ultra newbie question (don't laugh)

[Fredrik Lundh]

John Salerno wrote:

> So you see, what I'm asking for is very basic help, sort of along the 
> lines of "what things do I need to consider before I even begin this?" 
> Is OOP necessary here? Would utility functions work just as well for 
> simply writing the information to a file?

when you get programmers block, telling your brain to "shut up and let 
me write some code" is often a good idea.  just start tinkering with 
your first idea, and see if you can make it work.  if you get a little 
stuck, hack your way through it.  if you get really stuck, take a break, 
work on something else for a while, and wait for your brain to come up 
with a better idea.  repeat.

here's how I would start:

import xml.etree.ElementTree as ET

class Researcher:

     # attributes (you can skip this part, if you want)
     first_name = None
     last_name = None
     birth_country = None
     birth_state = None
     birth_city = None

     # the identity is lazily evaluated by getid (see below)
     id = None

     def getid(self):
	if not self.id:
	    self.id = (self.first_name + self.last_name).lower() # etc
	return self.id

     def maketree(self):
	elem = ET.Element("researcher", id=self.getid())
	ET.SubElement(elem, "first_name").text = self.first_name
	ET.SubElement(elem, "last_name").text = self.last_name
	ET.SubElement(elem, "birth_country").text = self.birth_country
	ET.SubElement(elem, "birth_state").text = self.birth_state
	ET.SubElement(elem, "birth_city").text = self.birth_city
	return elem

x = Researcher()

# simulate the UI's "OK" handler

x.first_name = "John"
x.last_name = "Salerno"
x.birth_country = "United States"
x.birth_state = "Texas"
x.birth_city = "Houston"

print ET.tostring(x.maketree())

</F>