3. Data model¶

3.2.1. None¶

This type has a single value. There is a single object with this value. This object is accessed through the built-in name None. It is used to signify the absence of a value in many situations, e.g., it is returned from functions that don’t explicitly return anything. Its truth value is false.

3.2.2. NotImplemented¶

This type has a single value. There is a single object with this value. This object is accessed through the built-in name NotImplemented. Numeric methods and rich comparison methods should return this value if they do not implement the operation for the operands provided. (The interpreter will then try the reflected operation, or some other fallback, depending on the operator.) It should not be evaluated in a boolean context.

See Implementing the arithmetic operations for more details.

3.2.3. Ellipsis¶

This type has a single value. There is a single object with this value. This object is accessed through the literal ... or the built-in name Ellipsis. Its truth value is true.

3.2.4. numbers.Number¶

These are created by numeric literals and returned as results by arithmetic operators and arithmetic built-in functions. Numeric objects are immutable; once created their value never changes. Python numbers are of course strongly related to mathematical numbers, but subject to the limitations of numerical representation in computers.

The string representations of the numeric classes, computed by __repr__() and __str__(), have the following properties:

• They are valid numeric literals which, when passed to their class constructor, produce an object having the value of the original numeric.

• The representation is in base 10, when possible.

• Leading zeros, possibly excepting a single zero before a decimal point, are not shown.

• Trailing zeros, possibly excepting a single zero after a decimal point, are not shown.

• A sign is shown only when the number is negative.

Python distinguishes between integers, floating-point numbers, and complex numbers:

3.2.5. Sequences¶

These represent finite ordered sets indexed by non-negative numbers. The built-in function len() returns the number of items of a sequence. When the length of a sequence is n, the index set contains the numbers 0, 1, …, n-1. Item i of sequence a is selected by a[i]. Some sequences, including built-in sequences, interpret negative subscripts by adding the sequence length. For example, a[-2] equals a[n-2], the second to last item of sequence a with length n.

Sequences also support slicing: a[i:j] selects all items with index k such that i <= k < j. When used as an expression, a slice is a sequence of the same type. The comment above about negative indexes also applies to negative slice positions.

Some sequences also support “extended slicing” with a third “step” parameter: a[i:j:k] selects all items of a with index x where x = i + n*k, n >= 0 and i <= x < j.

Sequences are distinguished according to their mutability:

3.2.6. Set types¶

These represent unordered, finite sets of unique, immutable objects. As such, they cannot be indexed by any subscript. However, they can be iterated over, and the built-in function len() returns the number of items in a set. Common uses for sets are fast membership testing, removing duplicates from a sequence, and computing mathematical operations such as intersection, union, difference, and symmetric difference.

For set elements, the same immutability rules apply as for dictionary keys. Note that numeric types obey the normal rules for numeric comparison: if two numbers compare equal (e.g., 1 and 1.0), only one of them can be contained in a set.

There are currently two intrinsic set types:

Sets

These represent a mutable set. They are created by the built-in set() constructor and can be modified afterwards by several methods, such as add().

Frozen sets

These represent an immutable set. They are created by the built-in frozenset() constructor. As a frozenset is immutable and hashable, it can be used again as an element of another set, or as a dictionary key.

3.2.7. Mappings¶

These represent finite sets of objects indexed by arbitrary index sets. The subscript notation a[k] selects the item indexed by k from the mapping a; this can be used in expressions and as the target of assignments or del statements. The built-in function len() returns the number of items in a mapping.

There is currently a single intrinsic mapping type:

3.2.8. Callable types¶

These are the types to which the function call operation (see section Calls) can be applied:

3.2.9. Modules¶

Modules are a basic organizational unit of Python code, and are created by the import system as invoked either by the import statement, or by calling functions such as importlib.import_module() and built-in __import__(). A module object has a namespace implemented by a dictionary object (this is the dictionary referenced by the __globals__ attribute of functions defined in the module). Attribute references are translated to lookups in this dictionary, e.g., m.x is equivalent to m.__dict__["x"]. A module object does not contain the code object used to initialize the module (since it isn’t needed once the initialization is done).

Attribute assignment updates the module’s namespace dictionary, e.g., m.x = 1 is equivalent to m.__dict__["x"] = 1.

>>> import typing
>>> typing.__name__, typing.__spec__.name
('typing', 'typing')
>>> typing.__spec__.name = 'spelling'
>>> typing.__name__, typing.__spec__.name
('typing', 'spelling')
>>> typing.__name__ = 'keyboard_smashing'
>>> typing.__name__, typing.__spec__.name
('keyboard_smashing', 'spelling')

3.2.10. Custom classes¶

Custom class types are typically created by class definitions (see section Class definitions). A class has a namespace implemented by a dictionary object. Class attribute references are translated to lookups in this dictionary, e.g., C.x is translated to C.__dict__["x"] (although there are a number of hooks which allow for other means of locating attributes). When the attribute name is not found there, the attribute search continues in the base classes. This search of the base classes uses the C3 method resolution order which behaves correctly even in the presence of ‘diamond’ inheritance structures where there are multiple inheritance paths leading back to a common ancestor. Additional details on the C3 MRO used by Python can be found at The Python 2.3 Method Resolution Order.

When a class attribute reference (for class C, say) would yield a class method object, it is transformed into an instance method object whose __self__ attribute is C. When it would yield a staticmethod object, it is transformed into the object wrapped by the static method object. See section Implementing Descriptors for another way in which attributes retrieved from a class may differ from those actually contained in its __dict__.

