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Bubbly Sprout
2,472 PointsHow to interpret self.append(...)?
In the video, the teacher has a line of code: self.append(...) My understanding is that self refers to an instance of the class, in this case Hand. Since Hand is inherited from List, Hand should have an attribute that is a List. The above line of code seems to append a new element to that List. But I'm wondering why the name of that List, say aList, is not used here, i.e., shouldn't it be self.aList.append(...)? The reason I'm asking is that in Hand class, one can include other attributes, including another list. If we don't include the list name, how does the computer know which attribute list to append to? Many thanks!
1 Answer
Michael Hulet
47,912 PointsHand inherits from List, which means that Hand is itself also a List. That means that all the same functionality that List has, Hand has also. Thus, it's perfectly valid to call append on an instance of Hand, because you can also do that on an instance of a List
Bubbly Sprout
2,472 PointsThat makes sense! Thank you for the reply! I guess the computer first looks for the append() method in Hand definition. When it can't find it, it looks in the parent (in this case List) definition. When it uses the append() method defined in List, the attribute of List is used.
KRIS NIKOLAISEN
54,967 PointsKRIS NIKOLAISEN
54,967 PointsCan you provide a link to the video?