On Thu, May 27, 2021 at 11:38 PM Paul Moore p.f.moore@gmail.com wrote:
This reminds me, if we ignore the performance aspect, function attributes provide this functionality, but there's a significant problem with using them because you can't access them other than by referencing the *name* of the function being defined.
Yeah, I mentioned that earlier, but just as one of the wide variety of variously-clunky ways to achieve the same thing. I think it's semantically the closest, but defining the initial value *after* the function is pretty unexciting.
It would be nice to have a better way to reference function attributes from within a function. (This would also help write recursive functions that could be safely renamed, but I'm not sure many people would necessarily think that's a good thing ;-))
The interaction with renaming isn't particularly significant, but the interaction with decoration is notable. Inside the execution of a function, you'd have a reference to the innermost function, NOT the one that would be identified externally. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing remains to be seen...
Hmm.
def static(**kw): def deco(func): statics = types.SimpleNamespace(**kw) @functools.wraps(func) def f(*a, **kw): func(*a, **kw, _statics=statics) return f return deco
@statics(n=0) def count(*, _statics): _statics.n += 1 return _statics.n
Add it to the pile of clunky options, but it's semantically viable. Unfortunately, it's as introspectable as a closure (that is: not at all).
ChrisA