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space added before printed line from except block

Bjorn Pettersen BPettersen at NAREX.com
Tue Dec 24 17:27:30 EST 2002 
> From: Terry Reedy [mailto:tjreedy at udel.edu] 
> 
> > On a different note, I'm wondering why str.join 
> > expects a 'list' as an argument:
> >while os.path.join requires separate arguments... Seems rather 
> >inconsistent? Anyone?
> 
> Hypotheses ;-)
> 
> 1. str.join(alist) was previously string.join(alist, joiner) 
> so one alist instead of separate args was necessary (joiner 
> comes after alist since it has default value and alist does 
> not).  2. Its the inverse of str.split  3. alist is commonly 
> formed by construction in a loop with alist.append. 4. the 
> items joined are commonly 'homogeneous' in some sense.
> 
> 1. os.path.join()  can be inverse of os.path.split. which 
> produces tuple that is commonly assigned to separate vars.  
> 2. joined path components are logically hierarchical rather 
> that parallel.  3. sequencial construction of a 'joinlist' 
> would be rare.
> 
> Overall, I suspect the two different interfaces each make 
> most sense in the different contexts of usage.

Ok, I guess I'll buy that for a dollar -- even if it doesn't sound too
terribly convincing <wink>.

I was just surprised that I noticed such an asymmetry now, after having
used both extensively for some time. Hmm.. maybe your conclusion is
right after all and they're really two different operations that just
happen to share a name...

Well, that's more thinking than I wanted to do today. I'll be by the
eggnog if anyone needs me <g>.

Happy Holidays everyone!
-- bjorn
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