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Shallow and Deep

The document explains the use of Python's copy module for shallow and deep copy operations. A shallow copy creates a new object that references the original elements without copying nested objects, while a deep copy creates a new object and recursively copies all nested objects. Examples demonstrate the differences in behavior when modifying the original list after creating shallow and deep copies.

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5 views2 pages

Shallow and Deep

The document explains the use of Python's copy module for shallow and deep copy operations. A shallow copy creates a new object that references the original elements without copying nested objects, while a deep copy creates a new object and recursively copies all nested objects. Examples demonstrate the differences in behavior when modifying the original list after creating shallow and deep copies.

Uploaded by

madhan95ece
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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We use the copy module of Python for shallow and deep copy

operations.
import copy
copy.copy(k)
copy.deepcopy(k)
k represents the original list.
Shallow Copy
A shallow copy creates a new object which stores the reference of
the original elements.
So, a shallow copy doesn't create a copy of nested objects, instead it
just copies the reference of nested objects. This means, a copy
process does not recurse or create copies of nested objects itself.
Adding new nested object using Shallow copy
import copy
old_list = [[1, 1, 1], [2, 2, 2], [3, 3, 3]]
new_list = copy.copy(old_list)
old_list[1][1] = 'A'
print("Old list:", old_list)
print("New list:", new_list)

output:
Old list: [[1, 1, 1], [2, 'A', 2], [3, 3, 3]]
New list: [[1, 1, 1], [2, 'A', 2], [3, 3, 3]]
Deep Copy
A deep copy creates a new object and recursively adds the copies of
nested objects present in the original elements. The deep copy
creates independent copy of original object and all its nested objects.
Adding a new nested object in the list using Deep copy
import copy
old_list = [[1, 1, 1], [2, 2, 2], [3, 3, 3]]
new_list = copy.deepcopy(old_list)
old_list[1][0] = 'B'
print("Old list:", old_list)
print("New list:", new_list)
output:
Old list: [[1, 1, 1], ['B', 2, 2], [3, 3, 3]]
New list: [[1, 1, 1], [2, 2, 2], [3, 3, 3]]

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