Same name for classmethod and instancemethod

Question:

I’d like to do something like this:

class X:

    @classmethod
    def id(cls):
        return cls.__name__

    def id(self):
        return self.__class__.__name__

And now call id() for either the class or an instance of it:

>>> X.id()
'X'
>>> X().id()
'X'

Obviously, this exact code doesn’t work, but is there a similar way to make it work?

Or any other workarounds to get such behavior without too much "hacky" stuff?

Asked By: Markus Meskanen

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Answers:

Class and instance methods live in the same namespace and you cannot reuse names like that; the last definition of id will win in that case.

The class method will continue to work on instances however, there is no need to create a separate instance method; just use:

class X:
    @classmethod
    def id(cls):
        return cls.__name__

because the method continues to be bound to the class:

>>> class X:
...     @classmethod
...     def id(cls):
...         return cls.__name__
... 
>>> X.id()
'X'
>>> X().id()
'X'

This is explicitly documented:

It can be called either on the class (such as C.f()) or on an instance (such as C().f()). The instance is ignored except for its class.

If you do need distinguish between binding to the class and an instance

If you need a method to work differently based on where it is being used on; bound to a class when accessed on the class, bound to the instance when accessed on the instance, you’ll need to create a custom descriptor object.

The descriptor API is how Python causes functions to be bound as methods, and bind classmethod objects to the class; see the descriptor howto.

You can provide your own descriptor for methods by creating an object that has a __get__ method. Here is a simple one that switches what the method is bound to based on context, if the first argument to __get__ is None, then the descriptor is being bound to a class, otherwise it is being bound to an instance:

class class_or_instancemethod(classmethod):
    def __get__(self, instance, type_):
        descr_get = super().__get__ if instance is None else self.__func__.__get__
        return descr_get(instance, type_)

This re-uses classmethod and only re-defines how it handles binding, delegating the original implementation for instance is None, and to the standard function __get__ implementation otherwise.

Note that in the method itself, you may then have to test, what it is bound to. isinstance(firstargument, type) is a good test for this:

>>> class X:
...     @class_or_instancemethod
...     def foo(self_or_cls):
...         if isinstance(self_or_cls, type):
...             return f"bound to the class, {self_or_cls}"
...         else:
...             return f"bound to the instance, {self_or_cls"
...
>>> X.foo()
"bound to the class, <class '__main__.X'>"
>>> X().foo()
'bound to the instance, <__main__.X object at 0x10ac7d580>'

An alternative implementation could use two functions, one for when bound to a class, the other when bound to an instance:

class hybridmethod:
    def __init__(self, fclass, finstance=None, doc=None):
        self.fclass = fclass
        self.finstance = finstance
        self.__doc__ = doc or fclass.__doc__
        # support use on abstract base classes
        self.__isabstractmethod__ = bool(
            getattr(fclass, '__isabstractmethod__', False)
        )

    def classmethod(self, fclass):
        return type(self)(fclass, self.finstance, None)

    def instancemethod(self, finstance):
        return type(self)(self.fclass, finstance, self.__doc__)

    def __get__(self, instance, cls):
        if instance is None or self.finstance is None:
              # either bound to the class, or no instance method available
            return self.fclass.__get__(cls, None)
        return self.finstance.__get__(instance, cls)

This then is a classmethod with an optional instance method. Use it like you’d use a property object; decorate the instance method with @<name>.instancemethod:

>>> class X:
...     @hybridmethod
...     def bar(cls):
...         return f"bound to the class, {cls}"
...     @bar.instancemethod
...     def bar(self):
...         return f"bound to the instance, {self}"
... 
>>> X.bar()
"bound to the class, <class '__main__.X'>"
>>> X().bar()
'bound to the instance, <__main__.X object at 0x10a010f70>'

Personally, my advice is to be cautious about using this; the exact same method altering behaviour based on the context can be confusing to use. However, there are use-cases for this, such as SQLAlchemy’s differentiation between SQL objects and SQL values, where column objects in a model switch behaviour like this; see their Hybrid Attributes documentation. The implementation for this follows the exact same pattern as my hybridmethod class above.

