x += ... is not the same than x = x + ... if x is mutable

[Jussi Piitulainen]

bartolome.sintes at gmail.com writes:

> Hi,
> 
> I thought that x += ... was the same than x = x + ..., but today I
> have realized it is not true when operating with mutable objects.
> 
> In Python 3.3 or 2.7 IDLE (Windows) compare:
> >>> a = [3]
> >>> b = a
> >>> a = a + [1]
> >>> b
> [3]
> 
> and
> >>> a = [3]
> >>> b = a
> >>> a += [1]
> >>> b
> [3, 1]
> 
> Is this behaviour explained in the Python documentation? 

Yes, it's documented in the language reference, specifically in the
latter half of the paragraph quoted below.

<http://docs.python.org/3/reference/simple_stmts.html#assignment-statements>

# An augmented assignment expression like x += 1 can be rewritten as x
# = x + 1 to achieve a similar, but not exactly equal effect. In the
# augmented version, x is only evaluated once. Also, when possible,
# the actual operation is performed in-place, meaning that rather than
# creating a new object and assigning that to the target, the old
# object is modified instead.