In Python, what does it mean if an object is subscriptable or not?

Question

Which types of objects fall into the domain of "subscriptable"?

Answer 1

It basically means that the object implements the __getitem__() method. In other words, it describes objects that are "containers", meaning they contain other objects. This includes lists, tuples, and dictionaries.

Answer 2

Off the top of my head, the following are the only built-ins that are subscriptable:

string:  "foobar"[3] == "b"
tuple:   (1,2,3,4)[3] == 4
list:    [1,2,3,4][3] == 4
dict:    {"a":1, "b":2, "c":3}["c"] == 3

But mipadi's answer is correct - any class that implements __getitem__ is subscriptable

Answer 3

A scriptable object is an object that records the operations done to it and it can store them as a "script" which can be replayed.

For example, see: Application Scripting Framework

Now, if Alistair didn't know what he asked and really meant "subscriptable" objects (as edited by others), then (as mipadi also answered) this is the correct one:

A subscriptable object is any object that implements the __getitem__ special method (think lists, dictionaries).

Answer 4

The meaning of subscript in computing is: "a symbol (notionally written as a subscript but in practice usually not) used in a program, alone or with others, to specify one of the elements of an array."

Now, in the simple example given by @user2194711 we can see that the appending element is not able to be a part of the list because of two reasons:-

1) We are not really calling the method append; because it needs () to call it.

2) The error is indicating that the function or method is not subscriptable; means they are not indexable like a list or sequence.

Now see this:-

>>> var = "myString"
>>> def foo(): return 0
... 
>>> var[3]
't'
>>> foo[3]
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
TypeError: 'function' object is not subscriptable

That means there are no subscripts or say elements in function like they occur in sequences; and we cannot access them like we do, with the help of [].

Also; as mipadi said in his answer; It basically means that the object implements the __getitem__() method. (if it is subscriptable). Thus the error produced:

arr.append["HI"]

TypeError: 'builtin_function_or_method' object is not subscriptable

Answer 5

I had this same issue. I was doing

arr = []
arr.append["HI"]

So using [ was causing error. It should be arr.append("HI")