Make the use of python properties/getters more consistent

[yao-cqc]

For instance, Circuit.n_gates is a property while Circuit.n_2qb_gates and Circuit.n_1qb_gates are methods. I'm also not sure whether Circuit.depth should be a method or a property.

[CalMacCQ]

I also spotted this recently. For me it would make sense to have all of these as properties as they are all characteristics of the Circuit object itself.

[sjdilkes]

I'd agree with having them as properties! * Seyon's suggestion for methods makes more sense

[ss2165]

I would actually advocate for make them all methods - they all require computation, some of them non-trivial, having then as methods makes that clear.

[ss2165]

However...this is an API breaking change, one I don't think is important enough to break API contract. @cqc-alec what do you think?

[CalMacCQ]

if we're going with methods we could go with Circuit.get_metric() perhaps?

The word 'get' seems to communicate that it is a method that calculates something rather than a property.

[cqc-alec]

Yeah I don't think we should break the API for this. We could introduce new methods though, with names prefixed by get_ as Callum suggests.

[github-actions[bot]]

This issue has been automatically marked as stale.

[cqc-alec]

No specific action here; closing until we have a better idea of enhanced API.