Referring to objects inside a list without using references or indices
<p>I'm using python for my shopping cart class which has a list of items. When a customer wants to edit an item, I need to pass the JavaScript front-end some way to refer to the item so that it can call AJAX methods to manipulate it.</p>

<p>Basically, I need a simple way to point to a particular item that isn't its index, and isn't a reference to the object itself.</p>

<p>I can't use an index, because another item in the list might be added or removed while the identifier is "held" by the front end. If I were to pass the index forward, if an item got deleted from the list then that index wouldn't point to the right object.</p>

<p>One solution seems to be to use UUIDs, but that seems particularly heavyweight for a very small list. What's the simplest/best way to do this?</p>
