Comment on Python Performance: Why 'if not list' is 2x Faster Than Using len()
mint_tamas@lemmy.world 6 days agoApart from the quote from the zen of python, does this really make your code better though? You will end up writing 4-5 lines with an extra level of indentation. The code does the same, but has worse performance and communicates the intent poorly (compared to the “pythonic” version).
gigachad@sh.itjust.works 6 days ago
I am not saying it’s better, just that I don’t like the proposed way :) I would argue that being “pythonic” has even less value than the Zen, which I quoted because it’s true, not because it is some strict rule (which it isn’t anyway).
You could argue I also need to write that extra code for the
if notcase, as I explicitly have to check if it isNoneif my program somewhere further down expects only lists.Hunting for those sweet milliseconds is a popular game in the Python community ;) if this mechanism is that important for your program, you should definitely use it, I would do as well!
mint_tamas@lemmy.world 6 days ago
I think pythonic is more important than performance and I would still choose that version over a try-catch block, were it slower. Being pythonic means it represents a commonly understood pattern in Python code, therefore it is more efficient in communicating intent.
sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 6 days ago
Exactly. The point of following a code style is to make obvious patterns easy to spot and deviations stand out. That’s why code style guidelines say your priorities should be:
3 should only be prioritized if the win is big enough, and there should probably be a comment right there explaining why the deviation was made.