> It will delete the *name* `item`. It does nothing to the object that was > bound to that name. If the name was the only reference to that object, it > may be garbage collected sooner or later. Read the documentation for the > `__del__()` method for more details and why implementing such a method > increases the chance that the object *won't* be garbage collected! > > Relying on the `__del__()` method isn't a good idea because there are no > really hard guaranties by the language if and when it will be called.
Ok, I gave a look at the docs and, in fact, relying on __del__ doesn't look like a good idea. Changing the code as to add an explicit method that closes dangling filehandles is easy. It would be somehow nice because -since that method would be added to a plugin API- it *forces* people writing plugins to ensure a way to close their dangling files, and this may be useful for a lot of future purposes. However I'd also like to track references to my objects -this would help debugging a lot. How can I do that? -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list