CS 505: Advanced Programming

Lecture 4: File IO, Classes

Allan N

slide credit:
stanford.edu/~schmit/cme193

4: File IO, Classes 4-1

 Contents

File I/O

Classes

Exercises

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 File I/O

How to read from and write to disk.

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 The file object

Interaction with the file system is pretty straightforward in Python.

Done using file objects

We can instantiate a file object using open or

file

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 Opening a file

f = open(filename,
option)

filename: path and filename

option:

’r’ read file

’w’ write to file
’a’ append to file

We need to close a file after we are done:

f.close()

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 with open() as f

Very useful way to open, read/write and close file:

with open(’data/text_file.txt’, ’r’) as

f:
print f.read()

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 Reading files

read() Read entire line (or first n characters, if supplied)

readline() Reads a single line per call

readlines() Returns a list with lines (splits at newline)

Another fast option to read a file

with open(’f.txt’, ’r’) as f:

for line in f:
print line

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 Reading files

read() Read entire line (or first n characters, if supplied)

readline() Reads a single line per call

readlines() Returns a list with lines (splits at newline)

Another fast option to read a file

with open(’f.txt’, ’r’) as f:

for line in f:
print line

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 Writing to file

Use write() to write to a

file
with open(filename, ’w’) as f:
f.write("Hello,{}!\n".format(name))

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 Contents

File I/O

Classes

Exercises

4: File IO, Classes 4-11

 Defining our own objects

So far, we have seen many objects in the course that come standard
with Python.

Integers

Strings

Lists

Dictionaries

etc

But often one wants to build (much) more complicated structures.

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 Defining our own objects

So far, we have seen many objects in the course that come standard
with Python.

Integers

Strings

Lists

Dictionaries

etc

But often one wants to build (much) more complicated structures.

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 Object Oriented Programming

Express computation in terms of objects, which are instances of classes

Class Blueprint (only one)

Object Instance (many)

Classes specify attributes (data) and methods to interact with the

attributes.

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 Object Oriented Programming

Express computation in terms of objects, which are instances of classes

Class Blueprint (only one)

Object Instance (many)

Classes specify attributes (data) and methods to interact with the

attributes.

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 Python’s way

In languages such as C++ and Java: data protection with private and
public attributes and methods.

Not in Python: only basics such as inheritance.

Don’t abuse power: works well in practice and leads to simple code.

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 Simplest example

# define class:
class Leaf:
pass

# instantiate
object leaf =
Leaf()

print leaf
# < main .Leaf instance at0x10049df80>

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 Initializing an object

Define how a class is instantiated by defining the init method.

Seasoned programmer: in Python only one constructor method.

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 Initializing an object

The init or constructor method.

class Leaf:
def init (self, color):
self.color = color # private
attribute

redleaf = Leaf(’red’)
blueleaf = Leaf(’blue’)

print redleaf.color
# red

Note how we access object attributes.

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 Self

The self parameter seems strange at first sight.

It refers to the the object (instance) itself.

Hence self.color = color sets the color of the object

self.color
equal to the variable color.

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 Another example

Classes have methods (similar to functions)

class Stock():
def init (self, name, symbol, prices=[]):
self.name = name
self.symbol = symbol
self.prices = prices

def high_price(self):
if len(self.prices) == 0:
return ’MISSINGPRICES’
return max(self.prices)

apple = Stock(’Apple’, ’APPL’, [500.43,570.60])

print apple.high_price()

Recall: list.append() or dict.items(). These are simply class methods!

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 Another example

Classes have methods (similar to functions)

class Stock():
def init (self, name, symbol, prices=[]):
self.name = name
self.symbol = symbol
self.prices = prices

def high_price(self):
if len(self.prices) == 0:
return ’MISSING
PRICES’
return max(self.prices)

apple = Stock(’Apple’, ’APPL’, [500.43,570.60])

print apple.high_price()

Recall: list.append() or dict.items(). These are simply class methods!

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 Class attributes

class Leaf:
n_leafs = 0 # class attribute: shared

def init (self, color):

self.color = color # object
attribute
Leaf.n_leafs += 1

redleaf = Leaf(’red’)
blueleaf = Leaf(’blue’)

print redleaf.color
# red
print Leaf.n_leafs
# 2

Class attributes are shared among all objects of that class.

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 Class hierarchy through inheritance

It can be useful (especially in larger projects) to have a hierarchy of

classes.
Example

Animal
Bird
Hawk
Seagull
...

Pet
Dog
Cat
...

...

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 Inheritance

Suppose we first define an abstract class

class Animal:
def init (self, n_legs, color):
self.n_legs = n_legs
self.color = color

def make_noise(self):
print (’noise’)

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 Inheritance

We can define sub classes and inherit from another class.

class Dog(Animal):
def init (self, color, name):
Animal. init (self, 4, color)
self.name = name
def
make_noise(self):
print self.name + ’: ’ + ’woof’

bird = Animal(2, ’white’)

bird.make_noise()
# noise
brutus = Dog(’black’, ’Brutus’)
brutus.make_noise()
# Brutus: woof
shelly = Dog(’white’, ’Shelly’)
shelly.make_noise()
# Shelly: woof

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 Base methods

Some methods to override

init : Constructor

repr : Represent the object (machine)

str : Represent the object (human)

cmp : Compare

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 Contents

File I/O

Classes

Exercises

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 Exercises

See course page on the e-learning site for exercises for this week. Let me
know if you have any question about exercises

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