Brian van den Broek wrote:
Raymond Hettinger said unto the world upon 2005-03-18 20:24:
I would like to get everyone's thoughts on two new dictionary methods:
def appendlist(self, key, *values): try: self[key].extend(values) except KeyError: self[key] = list(values)
For appendlist, I would have expected
def appendlist(self, key, sequence): try: self[key].extend(sequence) except KeyError: self[key] = list(sequence)
The original proposal reads better at the point of call when values is a single item. In my experience this will be the typical usage:
d.appendlist(key, 'some value')
as opposed to your proposal which has to be written d.appendlist(key, ['some value'])
The original allows values to be a sequence using d.appendlist(key, *value_list)
Kent
Right. I did try the alternatives out and get the issue you point to.
But:
1) In my own code, cases where I'd use the proposed appendlist method are typically cases where I'd want to add multiple items that have already been collected in a sequence. But, since I've little coding under my belt, I concede that considerations drawn from my experience are not terribly probative. :-)
2) Much more important, IMHO, is that the method name `appendlist' really does suggest it's a list that will be appended. Hence my stated expectation. While it would make the method name longer, given the original interface Raymond posted, I would find appendtolist more transparent.
out-of-my-depth-ly y'rs,
Brian vdB
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