What in the world is the attribute “__class__” in python

Question

I have a question about __class__ in python.

The documentation says that __class__ is the class to which a class instance belongs. So I con

Answer 1

This line:

NewCounter2.__class__.count = 3

changes the static count of counter, but here:

NewCounter2.count = 5

NewCounter2 now has its own count attribute that hides the static count;
so that line has no effect on NewCounter1.
This is also why NewCounter2.__class__.count != NewCounter2.count.