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Guido van Rossumcc6764c1995-02-09 17:18:10 +00001"""A generic interface to all dbm clones.
2
3Instead of
4
5 import dbm
6 d = dbm.open(file, 'rw', 0666)
7
8use
9
10 import anydbm
11 d = anydbm.open(file)
12
13The returned object is a dbm, gdbm or (on the Mac) dbmac object,
14dependent on availability of the modules (tested in this order).
15
16It has the following interface (key and data are strings):
17
18 d[key] = data # store data at key (may override data at
19 # existing key)
20 data = d[key] # retrieve data at key (raise KeyError if no
21 # such key)
22 del d[key] # delete data stored at key (raises KeyError
23 # if no such key)
24 flag = d.has_key(key) # true if the key exists
25 list = d.keys() # return a list of all existing keys (slow!)
26
27Future versions may change the order in which implementations are
28tested for existence, add interfaces to other db-like implementations
29(e.g. BSD Hash), and (in the presence of multiple implementations)
30decide which module to use based upon the extension or contents of an
31existing database file.
32
33The open function has an optional second argument. This can be set to
34'r' to open the database for reading only. Don't pas an explicit 'w'
35or 'rw' to open it for writing, as the different interfaces have
36different interpretation of their mode argument if it isn't 'r'.
37"""
Guido van Rossuma48061a1995-01-10 00:31:14 +000038
39try:
40 import dbm
Guido van Rossumcc6764c1995-02-09 17:18:10 +000041 def open(filename, mode = 'rw'):
42 return dbm.open(filename, mode, 0666)
Guido van Rossuma48061a1995-01-10 00:31:14 +000043except ImportError:
Guido van Rossumcc6764c1995-02-09 17:18:10 +000044 try:
45 import gdbm
46 def open(filename, mode = 'w'):
47 return gdbm.open(filename, mode, 0666)
48 except ImportError:
49 import dbmac
50 open = dbmac.open