Re:

[C.L.]

James Stroud jstroud at mbi.ucla.edu writes:
 
 C.L. wrote:
  I was looking for a function or method that would return the index to the
  first matching element in a list. ...
  ... __please don't be overly defensive__ ...
 
 The amount of typing wasted to defend design decisions such as this can 
 boggle one's mind. Just use lists unless you have on overwhelming reason 
 to do otherwise.
 
 James


Read the quote. I *am* using a list.

That doesn't change the fact that this is unfriendly design. It's an ugly
inconsistent chunk of a Python's past in which built-in types didn't behave like
objects. It sticks out like a sore thumb, maybe just not very often.

Oh, and thanks for the insulting tone of your anticipated response. Have you
anything better to do with your time than wasting bytes writing empty responses
to what you already deem a waste of typing?

*sighs* just what I expected: another idle troll defending something just for
the sake of defending it. On the other hand, thanks 7stud, for the truly helpful
response.

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index method only for mutable sequences??

[C.L.]

I was looking for a function or method that would return the index to the first
matching element in a list. Coming from a C++ STL background, I thought it might
be called find. My first stop was the Sequence Types page of the Library
Reference (http://docs.python.org/lib/typesseq.html); it wasn't there. A search
of the Library Reference's index seemed to confirm that the function did not
exist. A little later I realized it might be called index instead. Voila.

My point is that the docs list and describe it as a method that only exists for
MUTABLE sequences. Why only for mutables? The class of objects I would expect it
to cover would be all ordered sequences, or, to phrase it a little more
pointedly, anything that supports ordered INDEXing. My understanding is that
dict's don't fall into that class of objects since their ordering is not
documented or to be depended on. However, tuple's do support ordered indexing,
so why don't tuple's have an index method?

P.S.: I know I haven't yet gotten an answer to my why question yet, but,
assuming it's just an oversight or an example of design without the big picture
in mind, an added benefit to fixing that oversight would be that the index
method's documentation could be moved from the currently odd seeming location on
the Mutable Sequence Types page to a place someone would look for it 
logically.

P.P.S.: As much as the elementary nature of my question would make it seem, this
isn't my first day using Python. I've used it on and off for several years and I
LOVE Python. It is only because of my love for the language that I question its
ways, so please don't be overly defensive when I guess that the cause for this
possible oversight is a lack of design.

Corey Lubin


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