There are a large number of structures which are used in the definition of object types for Python. This section describes these structures and how they are used.
Base object types and macros¶All Python objects ultimately share a small number of fields at the beginning of the objectâs representation in memory. These are represented by the PyObject
and PyVarObject
types, which are defined, in turn, by the expansions of some macros also used, whether directly or indirectly, in the definition of all other Python objects. Additional macros can be found under reference counting.
All object types are extensions of this type. This is a type which contains the information Python needs to treat a pointer to an object as an object. In a normal âreleaseâ build, it contains only the objectâs reference count and a pointer to the corresponding type object. Nothing is actually declared to be a PyObject
, but every pointer to a Python object can be cast to a PyObject*. Access to the members must be done by using the macros Py_REFCNT
and Py_TYPE
.
This is an extension of PyObject
that adds the ob_size
field. This is only used for objects that have some notion of length. This type does not often appear in the Python/C API. Access to the members must be done by using the macros Py_REFCNT
, Py_TYPE
, and Py_SIZE
.
This is a macro used when declaring new types which represent objects without a varying length. The PyObject_HEAD macro expands to:
See documentation of PyObject
above.
This is a macro used when declaring new types which represent objects with a length that varies from instance to instance. The PyObject_VAR_HEAD macro expands to:
See documentation of PyVarObject
above.
The base class of all other objects, the same as object
in Python.
Test if the x object is the y object, the same as x is y
in Python.
Added in version 3.10.
Test if an object is the None
singleton, the same as x is None
in Python.
Added in version 3.10.
Test if an object is the True
singleton, the same as x is True
in Python.
Added in version 3.10.
Test if an object is the False
singleton, the same as x is False
in Python.
Added in version 3.10.
Get the type of the Python object o.
Return a borrowed reference.
Use the Py_SET_TYPE()
function to set an object type.
Changed in version 3.11: Py_TYPE()
is changed to an inline static function. The parameter type is no longer const PyObject*.
Return non-zero if the object o type is type. Return zero otherwise. Equivalent to: Py_TYPE(o) == type
.
Added in version 3.9.
Set the object o type to type.
Added in version 3.9.
Get the size of the Python object o.
Use the Py_SET_SIZE()
function to set an object size.
Changed in version 3.11: Py_SIZE()
is changed to an inline static function. The parameter type is no longer const PyVarObject*.
Set the object o size to size.
Added in version 3.9.
This is a macro which expands to initialization values for a new PyObject
type. This macro expands to:
_PyObject_EXTRA_INIT 1, type,
This is a macro which expands to initialization values for a new PyVarObject
type, including the ob_size
field. This macro expands to:
_PyObject_EXTRA_INIT 1, type, size,
Type of the functions used to implement most Python callables in C. Functions of this type take two PyObject* parameters and return one such value. If the return value is NULL
, an exception shall have been set. If not NULL
, the return value is interpreted as the return value of the function as exposed in Python. The function must return a new reference.
The function signature is:
PyObject *PyCFunction(PyObject *self, PyObject *args);
Type of the functions used to implement Python callables in C with signature METH_VARARGS | METH_KEYWORDS. The function signature is:
PyObject *PyCFunctionWithKeywords(PyObject *self, PyObject *args, PyObject *kwargs);
Type of the functions used to implement Python callables in C with signature METH_FASTCALL
. The function signature is:
PyObject *PyCFunctionFast(PyObject *self, PyObject *const *args, Py_ssize_t nargs);
Type of the functions used to implement Python callables in C with signature METH_FASTCALL | METH_KEYWORDS. The function signature is:
PyObject *PyCFunctionFastWithKeywords(PyObject *self, PyObject *const *args, Py_ssize_t nargs, PyObject *kwnames);
Type of the functions used to implement Python callables in C with signature METH_METHOD | METH_FASTCALL | METH_KEYWORDS. The function signature is:
PyObject *PyCMethod(PyObject *self, PyTypeObject *defining_class, PyObject *const *args, Py_ssize_t nargs, PyObject *kwnames)
Added in version 3.9.
Structure used to describe a method of an extension type. This structure has four fields:
Name of the method.
Pointer to the C implementation.
Flags bits indicating how the call should be constructed.
Points to the contents of the docstring.
The ml_meth
is a C function pointer. The functions may be of different types, but they always return PyObject*. If the function is not of the PyCFunction
, the compiler will require a cast in the method table. Even though PyCFunction
defines the first parameter as PyObject*, it is common that the method implementation uses the specific C type of the self object.
The ml_flags
field is a bitfield which can include the following flags. The individual flags indicate either a calling convention or a binding convention.
