A noob Python question

[Guy Adini]

Does anybody know how to access the list of python builtin functions from inside a function?

I am working on a distributed version of pythonect, where an XML-RPC server listens to request from the main thread, and handles the execution.

In order to do that, the server needs to wrap the python builtins, and I am trying to get to them.

In an interpreter, I can get their list through dir(__builtin__).

But inside a function, it turns out that dir() only gets the local scope.

Any ideas?

(You can see what I've tried under https://github.com/guyadini/pythonect/blob/master/pythonect/internal/server.py)

Thanks :)

[Guy Adini]

Update:

I just saw that __builtin__ is something that isn't always available.

__builtins__ (with the s), is available though - but gives me a different result inside the start_xml_server function (definitely not the global __builtins__).

What gives?

[Itzik Kotler]

Are you sure?

i.e.

>>> x = dir(__builtins__)
>>> def foobar():
...     return dir(__builtins__)
...
>>> x == foobar()
True
>>>

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[Guy Adini]

I also realized that (also trying inside a class, and getting the same results as you have - the __builtins__ stay the same).

However, when I run dir(__builtins__) inside my server.py module, I get a different list of builtins.

There's nothing in your code that could overwrite __builtins__, right? 

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[Itzik Kotler]

*within* Pythonect __builtins__ is extended by lang.py to provide additional functionally (i.e. expr, stmt, and remote functions).

But your code is running within Pythonect script, so I don't see why it should be any different.

Can you email me off the list the __builtins__ outputs?

Regards,
Itzik Kotler | http://www.ikotler.org

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[nir izraeli]

Guy,

I hope this helps:

http://docs.python.org/py3k/library/builtins.html 

 - Nir

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[Itzik Kotler]

It seems that __builtins__ is per-module/namespace.

When running from the interpreter environment, it's equal to Python's __builtin__.

To get Pythons' builtins from within a module, do:

import __builtin__

then:

dir(__builtin__)

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[Guy Adini]

Thanks to both of you! 

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