Visibility of global variables in imported modules

Question

I\'ve run into a bit of a wall importing modules in a Python script. I\'ll do my best to describe the error, why I run into it, and why I\'m tying this particular approach t

Answer 1

As a workaround, you could consider setting environment variables in the outer layer, like this.

main.py:

import os
os.environ['MYVAL'] = str(myintvariable)

mymodule.py:

import os

myval = None
if 'MYVAL' in os.environ:
    myval = os.environ['MYVAL']

As an extra precaution, handle the case when MYVAL is not defined inside the module.

Answer 2

A function uses the globals of the module it's defined in. Instead of setting a = 3, for example, you should be setting module1.a = 3. So, if you want cur available as a global in utilities_module, set utilities_module.cur.

A better solution: don't use globals. Pass the variables you need into the functions that need it, or create a class to bundle all the data together, and pass it when initializing the instance.

Answer 3

This post is just an observation for Python behaviour I encountered. Maybe the advices you read above don't work for you if you made the same thing I did below.

Namely, I have a module which contains global/shared variables (as suggested above):

#sharedstuff.py

globaltimes_randomnode=[]
globalist_randomnode=[]

Then I had the main module which imports the shared stuff with:

import sharedstuff as shared

and some other modules that actually populated these arrays. These are called by the main module. When exiting these other modules I can clearly see that the arrays are populated. But when reading them back in the main module, they were empty. This was rather strange for me (well, I am new to Python). However, when I change the way I import the sharedstuff.py in the main module to:

from globals import *

it worked (the arrays were populated).

Just sayin'

Answer 4

The easiest solution to this particular problem would have been to add another function within the module that would have stored the cursor in a variable global to the module. Then all the other functions could use it as well.

module1:

cursor = None

def setCursor(cur):
    global cursor
    cursor = cur

def method(some, args):
    global cursor
    do_stuff(cursor, some, args)

main program:

import module1

cursor = get_a_cursor()
module1.setCursor(cursor)
module1.method()

Answer 5

Globals in Python are global to a module, not across all modules. (Many people are confused by this, because in, say, C, a global is the same across all implementation files unless you explicitly make it static.)

There are different ways to solve this, depending on your actual use case.

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Before even going down this path, ask yourself whether this really needs to be global. Maybe you really want a class, with f as an instance method, rather than just a free function? Then you could do something like this:

import module1
thingy1 = module1.Thingy(a=3)
thingy1.f()

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If you really do want a global, but it's just there to be used by module1, set it in that module.

import module1
module1.a=3
module1.f()

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On the other hand, if a is shared by a whole lot of modules, put it somewhere else, and have everyone import it:

import shared_stuff
import module1
shared_stuff.a = 3
module1.f()

… and, in module1.py:

import shared_stuff
def f():
    print shared_stuff.a

Don't use a from import unless the variable is intended to be a constant. from shared_stuff import a would create a new a variable initialized to whatever shared_stuff.a referred to at the time of the import, and this new a variable would not be affected by assignments to shared_stuff.a.

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Or, in the rare case that you really do need it to be truly global everywhere, like a builtin, add it to the builtin module. The exact details differ between Python 2.x and 3.x. In 3.x, it works like this:

import builtins
import module1
builtins.a = 3
module1.f()

Answer 6

The OOP way of doing this would be to make your module a class instead of a set of unbound methods. Then you could use __init__ or a setter method to set the variables from the caller for use in the module methods.