# Variable.update

### Variable.<mark style="color:purple;">update</mark>(*\*, label=None, description=None, value\_labels=None*) → self

Update metadata attributes on a variable. Only updates an attribute if the value is not none; to unset an attribute, set it to an empty string.

### **Parameters:**

**`label` :&#x20;*****str, default None*** \
If specified, will set the variable's label. Must be less than or equal to 256 characters. Pass an empty string to unset a variable's label.

**`description` :&#x20;*****str, default None***\
If specified, will set the variable's description. Must be less than or equal to 5000 characters. Pass an empty string to unset a variable's description.

**`value_labels` :&#x20;*****list<{ "value": str, "label": str }>*****&#x20;|&#x20;*****None, default None***\
If specified, will set the value labels on a variable. Passed as a list of dicts with keys "value" and "label". Pass an empty list to unset the variable's value labels.

### **Returns:**&#x20;

**self (a** [**Variable**](https://docs.redivis.com/api/client-libraries/redivis-python/reference/variable)**)**

### **Examples:**

```python
table = redivis.organization("Demo").dataset("iris_species").table("iris")

variable = table.variable("sepalLengthCm")
variable.update(label="Sepal length in centimeters",
                description="A detailed description of how this variable was collected"
                )
         
# Update value labels on another variable (this particular example is a bit contrived)
table.variable("Species").update([
    {"value": "Iris-setosa", "label": "A detailed description about this value"},
    {"value": "Iris-versicolor", "label": "A detailed description about this other value"},
])
```