Mike Meyer wrote: > Yes, but the function "sorted" is more useful than a list method > "sorted" in a duck typing language.
I don't see what this has to do with "duck typing"? sorted() is simply a generic function accepting different types. I'm not aware that sorted() requires a specific interface of those types it accepts. > > The function sorted works on all iterators. I can do: > > >>> def t(n): > >>> for i in range(n): > >>> yield i > >>> ... > >>> print sorted(t(5)) > > and have it work. > > If sorted were a method of a class - the it'd have to be implemented > again for every class iterable class. Either that, or you'd have to > create an abstract parent of all iterable classes to add it to - which > seems more appropriate for a B&D language than Python. Instead of extending a class hierarchy it might even be possible to hook a trait into the class by means of a __traits__ attribute. http://fsl.cs.uiuc.edu/~mhills/presentations/TraitsPresentation.pdf Generators as well as lists and tuples would provide a sortable trait. The sorted() function could remain available for convenience. > And even if you do add the abstract class, how do you make my example > work without explictly converting the iterator to a list type? I don't know how sorted() is implemented? A naive implementation would in fact be nothing else then: def sorted(iter): l = list(iter) l.sort() return l Kay -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
