5. Data Structures — Python 3.9.

6 documentation 01/08/21, 2:13 PM

5. Data Structures
This chapter describes some things you’ve learned about already in more detail,
and adds some new things as well.

5.1. More on Lists

The list data type has some more methods. Here are all of the methods of list
objects:

list. append(x)
Add an item to the end of the list. Equivalent to a[len(a):] = [x] .

list. extend(iterable)
Extend the list by appending all the items from the iterable. Equivalent to
a[len(a):] = iterable .

list. insert(i, x)
Insert an item at a given position. The first argument is the index of the ele-
ment before which to insert, so a.insert(0, x) inserts at the front of the list,
and a.insert(len(a), x) is equivalent to a.append(x) .

list. remove(x)
Remove the first item from the list whose value is equal to x. It raises a
ValueError if there is no such item.

list. pop([i])
Remove the item at the given position in the list, and return it. If no index is
specified, a.pop() removes and returns the last item in the list. (The square
brackets around the i in the method signature denote that the parameter is
optional, not that you should type square brackets at that position. You will
see this notation frequently in the Python Library Reference.)

list. clear()
Remove all items from the list. Equivalent to del a[:] .

list. index(x[, start[, end]])

Return zero-based index in the list of the first item whose value is equal to x.
Raises a ValueError if there is no such item.

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The optional arguments start and end are interpreted as in the slice notation
and are used to limit the search to a particular subsequence of the list. The re-
turned index is computed relative to the beginning of the full sequence rather
than the start argument.

list. count(x)
Return the number of times x appears in the list.

list. sort(*, key=None, reverse=False)

Sort the items of the list in place (the arguments can be used for sort cus-
tomization, see sorted() for their explanation).

list. reverse()
Reverse the elements of the list in place.

list. copy()
Return a shallow copy of the list. Equivalent to a[:] .

An example that uses most of the list methods:

>>>
>>> fruits = ['orange', 'apple', 'pear', 'banana', 'kiwi', 'apple', 'banana'
>>> fruits.count('apple')
2
>>> fruits.count('tangerine')
0
>>> fruits.index('banana')
3
>>> fruits.index('banana', 4) # Find next banana starting a position 4
6
>>> fruits.reverse()
>>> fruits
['banana', 'apple', 'kiwi', 'banana', 'pear', 'apple', 'orange']
>>> fruits.append('grape')
>>> fruits
['banana', 'apple', 'kiwi', 'banana', 'pear', 'apple', 'orange', 'grape']
>>> fruits.sort()
>>> fruits
['apple', 'apple', 'banana', 'banana', 'grape', 'kiwi', 'orange', 'pear']
>>> fruits.pop()
'pear'

You might have noticed that methods like insert , remove or sort that only modi-
fy the list have no return value printed – they return the default None . [1] This is a
design principle for all mutable data structures in Python.

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Another thing you might notice is that not all data can be sorted or compared. For
instance, [None, 'hello', 10] doesn’t sort because integers can’t be compared
to strings and None can’t be compared to other types. Also, there are some types
that don’t have a defined ordering relation. For example, 3+4j < 5+7j isn’t a valid
comparison.

5.1.1. Using Lists as Stacks

The list methods make it very easy to use a list as a stack, where the last element
added is the first element retrieved (“last-in, first-out”). To add an item to the top
of the stack, use append() . To retrieve an item from the top of the stack, use
pop() without an explicit index. For example:

>>>
>>> stack = [3, 4, 5]
>>> stack.append(6)
>>> stack.append(7)
>>> stack
[3, 4, 5, 6, 7]
>>> stack.pop()
7
>>> stack
[3, 4, 5, 6]
>>> stack.pop()
6
>>> stack.pop()
5
>>> stack
[3, 4]

5.1.2. Using Lists as Queues

It is also possible to use a list as a queue, where the first element added is the first
element retrieved (“first-in, first-out”); however, lists are not e!cient for this pur-
pose. While appends and pops from the end of list are fast, doing inserts or pops
from the beginning of a list is slow (because all of the other elements have to be
shifted by one).

To implement a queue, use collections.deque which was designed to have fast

appends and pops from both ends. For example:

>>>
>>> from collections import deque
>>> queue = deque(["Eric", "John", "Michael"])
>>> queue.append("Terry") # Terry arrives
>>> queue.append("Graham") # Graham arrives

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>>> queue.popleft() # The first to arrive now leaves

'Eric'
>>> queue.popleft() # The second to arrive now leaves
'John'
>>> queue # Remaining queue in order of arrival
deque(['Michael', 'Terry', 'Graham'])

5.1.3. List Comprehensions

List comprehensions provide a concise way to create lists. Common applications
are to make new lists where each element is the result of some operations applied
to each member of another sequence or iterable, or to create a subsequence of
those elements that satisfy a certain condition.

