Home Original page

[Python-Dev] python 3 niggle: None < 1 raises TypeError

Greg Ewing greg.ewing at canterbury.ac.nz
Tue Feb 18 06:11:18 CET 2014 
Tim Peters wrote:
> Guido wanted to drop all the "arbitrary but consistent" mixed-type
> comparison crud for Python 3.

Nobody is asking for a return to the arbitrary-but-
[in]consistent mess of Python 2, only to bring
back *one* special case, i.e. None comparing less
than everything else.

I think there is a reasonable argument to be made
in favour of that. Like it or not, None does have
a special place in Python as the one obvious way
to represent a null or missing value, and often
one wants to sort a collection of objects having
keys that can take on null values. Refusing to
make that easy seems like allowing purity to beat
practicality.

-- 
Greg
More information about the Python-Dev mailing list