Creating my own "integer" object in Python

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Solution 1

This is a simple and incomplete example. Look at methods __sub__, __div__ and so on.

class Integer(object):
    def __init__(self, val=0):
        self._val = int(val)
    def __add__(self, val):
        if isinstance(val, Integer):
            return Integer(self._val + val._val)
        return self._val + val
    def __iadd__(self, val):
        self._val += val
        return self
    def __str__(self):
        return str(self._val)
    def __repr__(self):
        return 'Integer(%s)' % self._val

Then

n = Integer()
print n
m = Integer(7)
m+=5
print m

EDIT fixed __repr__ and added __iadd__. Thanks to @Keith for pointing problems out. EDIT Fixed __add__ to allow addition between Integers.

Solution 2

First, take a quick look at the documentation in the reference manual on emulating numeric types.

(Don't get too stuck on that - it's just to give you some familiarity with the methods underlying arithmetic operations in Python)

Then refer to the documentation for the numbers module, which includes all the Abstract Base Classes that are most relevant to emulating different kinds of numbers (e.g. numbers.Integral for custom integers).

Solution 3

I assume you want your Integer class to be mutable. To get your example, this will work:

class Integer(object):
    def __init__(self, num):
        self._val = num

    def __iadd__(self, other):
        self._val += int(other)

    def __str__(self):
        return str(self._val)

Solution 4

You can use operator overloading:

class Integer:

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

  def __repr__(self):
    return str(self.value)

  def __add__(self, value):
    self.value += value
    return self

a = Integer(2)
print a

a = a+3
print a

a += 4
print a

Solution 5

If you want to overload operators of the default cast-to-string method, the phrase you're looking for is "magic methods". These are the methods named like "__<name>__" and are used by python in cases other than direct method calls. You would want to define the __add__ and __str__ methods for your class in order for lines 2 and 3, respectively, to work.

Its worth mentioning that the __add__ method will be called if your new type is the left operand, and any type may be passed as its argument. For cases when yours is the right operand, you should also define the __radd__ method. This goes for all of the binary operators.

For a more complete list of magic methods for a numeric type, see Emulating Numeric Types.

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Johanna Larsson
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Johanna Larsson

In my spare time I play around with web technologies and build small projects.

Updated on June 04, 2022

Comments

  • Johanna Larsson
    Johanna Larsson over 1 year

    Essentially I want to be able to do something like:

    a = Integer(1)
    a += 1
    print a
    

    And of course printing the number two as result. What methods do I need to create to get this behaviour in my Integer class?

    Disclaimer: I'm not planning to use this for "real", just curious.

  • Keith
    Keith over 12 years
    This example mis-uses __repr__. That is intended to return the inverse of eval() and should return Integer(val) in this case. It also doesn't maintain the type: Python2> m = Integer(7) Python2> type(m) <class '__main__.Integer'> Python2> m+=5 Python2> type(m) <type 'int'>
  • smci
    smci about 12 years
    You should be inheriting from numbers.Number, not object; as per ncoghlan answer below. If you want to delete unwanted inherited methods, that's easy.

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