For example, assume we want to create a list of squares, like:

>>>
>>> squares = []
>>> for x in range(10):
... squares.append(x**2)
...
>>> squares
[0, 1, 4, 9, 16, 25, 36, 49, 64, 81]

Note that this creates (or overwrites) a variable named x that still exists after the
loop completes. We can calculate the list of squares without any side e"ects using:

squares = list(map(lambda x: x**2, range(10)))

or, equivalently:

squares = [x**2 for x in range(10)]

which is more concise and readable.

A list comprehension consists of brackets containing an expression followed by a

for clause, then zero or more for or if clauses. The result will be a new list re-
sulting from evaluating the expression in the context of the for and if clauses
which follow it. For example, this listcomp combines the elements of two lists if
they are not equal:

>>>
>>> [(x, y) for x in [1,2,3] for y in [3,1,4] if x != y]
[(1, 3), (1, 4), (2, 3), (2, 1), (2, 4), (3, 1), (3, 4)]

and it’s equivalent to:

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>>>
>>> combs = []
>>> for x in [1,2,3]:
... for y in [3,1,4]:
... if x != y:
... combs.append((x, y))
...
>>> combs
[(1, 3), (1, 4), (2, 3), (2, 1), (2, 4), (3, 1), (3, 4)]

Note how the order of the for and if statements is the same in both these
snippets.

If the expression is a tuple (e.g. the (x, y) in the previous example), it must be
parenthesized.

>>>
>>> vec = [-4, -2, 0, 2, 4]
>>> # create a new list with the values doubled
>>> [x*2 for x in vec]
[-8, -4, 0, 4, 8]
>>> # filter the list to exclude negative numbers
>>> [x for x in vec if x >= 0]
[0, 2, 4]
>>> # apply a function to all the elements
>>> [abs(x) for x in vec]
[4, 2, 0, 2, 4]
>>> # call a method on each element
>>> freshfruit = [' banana', ' loganberry ', 'passion fruit ']
>>> [weapon.strip() for weapon in freshfruit]
['banana', 'loganberry', 'passion fruit']
>>> # create a list of 2-tuples like (number, square)
>>> [(x, x**2) for x in range(6)]
[(0, 0), (1, 1), (2, 4), (3, 9), (4, 16), (5, 25)]
>>> # the tuple must be parenthesized, otherwise an error is raised
>>> [x, x**2 for x in range(6)]
File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
[x, x**2 for x in range(6)]
^
SyntaxError: invalid syntax
>>> # flatten a list using a listcomp with two 'for'
>>> vec = [[1,2,3], [4,5,6], [7,8,9]]
>>> [num for elem in vec for num in elem]
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9]

List comprehensions can contain complex expressions and nested functions:

>>>
>>> from math import pi

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>>> [str(round(pi, i)) for i in range(1, 6)]

['3.1', '3.14', '3.142', '3.1416', '3.14159']

5.1.4. Nested List Comprehensions

The initial expression in a list comprehension can be any arbitrary expression, in-
cluding another list comprehension.

Consider the following example of a 3x4 matrix implemented as a list of 3 lists of

length 4:

>>>
>>> matrix = [
... [1, 2, 3, 4],
... [5, 6, 7, 8],
... [9, 10, 11, 12],
... ]

The following list comprehension will transpose rows and columns:

>>>
>>> [[row[i] for row in matrix] for i in range(4)]
[[1, 5, 9], [2, 6, 10], [3, 7, 11], [4, 8, 12]]

As we saw in the previous section, the nested listcomp is evaluated in the context
of the for that follows it, so this example is equivalent to:

>>>
>>> transposed = []
>>> for i in range(4):
... transposed.append([row[i] for row in matrix])
...
>>> transposed
[[1, 5, 9], [2, 6, 10], [3, 7, 11], [4, 8, 12]]

which, in turn, is the same as:

>>>
>>> transposed = []
>>> for i in range(4):
... # the following 3 lines implement the nested listcomp
... transposed_row = []
... for row in matrix:
... transposed_row.append(row[i])
... transposed.append(transposed_row)
...
>>> transposed
[[1, 5, 9], [2, 6, 10], [3, 7, 11], [4, 8, 12]]

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In the real world, you should prefer built-in functions to complex flow statements.
The zip() function would do a great job for this use case:

>>>
>>> list(zip(*matrix))
[(1, 5, 9), (2, 6, 10), (3, 7, 11), (4, 8, 12)]

See Unpacking Argument Lists for details on the asterisk in this line.

