Automatic Generation of Python Class Files

[Marc 'BlackJack' Rintsch]

On Mon, 22 Oct 2007 17:31:51 -0600, Steven Bethard wrote:

> Bruno Desthuilliers wrote:
>> Computed attributes are IMHO not only a life-saver when it comes to 
>> refactoring. There are cases where you *really* have - by 'design' I'd 
>> say - the semantic of a property, but know from the start you'll need 
>> computation (for whatever reason). Then what would be the rationale for 
>> using explicit getters/setters ?
> 
> I'd be interested to hear what these use cases are.

Stupid little example: A circle object with `radius` and `diameter`
attributes.  It doesn't make sense to store both a as normal attributes
because they will eventually get out of sync.  One can be implemented as a
property.

Another one is delegation of attribute access.  I'm thinking of a wrapper
class around an object with an attribute, say `is_active`, and a wrapper
that has a property with the same name that returns the value of the
wrapped objects attribute.

Or lazy computation of an attribute.  Breaks expectations for the first
access -- long calculation for simple attribute access -- but meets it for
every subsequent access.

Ciao,
	Marc 'BlackJack' Rintsch