27.11. inspect — Inspect live objects

The inspect module provides several useful functions to help get information about live objects such as modules, classes, methods, functions, tracebacks, frame objects, and code objects. For example, it can help you examine the contents of a class, retrieve the source code of a method, extract and format the argument list for a function, or get all the information you need to display a detailed traceback.

There are four main kinds of services provided by this module: type checking, getting source code, inspecting classes and functions, and examining the interpreter stack.

27.11.1. Types and members

The getmembers() function retrieves the members of an object such as a class or module. The sixteen functions whose names begin with “is” are mainly provided as convenient choices for the second argument to getmembers(). They also help you determine when you can expect to find the following special attributes:

Type	Attribute	Description
module	__doc__	documentation string
	__file__	filename (missing for built-in modules)
class	__doc__	documentation string
	__module__	name of module in which this class was defined
method	__doc__	documentation string
	__name__	name with which this method was defined
	__func__	function object containing implementation of method
	__self__	instance to which this method is bound, or None
function	__doc__	documentation string
	__name__	name with which this function was defined
	__code__	code object containing compiled function bytecode
	__defaults__	tuple of any default values for arguments
	__globals__	global namespace in which this function was defined
traceback	tb_frame	frame object at this level
	tb_lasti	index of last attempted instruction in bytecode
	tb_lineno	current line number in Python source code
	tb_next	next inner traceback object (called by this level)
frame	f_back	next outer frame object (this frame’s caller)
	f_builtins	built-in namespace seen by this frame
	f_code	code object being executed in this frame
	f_globals	global namespace seen by this frame
	f_lasti	index of last attempted instruction in bytecode
	f_lineno	current line number in Python source code
	f_locals	local namespace seen by this frame
	f_restricted	0 or 1 if frame is in restricted execution mode
	f_trace	tracing function for this frame, or None
code	co_argcount	number of arguments (not including * or ** args)
	co_code	string of raw compiled bytecode
	co_consts	tuple of constants used in the bytecode
	co_filename	name of file in which this code object was created
	co_firstlineno	number of first line in Python source code
	co_flags	bitmap: 1=optimized | 2=newlocals | 4=*arg | 8=**arg
	co_lnotab	encoded mapping of line numbers to bytecode indices
	co_name	name with which this code object was defined
	co_names	tuple of names of local variables
	co_nlocals	number of local variables
	co_stacksize	virtual machine stack space required
	co_varnames	tuple of names of arguments and local variables
builtin	__doc__	documentation string
	__name__	original name of this function or method
	__self__	instance to which a method is bound, or None

inspect.getmembers(object[, predicate])

Return all the members of an object in a list of (name, value) pairs sorted by name. If the optional predicate argument is supplied, only members for which the predicate returns a true value are included.

Note

getmembers() does not return metaclass attributes when the argument is a class (this behavior is inherited from the dir() function).

inspect.getmoduleinfo(path)

Returns a named tuple ModuleInfo(name, suffix, mode, module_type) of values that describe how Python will interpret the file identified by path if it is a module, or None if it would not be identified as a module. The return tuple is (name, suffix, mode, mtype), where name is the name of the module without the name of any enclosing package, suffix is the trailing part of the file name (which may not be a dot-delimited extension), mode is the open() mode that would be used ('r' or 'rb'), and mtype is an integer giving the type of the module. mtype will have a value which can be compared to the constants defined in the imp module; see the documentation for that module for more information on module types.

inspect.getmodulename(path)

Return the name of the module named by the file path, without including the names of enclosing packages. This uses the same algorithm as the interpreter uses when searching for modules. If the name cannot be matched according to the interpreter’s rules, None is returned.

inspect.ismodule(object)

Return true if the object is a module.

inspect.isclass(object)

Return true if the object is a class, whether built-in or created in Python code.

inspect.ismethod(object)

Return true if the object is a bound method written in Python.

inspect.isfunction(object)

Return true if the object is a Python function, which includes functions created by a lambda expression.

inspect.isgeneratorfunction(object)

