Question about accessing class-attributes.

[Michele Simionato]

Michael Hudson <mwh at python.net> wrote in message news:<7h3y91tiszi.fsf at pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>...
> Then you get this kind of weirdness:
> 
> />> class C(type):
> |..     def __eq__(self, other):
> |..         return 1
> \__ 
> />> class A:
> |..     __metaclass__ = C
> \__ 
> />> class B:
> |..     __metaclass__ = C
> \__ 
> ->> d = {}
> ->> d[A] = 1
> ->> d[B] 
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<input>", line 1, in ?
> KeyError: <class '__main__.B'>
> ->> A == B
> 1
> 
> Then I suspect whether a instance of C gets A out of the dictionary
> depends on accidents of memory allocation and hash table
> implementation.  That's not a good thing.
> 
> CHeers,
> M.


Really, I don't see where is the problem. As far as I understand (correct me
if I am wrong) dictionaries are indexed trough the identifier of their keys
i.e. hash(A) == id(A). In this example, since A is not B, it is clear to me 
that d[B] is not defined and cannot work.

This issue has nothing to do with metaclasses:

class O(object): 
    def __eq__(self, other):
        return 1
 
a=O(); b=O()

assert id(a)==hash(a)
assert id(b)==hash(b)

assert a==b
assert a is not b

d={a:1}
d[a] #=>1
d[b] # error since d[b] is not defined, b is not a

It seems that everybody (including myself) sees more problems in 
metaclasses than really are.


                                                 Michele