[Python-Dev] Please review PEP 278 (original) (raw)

[Python-Dev] Please review PEP 278 - Universal newline support

Greg Ward gward@python.net
Fri, 8 Mar 2002 10:41:33 -0500

[Jack]

PEP 278 has been quietly sitting there with nothing much happening, after some initial discussion with two or three people.

First question: would people please review it, and preferrably also test it (esp. windows and linux are platforms on which I would like to see it tested).

+1 on handling any type of newline in Python source. Does this mean fixing the crock where the lexer can handle foreign newlines in files, but not in strings. (Haven't looked at your code, and it probably wouldn't help; I spent many hours staring at the lexer a year or two ago and I never understood what was going on with newlines until Guido explained it at IPC10. Sigh.)

+1 on optionally exposing the ability to handle any type of newline in an input file.

-1 on this being a configure-time option -- language features should not be selectable when the interpreter is built, or portability goes out the window!

-1 on using a file mode character that conflicts with existing conventions (eg. if "t" really is already used on Windows, find something else).

I guess that averages out to a nice big round 0 on the PEP overall. Don't be discouraged, it sounds like you're on the right track to me!

This'll be one for the press release: "New in Python 2.3! Python can now handle newlines and timezones!!" ;->

    Greg

-- Greg Ward - just another Python hacker gward@python.net http://starship.python.net/~gward/ Pointers are Arrays; Code is Data; Time is Money