PEP 591: Adding a final qualifier to typing (#990)

Author: msullivan

pep-0591.rst

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+PEP: 591
+Title: Adding a final qualifier to typing
+Author: Michael J. Sullivan <[email protected]>, Ivan Levkivskyi <[email protected]>
+Discussions-To: [email protected]
+Status: Draft
+Type: Standards Track
+Content-Type: text/x-rst
+Created: 15-Mar-2019
+Post-History:
+
+
+Abstract
+========
+
+This PEP proposes a "final" qualifier to be added to the ``typing``
+module---in the form of a ``final`` decorator and a ``Final`` type
+annotation---to serve three related purposes:
+
+* Declaring that a method should not be overridden
+* Declaring that a class should not be subclassed
+* Declaring that a variable or attribute should not be reassigned
+
+
+Motivation
+==========
+
+The ``final`` decorator
+-----------------------
+The current ``typing`` module lacks a way to restrict the use of
+inheritance or overriding at a typechecker level. This is a common
+feature in other object-oriented languages (such as Java), and is
+useful for reducing the potential space of behaviors of a class,
+easing reasoning.
+
+Some situations where a final class or method may be useful include:
+
+* A class wasn’t designed to be subclassed or a method wasn't designed
+  to be overridden. Perhaps it would not work as expected, or be
+  error-prone.
+* Subclassing or overriding would make code harder to understand or
+  maintain. For example, you may want to prevent unnecessarily tight
+  coupling between base classes and subclasses.
+* You want to retain the freedom to arbitrarily change the class
+  implementation in the future, and these changes might break
+  subclasses.
+
+The ``Final`` annotation
+------------------------
+
+The current ``typing`` module lacks a way to indicate that a variable
+will not be assigned to. This is a useful feature in several
+situations:
+
+* Preventing unintended modification of module and class level
+  constants and documenting them as constants in a checkable way.
+* Creating a read-only attribute that may not be overridden by
+  subclasses. (``@property`` can make an attribute read-only but
+  does not prevent overriding)
+* Allowing a name to be used in situations where ordinarily a literal
+  is expected (for example as a file name for ``NamedTuple``, a tuple
+  of types passed to ``isinstance``, or an argument to a function
+  with arguments of ``Literal`` type [#PEP-586]_).
+
+Specification
+=============
+
+The ``final`` decorator
+-----------------------
+
+The ``typing.final`` decorator is used to restrict the use of
+inheritance and overriding.
+
+A type checker should prohibit any class decorated with ``@final``
+from being subclassed and any method decorated with ``@final`` from
+being overridden in a subclass. The method decorator version may be
+used with all of instance methods, class methods, static methods, and properties.
+
+For example::
+
+    from typing import final
+
+    @final
+    class Base:
+        ...
+
+    class Derived(Base):  # Error: Cannot inherit from final class "Base"
+        ...
+
+and::
+
+    from typing import final
+
+    class Base:
+        @final
+        def foo(self) -> None:
+            ...
+
+    class Derived(Base):
+        def foo(self) -> None:  # Error: Cannot override final attribute "foo"
+                                # (previously declared in base class "Base")
+            ...
+
+
+For overloaded methods, ``@final`` should be placed on the
+implementation (or on the first overload, for stubs)::
+
+   from typing import Any, overload
+
+   class Base:
+       @overload
+       def method(self) -> None: ...
+       @overload
+       def method(self, arg: int) -> int: ...
+       @final
+       def method(self, x=None):
+           ...
+
+The ``Final`` annotation
+------------------------
+
+The ``typing.Final`` type qualifier is used to indicate that a
+variable or attribute should not be reassigned, redefined, or overridden.
+
+Syntax
+~~~~~~
+
+``Final`` may be used in in one of several forms:
+
+* With an explicit type, using the syntax ``Final[<type>]``. Example::
+
+    ID: Final[float] = 1
+
+* With no type annotation. Example::
+
+    ID: Final = 1
+
+  The typechecker should apply its usual type inference mechanisms to
+  determine the type of ``ID`` (here, likely, ``int``). Note that unlike for
+  generic classes this is *not* the same as ``Final[Any]``.
+
+* In class bodies and stub files you can omit the right hand side and just write
+  ``ID: Final[float]``.  If the right hand side is omitted, there must
+  be an explicit type argument to ``Final``.
+
+* Finally, as ``self.id: Final = 1`` (also optionally with a type in
