how to select an object from a list of objects by its attribute in python

Question

Apologies if this question has already been asked but I do not think I know the correct terminology to search for an appropriate solution through google.

I would like to

Answer 1

The missing underscore makes plist a public property. I don't think that's what you want, since it does not encapsulate the functionality and you could call a.plist.append instead of a.addPerson.

class Example():
   ...
   def filter(self, criteria):
       for p in self.plist:
           if criteria(p):
               yield p

   def getByNum(self, num):
        return self.filter(lambda p: p.num == num)

dave = next(a.getByNum(123))

If the numbers are unique, you may also consider using a dictionary that maps from number to name or person instead of a list. But that's up to your implementation.