How do I create a Python function with optional arguments

Question

I have a Python function which takes several arguments  Some of these arguments could be omitted in some scenarios   def some function  self  a  b  c  d   None  e   None  f   None  g   None  h   None        code   The arguments d through h are strings which each have different meanings  It is important that I can choose which optional parameters to pass in any combination  For example   a  b  C  d  e   or  a  b  C  g  h   or  a  b  C  d  e  f  or all of them  these are my choices     It would be great if I could overload the function - but I read that Python does not support overloading  I tried to insert some of the required int arguments in the list - and got an argument mismatch error   Right now I am sending empty strings in place of the first few missing arguments as placeholders  I would like to be able to call a function just using actual values   Is there any way to do this  Could I pass a list instead of the argument list   Right now the prototype using ctypes looks something like    fdll some function argtypes    c void p  c char p  c int  c char p  c char p  c char p  c char p  c char p

User · Accepted Answer

Try calling it like  obj some function   1   2   3   g  foo   h  bar     After the required positional arguments  you can specify specific optional arguments by name

User · Answer

Just use the  args parameter  which allows you to pass as many arguments as you want after your a b c  You would have to add some logic to map args- c d e f but its a  way  of overloading   def myfunc a b   args    kwargs      for ar in args        print ar myfunc a b c d e f    And it will print values of c d e f    Similarly you could use the kwargs argument and then you could name your parameters   def myfunc a b   args    kwargs         c   kwargs get  c   None        d   kwargs get  d   None         etc myfunc a b  c  nick   d  dog          And then kwargs would have a dictionary of all the parameters that are key valued after a b

[python] How do I create a Python function with optional arguments?

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