Class attribute assignments update the class’s dictionary, never the dictionary of a base class.

A class object can be called (see above) to yield a class instance (see below).

3.2.11. Class instances¶

A class instance is created by calling a class object (see above). A class instance has a namespace implemented as a dictionary which is the first place in which attribute references are searched. When an attribute is not found there, and the instance’s class has an attribute by that name, the search continues with the class attributes. If a class attribute is found that is a user-defined function object, it is transformed into an instance method object whose __self__ attribute is the instance. Static method and class method objects are also transformed; see above under “Classes”. See section Implementing Descriptors for another way in which attributes of a class retrieved via its instances may differ from the objects actually stored in the class’s __dict__. If no class attribute is found, and the object’s class has a __getattr__() method, that is called to satisfy the lookup.

Attribute assignments and deletions update the instance’s dictionary, never a class’s dictionary. If the class has a __setattr__() or __delattr__() method, this is called instead of updating the instance dictionary directly.

Class instances can pretend to be numbers, sequences, or mappings if they have methods with certain special names. See section Special method names.

3.2.12. I/O objects (also known as file objects)¶

A file object represents an open file. Various shortcuts are available to create file objects: the open() built-in function, and also os.popen(), os.fdopen(), and the makefile() method of socket objects (and perhaps by other functions or methods provided by extension modules).

The objects sys.stdin, sys.stdout and sys.stderr are initialized to file objects corresponding to the interpreter’s standard input, output and error streams; they are all open in text mode and therefore follow the interface defined by the io.TextIOBase abstract class.

3.2.13. Internal types¶

A few types used internally by the interpreter are exposed to the user. Their definitions may change with future versions of the interpreter, but they are mentioned here for completeness.

3.3.1. Basic customization¶

object.__new__(cls[, ...])¶

Called to create a new instance of class cls. __new__() is a static method (special-cased so you need not declare it as such) that takes the class of which an instance was requested as its first argument. The remaining arguments are those passed to the object constructor expression (the call to the class). The return value of __new__() should be the new object instance (usually an instance of cls).

Typical implementations create a new instance of the class by invoking the superclass’s __new__() method using super().__new__(cls[, ...]) with appropriate arguments and then modifying the newly created instance as necessary before returning it.

If __new__() is invoked during object construction and it returns an instance of cls, then the new instance’s __init__() method will be invoked like __init__(self[, ...]), where self is the new instance and the remaining arguments are the same as were passed to the object constructor.

If __new__() does not return an instance of cls, then the new instance’s __init__() method will not be invoked.

__new__() is intended mainly to allow subclasses of immutable types (like int, str, or tuple) to customize instance creation. It is also commonly overridden in custom metaclasses in order to customize class creation.

object.__init__(self[, ...])¶

Called after the instance has been created (by __new__()), but before it is returned to the caller. The arguments are those passed to the class constructor expression. If a base class has an __init__() method, the derived class’s __init__() method, if any, must explicitly call it to ensure proper initialization of the base class part of the instance; for example: super().__init__([args...]).

Because __new__() and __init__() work together in constructing objects (__new__() to create it, and __init__() to customize it), no non-None value may be returned by __init__(); doing so will cause a TypeError to be raised at runtime.

object.__del__(self)¶

Called when the instance is about to be destroyed. This is also called a finalizer or (improperly) a destructor. If a base class has a __del__() method, the derived class’s __del__() method, if any, must explicitly call it to ensure proper deletion of the base class part of the instance.

It is possible (though not recommended!) for the __del__() method to postpone destruction of the instance by creating a new reference to it. This is called object resurrection. It is implementation-dependent whether __del__() is called a second time when a resurrected object is about to be destroyed; the current CPython implementation only calls it once.

It is not guaranteed that __del__() methods are called for objects that still exist when the interpreter exits. weakref.finalize provides a straightforward way to register a cleanup function to be called when an object is garbage collected.

Note

del x doesn’t directly call x.__del__() — the former decrements the reference count for x by one, and the latter is only called when x’s reference count reaches zero.

CPython implementation detail: It is possible for a reference cycle to prevent the reference count of an object from going to zero. In this case, the cycle will be later detected and deleted by the cyclic garbage collector. A common cause of reference cycles is when an exception has been caught in a local variable. The frame’s locals then reference the exception, which references its own traceback, which references the locals of all frames caught in the traceback.

See also

Documentation for the gc module.

Warning

Due to the precarious circumstances under which __del__() methods are invoked, exceptions that occur during their execution are ignored, and a warning is printed to sys.stderr instead. In particular:

• __del__() can be invoked when arbitrary code is being executed, including from any arbitrary thread. If __del__() needs to take a lock or invoke any other blocking resource, it may deadlock as the resource may already be taken by the code that gets interrupted to execute __del__().

• __del__() can be executed during interpreter shutdown. As a consequence, the global variables it needs to access (including other modules) may already have been deleted or set to None. Python guarantees that globals whose name begins with a single underscore are deleted from their module before other globals are deleted; if no other references to such globals exist, this may help in assuring that imported modules are still available at the time when the __del__() method is called.

object.__repr__(self)¶

Called by the repr() built-in function to compute the “official” string representation of an object. If at all possible, this should look like a valid Python expression that could be used to recreate an object with the same value (given an appropriate environment). If this is not possible, a string of the form <...some useful description...> should be returned. The return value must be a string object. If a class defines __repr__() but not __str__(), then __repr__() is also used when an “informal” string representation of instances of that class is required.

