Learning Python, 6th Edition

Chapter 32. Class Odds and Ends

This chapter concludes our look at OOP in Python by presenting a collage of more advanced class topics. We will survey customizing built-in types, the relationship of classes and types, attribute tools like slots and properties, the special-case static and class methods, decorators and metaclasses, and the super call’s complete story. Some of these are introduced here but resumed by focused chapters in this book’s Part VIII, “Advanced Topics”.

As we’ve seen, Python’s OOP model is, at its core, relatively simple, and some of the topics presented in this chapter are so advanced and optional that you may not encounter them very often in your Python applications-programming career. In the interest of completeness, though—and because you never know when an “advanced” topic may crop up in code you use—we’ll round out our discussion of classes with a brief look at these advanced tools for OOP work.

As usual, because this is the last chapter in this part of the book, it ends with a section on class-related “gotchas” and a set of lab exercises for this part to help cement the ideas we’ve studied here. Beyond these exercises, studying larger OOP Python projects or starting some of your own is heartily recommended as a supplement to this book. As with much in life and computing, the benefits of OOP tend to become more apparent with practice.

Note

Blast from the past: Python 3.X launched with a mandatory “new-style” class model that could be enabled in 2.X ...