Ben Sizer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
>> Yeah, I use it from time to time:
>>
>> for foo in bar:
>> if foo matches some condition:
>> print "sail to tahiti!"
>> break
>> else:
>> print "abandon ship!"
>
>As a C++ programmer (which I'm sure undermines my argument before
>you've even read it...), this feels 'backwards' to me. Although I am no
>purist, the 'else' typically implies failure of a previous explicit
>condition, yet in this case, it's executed by default, when the
>previous clause was successfully executed. It would seem more natural
>if the else clause was triggered by 'bar' being empty, [ ... ]
It does:
>>> for foo in []:
... print foo
... else:
... print 'else'
...
else
I think it's clearer to see by comparing while with if:
if False:
do nothing
else:
do something
while False:
do nothing
else:
do something
and getting to the for behaviour from while is trivial.
That said, I've not had much call for it and was kind of surprised to
find myself writing a genuine for ... else the other week. But it was
the obvious way to do the task at hand, and I was happy it was there.
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