[Python-Dev] PEP 257 and init (original) (raw)

Guido van Rossum guido at python.org
Sun Jan 3 18:21:32 EST 2016

On Tue, Dec 29, 2015 at 1:03 PM, Facundo Batista <facundobatista at gmail.com> wrote:

On Tue, Dec 29, 2015 at 4:38 PM, Andrew Barnert <abarnert at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Isn't the same thing true for every special method? There are lots of classes where add just says "a.add(b) = a + b" or (better following the PEP) "Return self + value." But, in the rare case where the semantics of "a + b" are a little tricky (think of "a / b" for pathlib.Path), where else could you put it but add? > > Similarly, for most classes, there's only one of init or new, and the construction/initialization semantics are simple enough to describe in one line of the class docstring--but when things are more complicated and need to be documented, where else would you put it? Yeap. Note that I'm ok to include a docstring when the actual behaviour would deviate from the expected one as per Reference Docs. My point is to not make it mandatory.

> I usually just don't bother. You can violate PEP 257 when it makes sense, just like PEP 8. They're just guidelines, not iron-clad rules. Yeap, but pep257 (the tool [0]) complains for init, and wanted to know how serious was it. [0] https://pypi.python.org/pypi/pep257

That is the tool's fault. I personally hate with a vengeance that there are tools named after style guide PEPs that claim to enforce the guidelines from those PEPs. The tools' rigidity and simplicity reflects badly on the PEPs, which try hard not to be rigid or simplistic.

-- --Guido van Rossum (python.org/~guido) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/attachments/20160103/1a47a3a4/attachment.html>

More information about the Python-Dev mailing list