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The meaning of this (lemmy.ml)
submitted 3 days ago by bestelbus22@lemmy.world to c/programmerhumor@lemmy.ml
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[-] bobo1900@sopuli.xyz 79 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Partially unrelated to the meme, but I find it almost malicious how some python keywords are named differently from the nearly universal counterpart of other languagues.

This/self, continue/pass, catch/except and they couldn't find a different word for switch so they just didn't implement it.

It's as if the original designers purposefully wanted to be different for the sake of it.

[-] lime@feddit.nu 64 points 3 days ago

pass and continue are absolutely not equal (pass is a noop, and python has a continue keyword that does what you think), and switch is called match like in many other languages. except is weird though.

[-] Phen@lemmy.eco.br 11 points 3 days ago

"except" is also used in Pascal (or at least the main derivatives of it), but not sure if that's older than its use in Python or not.

[-] sjmarf@sh.itjust.works 16 points 3 days ago

Python does have a switch statement now, actually. And yes, they went out of their way to call it something different - match.

https://docs.python.org/3/tutorial/controlflow.html#match-statements

[-] NichtElias@sh.itjust.works 11 points 3 days ago

match isn't just equivalent to switch though, so in this case it actually makes sense to call it something different.

[-] Archr@lemmy.world 1 points 17 hours ago

This is very true. Match statements are much more powerful that switch statements in any other language.

For instance:

  • matching objects very specifically
  • if conditions within case statements
  • pulling variables from inside of the object directly.
[-] bestelbus22@lemmy.world 21 points 3 days ago

I read that self as a keyword also has quite a history. It was already used in Smalltalk, an OOP language from the early 80's.

[-] Jambalaya@lemmy.zip 15 points 3 days ago

Isn't self not actually a keyword? Like you can name the first variable in a class method anything and it will behave like self.

[-] Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 17 points 3 days ago

You could use "this" instead of "self". And if you want a lynch mob of Python programmers outside your house, make a push request with that to some commonly used package.

[-] pastermil@sh.itjust.works 14 points 3 days ago

I think there will be a lynch mob of git users outside your house for calling PR as "push request".

[-] Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 10 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

I've been wondering about the noise.

Edit: turns out, they weren't there to lynch me. They just gave me a two hour lecture on proper usage of git.

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[-] lime@feddit.nu 8 points 3 days ago

only github users. git itself doesn't have PRs, and other forges call them different things. gitlab calls them merge requests, pico calls them patch requests...

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[-] CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org 15 points 3 days ago

PHP naming "::" a Paamayim Nekudotayim is also pretty infamous.

When I'm designing shit, I'm pretty zealous about borrowing terminology from anything even vaguely related to avoid this.

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[-] SolNine@lemmy.ml 3 points 2 days ago

List and Array terminology also bothers me ... Why not just call it an array?

[-] Pyro@programming.dev 1 points 19 hours ago

But python lists are not like the base arrays in other languages. They function more like List<> or vector (C++ had to be special) and are named appropriately.

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[-] WolfLink@sh.itjust.works 44 points 3 days ago

In Python, self is not a keyword, it’s a conventional variable name. You can replace all instances of “self” with “this” and your code will work the same.

[-] jsomae@lemmy.ml 6 points 3 days ago

Lua might have been a better choice, since self is special in lua.

[-] diemartin@sh.itjust.works 5 points 3 days ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Kinda.

Lua defines it implicitly only when you use the

function foo:bar(a, b, c) -- note the colon

syntactic sugar, which gets translated to

function foo.bar(self, a, b, c) -- note the period

In all cases, self is a regular variable name. You can even redeclare a new local with that name even when the old one is in scope.

Edit: some typos

[-] jsomae@lemmy.ml 3 points 3 days ago

I don't see how what you said is inconsistent with me saying "self" is special in lua. Note that I did not say it's a keyword.

[-] diemartin@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 day ago

Derp, I misread.

[-] SkyNTP@lemmy.ml 7 points 3 days ago

Python is just distancing itself from JS.

[-] dan@literature.cafe 30 points 3 days ago

Sweet dreams are made of this

[-] schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de 53 points 3 days ago

TBF the last two bullet points are verbose descriptions of the thing it means in C++, Java, and Python too. It's just that in JS, "this" can also be used in other places.

But yeah, in practice, every time I write JS I want to throw my hands in the air and shout "this is bullshit", but never know what "this" refers to... :D

[-] bestelbus22@lemmy.world 10 points 3 days ago

Yeah that's fair, though it also discusses that whole prototype thing that JS has going on

[-] xiii@lemmy.world 7 points 3 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I was working on a C code base with classes, inheritance, and polymorphism, all done by hands and macros.

Something like

typedef struct s_some_class {
    void (*method)(this *s_some_class);
} t_some_class;

Overall, learning C was the best enabler in my whole career. For instance I was learning Python by tinkering with CPython VM, so when I see these ‘WAT’ quircks I know exactly what’s up.

[-] bestelbus22@lemmy.world 3 points 2 days ago

Interesting, how did they do inheritance? Something like void *super? Also why not switch to CPP if you wanna do OOP?

[-] xiii@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

In general, 'classes' declarations were done with macro. I don't remember the exact code — something akin to

BEGIN_CLASS(A, Parent);
CLASS_MEMBER(a...)
END_CLASS();

The project had started before C++ existed, and the switch would be too costly. It's not just OOP part, also reflection mechanism with bindings to the homemade scripting language, and multi-platform UI library. It was a gem of its time.

[-] bestelbus22@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

That sounds like quite a challenge to maintain, to speak in euphemisms ;)

[-] xiii@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

Revolutionary technologies of the '80 make me appreciate modern programming languages and especially tooling much more.

[-] Natanox@discuss.tchncs.de 23 points 3 days ago

Rust: Borrow handler got mad at you for asking

(I'd assume)

[-] drbluefall@toast.ooo 18 points 3 days ago

It's either a reference to an object instance, or the instance itself (depending on whether you specified &mut self, &self or just self).

[-] ferric_carcinization@lemmy.ml 13 points 3 days ago

Don't forget Self, the type of self.

[-] JakenVeina@lemm.ee 14 points 3 days ago

Alternative image for C: Mr. Incredible: "A PARAMETER IS A PARAMETER!"

[-] bjoern_tantau@swg-empire.de 12 points 3 days ago

My JS:

Ah, you mean that?

[-] AdamEatsAss@lemmy.world 10 points 3 days ago

In Python you can use this as a variable name

[-] pennomi@lemmy.world 9 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

In Python you can use 🍆 as a variable name.

Edit: oops, guess I was mistaken, you can use most Unicode but emojis are not valid.

[-] CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org 10 points 3 days ago

Edit: oops, guess I was mistaken, you can use most Unicode but emojis are not valid.

That actually seems even more arbitrary. Like, do they just hate fun?

[-] embed_me@programming.dev 11 points 3 days ago

Just going by the reputation, you probably can do this in JavaScript

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[-] captain_aggravated@sh.itjust.works 5 points 3 days ago

you might be thinking of Rust.

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this post was submitted on 08 Jun 2025
520 points (97.4% liked)

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