5.2. The del statement

There is a way to remove an item from a list given its index instead of its value:
the del statement. This di"ers from the pop() method which returns a value. The
del statement can also be used to remove slices from a list or clear the entire list
(which we did earlier by assignment of an empty list to the slice). For example:

>>>
>>> a = [-1, 1, 66.25, 333, 333, 1234.5]
>>> del a[0]
>>> a
[1, 66.25, 333, 333, 1234.5]
>>> del a[2:4]
>>> a
[1, 66.25, 1234.5]
>>> del a[:]
>>> a
[]

del can also be used to delete entire variables:

>>>
>>> del a

Referencing the name a hereafter is an error (at least until another value is as-
signed to it). We’ll find other uses for del later.

5.3. Tuples and Sequences

We saw that lists and strings have many common properties, such as indexing and
slicing operations. They are two examples of sequence data types (see Sequence
Types — list, tuple, range). Since Python is an evolving language, other sequence
data types may be added. There is also another standard sequence data type: the
tuple.

A tuple consists of a number of values separated by commas, for instance:

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>>>
>>> t = 12345, 54321, 'hello!'
>>> t[0]
12345
>>> t
(12345, 54321, 'hello!')
>>> # Tuples may be nested:
... u = t, (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)
>>> u
((12345, 54321, 'hello!'), (1, 2, 3, 4, 5))
>>> # Tuples are immutable:
... t[0] = 88888
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
TypeError: 'tuple' object does not support item assignment
>>> # but they can contain mutable objects:
... v = ([1, 2, 3], [3, 2, 1])
>>> v
([1, 2, 3], [3, 2, 1])

As you see, on output tuples are always enclosed in parentheses, so that nested
tuples are interpreted correctly; they may be input with or without surrounding
parentheses, although often parentheses are necessary anyway (if the tuple is part
of a larger expression). It is not possible to assign to the individual items of a tu-
ple, however it is possible to create tuples which contain mutable objects, such as
lists.

Though tuples may seem similar to lists, they are often used in di"erent situations
and for di"erent purposes. Tuples are immutable, and usually contain a heteroge-
neous sequence of elements that are accessed via unpacking (see later in this sec-
tion) or indexing (or even by attribute in the case of namedtuples ). Lists are muta-
ble, and their elements are usually homogeneous and are accessed by iterating
over the list.

A special problem is the construction of tuples containing 0 or 1 items: the syntax

has some extra quirks to accommodate these. Empty tuples are constructed by an
empty pair of parentheses; a tuple with one item is constructed by following a val-
ue with a comma (it is not su!cient to enclose a single value in parentheses).
Ugly, but e"ective. For example:

>>>
>>> empty = ()
>>> singleton = 'hello', # <-- note trailing comma
>>> len(empty)
0
>>> len(singleton)
1

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>>> singleton
('hello',)

The statement t = 12345, 54321, 'hello!' is an example of tuple packing: the

values 12345 , 54321 and 'hello!' are packed together in a tuple. The reverse op-
eration is also possible:

>>>
>>> x, y, z = t

This is called, appropriately enough, sequence unpacking and works for any se-
quence on the right-hand side. Sequence unpacking requires that there are as
many variables on the left side of the equals sign as there are elements in the se-
quence. Note that multiple assignment is really just a combination of tuple pack-
ing and sequence unpacking.

5.4. Sets
Python also includes a data type for sets. A set is an unordered collection with no
duplicate elements. Basic uses include membership testing and eliminating dupli-
cate entries. Set objects also support mathematical operations like union, inter-
section, di"erence, and symmetric di"erence.

Curly braces or the set() function can be used to create sets. Note: to create an
empty set you have to use set() , not {} ; the latter creates an empty dictionary, a
data structure that we discuss in the next section.

