Why is my attribute assigned to the class in this code?

Question

I was practicing with Class and init. I decided to create a Class called Child: class Child: def init(self, **kwargs): for attribute, value in kwargs.items(): setattr(self, attribute, value)

Then I created an instance: Bill = Child

Then, I decided to set some attributes: Bill.name = Bill Bill.hair = 'curly'

Then I tried to get the attribute back:

Child.hair(Bill) Traceback (most recent call last): File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module> TypeError: 'str' object is not callable

But when I just call it on the Class:

Child.hair 'curly'

I'm a newb, so I can see I might have the syntax wrong the first time. But why, when I've assigned an attribute to an instance of the Child class, does calling the attribute on the class give it back?

Answer 1 · 2019-01-25T01:49:23Z

January 25, 2019 1:49am

Because this

Then I created an instance: Bill = Child didn't create an instance it just created reference to the same class as Child - Bill and Child are the same thing.

To create an instance you would need to include the parenthesis:

bill = Child()  # create instance called bill (lower case for instance)

# use the id method to verify
# your ids will be different but Bill and Child should be the same
Bill = Child
sue = Child()
print("id of Bill is " + str(id(Bill)))
print("id of Child is " + str(id(Child)))
print("id of sue is " + str(id(sue)))

# output
id of Bill is 94898253810488
id of Child is 94898253810488
id of sue is 140248931096112

Answer 2 · 2019-01-25T06:00:38Z

January 25, 2019 6:00am

Thank you!

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Guy Larkin

Guy Larkin

Why is my attribute assigned to the class in this code?

2 Answers

Dave StSomeWhere

Dave StSomeWhere

Guy Larkin

Guy Larkin