> However I still don't believe "global" has the stretchiness in its > meaning that you claim it has. Have you ever heard a Python programmer > talking about closures use the word "global variable"?
I guess the term I've heard most often is "free variable," but I wouldn't be surprised if I saw the term "global" used to describe a free variable. However, I should point out that Dijkstra used "global" in a similar way in his 1971 book "A Discipline of Programming." The program examples in that book are in a language he devised for the purpose; one of the language's features is that every variable used in every block must be explicitly declared, even if it is taken from a surrounding block. If I remember correctly, the terms he used for variables taken from a surrounding block and variables defined and used in the same block were "global" and "private," respectively. _______________________________________________ Python-Dev mailing list Python-Dev@python.org http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-dev Unsubscribe: http://mail.python.org/mailman/options/python-dev/archive%40mail-archive.com