Return true if the object is a Python generator function.

inspect.isgenerator(object)

Return true if the object is a generator.

inspect.istraceback(object)

Return true if the object is a traceback.

inspect.isframe(object)

Return true if the object is a frame.

inspect.iscode(object)

Return true if the object is a code.

inspect.isbuiltin(object)

Return true if the object is a built-in function or a bound built-in method.

inspect.isroutine(object)

Return true if the object is a user-defined or built-in function or method.

inspect.isabstract(object)

Return true if the object is an abstract base class.

inspect.ismethoddescriptor(object)

Return true if the object is a method descriptor, but not if ismethod(), isclass(), isfunction() or isbuiltin() are true.

This, for example, is true of int.__add__. An object passing this test has a __get__ attribute but not a __set__ attribute, but beyond that the set of attributes varies. __name__ is usually sensible, and __doc__ often is.

Methods implemented via descriptors that also pass one of the other tests return false from the ismethoddescriptor() test, simply because the other tests promise more – you can, e.g., count on having the __func__ attribute (etc) when an object passes ismethod().

inspect.isdatadescriptor(object)

Return true if the object is a data descriptor.

Data descriptors have both a __get__ and a __set__ attribute. Examples are properties (defined in Python), getsets, and members. The latter two are defined in C and there are more specific tests available for those types, which is robust across Python implementations. Typically, data descriptors will also have __name__ and __doc__ attributes (properties, getsets, and members have both of these attributes), but this is not guaranteed.

inspect.isgetsetdescriptor(object)

Return true if the object is a getset descriptor.

CPython implementation detail: getsets are attributes defined in extension modules via PyGetSetDef structures. For Python implementations without such types, this method will always return False.

inspect.ismemberdescriptor(object)

Return true if the object is a member descriptor.

CPython implementation detail: Member descriptors are attributes defined in extension modules via PyMemberDef structures. For Python implementations without such types, this method will always return False.

27.11.2. Retrieving source code

inspect.getdoc(object)

Get the documentation string for an object, cleaned up with cleandoc().

inspect.getcomments(object)

Return in a single string any lines of comments immediately preceding the object’s source code (for a class, function, or method), or at the top of the Python source file (if the object is a module).

inspect.getfile(object)

Return the name of the (text or binary) file in which an object was defined. This will fail with a TypeError if the object is a built-in module, class, or function.

inspect.getmodule(object)

Try to guess which module an object was defined in.

inspect.getsourcefile(object)

Return the name of the Python source file in which an object was defined. This will fail with a TypeError if the object is a built-in module, class, or function.

inspect.getsourcelines(object)

Return a list of source lines and starting line number for an object. The argument may be a module, class, method, function, traceback, frame, or code object. The source code is returned as a list of the lines corresponding to the object and the line number indicates where in the original source file the first line of code was found. An IOError is raised if the source code cannot be retrieved.

inspect.getsource(object)

Return the text of the source code for an object. The argument may be a module, class, method, function, traceback, frame, or code object. The source code is returned as a single string. An IOError is raised if the source code cannot be retrieved.

inspect.cleandoc(doc)

Clean up indentation from docstrings that are indented to line up with blocks of code. Any whitespace that can be uniformly removed from the second line onwards is removed. Also, all tabs are expanded to spaces.

27.11.3. Classes and functions

inspect.getclasstree(classes, unique=False)

Arrange the given list of classes into a hierarchy of nested lists. Where a nested list appears, it contains classes derived from the class whose entry immediately precedes the list. Each entry is a 2-tuple containing a class and a tuple of its base classes. If the unique argument is true, exactly one entry appears in the returned structure for each class in the given list. Otherwise, classes using multiple inheritance and their descendants will appear multiple times.

inspect.getargspec(func)

Get the names and default values of a Python function’s arguments. A named tuple ArgSpec(args, varargs, keywords, defaults) is returned. args is a list of the argument names. varargs and varkw are the names of the * and ** arguments or None. defaults is a tuple of default argument values or None if there are no default arguments; if this tuple has n elements, they correspond to the last n elements listed in args.

