On Wednesday, September 6, 2017 at 9:22:15 AM UTC+5:30, Chris Angelico wrote: > On Wed, Sep 6, 2017 at 1:42 PM, Stefan Ram wrote: > > Steve D'Aprano writes: > >>So in what sense are references part of the Python language? > > > > It would be possible to describe Python using a concept > > called "reference", it's just that the The Python Language > > Reference, Release 3.6.0 (PRL) does /not/ do this. > > And programming language experts usually use the terms that > > the language specification uses with the meaning that the > > language specification is giving them. And this is why I say > > that JavaScript and Python do not have references. > > (Except "attribute references".) > > > >>Inside the interpreter, you (probably?) could print out the value of the > >>pointer, or manipulate it in some fashion. > > > > Well, this /is/ from the PRL: > > > > »An object's identity never changes once it has been created; > > you may think of it as the object's address in memory.«. > > ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯ > > - The Python Language Reference, Release 3.6.0; > > 3.1 Objects, values and types > > > > It's not called "reference", it's called "identity". But it > > might agree with your idea of a pointer of an implementation. > > And you /can/ print it. > > > >>>> print( id( 'abc' )) > > 4163144 > > Printing out an address is only half the point (pun intended) of a > pointer - and the useless half. Given a pointer, you need to be able > to dereference it. How can you, given the id of a Python object, > access the object itself? The nearest I've ever seen is a function > that searches every object it can find, looking for one with the same > id.
Well ⅓ the point of pointers may be printing them out — which even in a language with 1st class pointers like C is rarely done/needed Another ⅓ is dereferencing, pointer-arithmetic etc... the various manifestations of 1st-class pointers And the third ⅓ is to provide explanations to people asking authentic questions [like the OP of this thread] Sure you can say with Steven that this can be 'explained' by saying an object can be in two places at one time. Others would then say 'Humpty-dumpty!' since you have removed the most basic intuition of objects and you are in effect saying that a python object means what you ordain it means without further ado/explanation Since you believe a reference-less dictionary can be a model for such explanations, why not provide that? -- https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