This is typically used for debugging, so it is important that the representation is information-rich and unambiguous. A default implementation is provided by the object class itself.

object.__str__(self)¶

Called by str(object), the default __format__() implementation, and the built-in function print(), to compute the “informal” or nicely printable string representation of an object. The return value must be a str object.

This method differs from object.__repr__() in that there is no expectation that __str__() return a valid Python expression: a more convenient or concise representation can be used.

The default implementation defined by the built-in type object calls object.__repr__().

object.__bytes__(self)¶

Called by bytes to compute a byte-string representation of an object. This should return a bytes object. The object class itself does not provide this method.

object.__format__(self, format_spec)¶

Called by the format() built-in function, and by extension, evaluation of formatted string literals and the str.format() method, to produce a “formatted” string representation of an object. The format_spec argument is a string that contains a description of the formatting options desired. The interpretation of the format_spec argument is up to the type implementing __format__(), however most classes will either delegate formatting to one of the built-in types, or use a similar formatting option syntax.

See Format Specification Mini-Language for a description of the standard formatting syntax.

The return value must be a string object.

The default implementation by the object class should be given an empty format_spec string. It delegates to __str__().

Changed in version 3.4: The __format__ method of object itself raises a TypeError if passed any non-empty string.

Changed in version 3.7: object.__format__(x, '') is now equivalent to str(x) rather than format(str(x), '').

object.__lt__(self, other)¶

object.__le__(self, other)¶

object.__eq__(self, other)¶

object.__ne__(self, other)¶

object.__gt__(self, other)¶

object.__ge__(self, other)¶

These are the so-called “rich comparison” methods. The correspondence between operator symbols and method names is as follows: x<y calls x.__lt__(y), x<=y calls x.__le__(y), x==y calls x.__eq__(y), x!=y calls x.__ne__(y), x>y calls x.__gt__(y), and x>=y calls x.__ge__(y).

A rich comparison method may return the singleton NotImplemented if it does not implement the operation for a given pair of arguments. By convention, False and True are returned for a successful comparison. However, these methods can return any value, so if the comparison operator is used in a Boolean context (e.g., in the condition of an if statement), Python will call bool() on the value to determine if the result is true or false.

By default, object implements __eq__() by using is, returning NotImplemented in the case of a false comparison: True if x is y else NotImplemented. For __ne__(), by default it delegates to __eq__() and inverts the result unless it is NotImplemented. There are no other implied relationships among the comparison operators or default implementations; for example, the truth of (x<y or x==y) does not imply x<=y. To automatically generate ordering operations from a single root operation, see functools.total_ordering().

By default, the object class provides implementations consistent with Value comparisons: equality compares according to object identity, and order comparisons raise TypeError. Each default method may generate these results directly, but may also return NotImplemented.

See the paragraph on __hash__() for some important notes on creating hashable objects which support custom comparison operations and are usable as dictionary keys.

There are no swapped-argument versions of these methods (to be used when the left argument does not support the operation but the right argument does); rather, __lt__() and __gt__() are each other’s reflection, __le__() and __ge__() are each other’s reflection, and __eq__() and __ne__() are their own reflection. If the operands are of different types, and the right operand’s type is a direct or indirect subclass of the left operand’s type, the reflected method of the right operand has priority, otherwise the left operand’s method has priority. Virtual subclassing is not considered.

When no appropriate method returns any value other than NotImplemented, the == and != operators will fall back to is and is not, respectively.

object.__hash__(self)¶

Called by built-in function hash() and for operations on members of hashed collections including set, frozenset, and dict. The __hash__() method should return an integer. The only required property is that objects which compare equal have the same hash value; it is advised to mix together the hash values of the components of the object that also play a part in comparison of objects by packing them into a tuple and hashing the tuple. Example:

def __hash__(self):
    return hash((self.name, self.nick, self.color))

Note

hash() truncates the value returned from an object’s custom __hash__() method to the size of a Py_ssize_t. This is typically 8 bytes on 64-bit builds and 4 bytes on 32-bit builds. If an object’s __hash__() must interoperate on builds of different bit sizes, be sure to check the width on all supported builds. An easy way to do this is with python -c "import sys; print(sys.hash_info.width)".

If a class does not define an __eq__() method it should not define a __hash__() operation either; if it defines __eq__() but not __hash__(), its instances will not be usable as items in hashable collections. If a class defines mutable objects and implements an __eq__() method, it should not implement __hash__(), since the implementation of hashable collections requires that a key’s hash value is immutable (if the object’s hash value changes, it will be in the wrong hash bucket).

User-defined classes have __eq__() and __hash__() methods by default (inherited from the object class); with them, all objects compare unequal (except with themselves) and x.__hash__() returns an appropriate value such that x == y implies both that x is y and hash(x) == hash(y).

A class that overrides __eq__() and does not define __hash__() will have its __hash__() implicitly set to None. When the __hash__() method of a class is None, instances of the class will raise an appropriate TypeError when a program attempts to retrieve their hash value, and will also be correctly identified as unhashable when checking isinstance(obj, collections.abc.Hashable).

If a class that overrides __eq__() needs to retain the implementation of __hash__() from a parent class, the interpreter must be told this explicitly by setting __hash__ = <ParentClass>.__hash__.

If a class that does not override __eq__() wishes to suppress hash support, it should include __hash__ = None in the class definition. A class which defines its own __hash__() that explicitly raises a TypeError would be incorrectly identified as hashable by an isinstance(obj, collections.abc.Hashable) call.

