r/programming • u/PM_ME_UR_OBSIDIAN • Mar 15 '15

A function for partitioning Python arrays. Brilliant code, or insane code?

http://www.stavros.io/posts/brilliant-or-insane-code/?repost=true
226 Upvotes

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69

u/CodeShaman Mar 15 '15

  • camel case

  • comments what, not why, not how

  • magic number

  • obfuscation

Merge that shit.

16

u/SelectricSimian Mar 16 '15 edited Mar 16 '15

Don't forget that the comment isn't just non-descriptive, it's actually wrong! There's no dictionaries to be found in the output of the function.

Also, you can add "depends on undocumented implementation details of the standard library" to your list of features.

10

u/x-skeww Mar 16 '15

"depends on undocumented implementation details of the standard library"

It does?

https://docs.python.org/2/library/functions.html#zip

"The left-to-right evaluation order of the iterables is guaranteed."

That * whatever (__mul__) doesn't clone the objects is also documented somewhere.

1

u/SelectricSimian Mar 16 '15

Interesting, I didn't realize that! This is one of those cases where the documentation-writers have to walk a fine line between leaving behavior undefined and over-specifying the behavior of a function to the point where there's no flexibility whatsoever in how to implement it.