Deprecated since version 3.0: Use getfullargspec() instead, which provides information about keyword-only arguments and annotations.

inspect.getfullargspec(func)

Get the names and default values of a Python function’s arguments. A named tuple is returned:

FullArgSpec(args, varargs, varkw, defaults, kwonlyargs, kwonlydefaults, annotations)

args is a list of the argument names. varargs and varkw are the names of the * and ** arguments or None. defaults is an n-tuple of the default values of the last n arguments. kwonlyargs is a list of keyword-only argument names. kwonlydefaults is a dictionary mapping names from kwonlyargs to defaults. annotations is a dictionary mapping argument names to annotations.

The first four items in the tuple correspond to getargspec().

inspect.getargvalues(frame)

Get information about arguments passed into a particular frame. A named tuple ArgInfo(args, varargs, keywords, locals) is returned. args is a list of the argument names. varargs and varkw are the names of the * and ** arguments or None. locals is the locals dictionary of the given frame.

inspect.formatargspec(args[, varargs, varkw, defaults, formatarg, formatvarargs, formatvarkw, formatvalue])

Format a pretty argument spec from the four values returned by getargspec(). The format* arguments are the corresponding optional formatting functions that are called to turn names and values into strings.

inspect.formatargvalues(args[, varargs, varkw, locals, formatarg, formatvarargs, formatvarkw, formatvalue])

Format a pretty argument spec from the four values returned by getargvalues(). The format* arguments are the corresponding optional formatting functions that are called to turn names and values into strings.

inspect.getmro(cls)

Return a tuple of class cls’s base classes, including cls, in method resolution order. No class appears more than once in this tuple. Note that the method resolution order depends on cls’s type. Unless a very peculiar user-defined metatype is in use, cls will be the first element of the tuple.

27.11.4. The interpreter stack

When the following functions return “frame records,” each record is a tuple of six items: the frame object, the filename, the line number of the current line, the function name, a list of lines of context from the source code, and the index of the current line within that list.

Note

Keeping references to frame objects, as found in the first element of the frame records these functions return, can cause your program to create reference cycles. Once a reference cycle has been created, the lifespan of all objects which can be accessed from the objects which form the cycle can become much longer even if Python’s optional cycle detector is enabled. If such cycles must be created, it is important to ensure they are explicitly broken to avoid the delayed destruction of objects and increased memory consumption which occurs.

Though the cycle detector will catch these, destruction of the frames (and local variables) can be made deterministic by removing the cycle in a finally clause. This is also important if the cycle detector was disabled when Python was compiled or using gc.disable(). For example:

def handle_stackframe_without_leak():
    frame = inspect.currentframe()
    try:
        # do something with the frame
    finally:
        del frame

The optional context argument supported by most of these functions specifies the number of lines of context to return, which are centered around the current line.

inspect.getframeinfo(frame, context=1)

Get information about a frame or traceback object. A named tuple Traceback(filename, lineno, function, code_context, index) is returned.

inspect.getouterframes(frame, context=1)

Get a list of frame records for a frame and all outer frames. These frames represent the calls that lead to the creation of frame. The first entry in the returned list represents frame; the last entry represents the outermost call on frame‘s stack.

inspect.getinnerframes(traceback, context=1)

Get a list of frame records for a traceback’s frame and all inner frames. These frames represent calls made as a consequence of frame. The first entry in the list represents traceback; the last entry represents where the exception was raised.

inspect.currentframe()

Return the frame object for the caller’s stack frame.

CPython implementation detail: This function relies on Python stack frame support in the interpreter, which isn’t guaranteed to exist in all implementations of Python. If running in an implementation without Python stack frame support this function returns None.

inspect.stack(context=1)

Return a list of frame records for the caller’s stack. The first entry in the returned list represents the caller; the last entry represents the outermost call on the stack.

inspect.trace(context=1)

Return a list of frame records for the stack between the current frame and the frame in which an exception currently being handled was raised in. The first entry in the list represents the caller; the last entry represents where the exception was raised.