[Python-Dev] str with base (original) (raw)

"Martin v. Löwis" martin at v.loewis.de
Tue Jan 17 09:21:59 CET 2006

Alex Martelli wrote:

Is it finally time in Python 2.5 to allow the "obvious" use of, say, str(5,2) to give '101', just the converse of the way int('101',1) gives 5? I'm not sure why str has never allowed this obvious use -- any bright beginner assumes it's there and it's awkward to explain why it's not!-).

My main concern is what the impact on str would be. It seems "obvious" that

def str(obj, *args): return obj.str(*args)

because it is ultimately int's responsibility to interpret the base argument, not str's.

People would then come up with use cases like

class Color: msg = {'en':['red', 'green', 'blue'], 'de':['rot','grün','blau']} def str(self, language='en'): return self.msg[language][self.value]

red = Color(0)

so you could say

print str(red, 'de')

I don't think I like this direction.

Regards, Martin

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