Hi Steven, thanks a lot for the explanation.
I will keep in mind not to use names for my modules that can shadow the standard library. Regards, Fabian On 03/24/2013 07:27 PM, Steven D'Aprano wrote: > On Sun, 24 Mar 2013 18:12:49 -0500, Fabian von Romberg wrote: > >> Hi, >> >> I have a package name collections and inside of my package I want to >> import the collections package from the standard library, but there is >> name conflicts. >> >> How do I import explicitly from the standard library? > > You can't. However, you can import explicitly from your package, or > implicitly by using a relative import. > > Starting from Python 2.7, the "import" statement is always absolute. So > the line: > > import collections > > will always find the first *top level* module or package "collections" in > the python search path. See below for an important proviso. > > Inside your package, you can either use an explicit import like this: > > import mypackage.collections as collections > > or use a relative import like this: > > from . import collections > > Here is a concrete example. I create a package containing five files: > > mypackage/ > +-- __init__.py > +-- collections.py > +-- absolute_import.py > +-- explicit_import.py > +-- relative_import.py > > with the following content: > > # absolute_import.py > import collections > > # explicit_import.py > import mypackage.collections as collections > > # relative_import.py > from . import collections > > > The other two files (collections.py and __init__.py) can be blank. Now, > from *outside* the package, I can do this: > > > py> import mypackage.absolute_import > py> import mypackage.explicit_import > py> import mypackage.relative_import > py> > py> mypackage.absolute_import.collections > <module 'collections' from '/usr/local/lib/python3.3/collections/__init__.py'> > py> mypackage.explicit_import.collections > <module 'mypackage.collections' from './mypackage/collections.py'> > py> mypackage.relative_import.collections > <module 'mypackage.collections' from './mypackage/collections.py'> > > > Of course "from mypackage import absolute_import" etc. will also work. > > > However, beware: if you cd into the package directory, and then launch > Python, the current directory will contain a file "collections.py" which > will shadow the standard library collections.py. So don't do that. > > > -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list