It would be helpful if the rules of the game were spelled out more clearly.
The conditional expression is defined as X if C else Y. We don't know the precedence of the "if" operator. From the little test below, it seem to have a lower precedence than "or". Thus, it is desirable for the user to put the conditional expression in parentheses. Colin W. # condExpr.py # PEP 308 defines a conditional expression as X if C else Y # but we don't know exactly what X is supposed to be. # It doesn't seem to be spelled out in the syntax. def main(): names= ['abc', 'def', '_ghi', 'jkl', '_mno', 'pqrs'] res= '' for w in names: res= res + w if w[0] != '_' else '' z= 1 print 'res1:', res res= '' for w in names: res= res + (w if w[0] != '_' else '') z= 1 print 'res2:', res if __name__ == '__main__': main() Result: [Dbg]>>> res1: pqrs res2: abcdefjklpqrs -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list