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PEP20 aka the Zen of Python has a statement: Namespaces are one honking great idea -- let's do more of those! What exactly are we supposed to "do" according to this? Is it saying we should h...
#2: Post edited
by
Karl Knechtel
·
2023-12-03T11:18:09Z (11 months ago)
Edit tags; PEP20 was written in the 2.x days and nothing about its advice is version-specific.
PEP20 on namespaces: What exactly is it saying to do?
PEP20 aka the Zen of Python has a [statement](https://pep20.org/#namespaces): >Namespaces are one honking great idea -- let's do more of those! [What exactly](https://pep20.org/#ambiguity) are we [supposed to "do"](https://pep20.org/#practicality) according to this? Is it saying we should have more "honking great ideas" like namespaces and add them to the language as PEPs? Is it saying we should "use namespaces more"? How do you do that? As far as I know, Python has only one namespace system and it's not optional to use it. Everyone who writes scripts, functions, classes, methods, modules and packages is automatically subject to the rules of how Python handles namespaces. Scope in Python is intuitive so a lot of people use it without even being aware of the formal rule, because it behaves pretty much the [way you expect](https://pep20.org/#obvious) even if you were not aware of it. You can explicitly manipulate namespaces when you do things like `eval`, but this is uncommon and discouraged in normal programming. Is there some secret technique to leveraging namespaces to become a more effective Python programmer? Or is it just a convoluted way of saying "stick with local variables/objects when you can, avoid globals"?
#1: Initial revision
by
matthewsnyder
·
2023-12-02T18:04:42Z (11 months ago)
PEP20 on namespaces: What exactly is it saying to do?
PEP20 aka the Zen of Python has a [statement](https://pep20.org/#namespaces): >Namespaces are one honking great idea -- let's do more of those! [What exactly](https://pep20.org/#ambiguity) are we [supposed to "do"](https://pep20.org/#practicality) according to this? Is it saying we should have more "honking great ideas" like namespaces and add them to the language as PEPs? Is it saying we should "use namespaces more"? How do you do that? As far as I know, Python has only one namespace system and it's not optional to use it. Everyone who writes scripts, functions, classes, methods, modules and packages is automatically subject to the rules of how Python handles namespaces. Scope in Python is intuitive so a lot of people use it without even being aware of the formal rule, because it behaves pretty much the [way you expect](https://pep20.org/#obvious) even if you were not aware of it. You can explicitly manipulate namespaces when you do things like `eval`, but this is uncommon and discouraged in normal programming. Is there some secret technique to leveraging namespaces to become a more effective Python programmer? Or is it just a convoluted way of saying "stick with local variables/objects when you can, avoid globals"?