Creating object attributes

[Larry Bates]

I think we have all done something like what you have done.

I have the class create the attributes dynamically.
Something like (not tested).  I'm leaving the fixed record
parsing to you.

class FixedLengthRecord:
    def __init__(self, fields):
        self.fields=fields
        for field in fields:
            self.append(field
)
        return

    def __getitem__(self, key):
        try: return self.__dict__[key]
        except:
            print "Field name '%s' not found in current record" % key
            return None

    def __setitem__(self, key, value):
        if self.__dict__.has_key(key): self.__dict__[key]=value
        else:
            print "Field name '%s' not found in current record" % key
            return

    def __call__(self, key):
        try: return self.__dict__[key]
        except:
            print "Field name '%s' not found in current record" % key
            return None

    def append(self, field, value=None):
        if not self.__dict__.has_key(field): self.__dict__[field]=value
        else:
            print "Field name '%s' already found in current record" % key
            return

Then you can do:

myFields = ('first_name', 'last_name')
record=FixedLengthRecord(myFields)
record.append('address')

then these statements work

record.first_name="Greg"
record.last_name="Lindstrom"
record.address="123 Morning Glory Lane"

and

print record('first_name') outputs in "Greg"

Eliminates need for .set and .get methods and grows fieldnames
dynamically.

I hope this is what you were looking for.

Larry Bates
Syscon, Inc.



"Greg Lindstrom" <greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.726.1090528236.5135.python-list at python.org...
> Hello-
>
> I have created a class, FixedLengthRecord.py, that allows me to manipulate
> fixed length records in the routines I write.  I recently converted it to
> read record layouts from an SQL server (it used to read config files) and
I
> am thinking of making another change to make my code cleaner [WARNING: I
am
> going to be violating "pure" OO theology...if that offends you, please
exit
> now].
>
> The heart of the class is a dictionary named "fields" that stores the
> current value, length, data type, and default value for the field.  Each
key
> of the dictionary corresponds to a "logical name" read in from the
database.
> I then have "Get()" and "Set()" methods to -- as you might have guessed --
> get and set the values.  Other methods are Clear(), Spreadsheet(),
> Serialize(), Unserialize(), etc.  So, in my application code I might have
> something like the following:
>
> myRec = FixedLengthRecord( id='gsl0001', version='1.0', description='This
is
> my record!')
>
> myRec.Set('first_name', 'Greg')          # only field names in the record
> layout may be set this way
> myRec.Set('last_name', 'Lindstrom')
>
> giver = myRec.Get('first_name')
>
> OK...you get the idea.  What I would like to do, or at least consider, is
> adding an attribute for each data field value instead of adding it to the
> dictionary so I could access my data as follows:
>
> giver = myRec.first_name
>
> I still would use the Set() methods because they insure the fields are
less
> than or equal to the maximum length allowed.  This violates the OO
paradigm
> of accessor methods, but it cleans up my application code and, since I
live
> on reality street and not academia, I am interested in how to do it.
>
> So, to simplify the project a tad, suppose I had a tuple of fields.
>
> myFields = ('first_name', 'last_name')
>
> How could I incorporate them into an class "on the fly" to produce the
> equivalent of
>
> self.first_name = 'None
> self.last_name = None
>
> Are there other ways to handle fixed length records?
>
> Thanks!
> --greg
>
> Greg Lindstrom                                         (501) 975-4859
> NovaSys Health                  greg.lindstrom at novasyshealth.com
>
> "We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams"  W.W.
>
>