[westandskif]

oh, thanks, I'll add links to cheatsheet and quickstart pages to the README, it really makes sense!

As for the magic-stuff, I was contemplating designing the API with this approach, but I changed my mind because it would be difficult to tell which python expressions are evaluated at the moment of a conversion definition AND which in the compiled code.

However if we imagine this "magic" API, then it could be even closer to normal python code:

  m["key"].some_method(...)

which would resolve everything under the hood.

===

as for the collapsable generated code examples -- I've jotted down :)

[uryga]

> it would be difficult to tell which python expressions are evaluated at the moment of a conversion definition AND which in the compiled code

this is ofc a valid concern in any metaprogramming situation. has this been a problem in your experience? i'm guessing e.g. generating a conversion based on a list of fields is a thing someone might do, but it feels like a minority usecase (at least to me, someone with no actual experience with using the library :p)

[westandskif]

Re: whether it's been a problem in my experience -- sort of - yes

So now I'm doing my best to observe: PEP-20 the 2nd commandment with the hope that I'm not violating the 1st commandment badly :) https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0020/

Also I see another upside of this no-magic syntax in that it is distinctive -- there's no way to mix up convtools-related code with any other python code.

[carapace]

In re: the "magic", it seems to me that you could use a mock object and get the required info from it.

[westandskif]

In terms of the implementation, it's kind of trivial to implement the "magic", but it would be both confusing and inconsistent, see below.

e.g. imagine a case where you'd want to call datetime.strptime, partially initializing it at the moment of conversion definition. at the moment it is:

  c.call_func(
      datetime.strptime,
      c.item("updated"),
      "%Y-%m-%d"
  )

but it's unclear to me how would the "magic" approach deal with the case above.

[carapace]

Replace your current namespace with a mock object? You can eval or exec code with any dictionary-flavored object, and mocks can imitate dicts.

edit: no, you can't in Python 3..

I'll try to have a closer look later today.

[germanjoey]

What do you think about a DSL alternative?

[westandskif]

We would need to bring the whole python into it :/

[gigatexal]

looks really cool -- will evaluate when the API is stable -- would hate to adopt only to have it change from under me