How to get instance variables in Python?

Question

Every object has a __dict__ variable containing all the variables and its values in it.

Try this

>>> hi_obj = hi()
>>> hi_obj.__dict__.keys()

Use vars()

class Foo(object):
    def __init__(self):
        self.a = 1
        self.b = 2

vars(Foo()) #==> {'a': 1, 'b': 2}
vars(Foo()).keys() #==> ['a', 'b']

You normally can't get instance attributes given just a class, at least not without instantiating the class. You can get instance attributes given an instance, though, or class attributes given a class. See the 'inspect' module. You can't get a list of instance attributes because instances really can have anything as attribute, and -- as in your example -- the normal way to create them is to just assign to them in the __init__ method.

An exception is if your class uses slots, which is a fixed list of attributes that the class allows instances to have. Slots are explained in http://www.python.org/2.2.3/descrintro.html, but there are various pitfalls with slots; they affect memory layout, so multiple inheritance may be problematic, and inheritance in general has to take slots into account, too.

Both the Vars() and dict methods will work for the example the OP posted, but they won't work for "loosely" defined objects like:

class foo:
  a = 'foo'
  b = 'bar'

To print all non-callable attributes, you can use the following function:

def printVars(object):
    for i in [v for v in dir(object) if not callable(getattr(object,v))]:
        print '\n%s:' % i
        exec('print object.%s\n\n') % i

You can also test if an object has a specific variable with:

>>> hi_obj = hi()
>>> hasattr(hi_obj, "some attribute")

Your example shows "instance variables", not really class variables.

Look in hi_obj.__class__.__dict__.items() for the class variables, along with other other class members like member functions and the containing module.

class Hi( object ):
    class_var = ( 23, 'skidoo' ) # class variable
    def __init__( self ):
        self.ii = "foo" # instance variable
        self.jj = "bar"

Class variables are shared by all instances of the class.