Improve str() and object.__str__() documentation (issue #13538).
diff --git a/Doc/c-api/buffer.rst b/Doc/c-api/buffer.rst
index d98ece3..740b575 100644
--- a/Doc/c-api/buffer.rst
+++ b/Doc/c-api/buffer.rst
@@ -1,5 +1,10 @@
.. highlightlang:: c
+.. index::
+ single: buffer protocol
+ single: buffer interface; (see buffer protocol)
+ single: buffer object; (see buffer protocol)
+
.. _bufferobjects:
Buffer Protocol
@@ -9,9 +14,6 @@
.. sectionauthor:: Benjamin Peterson
-.. index::
- single: buffer interface
-
Certain objects available in Python wrap access to an underlying memory
array or *buffer*. Such objects include the built-in :class:`bytes` and
:class:`bytearray`, and some extension types like :class:`array.array`.
@@ -23,8 +25,8 @@
then desireable, in some situations, to access that buffer directly and
without intermediate copying.
-Python provides such a facility at the C level in the form of the *buffer
-protocol*. This protocol has two sides:
+Python provides such a facility at the C level in the form of the :ref:`buffer
+protocol <bufferobjects>`. This protocol has two sides:
.. index:: single: PyBufferProcs
diff --git a/Doc/library/functions.rst b/Doc/library/functions.rst
index f9e0d0a..0d8f61c 100644
--- a/Doc/library/functions.rst
+++ b/Doc/library/functions.rst
@@ -528,7 +528,7 @@
is used by most built-in types: :ref:`formatspec`.
The default *format_spec* is an empty string which usually gives the same
- effect as calling ``str(value)``.
+ effect as calling :func:`str(value) <str>`.
A call to ``format(value, format_spec)`` is translated to
``type(value).__format__(format_spec)`` which bypasses the instance
@@ -1246,38 +1246,51 @@
For more information on static methods, consult the documentation on the
standard type hierarchy in :ref:`types`.
+ .. index::
+ single: string; str() (built-in function)
+
.. function:: str(object='')
- str(object[, encoding[, errors]])
+ str(object=b'', encoding='utf-8', errors='strict')
- Return a string version of an object, using one of the following modes:
+ Return a :ref:`string <typesseq>` version of *object*. If *object* is not
+ provided, returns the empty string. Otherwise, the behavior of ``str()``
+ depends on whether *encoding* or *errors* is given, as follows.
- If *encoding* and/or *errors* are given, :func:`str` will decode the
- *object* which can either be a byte string or a character buffer using
- the codec for *encoding*. The *encoding* parameter is a string giving
- the name of an encoding; if the encoding is not known, :exc:`LookupError`
- is raised. Error handling is done according to *errors*; this specifies the
- treatment of characters which are invalid in the input encoding. If
- *errors* is ``'strict'`` (the default), a :exc:`ValueError` is raised on
- errors, while a value of ``'ignore'`` causes errors to be silently ignored,
- and a value of ``'replace'`` causes the official Unicode replacement character,
- U+FFFD, to be used to replace input characters which cannot be decoded.
- See also the :mod:`codecs` module.
+ If neither *encoding* nor *errors* is given, ``str(object)`` returns
+ :meth:`object.__str__() <object.__str__>`, which is the "informal" or nicely
+ printable string representation of *object*. For string objects, this is
+ the string itself. If *object* does not have a :meth:`~object.__str__`
+ method, then :func:`str` falls back to returning
+ :meth:`repr(object) <repr>`.
- When only *object* is given, this returns its nicely printable representation.
- For strings, this is the string itself. The difference with ``repr(object)``
- is that ``str(object)`` does not always attempt to return a string that is
- acceptable to :func:`eval`; its goal is to return a printable string.
- With no arguments, this returns the empty string.
+ .. index::
+ single: buffer protocol; str() (built-in function)
+ single: bytes; str() (built-in function)
- Objects can specify what ``str(object)`` returns by defining a :meth:`__str__`
- special method.
+ If at least one of *encoding* or *errors* is given, *object* should be a
+ :class:`bytes` or :class:`bytearray` object, or more generally any object
+ that supports the :ref:`buffer protocol <bufferobjects>`. In this case, if
+ *object* is a :class:`bytes` (or :class:`bytearray`) object, then
+ ``str(bytes, encoding, errors)`` is equivalent to
+ :meth:`bytes.decode(encoding, errors) <bytes.decode>`. Otherwise, the bytes
+ object underlying the buffer object is obtained before calling
+ :meth:`bytes.decode`. See the :ref:`typesseq` section, the
+ :ref:`typememoryview` section, and :ref:`bufferobjects` for information on
+ buffer objects.
