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Python Object-Oriented Python Advanced Objects Frustration

Andrei Oprescu
Andrei Oprescu
9,547 Points
Posted by Andrei Oprescu
Andrei Oprescu
9,547 Points

I am getting a RecursionError

I am on this question that says:

Now I want you to make a subclass of list. Name it Liar.

Override the len method so that it always returns the wrong number of items in the list. For example, if a list has 5 members, the Liar class might say it has 8 or 2.

You'll probably need super() for this.

And my code is:

class Liar(list): def len(self, *args, **kwargs): super().len(*args, **kwargs) return len(self) - 1

Can someone tell me what i did wrong with my code?

Thanks!

frustration.py 
class Liar(list):
    def __len__(self, *args, **kwargs):
        super().__len__(*args, **kwargs)
        return len(self) - 3

1 Answer

Steven Parker
Steven Parker
231,261 Points
Steven Parker
Steven Parker
231,261 Points

Since you're defining how the class will handle being asked for its length, then calling "len" from inside the code sets up a recursion loop. You probably want to only call the "super" length function and return a modified version of it.