Barry Warsaw

Guido van Rossum raised this question about PEP 842, and it applies with equal force here: But Python has existed without this feature for over 35 years – is it really urgent? Remember the Zen of Python, which says “Now is better than never. Although never is often better than right now.” No. This PEP is not urgent, and it does not claim to be. Nothing about module name visibility, or about a module’s exported public API, is urgent.

Author: Barry Warsaw <barry at python.org> Discussions-To: Discourse thread Status: Accepted Type: Standards Track Created: 31-Mar-2026 Python-Version: 3.15 Post-History: 01-Apr-2026, 13-Apr-2026, 15-Apr-2026 Resolution: 24-Apr-2026 Table of Contents Abstract Motivation Specification Entry point syntax File Naming and Discovery Error Handling Encoding Future Improvements Rationale Backwards Compatibility Security Implications How to Teach This Reference Implementation Rejected Ideas Open...

Classes can implement a new dunder method, __pprint__() which if present, generates parts of their instance’s pretty printed representation. This augments __repr__() which, prior to this proposal, was the only method used to generate a custom representation of the object. Since object reprs provide functionality distinct from pretty printing, some classes may want more control over their pretty display.