Steven D'Aprano, 13.03.2011 13:59:
The removal of cmp from the sort method of lists is probably the most
disliked change in Python 3. On the python-dev mailing list at the
moment, Guido is considering whether or not it was a mistake.
If anyone has any use-cases for sorting with a comparison function that
either can't be written using a key function, or that perform really
badly when done so, this would be a good time to speak up.
As Raymond Hettinger and Daniel Stutzbach pointed out in that thread, the
memory overhead is much lower in Python 3.2 and also depends on the usage.
If memory is a problem, it can still be traded for time by sorting in
multiple (stable) passes with smaller keys. It rarely is a problem in
practice, though, and Guido's initial post seems to suggest that as well.
Stefan
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