Re: PEP 3131: Supporting Non-ASCII Identifiers

Aldo Cortesi <aldo@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Thus spake Steven D'Aprano (steven@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx):

Perhaps you aren't aware that doing something "by eye" is idiomatic
English for doing it quickly, roughly, imprecisely. It is the opposite of
taking the time and effort to do the job carefully and accurately. If you
measure something "by eye", you just look at it and take a guess.

Well, Steve, speaking as someone not entirely unfamiliar with idiomatic
English, I can say with some confidence that that's complete and utter
bollocks (idomatic usage for "nonsense", by the way). To do something "by
eye" means nothing more nor less than doing it visually. Unless you can
provide a citation to the contrary, please move on from this petty little
point of yours, and try to make a substantial technical argument instead.

I can't find any reference for Steven's alleged idiomatic use of "by
eye", either -- _however_, my wife Anna (an American from Minnesota)
came up with exactly the same meaning when I asked her if "by eye" had
any idiomatic connotations, so I suspect it is indeed there, at least in
the Midwest. Funniest, of course, is that the literal translation into
Italian, "a occhio", has a similiar idiomatic meaning to _any_ native
speaker of Italian -- and THAT one is even in the Italian wikipedia!-)

I'll be the first to admit that this issue has nothing to do with the
substance of the argument (on which my wife, also my co-author of the
2nd ed of the Python Cookbook and a fellow PSF member, deeply agrees
with you, Aldo, and me), but natural language nuances and curios are my
third-from-the-top most consuming interest (after programming and...
Anna herself!-).

[[_Visual inspection_ plays a crucial role in many areas of engineering,
of course; for example, visual inspection of welds is a very reliable,
although costly, quality assurance process, particularly if you ensure
that the inspectors hold the top professional degrees from the American
Welding Society (if you're operating in the USA:-)]].


Alex
.

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