AttributeError: 'function' object has no attribute 'lower'

Question

I am trying to use sentiwordnet text file "SentiWordNet_3.0.0_20130122.txt". When I am importing the sentiwordnet.py file and attempting to run it I am getting the error as follows:

The error occured as:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------         AttributeError
Traceback (most recent call last)
<ipython-input-13-6e4eb476b4b2> in <module>()
----> 1 happy = cv.senti_synsets('happy', 'a')

C:\Users\Desktop\fp\sentiwordnet.pyc in     senti_synsets(self, string, pos)
     65         synset_list = wn.synsets(string, pos)
     66         for synset in synset_list:
---> 67             sentis.append(self.senti_synset(synset.name))
     68         sentis = filter(lambda x : x, sentis)
     69         return sentis

C:\Users\Desktop\fp\sentiwordnet.pyc in senti_synset(self, *vals)
     52             return SentiSynset(pos_score, neg_score, synset)
     53         else:
---> 54             synset = wn.synset(vals[0])
     55             pos = synset.pos
     56             offset = synset.offset

C:\Users\Anaconda2\lib\site-packages\nltk\corpus\reader\wordnet.pyc in synset(self, name)
     1227     def synset(self, name):
     1228         # split name into lemma, part of speech and synset number
---> 1229         lemma, pos, synset_index_str = name.lower().rsplit('.', 2)
     1230         synset_index = int(synset_index_str) - 1
     1231 

AttributeError: 'function' object has no attribute 'lower'

My code:

import sentiwordnet as snw
SWN_FILENAME = "SentiWordNet_3.0.0_20130122.txt"
cv = snw.SentiWordNetCorpusReader(SWN_FILENAME)
happy = cv.senti_synsets('happy', 'a')
print happy

Based on the error message, "name" in line 1229 of wordnet.pyc is a function when it should have been a string. — Adi Levin, Jan 22 '16 at 10:36
yes,maybe a string is not being passed to the senti_synsets method,what could be wrong in the code that is forbidding it?Is the CorpusReader unable to read the file? — Anonymous, Jan 22 '16 at 11:38

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Jan 23 '16 at 21:18

Could you try out the following code:

import nltk.corpus.reader.sentiwordnet as snw
SWN_FILENAME = "SentiWordNet_3.0.0_20130122.txt"
cv = snw.SentiWordNetCorpusReader('', [SWN_FILENAME])
happy = cv.senti_synsets('happy', 'a')
print(happy)

I think the sentiwordnet.py file you're using does not match to the nltk package you have installed. I was able to reproduce your error if I used such a mismatched pair. The code above uses the SentiWordNetCorpusReader which comes with the nltk package (see NLTK sources); however, the constructor for the reader wants as first argument a 'root' (I do not know nltk and have no clue what this might be ;-)), as the second it wants a list of file-ids (I think they mean filenames, however the code seems to be flexible enough to just accept also a filename as string).

You could also use another package version of nltk which matches your sentiwordnet.py file, I guess.

Yes!! Got it. I think importing sentiwordet from nltk package would be a better idea — Anonymous, Feb 12 '16 at 06:09
The problem is that the structure of the classes changed as it seems. By using the nltk package version you should be on the safe side (and use the newer version, as it seems). — Pachelbel, Feb 12 '16 at 11:26

AttributeError: 'function' object has no attribute 'lower'

1 Answers1