On Mon, Mar 30, 2020 at 10:08:06PM -0700, Guido van Rossum wrote: > On Mon, Mar 30, 2020 at 10:00 PM Steven D'Aprano <st...@pearwood.info> > wrote: > > > > it’s optimized for a different use case than string building, > > > > It is? That's odd. The whole purpose of StringIO is to build strings.
I misspoke: it is not the *whole* purpose. See below. > > What use-case do you believe it is optimized for? > > > > Let me tell you, since I was there. > > StringIO was created in order to fit code designed to a file, where all you > want to do is capture its output and process it further, in the same > process. (Or vice versa for the reading case of course.) IOW its *primary* > feature is that it is a duck type for a file, and that is what it's > optimized for. Also note that it only applies to use cases where the data > does, indeed, fit in the process's memory somewhat easily -- else you > should probably use a temporary file. If the filesystem were fast enough > and temporary files were easier to use we wouldn't have needed it. But it does that by *building a string*, does it not? That's what the getvalue() method is for. Perhaps we're talking past each other. I'm aware that the purpose of StringIO is to offer a file-like API with an in-memory object that doesn't require external storage on the file system. (Hence my retraction above about "whole purpose".) But it still has to do this by returning a string. (In the case of writing to a StringIO object, obviously.) -- Steven _______________________________________________ Python-ideas mailing list -- python-ideas@python.org To unsubscribe send an email to python-ideas-le...@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman3/lists/python-ideas.python.org/ Message archived at https://mail.python.org/archives/list/python-ideas@python.org/message/EIZYFHFYAGQNM6I7MAJO333UHQKICEBQ/ Code of Conduct: http://python.org/psf/codeofconduct/
