On 2012-04-21, Kiuhnm wrote:
>> Returning a None-value is pretty useless. Why not returning self, which
>> would be
>> the resulting list in this case? Returning self would make the
>> language a little bit more functional, without any drawback.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>>
>> Then nested calls like
>>
>> a = [].append('x').append('y').append('z')
>
> You just answered to your own question: append returns None so that
> people can't use it the way you did.
That is one possible way to design the method, but not the only
possible way.
> You make the reader believe that you're adhering to the functional
> paradigm whereas 'append' has actually side effects!
> Moreover, you use an assignment just to reinforce this wrong belief.
I know about side effects and I know that letting append return self
would not make Python a purely functional language with only immutable
data.
I just asked a simple question about a detail I personally would
consider it to be useful.
Please no further religious war about that ;-)
Bernd
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haben - und Geld." [Friedrich Nietzsche]
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