Python Memoising/Deferred Lookup Property Decorator

Python memoising/deferred lookup property decorator

For all sorts of great utilities I'm using boltons.

As part of that library you have cachedproperty:

from boltons.cacheutils import cachedproperty

class Foo(object):
    def __init__(self):
        self.value = 4

    @cachedproperty
    def cached_prop(self):
        self.value += 1
        return self.value

f = Foo()
print(f.value)  # initial value
print(f.cached_prop)  # cached property is calculated
f.value = 1
print(f.cached_prop)  # same value for the cached property - it isn't calculated again
print(f.value)  # the backing value is different (it's essentially unrelated value)

Applying a decorator to a property getter

prop = property(memoized(prop.fget), prop.fset, prop.fdel, prop.__doc__)

Don't modify the property; make a new one.

Lazy class property decorator

Pyramid framework has a very nice decorator called reify, but it only works at instance level, and you want class level, so let's modify it a bit

class class_reify(object):
    def __init__(self, wrapped):
        self.wrapped = wrapped
        try:
            self.__doc__ = wrapped.__doc__
        except: # pragma: no cover
            pass

    # original sets the attributes on the instance
    # def __get__(self, inst, objtype=None):
    #    if inst is None:
    #        return self
    #    val = self.wrapped(inst)
    #    setattr(inst, self.wrapped.__name__, val)
    #    return val

    # ignore the instance, and just set them on the class
    # if called on a class, inst is None and objtype is the class
    # if called on an instance, inst is the instance, and objtype 
    # the class
    def __get__(self, inst, objtype=None):
        # ask the value from the wrapped object, giving it
        # our class
        val = self.wrapped(objtype)

        # and set the attribute directly to the class, thereby
        # avoiding the descriptor to be called multiple times
        setattr(objtype, self.wrapped.__name__, val)

        # and return the calculated value
        return val

class Test(object):
    @class_reify
    def foo(cls):
        print("foo called for class", cls)
        return 42

print(Test.foo)
print(Test.foo)

Run the program and it prints

foo called for class <class '__main__.Test'>
42
42

How to create decorator for lazy initialization of a property

Denis Otkidach's CachedAttribute is a method decorator which makes attributes lazy (computed once, accessible many). To make it also read-only, I added a __set__ method. To retain the ability to recalculate (see below) I added a __delete__ method:

class ReadOnlyCachedAttribute(object):    
    '''Computes attribute value and caches it in the instance.
    Source: Python Cookbook 
    Author: Denis Otkidach https://stackoverflow.com/users/168352/denis-otkidach
    This decorator allows you to create a property which can be computed once and
    accessed many times. Sort of like memoization
    '''
    def __init__(self, method, name=None):
        self.method = method
        self.name = name or method.__name__
        self.__doc__ = method.__doc__
    def __get__(self, inst, cls): 
        if inst is None:
            return self
        elif self.name in inst.__dict__:
            return inst.__dict__[self.name]
        else:
            result = self.method(inst)
            inst.__dict__[self.name]=result
            return result    
    def __set__(self, inst, value):
        raise AttributeError("This property is read-only")
    def __delete__(self,inst):
        del inst.__dict__[self.name]

For example:

if __name__=='__main__':
    class Foo(object):
        @ReadOnlyCachedAttribute
        # @read_only_lazyprop
        def bar(self):
            print 'Calculating self.bar'  
            return 42
    foo=Foo()
    print(foo.bar)
    # Calculating self.bar
    # 42
    print(foo.bar)    
    # 42
    try:
        foo.bar=1
    except AttributeError as err:
        print(err)
        # This property is read-only
    del(foo.bar)
    print(foo.bar)
    # Calculating self.bar
    # 42

One of the beautiful things about CachedAttribute (and
ReadOnlyCachedAttribute) is that if you del foo.bar, then the next time you
access foo.bar, the value is re-calculated. (This magic is made possible by
the fact that del foo.bar removes 'bar' from foo.__dict__ but the property
bar remains in Foo.__dict__.)

If you don't need or don't want this ability to recalculate,
then the following (based on Mike Boers' lazyprop) is a simpler way to make a read-only lazy property.

def read_only_lazyprop(fn):
    attr_name = '_lazy_' + fn.__name__
    @property
    def _lazyprop(self):
        if not hasattr(self, attr_name):
            setattr(self, attr_name, fn(self))
        return getattr(self, attr_name)
    @_lazyprop.setter
    def _lazyprop(self,value):
        raise AttributeError("This property is read-only")
    return _lazyprop

Accessor decorator that only runs decorated code once in Typescript, returns previously calculated value on subsequent calls

I believe we can compute the value the first time and store it, and then retrieve it on subsequent calls using reflect-metadata as follows.

import "reflect-metadata";

const metadataKey = Symbol("initialized");

function once(
  target: any,
  propertyKey: string,
  descriptor: PropertyDescriptor
) {
  const getter = descriptor.get!;
  descriptor.get = function () {
    const val = Reflect.getMetadata(metadataKey, target, propertyKey);

    if (val) {
      return val;
    }

    const newValue = getter.apply(this);
    Reflect.defineMetadata(metadataKey, newValue, target, propertyKey);
    return newValue;
  };
}

A working example can be found here.

Big thanks to OP for helping to get the kinks worked out.

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