John Roth <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: ... > and division. We've allowed ourselves to be limited by the > ASCII character set for so long that improving that seems to be > outside of most people's boxes.
APL didn't allow itself to be limited that way. Anybody who's used it can hardly be accused to keep non-ASCII characters "outside their box". And, you know what? Despite being an old APL user, I think would be a _disaster_ for Python to go that route. Yes, ASCII imposes design constraints. But constraints can be a good and helpful thing. Look for example at what classical architects and sculptors DID, within horrible technical constraints on materials and methods, and compare it with artsy modern architecture, which can use an enormously wider palette of technical approaches and materials... I think a tiny minority of today's architecture and sculpture can rightfully be compared with the masterpieces of millennia past. Similarly, highly constrained forms such as sonnet or haiku can unchain a poet's creativity in part BECAUSE of the strict constraints they impose wrt free verse or prose... Back to feet-on-ground issues, mandating a wider-than-ASCII character set would horribly limit the set of devices, as well as of software tools, usable with/for Python -- I love the fact that Python runs on cellphones, for example. Input methods for characters outside the ASCII set are always a bother, particularly to the touch-typist: even to enter Italian accented vowels, on this US keyboard, I have to go through definitely eccessive gyrations, which horribly slow down my usually very fast typing. Seeing what you're doing can sometimes be a bother too: you need to ensure the glyphs for all the characters you need are readable _and distinguishable_ in whatever font you're using. Alex -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
