General

Named Parameters

Use named parameters for inline primitive types (when it makes the call site easier to understand).

✅ Good

twitter_search("@obama", retweets=False, numtweets=20, popular=True)

❌ Bad

twitter_search("@obama", False, 20, True)

🎭 Compare

# Good
twitter_search("@obama", retweets=False, numtweets=20, popular=True)
# Bad
twitter_search("@obama", False, 20, True)

Note

Consider using keyword only arguments when defining API’s.

💡 learnt from:

• Source: Raymond Hettinger

• Reference: Transform Python Slides

Unpacking

✅ Good

person = "John", "Doe", 42, "john.doe@example.net"

firstname, lastname, age, email = person

❌ Bad

person = "John", "Doe", 42, "john.doe@example.net"

firstname = person[0]
lastname = person[1]
age = person[2]
email = person[3]

🎭 Compare

# Good
person = "John", "Doe", 42, "john.doe@example.net"

firstname, lastname, age, email = person
# Bad
person = "John", "Doe", 42, "john.doe@example.net"

firstname = person[0]
lastname = person[1]
age = person[2]
email = person[3]

💡 learnt from:

• Source: Raymond Hettinger

• Reference: Transform Python Slides