[sorry folks, I'm tired, so this is halfway to a rant :-( ] I'm trying to do a work-around for the "namespace goes away after two levels of dtml method calls" problem with an XXXPythonMethod, and have now hit another wall as regards accessing the namespace enclosing the XXXPythonMethod. So I'm sitting here trying to figure out where this variable of mine is hidden, and I'm thinking I should be able to get there via the _ instance of TemplateDict. Well.... I'm not happy that I now know what TemplateDict is - I really wish I hadn't had to go there, but now that I'm there I have a much better understanding of why it is impossible to get information out of it; it has "do you have this key" and "get the value of this key" and absolutely nothing else. Is there a reason for this? I can think of *countless* times when the ability to just have a *glimpse* of my namespace would have saved hours. Is there a possibility that you could make the thing look more like a mapping object, with keys() and values() and items() and such? It'd sure save a ton of time. Some kind of tag to pretty-print the namespace would be great too. ... But then, actually, not having to deal with the namespace going away problem would have saved even more time. I'll describe it briefly to see if it rings any bells: Imagine a dtml method called methodA that looks like this: <!--#var standard_html_header--> Depth: <dtml-var "methodA(counter=counter+1)"> <!--#var standard_html_footer--> and you call it from a browser as methodA?counter:int=0 You'd expect one of these: a) zope locks up/crashes because of the recursion b) methodA bails out because someone detects recursion or exceeds a stack limit of some sort What you *get*, however, is the very suprising: Error type: KeyError Error value: standard_html_header And if you rip out the reference to standard_html_..., you'll get the equally baffling: Error type: NameError Error value: methodA In practice, you'll find that this disappearing act occurs at about the third level of expression evaluation. Ring any bells? It requires *horrible* workarounds when you run into it. Ok, thanks for putting up with this. Dave Parker Sr. Software Engineer GlobalCrossing