PyCon day 2: Notes from the GuidoNote@Lunch

by jesse in ,

Guido talked at length about Py3k today at lunch - I took a ton of notes, most of them raw for re-processing to our internal python group at work, but if you're wondering about some of the highlights and information - feel free to read them (warning, they're long). Py3k: Return to Python Mountain makes me very excited to be part of this community at this time and being able to experience (and maybe contribute) to the growth of a language.

Of course, You could also simply read (instead of my notes):

Onto my notes:

  • Classes:
    • classes() (old)
    • class(object) (new)
      • both will return type "class"
  • Print:
    • print becomes a function
    • print x, y versus print(x, y)
    • print x, versus print(x, end=" ")
    • print >>f,x versus print(x, file=f)
  • Dictionary views
    • Inspired by Java Collections Framework
    • Remove iterkeys() iteritems() itervalues()
    • Change .keys(), .items(), .values()
    • These now return a dict view (java map)
      • not an iterator
      • a lightweight object that can be iterated repeatedly
      • .keys(), .items() have set semantics
      • .values() has collection semantics
        • supports iteration and not much else
    • My note: This is much, much cleaner than what we have now.
  • Default Comparison Changes
    • Default ==, != compare object identity
    • Default , >= raises TypeError
      • Example: [1,2,""].sort() raises TypeError
      • Rationale: 2.x default ordering is bogus
  • Unicode String (not implemented)
    • Java Like model
      • string are always unicode, one str type, unicode
      • separate bytes type
      • must explicitly specify encoding to go between these
      • Open issues:
        • implementation
        • fixed width chars for O(1) indexing
        • maybe 3 internal widths: 1,2,4 byte characters
        • C API issues (many C APIS use C char* pointers)
          • optimize slicing and concatenation??
  • Bytes type (new)
    • mutable sequence o small ints (0-255)
    • b[0] is an int, b[:1] is a new bytes object
    • implemented efficiently as an unsigned char[]
    • has some list-like methods, e.g. extend()
    • has some string-like methods, e.g. find()
      • but none that depend on locale
    • bytes literals: b"ascii or \xDD or 12
  • New I/O Library
    • stackable component inspired by Java/Perl
    • lowest level unbuffered byte I/O
    • platform specific, don't use C stdio
    • add buffering
    • add unicode encoding/decoding
    • add CRLF/mapping
  • Compatible API
    • open(fnam) returns buffered text file
    • .read(), .readlines() return strings
    • open(name, 'b') returns buffered binary file
      • cannot user readlines() here.
  • Int/Long unification
    • Only one integer type
    • it's name is int
    • it's implementation is like long in py 2.5
    • C API is murky
    • Performance could use a boost.
  • Int division returns a float now
    • Always
    • same effect in 2.x with
    • from __future__ import division
    • use // for int division
    • use -Q option to Python 2.x to find old usage
  • Raise and Except changes
    • all exceptions must derive from BaseException
    • exceptions habve __traceback__ attr
    • must use raise E(arg) instead of raise E, arg
    • can still use raise E and raise without args
    • Use raise E(arg).with_traceback(tb)
    • instead of raise E, arg, tb
    • Use "except E as v:" instead of except E, v:
      • Variable v is deleted at the end of the except block!!!
      • this is going to get garbage collected/nuked
  • Signature Annotations
    • Not declarations
    • example:
      • def foo(x: "what", y: list(range(3))) -> 42*2:...
    • argument syntax is roughly
    • NAME [':' expr] ['=' expr]
    • Both expressions are evaluated at def time
    • foo.func_annotations is
      • {'a': 'what', 'b': [0,1,2], "return": 84}
    • Self note: You can use these for type checking.
    • no other use is made of these annotations
  • Keyword-Only parameters
    • example def:
      • def foo(a,b=1,*,c=42,d):...
    • example call:
    • foo(1,2,d=3)
    • cannot use:
    • foo(1,2,3) # raises TypeError
    • left of the star is positional args, can use keyword if you want
  • Set literals
    • {1,2,3} is the same as set([1,2,3])
    • no empty set literal, use set()
    • no frozenset literal, use frozenset()
    • Adding set comprehension's
      • {f(x) for x in S if P(x)}
      • result is a set
  • Absolute Import
    • within a package "import foo" does NOT search the package path,
    • only sys.path
    • use from . import foo for relative import
    • or use from import foo
    • In 2.4, if you have package P, and have a function named string, it
    • will import the local string - not the standard lib. The new
    • import . string is a literal "USE MINE" call
    • from __future__ import absolute_import in 2.5
  • String formatting
    • SEE PEP 3101
    • "See {0}, {1} and {foo}".format("a", "b", foo="c")
    • Shoe Size {0:8}.format(42)
      • :8 is a type specific piece for formatting, decimal places, empty chars
    • Borrowed this from .NET style
    • Dict example:
      • name {0[name]}.format({name:fred})
  • Nonlocal Statement

def outer(): x = 42 def inner(): nonlocal x #

  • See pep 3104
  • Abstract Base Classes
    • No pep yet, highly speculative
    • introduce a standard abstract class hierarchy for type categories like
    • file, container, sequence, etc
    • Standard types to use these as base classes to the object(s)
    • User defined types MAY USE THESE
    • When used, can help distinguish e.g. sequence from mapping or
    • file-like behavior or stringiness or numer-icity, etc
    • this allows you to "trick" a certain amount of type-iness into
    • anything you write (mainly large frameworks)
  • Misc Changes:
    • exec becomes a function again
    • range() becomes xrange()
    • input() becomes raw_input()
    • zip() returns an iterator
    • moved intern() into sys module
    • Renamed __nonzero__ o __bool__
    • 'as' and 'with' are keywords
    • More incoming, already implemented.
  • Misc Removals:
    • classic classes:new style classes default
    • back ticks, use repr()
    • removed : use !=
    • apply(): use func(*args)
    • coerce(), __coerce__: not needed
    • dict.has_key gone
  • Library Reforms
    • Guido not involved in this
    • others are interested effort stalled
    • need help here
    • may happend after 3.0a1
  • C API Changes
    • too early to tell
    • 3 party extensions authors want to know
    • For now, simple rules:
      • Adding APIs is okay
      • Deleting is OK
      • Changing APIs incompatibility is NOT okay
  • Converting 2.x Code to 3.0
    • generic conversion tool exists
    • sandbox/2to3
    • accuate source-to-source transformation
    • parse tree decorated with whitespace and comments
    • New conversions are easily added
      • create a class from boilerplate
      • add a class variable PATTERN to match nodes
      • add a method transform() to transform one node
    • Separately, Python 2.6 will help
      • can warn about out-of-date usages
      • not on by default, optionally enabled
      • can provide forward-compatible alternatives
  • What you can do to prepare
    • use 2.6
    • derive all exceptions from Exception
    • derive all classes from object
Comment