Python string to object (or class?)

Question

I am trying to loop through a list of known elements so I can check if they were submitted properly, then do something with them. Problem is, my elements are strings, but the corresponding element object is needed to assign a value to a user object.

Should something else be where eval(element) is?

elements = ('first_name', 'last_name', 'email')

u = request.user

for element in elements:    
    if not element in form.errors:
        dajax.alert('alert: %s' % form.cleaned_data[element])
        u.eval(element) = form.cleaned_data[element]
        dajax.add_css_class('div #%s' % element , 'form-group has-success')

google setattr, getattr... and you shall find the answer. — sberry
– sberry, Commented Nov 26, 2013 at 1:06
Style tip: It is considered a bad practice to do: if not element in form.errors:. As shown here, it should be: if element not in form.errors: (I know the link talks about is, but the same rule applies to in). — user2555451
– user2555451, Commented Nov 26, 2013 at 1:08
Are you sure you want to do this? If your object had a single dict attribute with keys 'first_name', 'last_name', and 'email' instead of three separate attributes, you wouldn't need a fancy setattr(thingy, element, value) fancy, just thingy.elements[element] = value. See this blog post and this one for more details. — abarnert
– abarnert, Commented Nov 26, 2013 at 2:31
Of course if you're using these attributes as statically-named attributes in most of your code, and only need to access them dynamically in one place, then this is a reasonable way to do it. It's just that when you usually want to access them dynamically, you probably didn't want attributes. — abarnert
– abarnert, Commented Nov 26, 2013 at 2:31

sberry · Accepted Answer · 2013-11-26 01:06:46Z

2

Use setattr like so:

setattr(u, element, form.cleaned_data[element])

answered Nov 26, 2013 at 1:06

sberry

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1 Comment

Justin Andrew Over a year ago

Thanks sberry. For others just learning python's built in functions, note that you may not: getattr(u, element) = form.cleaned_data[element] Use the setattr() as sberry shows above.

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