helping 0.0.5

Readable information for real people.

Helping

As my girlfriend's cat likes to say while knocking over my drink: "I'm HELPING!"

This library is dedicated to providing helpful information about Python objects. It's useful for everyone, but especially dedicated to those learning how to program.

This library is the result of teaching Python to thousands of students. Over time I found that the built-in dir() function was actively confusing to people learning Python, and I developed this library to help the students. Then I found myself using it for my own coding.

That's when I knew I had something worthwhile.

The goal is "Readable information for real people."

Installation

Run this command (note that Python 3.6 or greater is required):

pip install helping

info()

The primary method is helping.info(), which provides a readable summary of an object. It separates out the methods, attributes, classes, and exceptions, and perhaps most importantly, doesn't show private items unless requested.

If you call this without arguments, it provides info about the built-in Python functions, classes, and exceptions.

To see private items, pass the argument private=True.

By default the items are listed vertically, which I've found to be most readable. If you'd like a more compact form, pass compact=True.

Here is the output from calling helping.info(int):

int (<class 'type'>)
  methods:
    bit_length()
    conjugate()
    from_bytes()
    to_bytes()

  attributes:
    denominator
    imag
    numerator
    real

Here is the output from calling helping.info():

builtins (<class 'module'>)
  methods:
    abs()
    all()
    any()
    ascii()
    bin()
    breakpoint()
    callable()
    chr()
    compile()
    copyright()
    credits()
    delattr()
    dir()
    divmod()
    eval()
    exec()
    exit()
    format()
    getattr()
    globals()
    hasattr()
    hash()
    help()
    hex()
    id()
    input()
    isinstance()
    issubclass()
    iter()
    len()
    license()
    locals()
    max()
    min()
    next()
    oct()
    open()
    ord()
    pow()
    print()
    quit()
    repr()
    round()
    setattr()
    sorted()
    sum()
    vars()

  classes:
    BaseException
    bool
    bytearray
    bytes
    classmethod
    complex
    dict
    enumerate
    filter
    float
    frozenset
    GeneratorExit
    int
    KeyboardInterrupt
    list
    map
    memoryview
    object
    property
    range
    reversed
    set
    slice
    staticmethod
    str
    super
    SystemExit
    tuple
    type
    UnicodeDecodeError
    UnicodeEncodeError
    UnicodeTranslateError
    zip

  attributes:
    Ellipsis
    NotImplemented

  exceptions:
    ArithmeticError
    AssertionError
    AttributeError
    BlockingIOError
    BrokenPipeError
    BufferError
    BytesWarning
    ChildProcessError
    ConnectionAbortedError
    ConnectionError
    ConnectionRefusedError
    ConnectionResetError
    DeprecationWarning
    EnvironmentError
    EOFError
    Exception
    FileExistsError
    FileNotFoundError
    FloatingPointError
    FutureWarning
    ImportError
    ImportWarning
    IndentationError
    IndexError
    InterruptedError
    IOError
    IsADirectoryError
    KeyError
    LookupError
    MemoryError
    ModuleNotFoundError
    NameError
    NotADirectoryError
    NotImplementedError
    OSError
    OverflowError
    PendingDeprecationWarning
    PermissionError
    ProcessLookupError
    RecursionError
    ReferenceError
    ResourceWarning
    RuntimeError
    RuntimeWarning
    StopAsyncIteration
    StopIteration
    SyntaxError
    SyntaxWarning
    SystemError
    TabError
    TimeoutError
    TypeError
    UnboundLocalError
    UnicodeError
    UnicodeWarning
    UserWarning
    ValueError
    Warning
    ZeroDivisionError

functions()

Shows any functions defined in the script, and all built-in Python functions.

methods()

Shows just the methods of the specified object.

attributes()

Shows just the attributes of the specified object.

classes()

Shows just the classes belonging to the specified object.

exceptions()

Shows just the exceptions belonging to the specified object.

Logo by Ericatures