I am trying to make a class in Python with static variables and methods (attributes and behaviors)
import numpy
class SimpleString():
popSize = 1000
displaySize = 5
alphatbet = "abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz "
def __init__(self):
pop = numpy.empty(popSize, object)
target = getTarget()
targetSize = len(target)
When the code runs though it says that it cannot make the array pop because popSize is not defined
You either need to access it with a self.popSize
or SimpleString.popSize
. When you declare a variable in a class in order for any of the instance functions to access that variable you will need to use self
or the class name(in this case SimpleString
) otherwise it will treat any variable in the function to be a local variable to that function.
The difference between self
and SimpleString
is that with self
any changes you make to popSize
will only be reflected within the scope of your instance, if you create another instance of SimpleString
popSize
will still be 1000
. If you use SimpleString.popSize
then any change you make to that variable will be propagated to any instance of that class.
import numpy
class SimpleString():
popSize = 1000
displaySize = 5
alphatbet = "abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz "
def __init__(self):
pop = numpy.empty(self.popSize, object)
target = getTarget()
targetSize = len(target)
You need to use self
or the class object to access class attributes:
def __init__(self):
pop = numpy.empty(self.popSize, object)
target = getTarget()
targetSize = len(target)
or
def __init__(self):
pop = numpy.empty(SimpleString.popSize, object)
target = getTarget()
targetSize = len(target)
The latter form is really only needed if you want to bypass an instance attribute with the same name:
>>> class Foo(object):
... bar = 42
... baz = 42
... def __init__(self):
... self.bar = 38
... def printBar(self):
... print self.bar, Foo.bar
... def printBaz(self):
... print self.baz, Foo.baz
...
>>> f = Foo()
>>> f.printBar()
38 42
>>> f.printBaz()
42 42
Here self.bar
is an instance attribute (setting always happens on the object directly). But because there is no baz
instance attribute, self.baz
finds the class attribute instead.