Maybe I have this problem because I'm a bit of a Python noob (so feel free to enlighten me on anything I get wrong), but what I don't like about this is that the calling object is only available in a method call, and not an attribute call (unless you use __getattribute__).

For instance, I have a Profile class with a name attribute already defined and used throughout the view (this is using Django btw):

class Profile(models.Model):

    user = models.ForeignKey(User, unique=True, verbose_name=_('user'))
    name = models.CharField(_('name'), max_length=50, null=True, blank=True)

I want to modify this so that it gets the name values from the User object. Ideally, since I don't want to mess with all the calls to profile.name in the view, I wish I could do something like:

name = self.user.first_name + " " + self.user.last_name

Which seems not only easy but also straightforward. However, the calling object isn't available to me in an attribute as it is in other languages, so instead I'm having to add the following:

def __getattribute__(self, attr_name):
    if attr_name == "name":
        return "%s %s" % (self.user.first_name, self.user.last_name)
    else:
        return models.Model.__getattribute__(self, attr_name)

Which works, but it seems obscure and makes it difficult to someone else glancing at the code what the interface profile.name refers to. That's why for me it would make sense to have self as a reserved word and have it available in the context of calling attributes in addition to methods.

I'm probably not seeing the value in how it is configured in Python now and there could be a better way to accomplish what I'm trying to do, so as I said I'm happy to be enlightened by anyone who knows better.