``autorepr``: makes civilized string representations
====================================================
.. image:: https://travis-ci.org/wolever/autorepr.svg?branch=master
:target: https://travis-ci.org/wolever/autorepr
Now with Python 3 support!
Overview
--------
Python makes classes easy, but ``__repr__`` methods hard. Did you forget to
reference ``self`` again? Probably. Did have you thought to yourself "eh, this
class is real simple, it doesn't need a repr"? Without a doubt. Was production
taken down three times last week because your ``__str__`` returned unicode? ...
no? Maybe that's just me.
``autorepr`` makes it simple to build expressive, safe, and correct,
``__repr__``, ``__str__``, ``__unicode__``, and ``__bytes__`` methods in a
single line each.
With ``autorepr``, you get the repers you want, without worrying about the
fiddly bits (like encoding and decoding), leaving you to focus on your project:
.. code:: python
>>> from autorepr import autorepr, autotext
>>> class Person(object):
... name = u"Alex ☃"
... height = 123.456
...
... __repr__ = autorepr(["name", "height:0.1f"])
... __str__, __unicode__ = autotext("{self.name} ({self.height:0.0f} cm)")
...
>>> p = Person()
>>> repr(p)
"<__main__.Person name=u'Alex \\u2603' height=123.5 at 0x...>"
>>> unicode(p)
u'Alex \u2603 (123 cm)'
>>> str(p)
'Alex \xe2\x98\x83 (123 cm)'
Installation
------------
::
$ pip install autorepr
Usage
-----
``autorepr`` exposes two main functions:
- ``autorepr``, which builds a Python-esque ``__repr__`` string by passing
either a ``str.format``-style string, or a list of attributes which should be
included in a ``name=value`` list::
autorepr(["name", "height:0.1f"]) -->
"<pkg.Person name=u'Alex \u2603' height=123.5 at 0x...>"
autorepr("{self.id} name={self.name!r}") -->
"<pkg.Person 123 name=u'Alex \u2603' at 0x...>"
- ``autotext``, which uses ``autostr`` and ``autounicode`` to create
``__str__`` and ``__unicode__`` methods in a Python 2 + 3 friendly way::
__str__, __unicode__ = autotext("{self.name} ({self.height!d} cm)") -->
str: 'Alex \xe2\x98\x83 (123cm)'
unicode: u'Alex \u2603 (123cm)'
And three secondary functions - ``autostr``, ``autounicode``, and
``autobytes`` - which build ``__str__``, ``__unicode__``, and ``__bytes__``
functions, respectively. The functions will do their best to avoid Unicode
encoding / decoding errors, and will generally Do The Right Thing, even if the
inputs aren't necessarily sensible.
Note: the examples shown here are Python 2, but everything works equally well
under Python 3.
.. code:: python
>>> from autorepr import autorepr, autotext, autostr, autounicode
>>> class Person(object):
... name = u"Alex ☃"
... height = 123.456
...
... __repr__ = autorepr(["name", "height:0.1f"])
... __str__, __unicode__ = autotext("{self.name} ({self.height:0.0f} cm)")
...
>>> p = Person()
>>> repr(p)
"<__main__.Person name=u'Alex \\u2603' height=123.5 at 0x...>"
>>> unicode(p)
u'Alex \u2603 (123 cm)'
>>> str(p)
'Alex \xe2\x98\x83 (123 cm)'
Notice that ``autostr`` and ``autorepr`` (as called here through ``autotext``)
are intelligent about converting to/from unicode (decoding/encoding as UTF-8)
as necessary:
.. code:: python
>>> p.name = u"unicode: ☃"
>>> unicode(p)
u'unicode: \u2603 (123 cm)'
>>> str(p)
'unicode: \xe2\x98\x83 (123 cm)'
>>> p.name = 'utf-8 bytes: \xe2\x98\x83'
>>> unicode(p)
u'utf-8 bytes: \u2603 (123 cm)'
>>> str(p)
'utf-8 bytes: \xe2\x98\x83 (123 cm)'
*Note*: ``autostr`` and ``autorepr`` won't crash on invalid UTF-8 (for example,
if ``autounicode`` is asked to turn binary data into unicode), but the result
is *undefined* and may not be desirable.
Additional properties can be passed in as ``kwargs``, which will be called with
the instance as a parameter:
.. code:: python
>>> name_with_len = autostr("{self.name} length={len}",
... len=lambda self: len(self.name))
...
>>> p.name = 'Alex'
>>> name_with_len(p)
'Alex length=4'
This works with ``autorepr``'s list mode too:
.. code:: python
>>> repr_with_len = autorepr(["name", "len"],
... len=lambda self: len(self.name))
...
>>> repr_with_len(p)
"<__main__.Person name='Alex' len=4 at 0x...>"
If a regular format string is passed to ``autorepr``, it will use that instead
of the generated string:
.. code:: python
>>> repr_with_str = autorepr("{self.name!r}")
>>> repr_with_str(p)
"<__main__.Person 'Alex' at 0x...>"
And of course, if you don't want your ``__repr__`` to be wrapped in
``<ClassName ...>``, you can use ``autostr``:
.. code:: python
>>> repr_with_autostr = autostr("Person({self.name!r})")
>>> repr_with_autostr(p)
"Person('Alex')"
Format specifications can also be passed to ``autorepr`` if the default of
``!r`` is undesirable (for example, truncating floats):
.. code:: python
>>> with_fmt_spec = autorepr(["duration:0.1f", "addr:x", "type!s"],
... duration=lambda x: 123.456,
... addr=lambda x: 0xabc123,
... type=lambda x: "foo")
>>> with_fmt_spec(None)
'<....NoneType duration=123.5 addr=abc123 type=foo at 0x...>'