How do I implement __getattribute__ without an infinite recursion error?

Question

I want to override access to one variable in a class, but return all others normally. How do I accomplish this with __getattribute__?

I tried the follo

Answer 1

Are you sure you want to use __getattribute__? What are you actually trying to achieve?

The easiest way to do what you ask is:

class D(object):
    def __init__(self):
        self.test = 20
        self.test2 = 21

    test = 0

or:

class D(object):
    def __init__(self):
        self.test = 20
        self.test2 = 21

    @property
    def test(self):
        return 0

Edit: Note that an instance of D would have different values of test in each case. In the first case d.test would be 20, in the second it would be 0. I'll leave it to you to work out why.

Edit2: Greg pointed out that example 2 will fail because the property is read only and the __init__ method tried to set it to 20. A more complete example for that would be:

class D(object):
    def __init__(self):
        self.test = 20
        self.test2 = 21

    _test = 0

    def get_test(self):
        return self._test

    def set_test(self, value):
        self._test = value

    test = property(get_test, set_test)

Obviously, as a class this is almost entirely useless, but it gives you an idea to move on from.