Alexander Belopolsky <alexander.belopol...@gmail.com> added the comment:
On Sun, Jan 29, 2012 at 6:42 PM, STINNER Victor <rep...@bugs.python.org> wrote: .. > What do you call a constant argument? "float" and "decimal"? > You would prefer a constant like time.FLOAT_FORMAT? > Or maybe a boolean (decimal=True)? Yes. This was explained on python-dev not so long ago: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2010-July/102100.html The problem is not with the type of the argument (although boolean or enum argument type is often a symptom pointing to the issue.) The issue is that an argument that is never given a variable value at the call site is usually a sign of an awkward API. For example, what would you prefer: math('log', x) or math.log(x) ? > > I chose a string because my first idea was to add a registry to support other > format, > maybe user defined formats, like the one used by Unicode codecs. With all my respect for MAL, codecs are not my favorite part of the python library. One possibility (still awkward IMO) would be to use the return type as the format specifier. This would at least require the user to import datetime or decimal before calling time() with corresponding format. Few users would tolerate I/O delay when they want to get time with nanosecond precision. ---------- _______________________________________ Python tracker <rep...@bugs.python.org> <http://bugs.python.org/issue13882> _______________________________________ _______________________________________________ Python-bugs-list mailing list Unsubscribe: http://mail.python.org/mailman/options/python-bugs-list/archive%40mail-archive.com