Note

By default, the __hash__() values of str and bytes objects are “salted” with an unpredictable random value. Although they remain constant within an individual Python process, they are not predictable between repeated invocations of Python.

This is intended to provide protection against a denial-of-service caused by carefully chosen inputs that exploit the worst case performance of a dict insertion, O(n²) complexity. See http://ocert.org/advisories/ocert-2011-003.html for details.

Changing hash values affects the iteration order of sets. Python has never made guarantees about this ordering (and it typically varies between 32-bit and 64-bit builds).

See also PYTHONHASHSEED.

Changed in version 3.3: Hash randomization is enabled by default.

object.__bool__(self)¶

Called to implement truth value testing and the built-in operation bool(); should return False or True. When this method is not defined, __len__() is called, if it is defined, and the object is considered true if its result is nonzero. If a class defines neither __len__() nor __bool__() (which is true of the object class itself), all its instances are considered true.

3.3.2. Customizing attribute access¶

The following methods can be defined to customize the meaning of attribute access (use of, assignment to, or deletion of x.name) for class instances.

object.__getattr__(self, name)¶

Called when the default attribute access fails with an AttributeError (either __getattribute__() raises an AttributeError because name is not an instance attribute or an attribute in the class tree for self; or __get__() of a name property raises AttributeError). This method should either return the (computed) attribute value or raise an AttributeError exception. The object class itself does not provide this method.

Note that if the attribute is found through the normal mechanism, __getattr__() is not called. (This is an intentional asymmetry between __getattr__() and __setattr__().) This is done both for efficiency reasons and because otherwise __getattr__() would have no way to access other attributes of the instance. Note that at least for instance variables, you can take total control by not inserting any values in the instance attribute dictionary (but instead inserting them in another object). See the __getattribute__() method below for a way to actually get total control over attribute access.

object.__getattribute__(self, name)¶

Called unconditionally to implement attribute accesses for instances of the class. If the class also defines __getattr__(), the latter will not be called unless __getattribute__() either calls it explicitly or raises an AttributeError. This method should return the (computed) attribute value or raise an AttributeError exception. In order to avoid infinite recursion in this method, its implementation should always call the base class method with the same name to access any attributes it needs, for example, object.__getattribute__(self, name).

Note

This method may still be bypassed when looking up special methods as the result of implicit invocation via language syntax or built-in functions. See Special method lookup.

For certain sensitive attribute accesses, raises an auditing event object.__getattr__ with arguments obj and name.

object.__setattr__(self, name, value)¶

Called when an attribute assignment is attempted. This is called instead of the normal mechanism (i.e. store the value in the instance dictionary). name is the attribute name, value is the value to be assigned to it.

If __setattr__() wants to assign to an instance attribute, it should call the base class method with the same name, for example, object.__setattr__(self, name, value).

For certain sensitive attribute assignments, raises an auditing event object.__setattr__ with arguments obj, name, value.

object.__delattr__(self, name)¶

Like __setattr__() but for attribute deletion instead of assignment. This should only be implemented if del obj.name is meaningful for the object.

For certain sensitive attribute deletions, raises an auditing event object.__delattr__ with arguments obj and name.

object.__dir__(self)¶

Called when dir() is called on the object. An iterable must be returned. dir() converts the returned iterable to a list and sorts it.

import sys
from types import ModuleType

class VerboseModule(ModuleType):
    def __repr__(self):
        return f'Verbose {self.__name__}'

    def __setattr__(self, attr, value):
        print(f'Setting {attr}...')
        super().__setattr__(attr, value)

sys.modules[__name__].__class__ = VerboseModule

3.3.3. Customizing class creation¶

Whenever a class inherits from another class, __init_subclass__() is called on the parent class. This way, it is possible to write classes which change the behavior of subclasses. This is closely related to class decorators, but where class decorators only affect the specific class they’re applied to, __init_subclass__ solely applies to future subclasses of the class defining the method.

classmethod object.__init_subclass__(cls)¶

This method is called whenever the containing class is subclassed. cls is then the new subclass. If defined as a normal instance method, this method is implicitly converted to a class method.

Keyword arguments which are given to a new class are passed to the parent class’s __init_subclass__. For compatibility with other classes using __init_subclass__, one should take out the needed keyword arguments and pass the others over to the base class, as in:

class Philosopher:
    def __init_subclass__(cls, /, default_name, **kwargs):
        super().__init_subclass__(**kwargs)
        cls.default_name = default_name

class AustralianPhilosopher(Philosopher, default_name="Bruce"):
    pass

The default implementation object.__init_subclass__ does nothing, but raises an error if it is called with any arguments.

Note

The metaclass hint metaclass is consumed by the rest of the type machinery, and is never passed to __init_subclass__ implementations. The actual metaclass (rather than the explicit hint) can be accessed as type(cls).

Added in version 3.6.

When a class is created, type.__new__() scans the class variables and makes callbacks to those with a __set_name__() hook.

object.__set_name__(self, owner, name)¶

Automatically called at the time the owning class owner is created. The object has been assigned to name in that class:

class A:
    x = C()  # Automatically calls: x.__set_name__(A, 'x')

If the class variable is assigned after the class is created, __set_name__() will not be called automatically. If needed, __set_name__() can be called directly:

class A:
   pass

c = C()
A.x = c                  # The hook is not called
c.__set_name__(A, 'x')   # Manually invoke the hook

See Creating the class object for more details.

