incorrect prototypes??

Donald Beaudry (don@vicorp.com)
Fri, 18 Jun 93 13:36:49 EDT

>> I think this is wrong. newlistobject() should return a 'listobject *'
>> instead of a 'object *'. It may be consistent, but I think it is wrong.
>> If I am the only one in the world that does feel this way, I will
>> shut my mouth and keep quiet.

> Actually, I enjoy discussions like this, but so far few people have
> joined in, so I am here on my own defending some questional
> practice...

Well, I guess I should toss my opinion in so that Guido does not have
to feel alone.

I don't think that the practice of using object* for everything is
questionable at all. I even think that it is necessary. Python is a
dynamically typed language. Since C does not support dynamic type
checking it is up to the programmer to do it. Specifically, it is up
to the implementor of the object. All objects should have a public
interface and that interface must check that object passed is really
of the same type as expected. In fact, the static type of the object
(the C structure) should be hidden from the users of the object. It
is up to the implementor of the object to decide what attributes are
visible and to provide an interface to those attributes.

--Don
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