[Python-ideas] textFromMap(seq , map=None , sep='' , ldelim='', rdelim='') (original) (raw)

Masklinn masklinn at masklinn.net
Mon Oct 25 16:10:56 CEST 2010

On 2010-10-25, at 15:49 , spir wrote:

Hello,

A recommended idiom to construct a text from bits -- usually when the bits themselves are constructed by mapping on a sequence -- is to store the intermediate results and then only join() them all at once. Since I discovered this idiom I find myself constantly use it, to the point of having a func doing that in my python toolkit: def textFromMap(seq , map=None , sep='' , ldelim='',rdelim=''): if (map is None): return "%s%s%s" %(ldelim , sep.join(str(e) for e in seq) , rdelim) else: return "%s%s%s" %(ldelim , sep.join(str(map(e)) for e in seq) , rdelim) Example use: class LispList(list): def repr(self): return textFromMap(self , repr , ' ' , '(',')') print LispList([1, 2, 3]) # --> (1 2 3) Is there any similar routine in Python? If yes, please inform me off list and excuse the noise. Else, I wonder whether such a routine would be useful as builtin, precisely since it is a common and recommended idiom. The issues with not having it, according to me, are that the expression is somewhat complicated and, more importantly, hardly tells the reader what it means & does -- even when "unfolded" into 2 or more lines of code: elements = (map(e) for e in seq) elementTexts = (str(e) for e in elements) content = sep.join(elementTexts) text = "%s%s%s" %(ldelim , content , rdelim) I really am not sure you gain so much over the current sep.join(str(map(e)) for e in seq)), even with the addition of ldelim and rdelim which end-up in arguments-soup/noise (5 arguments in the worst case is quite a lot).

The name is also strange, and hints at needing function composition more than a new builtin.

3. A method for iterables (1) seq.textFromMap(...) (I personly find the latter more correct semantically (2).)

(2) I think the same about join: should be "seq.join(sep)" since for me the object on which the method applies is seq, not sep. This is also the choice of e.g. Ruby, but it has a severe limitation: Python doesn't have any Iterable type, yet join can be used with any iterable including generators or callable-iterators. Thus you can not put it on the iterable or sequence, or you have to prepare some kind of iterable mixin. This issue might be solved/solvable via the new abstract base classes, but I'm so sure about it (do you explicitly have to mix-in an abc to use its methods?).

In fact, Ruby 1.8 does have that limitation (though it's arguably not the worst limitation ever): Array#join exists but not Enumerable#join. They tried to add Enumerable#join in 1.9.1 (though a fairly strange, recursive version of it) then took it out then added it back again (or something, I got lost around there). And in any case since there is no requirement for enumerable collections to mix Enumerable in, you can have enumerable collections with no join support.

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