GE3151-PROBLEM SOLVING AND PYTHON PROGRAMMING

UNIT II-DATA TYPES, EXPRESSIONS, STATEMENTS

Python interpreter and interactive mode, debugging; values and types: int, float, boolean, string, and list;
variables, expressions, statements, tuple assignment, precedence of operators, comments;

Illustrative programs: exchange the values of two variables, circulate the values of n variables, distance
between two points.

2.1 INTRODUCTION TO PYTHON:

 Python is a general-purpose interpreted, interactive, object-oriented, and high-level programming language.
 It was created by Guido van Rossum during 1985- 1990.
 Python got its name from “Monty Python’s flying circus”.
 Python was released in the year 2000.

Python is interpreted
 Python is processed at runtime by the interpreter.
 You do not need to compile your program before executing it.
Python is Interactive
 You can actually sit at a Python prompt and interact with the interpreter directly to write your programs.
Python is Object-Oriented
 Python supports Object-Oriented style or technique of programming that encapsulates code within objects.
Python is a Beginner's Language
 Python is a great language for the beginner- Level programmers and supports the development of a wide range
of applications.

Python Features
Easy-to-learn
 Python is clearly defined and easily readable.
 The structure of the program is verysimple. It uses few keywords.
Easy-to-maintain
 Python's source code is fairly easy-to-maintain.
Portable
 Python can run on a wide variety of hardware platforms and has the same interface on allplatforms.
Interpreted
 Python is processed at runtime by the interpreter.
 So, there is no need to compile a program before executing it. You can simply run the program.
Extensible
 Programmers can embed python within their C,C++,JavaScript, ActiveX, etc.
Free and Open Source
 Anyone can freely distribute it, read the source code, and edit it.
High Level Language
 When writing programs, programmers concentrate on solutions of the current problem, no need to worry about
the low level details.
Scalable
 Python provides a better structure and support for large programs than shell scripting.

Applications
 Bit Torrent file sharing
 Google search engine, YouTube
 Intel, Cisco, HP,IBM
 i–Robot
 NASA

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 Face book, Drop box

2.2 Python interpreter

Interpreter: To execute a program in a high-level language by translating it one line at a time.
Compiler: To translate a program written in a high-level language into a low-level language all at once, inpreparation
for later execution.

Modes of python interpreter

Python Interpreter is a program that reads and executes Python code. It uses 2 modes of execution.
 Interactive mode
 Script mode
Interactive mode
 Interactive Mode, as the name suggests, allows us to interact with OS.
 When we type Python statement, interpreter displays the result(s) immediately.
Advantages
 Python, in interactive mode, is good enough to learn experiment or explore.
 Working in interactive mode is convenient for beginners and for testing small pieces of code.
Drawback
 We cannot save the statements and have to retype all the statements once again to re-run them.
 In interactive mode, you type Python programs and the interpreter displays the result:
>>> 1 + 1
2
 The chevron, >>>, is the prompt the interpreter uses to indicate that it is ready for you to enter code.
 If youtype 1 + 1, the interpreter replies 2.
>>> print('Hello, World!')
Hello, World!
This is an example of a print statement. It displays a result on the screen. In this case, the result is the words.

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Script mode:
 In script mode, we type python program in a file and then use interpreter to execute the content of the file.
 Scripts can be saved to disk for future use.
 Python scripts have theextension .py, meaning that the filename ends with.py
 Save the code with filename.py and run the interpreter in script mode to execute the script.

Interactive mode Script mode

A way of using the Python interpreter by A way of using the Python interpreter to read and
typing commands and expressions at the prompt. execute statements in a script.
Can’t save and edit the code Can save and edit the code
If we want to experiment with the code, If we are very clear about the code, we can
we can use interactive mode. use script mode.
we cannot save the statements for further use and we we can save the statements for further use and we no
have to retype all the statements to re-run them. need to retype all the statements to re-run them.
We can see the results immediately. We can’t see the code immediately.

2.3 Integrated Development Learning Environment(IDLE)

 Is a graphical user interface which is completely written in Python.
 It is bundled with the default implementation of the python language and also comes with optional part of the
Python packaging.

Features of IDLE
 Multi-window text editor with syntax highlighting.
 Auto completion with smart indentation.
 Python shell to display output with syntax highlighting.
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2.4 VALUES AND DATATYPES

Value
 Value can be any letter, number or string.
Eg, Values are 2, 42.0, and 'Hello, World!'. (These values belong to different datatypes.)

Data type
 Every value in Python has a data type.
 It is a set of values, and the allowable operations on those values.

