The description of dictionary comparison was out of date. Rather than
try to explain the complex general scheme we actually use now, I decided
to spell out only what equality means (which is easy to explain and
intuitive), leaving the other outcomes unspecified beyond consistency.
diff --git a/Doc/ref/ref5.tex b/Doc/ref/ref5.tex
index 5002f4d..be672b7 100644
--- a/Doc/ref/ref5.tex
+++ b/Doc/ref/ref5.tex
@@ -191,10 +191,10 @@
evaluated from left to right and placed into the list object in that
order. When a list comprehension is supplied, it consists of a
single expression followed by at least one \keyword{for} clause and zero or
-more \keyword{for} or \keyword{if} clauses. In this
+more \keyword{for} or \keyword{if} clauses. In this
case, the elements of the new list are those that would be produced
by considering each of the \keyword{for} or \keyword{if} clauses a block,
-nesting from
+nesting from
left to right, and evaluating the expression to produce a list element
each time the innermost block is reached.
\obindex{list}
@@ -815,13 +815,16 @@
corresponding items.
\item
-Mappings (dictionaries) are compared through lexicographic
-comparison of their sorted (key, value) lists.\footnote{
-This is expensive since it requires sorting the keys first,
-but it is about the only sensible definition. An earlier version of
-Python compared dictionaries by identity only, but this caused
-surprises because people expected to be able to test a dictionary for
-emptiness by comparing it to \code{\{\}}.}
+Mappings (dictionaries) compare equal if and only if their sorted
+(key, value) lists compare equal.\footnote{The implementation computes
+ this efficiently, without constructing lists or sorting.}
+Outcomes other than equality are resolved consistently, but are not
+otherwise defined.\footnote{Earlier versions of Python used\
+ lexicographic comparison of the sorted (key, value) lists, but this
+ was very expensive for the common case of comparing for equality. An
+ even earlier version of Python compared dictionaries by identity only,
+ but this caused surprises because people expected to be able to test
+ a dictionary for emptiness by comparing it to \code{\{\}}.}
\item
Most other types compare unequal unless they are the same object;