Python decorators vs passing functions

Question

def makebold(fn):
    def wrapped():
        return "<b>" + fn() + "</b>"
    return wrapped

def makeitalic(fn):
    def wrapped():
        return "<i>" + fn() + "</i>"
    return wrapped

@makeitalic
@makebold
def hello():
    return "hello world"

print(hello()) ## returns "<b><i>hello world</i></b>"

In this code, why not just define the functions makeitalic() and makebold() and pass in the function hello?

Am I missing something here or are decorators really better for more complicated things?

Adam Smith · Accepted Answer · 2017-04-12 22:08:13Z

8

In this code, why not just define the functions makeitalic() and makebold() and pass in the function hello?

You certainly could! Decorators are just syntactic sugar. Under the hood, what happens is:

@makeitalic
@makebold
def hello():
    return "hello world"

becomes:

def hello():
    return "hello world"

hello = makebold(hello)
hello = makeitalic(hello)

edited Apr 12, 2017 at 22:08

answered Apr 12, 2017 at 22:02

Adam Smith

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1 Comment

Sam Dillard Over a year ago

Thanks, seems unnecessary in this case. I'm sure they offer concision in other use cases.

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