Albert van der Horst writes:
> Useful as that function [Python's max with a key] may be, it
> shouldn't have been called max.
The meaning of the key should be added to help(max), if it still isn't
- "returns a maximal element or an element that maximizes the key".
In some communities they call it arg max, with a thin space between
the components of the name. Or maybe no space: argmax.
Would you also want sorted called something else when used with a key?
Because it doesn't produce a sorted list of the keys either:
>>> data = ("short", "long", "average")
>>> sorted(data, key=len)
['long', 'short', 'average']
>>> max(data, key=len)
'average'
>>> sorted(map(len, data))
[4, 5, 7]
>>> max(map(len, data))
7
While the key is not a filter, a filter is as available as the map
above:
>>> max(filter(lambda i : i % 17 == 0, range(100, 200)))
187
--
https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