Added in version 3.6.

class Meta(type):
    pass

class MyClass(metaclass=Meta):
    pass

class MySubclass(MyClass):
    pass

3.3.4. Customizing instance and subclass checks¶

The following methods are used to override the default behavior of the isinstance() and issubclass() built-in functions.

In particular, the metaclass abc.ABCMeta implements these methods in order to allow the addition of Abstract Base Classes (ABCs) as “virtual base classes” to any class or type (including built-in types), including other ABCs.

type.__instancecheck__(self, instance)¶

Return true if instance should be considered a (direct or indirect) instance of class. If defined, called to implement isinstance(instance, class).

type.__subclasscheck__(self, subclass)¶

Return true if subclass should be considered a (direct or indirect) subclass of class. If defined, called to implement issubclass(subclass, class).

Note that these methods are looked up on the type (metaclass) of a class. They cannot be defined as class methods in the actual class. This is consistent with the lookup of special methods that are called on instances, only in this case the instance is itself a class.

3.3.5. Emulating generic types¶

When using type annotations, it is often useful to parameterize a generic type using Python’s square-brackets notation. For example, the annotation list[int] might be used to signify a list in which all the elements are of type int.

A class can generally only be parameterized if it defines the special class method __class_getitem__().

classmethod object.__class_getitem__(cls, key)¶

Return an object representing the specialization of a generic class by type arguments found in key.

When defined on a class, __class_getitem__() is automatically a class method. As such, there is no need for it to be decorated with @classmethod when it is defined.

from inspect import isclass

def subscribe(obj, x):
    """Return the result of the expression 'obj[x]'"""

    class_of_obj = type(obj)

    # If the class of obj defines __getitem__,
    # call class_of_obj.__getitem__(obj, x)
    if hasattr(class_of_obj, '__getitem__'):
        return class_of_obj.__getitem__(obj, x)

    # Else, if obj is a class and defines __class_getitem__,
    # call obj.__class_getitem__(x)
    elif isclass(obj) and hasattr(obj, '__class_getitem__'):
        return obj.__class_getitem__(x)

    # Else, raise an exception
    else:
        raise TypeError(
            f"'{class_of_obj.__name__}' object is not subscriptable"
        )

>>> # list has class "type" as its metaclass, like most classes:
>>> type(list)
<class 'type'>
>>> type(dict) == type(list) == type(tuple) == type(str) == type(bytes)
True
>>> # "list[int]" calls "list.__class_getitem__(int)"
>>> list[int]
list[int]
>>> # list.__class_getitem__ returns a GenericAlias object:
>>> type(list[int])
<class 'types.GenericAlias'>

>>> from enum import Enum
>>> class Menu(Enum):
...     """A breakfast menu"""
...     SPAM = 'spam'
...     BACON = 'bacon'
...
>>> # Enum classes have a custom metaclass:
>>> type(Menu)
<class 'enum.EnumMeta'>
>>> # EnumMeta defines __getitem__,
>>> # so __class_getitem__ is not called,
>>> # and the result is not a GenericAlias object:
>>> Menu['SPAM']
<Menu.SPAM: 'spam'>
>>> type(Menu['SPAM'])
<enum 'Menu'>

3.3.6. Emulating callable objects¶

object.__call__(self[, args...])¶

Called when the instance is “called” as a function; if this method is defined, x(arg1, arg2, ...) roughly translates to type(x).__call__(x, arg1, ...). The object class itself does not provide this method.

3.3.7. Emulating container types¶

The following methods can be defined to implement container objects. None of them are provided by the object class itself. Containers usually are sequences (such as lists or tuples) or mappings (like dictionaries), but can represent other containers as well. The first set of methods is used either to emulate a sequence or to emulate a mapping; the difference is that for a sequence, the allowable keys should be the integers k for which 0 <= k < N where N is the length of the sequence, or slice objects, which define a range of items. It is also recommended that mappings provide the methods keys(), values(), items(), get(), clear(), setdefault(), pop(), popitem(), copy(), and update() behaving similar to those for Python’s standard dictionary objects. The collections.abc module provides a MutableMapping abstract base class to help create those methods from a base set of __getitem__(), __setitem__(), __delitem__(), and keys(). Mutable sequences should provide methods append(), count(), index(), extend(), insert(), pop(), remove(), reverse() and sort(), like Python standard list objects. Finally, sequence types should implement addition (meaning concatenation) and multiplication (meaning repetition) by defining the methods __add__(), __radd__(), __iadd__(), __mul__(), __rmul__() and __imul__() described below; they should not define other numerical operators. It is recommended that both mappings and sequences implement the __contains__() method to allow efficient use of the in operator; for mappings, in should search the mapping’s keys; for sequences, it should search through the values. It is further recommended that both mappings and sequences implement the __iter__() method to allow efficient iteration through the container; for mappings, __iter__() should iterate through the object’s keys; for sequences, it should iterate through the values.

object.__len__(self)¶

Called to implement the built-in function len(). Should return the length of the object, an integer >= 0. Also, an object that doesn’t define a __bool__() method and whose __len__() method returns zero is considered to be false in a Boolean context.

CPython implementation detail: In CPython, the length is required to be at most sys.maxsize. If the length is larger than sys.maxsize some features (such as len()) may raise OverflowError. To prevent raising OverflowError by truth value testing, an object must define a __bool__() method.

object.__length_hint__(self)¶

Called to implement operator.length_hint(). Should return an estimated length for the object (which may be greater or less than the actual length). The length must be an integer >= 0. The return value may also be NotImplemented, which is treated the same as if the __length_hint__ method didn’t exist at all. This method is purely an optimization and is never required for correctness.

