On Fri, 05 Nov 2010 22:51:10 +0000, Seebs wrote: >> IMHO, the lack of a reference manual for the language itself is a major >> hole in Python's documentation. > > I'm a bit lost here. Could you highlight some of the differences between > "a reference manual for the language itself" and "something written for > language lawyers"?
A reference manual tells you how to use the language. A specification tells you how to implement it. It's possible to /deduce/ how to use the language from a specification, but it could take significant time and effort. A specification is typically designed to be read in its entirety, and may yield little usable information until you've read a substantial portion of it. A reference manual is structured such that you can easily locate the portion which is necessary for the task immediately to hand, and only need to read that portion. OTOH, a tutorial typically isn't exhaustive. And even if it is, the information related to a topic may be scattered throughout multiple sections, making it hard to find a specific piece of information. E.g. the syntax of expressions adheres rather rigidly to the grammar used for parsing, which is fine for a specification, but not how a reference manual would normally be written. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
