How to declare a dictionary with inline function

Question

Do I have to formally define a function before I can use it as an element of a dictionary?

def my_func():
  print 'my_func'

d = {
  'function': my_func
}

I would rather define the function inline. I just tried to type out what I want to do, but the whitespace policies of python syntax make it very hard to define an inline func within a dict. Is there any way to do this?

Answer 1

The answer seems to be that there is no way to declare a function inline a dictionary definition in python. Thanks to everyone who took the time to contribute.

Answer 2

Do you really need a dictionary, or just getitem access?

If the latter, then use a class:

>>> class Dispatch(object):
...     def funcA(self, *args):
...         print('funcA%r' % (args,))
...     def funcB(self, *args):
...         print('funcB%r' % (args,))
...     def __getitem__(self, name):
...         return getattr(self, name)
... 
>>> d = Dispatch()
>>> 
>>> d['funcA'](1, 2, 3)
funcA(1, 2, 3)