The documentation for tempfile.mkstemp() at 
http://www.python.org/doc/2.3.3/lib/module-
tempfile.html (as well as the ActivePython 
documentation that ships with the Windows 2.3 build) 
says:

"mkstemp() returns a tuple containing an OS-level 
handle to an open file (as would be returned by os.open
()) and the absolute pathname of that file, in that order."

However, whenever I use it, it returns a tuple containing 
an integer (presumably the file descriptor) and the 
absolute pathname of the tempfile.  No file handle is 
returned.  

Sure enough, the in-line documentation states:

"The return value is a pair (fd, name) where fd is the file 
descriptor returned by os.open, and name is the 
filename."

Could someone please correct this discrepancy?

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As noted in the os.open() documentation, it returns a
file descriptor, which seems to make the mkstemp()
documentation perfectly reasonable (and correct).

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The documentation could be a bit clearer.  When I think of a 
file descriptor in python, I think of a file-like object, i.e. that 
which is returned by open(), as opposed to os.open().  

It's unclear to me why mkstemp() returns an os-level file 
descriptor as opposed to a Python file-like object, but I 
suppose that's beside the point.

I'll close the bug, though, because the documentation is 
literally correct, and the team has more urgent priorities.