Reference TOC: expand 'Atoms' and 'Primaries'

[terryjreedy]

BPO	29983
Nosy	@terryjreedy

^{Note: these values reflect the state of the issue at the time it was migrated and might not reflect the current state.}

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GitHub fields:

assignee = None
closed_at = None
created_at = <Date 2017-04-04.18:31:12.645>
labels = ['type-feature', '3.7', 'docs']
title = "Reference TOC: expand 'Atoms' and 'Primaries'"
updated_at = <Date 2017-04-04.18:45:31.139>
user = 'https://github.com/terryjreedy'

bugs.python.org fields:

activity = <Date 2017-04-04.18:45:31.139>
actor = 'terry.reedy'
assignee = 'docs@python'
closed = False
closed_date = None
closer = None
components = ['Documentation']
creation = <Date 2017-04-04.18:31:12.645>
creator = 'terry.reedy'
dependencies = []
files = []
hgrepos = []
issue_num = 29983
keywords = []
message_count = 2.0
messages = ['291131', '291133']
nosy_count = 2.0
nosy_names = ['terry.reedy', 'docs@python']
pr_nums = []
priority = 'normal'
resolution = None
stage = 'needs patch'
status = 'open'
superseder = None
type = 'enhancement'
url = 'https://bugs.python.org/issue29983'
versions = ['Python 2.7', 'Python 3.6', 'Python 3.7']

[terryjreedy]

Today there is a fairly long python-list thread about the difficult of finding info on 'dict comprehensions' in the doc. Point 1 is missing index entries. I opened bpo-29981 for this. Point 2 is something I have also noticed: the obscurity of 'Atoms' and 'Primaries' as titles of sections in the Expressions chapter. These are fairly esoteric Computer Science language theory terms. Compare these to beginner-friendly 'Binary arithmetic operators' and 'Comparisons'.

My specific suggestions, subject to change:

Atoms, including identifiers, literals, displays, and comprehensions
Primaries: attributes, subscripts, slices, and calls

[terryjreedy]

'displays' is partly redundant with 'comprehensions'. Since many think of other 'displays' as a type of literal, leave 'displays' out. They are well indexed. I think the most likely term people have trouble finding in the TOC is 'comprehension'. It was not immediately obvious to most that should be 'atoms'.