Question

from here I got an idea about how using variables from other modules. this all works fine with

import foo as bar

But I don’t want to import my modules as “bar” I want to use it without any prefix like

from foo import *

Using this it´s impossible to modify variables from other modules. reading will work! any idea? suggestions?

Answer 1

As far as I know, there is no way to import a value from a module and have it readable and writable by the importing scope. When you just import foo in Python, it creates a module object named foo. Getting and setting attributes on a module object will change them in the module’s scope. But when you from foo import something, foo is imported and a module object is created, but is not returned. Instead, Python copies the values you specified out of foo and puts them in the local scope. If what you are importing is an immutable type like int or str, then changing it and having the changes reflect in the foo module is impossible. It’s similar to this:

>>> class N(object):
...   def __init__(self, value):
...     self.value = value
>>> n = N(3)
>>> value = n.value
>>> print value, n.value
3 3
>>> value = 4
>>> print value, n.value
4 3

Excepting crude hacks, if you really want to be able to modify the module’s variable, you will need to import the module itself and modify the variable on the module. But generally, having to do this is indicative of bad design. If you are the writer of the foo module in question, you may want to look at some other, more Pythonic ways to solve your problem.