title: TypeError: split() takes no keyword arguments in Python 2.x
body: <p>I am trying to separate a section of a document into its different components which are separated by ampersands. This is what I have:</p>
  
  <pre><code>name,function,range,w,h,k,frac,constraint = str.split(str="&amp;", num=8)
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Error:</p>
  
  <pre><code>TypeError: split() takes no keyword arguments
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Can someone explain the error to me and also provide an alternate method for me to make this work?</p>