Say I create a class by the name of Car . Would I be able to add instance attributes without having them already listed as a parameter in my __init__ method (constructor), and if so, why would we need to do something like this? So pretty much it would look something like this:

class Car():
    
    def __init__():
        self.something = something

Of course normally I would have more stuff but for this example I kept it minimal.

CodePudding user response：

Yes, you can create instance attributes in __init__ whose values are not parameters.

This can be the case, for example, if an attribute has a fixed initial value, or a value that is derived from other parameters or other context.

CodePudding user response：

You can, but the point of the class Car() is to manage everything inside of it.

You do not want to create a Car, and add the wheels outside of the class, becasue tomorrow you will forget, will try to ebug the code, and you will not know why 3 different types of wheels were added by code which you have no clue were it is.

you will find the some car instances have car.wheels, car.tires, 8 wheels, will not know if car.tire is a spare tire, or a working tire. It will be a mess.