Creating a list of objects in Python

Question

I'm trying to create a Python script that opens several databases and compares their contents. In the process of creating that script, I've run into a problem in creating a list whose contents are objects that I've created.

I've simplified the program to its bare bones for this posting. First I create a new class, create a new instance of it, assign it an attribute and then write it to a list. Then I assign a new value to the instance and again write it to a list... and again and again...

Problem is, it's always the same object so I'm really just changing the base object. When I read the list, I get a repeat of the same object over and over.

So how do you write objects to a list within a loop?

Here's my simplified code

class SimpleClass(object):
    pass

x = SimpleClass
# Then create an empty list
simpleList = []
#Then loop through from 0 to 3 adding an attribute to the instance 'x' of SimpleClass
for count in range(0,4):       
    # each iteration creates a slightly different attribute value, and then prints it to
# prove that step is working
# but the problem is, I'm always updating a reference to 'x' and what I want to add to
# simplelist is a new instance of x that contains the updated attribute

x.attr1= '*Bob* '* count
print "Loop Count: %s Attribute Value %s" % (count, x.attr1)
simpleList.append(x)

print '-'*20
# And here I print out each instance of the object stored in the list 'simpleList'
# and the problem surfaces.  Every element of 'simpleList' contains the same      attribute value

y = SimpleClass
print "Reading the attributes from the objects in the list"
for count in range(0,4):
    y = simpleList[count]
    print y.attr1

So how do I (append, extend, copy or whatever) the elements of simpleList so that each entry contains a different instance of the object instead of all pointing to the same one?

Answer 1

You demonstrate a fundamental misunderstanding.

You never created an instance of SimpleClass at all, because you didn't call it.

for count in xrange(4):
    x = SimpleClass()
    x.attr = count
    simplelist.append(x)

Or, if you let the class take parameters, instead, you can use a list comprehension.

simplelist = [SimpleClass(count) for count in xrange(4)]