Answered By: Martijn Pieters

I have no idea what’s your actual use case is, but you can do something like this using a descriptor:

class Desc(object):

    def __get__(self, ins, typ):
        if ins is None:
            print 'Called by a class.'
            return lambda : typ.__name__
        else:
            print 'Called by an instance.'
            return lambda : ins.__class__.__name__

class X(object):
    id = Desc()

x = X()
print x.id()
print X.id()

Output

Called by an instance.
X
Called by a class.
X
Answered By: Ashwini Chaudhary

It can be done, quite succinctly, by binding the instance-bound version of your method explicitly to the instance (rather than to the class). Python will invoke the instance attribute found in Class().__dict__ when Class().foo() is called (because it searches the instance’s __dict__ before the class’), and the class-bound method found in Class.__dict__ when Class.foo() is called.

This has a number of potential use cases, though whether they are anti-patterns is open for debate:

class Test:
    def __init__(self):
        self.check = self.__check

    @staticmethod
    def check():
        print('Called as class')

    def __check(self):
        print('Called as instance, probably')

>>> Test.check()
Called as class
>>> Test().check()
Called as instance, probably

Or… let’s say we want to be able to abuse stuff like map():

class Str(str):
    def __init__(self, *args):
        self.split = self.__split

    @staticmethod
    def split(sep=None, maxsplit=-1):
        return lambda string: string.split(sep, maxsplit)

    def __split(self, sep=None, maxsplit=-1):
        return super().split(sep, maxsplit)

>>> s = Str('w-o-w')
>>> s.split('-')
['w', 'o', 'w']
>>> Str.split('-')(s)
['w', 'o', 'w']
>>> list(map(Str.split('-'), [s]*3))
[['w', 'o', 'w'], ['w', 'o', 'w'], ['w', 'o', 'w']]
Answered By: user4698348

In your example, you could simply delete the second method entirely, since both the staticmethod and the class method do the same thing.

If you wanted them to do different things:

class X:
    def id(self=None):
       if self is None:
           # It's being called as a static method
       else:
           # It's being called as an instance method
Answered By: Tom Swirly

“types” provides something quite interesting since Python 3.4: DynamicClassAttribute

It is not doing 100% of what you had in mind, but it seems to be closely related, and you might need to tweak a bit my metaclass but, rougly, you can have this;

from types import DynamicClassAttribute

class XMeta(type):
     def __getattr__(self, value):
         if value == 'id':
             return XMeta.id  # You may want to change a bit that line.
     @property
     def id(self):
         return "Class {}".format(self.__name__)

That would define your class attribute. For the instance attribute:

class X(metaclass=XMeta):
    @DynamicClassAttribute
    def id(self):
        return "Instance {}".format(self.__class__.__name__)

It might be a bit overkill especially if you want to stay away from metaclasses. It’s a trick I’d like to explore on my side, so I just wanted to share this hidden jewel, in case you can polish it and make it shine!

>>> X().id
'Instance X'
>>> X.id
'Class X'

Voila…

Answered By: Saeshan

(Python 3 only) Elaborating on the idea of a pure-Python implementation of @classmethod, we can declare an @class_or_instance_method as a decorator, which is actually a class implementing the attribute descriptor protocol:

import inspect


class class_or_instance_method(object):

    def __init__(self, f):
        self.f = f

    def __get__(self, instance, owner):
        if instance is not None:
            class_or_instance = instance
        else:
            class_or_instance = owner

        def newfunc(*args, **kwargs):
            return self.f(class_or_instance, *args, **kwargs)
        return newfunc

class A:
    @class_or_instance_method
    def foo(self_or_cls, a, b, c=None):
        if inspect.isclass(self_or_cls):
            print("Called as a class method")
        else:
            print("Called as an instance method")
Answered By: DomQ