Raymond Hettinger othello at javanet.com
Tue Feb 20 19:17:03 EST 2001

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>
> >Introducing some strange behavior with '!' may very well not be worth
> >it.  However, while adding '?' as a legal identifier character does
> >not make the Python more expressive, it can make Python programs more
> >self-documenting.  The convention of ending predicate function names
> >with '?' is useful, in my opinion.
>
> Definitely.  I always found that convention in Scheme to be
> very expresive and compact.  The convention of ending
> predicates with "!" when they modified internal state was also
> useful though perhaps not as intuitive as "?".
>

These naming conventions were useful to me iin Forth and Scheme;
however, they're ugly (IMHO).  The plain English forms are much
more expressive and flexible without carrying the risk of confusing
my optical lexer when I read code.

Count my vote:  -1

Raymond

"In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
 In practice, there is." -- Yogi Berra

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