Python at least is very clear about this ... everything, lists, class instances, dicts, tuples, strings, ints, floats ... are all passed by object reference. (Of course it's not relevant for tuples and scalars, which are immutable.)

  answer = frobnicate(foo)

> I don't care about the reference to foo (that's a low-level detail that should be confined to systems languages, not application languages)

This is not true at all. There's a big difference, for instance, between assigning a reference and assigning an object ... the former results in two names referring to the same object, whereas in the latter case they refer to copies. I had a recent case where a bug was introduced when converting Perl to Python because Perl arrays have value semantics whereas Python lists have reference semantics.

There seem to be disagreements here due entirely to erroneous or poor use of terminology, which is frustrating ... I won't participate further.

> Python at least is very clear about this ... everything, lists, class instances, dicts, tuples, strings, ints, floats ... are all passed by object reference. (Of course it's not relevant for tuples and scalars, which are immutable.)

Then let me just FTFY based on what you've said later:

Python will not be very clear about this ... everything, lists, class instances, dicts, tuples, strings, ints, floats, they all require the programmer to read and write documentation every time.

The function could mutate foo to be empty, if foo is mutable, but it can’t make it not exist.

No mention of references!

I don't care about references to foo. I don't care about facades to foo. I don't care about decorators of foo. I don't care about memory segments of foo.

"Did someone eat my lunch in the work fridge?"

"Well at least you wrote your name in permanent marker on your lunchbox, so that should help narrow it down"

  foo = open(‘bar.txt’)
  answer = frobnicate(foo)
  print(foo)

>> I sorely miss it in Python, JS and other languages. They keep me guessing whether a function will mutate the parent structure, or a local copy in those languages!

  #!/usr/bin/env python3
  import inspect
  
  def frobnicate(unfrobbed: any) -> None:
      frame = inspect.currentframe().f_back
      for name in [name for name, value in frame.f_locals.items() if value is unfrobbed]:
          del frame.f_locals[name]
      for name in [name for name, value in frame.f_globals.items() if value is unfrobbed]:
          del frame.f_globals[name]
  
  foo = open("bar.txt")
  answer = frobnicate(foo)
  print(foo)

  
  Traceback (most recent call last):
    File "hackers.py", line 20, in <module>
      print(foo)
            ^^^
  NameError: name 'foo' is not defined

Not that this is is reasonable code to encounter in the wild, but you certainly can do this. You could even make it work properly when called from inside functions that use `fastlocals` if you're willing to commit even more reprehensible crimes and rewrite the `f_code` object.

Anyway, it's not really accurate to say that Python passes by reference, because Python has no concept of references. It passes by assignment. This is perfectly analogous to passing by pointer in C, which also can be used to implement reference semantics, but it ISN'T reference semantics. The difference comes in assignment, like in the following C++ program:

  #include <print>
  
  struct Object
  {
      char member{'a'};
  };
  
  void assign_pointer(Object *ptr)
  {
      Object replacement{'b'};
      ptr = &replacement;
  }
  
  void assign_reference(Object &ref)
  {
      Object replacement{'b'};
      ref = replacement;
  }
  
  int main()
  {
      Object obj{};
      std::println("Original value: {}", obj.member);
      assign_pointer(&obj);
      std::println("After assign_pointer: {}", obj.member);
      assign_reference(obj);
      std::println("After assign_reference: {}", obj.member);
      return 0;
  }

  $ ./a.out
  Original value: a
  After assign_pointer: a
  After assign_reference: b

ANYWAY, irrelevant nitpicking aside, I do think Python has a problem here, but its reference semantics are kind of a red herring. Python's concept of `const` is simply far too coarse. Constness is applied and enforced at the class level, not the object, function, or function call level. This, in combination with the pass-by-assignment semantics does indeed mean that functions can freely modify their arguments the vast majority of the time, with no real contract for making sure they don't do that.

In practice, I think this is handled well enough at a culture level that it's not the worst thing in the world, and I understand Python's general reluctance to introduce new technical concepts when it doesn't strictly have to, but it's definitely a bit of a footgun. Can be hard to wrap your head around too.

These are alternative ways to keep the tents dry ... which entails that they were never soaked in the first place.

> A tent that’s been in a lake

The tents were never in the lake. A few inches of the campsite was in the lake at high water.

> sounds like a throwaway to me

Do you have any experience with this? I've been on trips where tents and even sleeping bags ended up in a river. They don't dissolve ...they can be dried in the sun. And a tent with a wet floor can be wiped down.

