Scribd
Upload
6 views20 pages

9 - Variables-I

The document explains the concept of variables in Python, defining them as storage locations for information. It covers how to declare variables using the assignment operator, naming rules for variables, and how to update their values. Additionally, it emphasizes the importance of using descriptive variable names for better code readability.

Uploaded by

linghao0521
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
6 views20 pages

9 - Variables-I

The document explains the concept of variables in Python, defining them as storage locations for information. It covers how to declare variables using the assignment operator, naming rules for variables, and how to update their values. Additionally, it emphasizes the importance of using descriptive variable names for better code readability.

Uploaded by

linghao0521
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 20

Variables I

What is a variable?
In simple words, a variable is a place where you can store information in
Python. It's like a box that you can put things in. You can give the variable a
name, and then you can use that name to access the information that's
stored in the box.

You can look to variables as something that holds a value, think of x and y in
math.
Declaring a variable
In python, declaring a variable is pretty straightforward. Look at the
following example:

The above code simply declares a variable called myname, which has the
value "Omar". This means, that whenever I use the variable myname, I will be
using the name Omar.
Declaring a variable
Examples on Variables
Assignment Operator

In python, the = is called the assignment operator, which is an operator that


gives a value to some variable, for example when we declared PI = 3.14, this
means that we have a variable called PI which has the value 3.14.

Assignment operator works as follows, we assign the value on the right to the
variable on the left. And now, whenever we use the variable, we will get that
value.
Assignment Operator

Note:
= in python is not the same as = in maths.
For example, in math when we say x = y, y = x.
Both expressions have the same meaning, which is that both x and y are equal to each
other.
However, in python this is not the case. In python x = y means whatever the value
that y holds is, get that value and assign it to x. However, y = x, means the opposite. It
means take the value that is stored in x and assign that to y.
Assignment Operator
Question Time

What do you think will happen when we run the following code?
Answer
Naming Rules
Variable names must start with a letter or the underscore character.
Variable names cannot start with a number.
Variable names can only contain alpha-numeric characters and
underscores (A-z, 0-9, and _ )
Variable names are case-sensitive (age, Age and AGE are three different
variables)
Variables names cannot be reserved keywords, like print(), from, in. Here is
a list of the reserved keywords in python.
Naming Rules
Here are some examples of valid variable names:
my_var
_my_var
myVar
MYVAR
myvar2
Naming Rules
Here are some examples of invalid variable names:
2myvar
my-var
my var
my$var
Naming Rules

Good Practice:
Use descriptive variable names. This will make your code easier to understand
and maintain. For example, instead of using the variable name "x", you could
use the variable name "total_price".
Naming Rules

Here are some examples of good variable names:


total_price
number_of_items
customer_name
Here are some examples of bad variable names:
x
y
z
Updating Variables

Sometimes we need to update our variable's value.


Say for example that we have a variable called employees_count indicating the
number of employees we have in the company, it equals 10 now.
Updating Variables

Now we have a new employee in the company.


So we want to update the variable called employees_count to be 11, i.e.
increase it by one.

We can do this using the following way.


Updating Variables
If this is looking weird to you, don't worry. This is actually strange at first.
But remember our rule, the value to the right of the operator is assigned to the
variable in the left of the operator.
This means that the variable called employees_count is now equal to
employees_count + 1. This means we took our variable, added one to it, and
then reassigned it to itself again.
Updating Variables
There is actually a cooler way to do this. In python there is a special operation
to increment or to decrement the value of a variable.

So we can go from this:

into this:
Updating Variables
This works also with the decrement operator.

You might also like