Here is a brief demonstration:

>>> basket = {'apple', 'orange', 'apple', 'pear', 'orange', 'banana'}>>>

>>> print(basket) # show that duplicates have been remo
{'orange', 'banana', 'pear', 'apple'}
>>> 'orange' in basket # fast membership testing
True
>>> 'crabgrass' in basket
False

>>> # Demonstrate set operations on unique letters from two words

...
>>> a = set('abracadabra')
>>> b = set('alacazam')
>>> a # unique letters in a
{'a', 'r', 'b', 'c', 'd'}
>>> a - b # letters in a but not in b

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{'r', 'd', 'b'}

>>> a | b # letters in a or b or both
{'a', 'c', 'r', 'd', 'b', 'm', 'z', 'l'}
>>> a & b # letters in both a and b
{'a', 'c'}
>>> a ^ b # letters in a or b but not both
{'r', 'd', 'b', 'm', 'z', 'l'}

Similarly to list comprehensions, set comprehensions are also supported:

>>>
>>> a = {x for x in 'abracadabra' if x not in 'abc'}
>>> a
{'r', 'd'}

5.5. Dictionaries
Another useful data type built into Python is the dictionary (see Mapping Types —
dict). Dictionaries are sometimes found in other languages as “associative memo-
ries” or “associative arrays”. Unlike sequences, which are indexed by a range of
numbers, dictionaries are indexed by keys, which can be any immutable type;
strings and numbers can always be keys. Tuples can be used as keys if they con-
tain only strings, numbers, or tuples; if a tuple contains any mutable object either
directly or indirectly, it cannot be used as a key. You can’t use lists as keys, since
lists can be modified in place using index assignments, slice assignments, or
methods like append() and extend() .

It is best to think of a dictionary as a set of key: value pairs, with the requirement
that the keys are unique (within one dictionary). A pair of braces creates an empty
dictionary: {} . Placing a comma-separated list of key:value pairs within the braces
adds initial key:value pairs to the dictionary; this is also the way dictionaries are
written on output.

The main operations on a dictionary are storing a value with some key and ex-
tracting the value given the key. It is also possible to delete a key:value pair with
del . If you store using a key that is already in use, the old value associated with
that key is forgotten. It is an error to extract a value using a non-existent key.

Performing list(d) on a dictionary returns a list of all the keys used in the dictio-
nary, in insertion order (if you want it sorted, just use sorted(d) instead). To
check whether a single key is in the dictionary, use the in keyword.

Here is a small example using a dictionary:

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>>>
>>> tel = {'jack': 4098, 'sape': 4139}
>>> tel['guido'] = 4127
>>> tel
{'jack': 4098, 'sape': 4139, 'guido': 4127}
>>> tel['jack']
4098
>>> del tel['sape']
>>> tel['irv'] = 4127
>>> tel
{'jack': 4098, 'guido': 4127, 'irv': 4127}
>>> list(tel)
['jack', 'guido', 'irv']
>>> sorted(tel)
['guido', 'irv', 'jack']
>>> 'guido' in tel
True
>>> 'jack' not in tel
False

The dict() constructor builds dictionaries directly from sequences of key-value

pairs:

>>>
>>> dict([('sape', 4139), ('guido', 4127), ('jack', 4098)])
{'sape': 4139, 'guido': 4127, 'jack': 4098}

In addition, dict comprehensions can be used to create dictionaries from arbitrary

key and value expressions:

>>>
>>> {x: x**2 for x in (2, 4, 6)}
{2: 4, 4: 16, 6: 36}

When the keys are simple strings, it is sometimes easier to specify pairs using
keyword arguments:

>>>
>>> dict(sape=4139, guido=4127, jack=4098)
{'sape': 4139, 'guido': 4127, 'jack': 4098}

5.6. Looping Techniques

When looping through dictionaries, the key and corresponding value can be re-
trieved at the same time using the items() method.

>>>
>>> knights = {'gallahad': 'the pure', 'robin': 'the brave'}
>>> for k, v in knights.items():

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... print(k, v)
...
gallahad the pure
robin the brave

When looping through a sequence, the position index and corresponding value can
be retrieved at the same time using the enumerate() function.

>>>
>>> for i, v in enumerate(['tic', 'tac', 'toe']):
... print(i, v)
...
0 tic
1 tac
2 toe

To loop over two or more sequences at the same time, the entries can be paired
with the zip() function.

>>>
>>> questions = ['name', 'quest', 'favorite color']
>>> answers = ['lancelot', 'the holy grail', 'blue']
>>> for q, a in zip(questions, answers):
... print('What is your {0}? It is {1}.'.format(q, a))
...
What is your name? It is lancelot.
What is your quest? It is the holy grail.
What is your favorite color? It is blue.

