Why does `TypeVar()` have the required argument `name`? even though we can differentiate type names with variable names

[hyperkai (Kai (Kazuya Ito))]

Why does TypeVar() have the required argument name? even though we can differentiate type names with variable names like below:

T1 = TypeVar()
T2 = TypeVar()
T3 = TypeVar()

[MegaIng (Cornelius Krupp)]

Because repr(T1) should result in something that is clearly related to T1. And this is not possible in a reasonable way without giving the name to the constructor.

[blhsing (Ben Hsing)]

You might be interested in this prior discussion of a possible new token or soft keyword to eliminate the redundant target name as the first argument to such a constructor:

Defining a symbolic syntax for referring to assignment targets

Full disclosure: I’m not sure this is a good idea (since it is seriously cryptic when you first encounter it, and hard to look up on your own), so I have precisely zero plans to pursue it any further myself. I do, however, find it to be an intriguing idea (prompted by this post in the PEP 736 discussion thread), so it seemed worth sharing in case someone else liked it enough to pick it up and run with it. The core of the idea: A standalone @ symbol on the right hand side of an assignment expr…

[jorenham (Joren Hammudoglu)]

Luckily there’s PEP 695