Fragano @ #382:
"I've no idea (being male, after all) of the extent to which this is actually true."
Hmm. Well, similar issues do apply to boys with the unrealistic body types used for male action figures/superheroes, though not quite to the same extent (as there is more than one kind of idealized male figure). It is notable that cosmetic surgery for men is on an upswing, including procedures like calf implants, as well as the use of anabolic steroids and HGH for bodybuilding.
These aren't really *new* trends, but I haven't yet seen anyone tie this all together in the popular media.
Bruce @11: Power tools aren't always the answer.
My condolences to all who are touched by his absence.
Fragano @ #297: I think he was a member of his own splinter group.
I came across a few interesting links regarding redistricting:
http://bolson.org/dist/
http://gking.harvard.edu/judgeit/
http://www.redistrictinggame.com/index.php
I find myself distracted by Larry-the-Stooge's head popping up at irregular intervals until it becomes all about watching for his next appearance. Argh.
Dave, 'partisanship' in current USA culture, is usually taken to mean 'My party, right or wrong'.
So, "I have chosen to support the party that reflects my duly considered values, you are engaged in partisan demagoguery, and he is an extremist kook."
Because each major party is so broad, they don't have policies so much as slogans (and epithets for the other side), and each major party is like a mini-parliamentary system of it's own (complete with small factions having disproportionate influence).
So "My party has a big tent, your party is beholden to special interests".
The ills you enumerate are consequence, not cause.
heresiarch @ #9: Like Jonathan Coulton! Gotta love the JoCo.
Weaving together several strands of this thread (prehistory (or rocks) and trek) I present to you Stone Trek.
Asteriod extinguishes Dinosaur
Dinosaur squishes (eats?) Mammal
Mammal diverts Asteroid?
Xopher @ #113: A telepath, of course.
xeger @ #97:
"I made the presumption, erroneously, perhaps, that the core language would include core libraries that were sufficient to many tasks."
I don't think that's an erroneous presumption, but 'many' != 'all'.
It sounds as though you're talking about the built in ConfigParser module, except I don't think it does nesting at all. There are other 3rd-party libraries available such as cfgparse, ConfigObj, and iniparse, as well as much more elaborate frameworks such as ZConfig, that are suitable for various configuration purposes. Some people want simplicity, others want features, and everyone wants *their* library included in the standard library. A single library can't satisfy everyone, and a standard library shouldn't (generally) contain competing implementations. Python is a 'batteries included' language, not a 'and the kitchen sink' language.
Meanwhile, piecing together your various statements on the problem, I'm now somewhat bemused at the idea of describing any multi-megabyte file as a 'configuration file', so I still think you may just have been trying to use the wrong tool for the job.
Since the $foo problem description is still incomplete, at this point I am no longer sure what the right tool would be, but I think we've established that using a built-in library intended for parsing simple configuration files isn't it. ;-)
xeger @ #83: But I didn't presume. I dealt with the ambiguity by giving two separate pointers.
Your statement that Python's built-in functions weren't conducing to recursive-descent parsing prompts me to note that anyone who limits themselves to Python's built-ins is missing the point of a language that has as one of it's main raisons d'être the extension of the language through libraries. Then, I'll second Bryan's recommendation of the pyparsing library. Were you trying to use regular expressions for the purpose?
As far as your being happy to have left Python behind for Java, well, that seems bizarre to me, but I am glad you found a language that suits you.
Bruce @ #87: I wasn't even thinking of anything as gnarly as run time *modification* of code (which Python can also do, of course), just run time generation. When a simple factory function can return a custom class at run time, why bother doing code-generation to accomplish the same task by writing out the equivalent source code to a file?
Apropos INTERCAL and Valgol and the attention we're giving to Python's syntactic indentation, I'll mention the Whitespace programming language: http://compsoc.dur.ac.uk/whitespace/
Bruce @ #70: It has not been my experience that the energy of highly combative debaters ever gets 'used up'.
Your point about transparent conversion to/from preferred formatting is well taken, but I'll note that imperfect round-tripping can result in spurious 'changes' that make reading diffs very hard.
"Hypothetically, is there anyone out there who would be willing to use XML if indentation was syntactic?"
Some, but probably not many. In any case, XML isn't intended to be used as a programming language (it *can* be used that way, obviously, but it shouldn't be). The affordances are different.
"I bet it makes automatic code generation annoyingly fragile."
Somewhat (or at least, your code generator can't just cut-n-paste nested bits). However, dynamic programming languages and their metaprogramming features tend to eliminate most of the need for code generation (and it's associated problems) anyway. In fact, I'd guess that Python is more often used to generate code in other languages (that lack those features) than in Python.
Xeger @ #68: So, you're looking for a Python for non-programmers introduction? How about the ones listed here: http://wiki.python.org/moin/BeginnersGuide/NonProgrammers
If you're looking for a *different* programmers intro, try http://wiki.python.org/moin/BeginnersGuide/Programmers
As for your file serialization problem, it sounds as though your code required the entire file to be in memory (and possibly mutating it several times) before writing anything to disk (as opposed to appending chunks to an existing file). There is more than one way to skin that cat, but the first thing I would try would be StringIO.
John A Arkansawyer @ #69: It's not original. Steal away.
Ah, the conversation has turned to an area in which I am confident in my expertise.
Michael Turyn @ #59: Regarding IDEs, there are several available for Python, some free, some commercial: Boa Constructor, Dr. Python, Stani's Python Editor (SPE), Eric Python IDE, PyPE, Komodo, Wing IDE, and others. Your best bet is to try them all to see which strike the best balance for you between features and simplicity[1].
Bruce Cohen @ #60: One of the main advantages of Python's syntactic indentation is that it completely eliminates a whole class of argument about indentation style (of course, you can still have arguments about naming conventions: camelCase vs. CapWords vs. underscore_separated, etc.).
The mixed tabs and spaces problem is solved by using an editor that can be set to insert spaces (typically 4) when you hit the tab key, and has a function or menu option to convert tabs to spaces. Most decent editors can be configured to treat Python files in this way.
Xeger @ #62: The best way to figure out what the 'Pythonic' approach would be is to read other people's Python code[2]. Fortunately, the standardizing effect of the syntactic indentation makes reading other people's code easier.
Regarding the documentation, are you saying that the tutorial[3] at the beginning of the Python documentation wasn't a good introduction?
Charlie @ #64: If vi is your tool of choice, I've recently found a nice GUI wrapper for it called Cream[4] that provides a 'best of both worlds' experience for some folks. I recommended it to Cory recently, but he got hung up on the lack of a 'search-and-replace within the selection only' feature[5].
[1] http://wiki.python.org/moin/IntegratedDevelopmentEnvironments
[2] http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Python/Cookbook/
[3] http://docs.python.org/tut/tut.html
[4] http://cream.sourceforge.net/
[5] http://www.boingboing.net/2007/11/16/droid-sans-mono-a-sw.html#comment-83162
I was born in 1970. I vaguely remember the Bicentennial, but given the personal turmoil in my family (that resulted in our relocation to Israel) at the time, the first clear news event I recall is Sadat's address of the Israeli Knesset in 1977, and later on, Camp David.
| Year | Number of comments posted |
|---|---|
| 2008 | 12 |
| 2007 | 19 |
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