Don't forget being able to do this from within the interpreter:
>>> print abs.__doc__
abs(number) -> number
Return the absolute value of the argument.
>>> print xrange.__doc__
xrange([start,] stop[, step]) -> xrange object
Like range(), but instead of returning a list, returns an object that
generates the numbers in the range on demand. For looping, this is
slightly faster than range() and more memory efficient.
> pydoc unittest
Help on module unittest:
NAME
unittest
FILE
/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.6/lib/python2.6/unittest.py
MODULE DOCS
http://docs.python.org/library/unittest
DESCRIPTION
Python unit testing framework, based on Erich Gamma's JUnit and Kent Beck's
Smalltalk testing framework.
This module contains the core framework classes that form the basis of
specific test cases and suites (TestCase, TestSuite etc.), and also a
text-based utility class for running the tests and reporting the results
(TextTestRunner).
[snip]
In [1]: abs?
Type: builtin_function_or_method
Base Class: <type 'builtin_function_or_method'>
String Form: <built-in function abs>
Namespace: Python builtin
Docstring:
abs(number) -> number
Return the absolute value of the argument.
In [1]: import json
In [2]: json.dumps??
Type: function
Base Class: <type 'function'>
String Form:<function dumps at 0x101f0bc08>
Namespace: Interactive
File: /usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.2/lib/python2.7/json/__init__.py
Definition: json.dumps(obj, skipkeys=False, ensure_ascii=True, check_circular=True, allow_nan=True, cls=None, indent=None, separators=None, encoding='utf-8', default=None, **kw)
Source:
def dumps(obj, skipkeys=False, ensure_ascii=True, check_circular=True,
allow_nan=True, cls=None, indent=None, separators=None,
encoding='utf-8', default=None, **kw):
""" [snip (excellent) docstring] """
# cached encoder
if (not skipkeys and ensure_ascii and
check_circular and allow_nan and
cls is None and indent is None and separators is None and
encoding == 'utf-8' and default is None and not kw):
return _default_encoder.encode(obj)
#snip rest of func
