Namespace, argparse, and usage

Question

This is really a few questions:

1. Is there a reason argparse uses a namespace instead of a dictionary?

2. Assuming I have a class with __init__(self, init_method, *args). The init_method parameter tells the init_function which way I want to initialize the class, while arg parameter gives all the arguments neccesary for the init. The arguments may be different for different methods. Should I use a dictionary, or a namespace?

3. Assuming that I use a namespace, how do I pass the namespace to __init__()?

Answer 1

1. The designers of arparse apparently felt it would be more convenient to access arguments as

   args.arg_name
   

   rather than

   args["arg_name"]
   

   This might be a matter of taste, though. I would have happily gone with the dictionary, especially given the fact that there is no Namespace class in the standard library, except for the one in argparse.

2. Use a dictionary.

3. If you really want a namespace here, you can use init_function(**args.__dict__)…but I don't recommend it.

Answer 2

It is easy to convert a Namespace into a dictionary using vars():

>>> vars(args)