Added in version 3.4.

a[1:2] = b

a[slice(1, 2, None)] = b

object.__getitem__(self, key)¶

Called to implement evaluation of self[key]. For sequence types, the accepted keys should be integers. Optionally, they may support slice objects as well. Negative index support is also optional. If key is of an inappropriate type, TypeError may be raised; if key is a value outside the set of indexes for the sequence (after any special interpretation of negative values), IndexError should be raised. For mapping types, if key is missing (not in the container), KeyError should be raised.

Note

for loops expect that an IndexError will be raised for illegal indexes to allow proper detection of the end of the sequence.

Note

When subscripting a class, the special class method __class_getitem__() may be called instead of __getitem__(). See __class_getitem__ versus __getitem__ for more details.

object.__setitem__(self, key, value)¶

Called to implement assignment to self[key]. Same note as for __getitem__(). This should only be implemented for mappings if the objects support changes to the values for keys, or if new keys can be added, or for sequences if elements can be replaced. The same exceptions should be raised for improper key values as for the __getitem__() method.

object.__delitem__(self, key)¶

Called to implement deletion of self[key]. Same note as for __getitem__(). This should only be implemented for mappings if the objects support removal of keys, or for sequences if elements can be removed from the sequence. The same exceptions should be raised for improper key values as for the __getitem__() method.

object.__missing__(self, key)¶

Called by dict.__getitem__() to implement self[key] for dict subclasses when key is not in the dictionary.

object.__iter__(self)¶

This method is called when an iterator is required for a container. This method should return a new iterator object that can iterate over all the objects in the container. For mappings, it should iterate over the keys of the container.

object.__reversed__(self)¶

Called (if present) by the reversed() built-in to implement reverse iteration. It should return a new iterator object that iterates over all the objects in the container in reverse order.

If the __reversed__() method is not provided, the reversed() built-in will fall back to using the sequence protocol (__len__() and __getitem__()). Objects that support the sequence protocol should only provide __reversed__() if they can provide an implementation that is more efficient than the one provided by reversed().

The membership test operators (in and not in) are normally implemented as an iteration through a container. However, container objects can supply the following special method with a more efficient implementation, which also does not require the object be iterable.

object.__contains__(self, item)¶

Called to implement membership test operators. Should return true if item is in self, false otherwise. For mapping objects, this should consider the keys of the mapping rather than the values or the key-item pairs.

For objects that don’t define __contains__(), the membership test first tries iteration via __iter__(), then the old sequence iteration protocol via __getitem__(), see this section in the language reference.

3.3.8. Emulating numeric types¶

The following methods can be defined to emulate numeric objects. Methods corresponding to operations that are not supported by the particular kind of number implemented (e.g., bitwise operations for non-integral numbers) should be left undefined.

object.__add__(self, other)¶

object.__sub__(self, other)¶

object.__mul__(self, other)¶

object.__matmul__(self, other)¶

object.__truediv__(self, other)¶

object.__floordiv__(self, other)¶

object.__mod__(self, other)¶

object.__divmod__(self, other)¶

object.__pow__(self, other[, modulo])¶

object.__lshift__(self, other)¶

object.__rshift__(self, other)¶

object.__and__(self, other)¶

object.__xor__(self, other)¶

object.__or__(self, other)¶

These methods are called to implement the binary arithmetic operations (+, -, *, @, /, //, %, divmod(), pow(), **, <<, >>, &, ^, |). For instance, to evaluate the expression x + y, where x is an instance of a class that has an __add__() method, type(x).__add__(x, y) is called. The __divmod__() method should be the equivalent to using __floordiv__() and __mod__(); it should not be related to __truediv__(). Note that __pow__() should be defined to accept an optional third argument if the ternary version of the built-in pow() function is to be supported.

If one of those methods does not support the operation with the supplied arguments, it should return NotImplemented.

object.__radd__(self, other)¶

object.__rsub__(self, other)¶

object.__rmul__(self, other)¶

object.__rmatmul__(self, other)¶

object.__rtruediv__(self, other)¶

object.__rfloordiv__(self, other)¶

object.__rmod__(self, other)¶

object.__rdivmod__(self, other)¶

object.__rpow__(self, other[, modulo])¶

object.__rlshift__(self, other)¶

object.__rrshift__(self, other)¶

object.__rand__(self, other)¶

object.__rxor__(self, other)¶

object.__ror__(self, other)¶

These methods are called to implement the binary arithmetic operations (+, -, *, @, /, //, %, divmod(), pow(), **, <<, >>, &, ^, |) with reflected (swapped) operands. These functions are only called if the left operand does not support the corresponding operation [3] and the operands are of different types. [4] For instance, to evaluate the expression x - y, where y is an instance of a class that has an __rsub__() method, type(y).__rsub__(y, x) is called if type(x).__sub__(x, y) returns NotImplemented.

Note that ternary pow() will not try calling __rpow__() (the coercion rules would become too complicated).

