Ask HN: What's your favorite Python quirk?

#1

Post by wampler » Sat, Jun 18, 2016, 1:40 PM UTC

Any unusual or unexpected feature of the language

Re: Ask HN: What's your favorite Python quirk?

#2

Post by jordigh » Sat, Jun 18, 2016, 1:42 PM UTC

There's a nice list here:

https://github.com/cosmologicon/pywat

Here's another one. Compare "x = 256; y = 256; x is y" with "x = 257" (enter) "y = 257" (enter) "x is y" with "x = 257; y = 257; x is y". It makes a difference whether x and y are assigned on the same line or not. From here:

http://glasnt.com/blog/2016/05/28/on-language-oddities.html

Re: Ask HN: What's your favorite Python quirk?

#3

Post by wampler » Sat, Jun 18, 2016, 1:45 PM UTC

jordigh wrote: post #2

There's a nice list here: https://github.com/cosmologicon/pywat Here's another one. Compare "x = 256; y = 256; x is y" with "x = 257" (enter) "y = 257" (enter) "x is y" with "x = 257; y = 257; x is y". It makes a difference whether x and y are assigned on the same line or not. From here: http://glasnt.com/blog/2016/05/28/on-language-oddities.html

Thanks for sharing!

Re: Ask HN: What's your favorite Python quirk?

#4

Post by wampler » Sat, Jun 18, 2016, 1:47 PM UTC

Abusing locals() - learnt it from @jroller

def foo(): """ >>> foo() {'a': 1, 'c': 3, 'b': 2} """ a = 1 b = 2 c = 3 return locals()

Re: Ask HN: What's your favorite Python quirk?

#5

Post by probinso » Mon, Jun 20, 2016, 7:18 AM UTC

My favorite quirk was deprecated.

Python 2.x

def function(a, (b, c)): # pattern extract matches a strictly two-elements

Python 3.x

def function(a, b_c): # not as clean, nor as expressive