There are these calling conventions:
This is the typical calling convention, where the methods have the type PyCFunction
. The function expects two PyObject* values. The first one is the self object for methods; for module functions, it is the module object. The second parameter (often called args) is a tuple object representing all arguments. This parameter is typically processed using PyArg_ParseTuple()
or PyArg_UnpackTuple()
.
Can only be used in certain combinations with other flags: METH_VARARGS | METH_KEYWORDS, METH_FASTCALL | METH_KEYWORDS and METH_METHOD | METH_FASTCALL | METH_KEYWORDS.
Methods with these flags must be of type PyCFunctionWithKeywords
. The function expects three parameters: self, args, kwargs where kwargs is a dictionary of all the keyword arguments or possibly NULL
if there are no keyword arguments. The parameters are typically processed using PyArg_ParseTupleAndKeywords()
.
Fast calling convention supporting only positional arguments. The methods have the type PyCFunctionFast
. The first parameter is self, the second parameter is a C array of PyObject* values indicating the arguments and the third parameter is the number of arguments (the length of the array).
Added in version 3.7.
Changed in version 3.10: METH_FASTCALL
is now part of the stable ABI.
Extension of METH_FASTCALL
supporting also keyword arguments, with methods of type PyCFunctionFastWithKeywords
. Keyword arguments are passed the same way as in the vectorcall protocol: there is an additional fourth PyObject* parameter which is a tuple representing the names of the keyword arguments (which are guaranteed to be strings) or possibly NULL
if there are no keywords. The values of the keyword arguments are stored in the args array, after the positional arguments.
Added in version 3.7.
Can only be used in the combination with other flags: METH_METHOD | METH_FASTCALL | METH_KEYWORDS.
Extension of METH_FASTCALL | METH_KEYWORDS supporting the defining class, that is, the class that contains the method in question. The defining class might be a superclass of Py_TYPE(self)
.
The method needs to be of type PyCMethod
, the same as for METH_FASTCALL | METH_KEYWORDS
with defining_class
argument added after self
.
Added in version 3.9.
Methods without parameters donât need to check whether arguments are given if they are listed with the METH_NOARGS
flag. They need to be of type PyCFunction
. The first parameter is typically named self and will hold a reference to the module or object instance. In all cases the second parameter will be NULL
.
The function must have 2 parameters. Since the second parameter is unused, Py_UNUSED
can be used to prevent a compiler warning.
Methods with a single object argument can be listed with the METH_O
flag, instead of invoking PyArg_ParseTuple()
with a "O"
argument. They have the type PyCFunction
, with the self parameter, and a PyObject* parameter representing the single argument.
These two constants are not used to indicate the calling convention but the binding when use with methods of classes. These may not be used for functions defined for modules. At most one of these flags may be set for any given method.
The method will be passed the type object as the first parameter rather than an instance of the type. This is used to create class methods, similar to what is created when using the classmethod()
built-in function.
The method will be passed NULL
as the first parameter rather than an instance of the type. This is used to create static methods, similar to what is created when using the staticmethod()
built-in function.
One other constant controls whether a method is loaded in place of another definition with the same method name.
The method will be loaded in place of existing definitions. Without METH_COEXIST, the default is to skip repeated definitions. Since slot wrappers are loaded before the method table, the existence of a sq_contains slot, for example, would generate a wrapped method named __contains__()
and preclude the loading of a corresponding PyCFunction with the same name. With the flag defined, the PyCFunction will be loaded in place of the wrapper object and will co-exist with the slot. This is helpful because calls to PyCFunctions are optimized more than wrapper object calls.
Turn ml into a Python callable object. The caller must ensure that ml outlives the callable. Typically, ml is defined as a static variable.
The self parameter will be passed as the self argument to the C function in ml->ml_meth
when invoked. self can be NULL
.
The callable objectâs __module__
attribute can be set from the given module argument. module should be a Python string, which will be used as name of the module the function is defined in. If unavailable, it can be set to None
or NULL
.
The cls parameter will be passed as the defining_class argument to the C function. Must be set if METH_METHOD
is set on ml->ml_flags
.
Added in version 3.9.
Equivalent to PyCMethod_New(ml, self, module, NULL)
.
Equivalent to PyCMethod_New(ml, self, NULL, NULL)
.
Structure which describes an attribute of a type which corresponds to a C struct member. When defining a class, put a NULL-terminated array of these structures in the tp_members
slot.
Its fields are, in order:
Name of the member. A NULL value marks the end of a PyMemberDef[]
array.
The string should be static, no copy is made of it.
The type of the member in the C struct. See Member types for the possible values.
The offset in bytes that the member is located on the typeâs object struct.
Zero or more of the Member flags, combined using bitwise OR.
The docstring, or NULL. The string should be static, no copy is made of it. Typically, it is defined using PyDoc_STR
.
