from (some module) import *

[Michael Hudson]

Ed <elb at cfdrc.com> writes:

> I'm new to Python, I hope I'm not trying to do the wrong thing here, but
> pls correct me if I am:
> 
> I want to prompt for a module name, then import it.  How do I make the
> module name in the "from" or "import" operators a variable?  I was
> trying
> 
> print "enter the file name"
> filename = raw_input()
> from filename import *

well, you can do this:

module = __import__(filename)

to mimic the effect of `import filename'.

I'm struggling to think of why you might want to do `import *' in this
situation.

You could do this:

exec "from %s import *"%raw_input()

but you'd need to watch for people typing in things like

"sys import exit; import os; os.system('rm -rf ~'); from sys"

depending on trust arrangements.

> This "module" I'm hoping to import contains only a list, Data = [...],
> and I have lots of such modules to process - each with different values
> in the Data list - and it changes all the time.  I thought I could
> change my script to prompt for the file/module name rather than edit the
> script each time I wanted to process a different file/module.

Ahh, then do 

module = __import__(raw_input())

and manipulate module.Data.

HTH,
Michael