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PEP 3140: str(container) should call str(item), not repr(item)

PEP: 3140

Title: str(container) should call str(item), not repr(item)

Version: $Revision$

Last-Modified: $Date$

Author: Oleg Broytman ,

Jim Jewett

Discussions-To: python-3000@python.org

Status: Rejected

Type: Standards Track

Content-Type: text/plain

Created: 27-May-2008

Post-History: 29-May-2008

Abstract

This document discusses the advantages and disadvantages of the

current implementation of str(container). It also discusses the

pros and cons of a different approach - to call str(item) instead

of repr(item).

Motivation

Currently str(container) calls repr on items. Arguments for it:

-- containers refuse to guess what the user wants to see on

str(container) - surroundings, delimiters, and so on;

-- repr(item) usually displays type information - apostrophes

around strings, class names, etc.

Arguments against:

-- it's illogical; str() is expected to call __str__ if it exists,

not __repr__;

-- there is no standard way to print a container's content calling

items' __str__, that's inconvenient in cases where __str__ and

__repr__ return different results;

-- repr(item) sometimes do wrong things (hex-escapes non-ascii

strings, e.g.)

This PEP proposes to change how str(container) works. It is

proposed to mimic how repr(container) works except one detail

- call str on items instead of repr. This allows a user to choose

what results she want to get - from item.__repr__ or item.__str__.

Current situation

Most container types (tuples, lists, dicts, sets, etc.) do not

implement __str__ method, so str(container) calls

container.__repr__, and container.__repr__, once called, forgets

it is called from str and always calls repr on the container's

items.

This behaviour has advantages and disadvantages. One advantage is

that most items are represented with type information - strings

are surrounded by apostrophes, instances may have both class name

and instance data:

>>> print([42, '42'])

[42, '42']

>>> print([Decimal('42'), datetime.now()])

[Decimal("42"), datetime.datetime(2008, 5, 27, 19, 57, 43, 485028)]

The disadvantage is that __repr__ often returns technical data

(like '') or unreadable string (hex-encoded

string if the input is non-ascii string):

>>> print(['ั‚ะตัั‚'])

['\xd4\xc5\xd3\xd4']

One of the motivations for PEP 3138 is that neither repr nor str

will allow the sensible printing of dicts whose keys are non-ascii

text strings. Now that unicode identifiers are allowed, it

includes Python's own attribute dicts. This also includes JSON

serialization (and caused some hoops for the json lib).

PEP 3138 proposes to fix this by breaking the "repr is safe ASCII"

invariant, and changing the way repr (which is used for

persistence) outputs some objects, with system-dependent failures.

Changing how str(container) works would allow easy debugging in

the normal case, and retain the safety of ASCII-only for the

machine-readable case. The only downside is that str(x) and

repr(x) would more often be different -- but only in those cases

where the current almost-the-same version is insufficient.

It also seems illogical that str(container) calls repr on items

instead of str. It's only logical to expect following code

class Test:

def __str__(self):

return "STR"

def __repr__(self):

return "REPR"

test = Test()

print(test)

print(repr(test))

print([test])

print(str([test]))

to print

STR

REPR

[STR]

[STR]

where it actually prints

STR

REPR

[REPR]

[REPR]

Especially it is illogical to see that print in Python 2 uses str

if it is called on what seems to be a tuple:

>>> print Decimal('42'), datetime.now()

42 2008-05-27 20:16:22.534285

where on an actual tuple it prints

>>> print((Decimal('42'), datetime.now()))

(Decimal("42"), datetime.datetime(2008, 5, 27, 20, 16, 27, 937911))

A different approach - call str(item)

For example, with numbers it is often only the value that people

care about.

>>> print Decimal('3')

3

But putting the value in a list forces users to read the type

information, exactly as if repr had been called for the benefit of

a machine:

>>> print [Decimal('3')]

[Decimal("3")]

After this change, the type information would not clutter the str

output:

>>> print "%s".format([Decimal('3')])

[3]

>>> str([Decimal('3')]) # ==

[3]

But it would still be available if desired:

>>> print "%r".format([Decimal('3')])

[Decimal('3')]

>>> repr([Decimal('3')]) # ==

[Decimal('3')]

There is a number of strategies to fix the problem. The most

radical is to change __repr__ so it accepts a new parameter (flag)

"called from str, so call str on items, not repr". The

drawback of the proposal is that every __repr__ implementation

must be changed. Introspection could help a bit (inspect __repr__

before calling if it accepts 2 or 3 parameters), but introspection

doesn't work on classes written in C, like all builtin containers.

Less radical proposal is to implement __str__ methods for builtin

container types. The obvious drawback is a duplication of effort

- all those __str__ and __repr__ implementations are only differ

in one small detail - if they call str or repr on items.

The most conservative proposal is not to change str at all but

to allow developers to implement their own application- or

library-specific pretty-printers. The drawback is again

a multiplication of effort and proliferation of many small

specific container-traversal algorithms.

Backward compatibility

In those cases where type information is more important than

usual, it will still be possible to get the current results by

calling repr explicitly.

Copyright

This document has been placed in the public domain.

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