By default (when flags
is 0
), members allow both read and write access. Use the Py_READONLY
flag for read-only access. Certain types, like Py_T_STRING
, imply Py_READONLY
. Only Py_T_OBJECT_EX
(and legacy T_OBJECT
) members can be deleted.
For heap-allocated types (created using PyType_FromSpec()
or similar), PyMemberDef
may contain a definition for the special member "__vectorcalloffset__"
, corresponding to tp_vectorcall_offset
in type objects. These must be defined with Py_T_PYSSIZET
and Py_READONLY
, for example:
static PyMemberDef spam_type_members[] = { {"__vectorcalloffset__", Py_T_PYSSIZET, offsetof(Spam_object, vectorcall), Py_READONLY}, {NULL} /* Sentinel */ };
(You may need to #include <stddef.h>
for offsetof()
.)
The legacy offsets tp_dictoffset
and tp_weaklistoffset
can be defined similarly using "__dictoffset__"
and "__weaklistoffset__"
members, but extensions are strongly encouraged to use Py_TPFLAGS_MANAGED_DICT
and Py_TPFLAGS_MANAGED_WEAKREF
instead.
Changed in version 3.12: PyMemberDef
is always available. Previously, it required including "structmember.h"
.
Get an attribute belonging to the object at address obj_addr. The attribute is described by PyMemberDef
m. Returns NULL
on error.
Changed in version 3.12: PyMember_GetOne
is always available. Previously, it required including "structmember.h"
.
Set an attribute belonging to the object at address obj_addr to object o. The attribute to set is described by PyMemberDef
m. Returns 0
if successful and a negative value on failure.
Changed in version 3.12: PyMember_SetOne
is always available. Previously, it required including "structmember.h"
.
The following flags can be used with PyMemberDef.flags
:
Not writable.
Emit an object.__getattr__
audit event before reading.
Indicates that the offset
of this PyMemberDef
entry indicates an offset from the subclass-specific data, rather than from PyObject
.
Can only be used as part of Py_tp_members
slot
when creating a class using negative basicsize
. It is mandatory in that case.
This flag is only used in PyType_Slot
. When setting tp_members
during class creation, Python clears it and sets PyMemberDef.offset
to the offset from the PyObject
struct.
Changed in version 3.10: The RESTRICTED
, READ_RESTRICTED
and WRITE_RESTRICTED
macros available with #include "structmember.h"
are deprecated. READ_RESTRICTED
and RESTRICTED
are equivalent to Py_AUDIT_READ
; WRITE_RESTRICTED
does nothing.
Changed in version 3.12: The READONLY
macro was renamed to Py_READONLY
. The PY_AUDIT_READ
macro was renamed with the Py_
prefix. The new names are now always available. Previously, these required #include "structmember.h"
. The header is still available and it provides the old names.
PyMemberDef.type
can be one of the following macros corresponding to various C types. When the member is accessed in Python, it will be converted to the equivalent Python type. When it is set from Python, it will be converted back to the C type. If that is not possible, an exception such as TypeError
or ValueError
is raised.
Unless marked (D), attributes defined this way cannot be deleted using e.g. del
or delattr()
.
Macro name
C type
Python type
char
short
int
long
long long
unsigned char
unsigned int
unsigned short
unsigned long
unsigned long long
float
double
char (written as 0 or 1)
const char* (*)
str
(RO)
const char[] (*)
str
(RO)
char (0-127)
str
(**)
object
(D)
(*): Zero-terminated, UTF8-encoded C string. With
Py_T_STRING
the C representation is a pointer; withPy_T_STRING_INPLACE
the string is stored directly in the structure.(**): String of length 1. Only ASCII is accepted.
(RO): Implies
Py_READONLY
.(D): Can be deleted, in which case the pointer is set to
NULL
. Reading aNULL
pointer raisesAttributeError
.
Added in version 3.12: In previous versions, the macros were only available with #include "structmember.h"
and were named without the Py_
prefix (e.g. as T_INT
). The header is still available and contains the old names, along with the following deprecated types:
Like Py_T_OBJECT_EX
, but NULL
is converted to None
. This results in surprising behavior in Python: deleting the attribute effectively sets it to None
.
Always None
. Must be used with Py_READONLY
.
Structure to define property-like access for a type. See also description of the PyTypeObject.tp_getset
slot.
attribute name
C function to get the attribute.
Optional C function to set or delete the attribute. If NULL
, the attribute is read-only.
optional docstring
Optional user data pointer, providing additional data for getter and setter.
The get
function takes one PyObject* parameter (the instance) and a user data pointer (the associated closure
):
It should return a new reference on success or NULL
with a set exception on failure.
set
functions take two PyObject* parameters (the instance and the value to be set) and a user data pointer (the associated closure
):
In case the attribute should be deleted the second parameter is NULL
. Should return 0
on success or -1
with a set exception on failure.
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