Note

If the right operand’s type is a subclass of the left operand’s type and that subclass provides a different implementation of the reflected method for the operation, this method will be called before the left operand’s non-reflected method. This behavior allows subclasses to override their ancestors’ operations.

object.__iadd__(self, other)¶

object.__isub__(self, other)¶

object.__imul__(self, other)¶

object.__imatmul__(self, other)¶

object.__itruediv__(self, other)¶

object.__ifloordiv__(self, other)¶

object.__imod__(self, other)¶

object.__ipow__(self, other[, modulo])¶

object.__ilshift__(self, other)¶

object.__irshift__(self, other)¶

object.__iand__(self, other)¶

object.__ixor__(self, other)¶

object.__ior__(self, other)¶

These methods are called to implement the augmented arithmetic assignments (+=, -=, *=, @=, /=, //=, %=, **=, <<=, >>=, &=, ^=, |=). These methods should attempt to do the operation in-place (modifying self) and return the result (which could be, but does not have to be, self). If a specific method is not defined, or if that method returns NotImplemented, the augmented assignment falls back to the normal methods. For instance, if x is an instance of a class with an __iadd__() method, x += y is equivalent to x = x.__iadd__(y) . If __iadd__() does not exist, or if x.__iadd__(y) returns NotImplemented, x.__add__(y) and y.__radd__(x) are considered, as with the evaluation of x + y. In certain situations, augmented assignment can result in unexpected errors (see Why does a_tuple[i] += [‘item’] raise an exception when the addition works?), but this behavior is in fact part of the data model.

object.__neg__(self)¶

object.__pos__(self)¶

object.__abs__(self)¶

object.__invert__(self)¶

Called to implement the unary arithmetic operations (-, +, abs() and ~).

object.__complex__(self)¶

object.__int__(self)¶

object.__float__(self)¶

Called to implement the built-in functions complex(), int() and float(). Should return a value of the appropriate type.

object.__index__(self)¶

Called to implement operator.index(), and whenever Python needs to losslessly convert the numeric object to an integer object (such as in slicing, or in the built-in bin(), hex() and oct() functions). Presence of this method indicates that the numeric object is an integer type. Must return an integer.

If __int__(), __float__() and __complex__() are not defined then corresponding built-in functions int(), float() and complex() fall back to __index__().

object.__round__(self[, ndigits])¶

object.__trunc__(self)¶

object.__floor__(self)¶

object.__ceil__(self)¶

Called to implement the built-in function round() and math functions trunc(), floor() and ceil(). Unless ndigits is passed to __round__() all these methods should return the value of the object truncated to an Integral (typically an int).

The built-in function int() falls back to __trunc__() if neither __int__() nor __index__() is defined.

Changed in version 3.11: The delegation of int() to __trunc__() is deprecated.

3.3.9. With Statement Context Managers¶

A context manager is an object that defines the runtime context to be established when executing a with statement. The context manager handles the entry into, and the exit from, the desired runtime context for the execution of the block of code. Context managers are normally invoked using the with statement (described in section The with statement), but can also be used by directly invoking their methods.

Typical uses of context managers include saving and restoring various kinds of global state, locking and unlocking resources, closing opened files, etc.

For more information on context managers, see Context Manager Types. The object class itself does not provide the context manager methods.

object.__enter__(self)¶

Enter the runtime context related to this object. The with statement will bind this method’s return value to the target(s) specified in the as clause of the statement, if any.

object.__exit__(self, exc_type, exc_value, traceback)¶

Exit the runtime context related to this object. The parameters describe the exception that caused the context to be exited. If the context was exited without an exception, all three arguments will be None.

If an exception is supplied, and the method wishes to suppress the exception (i.e., prevent it from being propagated), it should return a true value. Otherwise, the exception will be processed normally upon exit from this method.

Note that __exit__() methods should not reraise the passed-in exception; this is the caller’s responsibility.

3.3.10. Customizing positional arguments in class pattern matching¶

When using a class name in a pattern, positional arguments in the pattern are not allowed by default, i.e. case MyClass(x, y) is typically invalid without special support in MyClass. To be able to use that kind of pattern, the class needs to define a __match_args__ attribute.

object.__match_args__¶

This class variable can be assigned a tuple of strings. When this class is used in a class pattern with positional arguments, each positional argument will be converted into a keyword argument, using the corresponding value in __match_args__ as the keyword. The absence of this attribute is equivalent to setting it to ().

For example, if MyClass.__match_args__ is ("left", "center", "right") that means that case MyClass(x, y) is equivalent to case MyClass(left=x, center=y). Note that the number of arguments in the pattern must be smaller than or equal to the number of elements in __match_args__; if it is larger, the pattern match attempt will raise a TypeError.

3.3.11. Emulating buffer types¶

The buffer protocol provides a way for Python objects to expose efficient access to a low-level memory array. This protocol is implemented by builtin types such as bytes and memoryview, and third-party libraries may define additional buffer types.

While buffer types are usually implemented in C, it is also possible to implement the protocol in Python.

object.__buffer__(self, flags)¶

Called when a buffer is requested from self (for example, by the memoryview constructor). The flags argument is an integer representing the kind of buffer requested, affecting for example whether the returned buffer is read-only or writable. inspect.BufferFlags provides a convenient way to interpret the flags. The method must return a memoryview object.

object.__release_buffer__(self, buffer)¶

Called when a buffer is no longer needed. The buffer argument is a memoryview object that was previously returned by __buffer__(). The method must release any resources associated with the buffer. This method should return None. Buffer objects that do not need to perform any cleanup are not required to implement this method.

