On 15/09/2023 11:49, scruel tao via Python-list wrote: > ```python >>>> class A: > ... def __init__(self): > ... pass
> On many books and even the official documents, it seems that > many authors prefer to call `__init__` as a "method" rather > than a "function". That' because in OOP terminology methods are traditionally implemented as functions defined inside a class (There are other ways to define methods in other languages, but the class/function duology is by far the most common.) What is a method? It is the way that an object handles a message. OOP is all about objects sending messages to each other. Many different objects can receive the same message but they each have their own method of handling that message. (This is called polymorphism.) Over time the most common way to implememt OOP in a language is to invent a "class" structure and to allow functions to either be defined within it or added to it later. In either case these functions are what define how a class (and its object instances) handle a given message. So the function describes the method for that message. And over time that has become shortened to the function inside a class *is* its method. In practice, the message looks like a function call. And the method consists of the function body (and/or any inherited function body). Thus every method is a function (or set of functions) but not every function is a method (or part of one). -- Alan G Author of the Learn to Program web site http://www.alan-g.me.uk/ http://www.amazon.com/author/alan_gauld Follow my photo-blog on Flickr at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/alangauldphotos -- https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
