Why does my code work from interactive shell, but not when run from a file?

Question

I am trying to use the pprint module to check out some vars in Python, which I can happily do using the interactive shell and the code below:

import pprint
pp = pprint.PrettyPrinter()
stuff = ['cakes','bread','mead']
pp.pprint(stuff)

However, when I put the above into pprint.py and run it using python pprint.py I get the error:

$ python dev/pars/pprint.py 
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "dev/pars/pprint.py", line 1, in ?
    import pprint
  File "/home/origina2/dev/pars/pprint.py", line 2, in ?
    pp = pprint.PrettyPrinter()
AttributeError: 'module' object has no attribute 'PrettyPrinter'

What is different about the way modules are called when running Python code from a file compared to the interactive shell?

Answer 1

You named your program pprint.py, so at the line import pprint it tries to import itself. It succeeds, but your pprint.py doesn't contain anything called PrettyPrinter.

Change your code's name. [And, to be clear, delete any pprint.pyc or pprint.pyo files..]