Python has four standard data types

Numbers
 Number data type stores Numerical Values.
 This data type is immutable [i.e. values/items cannot be changed].
 Python supports integers, floating point numbers and complex numbers. They are defined as,

2.5 SEQUENCE
 A sequence is an ordered collection of items, indexed by positive integers.
 It is a combination of mutable (value can be changed) and immutable (values cannot be changed) data
types.
 There are three types of sequence data type available in Python, they are
 Strings
 Lists
 Tuples
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Strings
 A String in Python consists of a series or sequence of characters - letters, numbers, and special characters.
 Strings are marked by quotes:
 Single quotes(' ') E.g., 'This a string in single quotes'
 double quotes(" ") E.g., " This a string in double quotes "
 triple quotes(""" """) E.g., """This is a paragraph. It is made up of multiplelines and sentences."""
 Individual character in a string is accessed using a subscript(index).
 Characters can be accessed using indexing and slicing operations .
 Strings areimmutable i.e the contents of the string cannot be changed after it is created.
Indexing

 Positive indexing helps in accessing the string from the beginning.

 Negative subscript helps in accessing the string from the end.
 Subscript 0 or –ve n(where n is length of the string) displays the first element.
Example: A[0] or A[-5] will display “H”
Subscript 1 or –ve (n-1) displays the second element.
Example: A[1] or A[-4] will display “E”

Operations on string
 Indexing
 Slicing
 Concatenation
 Repetitions
 Membership
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Lists
 List is an ordered sequence of items.
 Values in the list are called elements /items.
 It can be written as a list of comma-separated items (values) between square brackets[ ].
 Items in the lists can be of different datatypes.

Operations on list
 Indexing
 Slicing
 Concatenation
 Repetitions
 Updation, Insertion, Deletion
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Tuples
 A tuple is same as list, except that the set of elements is enclosed in parentheses, instead of square brackets.
 A tuple is an immutable list. i.e. once a tuple has been created, you can't add elements to a tuple or remove
elements from the tuple.

Benefit of Tuple
 Tuples are faster than lists.
 If the user wants to protect the data from accidental changes, tuple can be used.
 Tuples can be used as keys in dictionaries, while lists can't.

Altering the tuple data type leads to error. Following error occurs when user tries to do.
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>>>t[0]="a"
Trace back (most recent call last):
File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
Type Error: 'tuple' object does not support item assignment

Mapping
 This data type is unordered and mutable.
 Dictionaries fall under Mappings.

Dictionaries
 Lists are ordered sets of objects, whereas dictionaries are unordered sets.
 Dictionary is created by using curly brackets. i,e.{}
 Dictionaries are accessed via keys and not via their position.
 A dictionary is an associative array (also known as hashes). Any key of the dictionary is associated (or
mapped) to a value.
 The values of a dictionary can be any Python data type. So dictionaries are unordered key-value- pairs (The
association of a key and a value is called a key- value pair)
 Dictionaries don't support the sequence operation of the sequence data types like strings, tuples and lists.

Basic Operations

If you try to access a key which doesn't exist, you will get an error message:
>>>words = {"house" : "Haus", "cat":"Katze"}
>>>words["car"]
Traceback (most recent call last): File "<stdin>", line 1, in
<module>KeyError: 'car'

Data type Compile time Run time

Int a=10 a=int(input(“enter a”))
Float a=10.5 a=float(input(“enter a”))
String a=”panimalar” a=input(“enter a string”)
List a=[20,30,40,50] a=list(input(“enter a list”))
Tuple a=(20,30,40,50) a=tuple(input(“enter a tuple”))

2.6 Variables,Keywords Expressions, Statements, Comments, Docstring ,Lines And Indentation, Quotation In
Python, Tuple Assignment

Variables
 A variable allows us to store a value by assigning it to a name, which can be used later.
 Named memory locations to store values.
 Programmers generally choose names for their variables that are meaningful.
 It can be of any length.
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 No space is allowed.
 We don't need to declare a variable before using it. In Python, we simply assign a value to a variable and it will
exist.

Assigning value to variable:

 Value should be given on the right side of assignment operator(=) and variable on left side.
>>> counter =45
print (counter)
>>> 45
 Assigning a single value to several variables simultaneously:
>>> a=b=c=100

 Assigning multiple values to multiple variables:

>>> a,b,c=2,4,"ram"

Keywords
 Keywords are the reserved words in Python.
 We cannot use a keyword as name, function name or any other identifier.
 They are used to define the syntax and structure of the Python language.
 Keywords are case sensitive.

Identifiers
 Identifier is the name given to entities like class, functions, variables etc. in Python.
 Identifiers can be a combination of letters in lowercase (a to z) or uppercase (A to Z) or digits (0 to 9) or an
underscore (_).
 An identifier cannot start with a digit.
 Keywords cannot be used as identifiers.
 Cannot use special symbols like!, @, #, $, % etc. in our identifier.
 Identifier can be of any length.
Example:
Names like myClass, var_1, and this_is_a_long_variable

Statements and expressions

 Instructions that a Python interpreter can executes are called statements.
 A statement is a unit of code like creating a variable or displaying a value.
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Statements
>>> n = 17
>>>print (n)
>>> 17
 Here, The first line is an assignment statement that gives a value to n.
 The second line isa print statement that displays the value of n.

Expressions
 An expression is a combination of values, variables, and operators.
 A value all by itself is considered an expression, and also a variable.
So the following are all legal expressions:
>>> 42
42
>>> a=2
>>>a+3+2
7
>>> z=("hi"+"friend")
>>>print(z)
hi friend

Input and output

Input: Input is data entered by user (end user) in the program.
In python, input() function is available for input.

