Should one always add super().__init__() to the __init__?

[Chris Angelico]

On Sun, Sep 30, 2012 at 3:17 AM, Steven D'Aprano
<steve+comp.lang.python at pearwood.info> wrote:
> No. Only add code that works and that you need. Arbitrarily adding calls
> to the superclasses "just in case" may not work:
>
> py> class Spam(object):
> ...     def __init__(self, x):
> ...             self.x = x
> ...             super(Spam, self).__init__(x)
> ...
> py> x = Spam(1)
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
>   File "<stdin>", line 4, in __init__
> TypeError: object.__init__() takes no parameters

That's because you're subclassing something that doesn't take
parameters and giving it parameters. Of course that won't work. The
normal and logical thing to do is to pass on only the parameters that
you know the parent class expects... but that implies knowing the
parent, so it's kinda moot.

ChrisA