How do I correctly clean up a Python object?

Question

class Package:
    def __init__(self):
        self.files = []

    # ...

    def __del__(self):
        for file in self.files:
            os.unlink(file)
         


        

Answer 1

The standard way is to use atexit.register:

# package.py
import atexit
import os

class Package:
    def __init__(self):
        self.files = []
        atexit.register(self.cleanup)

    def cleanup(self):
        print("Running cleanup...")
        for file in self.files:
            print("Unlinking file: {}".format(file))
            # os.unlink(file)

But you should keep in mind that this will persist all created instances of Package until Python is terminated.

Demo using the code above saved as package.py:

$ python
>>> from package import *
>>> p = Package()
>>> q = Package()
>>> q.files = ['a', 'b', 'c']
>>> quit()
Running cleanup...
Unlinking file: a
Unlinking file: b
Unlinking file: c
Running cleanup...