Neil Cerutti wrote: >> On Apr 23, 1:38 pm, Antoon Pardon <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >>> The following is part of the explanation on slices in the >>> tutorial: >>> >>> The best way to remember how slices work is >> ... >>> +---+---+---+---+---+ >>> | H | e | l | p | A | >>> +---+---+---+---+---+ >>> 0 1 2 3 4 5 >>> -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 > > I object only to the word "best". I don't like the above model > because it divorces the indexes that appear in subscripts from > those that appear in slices. I 't find it complicated to think: > a[2:4] is the contiguous slice of elements starting at the gap > between element 1 and 2, and ending at the gap between element 3 > and 4. I've always found thinking of [2:4] as a half-open range > much easier. > > I suppose the above model could avoid this notational problem if > you say that a[k] means the one element slice a[k:k+1] > (technically true for strings, but false for lists), rather than > ever thinking of item indexes as pointing directly at an item. > > So I vote that the word "best" be removed.
I agree. It would be better to say that, "One way to help you understand how slices work is to think of..." -- Michael Hoffman -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