+  square brackets). This is allowed *only* in ``__init__`` methods, so
+  that the final instance attribute is assigned only once when an
+  instance is created.
+
+
+Semantics and examples
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+The two main rules for defining a final name are:
+
+* There can be *at most one* final declaration per module or class for
+  a given attribute. There can't be separate class-level and instance-level
+  constants with the same name.
+
+* There must be *exactly one* assignment to a final name.
+
+This means a type checker should prevent further assignments to final
+names in type-checked code::
+
+   from typing import Final
+
+   RATE: Final = 3000
+
+   class Base:
+       DEFAULT_ID: Final = 0
+
+   RATE = 300  # Error: can't assign to final attribute
+   Base.DEFAULT_ID = 1  # Error: can't override a final attribute
+
+   for x in [1, 2, 3]:
+      FOO: Final = x  # Error: Cannot use Final inside a loop
+
+error: Cannot use Final inside a loop
+
+Additionally, a type checker should prevent final attributes from
+being overridden in a subclass::
+
+   from typing import Final
+
+   class Window:
+       BORDER_WIDTH: Final = 2.5
+       ...
+
+   class ListView(Window):
+       BORDER_WIDTH = 3  # Error: can't override a final attribute
+
+A final attribute declared in a class body without an initializer must
+be initialized in the ``__init__`` method (except in stub files)::
+
+   class ImmutablePoint:
+       x: Final[int]
+       y: Final[int]  # Error: final attribute without an initializer
+
+       def __init__(self) -> None:
+           self.x = 1  # Good
+
+Type checkers should infer a final attribute that is initialized in
+a class body as being a class variable. Variables should not be annotated
+with both ``ClassVar`` and ``Final``.
+
+``Final`` may only be used as the outermost type in assignments or variable
+annotations. Using it in any other position is an error. In particular,
+``Final`` can't be used in annotations for function arguments::
+
+   x: List[Final[int]] = []  # Error!
+
+   def fun(x: Final[List[int]]) ->  None:  # Error!
+       ...
+
+Note that declaring a name as final only guarantees that the name will
+not be re-bound to another value, but does not make the value
+immutable. Immutable ABCs and containers may be used in combination
+with ``Final`` to prevent mutating such values::
+
+   x: Final = ['a', 'b']
+   x.append('c')  # OK
+
+   y: Final[Sequence[str]] = ['a', 'b']
+   y.append('x')  # Error: "Sequence[str]" has no attribute "append"
+   z: Final = ('a', 'b')  # Also works
+
+
+Type checkers should treat uses of a final name that was initialized
+with a literal as if it was replaced by the literal. For example, the
+following should be allowed::
+
+   from typing import NamedTuple, Final
+
+   X: Final = "x"
+   Y: Final = "y"
+   N = NamedTuple("N", [(X, int), (Y, int)])
+
+
+Reference Implementation
+========================
+
+The mypy [#mypy]_ type checker supports `Final` and `final`. A
+reference implementation of the runtime component is provided in the
+``typing_extensions`` [#typing_extensions]_ module.
+
+
+Rejected/deferred Ideas
+=======================
+
+The name ``Const`` was also considered as the name for the ``Final``
+type annotation. The name ``Final`` was chosen instead because the
+concepts are related and it seemed best to be consistent between them.
+
+We considered using a single name ``Final`` instead of introducing
+``final`` as well, but ``@Final`` just looked too weird to us.
+
+A related feature to final classes would be Scala-style sealed
+classes, where a class is allowed to be inherited only by classes
+defined in the same module. Sealed classes seem most useful in
+combination with pattern matching, so it does not seem to justify the
+complexity in our case. This could be revisisted in the future.
+
+
+References
+==========
+
+.. [#PEP-484] PEP 484, Type Hints, van Rossum, Lehtosalo, Langa
+   (http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0484)
+
+.. [#PEP-526] PEP 526, Syntax for Variable Annotations, Gonzalez,
+   House, Levkivskyi, Roach, van Rossum
+   (http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0526)
+
+.. [#PEP-586] PEP 486, Literal Types, Lee, Levkivskyi, Lehtosalo
+   (http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0586)
+
+.. [#mypy] http://www.mypy-lang.org/
+
+.. [#typing_extensions] https://github.com/python/typing/typing_extensions
+
+Copyright
+=========
+
+This document has been placed in the public domain.
+
+..
+   Local Variables:
+   mode: indented-text
+   indent-tabs-mode: nil
+   sentence-end-double-space: t
+   fill-column: 70
+   coding: utf-8
+   End: