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Python example: possible speedup?

Hrvoje Niksic hniksic at srce.hr
Wed Sep 8 14:06:42 EDT 1999 
John Mitchell <johnm at magnet.com> writes:

> A few suggestions:
> 
> 1) almost never use a catch-all-exceptions block.  For example, in your
> next_header method.

I don't think it causes a slowdown, but point taken.

> 2) avoid doing semi-slow operations in the middle of a loop:
> 
> - string addition (self.__current = self.__current + line)

As I said in the original message, I've tried to optimize this by
making self.__current a list, but it didn't work any faster.

> - reading a file one line at a time (self.__fp.readline())

I don't see an alternative to this, except to read the whole file at
once, which I am trying to avoid, as the files are large.

> 3) lambdas are fun, but very slow.

I am almost completely sure that the sort you refer to is not the
cause of the slowdown.

> 4) objects are your friend.  Dont know about speed, but they
> simplify code *so much* that I always use them, even for dump
> dictionary-like and list-like things.

I don't really understand this.  I'll study your code and see if it's
clearer then.
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