On 2011-04-15 11:02:17 -0700, Jim Fulton said:

> On Fri, Apr 15, 2011 at 1:32 PM, Éric Araujo
> <merwok@netw...> wrote:
>> As an aside, I wonder why people use dot+colon notation instead of just
>> dots to reference callables.  In distutils2 for example we resolve
>> dotted names to find command classes, command hooks and compilers.  So
>> what’s the benefit, marginally easier parsing?
>
> An opportunity of using a colon is that it allows::
>
>    dotted.module.name:expression
>
> where expression may be more than just a name::
>
>   foo.bar:Bar()

Or foo.bar:Baz.factory.

I wouldn't go so far as to eval() what's after the colon.  The real
difference is this:

[foo.bar]:[Baz.factory]
|         ^- Attribute lookup.
^- Module lookup.

You can't do this:

import foo.bar.Baz.factory

Thus the difference.  However, the syntax is actually more flexible than that:

[foo.bar]/[subfolder/file]
|         ^- Sub-path.
^- Module.

/[foo/bar]
  ^- Just path.

— Alice.


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