Myujth

Obviously I'm doing something stupid. But what?

I get:

File "<path>", line 71, in args
 filename = filename
NameError: name 'filename' is not defined

...on the next-to-last line below ("filename = filename"):

def parseLog(filename, explain=False, omitminor=False, omitexpected=False, 
omitgdocs=False, args=None):
 print(filename)
 if not args:
 class args:
 filename = filename
 explain = explain

Yet the 2nd line above ("print(filename)") works fine. So, why the error?

In case you're wondering why I'm doing this in the first place, it's because the function parseLog() can also be called by the command line, like so:

def parseLogCLI():
 ''' parse command line for arguments '''

 parser = argparse.ArgumentParser()
 parser.add_argument('filename')
 parser.add_argument('-explain', action="store_true", help='Explain what program has done')
 parser.add_argument('-omitminor', action="store_true", help='Omit minor errors ' + repr(minor_errors))
 parser.add_argument('-omitexpected', action="store_true", help='Omit machines expected to be often offline')
 parser.add_argument('-omitgdocs', action="store_true", help='Omit errors on Google Docs native files (not copyable) ' + repr(gdocs))
 args = parser.parse_args()

 parseLog(arg.filename, args=args)

...so I'm trying to construct an 'arg' class (as argparse does) to pass to my function. If there's a better way to do this, I'm interested.

With class args: you are starting the definition of a class.
In that context, the first occurrence of filename defines a class attribute, which you are trying to assign from its own value before it is fully defined.

First of all, I think you should investigate in more details the concepts of classes, scopes, and instances.
This will help you understand why your function argument filename is hidden by the new definition inside the class scope.

It seems to me like you have a scope issue, in that the inner class 'arg' doesn't have access to the scope of the outer class. One solution would be to use the 'global' keyword like so:

def parseLog(filename, explain=False, omitminor=False, omitexpected=False, 
omitgdocs=False, args=None):
 global fname, expl
 fname = filename
 expl = explain
 print(filename)
 if not args:
 class args:
 filename = fname
 explain = expl

You can read more about Python variable scopes here.