Re: exec within function
Terry Reedy
> hi,
> I'm not sure how I can use exec within a function correctly
> here is the code i'm using:
>
> def a():
> exec('b=1')
> print(b)
>
> a()
>
> this will raise an error, but I would like to see it outputting 1
Always **copy and paste** **complete error tracebacks** when asking a
question like this. (The only exception would be if it is v e r y long,
as with hitting the recursion depth limit of 1000.)
Gerald Britton
>>> def a():
... exec('b=1')
... print(b)
...
>>> a()
1
>>>
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>
--
Gerald Britton
Peter Otten
> On Wed, Feb 3, 2010 at 2:59 PM, Terry Reedy <tjr...@udel.edu> wrote:
>> On 2/3/2010 3:30 AM, Simon zack wrote:
>>>
>>> hi,
>>> I'm not sure how I can use exec within a function correctly
>>> here is the code i'm using:
>>>
>>> def a():
>>> exec('b=1')
>>> print(b)
>>>
>>> a()
>>>
>>> this will raise an error, but I would like to see it outputting 1
>>
>> Always **copy and paste** **complete error tracebacks** when asking a
>> question like this. (The only exception would be if it is v e r y long,
>> as with hitting the recursion depth limit of 1000.)
> I get no error:
>
>>>> def a():
> ... exec('b=1')
> ... print(b)
> ...
>>>> a()
> 1
My crystal ball says you're using Python 2.x. Try it again, this time in
3.x:
Python 3.1.1+ (r311:74480, Nov 2 2009, 15:45:00)
[GCC 4.4.1] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> def f():
... exec('a = 42')
... print(a)
...
>>> f()
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
File "<stdin>", line 3, in f
NameError: global name 'a' is not defined
OP: Python 2.x generates different bytecode for functions containing an exec
statement. In 3.x this statement is gone and exec() has become a normal
function. I suppose you now have to pass a namespace explicitly:
>>> def f():
... ns = {}
... exec("a=1", ns)
... print(ns["a"])
...
>>> f()
1
Peter