- For more information on strings see :ref:`typesseq` which describes sequence
- functionality (strings are sequences), and also the string-specific methods
- described in the :ref:`string-methods` section. To output formatted strings,
- see the :ref:`string-formatting` section. In addition see the
- :ref:`stringservices` section.
+ Passing a :class:`bytes` object to :func:`str` without the *encoding*
+ or *errors* arguments falls under the first case of returning the informal
+ string representation (see also the :option:`-b` command-line option to
+ Python). For example::
+
+ >>> str(b'Zoot!')
+ "b'Zoot!'"
+
+ ``str`` is a built-in :term:`type`. For more information on the string
+ type and its methods, see the :ref:`typesseq` and :ref:`string-methods`
+ sections. To output formatted strings, see the :ref:`string-formatting`
+ section. In addition, see the :ref:`stringservices` section.
.. function:: sum(iterable[, start])
diff --git a/Doc/library/stdtypes.rst b/Doc/library/stdtypes.rst
index f6eca56..4b224b3 100644
--- a/Doc/library/stdtypes.rst
+++ b/Doc/library/stdtypes.rst
@@ -794,6 +794,9 @@
the yield expression <yieldexpr>`.
+.. index::
+ single: string; sequence types
+
.. _typesseq:
Sequence Types --- :class:`str`, :class:`bytes`, :class:`bytearray`, :class:`list`, :class:`tuple`, :class:`range`
@@ -804,17 +807,20 @@
other containers see the built in :class:`dict` and :class:`set` classes, and
the :mod:`collections` module.
-
.. index::
object: sequence
- object: string
object: bytes
object: bytearray
object: tuple
object: list
object: range
+ object: string
+ single: string
+ single: str() (built-in function); (see also string)
-Strings contain Unicode characters. Their literals are written in single or
+Textual data in Python is handled with :class:`str` objects, or :dfn:`strings`.
+Strings are immutable :ref:`sequences <typesseq>` of Unicode code points.
+String literals are written in single or
double quotes: ``'xyzzy'``, ``"frobozz"``. See :ref:`strings` for more about
string literals. In addition to the functionality described here, there are
also string-specific methods described in the :ref:`string-methods` section.
diff --git a/Doc/reference/datamodel.rst b/Doc/reference/datamodel.rst
index 322e8c8..8bbbc99 100644
--- a/Doc/reference/datamodel.rst
+++ b/Doc/reference/datamodel.rst
@@ -1124,11 +1124,12 @@
modules are still available at the time when the :meth:`__del__` method is
called.
+ .. index::
+ single: repr() (built-in function); __repr__() (object method)
+
.. method:: object.__repr__(self)
- .. index:: builtin: repr
-
Called by the :func:`repr` built-in function to compute the "official" string
representation of an object. If at all possible, this should look like a
valid Python expression that could be used to recreate an object with the
@@ -1141,18 +1142,25 @@
This is typically used for debugging, so it is important that the representation
is information-rich and unambiguous.
+ .. index::
+ single: string; __str__() (object method)
+ single: format() (built-in function); __str__() (object method)
+ single: print() (built-in function); __str__() (object method)
+
.. method:: object.__str__(self)
- .. index::
- builtin: str
- builtin: print
+ Called by :func:`str(object) <str>` and the built-in functions
+ :func:`format` and :func:`print` to compute the "informal" or nicely
+ printable string representation of an object. The return value must be a
+ :ref:`string <textseq>` object.
- Called by the :func:`str` built-in function and by the :func:`print` function
- to compute the "informal" string representation of an object. This differs
- from :meth:`__repr__` in that it does not have to be a valid Python
- expression: a more convenient or concise representation may be used instead.
- The return value must be a string object.
+ This method differs from :meth:`object.__repr__` in that there is no
+ expectation that :meth:`__str__` return a valid Python expression: a more
+ convenient or concise representation can be used.
+
+ The default implementation defined by the built-in type :class:`object`
+ calls :meth:`object.__repr__`.
.. XXX what about subclasses of string?