Defining constant strings

Hans

Hi,

I want to define a couple of constant strings, like in C:
#define mystring "This is my string"
or using a const char construction.

Is this really not possible in Python?

Hans

Aug 27 '06 #1

Subscribe Reply

6747

Tal Einat

Hans wrote:

Hi,

I want to define a couple of constant strings, like in C:
#define mystring "This is my string"
or using a const char construction.

Is this really not possible in Python?

Hans

It is really not possible.

The Pythonic way (as far as I have come to know it) is to stop trying
to protect yourself from yourself, and just don't change something
which should be constant. Good documentation (including in-code
comments) and good design are better for preventing programming errors
than defining things as constant.

Actually, you can't really define anything as constant in C either. A
#define can be overriden, a 'const' variable can be casted. These are
merely conventions which are enforced to some degree by compilers, but
can easily be worked around.

There are conventions for constant values in Python too. Usually,
variables with an all uppercase name are used. As for variables,
functions, attributes, methods etc. which shouldn't be changed/used
outside a certain module/class: these are usually prefixed with an
underscore ("_"). These are not enforced by the interpreter at all,
though.
As a side note, Python strings are actually all constants, or
"immutable" in Python-ish. The variables which reference string objects
can be changed to reference any other object - that's the nature of
Python variables. But the strings themselves don't change.

- Tal

Aug 27 '06 #2

Tal Einat

Hans wrote:

Hi,

I want to define a couple of constant strings, like in C:
#define mystring "This is my string"
or using a const char construction.

Is this really not possible in Python?

Hans

One last note:

If you truly insist on having constant variables, you could write a
class which implements such behavior. You can write a simple class
which answers your specific needs quite easily.

Or you could go for a more generic approach, such as this:
http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Coo...n/Recipe/59878

- Tal

Aug 27 '06 #3

Peter Otten

Hans wrote:

I want to define a couple of constant strings, like in C:
#define mystring "This is my string"
or using a const char construction.

Is this really not possible in Python?

No, this is not really not possible in Python:

$ ls
preprocess.pyp
$ cat preprocess.pyp
#define MYSTRING "Hello, world"
def f():
print "Goodbye, " MYOTHERSTRING
print MYSTRING
f()
$ gcc -DMYOTHERSTRING= "'sanity'" -xc -E preprocess.pyp -o preprocess.py
$ python preprocess.py
Hello, world
Goodbye, sanity
$

:-)

Peter

Aug 27 '06 #4

danielx

I would really like to highlight something Tal has already said: Python
strings are immutable. That means if you construct a string object, you
don't have to worry about someone else going in and changing that
object. What might happen, however, is that someone might reassign a
variable you have which points to that object. You can tell people not
to do this (although you can't force them) using a mechanism Tal has
also described. You give your variable a name which is all caps.

Hans wrote:

Hi,

I want to define a couple of constant strings, like in C:
#define mystring "This is my string"
or using a const char construction.

Is this really not possible in Python?

Hans
------=_NextPart_000_ 004E_01C6C9FF.C 5137CF0
Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
X-Google-AttachSize: 902

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<HTML><HEAD>
<META http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
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<STYLE></STYLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY bgColor=#e6e3df >
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Hi,</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I want to define a couple of constant strings, like
in C:</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>#define mystring "This is my string"</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>or using a const char construction.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Is this really not possible in Python?</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Hans</FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>

------=_NextPart_000_ 004E_01C6C9FF.C 5137CF0--

Aug 27 '06 #5

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