match statement

[mmliam]

How likely is it that the Python match-statememt will ever be included in microPython?

[peterhinch]

PEP636 has been discussed - the consensus seemed to be "unlikely". I gather it requires a different parser and the implementation is unlikely to be "micro".

[mmliam]

I suspected something like that; pity. thanks.

[sosi-deadeye]

A bit of history.

The new PEG parser (PEP 617) were released with CPython 3.9. This change allowed to implement the walrus operator (assignment expression).

The structural pattern matching (PEP 622) was introduced with CPython 3.10 and was the first use of a soft keyword.

Quote from the PEP:

The match statement uses a soft keyword, and it is one of the first major Python features to take advantage of the capabilities of the new PEG parser. This means that third-party parsers which are not ‘PEG-compatible’ will have a hard time with the new syntax.

My implication is, if a LL(1) parser is used, the match statement must become a keyword. Then you could not use match as a name. Very bad.

If someone could write a PEG parser for micropython, which is in size equal or smaller, this would be a nice addition.