Python’s Magic Methods

Here are some links to documentation of Python’s magic methods, aka special methods, aka “dunder” (double underscore) methods.

• Rafe Kettler’s A Guide to Python’s Magic Methods

  ::—> http://www.rafekettler.com/magicmethods.html
  
  

• Michael Foord’s chapter on Python Magic Methods from this book IronPython in Action: Unleashing .NET with Python

  ::—> http://www.ironpythoninaction.com/magic-methods.html
  
  

• David’s article on Siafoo on Python __Underscore__ Methods

  ::—> http://www.siafoo.net/article/57
  
  

• The Python Quick Reference on John Shipman’s wonderful New Mexico Tech web site

  ::—> http://infohost.nmt.edu/tcc/help/pubs/python/web/special-methods.html
  
  

• The official Python Language Reference
  ::—> http://docs.python.org/reference/datamodel.html#special-method-names
  
  
• Kumar McMillan’s post on Magic Methods on his FarmDev blog has a few interesting observations

  ::—> http://farmdev.com/src/secrets/magicmethod/index.html
  
  

There are also a few other Python features that are sometimes characterized as “magic”.

• some of the built-in functions, especially that newcomer: super()
  
  
• decorators that use some of the new built-in functions — @staticmethod, @classmethod, and @property
  
  

I’m sure there are other useful Web pages about magic methods that I haven’t found. If you know of one (and feel like sharing it) please add it in the comments section below.