C-API, tp_dictoffset vs tp_members

["Martin v. Löwis"]

> When would I use PyObject_SetAttrString/tp_dictoffset instead of tp_members? 

When I have a variable list of attributes, and cannot statically know
what those attributes might be.

> I have a predefined set of members, some of which are optional.

Having optional fields is also a good reason.

> The problem 
> I had with an embedded dictionary was that I can't see its elements using 
> "dir()".

How so? That should work fine.

> Now I just converted to using tp_members, and it still seems to 
> work correctly for the cases I tested.

So how do you do optional fields now? In particular, how would you do
optional integers?

> Even better, I can declare the fields 
> as read-only then and add doc-strings. So, I wonder, what made the original 
> author[2] use tp_dictoffset instead? 

Most likely, it was the simplest approach. This code only wants to set
the attributes, and never read them. It's easier to maintain: if you
want to add a field with tp_members, you have to change multiple places,
and you have to consider garbage collection (assuming you have embedded
objects). With tp_dictoffset, adding another attribute is easy.

Regards,
Martin