[Python-Dev] code blocks using 'for' loops and generators (original) (raw)

Steven Bethard steven.bethard at gmail.com
Sun Mar 13 02:01:50 CET 2005

Brian Sabbey <sabbey at u.washington.edu> wrote:

I agree that this is a confusing way to use generators. But it is the expected way to use "code blocks" as found in other languages. It would take some getting used to that 'for' can be used this way, but I think it would be worth it.

I guess I need some more convincing... I don't find your approach[*], e.g.

def pickled_file(name): f = open(name, 'r') data yield pickle.load(f) f.close() f = open(name, 'w') pickle.dump(data, f) f.close()

for data in pickled_file('greetings.pickle'): data.append('hello') data.append('howdy') continue data

any clearer than, say:

class PickledFile(object): def init(self, name): self.name = name f = open(self.name, 'r') self.data = pickle.load(f) f.close() def close(self): f = open(self.name, 'w') pickle.dump(self.data, f) f.close()

p = PickledFile('greetings.pickle') p.data.extend(['hello', 'howdy']) p.close()

Note that I'm not using the iteration construct (for-in) because I'm not really doing an iteration here. Pehaps I could be taught to read for-in otherwise, but without an obvious benefit for doing so, I'm really not inclined to.

Steve

[*] I've renamed your "l" to "data". The first time I read your post, it looked even more confusing to me because "l" (lower case L) is rendered too similarly to "|" (or-bar) in my browser.

You can wordify anything if you just verb it. --- Bucky Katt, Get Fuzzy

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