In <4ba58503$0$27838$c3e8...@news.astraweb.com> Steven D'Aprano <st...@remove-this-cybersource.com.au> writes:
>On Sat, 20 Mar 2010 22:15:54 +0000, kj wrote: >> I need to create a class solely for the purpose of encapsulating a large >> number of disparate data items. >There's a built-in for that. It's called "dict". Syntax for item access >is a tiny bit different, but still very common: >data['foo'] >instead of >data.foo I find the latter more readable than the former. All those extra elements (the brackets and the quotes, vs the single dot) add Perl-like visual noise to the code, IMHO. And dicts are vulnerable to this sort of bug: data['typo'] = type(foobar) Also, AFAIK, initialization of a dictionary is never as simple as i = myclass(*fields) But in a sense you're right: aside from these objections, *functionality-wise* what I'm looking for is not very different from a dictionary, or a C struct. >> At the moment I have no plans for any >> methods for this class other than the bazillion accessors required to >> access these various instance variables. >Huh? If you have instance variables, why don't you refer to them by name? I'm sorry, I used the wrong terminology. I see now that the correct term is "(instance) attribute", not "instance variable". >Leave the repetitive accessor code out. Python isn't Java. >http://dirtsimple.org/2004/12/python-is-not-java.html Thanks for the link! The bit about "Guido's time machine" is pretty funny. ~K -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
