On Thu, 10 Nov 2011 15:37:05 -0500, Devin Jeanpierre wrote: >> '--' not being allowed for a name has *nothing* to do with exec, and >> everything to do with `--` not being a valid Python identifier. > > The only reason valid python identifiers come into it at all is because > they get pasted into a string where identifiers would go, and that > string is passed to exec().
That is patently untrue. If you were implementing namedtuple without exec, you would still (or at least you *should*) prevent the user from passing invalid identifiers as attribute names. What's the point of allowing attribute names you can't actually *use* as attribute names? You could remove the validation, allowing users to pass invalid field names, but that would be a lousy API. If you want field names that aren't valid identifiers, the right solution is a dict, not attributes. Here's a re-implementation using a metaclass: http://pastebin.com/AkG1gbGC and a diff from the Python bug tracker removing exec from namedtuple: http://bugs.python.org/file11608/new_namedtuples.diff You will notice both of them keep the field name validation. -- Steven -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
