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Welcome to Software Development on Codidact!

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Q&A What does "namespace" mean?

A well-known easter egg in Python displays some ideas about writing good Python code, credited to Tim Peters (one of the core developers). This question is about the last: Namespaces are one hon...

2 answers  ·  posted 1y ago by Karl Knechtel‭  ·  last activity 1y ago by Olin Lathrop‭

#1: Initial revision by user avatar Karl Knechtel‭ · 2023-12-02T06:03:39Z (about 1 year ago)
What does "namespace" mean?
A well-known [easter egg](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/43577404) in Python displays some ideas about writing good Python code, credited to Tim Peters (one of the core developers). This question is about the last:

> Namespaces are one honking great idea -- let's do more of those!

It seems that the concept of a "namespace" appears in programming generally, not just in Python. Presumably this concept is important, given its inclusion here. However, it's hard to pin down a clear definition simply from considering its use in context. For example, I have seen a class [`SimpleNamespace`](https://docs.python.org/3.8/library/types.html#types.SimpleNamespace) in the Python standard library; but it seems like the term is also used to describe things that are not actually objects in a program at runtime at all.

What exactly is a "namespace"? Does it refer to one specific concept that has particular properties regardless of the programming language? Or else how exactly should I understand it?