Syntax for input()

variable = input (“data”)

Example
>>> x=input("enter the name:")
enter the name: george
>>> y=int(input("enter the number"))
enter the number 3
OUTPUT: Output can be displayed to the user using Print statement .

Syntax
print (expression/constant/variable)
Example:
>>> print(“ Hello ”)
Hello
Comments
 A hash sign (#) is the beginning of a comment.
 Anything written after # in a line is ignored by interpreter.
 Python does not have multiple-line commenting feature. You have to comment each lineindividually as follows:
Eg: percentage = (minute * 100)/60 # calculating percentage of an hour
Docstring
 Docstring is short for documentation string.
 It is a string that occurs as the first statement in a module, function, class, or method definition.
 We must write what a function/class does in the docstring.
 Triple quotes are used while writing docstrings.
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Example:
functionname doc.
def double(num):
"""Function to double thevalue"""
return2*num
>>>print (double. doc )

Lines and indentation

 Most of the programming languages like C, C++, Java use braces { } to define a block of code. But, python uses
indentation.
 Blocks of code are denoted by line indentation.
 It is a space given to the block of codes for class and function definitions or flow control.

Example:
a=3
b=1
if(a>b):
print("a is greater")
else:
print("b is greater")

Quotation in python
 Python accepts single ('), double (") and triple (''' or """) quotes to denote string literals.
 Anything that is represented using quotations are considered as string.
Single quotes(' ') Eg, 'This a string in single quotes'
Double quotes(" ") Eg, " This a string in double quotes"
Triple quotes(""" """)
Eg: """ This is a paragraph. It is made up of multiple lines and sentences """

Tuple assignment
 An assignment to all of the elements in a tuple using a single assignment statement.
 Python has a very powerful tuple assignment feature that allows a tuple of variables on the left of anassignment
to be assigned values from a tuple on the right of the assignment.
 The left side is a tuple of variables; the right side is a tuple of values.
 Each value is assigned to its respective variable.
 All the expressions on the right side are evaluated before any of the assignments. This feature makes tuple
assignment quite versatile.
 Naturally, the number of variables on the left and the number of values on the right have to be the same.

Example
>>>>>(a, b, c, d) = (1, 2, 3)
ValueError: need more than 3 values to unpack

Example:
 It is useful to swap the values of two variables.
 With conventional assignment statements, we have to use a temporary variable.
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For example, to swap a and b

Tuple assignment solves this problem neatly:

(a, b) = (b, a)

One way to think of tuple assignment is as tuple packing/unpacking.

In tuple packing, the values on the left are ‘packed’ together in a tuple.

>>>b = ("George",25,"20000") # tuple packing

In tuple unpacking, the values in a tuple on the right are ‘unpacked ‘into the variables/names on the right.
>>>b = ("George", 25, "20000") # tuple packing
>>>(name, age, salary)=b # tuple unpacking
>>>name
'George'
>>>age
25
>>>salary
20000

2.7 OPERATORS
 Operators are the constructs which can manipulate the value of operands.
 Consider the expression 4 + 5 = 9. Here, 4 and 5 are called operands and + is called operator
Types of Operators
Python language supports the following types of operators
 Arithmetic Operators
 Comparison (Relational)Operators
 Assignment Operators
 Logical Operators
 Bitwise Operators
 Membership Operators
 Identity Operators

Arithmetic operators
They are used to perform mathematical operations like addition, subtraction, multiplication etc.
Assume, a=10 and b=5
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Comparison(Relational) Operators
 Comparison operators are used to compare values.
 It either returns True or False according to the condition. Assume, a=10 and b=5
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Assignment Operators
 Assignment operators are used in Python to assign values to variables.
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Logical Operators
 Logical operators are the and, or, not operators.

Bitwise Operators
 A bitwise operation operates on one or more bit patterns at the level of individual bits
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Membership Operators
 Evaluates to find a value or a variable is in the specified sequence of string, list, tuple, dictionary or
not.
 Let, x=[5,3,6,4,1]. To check particular item in list or not, in and not in operators are used.

Identity Operators
 They are used to check if two values (or variables) are located on the same part of thememory
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Operator precedence
 When an expression contains more than one operator, the order of evaluation depends on the order of
operations.

The acronym PEMDAS (Parentheses, Exponentiation, Multiplication, Division, Addition, Subtraction) is a

useful way to remember the rules:
 Parentheses have the highest precedence and can be used to force an expression to evaluate in the
order you want. Since expressions in parentheses are evaluated first, 2 * (3-1)is 4, and (1+1)**(5-2) is 8.
 Exponentiation has the next highest precedence, so 1 + 2**3 is 8, not 27, and 2*3**2 is 18, not 36.
 Multiplication and Division have higher precedence than Addition and Subtraction. So 2*3-1 is 5, not 4,
and 6+4/2 is 8, not 5.
 Operators with the same precedence are evaluated from left to right (except exponentiation).
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2.8 ILLUSTRATIVE PROGRAMS