdas, was Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Ben Finney <ben+python@benfinney.id.au> - 2016-07-02 11:52 +1000
        Re: Fear and suspicion of lambdas, was Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions dieter <dieter@handshake.de> - 2016-07-02 08:57 +0200
        Re: Fear and suspicion of lambdas, was Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Ben Finney <ben+python@benfinney.id.au> - 2016-07-02 18:00 +1000
  Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Lawrence D’Oliveiro <lawrencedo99@gmail.com> - 2016-06-29 19:50 -0700
  Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Lawrence D’Oliveiro <lawrencedo99@gmail.com> - 2016-07-01 15:08 -0700
    Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2016-07-01 23:09 -0600
      Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Lawrence D’Oliveiro <lawrencedo99@gmail.com> - 2016-07-01 23:40 -0700
        Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2016-07-02 22:48 -0600
          Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Lawrence D’Oliveiro <lawrencedo99@gmail.com> - 2016-07-02 22:37 -0700
            Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2016-07-03 05:52 -0600
              Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Lawrence D’Oliveiro <lawrencedo99@gmail.com> - 2016-07-03 14:17 -0700
                Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2016-07-03 16:38 -0600
                Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Lawrence D’Oliveiro <lawrencedo99@gmail.com> - 2016-07-03 16:25 -0700
                Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2016-07-04 09:39 +1000
                Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Lawrence D’Oliveiro <lawrencedo99@gmail.com> - 2016-07-03 16:59 -0700
                Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2016-07-04 10:06 +1000
                Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Lawrence D’Oliveiro <lawrencedo99@gmail.com> - 2016-07-03 17:23 -0700
                Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2016-07-03 18:01 -0600
                Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Lawrence D’Oliveiro <lawrencedo99@gmail.com> - 2016-07-03 17:06 -0700
                Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2016-07-03 18:20 -0600
    Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Ben Finney <ben+python@benfinney.id.au> - 2016-07-02 15:32 +1000
    Re: Meta decorator with parameters, defined in explicit functions Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2016-07-01 23:53 -0600

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