Dave Kuhlman wrote:
> Some of us old school types feel that properties are
non-Pythonic.
> They are a way to write code that does something that
it does not
> look like that code is doing. It hides your intend.
So, it is not
> explicit.
>
> "Explicit is better than implicit."
> - Tim Peters
> (see http://www.p
ython.org/dev/peps/pep-0020/)
>
> In other words, properties are a way of writing code
that appears
> harmless, for example:
>
> temp = weather.temperature
>
> and:
>
> weather.temperature = temp
>
> but making it do arbitrary, sneaky, gratuitous, and
egregious things.
And this is different how from what is available without
properties?
__setattr__ and __getattr__ hooks have been available at
least since
Python 1.4. New-style classes add __getattribute__. All of
these exist
so you can make attribute access do useful things, or if you
want,
arbitrary, sneaky, gratuitous, and egregious things.
Functions *are* descriptors (the underlying mechanism behind
properties)
since Python 2.2. The magic that makes bound and unbound
methods is in
the __get__() method of the function. When you invoke
weather.getTemperature() you are essentially invoking a
property to get
the getTemperature() method. Which is pretty sneaky 
Of course you can also change the meaning of a + b, c[1],
etc if you like.
Because it is highly dynamic and exposes much of its
internal
mechanisms, Python gives the programmer great latitude to do
stupid
things in a wide variety of ways. This is generally
considered a feature.
Kent
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