To loop over a sequence in reverse, first specify the sequence in a forward direc-
tion and then call the reversed() function.

>>>
>>> for i in reversed(range(1, 10, 2)):
... print(i)
...
9
7
5
3
1

To loop over a sequence in sorted order, use the sorted() function which returns
a new sorted list while leaving the source unaltered.

>>> basket = ['apple', 'orange', 'apple', 'pear', 'orange', 'banana']>>>

>>> for i in sorted(basket):
... print(i)

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...
apple
apple
banana
orange
orange
pear

Using set() on a sequence eliminates duplicate elements. The use of sorted() in

combination with set() over a sequence is an idiomatic way to loop over unique
elements of the sequence in sorted order.

>>> basket = ['apple', 'orange', 'apple', 'pear', 'orange', 'banana']>>>

>>> for f in sorted(set(basket)):
... print(f)
...
apple
banana
orange
pear

It is sometimes tempting to change a list while you are looping over it; however, it
is often simpler and safer to create a new list instead.

>>>
>>> import math
>>> raw_data = [56.2, float('NaN'), 51.7, 55.3, 52.5, float('NaN'), 47.8
>>> filtered_data = []
>>> for value in raw_data:
... if not math.isnan(value):
... filtered_data.append(value)
...
>>> filtered_data
[56.2, 51.7, 55.3, 52.5, 47.8]

5.7. More on Conditions

The conditions used in while and if statements can contain any operators, not
just comparisons.

The comparison operators in and not in check whether a value occurs (does not
occur) in a sequence. The operators is and is not compare whether two objects
are really the same object. All comparison operators have the same priority, which
is lower than that of all numerical operators.

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Comparisons can be chained. For example, a < b == c tests whether a is less

than b and moreover b equals c .

Comparisons may be combined using the Boolean operators and and or , and the
outcome of a comparison (or of any other Boolean expression) may be negated
with not . These have lower priorities than comparison operators; between them,
not has the highest priority and or the lowest, so that A and not B or C is
equivalent to (A and (not B)) or C . As always, parentheses can be used to ex-
press the desired composition.

The Boolean operators and and or are so-called short-circuit operators: their ar-
guments are evaluated from left to right, and evaluation stops as soon as the out-
come is determined. For example, if A and C are true but B is false, A and B and
C does not evaluate the expression C . When used as a general value and not as a
Boolean, the return value of a short-circuit operator is the last evaluated
argument.

It is possible to assign the result of a comparison or other Boolean expression to a

variable. For example,

>>>
>>> string1, string2, string3 = '', 'Trondheim', 'Hammer Dance'
>>> non_null = string1 or string2 or string3
>>> non_null
'Trondheim'

Note that in Python, unlike C, assignment inside expressions must be done explic-
itly with the walrus operator := . This avoids a common class of problems encoun-
tered in C programs: typing = in an expression when == was intended.

5.8. Comparing Sequences and Other Types

Sequence objects typically may be compared to other objects with the same se-
quence type. The comparison uses lexicographical ordering: first the first two
items are compared, and if they di"er this determines the outcome of the compar-
ison; if they are equal, the next two items are compared, and so on, until either
sequence is exhausted. If two items to be compared are themselves sequences of
the same type, the lexicographical comparison is carried out recursively. If all
items of two sequences compare equal, the sequences are considered equal. If one
sequence is an initial sub-sequence of the other, the shorter sequence is the
smaller (lesser) one. Lexicographical ordering for strings uses the Unicode code
point number to order individual characters. Some examples of comparisons be-

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tween sequences of the same type:

(1, 2, 3) < (1, 2, 4)

[1, 2, 3] < [1, 2, 4]
'ABC' < 'C' < 'Pascal' < 'Python'
(1, 2, 3, 4) < (1, 2, 4)
(1, 2) < (1, 2, -1)
(1, 2, 3) == (1.0, 2.0, 3.0)
(1, 2, ('aa', 'ab')) < (1, 2, ('abc', 'a'), 4)

Note that comparing objects of di"erent types with < or > is legal provided that
the objects have appropriate comparison methods. For example, mixed numeric
types are compared according to their numeric value, so 0 equals 0.0, etc. Other-
wise, rather than providing an arbitrary ordering, the interpreter will raise a
TypeError exception.

Footnotes

[1] Other languages may return the mutated object, which allows method chain-
ing, such as d->insert("a")->remove("b")->sort(); .

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