Ian Kelly <ian.g.ke...@gmail.com> writes: > On Wed, Nov 25, 2015 at 5:52 PM, Random832 <random...@fastmail.com> wrote: > > On 2015-11-25, Ben Finney <ben+pyt...@benfinney.id.au> wrote: > >> That is, the ‘2’ in ‘cartesian_point = (2, 3)’ means something > >> different than in ‘cartesian_point = (3, 2)’. > >> > >> Whereas the ‘2’ in ‘test_scores = [2, 3]’ means exactly the same as > >> in ‘test_scores = [3, 2]’. > >> > >> If each position in the sequence gives the value there a different > >> menaning, use a tuple; if not, use a list. > > > > I don't think that's really right.
I was expanding on (by replying to) earlier advice about expressing semantics in our choice of data types. > > The difference between a tuple and a list is that one is mutable > > and the other is not. That is a difference enforced in the behaviour of the types, yes. I didn't talk about behaviour, but about meaning. I'm saying that the behavioural difference conveniently lines up with a semantic difference, even to the point of the meaning of “tuple” that pre-dates Python. > I think that Ben was actually trying to make a distinction between > heterogeneity and homogeneity of the contents, not a distinction of > whether the collection was ordered or not. That's right, thank you. -- \ “Nothing exists except atoms and empty space; everything else | `\ is opinion.” —Democritus, c. 460 BCE – 370 BCE | _o__) | Ben Finney -- https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