3.3.12. Special method lookup¶

For custom classes, implicit invocations of special methods are only guaranteed to work correctly if defined on an object’s type, not in the object’s instance dictionary. That behaviour is the reason why the following code raises an exception:

>>> class C:
...     pass
...
>>> c = C()
>>> c.__len__ = lambda: 5
>>> len(c)
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
TypeError: object of type 'C' has no len()

The rationale behind this behaviour lies with a number of special methods such as __hash__() and __repr__() that are implemented by all objects, including type objects. If the implicit lookup of these methods used the conventional lookup process, they would fail when invoked on the type object itself:

>>> 1 .__hash__() == hash(1)
True
>>> int.__hash__() == hash(int)
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
TypeError: descriptor '__hash__' of 'int' object needs an argument

Incorrectly attempting to invoke an unbound method of a class in this way is sometimes referred to as ‘metaclass confusion’, and is avoided by bypassing the instance when looking up special methods:

>>> type(1).__hash__(1) == hash(1)
True
>>> type(int).__hash__(int) == hash(int)
True

In addition to bypassing any instance attributes in the interest of correctness, implicit special method lookup generally also bypasses the __getattribute__() method even of the object’s metaclass:

>>> class Meta(type):
...     def __getattribute__(*args):
...         print("Metaclass getattribute invoked")
...         return type.__getattribute__(*args)
...
>>> class C(object, metaclass=Meta):
...     def __len__(self):
...         return 10
...     def __getattribute__(*args):
...         print("Class getattribute invoked")
...         return object.__getattribute__(*args)
...
>>> c = C()
>>> c.__len__()                 # Explicit lookup via instance
Class getattribute invoked
10
>>> type(c).__len__(c)          # Explicit lookup via type
Metaclass getattribute invoked
10
>>> len(c)                      # Implicit lookup
10

Bypassing the __getattribute__() machinery in this fashion provides significant scope for speed optimisations within the interpreter, at the cost of some flexibility in the handling of special methods (the special method must be set on the class object itself in order to be consistently invoked by the interpreter).

3.4.1. Awaitable Objects¶

An awaitable object generally implements an __await__() method. Coroutine objects returned from async def functions are awaitable.

object.__await__(self)¶

Must return an iterator. Should be used to implement awaitable objects. For instance, asyncio.Future implements this method to be compatible with the await expression. The object class itself is not awaitable and does not provide this method.

Note

The language doesn’t place any restriction on the type or value of the objects yielded by the iterator returned by __await__, as this is specific to the implementation of the asynchronous execution framework (e.g. asyncio) that will be managing the awaitable object.

3.4.2. Coroutine Objects¶

Coroutine objects are awaitable objects. A coroutine’s execution can be controlled by calling __await__() and iterating over the result. When the coroutine has finished executing and returns, the iterator raises StopIteration, and the exception’s value attribute holds the return value. If the coroutine raises an exception, it is propagated by the iterator. Coroutines should not directly raise unhandled StopIteration exceptions.

Coroutines also have the methods listed below, which are analogous to those of generators (see Generator-iterator methods). However, unlike generators, coroutines do not directly support iteration.

coroutine.send(value)¶

Starts or resumes execution of the coroutine. If value is None, this is equivalent to advancing the iterator returned by __await__(). If value is not None, this method delegates to the send() method of the iterator that caused the coroutine to suspend. The result (return value, StopIteration, or other exception) is the same as when iterating over the __await__() return value, described above.

coroutine.throw(value)¶

coroutine.throw(type[, value[, traceback]])

Raises the specified exception in the coroutine. This method delegates to the throw() method of the iterator that caused the coroutine to suspend, if it has such a method. Otherwise, the exception is raised at the suspension point. The result (return value, StopIteration, or other exception) is the same as when iterating over the __await__() return value, described above. If the exception is not caught in the coroutine, it propagates back to the caller.

Changed in version 3.12: The second signature (type[, value[, traceback]]) is deprecated and may be removed in a future version of Python.

coroutine.close()¶

Causes the coroutine to clean itself up and exit. If the coroutine is suspended, this method first delegates to the close() method of the iterator that caused the coroutine to suspend, if it has such a method. Then it raises GeneratorExit at the suspension point, causing the coroutine to immediately clean itself up. Finally, the coroutine is marked as having finished executing, even if it was never started.

Coroutine objects are automatically closed using the above process when they are about to be destroyed.

3.4.3. Asynchronous Iterators¶

An asynchronous iterator can call asynchronous code in its __anext__ method.

Asynchronous iterators can be used in an async for statement.

The object class itself does not provide these methods.

object.__aiter__(self)¶

Must return an asynchronous iterator object.

object.__anext__(self)¶

Must return an awaitable resulting in a next value of the iterator. Should raise a StopAsyncIteration error when the iteration is over.

An example of an asynchronous iterable object:

class Reader:
    async def readline(self):
        ...

    def __aiter__(self):
        return self

    async def __anext__(self):
        val = await self.readline()
        if val == b'':
            raise StopAsyncIteration
        return val

3.4.4. Asynchronous Context Managers¶

An asynchronous context manager is a context manager that is able to suspend execution in its __aenter__ and __aexit__ methods.

Asynchronous context managers can be used in an async with statement.

The object class itself does not provide these methods.

object.__aenter__(self)¶

Semantically similar to __enter__(), the only difference being that it must return an awaitable.

object.__aexit__(self, exc_type, exc_value, traceback)¶

Semantically similar to __exit__(), the only difference being that it must return an awaitable.

An example of an asynchronous context manager class:

class AsyncContextManager:
    async def __aenter__(self):
        await log('entering context')

    async def __aexit__(self, exc_type, exc, tb):
        await log('exiting context')

Footnotes