Yeah, pretty much.  (I suppose an admonition not to expect behavior B
if you use the set_height method is part of the etc.)

I was thinking (and keep in mind I've not proven myself smarter than a
bricked and kicked horse) that it would take less verbiage (easier)
and be more readily understandable (less cryptic) to the uninitiated
reader for the tutorial to say "set the row height to a fixed number
of twips using Row.set_height" than to even mention height_mismatch at
all.  I'll admit I haven't given much thought to cases where it would
be nice to have easy access to height_mismatch other than to set a
fixed row height.  I doubt I would miss it if this property were not
exposed in the API at all, but then I'm sure that would break someone
else's code.

I would document the height setter method, including why it's setting
height_mismatch, in the source code (presumably in Row.py); that would
be plenty clear enough for spelunkers but out of the way for less
curious get-the-job-done types.

It probably also goes without saying that it's both easier and less
cryptic for the xlwt user to write

  ws.row(r).set_height(h)

than

  ws.row(r).height = h
  ws.row(r).height_mismatch = True  # needed to force height setting

or to bundle away the latter in his own function or module.  Or to
futz with his xlwt installation so that he doesn't need to
(thereafter) include his own function or module.

I actually didn't find your message cryptic at all, once I was in the
proper frame of mind to pay attention to it.  I wasn't in the proper
frame of mind initially because I was thinking to myself that I wasn't
having the problem that the OP was having, so it wouldn't do me much
good to read on.  (I guess at the time I was being a less-curious,
get-the-job-done type.)

Once I did read on, I did see the mention of the demo script, and I
even read it, but it is not easy for me to try it out on this
computer.  I will give it a go tomorrow.

Also, I'm sure you're referring to the write_merge toward the end of
the script, but I have come to not use write_merge, because I haven't
had success with it and borders.  Instead, I've got my own
Frankenmerge that better serves my needs (but for all I know is crap
for anyone else):

def merge(sheet, r1, c1, r2, c2, label, style):
    sheet.merge(r1, r2, c1, c2)
    for row in range(r1, r2 + 1):
        for col in range(c1, c2 + 1):
            if row in (r1, r2) or col in (c1, c2):
                if (row, col) == (r1, c1):
                    value = label
                else:
                    value = None
                sheet.write(row, col, value, style)

I can't get the Excel UI to automatically accommodate wrapped text in
merged cells, which is why I figured it was an Excel bug, and not a
problem with xlwt.  However, it is also entirely possible that my
Excel-fu is simply insufficient.

John Y.