staticvar 0.0.6

The horrors of C Static variables for Python, with Python.

staticvar

A module that adds the horrors of C Static variables to Python, with Python.

In programming, a static variable is the one allocated “statically,” which means its lifetime is throughout the program run.

Learn About Static Variables in C

Python does not provide a quick native way to declare static variables. There are some workarounds, but they don't look very nice; so I made a module that does it for you.

Currently, this module only supports integer, float, string and boolean types.

To get started, install staticvar by typing the following in your command line:

pip install staticvar

In your project, import the staticvar module as follows:

from staticvar import Static

Next, declare the name of the static variable with its value and type as the arguments:

# Syntax: VARIABLE_NAME = Static(VALUE, "TYPE")
foo = Static(3, "int")

Supported types include:

• "int" for integer type variables
• "float" for float type variables
• "str" for string type variables
• "bool" for boolean type variables

Alternatively, if no type is passed, staticvar will infer the type.

To access the value of the variable, use the get() method:

print(foo.get())

Output:

> 3

To change the value of the variable, use the set() method with the desired value as the argument:

# Syntax: VARIABLE_NAME.set(VALUE)
foo.set(4)
print(foo.get())

Output:

> 4

The set() method also returns the new set value:

print(foo.set(5))

Ouput:

> 5

To get the type of the variable, use the getType() method:

print(foo.getType())

Output:

> int

Variables set using the staticvar module are not dynamic. Trying to later assign data with different types from the originally set/inferred one will raise an error if it cannot be converted/casted:

foo.set(6.9) # A float value in an integer variable type will be casted as an integer
print(foo.get())

Output:

> 6

foo.set("Hello, mum!") # Python will fail to convert this non-numerical string into integer and will raise an error
print(foo.get())

Output:

> ValueError: invalid literal for int() with base 10: 'Hello, mum!'

An example on how to utilise static variables in a simple program

Though there are better ways to do it, we can use static variables to find the factorial of a number.

from staticvar import Static


# Using recursion and static variables to find the factorial of a number
def factorial(limit, reset = True):
	count = Static(1, "int")
	answer = Static(1) # If no type specified, staticvar will infer the type

	if reset == True:
		count.set(1)
		answer.set(1)

	if count.get() <= limit:
		answer.set(answer.get() * (count.set(count.get() + 1) - 1))
		factorial(limit, False)

	return answer.get()


user_input = eval(input("Enter a number: "))
print(factorial(user_input))