[3.6] bpo-27505: Retrofit module __class__ documentation from 3.7 (GH-5321)

The module `__class__` attribute documentation added to 3.7 for PEP 562
(dynamic module attributes) also applies to earlier versions. This backports
that subset of the new docs to the 3.6 branch so that it will appear in the
main online documentation and in the final 3.6 binary release.

Patch by Cheryl Sabella.

diff --git a/Doc/reference/datamodel.rst b/Doc/reference/datamodel.rst
index cd11020e0dbc662e2664a4bfe8f3ee10ddb5120a..9752494972fff54298089cfb983ddf8c181e5b23 100644 (file)
--- a/Doc/reference/datamodel.rst
+++ b/Doc/reference/datamodel.rst
@@ -1500,6 +1500,39 @@ access (use of, assignment to, or deletion of ``x.name``) for class instances.
    returned. :func:`dir` converts the returned sequence to a list and sorts it.
 
 
+Customizing module attribute access
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+.. index::
+   single: __class__ (module attribute)
+
+For a more fine grained customization of the module behavior (setting
+attributes, properties, etc.), one can set the ``__class__`` attribute of
+a module object to a subclass of :class:`types.ModuleType`. For example::
+
+   import sys
+   from types import ModuleType
+
+   class VerboseModule(ModuleType):
+       def __repr__(self):
+           return f'Verbose {self.__name__}'
+
+       def __setattr__(self, attr, value):
+           print(f'Setting {attr}...')
+           setattr(self, attr, value)
+
+   sys.modules[__name__].__class__ = VerboseModule
+
+.. note::
+   Setting module ``__class__`` only affects lookups made using the attribute
+   access syntax -- directly accessing the module globals (whether by code
+   within the module, or via a reference to the module's globals dictionary)
+   is unaffected.
+
+.. versionchanged:: 3.5
+   ``__class__`` module attribute is now writable.
+
+
 .. _descriptors:
 
 Implementing Descriptors