How do I pass a variable by reference?

Question

The Python documentation seems unclear about whether parameters are passed by reference or value, and the following code produces the unchanged value 'Original' class PassByReference:  def __init__(self):   self.variable = 'Original'   self.change(self.variable)   print(self.variable)  def change(self, var):   var = 'Changed'Is there something I can do to pass the variable by actual reference?

Answer 1

No, this is not possible in python, a copy of objects are always passed in python. You could work around that by passing a single element list. A copy of the reference to the list will be passed, but that reference still points to the same list. It's an ugly hack though, and I'm not sure why you would want to do it, but it does work.