Lets say I have
class Super():
def method1():
pass
class Sub(Super):
def method1(param1, param2, param3):
stuff
Is this correct? Will calls to method1 always go to the sub class? My plan is to have 2 sub classes each override method1 with different params
In Python, methods are just key-value pairs in the dictionary attached to the class. When you are deriving a class from a base class, you are essentially saying that method name will be looked into first derived class dictionary and then in the base class dictionary. In order to "override" a method, you simply re-declare the method in the derived class.
So, what if you change the signature of the overridden method in the derived class? Everything works correctly if the call is on the derived instance but if you make the call on the base instance, you will get an error because the base class uses a different signature for that same method name.
There are however frequent scenarios where you want derived class method have additional parameters and you want method call work without error on base as well. This is called "Liskov substitution principle" (or LSP) which guarantees that if person switches from base to derived instance or vice versa, they don't have to revamp their code. To do this in Python, you need to design your base class with the following technique:
class Base:
# simply allow additional args in base class
def hello(self, name, *args, **kwargs):
print("Hello", name)
class Derived(Base):
# derived class also has unused optional args so people can
# derive new class from this class as well while maintaining LSP
def hello(self, name, age=None, *args, **kwargs):
super(Derived, self).hello(name, age, *args, **kwargs)
print('Your age is ', age)
b = Base()
d = Derived()
b.hello('Alice') # works on base, without additional params
b.hello('Bob', age=24) # works on base, with additional params
d.hello('Rick') # works on derived, without additional params
d.hello('John', age=30) # works on derived, with additional params
Above will print:
Hello Alice Hello Bob Hello Rick Your age is None Hello John Your age is 30. Play with this code