[Python-Dev] relative import circular problem

PJ Eby pje at telecommunity.com
Thu Apr 4 23:00:01 CEST 2013


On Thu, Apr 4, 2013 at 4:42 PM, Guido van Rossum <guido at python.org> wrote:
> I do think it would be fine if "from a import b" returned the
> attribute 'b' of module 'a' if it exists, and otherwise look for
> module 'a.b' in sys.modules.

Technically, it already does that -- but inside of __import__, not in
the IMPORT_FROM opcode.

But then *after* doing that check-and-fallback, __import__ doesn't
assign a.b, because it assumes the recursive import it called has
already done this...  which means that when __import__ returns, the
IMPORT_FROM opcode tries and fails to do the getattr.

This could be fixed in one of two ways.   Either:

1. Change importlib._bootstrap._handle_fromlist() to set a.b if it
successfully imports 'a.b' (inside its duplicate handling for what
IMPORT_FROM does), or
2. Change the IMPORT_FROM opcode to handle the fallback itself

While the latter involves a bit of C coding, it has fewer potential
side-effects on the import system as a whole, and simply ensures that
if "import" would succeed, then so would "from...import" targeting the
same module.

(There might be other fixes I haven't thought of, but really, changing
IMPORT_FROM to fallback to a sys.modules check is probably by far the
least-invasive way to handle it.)


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