Chris Angelico, 27.06.2012 13:02: > On Wed, Jun 27, 2012 at 8:25 PM, Christian Tismer wrote: >> I think, for the small importance of the print statement in code, it >> would have made the transition easier, if python 3 was as flexible >> as python 2.7, with a symmetric >> >> "from __past__ import print_statement" construct. > > For how long? Will Python require, in perpetuity, the code to support > this? Must the print statement be enhanced when the print function is? > What about bug fixes? How much dev time is required to enable backward > compatibility past a boundary across which backward compatibility was > not promised? And if there's a limit to the duration of this __past__ > directive, when should it be and what should happen after that point? > > Much easier to simply say no.
I concur. For supporting something that shouldn't have been there in the first place, such as a print statement in production code, it's way too much overhead to keep it working despite of significant changes in the I/O layer that went into Python 3.x, including the removal of the soft-space "feature". For comparison, the revival of the "u" string prefix in Py3.3 is a simple change in the parser grammar that's easy to maintain but that has a huge impact on the Py3 compatibility of code that accepts to drop support for Py2.5 and earlier (as well as Py3.[012]) but wants to keep working in Py2.[67] (which supports the opposite "b" prefix). We've been supporting that in Cython for a while and it worked out really well so far. Stefan -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
