[PATCH] python/thread: always return a string in get_subject/authors

[Sebastian Spaeth]

On Mon, 09 May 2011 09:20:41 -0300, David Bremner <david at tethera.net> wrote:
> On Mon,  9 May 2011 09:06:34 +0200, Anton Khirnov <anton at khirnov.net> wrote:
> > Now None is returned when those don't exist, which is inconvenient to
> > deal with.
> 
> I'm not using the python bindings, but from a philosophical point of
> view, this change makes me a bit uncomfortable since it apparently
> merges two cases together, and makes an error (no Subject)
> indistinguishable from an odd situation (Subject of empty string).
> Or am I missing something here?

Hi there,

This change makes me a bit uncomfortable too. 3 Reasons:

- I believe users should be able to distinguish the case when someone
  uses an empty subject, and when someone doesn't specify a subject at
  all.

- People have been writing code and breaking backwards compatability for
  such a small gain doesn't really seem worth it.

- Testing-wise this is easy. Just test for "if subject:" on the returned
  value and you'll get both cases (empty and non-existing).

But if people really want it, I won't object.

Sebastian
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