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Python

Posted by Dylan Ginsburg
Dylan Ginsburg
1,781 Points

Question About In Place Magic Methods

For in place magic methods, at least in the answers for some of the exercises and in the videos, when defining one of these methods to update a value we use the expression 'self.value = self + other'. My question is why do we use self rather than 'self.value = self.value + other'. I do not understand why putting self there works.

1 Answer

Jeff Muday
MOD
Jeff Muday
Treehouse Moderator 28,720 Points
Jeff Muday
Jeff Muday
Treehouse Moderator 28,720 Points

I like that you are thinking about this-- it is kind of an advanced topic and a little bit dependent on what the code designer is looking to achieve. Personally I favor methods that don't coerce or change the data type.

Rather than reinventing the answer, Chris Freeman (who is an excellent moderator) answered it this way:

https://teamtreehouse.com/community/iadd-changes-the-data-type