Most concise way to create a python dictionary from local variables

Question

In Objective-C, you can use the NSDictionaryOfVariableBindings macro to create a dictionary like this

NSString *foo = @"bar"
NSString *flip = @"rar"
NSDictionary *d = NSDictionaryOfVariableBindings(foo, flip)
// d -> { 'foo' => 'bar', 'flip' => 'rar' }

Is there something similar in python? I often find myself writing code like this

d = {'foo': foo, 'flip': flip}
# or
d = dict(foo=foo, flip=flip)

Is there a shortcut to do something like this?

d = dict(foo, flip) # -> {'foo': 'bar', 'flip': 'rar'}

Answer 1

No, this shortcut in python does not exist.

But perhaps this is what you need:

>>> def test():
...     x = 42
...     y = 43
...     return locals()
>>> test()
{'y': 43, 'x': 42}

Also, python provides globals() and vars() build-in functions for such things. See the doc .

Answer 2

have you tried vars()

vars([object])
Return the __dict__ attribute for a module, class, instance, or any other object with a __dict__ attribute.

Objects such as modules and instances have an updateable __dict__ attribute; however, other objects may have write restrictions on their __dict__ attributes (for example, new-style classes use a dictproxy to prevent direct dictionary updates).

so

variables = vars()
dictionary_of_bindings = {x:variables[x] for x in ("foo", "flip")}

Answer 3

Python doesn't quite have a way to do this, though it does have the functions locals and globals which can give you access to the entire local or global namespace. But if you want to pick out selected variables, I consider it better to use inspect . Here's a function that should do that for you:

def compact(*names):
    caller = inspect.stack()[1][0] # caller of compact()
    vars = {}
    for n in names:
        if n in caller.f_locals:
            vars[n] = caller.f_locals[n]
        elif n in caller.f_globals:
            vars[n] = caller.f_globals[n]
    return vars

Make sure to check that it works in whatever Python environment you're using. Usage would be like so:

a = 1
b = 2
def func():
    c = 3
    d = 4
    compact('b', 'd')  # returns {'b': 2, 'd': 4}

I don't think there's any way to get away without the quotes around the variable names, though.