Type confusion with protocol attributes when explicitly subclassing protocol
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Description
Bug Report
When type hinting an attribute on a protocol, and then explicitly subclassing the protocol in a class and performing assignment on the attribute, mypy appears to lose the type information on the attribute. In one case, mypy determines the type is whatever can be inferred from the assignment, and in another case, mypy cannot determine the type.
I've looked at Python's documentation for explicitly subclassing a Protocol (docs) as well as the documentation in mypy for Protocols (docs) and I believe this should work.
To Reproduce
Case 1: Incompatible types in assignment
from typing import Protocol
class InventoryItemProtocol(Protocol):
val: int | None
class InventoryItemMixin(InventoryItemProtocol):
def set(self) -> None:
self.val = 1
class InventoryItem(InventoryItemMixin):
def __init__(self) -> None:
self.val: int | None = None
Case 2: Cannot determine type
from typing import Protocol
class ValProtocol(Protocol):
val: int | None
class Runner(ValProtocol):
def run(self) -> None:
if not self.val:
raise ValueError
self.val = 1
Expected Behavior
Both programs pass type checks.
Actual Behavior
Case 1
sandbox_protocol1.py:15: error: Incompatible types in assignment (expression has type "int | None", base class "InventoryItemMixin" defined the type as "int") [assignment]
Found 1 error in 1 file (checked 1 source file)
Case 2
sandbox_protocol2.py:10: error: Cannot determine type of "val" [has-type]
Found 1 error in 1 file (checked 1 source file)
Your Environment
mypy --version
mypy 1.17.1 (compiled: yes)
python --version
Python 3.12.2
Contributor guide
First steps
- Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
- Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
- Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
- Open a pull request that references the issue number.
Research direction
Start by running the two protocol examples from the issue with mypy 1.17.1 and compare the errors with the expected behavior. Trace how explicitly subclassed Protocol attributes are inferred and validated; done means both examples pass type checking without losing the declared attribute type.
Written by the indexing model from the issue text.
Assessment
- Tech stack
- python
- Domain
- devtools
- Issue type
- Bug
- Difficulty
- 4/5
- Estimated time
- 3-5 days
- Activity status
- Stale
- Clarity
- Mostly clear
- Newbie friendliness
- 45/100