> “Just take the tents out of the water”.

Those words don't appear anywhere. Try looking at the actual words and not just your mental images.

I think some people are interpreting “campsite” as the literal space occupied by the tent’s ground sheet while you are interpreting it as the broader area - which in an organised institutional arrangement might be called the “campground”

To use an analogy, think of being in a partly flooded parking space vs parking lot

It makes sense that someone with the former interpretation - the tent ground sheet submerged by a few inches of water - would understand that the tent got soaked.

"A campsite is a designated area where individuals can set up bedding, sleeping bags, or cooking equipment, such as stoves or fires. This definition encompasses any location that allows for sleeping or cooking, regardless of whether it includes a tent, lean-to, shack, or other structures."

And here's the Wikipedia description, which notes that the English "campsite" is equivalent to the American "campground", but that is broader and neither is so absurdly narrow as your words:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campsite

> would understand that the tent got soaked

I already refuted this nonsense ... there is no reason to think from the OP's description that the tent got soaked.

> To use an analogy, think of ...

I don't need any help with thinking, especially from bad analogies that are flatly contradicted by the OP's description. What's the parking lot analogy to building dams?

But I guess a synthetic ultra light tent will do better.

I also assumed the tents were already there when he arrived (complete assumption, but the term campsite conjures up a place with tents already there), and so must be of the more heavy more stationary kind.

Anyway, the point is, I also had this question: Where do you go when you mess up your tent like that? How can a dam in a layer of water make it dry? Don't you need a dam and then pump it dry.

This is going too far, I just wanted to defend the question. Maybe it's a cultural difference.

[0] https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=de+waard+tent&ia=images&iax...

It appears that you are confused with West European camping, which is where you drive two days to the south of France (most of which stuck in traffic), pay large amounts of money for a patch of perfectly flat grass where you are allowed to park your car and set up your tent. In a grid pattern with hundreds of other tents. Where there is a building nearby for toilets and showers. And a swimming pool plus live entertainment for the children.

OP appears to be talking about camping in nature.

Tents are generally made of a very wuick-drying, thin synthetic.

And like the other person said, this does make it seem like you’ve potentially never been camping but i don’t want to gatekeep the definition of “camping”. My version is carrying everything I need on my back for two weeks and walking 10-15 miles each day to the next campsite (read: “patch of dirt”, preferably near fresh water). Other people “camp” in RV’s though, so.

"A campsite is a designated area where individuals can set up bedding, sleeping bags, or cooking equipment, such as stoves or fires. This definition encompasses any location that allows for sleeping or cooking, regardless of whether it includes a tent, lean-to, shack, or other structures."

I would note that camping also involves sitting in campchairs talking, reading, singing, etc.

And

> I’d call your version hiking/walking/backpacking depending where I am.

The hiking/walking/backpacking is what nerdsniper does between campsites:

> My version is carrying everything I need on my back for two weeks and walking 10-15 miles each day ==> to the next campsite <==

Despite his phrasing, he of course is not saying that hiking == camping.

You've never been camping. Ok.

In England, we can’t just pitch up a tent in the woods, we need to pay for a campsite where there’s other tents.

I suspect, from their description, this person is from a different country again, where camping may happen in large open steppe with lots of other yurts.

Also, this is about a campsite a few inches of which is in a lake, and people moving their tents. But apparently paying attention to the actual context is optional for some people.

I also feel it was unnecessary to dismiss their experience as “not camping,” just because it was different to yours. It turns a learning opportunity for us all into a needlessly toxic argument.

Allow me to correct myself: I meant to say I believed you were referring wild camping, away from a commercial site (either alone or part of a group).

> None of this is responsive to my comment that you are responding to ... I find that quite toxic.

You find it toxic that I won’t join you in an argument that only you want to have?

> Again, your notion of my experience of camping does not come from anything I actually wrote ... that's quite toxic.

I just woke up an hour ago. Did you find that toxic, too?

No, that's not what that word means.

> all the same rights could be obtained through a domestic partnership or an out-of-state marriage. It was just a nominal dispute about what the word “marriage” means.

That too is not true.

> The fact that Mozilla didn't allow their CEO to deviate from the majority point of view on this issue (again, a minority viewpoint in California at the time!) revealed Mozilla to be a heavily politicized, extremely bigoted corporation, that puts ideological conformity first.

Not at all true.

Yes, and you've received email that was addressed like that ... so what's your issue?

> I’ve wondered if this person has access to any of my information?

Yes, because "this person" is you.