doctest.py currently does not include doctests from method descriptors 
in a class.

The patch is simple, in the _find function in class DocTestFinder:

Original:
                # Recurse to methods, properties, and nested classes.
                if ((inspect.isfunction(val) or inspect.isclass(val) or
                      isinstance(val, property)) and
                      self._from_module(module, val)):

Patched:
                # Recurse to methods, properties, and nested classes.
                if ((inspect.isfunction(val) or inspect.isclass(val) or
                      inspect.ismethoddescriptor(val) or
                      isinstance(val, property)) and
                      self._from_module(module, val)):

Adding the "inspect.ismethoddescriptor(val) or" line.

The patch you suggest is *not* sufficient, at least not by my testing.

However, the attached patch does work, according to my tests.

I am not sure whether this would be considered a bugfix or a new feature.
(ie, whether it would apply to 2.6 and 3.1 or not)

But the change is needed for 3.x also.

I am not sure whether the doc needs changing. A testcase should be added to doctest-test.

Attached is a simple test script for the patch I submitted. I have tested it with Python 2.6 both before and after applying the patch. Run it from the command line.

With the unpatched doctest module, it prints:

"Expected 2 doctests, but only found 1"

After the patch, it finds and runs both doctests, and prints nothing.

Can you add your test(s) in Lib/test/test_doctest.py ? That way it will be run with the Python regression suite. Ideally a documentation update would come with the patch. Also, line length should ideally be capped at 79 characters (re: PEP-8).

Might as well move the valname string building outside of both if-tests since it's common to both of them.


Terry: this looks like a feature rather than a bug, removing 2.6/3.1.

I have fixed the issue with line length, and taken Brian's advice re valname. Updated patch for doctest and test.test_doctest2 is attached.

So for staticmethods and classmethods, valname doesn't need to be reassigned?

Could someone please respond to Georg's comment msg104300, thanks.