Nick Coghlan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> added the comment: I have a couple of use cases for bytes-as-ASCII-text -> int, one of which also touches on floats. The other numeric types also accepting bytes as representing ASCII encoded strings would then follow from a consistency of behaviour argument.
Use case 1: Decimal implementation The simplest way to retain the 2.x series decimal performance in 3.0 is to switch the mantissa storage from a string to a bytes object. This is only possible if the int constructor accepts bytes objects and treats them as an ASCII-encoded string. Use case 2: Serial protocols with embedded ASCII text I work with a lot of control protocols for different pieces of hardware, and one way the hardware vendors avoid having to write a custom control interface for their hardware is to make their serial interface human readable (so a terminal program like Hyperterminal or Miniterm becomes their user interface). Writing automated control software for these devices is essentially an exercise in screen-scraping the ASCII strings received on the serial port. Having to go through Unicode to convert ASCII digits embedded in these strings to numbers would be a major pain. While these numbers are mostly integers, you do get the occasional floating point value turning up as well, so bytes->float can also be useful. ---------- nosy: +ncoghlan __________________________________ Tracker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> <http://bugs.python.org/issue2483> __________________________________ _______________________________________________ Python-bugs-list mailing list Unsubscribe: http://mail.python.org/mailman/options/python-bugs-list/archive%40mail-archive.com
