Unlocking the Power of Python Encapsulation: Best Practices and Examples

Python encapsulation is a process of wrapping up of data members and member functions within the class. In simple ways we can explain like not allowing a direct access to these variables and methods.

When there is a direct access the variables may be altered and default values can be replaced according to the scenario.

Encapsulation is one of the fundamental concepts of object-oriented programming (OOP) that refers to the idea of bundling data and methods that operate on that data within a single unit or object. The goal of encapsulation is to hide the internal details of an object’s implementation and to only expose a public interface or API that can be used to interact with the object.

In Python, encapsulation is achieved by using access modifiers to control the visibility of an object’s attributes and methods. There are two types of access modifiers in Python:

1. Public: Public members are accessible from anywhere in the program. In Python, all attributes and methods are public by default.
2. Private: Private members are only accessible within the class that defines them. In Python, you can create private members by prefixing the attribute or method name with two underscores (__). For example, __name would be a private attribute in a class.

Python Encapsulation is a way of encapsulating up of data members and member functions confused ?? go read this blog for a clarity now

Let us see the concept of encapsulation with a real time example and also go through this blog before getting started.

Python Encapsulation Video Tutorial :

In this video tutorial let us try to see the detailed implementation of encapsulation in python.

class A:
     a = 10
  
     def display(self):
         print(self.a)

a1 = A()

Here we have created a class and added variable and method and try to access them

print(a1.a)

output :

10

Now we can also alter the value of a variable as

a = 5

then when we try to print a we will be getting a = 5

So in order to maintain security we make us of encapsulation concept. Where we can try to make the variable private and access with the help of declared method as below

class A:
     __a = 10
  
     def display(self):
         print(self.a)

a1 = A()
a1.display()

output :

10

Now when you try to access variable directly rather than accessing through method you will get an error.

Encapsulation is a fundamental concept in object-oriented programming that is supported in Python through the use of access modifiers. In Python, all attributes and methods of a class are public by default, which means they can be accessed from anywhere in the program. However, you can create private attributes and methods by prefixing their names with two underscores (__).

Private attributes and methods in Python are not truly private, but rather their names are “mangled” by Python to avoid naming conflicts with other attributes and methods in subclasses. When you prefix an attribute or method name with two underscores, Python replaces the name with _classname__name, where classname is the name of the class in which the attribute or method is defined. This means that you can still access private attributes and methods from outside the class, but you need to use the mangled name.

If you have any query’s in this tutorial on Python Encapsulation do let us know in the comment section below. If you like this tutorial do like and share us for more interesting updates..

Go through the above specified video tutorial for further explanation.