Question

I am trying to copy the nested list a, but do not know how to do it without using the copy.deepcopy function.

a = [[1, 2], [3, 4]]

I used:

b = a[:]

and

b = a[:][:]

But they all turn out to be shallow copy.

Any hints?

Answer 1

My entry to simulate copy.deepcopy:

def deepcopy(obj):
    if isinstance(obj, dict):
        return {deepcopy(key): deepcopy(value) for key, value in obj.items()}
    if hasattr(obj, '__iter__'):
        return type(obj)(deepcopy(item) for item in obj)
    return obj

The strategy: iterate across each element of the passed-in object, recursively descending into elements that are also iterable and making new objects of their same type.

I make no claim whatsoever that this is comprehensive or without fault [1] (don’t pass in an object that references itself!) but should get you started.

[1] Truly! The point here is to demonstrate, not cover every possible eventuality. The source to copy.deepcopy is 50 lines long and it doesn’t handle everything.